Full of Maggots and Stank

"Some day God will show his care for you." --Exod. 13:19

Old Testament
Book Two: Exodus
The Exodus from Egypt (cont'd)
Chapter 13: The Rules of Passover Again
Chapter 14: The Big Moment! Moses Parts the Sea
Chapter 15: Beats
Chapter 16: Moan, Moan, Moan

As difficult as this is to believe, I'm actually starting to like God! Everything in the bible is backwards. The regular everyday humans are clearly the heroes of the bible--the ones who build the tower of Babel, Abimelech. The main characters of the bible are almost always deceitful a-holes: Abraham, Jacob. And of course God is the antagonist. But lately all of Israel is becoming obnoxious whiny children. They are giving God a run for his money. It's become a real clash of the passive-aggressives.

God is downright cool in these chapters. In the previous chapters, God came across as an insecure douche, hardening Pharaoh's heart in order to make himself look good. Here he does the same thing, but it comes across differently. Now he's just hard-core God, he's doing it purposefully to be a dick. He could just kill the Egyptians, or he could just let them go. But neither of those things are good enough. He takes great delight in making them run under the wall of water then drowning every last one of them, just to show them who's boss. This is a god you could actually get behind, kind of a wrestler version of God. The God in these chapters has a mullet and wears a tank-top with his nipples showing.

Here's what makes this story particularly appealing, cool enough that you could imagine actually taking part. The Israelites here are almost on a par with God. They are not fearful of God; rather, all they do is complain! God can do no right. Like a down-trodden husband, nothing he does is good enough. He delivers them from slavery! but the Israelites would prefer that to living in this disgusting wilderness. He feeds them to keep them from starving! but they complain because he makes them save up for the Sabbath. God is constantly trying to gain their favor, and Israel are as capricious as 15-year-old girls (but, being Israelite, 15-year-old girls with giant vaginas).

But like any good co-dependent, God doesn't do what he should do, which is say, "You want to go back to Egypt? More power to you! Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way back." Instead he sets up one little test after another to see if they really like him, like not feeding them every day, but only six of seven, to see if they will obey his rule of not working on day 7.

What I love is that that is all the Israelites have to do to prove their love for him. No worshiping, no accepting anyone as your lord and savior, just don't go shopping on Sunday and you're good to go. This is a very good religion. A hard-core God whom you have eating out of the palm of your hand. I like it.

(In case you're only reading this blog, without reading the actual text along with me, chapter 14 is the climax of Exodus, when Moses parts the sea and drowns the Egyptians.)


--bibletoenail


Textual Notes:
- Exod. 13:17 -- Just interesting--God is worried that the Israelites might change their minds about leaving Egypt!

- Exod. 13:19 -- "Some day God will show his care for you." I love that quote. Not any time soon, but some day.

- Exod. 13:21 -- God must be a pretty damn bright light to light the way for 600,000 people!

- Exod 12:40n -- 12:40 says the Israelites had been settled in Egypt for 430 years. But this number differs from Gen. 15:13 (four hundred years), and Exod. 6:16-20 lists only four generations between Jacob and Moses. It's just interesting to me that textualist Christians put so much faith in the precise language of the bible, counting exactly this and that (like the age of the earth), and yet the book is so self-contradictory repeatedly.

- Exod. 12:43-49n -- Interesting: the phrases "bought slave," "hired man," and "native-born" presupposes social conditions after the later settlement in the agricultural setting of Canaan. More evidence that this book was written at certain times, and was written in the context of those times. Aaron is emphasized at one point because the Aaronite priests were in charge. Judah was added in Gen. ch. 38 because later David becomes king. And this part, written when Israel was in Canaan, described Israeli culture of that time, not the time when they were in Egypt. It's like seeing a digital wristwatch on a cowboy in a movie. Also intriguing to me, as far as I can tell there are real, actual bible scholars, who do the kind of research, textual, archaeological, historical that scholars do in any field--history, literature. They are as skeptical and scientific in their studies as anyone. What is interesting is that they are the real bible scholars. They are clearly the ones that know the most about the bible, and yet they are not the ones that Christians talk about when they talk about bible "experts." There must be journals, as in any discipline, with articles arguing new readings of some passage. That would be interesting to see. The point is again, simply, that Christian belief is by definition anti-intellectualism in every possible way.

- Exod. 13:8n -- More evidence of how the story changed from year to year as it was related orally.

- Exod. 13:9n -- Same thing--an old custom of placing a mark on the hand or forehead is reinterpreted as a reminder of God's deliverance from Egypt.

- Exod. 15:20 -- Aaron's sister Miriam sounds totally hot. I hope we get to see more of her.

- Exod. 16:31 -- Manna from heaven.

-Exod. 16:36 -- Could someone verify whether they have ever seen this passage before? I think this passage is my first personal proof of a living God. Throughout this section, they keep talking about an "omer." I kept asking myself, what the fuck is an omer. Then, in a parenthetical! At the very end of the section! God himself just added a verse to the bible to tell me! Look: "An omer is one tenth of an ephah." Oh, now I understand! Thanks, God!


Quotables:
"A land flowing with milk and honey." --Exod. 13:5
"Upon your forehead as a phylactery." --Exod. 13:16
"Some day God will show his care for you." --Exod. 13:19
"And all the time the Lord went before them, by day a pillar of cloud to guide them on their journey, by night a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel night and day." --Exod. 13:21
"I will make Pharaoh obstinate, and he will pursue them, so that I may win glory for myself at the expense of Pharaoh and all his army." --Exod. 14:4
"Were there no graves in Egypt, that you should have brought us here to die in the wilderness?" --Exod. 14:11
"'Leave us alone; let us be slaves to the Egyptians.' We would rather be slaves to the Egyptians than die here in the wilderness." --Exod. 14:12
"The Lord will fight for you; so hold your peace." --Exod. 14:14
"When Israel saw the great power which the Lord had put forth against Egypt, all the people feared the Lord, and they put their faith in him and in Moses his servant." --Exod. 14:31
"They gathered, some more, some less, but when they measured it, those who had gathered more had not too much, and those who had gathered less had not too little. Each had just as much as he could eat." --Exod. 16:18
"It became full of maggots and stank." --Exod. 16:20
"How long will you refuse to obey my commands and instructions?" --Exod. 16:28