Genesis II  

I feel like I could take another week to reflect on Genesis, but it is time for the sequel: Genesis II: The Reckoning. Also known as Exodus. I can already tell this book is very much a sequel to Genesis, involving how God continues his plan to fulfill his covenant with Abraham's family (they will be a great nation, they will possess the land of Canaan, and all nations will be blessed through them).

I can also tell it's a different literary style than a lot of Genesis. It is much more of a fast-moving story, in which all the parts have a purpose and work towards the main points. Often Genesis would seem to go off on tangents about where certain nations came from and the like that didn't seem to fit the main flow all that well.

We have a few important characters introduced: Moses, his brother Aaron, the Pharaoh they deal with, and the people of Israel family, which have multiplied and become numerous.

Summary

The first two pages were mainly background and set up, sort of a "here's what happened since the end of Genesis" type of thing. The Israelites do become very numerous and become slaves in Egypt.

Moses, a Hebrew, is born and raised by Pharaoh's daughter, escaping a scheme to kill all Hebrew male babies. Moses demonstrates a hunger for justice that ends up forcing him to run away from Egypt.

Pharaoh eventually dies and meanwhile the Israelites are crying out for help. God hears them and remembers his covenant with Abraham (see, it's a sequel) and his concern for them is noted. That's the setup, the background info for Exodus. Then the action starts.

God goes to work right away by appearing to Moses in the form of a burning bush. He talks to Moses and says a few things: He does see the misery of the Israelites, he is coming down to rescue them, and he is sending Moses.

Moses wonders how he could be part of such a plan, and who to tell the Israelites this God is.

God says he will be with Moses and will grant him success, and his name is I AM, The LORD. He says to tell the Israelite elders The LORD is coming to save them and give them Canaan, and to ask Pharaoh for some time off. God predicts that Pharaoh won't let them go, so God will do wonders and then they'll be able to go, and they'll go away rich.

Moses is worried the Israelites won't believe him, so God gives him some signs, one including Moses' staff turning into a snake. Moses is still worried because he doesn't speak well, so God provides again by suggesting Moses' brother Aaron do the speaking. Once Moses is on his way back to Egypt, God appears one more time and lets him know that when Pharaoh says "NO" God will strike down his firstborn son.

The importance of circumcision is briefly referenced, and the Moses and Aaron tell the Israelites what's up. They agree and worship The LORD.

But when Moses and Aaron request time off from Pharaoh, he remarks that the Israelites are just lazy, and that he doesn't know this "The LORD" they are talking about. Instead of giving them time off he makes their work much harder, and the Israelites despise Moses for it.

Moses goes to God and complains, thinking the whole thing is useless. But God reiterates that he is the same God of Abraham, The LORD, although he hadn't told them his name. He references his covenant to give them Canaan, and he says he will make them his nation. He says he will do it by his mighty hand. When Moses reports this to the Israelites, they aren't so excited anymore, because of the extra work it got them last time.

God tells Moses to go talk to Pharaoh about it again, but Moses complains that it won't do any good.

Analysis

Wow, there's a whole lot to take in here. First off, like I said at the beginning of the post, this is very much the sequel to Genesis, with God mentioning his covenant with Abraham many times. It is very clear that this is the same God, which means he's trustworthy and powerful and good. He says his name this time: The LORD.

A big contrast with Abraham's story, though, is that no one is giving God the benefit of the doubt. In Genesis, Abraham and Jacob did doubt God's power to fulfill his promises, but they still worshiped God over and over and trusted him for many things. God brought them to a place of trust by the end of their stories.

In Exodus, no one seems to understand how powerful and active God is. Where Abraham didn't hesitate to get up and move, Moses has all kinds of complaints right away, complaints that directly contradict what God says.

Pharaoh says he doesn't know anything about God, contrasting what Abraham's neighbors would say (they saw how blessed by God he was). And when times get rough the Israelites and Moses totally turn on what God has to say, even though God predicted it would go down exactly like it does go down.

Nevertheless, God is determined to hold up his part of the covenant with Abraham's family, and maintains that he will somehow bring Israel out of Egypt and giving them Canaan.

Response

The Israelites, despite being very numerous, have fallen on some hard times. Meanwhile, God is not known at all in the way he was in Genesis. In Genesis, everyone saw all the time God's work in Abraham's family's life. Moses and the Israelites have no patience at all and it seems God has to start all over again in this human character development thing. They do not trust God like Abraham and Jacob and Jacob's sons did at the ends of their lives.

Meanwhile, I, the reader, have tons of confidence that God will come through because it's clear this is the same God in Genesis and he created earth, helped Sarah have a kid in her old age, etc. The question is, how long is it going to take Moses, the Israelites, and Pharaoh to figure this out?