Exodus 3

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Exodus 3

Summary

Moses tended his father-in-law’s (Jethro’s) sheep near the mountain Horeb when he saw a bush of fire that didn’t burn. When he investigated he heard God’s voice telling him to free the Israelites from Egypt because he saw their suffering. They are to lie to Pharaoh about performing sacrificed to their God. After some discussion about the name of God so that the elders would listen to Moses, God explains that he will strike at the Egyptians and this will convince the Pharaoh to let them go.

God is promising them a land of milk and honey, currently occupied by a bunch of other peoples.

In addition, the Israelites are to ask for valuables so that they can “plunder” the Egyptians.

Commentary

First, who the heck is Jethro? In the last chapter his father in law, the priest was named Reuel.

I imagine the Pharaoh would give them some trouble, so having God to perform some feats will come in handy. It sounds like God has something nasty in mind, but of course the Pharaoh is a slaver, so not a nice guy to begin with. Moses will have to lie, I suppose to get his people free.

Then the plan is to go this land of milk and honey.  Canaan, we can assume, since this is what was promised to Abraham in Gen 17:8 and appears to still be inhabited by many other peoples. I’m sure they will all get along just fine together.

Exodus 2

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Exodus 2

This is where a Levite couple have a child and hide him from the Pharaoh so he doesn’t kill him. When they can’t hide him any more they float him down stream, where he’s found by the daughter of the Pharaoh, she takes pity on him and by some coincidence asks the childs mother to nurse him. It is some time later that she decides to name him Moses, but only after some time has passed, and she apparently didn’t had seen him since. That’s when she named him Moses.

So, Moses grew up and saw other Hebrews are working and killed an Egyptian who was hurting one of them. Because of this he had to flee Egypt to Midian. In Midian he helped some girls trying to water their sheep and their priest father invited Moses to stay with them. Reuel, the priest gave Moses one of his daughters, Zipporah, who then had a son, Gershon,

During that long time while Moses was away the Egyptian King died and the Hebrews cried out because of the slavery. God heard them and was concerned.

So, of course it’s super convenient that Moses’ mother is the wet nurse chosen by the Pharaoh’s daughter.

And it seems we have a case of murder that will go unpunished. We can assume that Moses knows that he is a Hebrew since he saved the slave from the beating and wanted to intervene in the fight between 2 other Hebrews (Exo 2:13).

And lastly, God finally notices that his people are enslaved. This is troubling, because they did nothing to deserve it. They were living peacefully with the Egyptians up until a new Pharaoh decided to enslave them. Go clearly doesn’t pay much attention to his chosen people. It’s only until they are groaning under the oppressions, possibly generations later, that he decides to do even care, let alone do anything about it.

Exodus 1

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Exodus 1

Sometime after Joseph and his brothers die, a new king comes to power in Egypt (I thought they had Pharaohs) and doesn’t like that they have become so numerous. We don’t know how long after Joseph this king comes along, but he doesn’t seem to care much about all the good he did for Egypt.

The king’s afraid of the Israelites and decides to enslave them and force harsh work on them.

In addition, this king wants the Hebrew midwives to kill any boys that are born. The midwives ignore this command and tell the king later that Hebrew women give birth too fast for them to get there in time. This is apparently another lie God is ok with, because he rewards them with families of their own.

Finally, the Pharaoh (not the king?) gives an order that every Hebrew boy that is born must be thrown into the Nile.

While this is very early in this book, I must note that these horrible things are happening to the Israelites despite there being no indication that they have done anything to displease God. He’s letting this happen while he watches silently.

Genesis: A Summary

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Genesis is just another collection of etiological myths and moral atrocities. It’s a horrible god doing horrible things to equally horrible people. From Adam to Noah to Abraham. I can’t imagine that this is a very good beginning to a book known as “The Good Book”.  I know, Christians only care about the New Testament, but these stories exist as part of the entire thing. This lays the foundation and it’s cracked and rotten from the first brick.

Over and over again God feel compelled to kill his creation. With so much failure, at some point it’s not the creation that is at fault, but the designer. Cain, Noah, Sodom and Gomorrah, Sarah, Abraham, Esau, Jacob! When did God ever create something that DIDN’T end up a spiteful, murderous or deceitful asshole?

Sure, there are a couple nice people.  Joseph didn’t seem 1/2 bad and all Hagar did was get used and tossed aside. So, the almighty creator is not a complete failure, it’s a close thing.

So, these are clearly not the stories designed to make up fall in love with this God. No one would expect us to be happy that this was our lord. Which begs the question: Why these stories? Why wouldn’t someone invent better ones?

I suppose because these are the stories people had. People didn’t “invent” them so much as they emerged. As they got told and retold they reformed into what they are. In the end, “history” is written by the winners. These peoples outlived their enemies. If Jacob’s descendants had died out and Laban’s had triumphed there would be stories of how he had to endure the treachery of an evil Jacob who stole his livestock and daughters.

It’s taken me a long time to finish these posts on the book of Genesis. I’ve not written as quick as I intended, despite reading the NIV all the way through. Yet it still feels like an accomplishment to blog the whole book of Genesis.

Onward to Exodus.

Genesis 50

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Genesis 50

Joseph has his father embalmed like an Egyption, asks the Pharaoh for his leave and takes Jacob to Canaan to bury him.  With him go dignitaries, his brothers and much of their households.

His brothers were worried that Joseph would try to take revenge against them for being such assholes to him in the past. They told Joseph that Jacob wanted them to forgive each other. Joseph thinks that since it was all God’s plan, it was OK.

Lastly, Joseph lives to be an old man. He has the Israelites (the descendants of his father) swear that when God comes to their aid they will take his bones out of Egypt  He gets embalmed and put in a coffin.

The narrative at this point doesn’t say anything is wrong with the Israelites living in Egypt. With Joseph such an important person there, how could anything be wrong?