Nehushtan
In the biblical Books of Kings (2 Kings 18:4; written c. 550 BC), the Nehushtan (Hebrew: נחשתן Nəḥuštān [nəħuʃtaːn]) is the derogatory name given to the bronze serpent on a pole first described in the Book of Numbers which God told Moses to erect so that the Israelites who saw it would be protected from dying from the bites of the "fiery serpents", which God had sent to punish them for speaking against him and Moses (Numbers 21:4–9). In Kings, King Hezekiah institutes an iconoclastic reform that requires the destruction of "the brazen serpent that Moses had made; for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it; and it was called Nehushtan". The term is a proper noun coming from either the word for "snake" or "brass", and thus means "The (Great) Serpent" or "The (Great) Brass".[1]
In the biblical story, following their Exodus from Egypt, the Israelites set out from Mount Hor, where Aaron was buried, to go to the Red Sea. However they had to detour around the land of Edom (Numbers 20:21, 25). Impatient, they complained against Yehovah and Moses (Num. 21:4–5), and in response God sent "fiery serpents" among them and many died. The people came to Moses to repent and asked him to ask God to take away the serpents. Moses prayed to God, who told Moses, 'Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole; and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he seeth it, shall live.' (Numbers 21:4–9) This did not remove the source of the people's suffering; it enabled them to survive it.
The term also appears in 2 Kings 18:4 in a passage describing reforms made by King Hezekiah, in which he tore down altars, cut down symbols of Asherah, destroyed the Nehushtan,[9][10][11] and according to many Bible translations, gave it that name.[12]
Regarding the passage in 2 Kings 18:4,[12] M. G. Easton noted that "the lapse of nearly one thousand years had invested the 'brazen serpent' with a mysterious sanctity; and in order to deliver the people from their infatuation, and impress them with the idea of its worthlessness, Hezekiah called it, in contempt, 'Nehushtan', a brazen thing, a mere piece of brass".[1]
The tradition of naming it Nehushtan is not considered to be any older than the time of Hezekiah.[13]
In the Gospel of John, Jesus discusses his destiny with a Jewish teacher named Nicodemus and makes a comparison between the raising up of the Son of Man and the act of the serpent being raised by Moses for the healing of the people.[14][15] Jesus applied it as a foreshadowing of his own act of salvation through being lifted up on the cross, stating "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:14–16).
Charles Spurgeon preached a famous sermon on "the Mysteries of the Brazen Serpent" and this passage from John's Gospel in 1857.[16]
The Brazen Serpent
https://www.khouse.org/articles/2006/644/