…if Miriam used the term “Cushite” as a racial slur referring to skin color, it may be thought quite just that Miriam’s skin turned a sickly white color in rebuke. Additionally, if “Cushite” was used to convey the foreignness of Moses’ wife, it is fitting that Miriam is, in turn, made to feel the outsider as she is set apart outside the camp.
Thus, in an instant, Miriam, an insider, comes to know the difficult predicament of being an alien — a predicament she should never have forgotten considering Israel’s sojourn in Egypt.
Rabbi Yehuda Hausman, “Black, White and Nameless”, Jewish Journal (5-11 June 2015), 35.