God’s Identity and Power
In Exodus, the second book of the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament, the people of Israel are enslaved in Egypt instead of thriving in the land (Canaan) that God had promised to their ancestors hundreds of years before. In this context of oppression, God’s power is revealed primarily through his mighty works such as the plagues he brings upon Egypt, his deliverance of the Israelites from slavery, and his feeding the Israelites in their desert…
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Redemption and Deliverance
The book of Exodus recounts the Israelites’ escape from their oppressors in Egypt, with the help of a series of dramatic plagues. However, the exodus story is nothing like a typical ancient conquest narrative in that the Israelites don’t defeat the Egyptians by fighting—instead, they trust their God to deliver them. In other words, the Israelites’ flight from Egypt is not a story of them defeating their enemies; it’s a story of God confronting…
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The Covenant
In the book of Genesis, God promised to make the patriarchs (Israel’s ancestors) a great nation, one blessed with both land and offspring. In the book of Exodus, God begins to keep his promise by freeing the Israelites from Egyptian slavery and providing for them in the desert (despite their own recurrent failures to believe and obey). The formal name for this promise is the “covenant,” and it basically stipulates that in response…
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Mediators and the Priesthood
From God’s charge to Moses from the burning bush (when he instructs Moses to speak to Pharaoh on his behalf) to the establishment of the Israelite priesthood many chapters later, Exodus is filled with the idea of mediators, or people who stand between God and humans. This idea is necessary because, according to the Hebrew Bible, God’s immediate presence is too holy for human beings to bear. Through the flawed and frail examples of…
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