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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadGreater Men and Women of the Bible by James Hastings: 154. Before Pharaoh
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Before Pharaoh
Literature
Curtiss, S. I., Primitive Semitic Religion To-day (1902), 69.
Driver, S. R., The Book of Exodus (Cambridge Bible) (1911) li., 55, 405.
Foakes-Jackson, F. J., The Biblical History of the Hebrews (1903), 50.
Hull, E. L., Sermons, iii. 94.
Hyamson, M., The Oral Law (1910), 65.
McFadyen, J. E., The Messages of the Bible, iv. (1901) 52.
Maclaren, A., Expositions: Exodus, etc. (1906), 33.
McNeile, A. H., The Book of Exodus (Westminster Commentaries) (1908), 42.
Maspero, G., New Light on Ancient Egypt (1908), 221.
Montefiore, C. G., The Bible for Home Reading, i. (1896) 63.
Ottley, R. L., A Short History of the Hebrews (1901), 60.
Pearse, M. G., Moses: His Life and its Lessons (1894), 45.
Petrie, W. M. F., Researches in Sinai (1906), 35.
Smith, John, The Permanent Message of the Exodus (1895), 77.
Whitham, A. R., Old Testament History (1912), 77.
Biblical World, xxix. (1907) 383 (T. G. Soares).
Bibliotheca Sacra, lxv. (1908) 401, 611 (E. M. Merrins).
Upon Pharaoh, and upon all his servants.- Psa_135:9.
1. The picture of the departure of Moses from Midian is graphic. Moses takes his wife and his children-“his wife, whom he had won by his chivalrous attack on the Bedouin shepherds,” and the children born to him in his exile, and named in two opposite moods of sorrow and rejoicing-and he sets his wife upon his ass-“the ass,” the only beast of burden that he possesses-and places her infant son, or perhaps both her sons, in her arms, while, leaning on his staff, he manfully trudges by their side. It is no large cavalcade that goes forth, no company of camels with gay tassels and jingling bells, no troop of prancing horses, no pomp of chariots-one ass bears all the treasures of the man who will shortly beard the Pharaoh, and “spoil the Egyptians,” and come out of Egypt with much substance; and his treasure consists not in silver, or gold, or jewels, or rich raiment, but in the wife and little ones, which are all that Midian has given him.
As we contemplate the picture, our thoughts go forward to that other narrow household, which went from Palestine into Egypt in the days of Herod the Great (Mat_2:14), whose “flight” has been so often represented by painters; to Joseph trudging along the sandy path, supported by his staff, and Mary seated on the ass by his side, and pressing the young child to her bosom. Here the interest is concentrated on the aged man, there on the infant child; here danger is being fronted, there it is being escaped; but in both cases the journey is being undertaken at the express command of God, its outward circumstances are similar, and it is necessary for the accomplishment of God's purposes with respect to man. If Moses does not go into Egypt, there will be no deliverance of the fleshly Israel from their oppressors; if the “young child” be not carried out of the reach of Herod, there will be no deliverance of the spiritual Israel from sin and Satan.1 [Note: G. Rawlinson, Moses: His Life and Times, 81.]
2. Somewhere “in the mountain of God,” that is, in the higher hill country, Aaron and Moses met. “And the Lord said to Aaron, Go into the wilderness to meet Moses. And he went and met him in the mountain of God, and kissed him. And Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord wherewith he had sent him, and all the signs wherewith he had charged him. And Moses and Aaron went and gathered together all the elders of the children of Israel” (Exo_4:27-29).
The interchange of thought between the two brothers during their long journey from “the mountain of God” to Egypt led to a conviction, in which both shared, that, before any application could, with reasonable prospect of success, be made to Pharaoh, it was necessary that their mission should be fully acknowledged and accepted by the people of Israel. Of what avail would it be to contend with that mighty ruler, and gradually subdue his spirit, and overcome the proud resistance which he was sure to offer to their message, if at last, when the time came for action, the people should repudiate their leadership, and decline to move at their command? Practically, therefore, the first step to be taken was to secure the adhesion of the mass of the Israelites. For this purpose application was made, as God had Himself suggested (Exo_3:16), to “the elders of Israel”-that is, to those native officials who in different localities, exercised, and were allowed to exercise, a certain authority over the rest of their countrymen. In Oriental countries, an alien race dwelling among the ruling nation is almost always permitted to have its chiefs or head-men, who control it, act on its behalf, and are the means of communication between it and the government. Among the Israelites these persons would probably be “the chiefs of the fathers,” i.e., the hereditary heads of families. Moses and Aaron, though destitute of any legal right to convene a meeting of such persons, regarded it as morally within their competence to do so, and issued a summons, which was obeyed, to “all the elders of the children of Israel.”
3. “Afterwards,” as it is written,-with what interval we do not know-Moses and Aaron went on their solemn and important mission before Pharaoh. It was a daring thing for these two men to present themselves at all in the presence of Pharaoh, and much more so on such an errand. A man weak and capricious, arrogant, passionate, and cruel, he set himself on a level with the divinities of Egypt, and took their titles to himself. He was the Living One-the Giver of Life-the Gracious Lord-the Good God. And here before this haughty monarch in the midst of his courtiers came the representatives of these slaves with their demand. Brief and direct was the message they uttered, peremptory almost, and little in keeping with such language as Pharaoh alike demanded and received: “Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast unto me in the wilderness.”
Who are these whom God calls My People? Are not all people His, to hear Him and to obey? Must not all men render their account to Him? My people! We can think that haughty Egypt heard it and laughed aloud-“What, these wretched creatures that dare not call their lives their own! These slaves the chosen favourites of Heaven! No, no! If the gods care for any it is for kings, and for mighty men of valour, for the learned and the great. The mighty Pharaoh with his pomp and his palaces, and this proud nation-we are they in whom the gods delight.” My people! We can think the Israelites heard it and sighed-“Ah, if I were only one of them-alas, it is not for me to think of such a boast and blessedness.” We see the poor slave stand for a moment, lifting the lean and bruised body in the fierce heat of the sun; the fetter chafes his wrist; and now the taskmaster's whip falls upon his shoulders with a curse, “Ye are idle-ye are idle.” One of His people indeed! And sighing bitterly the Israelite turns to his burden. Blessed be God-He is not ashamed of His poor children. Ashamed! It is almost blasphemy to put it so far from the truth. No indeed, He stoopeth lowest for those that are lowest down. He cometh most gloriously for those that are the neediest. Never in the whole history of the world did He reveal Himself with such pomp and majesty as for these poor slaves. Of these it is that the word is spoken-“Let my people go, that they may serve me.”1 [Note: M. G. Pearse, Moses: His Life and its Lessons, 67.]
The poet Whittier, in the introduction he wrote to the Journal of John Woolman, says that the appalling magnitude of the evil of slavery, against which he felt himself especially called to contend, was painfully manifest to John Woolman. At the outset, all about him, in every department of life and human activity, in the state and the church, he saw evidences of its strength, and of the depth and extent to which its roots had wound their way among the foundations of society. Yet he seems never to have doubted for a moment the power of simple truth to eradicate it, nor to have hesitated as to his own duty in regard to it. There was no groping like Samson in the gloom: no feeling in blind wrath and impatience for the pillars of the temple of Dagon. “The candle of the Lord shone about him,” and his path lay clear and unmistakable before him. He believed in the goodness of God that leadeth to repentance; and that love could reach the witness for itself in the hearts of all men, through all entanglements of custom and every barrier of pride and selfishness. No one could have a more humble estimate of himself; but as he went forth on his errand of mercy he felt the Infinite Power behind him, and the consciousness that he had known a preparation from that Power “to stand as a trumpet through which the Lord speaks.” The event justified his confidence; wherever he went hard hearts were softened, avarice and love of power and pride of opinion gave way before his testimony of love.
When a deed is done for Freedom, through the broad earth's aching breast
Runs a thrill of joy prophetic, trembling on from east to west,
And the slave, where'er he cowers, feels the soul within him climb
To the awful verge of manhood, as the energy sublime
Of a century bursts full-blossomed on the thorny stem of Time.
Through the walls of hut and palace shoots the instantaneous throe,
When the travail of the Ages wrings earth's systems to and fro;
At the birth of each new Era, with a recognizing start,
Nation wildly looks at nation, standing with mute lips apart,
And glad Truth's yet mightier man-child leaps beneath the Future's heart.
We see dimly in the Present what is small and what is great,
Slow of faith how weak an arm may turn the iron helm of fate,
But the soul is still oracular; amid the market's din,
List the ominous stern whisper from the Delphic cave within,-
“They enslave their children's children who make compromise with sin.”
Slavery, the earth-born Cyclops, fellest of the giant brood,
Sons of brutish Force and Darkness, who have drenched the earth with blood,
Famished in his self-made desert, blinded by our purer day,
Gropes in yet unblasted regions for his miserable prey;-
Shall we guide his gory fingers where our helpless children play?1 [Note: J. R. Lowell, The Present Crisis.]
4. It was probably in an audience-room of some splendid palace where the lordly Pharaoh received deputations and embassies that they met him. How mixed must Moses' feelings have been, entering as a suppliant the precincts in which he had played no inconspicuous part in those buried years!
An Egyptian palace was explored for the first time in the winter of 1888-9 by Grébaut, then from 1900 the methodical clearing out was undertaken by an Englishman, Mr. Newbury, at the expense of R. de P. Tytus, an American. Now, after three years, many of the buildings of which it consisted have been dug out and its plan can be clearly distinguished. The few tourists whom curiosity takes there can study at their ease the favourite residence of Amenôthês iii., one of the most illustrious sovereigns of the eighteenth dynasty, and they can freely walk through the most private apartments, even those in which the queen shut herself up with the ladies of her suite. The buildings rose from alluvial earth covered by sand, but which was then well watered, and allowed the laying out of beautiful gardens on the edge of the desert. Towards the east could be seen the steep slopes and the peaked mountains of Libya, towards the west and south the fields and groves of the Theban plain; towards the north Amenôthês iii. saw the masonry of the funerary temple he was building, and above the line of the cornices the heads of the two colossi erected by his minister, Amenôthês, son of Hapouî, to his glory. The chapels of his predecessors retreated one behind the other to the entrance of the valley which leads to the tombs of the kings, and beyond the Nile, its feet bathed in the eddies of the stream, the Thebes of the living extended as far as the eye could reach; Luxor and its sanctuary faintly outlined. Ashiru with its high grey ramparts, Karnak with its silhouette indented with obelisks, closed the horizon.
Nothing in the aspect of the place authorizes us to conjecture exactly how the family and their servants distributed themselves through the palace, but we can distinguish the grand apartments from those used in everyday life. Two oblong, rectangular walls, supported by two parallel lines of columns, were evidently used as guard-rooms; there the crowd of courtiers and officers of the crown assembled, and on audience or festival days hierarchically took up their positions, each according to his rank. Foreign ambassadors waited there until the moment of offering the gifts or tributes of their masters; generals, on their return from a successful expedition, received there the reward of their victory. Important persons of Thebes and of the whole of Egypt paid homage there to Pharaoh with due eloquence and genuflexion. The semi-barbarous pomp of the Egyptian court pervaded the place with its contrasts of extreme refinement and African barbarity. It was displayed in garments of almost transparent lawn, and in skins of animals, in paint, in tattooing, in flowers in profusion, in strong perfumes on heads and bodies; perhaps solemn banquets were given there, and bestial feasting succeeded the interminable palavers in which sovereign and subjects exchanged the most extravagant compliments, like the negro or Malgache chiefs of our day.
An antechamber of modest dimensions led to the private cabinet of Amenôthês iii. Persons admitted to the honour of the royal presence suddenly saw before them, framed by two columns of painted wood, the dais on which the Majesty of the Living Horus deigned to reveal himself to them, and, set off against the semi-darkness, the luminous figure of Pharaoh. It appeared to them like a sacred image, in the stiff attitude of sovereignty, immovable, the eyes fixed, symbolical diadems on the forehead, the sceptre and anserated cross in the hands, all shining with gold and enamel. They had to cover their eyes as if unable to endure the brightness of the divine countenance, then to throw themselves flat on the ground and, smelling at the earth, to wait until the idol spoke to them. The postures varied according to their rank, and according to the degree of favour desirable to show them. Some were left prostrated, nose against the ground; others remained kneeling, others again stood, but bent in two; some enjoyed the privilege of standing up straight with only the head slightly bent. Like the religious services, the royal receptions were a sort of ballet accompanied with words, each act of which was regulated with an attention to detail enough to have plunged a Byzantine master of the ceremonies into despair. Persons entered amidst singing, and left amidst shouts accompanied by the sound of timbrels, and the conversation which occurred at the interview had to be spoken in rhythm and with carefully studied intonations. A voice in perfect tune was required for addressing the lords of the earth, just as for addressing the lords of heaven.1 [Note: G. Maspero, New Light on Ancient Egypt, 221.]