Numbers, Chapter 21, verses 4-9
4 The people murmuring are plagued with fiery serpents, 7 They repenting are healed by a brasen serpentJohn, Chapter 8, verses 21-30
12 He preacheth himself the light of the world, and justifieth his doctrine8
8:23 Ye are - Again he passes over their interruption, and proves what he advanced, Joh 8:21.Of them that are beneath - From the earth.I am of them that are above - Here he directly shows whence he came, even from heaven, and whither he goes.
8:24 If ye believe not that I AM - Here (as in Joh 8:58) our Lord claims the Divine name, I AM, Exo 3:14. But the Jews, as if he had stopped short,and not finished the sentence, answered, Who art thou?
8:25 Even what I say to you from the beginning - The same which I say to you, as it were in one discourse, with one even tenor from the time I first spake to you.
8:26 I have many things to say and to judge of you - I have much to say concerning your inexcusable unbelief: but he that sent me is true - Whether ye believe or no. And I speak the things which I have heard from him - I deliver truly what he hath given me in charge.
8:27 They understood not - That by him that sent him he meant God the Father. Therefore in Joh 8:28-29 he speaks plainly of the Father, and again claims the Divine name, I AM.
8:28 When ye shall have lifted up - On the cross, ye shall know - And so many of them did, that I AM - God over all; and that I do nothing of myself - Being one with the Father.
8:29 The Father hath not left me alone - Never from the moment I came into the world.
21 The defect of Arad, Num 21:1-3.
The people murmur and are plagued with fiery serpents, Num 21:4-6.
They are healed by looking on the brazen serpent, Num 21:7-9.
They journey forward, Num 21:10-20.
Conquer Sihon, Num 21:21-31.
And Og, Num 21:33-35.
21:4 By way of the Red - sea - Which leadeth to the Red - sea, as they must needs do to compass the land of Edom. Because of the way - By reason of this journey, which was long and troublesome, and unexpected,because the successful entrance and victorious progress which some of them had made in the borders of Canaan, made them think they might have speedily gone in and taken possession of it, and so have saved the tedious travels and farther difficulties, into which Moses had again brought them.
21:5 Against God - Against Christ, their chief conductor, whom they tempted, Co1 10:19. Thus contemptuously did they speak of Manna, whereas it appears it yielded excellent nourishment, because in the strength of it they were able to go so many and such tedious journeys.
21:6 Fiery serpents - There were many such in this wilderness, which having been hitherto restrained by God, are now let loose and sent among them. They are called fiery from their effects, because their poison caused an intolerable heat and burning and thirst, which was aggravated with this circumstance of the place, that here was no water, Num 21:5.
21:8 A fiery serpent - That is, the figure of a serpent in brass, which is of a fiery colour. This would require some time: God would not speedily take off the judgment, because he saw they were not throughly humbled.Upon a pole - That the people might see it from all parts of the camp, and therefore the pole must be high, and the serpent large. When he looketh - This method of cure was prescribed, that it might appear to be God's ownwork, and not the effect of nature or art: and that it might be an eminent type of our salvation by Christ. The serpent signified Christ, who was in the likeness of sinful flesh, though without sin, as this brazen serpent had the outward shape, but not the inward poison, of the other serpents: the pole resembled the cross upon which Christ was lifted up for our salvation: and looking up to it designed our believing in Christ.
21:9 He lived - He was delivered from death, and cured of his disease.