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Introduction
The story of Moses, written by Moses himself, describes the challenge of taking the
Israelites to the Promised Land when they don’t want to go. To accomplish this, Moses must
exterminate the inhabitants of the Promised Land while at the same time persuading God not to exterminate
the Israelites. He portrays himself as as a modest man in charge of his god and his people. God is always
upset with the Israelites, but Moses realizes that it’s just because he's insecure and wants to
impress. Moses keeps God in line by frequently pointing out that if he kills his chosen people,
foreigners will despise him because he can’t keep control. Moses saves the Israelites not only from
slavery but from the wrath of God.
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The First Flight from Egypt
One day Moses came across an Egyptian beating an Israelite. He looked around, and as
the coast was clear he killed the Egyptian
and hid the body in the sand. The following day he saw two Israelites fighting, and asked the reason. One
of them replied, “Who made you prince
and judge over us? Are you planning to kill me, the way you killed that Egyptian?” Then Moses fled to
Midian, because he was afraid that everyone
knew about the murder.
— Exodus 2:11 |
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God’s Plan to Steal Land and Jewelry for the Israelites
As Moses was minding a flock of sheep, an angel appeared to him in a burning bush. The
voice of the Lord called, “Moses, Moses,
I’ve come to rescue my people and bring them to a land flowing with milk and honey, which currently
belongs to the Canaanites, the Hittites, the
Amonites, the Perizzites and the Jebusites. The king of Egypt won’t let my people go, and so I’ll perform
miracles until he does. What is more,
I’ll make the Egyptians like my people and lend them gold and silver jewelry, which they can steal when
they leave.”
— Exodus 3 |
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God’s Plan to Impress Pharaoh
To prove that Moses really had spoken with him, God gave him three tricks; a stick
which became a snake, the ability to turn
his own hand white, and the ability to turn water to blood. God told him to return to Egypt, and said,
“You must impress Pharoah with the tricks.
I’ll influence his mind so he’ll refuse to release the people, then you tell him, “Israel is like a
firstborn son to me, and if you won’t let
them go, I’ll kill your firstborn son.”
— Exodus 4 |
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The Egyptian Magicians are Just as Good
Moses and his brother Aaron went before Pharaoh, and Aaron did the trick with the stick
which turns into a snake. Then Pharoah
called the magicians of Egypt, and they did the same trick; but Aaron won, because his stick swallowed up
their sticks. And, as he’d promised,
the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart so he refused to let the people go.
The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Meet Pharaoh tomorrow on the banks of the Nile, and say, “You haven’t listened to the god of the Hebrews, but now you will know he IS the Lord! With this stick I turn the Nile to blood!” And Aaron was told, “Hold out your stick and there will be blood throughout all Egypt, from the rivers to the wooden bowls.” Moses and Aaron did as the Lord commanded, and there was blood everywhere. But the Egyptian magicians did the same thing with their spells, so Pharaoh remained obstinate, and forgot about the whole thing. — Exodus 7:10 |
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The Reason Why God Wouldn’t Let Pharoah Make His Own Decisions
The Lord sent plagues of frogs, maggots, flies, festering boils and hail, until the
Egyptian magicians couldn’t compete; but
every time Pharoah agreed to set the people free, the Lord would harden his heart again.
The Lord said to Moses, “I’ve made Pharaoh stubborn so as to impress him with my tricks, and so you can tell your children and grandchildren the story of how I teased the Egyptians, and the tricks I showed them!” And after producing locusts and darkness the Lord added, “I shall bring one last plague on Pharaoh and Egypt. At midnight I will kill all the firstborn from the prince to the slave girl, and a great cry will go up from all over Egypt.” — Exodus 8, 9, 10 |
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The Final Trick
So at midnight the Lord killed all the firstborn in Egypt, and Pharaoh and all the
Egyptians rose up and wept, for there was
not a house without someone dead. Then the Israelites set out, about six hundred thousand men on foot as
well as women and children, bringing
flocks, herds and provisions. And the Lord told them not to share any of their food with uncircumcised
people. He led the Israelites through the
wilderness to the Red Sea, avoiding the land of the warring Philistines lest they change their minds and
return to Egypt.
— Exodus 12; 29 |
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The Lord Wants Respect
The Lord said to Moses, “Tell the Israelites to camp by the sea, and I’ll make Pharaoh
pursue them. And Pharaoh and all his
army will respect me; they’ll know I AM the Lord!” So Pharaoh’s army chased the Israelites, who
complained to Moses, “What did we tell you?
Didn’t we say, ‘Just leave us alone, slavery’s better than dying in the wilderness’?”
But the Lord said “What’s the meaning of this racket! Hold out your stick, Moses, and divide the sea. I’ll make the Egyptians come after you, and I shall win glory for myself at the expense of Pharaoh and his army, chariots and cavalry. Then the Egyptians will know I AM the Lord, when I’ve gotten respect by killing Pharaoh!” — Exodus 14 |
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The Lord Makes Some Laws
Three months after leaving Egypt, the Israelites camped in Sinai beside a mountain. The
Lord said to Moses, “I’ll come to you
in a thick cloud, so I can talk to you in the hearing of the people. Tell them to wash their clothes in
preparation and not to go near the
mountain or they’ll be killed.” Moses also told the people not to have sex with their wives. On the third
day there was thunder and lightning,
and a thick cloud on the mountain. The Lord came down in fire; smoke rose like the smoke of a kiln, and
all the people trembled violently.
God said, “You must make an altar for me, but don’t build sacred steps in case your private parts might be exposed over them. These are my laws: when you buy an Israelite slave, keep him for six years before releasing him. When a man sells his daughter into slavery, she isn’t to go free as male slaves may. Whoever curses his father or mother must be put to death. Whoever sacrifices to any god but the Lord must be put to death. You must not curse the ruler of your people. I shall send terror of me ahead of you, and will destroy everyone in your path: I’ll put in your hands the inhabitants of the lands from the Red Sea to the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the river, and you will drive them out.” — Exodus 1 |
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The People Have a Party, and God is Not Pleased; But Doesn’t Kill His Chosen People Because
of What the Egyptians Might Say
Moses repeated all the laws to the people, and they said, “We’ll do everything the Lord
told us.” He then built an altar, and
flung blood from a sacrificed bull over the people. The Lord said to Moses, “Come up the mountain, and
I’ll give you the stone tablets on which
I’ve inscribed the laws.”
A cloud covered the mountain, and Moses entered it and stayed forty days and forty nights; and God gave him extremely detailed instructions on the design and décor of his sanctuary. When the people saw how long Moses was taking, they went to Aaron and said, “We don’t know what’s happened to Moses, but we’d like to make some gods.” Aaron told them to collect all their gold ear-rings, and he cast the gold into the image of a bull-calf. He built an altar for it, and the people made offerings and had a party. But the Lord was angry, and told Moses to return down the mountain, saying, “Let me destroy them!” Moses replied, “You brought them from Egypt with great power. Why would you let the Egyptians say, ‘His evil intention was to kill them on the mountains and wipe them off the face of the earth’?” So the Lord thought better of the evil with which he’d threatened his people. — Exodus 24, 32 |
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The Levites Are Rewarded For Their Obedience
As he approached the camp Moses saw the bull-calf and the dancing, and in a burst of
anger he flung down the tablets and
shattered them at the foot of the mountain. He destroyed the golden calf and said, “Who is on the Lord’s
side? Come to me.” The Levites rallied
to him, and he said to them, “The Lord commands each of you to arm himself; go through the camp and kill
brother, friend and neighbor.” They
obeyed, and about three thousand people died that day. Moses said, “You have been made priests of the
Lord today, because you each turned against
his own son and his own brother, and so have brought a blessing upon yourselves.”
— Exodus 32:19 |
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Moses Sees the Back Parts of the Lord
Moses said to the Lord, “Don’t send us on if you’re not prepared to go with us, or how
will others know we’re your chosen
people and different from everyone else on earth?” The Lord replied, “I’ll do what you ask because I like
you, and I know you by name.”
Moses prayed, “Show me your glory!” The Lord answered, “I shall make my goodness pass before you, and proclaim the name ‘Lord’. I shall be gracious to whom I shall be gracious,” but he added, “You mustn’t see my face, for no mortal can see my face and live. Stand on this rock, and when my glory passes by I shall put you in a crevice, and cover you with my hand. Then I’ll take my hand away and you shall see my back parts.” — Exodus 33:12 |
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The Impertinence of Aaron’s Sons: Moses Takes Charge
Moses had the people build a magnificent tabernacle for the Lord, and Aaron and his
sons made sacrifice there. One day Aaron’s
sons Nadab and Abihu took Aaron’s censer and offered fire to the Lord which he hadn’t asked for; then
fire came out from the Lord which
completely burned them up, and they died before the Lord. Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the Lord
meant when he said:
‘Among those who approach me Aaron said nothing. Moses ordered the bodies to be carried out of the camp, and told Aaron and his remaining sons, “Don’t let anyone see you mourning or the Lord will kill you too, and be angry with the whole community.” — Leviticus 10 |
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The Ingratitude of the People
The people were starving, saying “Who will give us meat? We remember the fish of Egypt;
the cucumbers and the melons, the
leeks, the onions and the garlic; but now there is nothing except manna.”
Moses heard the people weeping with their families, and was displeased. The Lord became extremely angry and said, “Tell the people, ‘You’ve complained, saying ‘Who will give us meat? Life was better in Egypt.’ Therefore the Lord will give you meat to eat until it comes out of your nostrils!” Then a great wind came from the Lord bringing quails from the sea which fell by the camp, and the people gathered them; but while the flesh was still between their teeth, before it was even chewed, the Lord killed them with a huge plague. — Numbers 11 |
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What Will People Think? And all the congregation wept, saying “Would to God we’d died in Egypt, or in the
wilderness!” They said to each other, “Let’s
choose a leader, and return to Egypt,” and the Lord said to Moses, “How long will they provoke me? I’ll
kill them all with the plague.”
Again God Spares His Chosen People But Moses answered, “If you destroy them then other nations will say, ‘The Lord killed his people because he couldn’t bring them to the land he promised!’ You are longsuffering and very merciful, so pardon, I beg you, their wickedness.” And the Lord said, “I’ll pardon them as you suggest. But tell them, ‘Your bodies shall die in this wilderness, and your children shall wander for forty years to be punished for your whoring, until your carcasses rot!’” — Numbers 14 |
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More Ingratitude
Now Korah, Dathan and Abiram came with two hundred princes and said to Moses: “Why did
you bring us from a fruitful land to
kill us in the wilderness! Is it to make yourself a prince over us?” Moses was very angry, and said to
the Lord, “I haven’t taken one ass from
them, nor have I hurt one of them.” And he told them to meet at the tabernacle the next day.
So they came, bringing incense to glorify the Lord, but the Lord said to Moses, “Step aside so I can kill them.” Then they fell upon their faces crying, “O God, one man sins and you’re angry with the whole assembly?” When Korah, Dathan and Abiram came out and stood in the door of their tents with their wives, their sons, and their little children, Moses said to the people, “Stand aside; and remember, if the earth opens and swallows them up, I didn’t do it, the Lord did!” Then a great chasm opened in the earth, and they and all their families and possessions went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them. The princes ran away, afraid that they too would be killed; so the Lord set fire to them, and they were completely burned up. And on the following day, the congregation murmured against Moses and Aaron, saying, “You killed the Lord’s people!” This made the Lord very angry again, so he made fourteen thousand and seven hundred people die of the plague. — Numbers 16 |
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The Story of the Man Caught Gathering Sticks
And while they were in the wilderness they came upon a man who was gathering sticks on
the Sabbath day. They brought him to
Moses and Aaron, and the Lord said to Moses, “This man must definitely be put to death. All the
congregation must stone him with stones.” So the
congregation brought him outside the camp and stoned him to death, as the Lord commanded Moses.
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell your people to make fringes on the borders of their clothing, and a put a ribbon of blue around the borders; and they mustn’t go whoring any more.” — Numbers 15:3 |
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The Story of How the Lord was Angered by the Midianites
The people began to have sex with the daughters of Moab, and to pray to their gods. The
Lord became angry at this, and said to
Moses, “Hang them by the neck facing into the sun, so that my fierce anger shall be appeased!” And Moses
said to the judges, “Kill every man who
has done this thing.”
While the congregation was weeping by the door of the tabernacle, an Israelite with a Midianite woman came into Moses’ view. When Phinehas saw her, he got up and took a javelin in his hand; he followed them into the tent and thrust both of them through, piercing the woman through her belly. The Lord said to Moses, “Phinehas has averted my wrath from the Israelites so that I didn’t destroy them in my jealousy. I will give him and his descendants the covenant of everlasting priesthood.” Now the Israelite who was slain was a Simeonite prince while his woman was a Midianite princess; and the Lord said to Moses, “Kill the Midianites! For they annoy you with their trickery, with which they have deceived you.” — Numbers 25 |
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The Story of How the Lord was Avenged on the Midianites
And Moses said to the people, “Arm yourselves for war!” And they made war against the
Midianites, as the Lord commanded Moses,
and slaughtered all the males. They killed the kings of Midian, and captured all the women with their
little ones, and took all their cattle and
flocks, and all their goods.
And they burned all their cities and fine castles to the ground, and brought the prisoners to Moses. But Moses was angry with the generals. He said to them, “Why have you saved the women alive? Now kill every little boy and every woman who isn’t a virgin. Just keep the women children for yourselves.” Then the Lord said to Moses, “Divide the spoils between the soldiers and the congregation, and from the soldiers half, take one part in fifty for me.” And the booty was 675,000 sheep, 12,060 cows, 1,060 asses and 32,000 virgins, and the Lord’s portion was 675 sheep, 72 cows, 31 asses and 32 virgins. — Numbers 31 |
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How Moses and God Encouraged the People to Take the Promised Land
Twelve men went into Eschol and returned saying it was a fertile land; but the
Israelites rebelled against the Lord’s
commandments and murmured “Why should we invade? The people are bigger and taller than we are.” So the
Lord told Moses “Tell the Israelites, ‘You
can drive out all the inhabitants, because I’m giving you the land for yourselves.’”
And these are the words which Moses spoke to all Israel: “The Lord God delivered Sihon to us and we killed him, and his sons, and all his people. And the Lord delivered into our hands Og the King of Bashan and all his people; Og was the last of the giants, and he had a bedstead made of iron, nine cubits in length and four in breadth. And we killed him and completely annihilated him. We took all his cities and utterly destroyed the men, women and children, of every city, but the cattle and the riches of his cities we took for as loot for ourselves. The Lord God will bring you into the land he promised your fathers to give you large and beautiful cities which you didn’t build, houses full of good things which you never bought, wells which you didn’t dig, and vineyards and olive trees which you never planted; so be careful not to forget the Lord, (for the Lord your God is a jealous God) in case he should become angry with you, and destroy you from the face of the earth. The Lord your God shall cast out many for you; he’ll get rid of the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites. And when the Lord God delivers them to you, you must utterly destroy them, make no treaties with them, nor show any mercy to them.” — Deuteronomy 1:23, Numbers 33:50, Deuteronomy 2:33, Deuteronomy 6:10, Deuteronomy 7:1 |
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The Lord Assigns Other Deities for Gentiles
Don’t make statues of any animal, bird or fish, nor bow down in worship to the sun, the
moon and the stars; the Lord assigned
these for all the other peoples everywhere under heaven.
— Moses’ First Discourse, Deuteronomy 4:15 |
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How To Treat The Bride Who May Not Be a Virgin
When a man takes a wife and after sex claims that she wasn’t a virgin, then her parents
should take the blood-stained sheet to
the elders at the town gate; the elders must then punish the man for maligning a virgin of Israel. If, on
the other hand, the accusation turns
out to be true, then they must bring her to the door of her father’s house and the men of the town will
stone her to death.
— Laws Delivered by Moses, Deuteronomy 13 |
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Hygienic Practices to Avoid Offending the Lord
When you are camped near an enemy, be careful to avoid any foulness. When one of your
men is unclean because of a nocturnal
emission, he must go out of the camp. Towards evening he is to wash himself, and he may re-enter at
sunset.
You must have a sign outside the camp showing where you can withdraw to relieve yourself. As part of your equipment you are to have a trowel, and when you squat outside you are to scrape a hole with it, then turn around and cover your excrement. The Lord moves with you your camp to keep you safe, so it must be kept holy in case he should see something offensive and go no further with you. — Laws Delivered by Moses, Deuteronomy 23:9 |
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The Curses of the Lord
If you won’t obey the Lord by observing all his commandments, then the following curses
shall come upon you. May the Lord
strike you with hemorrhoids, scabs, and the itch for which there is no cure. May the Lord strike you with
madness, blindness and stupefaction;
you will be oppressed and robbed, day in, day out, with no-one to save you. Your fiancée will be raped
and your donkey will be stolen. May the
Lord strike you on the knee and leg with severe boils, which will spread from the sole of your foot to
the crown of your head. May the Lord give
you to another nation where you will become a horror, a byword, and an object- lesson to the people
there. Your sons and daughters will be
captured, and your fruit and vegetables will be infected with the mole-cricket. Or perhaps another nation
will swoop upon you like a vulture, and
will besiege your towns until you eat your own children, the flesh of your sons and daughters. And even
the more refined man will refuse to share
the child-meat he is eating with his remaining family. The Lord will bring upon you sickness and plague
of every kind, even those not recorded in
this book of law, until you are destroyed. Just as the Lord took delight in you, so now it will be his
delight to ruin and exterminate you.
— Deuteronomy 28 |
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The Song of Moses
Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. My
doctrine shall drop as the rain, my
speech shall distil as dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, as the showers upon the grass.
Because I speak the name of the Lord, a God of Truth without any wickedness. When his people provoked him with strange gods he said, ‘My anger burns like fire, and shall burn to the lowest hell till my people are starved, and devoured with burning heat and bitter destruction. I will send ravening beasts upon them, and poisonous snakes. Both the young man and the virgin, the baby and the old man, will be destroyed by the sword and their own terror. I would do this, did I not fear the anger of their enemies who might insolently boast ‘The victory is ours!’ And if I sharpen my glittering sword, I will bring revenge to those enemies. I will make my arrows drunk with their blood, and my sword will eat their flesh!” Moses sang this song to the people, and this is how he blessed them before he died. Indeed, he loved the people, and they sat at his feet. Bless him, O Lord, and slash the private parts of those who rebel against him. Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died, and his eye was not dimmed, nor his natural force abated. — Deuteronomy 32 |
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The Commandments
1. Do not allow a witch to live.2. The unfaithful husband or wife must be put to death. 3. If a man beats his servant and kills him, he must be punished; but if he just beats him for two or three days he shall not be punished, for the servant is his property. 4. If any man has sex with a domestic, she shall be whipped. 5. Any man who has a blemish, a flat nose, or is lame, or a dwarf, or scabbed, or has his testicles crushed, shall not profane my sanctuaries. 6. You may not wear clothing made of a wool /linen blend. 7. You must make fringes on four sides of your clothing. 8. When two men fight and the wife of one, in order to protect him, puts her hand out and seizes his enemy by his private parts, then you must cut off her hand. 9. And he that swears at his father or mother must definitely be put to death. 10. When you come to attack a city, proclaim peace; if the people agree, make them your slaves. If they do not agree, kill every male with the sword, and take for yourself the women, children and livestock and everything else worth plundering. This you must do to all foreign cities. — 1. Leviticus 20:10, 2. Exodus 22:18, 3. Exodus 21:20, 4. Leviticus 19:20, 5. Leviticus 21:8, 6. Deuteronomy 22:11, 7. Deuteronomy 22:12, 8. Leviticus 19:27, 9. Deuteronomy 25:11, 10. Deuteronomy 20:10 |