Abstract
The Biblical Book of Exodus is the narrative version of the great transformation from polytheism to Biblical monotheism in the Ancient World. The interest of the story, in which ancient Egypt plays such an important and sinister role, lies not in what really happened but how, by whom, when, in which form, and for what purpose it was told in the course of millennia. The story is about the revolutionary birth of both a people and a religion. It has a political and a religious aspect and both aspects are inseparably linked. It is a story of liberation (from Egypt) and to commitment (to “Law” and covenant)—from Egyptian slavery to Divine service. It involves a great amount of violence that is both of a political nature (Egyptian oppression of the Israelites, the “plagues” against the Egyptians) and of a religious one (the massacre after the cult of the Golden Calf)—the “founding violence” that typically accompanies the birth of something radically new.
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Notes
- 1.
The earliest exact quote is attributed to Cicero by Aquinas, Sum. Theol. II-I:Q7:3; cf. Cicero, De inv. 1.27 [1:41].
- 2.
For the textual history of Exodus cf., e.g., Schmid 1999.
- 3.
If those Biblical scholars are right who date the Song of the Sea (Exod 15) to a very early date (ninth century BC and earlier), because of its highly archaic language, this poem should count for the oldest allusion to the Exodus myth.
- 4.
Both images, by the way, come from the Egyptian and Babylonian imagery of sacred kingship. In Egypt, Pharaoh is held to be the son of god and in Babylonia, the king is wedded to the divine world by a hieros gamos.
- 5.
- 6.
Ronald Hendel points out to me that even in the Code of Hammurapi the (secular) law receives a divine foundation since the king is shown before Shamash, the god of the sun and of justice to whom he is responsible. However, Hammurapi, not Shamash, acts as legislator here, whereas in the torah the laws are given by Yahweh, not by Moses. Hammurapi is bound to formulate his laws in conformity with the divine idea of justice, whereas Moses is bound to promulgate the divine laws in conformity with Yahweh’s dictation.
- 7.
Up to this point, the monotheism of faithfulness as propagated by the early prophets was just a—much contested—minority position within a generally syncretistic Israel worshipping other gods (Ba'alîm and Asherôth) besides Yahweh. Only among the exile community did it achieve a position of dominance.
- 8.
See also Bernhard Lang, Buch der Kriege, 10–13; 45–47. The late date of the patriarch stories vis à vis the Exodus story follows from the scarcity of references to Abraham outside the book of Genesis.
- 9.
The Mishnaic collection of proverbs Pirqê Avôt has in its 5th section a collection of decades, three of which occur in the Exodus narrative: the ten plagues, ten commandments, and ten cases of “murmuring” of the people during their wandering in the wilderness.
- 10.
Quoted and translated after Otto 1999: 82.
- 11.
Deuteronomy is especially rich in passages that bespeak the anxiety of forgetting through the change of place, e.g.: “Take heed to thyself that thou forget not the Lord thy God, so as not to keep his commands, and his judgments, and ordinances, which I command thee this day: lest when thou hast eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt in them; … thou shouldest be exalted in heart, and forget the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.” (Deut 8:11–14)
- 12.
I am using the Hebrew-German edition Die Pessach Haggada (Shire et al. 1998). Translations mine.
- 13.
Ad of the journal Tikkun in New York Times of March 22, 2002.
- 14.
Herût “freedom“ is not a Biblical term. The Bible uses the word avodah “service” both for the Egyptian serfdom and for the service of God. It opposes the liberating service of God and the oppressive service of Pharaoh.
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Assmann, J. (2015). Exodus and Memory. In: Levy, T., Schneider, T., Propp, W. (eds) Israel's Exodus in Transdisciplinary Perspective. Quantitative Methods in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-04768-3_1
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