(1) The Israelites arrived in a body at the wilderness of Zin on the first new moon, and the people stayed at Kadesh. Miriam died there and was buried there.(2) The community was without water, and they joined against Moses and Aaron.(3) The people quarreled with Moses, saying, “If only we had perished when our brothers perished at the instance of יהוה !(4) Why have you brought יהוה’s congregation into this wilderness for us and our beasts to die there?(5) Why did you make us leave Egypt to bring us to this wretched place, a place with no grain or figs or vines or pomegranates? There is not even water to drink!”(6) Moses and Aaron came away from the congregation to the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, and fell on their faces. The Presence of יהוה appeared to them,(7) and יהוה spoke to Moses, saying,(8) “You and your brother Aaron take the rod and assemble the community, and before their very eyes order the rock to yield its water. Thus you shall produce water for them from the rock and provide drink for the congregation and their beasts.”

(1) ולא היה מים לעדה AND THERE WAS NO WATER FOR THE CONGREGATION — Since this statement follows immediately after the mention of Miriam’s death, we may learn from it that during the entire forty years they had the “well” through Miriam’s merit (Taanit 9a).

(17) Then Israel sang this song:
Spring up, O well—sing to it—
(18) The well which the chieftains dug,
Which the nobles of the people started
With maces, with their own staffs. And from Midbar to Mattanah,

The Sages taught in a baraita...Eretz Yisrael is watered by the Holy One, Blessed be He, Himself, and the rest of the entire world is watered through an intermediary, as it is stated: “Who gives rain upon the land, and sends water upon the fields” (Job 5:10).

(11) but the land you are about to cross into and possess, a land of hills and valleys, soaks up its water from the rains of heaven.(12) It is a land which your God יהוה looks after, on which your God יהוה always keeps an eye, from year’s beginning to year’s end.(13) If, then, you obey the commandments that I enjoin upon you this day, loving your God יהוה and serving [God] with all your heart and soul,(14) I will grant the rain for your land in season, the early rain and the late. You shall gather in your new grain and wine and oil—(15) I will also provide grass in the fields for your cattle—and thus you shall eat your fill.(16) Take care not to be lured away to serve other gods and bow to them.(17) For יהוה’s anger will flare up against you, shutting up the skies so that there will be no rain and the ground will not yield its produce; and you will soon perish from the good land that יהוה is assigning to you.

(1) Give ear, O heavens, let me speak;
Let the earth hear the words I utter!
(2) May my discourse come down as the rain,
My speech distill as the dew,
Like showers on young growth,
Like droplets on the grass.

Rabbi Abbahu said: From when does one recite a blessing over rain? From when the groom goes out to meet the bride, that is, when there are puddles of water on the ground such that the water below, represented as the bride in this metaphor, is splashed from above by the raindrops, represented as the groom.The Gemara asks: What blessing does one recite over rain? Rav Yehuda said that Rav said: We thank you, O Lord our God, for each and every drop that You have made fall for us.

§ The Gemara returns to the issue of rain. Rabbi Ḥama, son of Rabbi Ḥanina, said: The day of the rains is as great as the day on which the heavens and earth were created, as it is stated: “Drop down, heavens, from above, let the skies pour down righteousness; let the earth open that they may bring forth salvation, and let it cause righteousness to spring up together; I, the Lord, have created it” (Isaiah 45:8). The Gemara explains that the verse does not say: I have created them, in the plural, but: I have created it. In other words, the verse is referring to rain, rather than to the heavens and the earth, which indicates that rainfall is as important as the creation of the world.

(13) O Hope of Israel! O LORD! All who forsake You shall be put to shame, Those in the land who turn from You Shall be doomed men, For they have forsaken the LORD, The Fount of living waters.