Reading the Bible, Exodus Chapter 1
Birth of Moses
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in Hebrew the book is called Shemot (translated “Names”). it starts with the description of all the lineage of the people who were in Egypt and then their dynasty.
Becoming a trouble. Becoming slaves. Sanctions.
After the passing of Yosef, well respected in egypt, and his brothers, and the paroe king who knew them, the next book starts with the fact that egyptians do not like the presence of the Jewish people, who flourish on their lands.
The egyptians end up enslaving the Jewish people. After all we heard in the previous book, i actually don’t know how this is possible, but anyhow…
Note from 14.1.2023: Raamsses, the name of the egyptian city where jewish people were working at, is actually a formation for “Ra” + “Msses”. Ra in hebrew means Bad, Evil. “Msses” in egyptian means Moses, Moshe. the meaning is that this city was bad for Moshe and his people.
The second or third paroe after the one who knew Yosef, started to put sanctions on the Jewish. He commands the hebrew nurses to kill new born baby boys (to stop the multiplication of the people), because apparently they still kept growing in numbers. But they claim to find the Jewish mothers already after birth upon their arrival, so they did not have a chance to even hold the boy (“like animals of the nature”, 1:20). This lie couldn’t have been held for long. But I don’t know how they left without punishment from paroe.
At some point the paroe understands something is wrong, and he commands ANY Egyptian to kill a new born Jewish boy they see.
the birth of Moses
Coming from a family of pure Levi tribe, only 4th generation after Levi himself, and about 200–400 years later (each father lived for 130 years), Moshe is born. But he is lucky to survive the situation, since the mother hides him for 3 months in the house. Later she releases him on a crib on the Nile. The paroe daughter finds him, and although she realizes he is Jewish, she takes him in. Since the baby needs to be fed, and Paroe’s daughter was not able to do so, she needed to find a pregnant woman. Sister of Moshe comes to the rescue and it is told that she confronts the lady, proposing that she would find the boy’s mother. Paroe’s daughter agrees. once the mother was found, Paroe’s daughter asks her to feed him for several months as a job, but later she takes him in. i think the fact that Miriam, the sister, approached the Paroe’s daughter in that situation, was quite brave of her. after all, its a king’s daughter, and they were talking about a crime.
Eventually, the King’s daughter is the one to name him, Moshe (meaning to pull something out of the water). perhaps a different name was given to him by his mother in the first few months, and later was changed.
Note from 14.1.2023: several new points were discovered in this part.
First, it's quite weird that we are not told the names of the parents and other family members of Moshe. it is said that “one man from Levi took a woman from Levi” (Exodus, 2:1). Why wouldn't they tell us their names? the bible invests a great deal of space and time for genealogy. Isn't Moshe important enough to be told about his? Also, we know that Moshe had a brother and a sister, Aharon and Miriam. why do we not hear more about them too?
Second, the vessel that Moshe is placed in when sent on the water, is called “Teva”, which means a Box in hebrew. in hebrew we wouldn’t call a floating vessel in this word, and interestingly, it is the same name that the Arc of Noah was called. this similarity is important. This links these two people in saving humanity. One for ALL humanity, and the other for the Jewish people.
Third, the legendary story about moshe taking the coal into his mouth, doesnt exist in the bible. how so? and where did it came from?
Killing the Egyptian and running away
Down the road, they also tell the boy that he is Jewish. This is weird since a 3 months baby could just been raised as egyptian, and would have never known of his legacy. But we are not told how Moshe finds out of his identity. Perhaps Egyptian kids laughed at him…
Some years later, Moshe sees an egyptian man beating a Jewish man. He looks around and sees no one, kills the Egyptian and buries the person. The next day he sees two jewish men fight and tries to stop them. They respond “don’t be righteous. You killed a man yesterday”. He tells the people that Jewish people should never fight each other. But what he does know is that the murderer’s identity is revealed, and he has to escape from the house of paroe. He goes to hide back with the Jewish who still live in land of Goshen.
Moshe Meets God. Moshe is hesitant. A lot.
Moshe finds a wife there by doing good deeds. And they have a boy.
He works as a shepherd for his father-in-law, and its weird that he actually managed to escape. During one of the travels, God reveals himself to Moshe as the burning bush that never dies. God speaks to moshe in actual voice through the bush, and promised that he will to take the Jews out of egypt to the land of Israel. God asks him to go to paroe and ask him to release the jewish people. But moshe is hesitant. He answers “why would paroe listen to me?” (3:11). God assures him that he will be with him.
God explains again in quite details how the events are going to go, and asks him to go to the Israeli people and explain them this, and then go to the king paroe together. But Moshe is still hesitant: “they will not believe me and will not listen to me”, since they will I lie about you coming to me (4:1).
notes from 13.1.2023: Moshe asks god to tell him his name, since israelites will ask for the name of the god. God says “i will be whoever i will be” (Exodus, 3:14). but then God also says: “just tell them ‘i will be’ sent you” (Exodus, 3:14). in hebrew ‘i will be’ is one word: “Eheye”. i find this sentence almost like a joke that god plays with moshe. its like he is saying “are you seriously asking me what is my name? do you really need a name in order to present me?”. in the next phrase, god says a serious response and giving a good desciption of how to call him. which actually makes sense that there was a joke before that…
Then comes the age of magic (and miracle, some would say).
God show moshe some magic tricks that he now has. The staff that turn to a snake, and back to a staff; putting his hand under the בית שחי and it comes out leper, and healing it by putting it back in; take water from the nile, and when you spill them on the land it will become blood.
Moshe seems convinced of these tools, but his hesitance goes to another direction. Now he talks about his disability — the speech difficulty. Actually, the familiar story of Moses putting burning fire in his mouth is not told in the bible. So we actually do not know how he became this way.
From god’s response, I feel that now he starts to get upset of Moshe's disbelief: “who has made you this way? I am. Now GO and do as I SAID” (4:11–12). But Moshe is still not following the orders. He refuses and asks to find another guy. God is angry (officially) with Moshe, and explains that Aharon, his young brother, will be very happy to see him again, and he will help him speak to the people. “He will be a mouth for you, and you will be a God for him” (4:17).
Back to Egypt
So Moshe needs to leave his house and job. He goes to the “boss”, his father in law, and resigns. But even here, he doesn’t say ‘God revealed to me and said X and Y’. He says: “I would like to go back to Egypt and see my family before they die” (4:19). Each time we hear a phrase about what Moshe does, and then what God is telling him. Perhaps it is like a confirmation that God cannot leave him since he was so hesitant in this whole journey. God keeps confirming and repeats himself with things he already said.
Circumcising the son of Moshe
Apparently, son of Moshe was not circumcised. And an angel comes to kill the boy. The wife tries to stop Moshe, fights with him, then she cuts it herself. The angel and moshe stop. But it seem that even though the wife understands the reason of moshe’s behavior, the relationship is not the same after that event.
To me this event also means that Israelites have forgotten the tradition in less than 4 generations after yaakov. If moshe’s son was not circumsized, why we would we think that any other would be?
Meeting aharon and the Israelites
God commands Aharon to travel into the desert to meet his brother. He follows. No response, no objection, even to a weird command as this. Such a difference between moshe and aharon!
Anyway, they meet, kiss, catch up, and then go to gather the people. aharon tells them the events and they actually believe this, which probably was quite a surprise to moshe.
Meeting paroe. Making things worse
Then Aharon and Moshe go to paroe to ask him to let the people go. For now, its just a short religious trip of 3 days. just to make some praying and come back. Paroe refuses. He does not know who is this god they speak of. From what he said, it seems like there was like an organized rebellion, since he says “why did you stop the people from their sufferings?” (meaning from their slavery work). But moshe and aharon insist more. Paroe gets mad, and adds a new sanction: do not provide food for the jewish workers, even though they need to continue to do the same amount of labor.
This was an awful sanction, which led to a discussion between the workers and their managers, and eventually to a fight. The managers came back to paroe asking for some food for the people. He stays strong with his ways, like a strong king. He tells them that since they are weak, they now look for a God, meaning that the fault of this is of moshe and aharon.
The people understand and go blame moshe for this.
Moshe, completely understanding their anger, goes with this to god. But he only confirms that this is the correct path.
read the chapter bible text in hebrew.
