Miriam in the Wilderness

Being alone in the woods can be at turns peaceful, at turns mournful, at turns frightening. Sometimes you just feel how alone you are. Did Miriam, Moses’ sister, find any source of comfort in her removal from the encampment on account of leprosy?

And the cloud departed from the tent. And Miriam was afflicted with tsara’ath, leprosy: her skin was white like snow. And Aaron looked on Miriam, and he could see she was leprous. And Aaron said … “let her not be as one dead, of whom the flesh is half consumed when he comes from his mother’s womb.” And Moses cried to the LORD saying, “El nah refah na la” (meaning, “Heal her, O God, I beg you”). And Miriam was shut out from the camp seven days: and the people journeyed not till Miriam was brought in again. –Numbers 12