Moses and the story of Exodus

Now Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died. Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power in Egypt. Look, he said to his people, the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them, or they will become even more numerous. And if war breaks out, we'll join our enemies, fight against us, and leave the country. So they put slave masters over them, to oppress them with forced labor. And they built Peterhom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread. So the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites and worked them ruthlessly. Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people. Every Hebrew boy that is born, you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live. Now a man of the tribe of Levi married a Levite woman, and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months. But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and peach. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile. His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him. Then Pharaoh's daughter went down to the Nile to bathe, and her attendants were walking along the river bank. She saw the basket among the reeds and said they're a female slave to get it. She opened it and saw the baby. He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. This is one of the Hebrew babies, she said. Then his sister asked Pharaoh's daughter, shall I go and get one of the Hebrew women to nurse the baby for you? Yes, go, she answered. So the girl went and got the baby's mother. Pharaoh's daughter said to her, take this baby and nurse him for me, and I will pay you. So the woman took the baby and nursed him. When the child grew older, she took him to Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, saying, I drew him out of the water. One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. Looking this way and that, and seeing no one. He killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. When Pharaoh heard of this, he tried to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian, where he sat down by a well. During that long period, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned in their slavery and cried out, and their cry for help because of the slavery went up to God. God heard their groaning, and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them. Now Moses was sending the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. And he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire, it did not burn up. When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, Moses, Moses. And Moses said, Here I am. Do not come any closer, God said. Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground. Then he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. At this Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God. The Lord said, I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So now go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt? Moses said to God, Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you. And they ask me, What is his name? Then what shall I tell them? God said to Moses, I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites. I am has sent me to you. Moses answered, What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, The Lord did not appear to you? Then the Lord said to him, What is that in your hand? A staff, he replied. The Lord said, Throw it on the ground. Moses threw it on the ground, and it became a snake. And he ran from it. Then the Lord said to him, Reach out your hand and take it by the tail. So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake, and he turned back into a staff in his hand. This, said the Lord, is so that they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you. Moses said to the Lord, Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to a servant. I am slow of speech and tongue. But Moses said, Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else. Then the Lord's anger burned against Moses, and he said, What about your brother Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and he will be glad to see you. He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. The Lord said to Moses, When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. Afterward, Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and said, This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says. Let my people go, so that they may hold a festival to me in the wilderness. Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, and I will not let Israel go. Then they said, The God of the Hebrews has met with us. Now let us take a three-day journey into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God, or he may strike us with plagues or with the sword. But the king of Egypt said, Moses and Aaron, why are you taking the people away from their labor? Get back to your work. That same day, Pharaoh gave this order to the slave drivers and oversees in charge of the people. Make the work harder for the people Moses returned to the Lord and said, Why, Lord? Why have you brought trouble on these people? Is this why you send me? Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble on these people, and you have not rescued your people at all. Then the Lord said to Moses, Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh. Because of my mighty hand, he will let them go. Because of my mighty hand, he will drive them out of his country. Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant. But I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and though I multiply my signs and wonders in Egypt, he will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt, and with mighty acts of judgment, I will wring out my divisions, my people, the Israelites. And the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out of it. Now the Lord had said to Moses, I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and on Egypt. After that, he will let you go from here, and when he does, he will drive you out completely. Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month, each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household. Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and the tops of the door frames of the houses where they eat the lambs. That same night, they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire along with bitter herbs and bread made without yeast. This is how you are to eat it, with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste. It is the Lord's Passover. On that same night, I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals. And I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt. At midnight, the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on the throne to the firstborn of the prisoner who was in the dungeon and the firstborn of all the livestock as well. Pharaoh and all his officials got up during that night and there was loud wailing in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead. During the night, Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, Up, leave my people, you and the Israelites, go. Worship the Lord as you have requested. Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also, bless me. The time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years. At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord's divisions left Egypt. Then Moses said to the people, Commemorate this day, the day you came out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, because the Lord brought you out of it with a mighty hand. Eat nothing containing yeast. When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not leave them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, if they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt. So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt, ready for battle. By day, the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way, and by night, in a pillar of fire, to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night. Then the Lord said to Moses, Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp near Paya Hirot, between Migdol and the sea. They are to encamp by the sea, directly opposite Baal Zephon. Pharaoh would think, the Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert. When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about them and said, What have we done? We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services. So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him. The Egyptians, all Pharaoh's horses and chariots, horsemen and troops, pursued the Israelites and overtook them as they camped by the sea near Paya Hirot, opposite Baal Zephon. As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians marching after them. They were terrified and crying out to the Lord. They said to Moses, Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn't we say to you in Egypt, Leave us alone? Let us serve the Egyptians? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert. Moses answered the people, Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you. You need only to be still. Then the Lord said to Moses, Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on. Raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea. And all that night the Lord drove the sea back with the strongest wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground with a wall of water on their right and on their left. The Egyptians pursued them and all Pharaoh's horses and chariots and horsemen followed them into the sea. Then the Lord said to Moses, Stretch out your hand over the sea so that the waters may flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen. The water flowed back and covered the chariots and horsemen, the entire army of Pharaoh that had followed the Israelites into the sea. Not one of them survived. That day the Lord saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians and Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore. And when the Israelites saw the mighty hand of the Lord displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in him and in Moses, his servant. The whole Israelite community set out from Elam and came to the Desert of Sin, which is between Elam and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had come out of Egypt. In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The Israelites said to them, If only we had died by the Lord's hand in Egypt. There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death. So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, In the evening you will know that it was the Lord who brought you out of Egypt, and in the morning you will see the glory of the Lord because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we that you should grumble against us? Moses also said, You will know that it was the Lord when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you want in the morning because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us, but against the Lord. That evening a quail came and covered the camp, and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. When the dew was gone, thin flakes, like frost on the ground, appeared on the desert floor. When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, What is it? For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, It is the bread the Lord has given you to eat. This is what the Lord has commanded. Everyone is to gather as much as they need. Take an omer for each person you have in your tent. The Israelites did as they were told. Some gathered much, some little. The whole Israelite community set out from the desert of sin, traveling from place to place as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. So they quarreled with Moses and said, Give us water to drink. Moses replied, Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the Lord to the test? But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst? Then Moses cried out to the Lord, What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me. The Lord answered Moses, Go out in front of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink. So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. After they set out from Rephidim, they entered the desert of Sinai, and Israel camped there in the desert in front of the mountain. On the morning of the third day, there was thunder and lightning with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled. The Lord descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the top of the mountain. So Moses went up. And God spoke all these words, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above, or on the earth beneath, or in the waters below. You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Honor your father and your mother so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. Then the Lord said to Moses, Tell the Israelites this. You have seen for yourselves that I have spoken to you from heaven. Do not make any gods to be alongside me. Do not make for yourselves gods of silver or gods of gold. When the Lord finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the covenant law, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God. When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him. Then the Lord said to Moses, Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt. When Joshua heard the noise of the people shouting, he said to Moses, There is the sound of war in the camp. Moses replied, It is not the sound of victory. It is not the sound of defeat. It is the sound of singing that I hear. When Moses approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, his anger burned, and he threw the tablets out of his hands, breaking them to pieces at the foot of the mountain. He said to Aaron, What did these people do to you that you led them into such great sin? So Moses went back to the Lord and said, Oh, what a great sin these people have committed. They have made themselves gods of gold. But now please forgive their sin. But if not, then blot me out of the book you have written. The Lord replied to Moses, Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. Moses said to the Lord, You have been telling me, Lead these people, but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. You have said, I know you by name, and you have found favor with me. If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways, so I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people. The Lord said to Moses, Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. Then the Lord said, I am making a covenant with you. Before all your people, I will do wonders never before done in any nation in all the world. The people you live among will see how awesome is the work that I, the Lord, will do for you. Moses assembled the whole Israelite community and said to them, These are the things the Lord has commanded you to do. All who are skilled among you are to come and make everything the Lord has commanded. The tabernacle, with its tent and its covering, clasps, frames, crossbars, posts, and bases. The ark, with its poles and the atonement cover and the curtain that shields it. The table, with its poles and all its articles, and the bread of the presence. The lampstand, that is for light, with its accessories, lamps and oil for the light. The altar of incense, with its poles, the anointing oil and the fragrant incense. The curtain for the doorway at the entrance to the tabernacle. The altar of burnt offering, with its bronze grating, its poles and all its utensils. The bronze basin with its stand. The Israelites had done all the work just as the Lord had commanded Moses. Moses inspected the work and saw that they had done it just as the Lord had commanded. So Moses blessed them, covered the tent of Mithic. The glory of the Lord filled the tavern. So they set out from the mountain of the Lord and traveled for three days. The ark of the covenant of the Lord stood before them during those three days to find them a place to rest. The Lord said to Moses, Send some men to explore the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites. From each ancestral tribe, send one of its leaders. When Moses sent them to explore Canaan, he said, Go up through the Negev and on into the hill country. See what the land is like and whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many. How is the soil? Is it fertile or poor? Are there trees in it or not? Do your best to bring back some of the fruit of the land. At the end of the forty days, they returned from exploring the land. They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the desert of Paran. There they reported to them and to the whole assembly and showed them the fruit of the land. They gave Moses this account. We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey. Here is its fruit. Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it. But the men who have gone up with him said, We can't attack those people. They are stronger than we are. And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. That night, all the members of the community raised their voices and wept aloud. All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, If only we have died in Egypt or in this wilderness. Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn't it be better for us to go back to Egypt? And they said to each other, We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt. Then Moses and Aaron fell face down in front of the whole Israelite assembly gathered there. But the whole assembly talked about stoning them. Then the glory of the Lord appeared at the tenth of Midian to all the Israelites. The Lord said to Moses, How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me in spite of all the signs I have performed among them? I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them. But I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they. Moses said to the Lord, Then the Egyptians will hear about it. By your power, you brought these people up from among them. If you put all these people to death, leaving none alive, the nations who have heard this report about you will say, The Lord was not able to bring these people into the land He promised them on oath, so He slaughtered them in the wilderness. In accordance with your great love, forgive the sin of these people, just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now. The Lord replied, I have forgiven them as you asked. Nevertheless, as surely as I live, and as surely as the glory of the Lord fills the whole earth, not one of those who saw my glory and the signs I performed in Egypt and in the wilderness, but who disobeyed me and tested me ten times, not one of them will ever see the land I promised on oath to their ancestors. No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it. The Lord's anger burned against Israel, and He made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until the whole generation of those who had done evil in His sight was gone. In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses proclaimed to the Israelites all that the Lord had commanded him concerning them. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep His commands. Observe the commands of the Lord your God, walking in obedience to Him and revering Him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs gushing out into the valleys and hills. The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to Him. You are standing here in order to enter into a covenant with the Lord your God, a covenant the Lord is making with you this day and sealing with an oath to confirm you this day as His people, that He may be your God as He promised you and as He swore to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to Him, and to keep His commands, decrees, and laws. Then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. I am now a hundred and twenty years old, and I am no longer able to lead you. The Lord has said to me, You shall not cross the Jordan. Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the presence of all Israel, Be strong and courageous, for you must go with these people into the land that the Lord swore to the ancestors to give them, and you must divide it among them as their inheritance. The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you. He will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid. Do not be discouraged. Then Moses climbed Mount Nebo from the plains of Moab to the top of Pisgah, across from Jericho. There the Lord showed him the whole land from Gilead to Dan. Then the Lord said to him, This is the land I promised on oath to Abram, Isaac, and Jacob when I said, I will give it to your descendants. I have let you see it with your eyes, but you will not cross over into it. And Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in Moab, as the Lord had said. He buried him in Moab, in the valley opposite Beth-Peor. But to this day, no one knows where his grave is. Since then, no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. For with all those signs and wonders the Lord sent him to do in Egypt to Pharaoh and to all his officials and to his own land. For no one has ever shown the mighty power or performed the awesome deeds that Moses did in the sight of all Israel.