An Atheist Explores the Bible Part Eleven: Moses, Bob Marley, and Iron Maiden (Exodus 1-5)

Exodus 1-5
Moses, Bob Marley, and Iron Maiden

Welcome to another instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Bible version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the King James Bible, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology. 

For more detail, see the introductory post http://bit.ly/2F8f9JT

For the online KJV I use, see here http://bit.ly/2m0zVUP

And now:

Exodus 1

“Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph”

Having spent the last few chapters of Genesis with songs from Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat running through my head, now I get Bob Marley from the book title. It could be worse.

The action moves on a few generations from Joseph’s time, to a new Pharaoh who doesn’t trust the Hebrews due to their numbers and success. He enslaves them and orders all of their male children to be killed, but the Hebrew midwives disobey him. He reissues the edict to his own people.

It looks like this new Pharaoh (or, as he is referred to in this chapter, King of Egpyt) is not as wise or benevolent as his predecessor. He thinks it “wise” that the best way to deal with the Hebrews and ensure that they don’t lend their numbers to his enemies is to treat them really harshly. Uh, I don’t think that’s going to work. If they weren’t going to rebel before, they probably will now.

Exodus 2

“And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink.”

A bit of an edited highlights of the early life of Moses here. Although the story of him being sent down the river in a raft of rushes is well known to me, it seems like he doesn’t go very far as he ends up effectively being raised by his birth mother, as nurse in the service of Pharaoh’s daughter, his adoptive mother. Which is a bit flat as a storyline goes, really.

Then, grown-up Moses comes across an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, and he kills the Egyptian and hides the body. A bit later he tries to intervene in a dispute between two Hebrews, and there’s a great piece of dramatic irony where one of the men says “Who made you a judge over us?” and they get a bit snarky, saying “What, you going to kill us like you did that Egyptian?” And sure enough his bit of revolutionary fervour is known to the authorities whereby he runs away to Midian, gets married to Zepporah the daughter of a priest and has a son Gorshan, a “stranger in a strange land”, thus inspiring Robert Heinlein and Bruce Dickinson at the same time.

The old Pharaoh dies, but things don’t get better for the Hebrews and then God remembers that he made a covenant with them and that He ought to do something about it.

Exodus 3

“And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.”

Technically not a lot happens in this chapter – God appears to Moses in a burning bush and tells him that the Hebrews will arise from captivity and head into a new land, despoiling the Egyptians in the process. But there’s a lot of famous stuff in it. The burning bush itself, which I had to go back and check didn’t also happen when Abraham nearly sacrificed Isaac. It doesn’t, this is the first time for that particular apparition. Also God saying His “name” – “I AM”, also “I AM WHAT I AM”, where I rather irreverently think of Popeye. And the expression “land of milk and honey” crops up as descriptive of the Promised Land. This is a more dramatic expression of the covenant than occurred to the four heroes of Genesis (Jacob’s Ladder being probably the most extravagant vision), and I think heralds a change in tone for Exodus whereby God is going to be more of a direct player in events.

Exodus 4

“And Moses said unto the LORD, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue”

The conversation between Moses and God continues, with God demonstrating a series of miracles to Moses – turning a rod into a snake and back again, making his hand leprous (!) and also (although we don’t see this happen on screen), turning water into blood. Kind of … kind of creepy miracles really, if you stop to think about it. Moses protests that he isn’t the right man for the job but God tells him to man up, and that He will not only help with his public speaking but that Moses’ brother Aaron (who is a better public speaker) will help him.

So Moses heads back to Egypt with his family, where he meets Aaron and the two of them demonstrate the miracles and promise deliverance to the Hebrew slaves. Now, there’s a bit I skipped, that makes no sense; Verse 24 - “And it came to pass by the way in the inn, that the LORD met him, and sought to kill him”. “Him” seems to be Gorshan as in the next verse Zipporah circumcises her son with a sharp stone. But it could mean Moses, but I’m not sure why God is suddenly trying to kill him in an inn. It’s like a section got cut and paste to the wrong place.

Exodus 5

“And the king of Egypt said unto them, Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their works? get you unto your burdens”

Oh dear. Moses and Aaron ask the Pharaoh for time off for a religious ceremony, but the Pharaoh is not happy with this “idleness” and makes the Hebrew slaves work even harder. There’s a lot of back and forth about them now having to gather straw for brick-making rather than being given it, at the end of which Moses points out to God that although he’s done what God told him to it’s actually made matters worse for the Hebrews.

Not a lot to add to this chapter. This is a different Pharaoh to the one in Chapter 2 but he’s still being dickish.