Shemot – Torah with Joseph

Read the transcript below, or watch a video of the teaching by Joseph Shulam.

Shalom. My name is Joseph Shulam. And together with Brad TV, we are doing a series of all the weekly portions of reading that are read in all the synagogues around the world, including in our synagogue in Jerusalem, a synagogue of Jewish disciples of Yeshua. And we just finished the book of Genesis. We're starting the book of Exodus. And this is the first portion of the book of Exodus. And it's called in Hebrew Shemot, which means “the names.”

And the books of the Bible in English follow the Greek Septuagint, which gave the books a logical name. The Hebrew text doesn't have names and doesn't have chapters and doesn't have verses in the ancient Hebrew text. In the modern Hebrew text, there is everything. But the names remain the first word of the texts. It's not logical. The book of Exodus is logical, it talks about the Exodus of the children of Israel from Egypt. In Hebrew it is called “the names” because these are the names of the children of Israel who came down to Egypt.

Joseph was a big shot in Egypt and he invited his brothers and his father and his family to come down to Egypt and they came down to Egypt and Pharaoh gave them the best part of Egypt, the land of Goshen, to live in. Then years passed, more than 100 years for sure, and a new Pharaoh came, several Pharaohs past through the rulership of Egypt. And the first thing we know after the names of the 12 tribes are named is that Joseph dies in verse six of chapter one and all of his brothers died, that whole generation that came down to Egypt, and the children of Israel grow. Verse seven of chapter one,

The Children of Israel Grew

That's good news. Children of Israel grew. And the word that is used in the Hebrew is very interesting. In verse seven, they multiplied and they spawned like a fish spawns, like a frog spawns. They increased greatly and became very powerful. So I learned from my father, that was the generation of World War II. He was born before World War I, he was born in 1906. So as a teenager, he experienced World War I. And then as an adult, he experienced World War II. And his conclusion was Jews should live in the land that God gave them in the land of Israel and not get involved in the lands of the Gentiles.

It's not healthy for Jews to be involved in the politics and in the power struggle in the land of the Gentiles. That was his conclusion from his experience in the two World Wars. They should stick to business, they should stick to their own communities and not get involved in the politics of the world. I don't know if he was right or wrong, but this text in the book of Exodus tells us that when they grew, the Egyptians and Pharaoh himself start feeling threatened. What would happen with these people that have a different allegiance to ours, to the Egyptians? If we have an enemy from the outside, will they join that enemy? Will they be a fifth column?

And that's what starts the saga of the slavery of the children of Israel that lasted around 200 years in Egypt. Maybe more than 200 years of slavery. After the 200 years that they were in the land of Goshen and enjoyed the wealth of Egypt, and as they grew, they became a potential threat to the Egyptians and to the Egyptian government and to the pharaohs. And then verse 10 of the book of Exodus, Pharaoh comes in and says,

Fear of the Power of the Hebrews Leads to Their Enslavement

That fear, that fear of the power of the children of Israel, in the diaspora of Egypt, spawns the idea of making the Hebrews into slaves. And they put over the children of the Hebrews,

The Egyptians were in dread of the children of Israel. So here we are, the children of Israel are in bondage in the land of Egypt and the Egyptians dread them and they work hard in servitude and rigor according to the book of Exodus chapter one, verse 14. And they continue multiplying. So there has to come now some kind of measure that the Egyptians will slow down the growth of the Hebrews and they appoint midwives to control the birth rate. And that is killing every baby that is a male baby.

They appoint these midwives, Shifra and Puah. And these midwives, it's not clear whether they're Egyptians or they're Hebrew women, it's not clear, but whatever they are, it doesn't make any difference. They don't obey Pharaoh. They allow some of the male children of the Hebrews to live and Pharaoh comes in and complains about them. And they said, look, the Hebrew women are quick. By the time we get to them to help them give birth, boom, the baby's are out already, we can't do anything about it. It's a good excuse.

Moses is Born

The scene changes and goes from the midwives and their discussion of the Hebrew women to the birth of a baby in the house of Levi. That's in chapter two of Exodus. And a man of the house of Levi went and took as a wife the daughter of Levi. So the woman conceived and bore a son and once she saw that he was a beautiful child, she hid him three months. But once you could no longer hide him, she took an ark, a basket, covered it with pitch, made it waterproof, put the baby inside because he was already three months old, he was beginning to cry, we was beginning to sound off.

You can't hide him. And of course it endangered the whole family if he found that this baby was born during the time when every male baby of the Hebrews was to be drowned in the river then the whole family would pay the price. So she puts this baby in the basket. Boom. She floats the basket in the Nile River. And then the scene changes. The daughter of Pharaoh, we don't know her name, goes down to the river to bathe. That's chapter two, verse five.

And of course she's the princess, the daughter of Pharaoh, she has an entourage. She has handmaids there to serve her, to hold her towel, to hold her clothes, to help scrub her back, to do whatever is necessary when she bathes in the river, the Nile.

But strange text. Most people don't pay attention to this. She goes into the river in verse five to bathe. Her handmaids walked along the riverside and once she saw the ark among the reeds, she sent her handmaid to get it. Okay, this is strange text. The daughter of Pharaoh, the princess, goes into the river, into the Nile River by herself and her handmaids are out on the shore. They don't go in the water with her? What kind of thing is that? If they're there to protect her and to help her bathe, why is she going to the river by herself?

Why Does Pharaoh’s Daughter Bathe Alone?

To this question that Christians don't ask rabbinical Jews asked. What is this? That the daughter of Pharaoh goes down with her handmaids, we don't know how many there were, and they stay out in the shore and she goes into the water herself to bathe? Unlikely. Unless, she goes down to bathe a ritual bath. A mikvah. Unless she has accepted the faith of the Hebrews and she goes there during the time of the month to be purified.

Yes. Yes, dear brothers. That's how the rabbis interpret this text. She converted to Judaism. And what is in support of this view is when she sees the child, the baby, a Hebrew baby, boom, she opens the basket, she looks at the baby and says, oh, this is a Hebrew baby. How would you know that? She's the princess. She lives in the palace. She's not mixing with the slaves. She's not mixing with the slaves, the community of the enslaved Hebrews in the land of Egypt.

How would she know that this is a Hebrew baby? Unless she knows something about the Hebrews. And how would she know about the Hebrews if she did not identify with them and probably convert to believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and observed the purity laws. That's why she goes down in the river by herself and her handmaids stay out on the shore walking around watching her. So here she finds a Hebrew baby and she wants that Hebrew baby. But in the meantime, Miriam, that older sister of Moses, is up on the shore observing what is happening, following the ark along the shores of the Nile River.

And once she sees the daughter of Pharaoh finding the basket with the baby inside floating in the Nile she goes and says, oh, well, maybe you'd be interested in a wet nurse to come and nurse this baby since the daughter of Pharaoh was not married and since she didn't have milk to give. So Miriam offers help. She offers somebody that will nurse that baby. And of course, who comes to nurse that baby? Moses' own mother, Jochebed.

Yes. And so it's all arranged you could say by the hands of God. You could say by the partnership of the hands of God, with the intervention of men. And that baby's raised in the palaces of Pharaoh as the grandson of Pharaoh. We don't know how Pharaoh reacted when his daughter brings in a baby into the palace. And she knows it's a Hebrew baby, I don't know if Pharaoh knew it was a Hebrew baby or didn't know it was a Hebrew baby. But he accepts his daughter's decision and respects her desire.

And that baby grows up as the prince of Egypt in the palaces of the Pharaohs and whoever has visited Karnak, Heliopolis, and the other great cities of ancient Egypt, knows that the palaces of the pharaohs were sumptuous, were beautiful, were huge, were rich and powerful. Egypt was the most powerful empire of that day. That ruled from Tunisia on the shores of the Mediterranean all the way down to past Lake Victoria in Africa.

So about a good third of all of Africa was in the empire of Egypt. So there we are. Moses grows up there. And he is now 40 years old. Educated as an Egyptian. Ate, lived, dressed as an Egyptian in the house of Pharaoh. But suddenly, in verse 10 of chapter two, we find the following text.

Moses Sees Slave Being Beaten

Oh, wow. Look, dear brothers and sisters, this prince of Egypt, 40 years old, he knows who he is. In this text, verse 11, chapter two of Exodus, we know he already knew who he was. He knew that these slaves that are being beaten and worked into slavery to their bone are his brothers, are his brethren. But it took him 40 years to realize that. It took him 40 years to feel that he belongs to them. That they belong to him. And then he goes down to them and the English says, he went out to his brethren. In the Hebrew, he went down to his brethren. And he sees an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his brethren, he identifies with this Hebrew that is being beaten by the Egyptian slave driver.

And he looked this way and that way, in other words, he knew what he was doing. He looked to the right, he looked to the left, he saw there's nobody watching so Boom! He hits that Egyptian, he kills him. Frees the slave. Sends him home. And when the second day, behold, the Hebrew men were fighting, two Hebrews were fighting. And he sees one striking the others and he sees that it is wrong. He comes to separate the two Hebrews that are fighting with each other and one of them says, "Who made you prince and judge over us? Do you intend to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?" In other words, the news, the secret, went viral in the Hebrew community. The prince of Egypt killed an Egyptian for our sake. And now they know.

Look, I'm going to be frank with you, dear brothers and sisters, it's hard to keep a secret in Israel. Now, just as then. We're people who like to share good news and sometimes even bad news. It's hard to keep a secret in Israel. And so Moses realizes that his identity has been compromised. His position as prince of Egypt has been compromised and that if he has to stand trial before Pharaoh, all of his history will be exposed and that will finish his career and bring punishment on the Hebrews in general. So he runs away to the desert, to the Sinai desert. And there he meets a priest of Midian and he falls in love with his daughter or marries his daughter.

Her name is Zipporah and she was drawing water, he saw her and he becomes a shepherd serving the prince of Midian. Now, one thing that we don't know from this text, we know from other text, is that the Egyptians hated shepherds. Being a shepherd was the lowest possible occupation in Egypt. So Moses from the princehood of Pharaoh's house ends up being a servant of a pagan priest named Jethro, named Hobab, he's got several names.

Moses and the Burning Bush

And I'm going to jump a little bit of the text. He has children from Zipporah and then while shepherding, he's out on the mountain of Sinai and he's in the mountain of Sinai and there chasing after a sheep, he sees a burning bush that is burning, burning, burning, and not being devoured. And God reveals himself to Moses. God reveals himself to Moses and asks him to go on a mission. The mission is, dear brothers and sisters, go down to Pharaoh and tell him to let my people go. Deliver my people.

Of course, Moses doesn't want to go. Moses is impressed by the burning bush enough, but he doesn't want to go down to Egypt because he killed a person there and he's afraid of what's going to happen to him if he goes down to Egypt. And he finds excuses. One of his major excuses. I stutter, I can't speak clearly. Send somebody else. God is as stubborn as Moses. And he doesn't let Moses get off the hook so easily. And Moses argues and God argues with him. It's a very interesting discussion between God and Moses.

But in the end, of course, who wins? God wins. God wins with an argument that we find in chapter four of the book of Exodus. Moses says I can't express myself right. And God says, "Who do you think made your mouth?" You think I don't know who you are? I don't know your capacities? Here. You have a stick in your hand. Let me show you what I can do. Throw the stick down.

Chapter four. And Moses throws the stick down, it becomes a snake. Depends how you interpret the word. It becomes an alligator, it becomes a snake, it becomes a vicious animal. And then God says to Moses, pick it up from the tail. Which anybody knows that if you pick up a snake or an alligator from the tail, he's going to turn around and bite you. And Moses has to be obedient. He picks it up from the tail, it becomes a stick again. And God says here is one sign. You go down to Pharaoh, you have the power. I'm giving you the tools to face Pharaoh and his wise men.

Let My People Go

And tell Pharaoh let my people go. This is not a small thing. Moses, with a stick and a stutter, goes down to Egypt. On the way, there's all kinds of problems that he faces. But the big news is that in the end Moses gives in to God with his stick and with his stutter and God provides him with Aaron, his brother, to be his mouthpiece. Aaron, his brother, is his mouthpiece and he can speak and Moses is there with the power of God in him, with the mission of God in him.

And with his stick and he stutter, he faces Pharaoh and Pharaoh's wise man and they have some tricks also. But of course God's demonstration of power before Pharaoh and his wise men is much greater than that of the Egyptian magicians and wise man. This is the end of our portion of the week.

Next week, we'll see what happens in Egypt when Pharaoh refuses to let God's people go. God bless all of you. And read the text for yourselves every week. Read the texts for yourself. You'll gain so much more by reading for yourself than just hearing me. Thank God for Brad TV that he's using this opportunity to share from God's word things that will inspire you and empower you. In Yeshua's name, amen.