Moses A Germ Killer

1914

Stayed Plague Through the Use of Incense

Oils Used Were Powerful Antiseptics and This Explains What Has Often Been Considered a Miracle

Moses knew the secret of killing the germs in the air. This is made clear by the account of the staying of the plague as recorded in the Book of Numbers. In the sixteenth chapter of that book is the story of the awful plague that attacked the Israelites in the wilderness, then the story, too, of the method by which its ravages were stopped. In verses 46 to 49 of that chapter is the following:

46 And Moses said unto Aaron, "Take a censer, and put fire therein from off the altar, and put on incense, and go quickly unto the congregation, and make an atonement for them: for there is wrath gone out from the LORD; the plague is begun."
47 And Aaron took as Moses commanded, and ran into the midst of the congregation; and, behold, the plague was begun among the people: and he put on incense, and made an atonement for the people.
48 And he stood between the dead and the living; and the plague was stayed.
49 Now they that died in the plague were fourteen thousand and seven hundred, beside them that died about the matter of Korah.

In this plain account of the text it appears that Aaron separated the men and women suffering from the plague from those not yet attacked, and then he plied the censer with incense and swung it between the hosts, so that not a germ in the air could pass over from the plague stricken to those not yet attacked by the disease.

It is probable from the character of the attack as recorded in the Bible that this plague was something like the plagues which have appeared in late years in Europe, and later in China, that hasty cholera which seized upon its victims and slays them within a day.

It is well known among the modern chemists that the essential oils were freely used in the making of incense with which the censers were filled. One of the most modern and approved methods of disinfecting a room is to burn a sulphur candle in it, the fumes of the sulphur destroying the germs in the walls and crevices. The ancient Egyptians had taught the method of disinfecting to Moses, and he hastened to instruct Aaron, probably suggesting to him precisely what drugs to put in the censers, so as to make the fumes absolute germicides.

This explains what has often been considered a miracle, but need be nothing more than the employment of scientific means for stopping the plague.

It is now believed that the burning of incense in many of the extremely ancient temples and other places of worship, like those of India, while made a part of the ceremony, was really instituted by the very wise priests of those ancient days, who understood the dangers of infection.

Especially before such shrines and in such temples as it was customary for the ancients to make annual pilgrimages, so did the priests realize that the thousands and thousands of pilgrims had come from various provinces and from all sorts of conditions of living, and the burning of the incense was in reality a precaution quite necessary for the prescription of the health of the crowds.