Moses Returns to Egypt

(Exodus 4:20 - 5:21)

Moses took his wife and his sons and set them on donkeys, and they began their journey back to Egypt.  And as he was told, Moses carried with him the divine staff.  Jehovah reminded him, “When you arrive in Egypt, make sure that you work your wonders and perform before the Pharaoh all the feats of magic I have taught you.  Even so, I will make the Pharaoh stubborn so that he will still refuse to let your people go.  You should then tell him the demands of Jehovah,  'Israel is my son, my favored son.  I tell you to let my son go so he can worship me.  If you fail to do so, I will kill your favored son.’”

During the journey, when Moses was camping for the night, an extraterrestrial confronted him.  He was at the point of killing Moses when Sephora quickly seized a sharpened flint and, with it, circumcised their son.   Flinging the bloody, excised foreskin at Moses' crotch, she declared,  “You are now wedded to me in blood,"  after which the extraterrestrial released Moses and departed.  (She used the term “wedded to me in blood" because of the circumcision).

Jehovah communicated to Aaron.  "Go out into the desert to meet Moses."   And he journeyed to the holy mountain and, when he found Moses, he greeted him with a kiss.  Moses told Aaron all the things that Jehovah, who had sent him, had revealed and showed him the feats of magic in which he had instructed him.

Moses and Aaron appeared before a meeting of the elders of Israel.  There Aaron conveyed to them the words Jehovah had spoken to Moses and demonstrated the magical feats before the people.  The people were duly convinced.  And when they learned that Jehovah had visited their people and had observed their hardships, they bowed down in worship.

Moses and Aaron appeared before the Pharaoh and told him, "Jehovah, the god of Israel, says, 'Free my people, so that they may hold a sacrificial ceremony to me in the desert."  But he replied, "Who is Jehovah that I should listen to him and free the Israelites?  I've never heard of this Jehovah, and I won't free the Israelites."

Moses and Aaron replied, "The god of the Hebrews has called to us and instructed us to journey three days into the desert and there to make sacrifices to him.  If we don't, he may afflict us with wars or plagues.”

The Pharaoh of Egypt said, "Why do you, Moses and Aaron, entice the people away from their appointed tasks.  Get back to work!"  He further complained, "The Israelites are numerous now and already overflowing their territory.  How much more will they increase in numbers if we give them leisure from their labor?”

On the same day the Pharaoh commanded the overseers and taskmasters, "You will no longer furnish the Israelites with straw to make brick as you’ve been doing.  Let them go out and glean straw for themselves.  You will not decrease the quota of bricks they are required to make or reduce their labor in any way.  They’re a lazy lot. They whine, 'We want to go and make a sacrifice to our god.'  Keep them busy with more and more work.  Make sure they do it and not listen to foolish talk."

The overseers and taskmasters went out and told the Israelites, "The Pharaoh has said you will have no more straw.  You must go out and gather it for yourselves wherever you can find it, but your work load will not be reduced."

And so the Israelites dispersed over the land to collect stubble instead of straw.  The taskmasters drove them hard, telling them, "Make your daily quota just as you did when you were given straw." 

The Israelite foremen, those chosen by the taskmasters, were beaten.  "Why haven't you filled your quota of bricks the past few days, as you did in the past?" they were asked.  But the Israelite foreman brought their grievances to the Pharaoh. "Why do you treat your servants like this?” they asked him.  “Your servants are given no straw, yet are ordered to make bricks as before.  When we can’t, we’re whipped.  The fault is not with us, but with your people.”

The Pharaoh responded, “Lazy!  That’s what you are, you don’t want to work.  That’s why you keep grousing, 'We want to go and sacrifice to our god.'  Get back to work!  You will not be given straw and the quota of bricks you must deliver will remain the same."

The Israelite foremen knew they were in deep trouble when they heard, "Your daily quota of bricks will not be lessened."  As they left their audience with the Pharaoh, Moses and Aaron were waiting for them.  The foremen stood up to them and chewed them out, “May God judge you harshly because you have made our people loathsome in the eyes of the Pharaoh and his men.  You've only given them an excuse to exterminate us."

Notes
1.  Jehovah commands Moses to perform his magic feats before the Pharaoh and, then by way of encouraging him (not), tells him that the Pharaoh will be unconvinced, not because of the Pharaoh's own stubborn nature, but because Jehovah has made him that way.  Logically, Jehovah is working at cross purposes.  He wants the Pharaoh to act a certain way and then compels him to act in the opposite manner.  It makes no sense, except to reinforce the belief that nothing happens unless it is divinely ordained.

2.  An unusual and disturbing incident on the trip back to Egypt occurs at an inn.  An extraterrestrial shows up with the presumed intent of killing Moses because his second(?) son had not been circumcised.  (The text is somewhat muddled.)  Moses has been shockingly remiss in not performing this procedure, but it must be remembered he was brought up as an Egyptian and not as a Hebrew, and his wife, though Hebrew, was not an Israelite.  Some have suggested he did not do so because his second son Eliezer had been recently born and Moses did not want him to travel weakened by the operation.  This, of course, is mere conjecture.  At any rate, it is somewhat shocking that a Jehovan would come down to earth to murder Moses simply because his son hadn't been circumcised, especially when Moses had just been selected as Jehovah’s spokesman and emissary.  Were Jehovans constantly on the rampage, killing the fathers of uncircumcised Hebrew babies wherever they found them?  It is possible that Jehovah himself sent this particular extraterrestrial assassin?  If so, why?  Or was this extraterrestrial acting on his own, unaware of Jehovah's plans for Moses?

3.  The Pharaoh rebuffs Moses and scorns Jehovah, of whom he has no knowledge.  The Egyptians worshiped a large number of gods and goddesses, most of them depicted with human bodies with the heads of animals.  The Pharaoh himself was generally regarded either as a living god or as a god to-be.  It is understandable that he would not kowtow to some no-name god worshiped by his slaves.

5.  On one level, the conflict between the Pharaoh and the Israelites is the familiar one of management and labor.  Management thinks the workers are lazy and uppity, labor thinks management is arrogant and abusive.  Here, the Pharaoh rejects the demands of labor (time off for religious worship) and, for their presumption, he makes their working conditions more onerous.  The labor leader, Moses, is rebuked by representatives of the rank and file for making their lot worse instead of better.