על חיי משה, ספר א י״בOn the Life of Moses, Book I 12
א׳
1[63] To return to Moses, he became more skilled than any of his time in managing flocks and providing what tended to the benefit of his charges. His capacity was due to his never shirking any duty, but showing an eager and unprompted zeal wherever it was needed, and maintaining a pure and guileless honesty in the conduct of his office.
ב׳
2[64] Consequently the flocks increased under him, and this roused the envy of the other graziers, who did not see anything of the sort happening in their own flocks. In their case it was felt to be a piece of luck if they remained as they had been, but with the flocks of Moses any failure to make daily improvement was a set-back, so great was the progress regularly made, both in fine quality, through increased fatness and firmness of flesh, and in number through their fecundity and the wholesomeness of their food.
ג׳
3[65] Now, as he was leading the flock to a place where the water and the grass were abundant, and where there happened to be plentiful growth of herbage for the sheep, he found himself at a glen where he saw a most astonishing sight. There was a bramble-bush, a thorny sort of plant, and of the most weakly kind, which, without anyone’s setting it alight, suddenly took fire; and, though enveloped from root to twigs in a mass of fire, which looked as though it were spouted up from a fountain, yet remained whole, and, instead of being consumed, seemed to be a substance impervious to attack, and, instead of serving as fuel to the fire, actually fed on it.
ד׳
4[66] In the midst of the flame was a form of the fairest beauty, unlike any visible object, an image supremely divine in appearance, refulgent with a light brighter than the light of fire. It might be supposed that this was the image of Him that IS; but let us rather call it an angel or herald, since, with a silence that spoke more clearly than speech, it employed as it were the miracle of sight to herald future events.
ה׳
5[67] For the burning bramble was a symbol of those who suffered wrong, as the flaming fire of those who did it. Yet that which burned was not burnt up, and this was a sign that the sufferers would not be destroyed by their aggressors, who would find that the aggression was vain and profitless while the victims of malice escaped unharmed. The angel was a symbol of God’s providence, which all silently brings relief to the greatest dangers, exceeding every hope.