During their forty-year sojourn in the wilderness, the children of Israel murmured and complained unto God and Moses numerous times. On one such occasion the Israelites spoke against God and Moses due to a lack of bread and water. They even went as far as to loathe the heavenly manna, or light bread, which God freely and faithfully provided for them and their needs each and every day. Because of the audacity that they displayed towards their creator and benefactor, the Bible tells us that the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people which bit them and even killed many of them (Numbers 21:6). Coming to their senses the people repented and asked Moses to pray unto the Lord, so that He would take the serpents away from them. Moses did pray, and the Lord in turn commanded Moses to make a serpent out of brass and place it upon a pole, so that anyone bitten who looked upon the brazen serpent would live and be cured of their affliction. As we shall see, this event concerning the brazen serpent as recorded in the Old Testament is symbolic of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ as found written in the New Testament. For when the Jewish leader and Pharisee Nicodemus spoke with Jesus one night, the Lord told him, “…as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up” (John 3:14). The attempt of this study will be to compare the healing and life saving elements of the brazen serpent, with the soul saving and sanctifying properties of the cross of Jesus Christ. So, let us turn now and look into these subjects a little deeper, and with God’s help may we be enlightened.
Now desert terrain is known to be inhabited by many cold-blooded reptiles including snakes. However, in all the years that the children of Israel wandered in the desert, at no other time was any Israelite ever bitten by a snake until we come to what happened in the 21st chapter of Numbers. So, it would appear that through Israel’s disobedience God lifted His holy protection and allowed His people to suffer. But in His mercy and loving kindness God provided a remedy for the people’s affliction. The remedy for ancient Israel’s venomous snake bite was to look upon a brazen serpent upon a pole, and for all of humanity today the remedy for our deadly sins is to look upon Christ crucified. Just as Israel of old had to look at the brazen serpent in order to be healed, so too must all men look to Christ for healing and salvation. Conversely speaking, the Israelites who would not look at the brazen serpent died, so too he who rejects or denies Christ will not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him (John 3:36).
Continuing with the theme of God sending His people afflictions in order to bring them to repentance, we also find in the book of Revelation where the Lord sends forth plagues upon the sinful people living in the end times in the hopes that they too might also repent. Unfortunately, even though their torments are severe and the pain intense, the Bible informs us that these future inhabitants of the earth will not repent, “…of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts” (Revelation 9:21). Just as the heart-hardened and stiff-necked Israelites rejected the Lord’s means for their healing, so too will sinful men in the future refuse God’s plan of salvation, even-though they are sorely vexed with excruciating pain and plagued by unbearable sufferings (Revelation 16:9-11).
When analyzing the properties of the brazen serpent, we see that it was made out of brass: a metal which is a symbol for judgment, and that this piece of metal was forged in the shape or image of a snake: a symbol of evil or even that of the devil. It is interesting to note that it was a serpent which deceived Eve into eating the forbidden fruit and thus plunged the world and all of mankind into a fallen state. Yet God used the image of a serpent as an instrument to heal and to save, the very opposite of what the serpent did in the Garden of Eden. Going further, the Lord prophesied to the serpent telling this creature that God would put enmity between it and the woman, and between the serpent’s seed and the woman’s seed, and that the woman’s seed would bruise the head of the serpent (Genesis 3:15). Now the seed of the woman, which would bruise the head of the serpent, is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. What is even more revealing, concerning this passage from Genesis, is the description of Christ’s physical characteristics as found in the book of Revelation where it is written that Christ’s feet were, “…like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace” (Revelation 1:15). The fact that brass is a symbol of judgment and that Christ’s feet have the appearance of brass, then this means that the Lord Jesus has truly trampled upon the head of the serpent and has judged the prince of this world, keeping at bay all the machinations of the evil one firmly under His feet of brass.
After all the events surrounding the brazen serpent during the children of Israel’s wandering in the wilderness, further mention of this brass snake in all of the Torah (or five books of Moses) is nowhere to be found. However, several centuries later in Israel’s history, the brazen serpent is once again identified. For during the reign of Hezekiah king of Judah, the Bible relates how he did right in the sight if the Lord, by removing the high places and breaking in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made (II Kings 18:4). The purpose behind king Hezekiah destroying the brazen serpent was due to the children on Israel who burned incense to it, thus turning this object of healing into an idol. In addition to destroying the brazen serpent, the Bible also states that king Hezekiah called it Nehushtan. Though the direct meaning of the name Nehushtan is elusive, it is implied in the scriptures that this name for the brazen serpent was in fact derogatory, making the Nehushtan an object of scandal for Israel and not a symbol of honor for the nation.
Now several centuries have passed since the days of prophet Moses and king Hezekiah, but the image of a snake on a pole is a symbol used today in the modern world of health care, representing both healing and medicine. For the symbol of a snake on a rod, as found on the back of ambulances and EMS vehicles, represents the staff of Asclepius, who was an ancient Greek physician and who is also associated as the Greek god of medicine. Though the staff of Asclepius and the Nehushtan are nearly identical in appearance, the “Star of Life” symbol created by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) adapted their insignia to officially represent the rod of Asclepius as taken from Greek mythology and not the brazen serpent, or the Nehushtan from the Holy Bible.
In closing I would like to say that it is very interesting and also very ironic that the image of a snake has been used throughout the ages to represent health, when it was through a serpent that death entered into the world in the first place. And even if one doesn’t believe in Bible stories or Greek mythology the fact that an animal that can cause death is associated with healing, life, and even salvation is indeed a paradox. Maybe by pondering on things not quite so easily understood can we gradually bring ourselves into a life filled with mysteries and parables, just as Christ Himself taught the people by using parables. Both the events concerning the brazen serpent and the crucifixion of Jesus Christ are indeed mysteries, and life saving mysteries at that. For in both cases it is by faith that salvation was and is achieved.