Why is Moses called Ne’eman
Why is Moses called (Num 12:7)
“the ne’eman (faithful one)”?
And what is the difference between his visions and those of other prophets?
Our sidra features, among other gems, the primary source for Maimonides’ seventh principle of faith – that Moses was the chief of all the prophets that preceded and followed him.
Miriam and Aaron question the irregularity of Moses’ withdrawal from normal marital life into celibacy, whereupon G‑D summons them and spells out the unique nature of Moses’ prophecy. “If there will be prophets among you, I G‑D shall make Myself known to them in a mar’a; in a dream shall I speak with Him. Not so is My servant Moses, in My entire domain he is the ne’eman. I speak to him in direct communication (peh el peh) in a mar’eh, not in allegory – he sees a true picture” (Num 12:6-8).\
We have purposely left untranslated three words which we have to examine closely in order to further clarify the fundamental difference between Moses’ prophecy and that of the other prophets.
Firstly, the words mar’a and mar’eh. The first is in feminine form, the second masculine. Certain other words in Hebrew bear a dual form, for example shir and shira (song), eden and ed’na (ecstatic delight). In each of these cases the masculine form denotes powerfulness, clarity and specificity whereas the feminine noun bespeaks relative weakness, obscurity and generality. Moses and the Bnei Yisrael sang shira whereas in the Messianic future we shall sing shir chadash, a new song of even greater quality of prophetic inspiration (see Mechilta to Ex 15:1).
Similarly here, mar’a denotes a somewhat hazy vision – comparable to a slightly distorted mirror. Such were the visions experienced by all our true prophets (other than Moses) in dreams or trances. They communicated their visions faithfully but in their own words and according to their own understanding. Sometimes the prophet would not grasp (as in the case of Jonah) the full import of his own prophecy.
Mar’eh, on the other hand, denotes a clear, pellucid vision experienced in wakefulness and communicated in its entirety. Such was the unique prophecy of Moses. Every word related to him by G‑D was transmitted to the people in the form of our holy and unique Torah.
This truth is further clarified by the use of the word ne’eman, usually translated as “faithful”. To say that Moses is faithful is to state the obvious. All the Godsent prophets of Tanakh faithfully communicated their prophecies.
I would like to suggest that ne’eman is utilised here as a noun and the meaning is: he who is capable of saying amein to all of My words.
Amein means ‘it is true’. Only he who fully hears, comprehends and grasps the essence of a statement or message can meaningfully say amen to that statement. Similarly in halakha one must hear the whole of a berakha in which he wishes to be included for his amein to be effective.
We have perhaps arrived at the essence of the meaning of the words “in My domain he (Moses) is the ne’eman”.
G‑D is explaining to Miriam and to Aaron – and to us, the privileged eavesdroppers on one of the most famous Divine conversations in Scripture – that Moses was able to ‘amen’ every single word he heard from G‑D, so clear were they to him.
As a postscript we might observe that one other individual did experience – and understood, at least temporarily – a mar’eh, a clear vision. This was Daniel (Dan. 10:1 although see verse 7 where it has already dissipated to a mar’a!). But Daniel was not a navi, a prophet (Sanhedrin 94a). A navi must bring (le-havi) the word of G‑D to the people. This, Daniel was withheld from doing. His massively powerful eschatological visions will be understood only in the Messianic era.