Metaphysical meaning of Gershom (mbd)
Gershom, ger'-shom (Heb.)--thrusting out; driving off; expulsion; exile; a stranger there.
a Son of Moses, by Zipporah, daughter of Reuel the Midianite. "And he called his name Gershom; for he said, I have been a sojourner in a foreign land" (Exod. 2:22). b A son of Levi (I Chron. 6:16). c Another Gershom is mentioned in Ezra 8:2.
Meta. The sense of strangeness and of isolation that comes over him who has been somewhat violent in his first great zeal to overcome error and to carry out the work that Spirit has told him to do. What he has sown in aggressively fighting evil (Moses killed the Egyptian who was oppressing an Israelite) he is now reaping in being cut off from his old accustomed thoughts and acts--and from former associates, perhaps, if his aggression has been expressed outwardly.
At this stage man has not yet established harmony in himself, nor has he really been fitted for the work that it is his to do. He is in a period of waiting, and of preparation--a "sojourner" in a strange land. He has left, or rather he sees the necessity for leaving, Egyptian darkness, but has not yet come into spiritual understanding. (Moses was forty years in the land of Midian. It was here, tending the sheep, that he was fitted for his work of delivering Israel from Egypt. He had to overcome all strife and contention in himself, just as each would-be overcomer must do before he can really find the deliverance that he is seeking. Midian means strife and contention; it also refers to a certain enlarging or extending of the senses, and belongs more to the mental realm than to the purely physical. There is some enlightenment in the Midian state of consciousness. Reuel, the grandfather of Gershom, means friendship of God.)
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Preceding Entry: Gerizim
Following Entry: Gershon
