Two men are walking to temple. The older man says to the younger man, “So, do you know why the Jewish people aren’t voting for President Bush?” The younger man replies with an inquisitive “No.” “Well,” says the older man, “the last time the Jewish people followed a Bush they wound up wandering in the Desert.” This recent political joke is in reference to the Exodus story of Moses and the burning bush. As stated in the bible it reads: “Moses was tending the flock of Jethro, his father in law, the priest of Midian. He led the flock far into the wilderness and came to Horev, the mountain of Elohim. The angel of YHVH appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush. He gazed: the bush is blasing fire yet the bush is not consumed!” (Exodus 3:1-2) Exodus is the second of the five “books of Moses” that tells the story of the Exodus of Israelites from Egypt through the Sinai Desert. When Moses was born, the Israelites were oppressed by the Egyptian Pharaoh and bound to a harsh life of labor taking part in building some of the great public works of Egypt such as the pyramids, fortresses, and installations to regulate the flow of the Nile River. For fear that the Israelite population would continue to increase, the Pharaoh insisted that every male Hebrew child would be killed at birth. Ironically, during this oppressive period, Moses, the “future deliverer of Israel”, was born. To protect his life, his mother sent him down the Nile in a specially woven ark. He was found by the Pharaoh’s daughter who took him in and, to add to the irony, she hired his mother to be his foster nurse. The baby boy grew up and was adopted into the Pharaoh’s household and named Moses. His name is derived from the Egyptian root “mose” meaning “son”, but in the Bible, it is said to hale from the Hebrew root meaning “drawn out of the water.” Even though Moses, was raised as an Egyptian, he knew that he was truly Hebrew. After seeing an Egyptian taskmaster cruelly beating a Hebrew, Moses became so furious that he murdered the Egyptian. Fearing that the Pharaoh would find out what he had done, Moses fled to the wilderness, “the eternal safe retreat of outcasts from ancient society and of those in revolt against authority.” Moses found himself in the Sinai Desert amongst other ... ... middle of paper ... ...suffering from harsh treatment and facing eradication, they had hope and faith for a better life. A life which Moses helped to bring them following his command from God. The excerpt from the Zohar concerning Moses and the burning bush ends with an uplifting quote, “Happy are Israel! The Blessed Holy One has separated them from all nations and called them His Children, as it is written: ‘You are children of YHVH your God!’ (Deuteronomy 14:1)” The people of Israel had endured a great deal of suffering in which most people would begin to question their faith in God. However, through this suffering, those of Israel have continued to separate themselves from others and persevered to serve their Lord. I feel that this story is very important concerning the history of the struggles that Jews have faced and overcome. Although, the joke at the beginning of this paper obviously seems to mock the story of Moses and the burning bush, the fact that the story is still remembered today and understood by the masses that it only further depicts the story’s vital significance to the Jewish religion. I see the joke as only a continued remembrance of the Prophet Moses and his struggles for Israel.
Split conception occurs within Exodus when describing the birth of Moses, and the birth of Israel as a nation. This concept of split conception is defined as having two mothers and two separate birth stories, which come together and intertwine. Moses directly has two mothers, while the people of Israel come together from two metaphorical mothers. Moses serves as the first example of split conception in chapter two of Exodus. Moses’ two mothers, Jochebed and Bithiah, came from two completely different backgrounds. Jochebed, his biological mother, was a Hebrew woman and slave who gave Moses away in order to save his life. The woman who found him, Bithiah, was Pharaoh's daughter and therefore an Egyptian princess. Moses repeatedly struggles with
During the time when the Egyptians were taking over the Hebrews, there was a man by the name of Moses. His mother to save his life put Moses into a river. Moses was found by the pharaohs' daughter, his life was spared and she adopted him. He was named Moses because it means drawn from the water. Moses was chosen by god to save his people. He had things going on in his life that interfered with doing the mission God wanted him to do, but with God by his side he eventually found faith in God and became very successful. He knew that no matter what was ahead of him he would succeed. Moses and God spoke with eachother, and god gave him specific directions on what he wanted and how he wanted it done. Moses didn't want to lead the Jews out of Egypt, except he was chosen by God, and he can't disappoint him. And soon...
Moses spends forty years following the instructions of God throughout Exodus. However, in Numbers, God tells him to speak to the rock and it will bring them water. Instead of speaking to the rock, he strikes it with his staff, like he did previously in Exodus. When he does not directly follow the instructions he was given, God responds by saying, “‘Because you were not faithful to me in showing forth my sanctity before the Israelites, you shall not lead this community into the land I will give them,’” (Numbers 20:12). Moses ends up being able to see the Promised Land, but never being able to set foot inside
Exodus was really the foundation of Judaism; it was the reason the Israelites settled in Israel. Exodus gave the Jews hope that God would take care of them. It marked the time when the Israelites were delivered from bondage as slaves in Egypt. Exodus is commemorated by Jewish people every year at Passover.
...istory/faith-history of Israel” occurred (Fries 66). God appeared to Moses in the burning bush, and sent him to save the Israelites from their suffering. God plagued the Egyptians with a series of ten plagues of increasing severity. The Israelites were then led to the Red Sea where Moses, by God’s grace, parted the waters allowing them to cross on dry land. The Egyptian army was drowned behind them. The Israelites had escaped.
Moses was a major character in the fact that he was the reason his son, Adam, became the man that he had become. “If just once in all my born days you’d say a good thing to me” (Fast 3), Moses stated. Moses wanted Adam to be raised the way that Moses was raised and respect it. Adam did not like how strict his father was to him and did not want to be raised like he was. “Maybe it’s time I just went and did something without my father”
Like no other prophet before him, Moses was “a vessel for displaying God 's awesome powers…” (Jen Saunders, "What Significance Does Moses Have to the Hebrew People?") This not only allowed the Israelites to leave Egypt, but protected them along their way to a new land and cemented their faith in G-d. His most notable act was the ten plagues. G-d channeled his divine powers into Moses’s human vessel and made him turn the Nile into blood, let frogs, bugs, wild animals and locusts overrun Egypt, give disease to their livestock, riddle the people with boils, strike down a thunderstorm of hail and fire, bury them in darkness, and kill off every nonbelievers first born. (Chabad, “The Ten Plagues”) This certainly put the fear of G-d into the Egyptians. His next big act would be splitting the Red Sea. With the raise of Moses’s staff, G-d allowed him to part the sea, protecting the Hebrews of the advancing Egyptian army. Instances like this occurred, just enough for the Hebrews to reinforce their belief in the one and only, to praise no other and to follow the rules of no other. Through demonstrations, such as striking water out of a rock, Moses was the catalyst for Hebrews to accept their G-d. He was able to captivate a people into a zealous belief that lasted for many years to
Before relationships begin to develop, each of the protagonists are in different positions. Moses is born a Hebrew, but growing up he is considered an Egyptian. When Moses flees to Midian and saves the
There are many themes running through the Old Testament myth of Exodus – slavery, rescue and redemption, guidance, commandments on how to live, the creation of a nation, and God’s power over other gods. In this paper I will explore what appears to be the chief reasoning behind the creation of the Exodus myth – the explanation of the creation of a monotheistic religion and the similarities of the Exodus myth to the ancient myths, as well as how one should approach the reading of the myth.
Like Odysseus, Moses was at one with the gods. In Moses' case it was only
Fire is holy to those of the Jewish religion as it is a representation of Yahweh's continuous presence in humanity. Mentioned in the Torah and the Old Testament of the bible, is the story of Moses and the burning bush (Book of Exodus). This flaming shrubbery was Yahweh and is also an example of fire showing Yahweh's presence in human lives. This symbolism of Yahweh through fire is demonstrated and practiced when the menorah is lit in temples and during Hanukkah. Fire also is symbolistic of the Jewish people's victory over the Syrian greekss, as also represented when the menorah is lit. This symbolsim of fire connects judaism to other religions such as Christianity and aboriginal spirituality. Present in all of these religions is the belief that fire is representative of God on eath and as a part in human lives (Christianity especially, as many beliefs have been derived from
He steers the Israelites outside of Egypt to the entryway of the Promised Land. The text addresses Moses using superlatives. Moses not once lost his wisdom of humanness, exhibiting characteristics of fury, aggravation, and an absence of self-confidence in addition to his leadership abilities, humility and perseverance (Harper 's Bible Dictionary 1952, 655). Moses was born as a Hebrew to his mother named Jochebed. Jochebed laid her baby into an impermeable container, sitting him inside the stalks of the Nile in order to conceal him since the Egyptian declaration was made to execute all newborn Hebrew males. The baby was recovered by Pharaoh’s daughter, who is spotted taking the baby from the reeds of the Nile. Miriam, (Moses’ sister) spies the lady embracing the baby, and witnesses her genuine response to the baby being Hebrew. Miriam recommends to attain a nurse for the baby from the Hebrew females, who will tend to the baby throughout his infancy. Miriam carries Jochebed to Pharaoh’s daughter as the lady that will attend to the newborn. This demonstration bears a resemblance to legends that are initiated in the world of offspring, who avoided a destined death, that were concealed or cared for by a surrogate parent, and then were given back or they surfaced to assume a vital part in their civilization (Gehman and Green n.d.,
The Quran states that God spoke to Moses' mother and told her to place her baby in a basket and send the child in the bas...
The birth of Moses was the first of the many miraculous events he would have experienced throughout the duration of his life because he should have been killed according to demands of Pharaoh. The king of Egypt ordered the midwives (caretakers) of the Hebrew women to kill all baby boys, and let all the baby girls live. He wanted the baby boys to be killed because he knew that the one that would be responsible for his demise was in the midst of that new breed of the Hebrew males. Pharaoh wasn't worried about birth of the female, Hebrew child because he knew that she was no threat to the throne, but he was well aware that his throne was in jeopardy if he allowed the male, Hebrew child to live. Pharaoh ordered his people, "Every boy that is born to the Hebrews, you shall throw into the Nile but you shall let every girl live."(Exodus 1:22) Even though the king ordered the midwives to kill the male babies, they did not kill th...
According to the book of Exodus in the Bible, Israel's future leader, Moses, was born at a very risky time. It was a time when the Jews in Egypt had increased in number and prospered so much that the Egyptian pharaoh decreed that every male Jew who was born at that time was to be killed. Moses was born a Jew. However, when his mother realized that, the time came for him to be born; she decided not to let him be killed and was eager to hide him. It was not possible though to keep him with her, for she would be found. Consequently, she decided to hide him among the reeds in the River Nile (Exodus 1-2 and QB VI...