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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

man·na       (mān'ə)  Pronunciation Key  n.   In the Bible, the food miraculously provided for the Israelites in the wilderness during their flight from Egypt. Spiritual nourishment of divine origin. Something of value that a person receives unexpectedly: viewed the bonus as manna from heaven. The dried exudate of certain plants, as that of the Mediterranean ash tree, formerly used as a laxative. A sweet granular substance excreted on the leaves of plants by certain insects, especially aphids, and often harvested by ants. [Middle English, from Old English, from Late Latin, from Greek, from Aramaic mannā, from Hebrew mān; see mnn in Semitic roots.]

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manna 

WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

manna
noun
1.	hardened sugary exudation of various trees
2.	(Old Testament) food that God gave the Israelites during the Exodus [syn: miraculous food]

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Manna

Man"na\, n. [L., fr. Gr. ?, Heb. m[=a]n; cf. Ar. mann, properly, gift (of heaven).]

1. (Script.) The food supplied to the Israelites in their journey through the wilderness of Arabia; hence, divinely supplied food. --Ex. xvi. 15.

2. (Bot.) A name given to lichens of the genus Lecanora, sometimes blown into heaps in the deserts of Arabia and Africa, and gathered and used as food.

3. (Bot. & Med.) A sweetish exudation in the form of pale yellow friable flakes, coming from several trees and shrubs and used in medicine as a gentle laxative, as the secretion of Fraxinus Ornus, and F. rotundifolia, the manna ashes of Southern Europe.

Note: Persian manna is the secretion of the camel's thorn (see Camel's thorn, under Camel); Tamarisk manna, that of the Tamarisk mannifera, a shrub of Western Asia; Australian, manna, that of certain species of eucalyptus; Brian[,c]on manna, that of the European larch.

Manna grass (Bot.), a name of several tall slender grasses of the genus Glyceria. they have long loose panicles, and grow in moist places. Nerved manna grass is Glyceria nervata, and Floating manna grass is G. flu.

Manna insect (Zo["o]l), a scale insect (Gossyparia mannipara), which causes the exudation of manna from the Tamarisk tree in Arabia.

Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Manna

Heb. man-hu, "What is that?" the name given by the Israelites to the food miraculously supplied to them during their wanderings in the wilderness (Ex. 16:15-35). The name is commonly taken as derived from _man_, an expression of surprise, "What is it?" but more probably it is derived from _manan_, meaning "to allot," and hence denoting an "allotment" or a "gift." This "gift" from God is described as "a small round thing," like the "hoar-frost on the ground," and "like coriander seed," "of the colour of bdellium," and in taste "like wafers made with honey." It was capable of being baked and boiled, ground in mills, or beaten in a mortar (Ex. 16:23; Num. 11:7). If any was kept over till the following morning, it became corrupt with worms; but as on the Sabbath none fell, on the preceding day a double portion was given, and that could be kept over to supply the wants of the Sabbath without becoming corrupt. Directions concerning the gathering of it are fully given (Ex. 16:16-18, 33; Deut. 8:3, 16). It fell for the first time after the eighth encampment in the desert of Sin, and was daily furnished, except on the Sabbath, for all the years of the wanderings, till they encamped at Gilgal, after crossing the Jordan, when it suddenly ceased, and where they "did eat of the old corn of the land; neither had the children of Israel manna any more" (Josh. 5:12). They now no longer needed the "bread of the wilderness." This manna was evidently altogether a miraculous gift, wholly different from any natural product with which we are acquainted, and which bears this name. The manna of European commerce comes chiefly from Calabria and Sicily. It drops from the twigs of a species of ash during the months of June and July. At night it is fluid and resembles dew, but in the morning it begins to harden. The manna of the Sinaitic peninsula is an exudation from the "manna-tamarisk" tree (Tamarix mannifera), the el-tarfah of the Arabs. This tree is found at the present day in certain well-watered valleys in the peninsula of Sinai. The manna with which the people of Israel were fed for forty years differs in many particulars from all these natural products. Our Lord refers to the manna when he calls himself the "true bread from heaven" (John 6:31-35; 48-51). He is also the "hidden manna" (Rev. 2:17; comp. John 6:49,51).