Quails

Quails (Hebrew selav) appear in two episodes of miraculous provision in Israel's wilderness wandering. At Sinai, the people complained against Moses and Aaron that they had left the fleshpots of Egypt; that evening God sent quails that covered the camp (Exodus 16:13), giving the people meat alongside the manna he was beginning to provide. The second and more extensive quail miracle occurred at Kibroth-hattaavah when the mixed multitude craved meat: God sent a wind that drove quails from the sea and deposited them to a depth of two cubits for a day's journey around the camp (Numbers 11:31). The people gathered them greedily, but while the flesh was still between their teeth, God's anger burned against them for their craving and a great plague struck (Numbers 11:33) — giving Kibroth-hattaavah its name, graves of craving.

The quail miracles are commemorated in Psalm 78:27–31 as evidence of God's provision and of Israel's faithless ingratitude: he rained flesh on them "like dust" and yet they sinned still more. The Psalmist uses the episode as a typological warning about testing God. The common quail (Coturnix coturnix) migrates seasonally across the Sinai peninsula in vast flocks, making its appearance in the wilderness plausible as a natural phenomenon superintended providentially.