Page 25 - Advanced Biblical Backgrounds Student Textbook

Marriage was often arranged among families. Usually when the children were young. In Egypt the
practice of a barren woman giving her slave to a husband as a concubine was normal. The couple would
then adopt a son born to the concubine as their own. This again gives a background that explains Sarah
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giving her slave to Abraham.

Egypt offered one of the greatest educations
available at the time. They also were known for
the process of mummification. Joseph was
mummified when he died in Egypt in Genesis
50:2-3. This picture of an Egyptian mummy was
taken when they were on display at the
Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC. The
Bible records Moses taking Joseph’s bones with
the people during the exodus in Exodus 24:32.
Economically the Egyptians were known for
trade, agriculture, and cattle. The Nile provided
the method to ship cargo up and down Egypt
and throughout the world. The Egyptians did business with many other lands such as Phoenicia, Canaan,
Crete, and many other regions.
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The exodus conception in Jewish thought:
The exodus is the story of how God delivered His people and brought them to the land He promised. It
was seen by Jews as the proof of Yahweh’s supremacy over the powers of the earth and the cosmos.
Because of the miraculous intervention of God on their behalf, the vivid memories of the events of the
exodus largely shaped the Jewish view of God’s interaction. Michael Fishbane explains that “the exodus
tradition was used, from the first, as a paradigmatic teaching for present and future generations.” In
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other words, it became the primary teaching pattern to teach the next generations. This continued
throughout the exiles during the empires of Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Roman. Exodus 13:8 makes
this pattern of teaching standard when Moses said to the people “You shall tell your son on that day, ‘It
is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt” (ESV). The work of God in the exodus
is what gave hope to the Jews in the exiles that were to come. God had delivered once and established
His people in the promised land. He would do so again. This language is seen throughout Isaiah. Isaiah
says that because of the sin of the people of God there will be an exile. The people will be delivered by
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God who will establish His kingdom in Jerusalem and reign on the throne of David.

This view of the exile and the saving work of God is picked up by the predominantly Jewish early church.
Notice that in Hebrews the Christians are told not to go back and perish with the Jews but to come out
from among them into the wilderness and seek the city that was to come. God was going to establish
the New Jerusalem. If they were faithful, they would receive the promise.

Revelation also takes up the language of the exodus concept. There is a great oppression on earth as the
whore of Babylon and the dragon persecute God’s people. God supernaturally defends His people. He

43 Ibid., 68-69.
44 Ibid., 76-77.
45 Michael Fishbane, “The Exodus Motif/The Paradigm of Historical Renewal,” in Text and Texture: A Literary
Reading of Selected Texts, ed. Fishbane (Oxford, England: One World, 1998), 121.
46 R. Michael Fox. Ed. Reverberations of the Exodus in Scripture. United States: Pickwick Publications, 2014.

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