The Bible does not give a precise date for the exodus from Egypt. The text never names any of the pharaohs involved. Biblical scholars are divided between two possible dates. The early date would place the exodus about 1446 BC, based on 1 Kings 6:1, which says the dedication of the temple (966 BC) occurred 480 years after the exodus. However, the number 480 may be symbolic, as Hebrews thought certain numbers has special significance, especially 40 and 12 (which multiplied gives 480). It may refer more loosely to 12 generations rather than a precise time. The late date falls during the reign of Rameses II after 1279 BC; one of the cities the Israelites helped to build was named Rameses (Ex. 1:11). Also the people of Moab and Edom, which Numbers 20 says opposed Israel, did not exist as nations until the 13^th century. We have found no archeological remains to settle the question.

Pictured here is the stele (historical marker) of Pharaoh Merneptah, son of Rameses the Great, who ruled over Egypt in the late 13th century BC. The Merneptah Stele is significant to biblical archaeologists because it is the earliest extra-biblical reference to the nation of Israel yet to be discovered. The mention of Israel in the land of Canaan is very short; it simply says, “Israel is laid waste, its seed is not.” Nevertheless, despite its brevity, the reference is very telling. It indicates that at the time the inscription was engraved, the nation of Israel was significant enough to be included by name among the other major city-states which were defeated by Merneptah in the late 13th century BC. From the Cairo Museum.

Exodus picks up the story of Israel several centuries after the end of Genesis. The text says that this Pharaoh did not remember Joseph or what he did for Egypt. Jacob’s descendants are now a large population whom the Egyptians fear might revolt against them, so they have enslaved them to build great cities.

The Hebrew midwives stand up to Pharaoh in an act of civil disobedience, obeying the laws of God rather than man. Note that the midwives are named in the text, but not Pharaoh. God honors those who serve Him, rather than the powerful in the eyes of the world.

God provides a deliverer with the birth of Moses. His Egyptian name means “drawn from the water” as a reminder of his rescue in the basket. The text does not indicate that God led Pharaoh’s daughter to this spot, but God can use even unbelievers to fulfill His purposes.

Moses’ sister Miriam is not named until 15:20.

As an adult, Moses kills an Egyptian and flees to Midian in the Sinai peninsula east of Egypt. God hears the cries of his people and tells Moses that he is the one to confront Pharaoh, telling him to let the people go.

Mt. Horeb, “the mountain of God,” is the same as Mt. Sinai (Deut. 4:10). The precise location of the mountain on which Moses met God is unknown, but the general region possibly lies in the south of the Sinai peninsula (modern day Saudi Arabia).

When he nears the bush that burns but isn’t consumed, Moses hears a voice, saying he must take off his sandals for this is holy ground. The word holy means sanctified or set apart by God for special use or service. A Jewish family would set aside special candlesticks for the Sabbath. Christians are called holy, not in the sense that we are morally perfect (“holier than thou”), but that God has set us apart from the world for a special purpose (1 Corinthians 1:2). God’s calling makes us holy, not our own actions.

God tells Moses to explain to the people that “I am” has sent him. The name Yahweh, which God reveals to Moses in 3:15 and 6:3, is a form of the Hebrew verb “to be.” God is the one who exists and gives life to everything. Only He exists within Himself, depending on no other source of power. In many English Bibles, Yahweh is translated as LORD (all caps).

Almighty God calls a weak man to do an extraordinary thing. Moses is full of excuses, but God ultimately says – “Moses, this isn’t about you. It is about me! I am the great I AM.” God permits Moses to have his brother Aaron speak for him.

God gives Moses miraculous signs to prove that he is from God. Two of these signs he later demonstrates before Pharaoh: the staff becoming a serpent, and the water turning to blood. The text never says if he used the sign of leprosy.

In 4:21 God says that he will harden Pharaoh’s heart against letting the people go. This raises a difficult question: did Pharaoh never have a chance to accept God’s message and obey Him? Did God condemn Pharaoh beforehand in an act of predestination?

Notice that the text says that Pharaoh hardened his own heart several times (8:15, 32; 9:34). Perhaps an illustration will help to explain. If Tom says, “Bill makes me so mad!” we understand that Bill isn’t manipulating Tom’s emotions in some mysterious way, so that Tom’s anger is beyond his control. Something Bill does causes Tom to react in a negative way.

In a similar way, God’s command to let his people go challenged Pharaoh’s authority, which the Egyptians believed derived from their gods. Egyptians believed that Pharaoh represented a god on earth. The presence of the one true God and His mighty power caused Pharaoh to harden his heart in stubborn refusal to admit a Being greater than himself. In this sense, God’s actions hardened Pharaoh’s heart, without assuming that God had taken away Pharaoh’s free will.

Throughout the Bible, God gives men and women a choice to follow Him: “Now choose life, so that you and your children may live, and that you may love the Lord your God” (Deut 30:19-20). “Choose this day whom you will serve … but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15). “They hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord” (Proverb 21:9). “If any man chooses to do God’s will, he will know of my teaching, whether it is from God or whether I speak for myself” (John 7:17).

The Statue of Moses is by Michelangelo

& Read Exodus 5-13

Moses initially requests that the people be allowed to leave temporarily to worship in the desert. Pharaoh fears they will not return. He thinks they are lazy and makes their work even harder by ordering them to collect their own straw for bricks. The people complain that Moses has made their lives worse, not better, and in turn, Moses complains to God: "You have not rescued your people at all." But God confirms his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give their descendants the land of Canaan.

Pharaoh’s magicians could duplicate the serpent from the staff and the two plagues of blood and frogs, but not the gnats (one wonders where the magicians got their water, as the text says that all the water, even in buckets and jars, had turned to blood). Perhaps these were mere tricks, or perhaps power from Satan to confront God; the text does not say. They could duplicate the plagues but not reverse them -- which would have been more helpful to Pharaoh; they didn’t need more frogs! Usually frogs were a good sign, as it meant that harvest time had come. But in this case they were too much of a good thing.

As the plagues grow worse, Pharaoh tries to negotiate with God. He will allow the men to leave but not their families, to ensure that they will return. Then he says that they must leave their livestock. But unlike the time when God allowed Abraham to negotiate the rescue of Sodom, God is in no mood to bargain with Pharaoh.

Ex. 12:12 says that God sent the plagues to “bring judgement against all the gods of Egypt.” Several of the plagues appear to strike at specific gods and question their power. The Nile was the lifeblood of Egypt, sometimes called the blood of Osiris, god of the underworld; thus it is fitting that the Nile turned to blood. Heqt was a frog-headed goddess, but could not control the second plague. Sehkmet (lion) protected her followers from epidemics, but she could not stop the death of the livestock, nor could Hathor (cow). The ninth plague, darkness, blotted out the sun, worshipped as Ra or Amun-Ra. The jackal-headed Anubis, lord of embalming, did not prevent the death of the first born.

Osiris               Sehkmet                Hathor

   Amun-Ra                     Ra                            Anubis

Note that God protected his people from the plagues. Even darkness did not cover the land of Goshen where the Israelites lived, indicating that this was not a natural phenomenon such as an eclipse.

You should learn the ten plagues in order for the exam.

The Passover bread was unleavened for two reasons; they were in a hurry to leave, and leaven was a symbol of impurity to the Jews.

Lamb's blood on the doorposts was a sign for the angel of death to pass over the house. In 1 Corinthians 5:7, Paul describes Jesus as our Passover lamb, whose blood causes God to overlook our sins. Just as Israelites remembered their salvation from Egypt by eating the Passover, Christians today eat the Lord's supper in memory of Jesus' sacrifice. The original Last Supper given by Jesus for his disciples was in fact a Passover meal.

The month of Aviv (Abib) falls around the end of March or first of April.

& Read Exodus 14-17, 19-20

The Greek translation of the OT called the place of crossing the Red Sea, but the Hebrew actually says, “sea of reeds,” possibly one of the fresh water lakes above the Gulf of Suez. In any event it was deep enough to drown the Egyptian army.

Egyptian chariots held two people, the driver and an archer and were very deadly on the battlefield. No wonder the Israelites panicked when they saw six hundred of them coming after them.

An Egyptian chariot from the Museum of Cairo

http://touregypt.net/featurestories/chariots.htm

Even after God rescues them by a spectacular miracle (one of my all-time favorite movie scenes from The Ten Commandments), the people begin complaining almost immediately. Despite their ingratitude, God continues to provide them what they need. He provides fresh water from bitter, and sends quail and manna. Manna sounds like the Hebrew words "man hu" meaning "What is this?" (16:15). Notice that they were not to hoard the food, as any leftovers would spoil. Perhaps this is a lesson for us today, on how we should not seek to keep more possessions than we need. Our lives should not focus on accumulating things.

The Amalekites were descendants of Esau and continued to be an adversary of Israel.

First mention of Joshua in 17:14.

For the exam you should learn the Ten Commandments in correct order.

& Read Exodus 32

In this story notice how Aaron refuses to take responsibility for his actions; he claims that once he threw the gold into the fire, a golden calf simply "came out." This shifting of responsibility for sin resembles the excuses that Adam and Even made: "The woman gave it to me" ... "The serpent told me to do it."

The shameful episode of the Golden Calf represents the theme we see throughout Exodus:  the contrast between God’s faithfulness and Israel’s faithlessness. After reading about God's performing numerous wonders on behalf of his people, we may shake our heads in disbelief at their willingness to abandon the living God for a dead idol. However, the Bible tells us that idols do not have to be physical objects, that any thing or attitude that takes priority over God becomes an idol for us.

Today many of us worship at the altar of materialism, as our culture tells us that we can never have enough. We must buy the latest gadgets or clothes or fads, even as our closets and shelves are already full of things we don't use. In Colossians 3:5, Paul calls greed idolatry. Individualism has become an idol in our society. We insist on our right to do what we want, our right to protest, to smoke, to own a gun, to have an abortion, to sue anyone who offends us. Christianity stands in sharp contrast to this attitude, calling us to consider our responsibilities toward others more important than fighting for our own rights. Until we rid our lives of these idols, we should not criticize the Israelites for theirs.

The Tabernacle

The remaining chapters of Exodus describe the design and building of the Tabernacle. This was not a place where people gather to worship like a church, . Only priests could enter the Tabernacle itself, and only the high priest could enter the Holy of Holies where the Ark of the Covenant rested. A veil separated this inner sanctuary from the rest of the Tabernacle. The Tabernacle was primarily a physical sign of the presence of God, dwelling in the midst of His people.

Priests offered daily sacrifices on behalf of the people. Later, when Israel had a king, he would perform certain rites on their behalf. On festival days such as Passover, the people would gather around the Tabernacle, but not inside it.

From the illustration below, be familiar with the major items inside the Tabernacle.

illustration from The Old Testament Today, John H. Walton and Andrew Hill, 2004.

The Ark of the Covenant contained the Ten Commandments, a jar of manna (Ex. 16:33), and Aaron’s rod that miraculously budded (Numbers 17:10; Hebrews 9:4). No one could touch the Ark because of its holiness. Priests carried it by poles inserted in rings on the side.

Here is a Christian artist's concept of what the ark might have looked like.  Mr. Comstock imagines that the Hebrew artisans would have been influenced by their time in Egypt and has painted his Ark in an Egyptian style.     Copyright  2001 by Chester Comstock   http://www.artsales.com/comstock/ark/

The lid on the Ark was decorated with two cherubim with wings outspread. On the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), the high priest would enter the Holy of Holies and sprinkle blood from the sacrifice onto the lid, indicating that God had forgiven the sins of the people.

In the NT, the Greek word for this lid, hilasterion, became the word used for atonement, as Jesus’ blood washes away our sins today. An early translator of the Bible into English, William Tyndale coined the term atonement,  “at-one-ment” to mean being reconciled to God, being "at one with God."

In the NT, Hebrews 10:4 says that "it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins." These sacrifices for Israel were temporary and ultimately pointed toward a final fulfillment in the death of Christ for us: "We have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all" (10:10).

As a perfect being, God represents both perfect mercy and perfect justice. If God merely dismissed our sin, then He would be merciful but not just. In Romans 3:25-6 Paul argues that in order for God to be both just and the justifier of the faithful, the price of sin had to be paid by someone. Jesus willingly took our sins and our punishment upon himself; he "became sin for us" (2 Cor 5:21).

We see the background for this concept of suffering in the place of someone else in Isa 53:4-6: “Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

The amazing thing is that God in His mercy decided to place the punishment on His Son, rather than on us. That's the meaning of forgiveness, the “amazing” part of grace. Simply saying “I forgive you” wouldn't have cost God anything. That kind of forgiveness is easy, with no consequences for anyone. The gospel says that forgiveness cost God His only beloved son, making grace priceless.