Loaves

Exodus 16:16-18 ...Gather of it every man according to his eating, an omer for every man, according to the number of your persons... And when they did mete it with an omer, he that gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack; they gathered every man according to his eating.

The omer means a sheaf, and by extension the volume of grain a sheaf yields when threshed. But the omer has another meaning that keeps it defined correctly – it is the total amount of nutrition required for a man in a day. One omer of manna – about 2 quarts/liters – was enough to thoroughly fill up any Israelite for one day. It contained everything a healthy diet needed, baked right in – it had to have, since it was their primary food for 40 years!

Exodus 16:31 And the house of Israel called the name thereof Manna: and it was like coriander seed, white; and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.

Myrhh

It was not just flour, it was apparently divinely mixed with oil and honey. It must have had a high concentration of fats, for “when the sun waxed hot, it melted.” (Exodus 16:21), yet not so high it couldn’t be baked, for the most common method of eating it was to “beat it in a mortar, and baked it in pans, and made cakes of it: and the taste of it was as the taste of fresh oil” (Numbers 11:8). It was also the color of bdellium (verse 7), an aromatic tree resin similar to myrhh (pictured) – yellowish brown.

Matthew 6:11 Give us this day our daily bread.

Manna was literally Israel’s daily bread, which they baked into individual loaves, one of which fed each person. But that just scratches the surface of the meaning, because the amount required to feed each person was one omer!

An omer holds about 2.5 pounds (1.1kg) of grain. Is that enough for one man to live on? According to modern estimates, the typical person eats between 3-5 pounds per day. Bread is a higher-energy food than average, so 2-2.5 pounds of bread would easily sustain a person. In fact, you might find it hard to eat it all, in which case the worms would finish it for you.

Roman soldiers were hard-working, strong men in a similar climate and age who were well documented. Historians believe 60-75% of their diet was grain, and the total volume of their daily diet including wine weighed approximately 2.6 pounds! (Jonathan P. Roth, The Logistics of the Roman Army at War)

Baked Bread

This figure ties in excellently with what God gave Israel; manna was almost their sole food so it was designed by God to be complete, and nutritious. And each day they received one omer, about 2.5 pounds, and that was literally their daily bread!

Now ten bowls of manna equals an ephah; and the word ephah comes from the Hebrew aphah, “to bake”. Presumably then, this was the amount of bread baked in one batch. The omer then, logically, would be equivalent to one loaf of bread!

Go to a modern bakery, a good one that makes real sourdough bread, as the Israelites made. Buy a loaf of bread from them – doesn’t matter what kind. Take it home and weigh it. To this day bread is made in loaves that typically weigh 2-3 pounds! (1-1.3kg).

Which is the amount one man needs to eat, the amount that comes from one man’s bundle of wheat, or 1/100^th of what a donkey can carry!

See Also

The Meanings of the Measures