Hebrew Fire

All the while, it is not the purpose of this book either to establish or to refute textual roots. Our goals are broader and far more humble and important. Presenting a few examples that might help illuminate Egyptian aggravations or influences on Levitic, Israelite, and Judaic religion will be a sufficient task for this booklet.

Here and there in this study political history will have to be blended with literary history, to the chagrin of purist historians. The condition of our sources does not permit a clean line of demarcation. But even though large portions of the landscape may remain shrouded in morning fog by this approach, it is hoped that the general nature and direction of the Hebrew ideological rivulet, which flowed from Egypt through Palestine into the Mediterranean realm, will emerge from this historical sketch clearly enough to be worth our while.

Moses an Egyptian Hebrew

Apart from partial Hebrew scriptures we have no evidence that Moses, the leader of Israel's "Exodus," ever lived. A self-serving cult document is not the best possible source for historical proof. It is necessary, therefore, to slide sideways from general history and substitute some history of Hebrew literature. The time of composition of literary works, in a roundabout manner, is still a historical datum that may be considered for understanding the people who wrote and used them.

The Exodus epic, as recorded in the book of Exodus, begins with a brief reference to a time when the “people of Israel” were not yet slaves in Egypt. Perhaps another hand has added the story of how a Levite baby boy was exposed in a reed basket, somewhere along the Nile. He was found and adopted by the pharaoh's daughter, who raised the child in her royal surroundings and, presumably, gave him his Egyptian name, Moses.

Inasmuch as a similar exposure of a baby in a reed basket has been ascribed to the first Mesopotamian imperialist, Sargon of Akkad, the literal historical weight of this Moses story will have to be adjusted downward. Was this story recited to establish the credentials of Moses as a great hero of Sargon's stature? And then, why would later Israelite scribes have wanted to gloss over the Egyptianness of this man before accepting him as a their savior hero? In any case, the story tells about the birth and the early months of Moses' life in Egypt. It leaves a large lacuna concerning the remainder of his life in that great land. This much is clear, the story explicitly tries to link the man's birth to his later life as a leader who was destined to govern a runaway group of Hebrew slaves.

We are told that at a mature age Moses observed, one day, how a Hebrew man was being beaten by an Egyptian supervisor. Moses sided with the underdog and killed the Egyptian tormentor. In fear of punishment he then fled to Midian, an oasis in the Sinai desert to the east. A priest named Jethro took the Egyptian fugitive into his home and gave him one of his daughters in marriage. In time she bore Moses two sons.

One day, so the narrative continues, while watching the animals of his father‑in‑law, Moses saw an apparition: an “angel of fire” burning from the middle of a bush. Miraculously, the fire did not consume its branches. Ever since his flight from Egypt the man Moses must have wondered about his obligations toward the Hebrews who still languished and suffered back in Egyptian labor camps. His thoughts apparently were fuelled by the nagging memory of his personal violent and “criminal” interference. To justify this deed, it seems, he was predestined eventually to act on this matter. He was challenged to upgrade his status from being a fugitive from Egyptian law to that of a minority representative in political exile.

But be that as it may, from the burning bush Moses heard the voice of God. And that voice of God announced the divine decision that the Hebrew slaves were to be delivered from the bondage of Egyptian grand domestication. Then and there God commissioned Moses to approach the elders of these subjugated Hebrews in Egypt with his saving proposition:

You and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt and say to him, “The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us; and now, we pray you, let us go a three days journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God.” (Exodus 3:18)

The reason for which God enlisted here the services of a leader who was familiar with proceedings at the Egyptian royal court is rather transparent. The strategy of Moses was to hoodwink the pharaoh with a ruse of citing religious obligations. Moses and the elders of the Hebrew slaves were to request a furlough, on the pretext of having to perform religious rites to their God who even by Egyptian reckoning dwelt in the Sinai desert. The motif of a pilgrimage pretext is mentioned again, later in the story, after Moses was actually granted permission for a portion of the people to leave. But Moses rejected a partial exodus and insisted that all Hebrew slaves are required by their God to go on this holy pilgrimage together.

In Hebrew opinion the stated objective of performing religious services in the Sinai desert was amply fulfilled later on, as their Exodus story unfolds. The people's service to their God, who dwells outside Egypt, was intended to last for all time. With the hindsight of tradition it had to be that way, or else Moses could be accused of having paraded before the pharaoh while telling a lie.

Apparently Moses held some initial hope for a diplomatic settlement, to the effect that a measure of religious freedom could be negotiated with an Egyptian pharaoh. And truly, if ever on earth there was a man who could negotiate religious privileges for oppressed slaves in Egypt, it would have been someone like Moses who knew the ways of Egyptian government. Such a spokesman for minority rights would have had to be familiar with Egyptian theology, as well as with political theory, and know that both of these were the same thing. He would have had to be acquainted with the ways of Egyptian as well as of Hebrew religion. And he would have had to be someone who knew how to exploit the differences between these two.

Yahweh as Amun

After we are told by the primary narrator how the Hebrew God has introduced himself as “Yahweh” (Exodus 3:7-8), another hand informs those who might still be unfamiliar with the God's manner of referring to himself by means of the word symbol YHWH (Exodus 3:9–15). We are told that the designation Yahweh was ascribed to the God of the Hebrews precisely at the crucial point in Levitic history, in preparation for the Exodus. The question that a thoughtful Israelite might have wished to ask concerning this word symbol is conveniently put in the mouth of Moses, who asks God directly:

If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, “the God of your fathers has sent me to you,” and they ask me, "What is his name?" What shall I say to them? God said to Moses, “I Am Who I Am.” And he said, “Say to the people of Israel, `I AM has sent me to you.'” (Exodus 3:13–14)

Devout readers in later Judaism have avoided reading the letter configuration YHWH because to them it signified the unspeakable name of God. It seems as though, somehow, the followers of Moses remembered part of the original lesson of Egyptian theology, that the name of God is not to be pronounced, on penalty of death. According to what else their leader Moses must have known about such holy matters, however, his people need not have worried excessively about this particular theological technicality.

Really! In second booklet of this series we have already shown how, in the context of Egyptian Amun theology—which the Egyptian aristocrat Moses must have studied thoroughly—it was impossible to pronounce the real name of the supreme God. Not even the lesser gods, those manifestations of angelic rank who surrounded the hidden essence of Amun, knew their God's real name.

The chances of ordinary humankind ever getting to know and to be able to pronounce the real name of the Hebrew God were equally remote. The word symbol YHWH, or I AM WHO I AM, is not really a name. If anything, it added up to God gently telling off Moses—letting him know that the Holy Name is not for him to know.

The Exodus story tells about Moses as a leader of Hebrews who was born of Hebrew parents; yet, he lived the early decades of his life as an Egyptian aristocrat in royal surroundings. If the second half of the preceding summary sentence is accepted as a possibility, and I see no reason why it cannot be, it follows that this man Moses also must have been well versed in traditional Egyptian political theory. Throughout Egyptian history the disciplines of political theory and theology belonged together. Moses, the aristocrat, therefore must have known contemporary Amun theology very well.

Startled by a spectacular fire and an anonymous divine call, Moses demanded assurance that he would be able to finish the job that, long ago, he had begun with an act of violence. Even though he asked his question on behalf of the Hebrew elders who lived in Egypt, he obviously needed additional divine assurance for himself. He needed this assurance to shore up his own confidence.

Our Egyptian-educated potential leader, who still had to be convinced of the feasibility of his assigned (and chosen) task, found himself caught up in an interesting dilemma. Could he who obviously knew Amun theology very well convince himself to actually obey the call of a God of Hebrew wanderers? And, if he could obey, could his faith actually have withstood the challenges and disappointments of the daring Exodus stratagem he envisioned?

Furthermore, could he have accomplished all these things, trustingly, if this Hebrew God who commissioned him actually had told him his name? In Egypt it was the hidden-ness of the All-God's nature, and of his holy name, that rendered Amun the greatest imaginable power in the cosmos. Could Moses have faced Amun and the Egyptian pharaoh on behalf of any other God who was defined less great than Amun? Or, in the Egyptian fashion of doing theology—on behalf of any God who with his magnitude could not account for all that was known about Amun? Probably not.[1]

But then, I am is not a name, as Amun in Egypt was not a name either. To perceive some theological unity between two unnameable or undefinable configurations of reality is not overly difficult. Both have their very hidden-ness and mystery in common. The Egyptian root of Amun is imn, which denotes hidden-ness and invisibility. During the New Kingdom the god Amun also was referred to as “He who abides in all things” (Der in allen Dingen bleibt).[2] How great is the distance from this theology to that which concerns itself with an I AM, or with an I AM WHAT I AM, or with an I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE, or with a HE CAUSES TO BE?

Hans Bonnet rejects the idea that a close parallelism may exist in the case of these two theologies. For instance, concerning the Egyptologist Sethe he remarked that the latter “dares to suspect that Yahweh was shaped after the model of Amun” (Bonnet pp. 31f). Obviously, Bonnet's judgment is based on a very spiritualized interpretation of Yahweh that appears informed more by Hellenic philosophical dualism than the Moses religion itself. Is pure spiritual transcendence really the most important aspect of Mosaic monotheism? Is a God who disguises his presence in a burning bush, in a cloud, or in a pillar of fire really “transcendent” in the Hellenic sense of transcendental Platonic “ideas”? This writer has concluded otherwise.

Although an influence of Indo-European dualism on Yahweh theology during the period of the Judges and the early monarchy is being ruled out here, one nevertheless must assume a strong basis of Semitic-Canaanite religiosity for all those Hebrews who dwelled in Palestine. As we shall have occasion to delineate shortly, most of the Israelite tribes may never have been in Egypt—though, in that case all of them have become involved with the Egyptian-Philistine frontier. The actual exposure of the Levites to Egyptian culture and religion, of course, would have depended on the length of their sojourn there. It seems in any case useful to consider in some detail the impact that Egyptian Amun theology, via Moses and his fellow Levites, could have had on the larger Israelite confederation. After all, an Exodus event and a Torah tradition attributed to Moses, in the course of a few centuries, became the central features of Israelite unity. The Egyptian-Hebrew connection is explored here to call attention to a neglected dimension of inquiry.

* * *

And yes, there also were significant differences between Yahweh theology and Amun theology from the outset. After all, the respective cults of these supreme deities engaged in mythological wrangling over the outcome of the Exodus episode. Each sponsored a different unit of people. Amun theology emphasized more the freshness of divine breath and living water, in continuity with Shu's Heliopolitan function and with the fertile blessings of the Nile. This was a function that Yahweh may have assumed only later in Israelite history. It was in the Elijah cycle of stories, 1 Kings 18, that the Hebrew Yahweh of the desert finally established himself as the bona fide giver of rain for agriculture.

Yahweh theology, at least the Levitic strain that traced its origins to the Sinai area, emphasized much more the fire of God's sternness and wrath. By comparison, this degree of severity was accounted for in Egypt by the lowest Enneadean hypostasis of Seth. In realistic perception of greater‑than‑human configurations of reality, what else could one have expected? A people who dwell all their lives in the lush and fertile Nile valley, naturally, will experience more of the All-God's Shu aspect. And a people who roam in the desert and daily struggle to survive its fierce heat—such as was the life-style of the Midianites who harbored Moses—naturally will experience more of the fiery Seth aspect. Whoever Moses was, he surely was aware of this difference, he is said to have lived at both places long enough to learn about such things.

A new and far more significant difference between Yahweh and Amun theology emerges only subsequently, in the story pertaining to the Exodus struggle itself, especially on the Israelite side. YHWH became the scribal designation of the God of gods at a time when that deity made a special effort to liberate a chosen group of Hebrew slaves from bondage in Egypt. For the history and evolution of religion, this means that a new kind of “God of gods” awareness thereby was introduced into the world to stay. This new God of gods theology stood in direct conflict with the very imperial grand domesticators who originally had defined and traditionally had been ruling in the name of the God of gods.

The God who revealed himself to Moses, by his very act of revelation, showed himself to be greater than his imperialistic apparitions that preceded him. He no longer endorsed a human deified King of kings in return for his keep or for the maintenance of his state cult. He was a God who forbade sacred images that, back in Egypt, were prominently used in the state cult. He forbade these images, apparently, because in the hands of priestly grand domesticators such were used as levers for political control. In contrast to the Egyptian and Canaanite deities who blessed artists and sculptor-priests, apparently, the God of Moses entrusted the management of his cult to a class of scribes. So it appears, judged by the written legacy these scribes produced.

The God of Moses was Lord of the entire world and, at the same time, also savior of a people who previously had fallen victim to ambitious grand domesticators. During the millennia that followed, this God, together with the reactionary universal salvation movements his cult inspired, toppled many a grand domesticator and pretender to divine authority. He disallowed and reformed many an over-domestication system or “civilization.”

Yahweh as Amun-Seth

Before leaving the monotheism of Moses to itself, to watch how its gospel of slave liberation has infected Palestine and lands beyond, it still may be helpful to say a few things about the Egyptian “Seth” element as it pertains to the Yahweh‑Amun theology of Moses.

In its Heliopolitan orthodox setting the divine Ennead, which includes Seth, represents a series of hypostases that emanate from a single source, Atum. During the New Kingdom the Amun theology that Moses had learned was still the full heir of the orthodox manner of thinking about theogony, as a process of generation and emanation. Therefore, the theological mind of Moses can be expected to have been aware not only of the essential attributes of the hidden godhead of the New Kingdom, Amun, but also of the God's desert heat emanation—the portion of Seth. As a desert god, Seth was known among Egyptians also as the god of foreigners, of thunder, lightning, and earthquakes. Seth in his cosmic dimension, on a monthly cycle, also was deemed responsible for injuring the poor eye of Horus, the moon.

It has been told that Moses spoke to the pharaoh in the name of the God of the Hebrews (Exodus 5:3). To an Egyptian pharaoh that meant in the name of Seth. Of course, the Hebrew narrator happily proceeded to exaggerate the status of Moses another step, at the expense of a supposedly superstitious pharaoh. But then, this is understandable. The story was told to amuse Hebrews, not Egyptians:

…the Lord said to Moses, "See, I make you as God to the Pharaoh; and Aaron your brother shall be your prophet." (Exodus 7:1)

It is uncertain how much historical weight can be given to the ten plagues that, with the exception of the last, can be explained in terms of ordinary natural or environmental imbalances. All nine, it must be acknowledged, also proved ineffective for softening the pharaoh's “hardened heart.”

The initial ruse of having to make a three‑day journey into the Sinai desert, to fulfill religious obligations under the threat of divine punishment, may have been only a cover for a more subtle ruse. What halfway intelligent pharaoh would not have been able to see through the first one? And yes, the story tells how the pharaoh hardened his heart, as could reasonably be expected of him.

Perhaps the real goal or ruse, from the outset, was to nag and intimidate the pharaoh, and wear him down to a point where he no longer would pay attention. Repeated rumors, to the effect that these people were about to leave, could so have been neutralized by the persistent formal diplomatic requests of Moses. Repeated unsubstantiated rumors could have created an impression to the effect that Moses and these slaves would never try to leave without the pharaoh's official consent. Such a subtle strategy could have given the escapees much needed lead time before the ruler would seriously have taken note. Of course, these are mere speculations based on the style of subterfuge by which political problems are being resolved in Near Eastern lands still today.

But then, the tenth and special plague attracts our attention as the pivotal point in the Exodus story plot. All of Egypt's firstborn sons, we are told, have been slain by an executioner angel of Yahweh. It is high time to rethink this Hebrew story plot from the hypothetical point of view of a twofold Hebrew‑Egyptian mind, such as had been the mind of Moses. The God who killed the firstborn sons of the Egyptians would have been Seth to them, the very god of desert dwellers. Furthermore, on the Egyptian side, the color of appearance of Seth, and of all his evil deeds, was red.[3] On the Hebrew side, Mosaic tradition has accented the role of their God with all kinds of red “fire” kratophanies.

Egyptians always have experienced unease in the presence of Seth. Their perception of this lowest Enneadean hypostasis, in Egyptian tradition, clearly has constituted the weakest point in the politico-religious structure within which an Egyptian pharaoh was obliged to operate. Even if critical historiography refuses to accept the tenth Exodus plague as a historical event and even if the rite of Passover is to be understood only as an historicized ancient communal herder sacrifice, both of these motifs together nevertheless may contain a historical kernel of fact. They hint at an actual diplomatic leverage that Moses reasonably could have applied to the Egyptian royal court.

Traditionally, whenever in Egypt a pharaoh died the god Seth was known to have killed him, reduced him or transformed him into the condition of an Osiris corpse. From the Hebrew perspective, of course, Yahweh upstaged the Egyptian perception of Seth. Instead of waiting to kill an old Egyptian pharaoh, he killed his firstborn son. This means he killed the very person who, on his ceremonial rebirth as Horus during the next enthronement rite, was meant to become the ruling pharaoh.

Egyptian mythology knows the ruling pharaoh as Horus and the avenger of Osiris. The young king supposedly was the one who was to have mutilated Seth during a battle that then ensued.[4] According to Egyptian tradition, however, that victory of Horus over Seth was never a decisive one. Seth was mutilated, and while they struggled the avenger Horus lost his eye. Both divinities had to be healed by Thoth. This meant that after their struggle Seth was again in a position to strike another blow against the next Horus‑king of Egypt, whenever he chose to do so. And everyone knew that ruling pharaohs when they suffered death were dispatched by Seth, to be thereby transformed into Osiris. In this manner the god Seth repeatedly defeated a ruling Egyptian Horus. He transformed him back into the mode of his brother Osiris.

To the extent that Moses spoke authoritatively to the pharaoh, in the name of a God who behaved as Amun and Seth combined—or as the Hebrew narrator would mockingly have it, to the extent that Moses himself impersonated that kind of a God—he indeed did have a plausible case as to why the Hebrew people should be let go. People who belonged to this dangerous God of the desert, in Egypt, could not be held captive indefinitely with impunity. Moreover, it also was reasonable to think that the people of Seth should want to appease this dangerous God in the desert places where, according to Egyptian perception, he actually lived.

It is quite possible therefore that a diplomatically astute Moses indeed assured the pharaoh that an appeased Yahweh-Amun-Seth would refrain from plaguing Egypt. The presence of a narrative with ten plagues, which now dominates the larger Exodus epic, suggests that at one point some threats of plagues indeed could have been made.

The clinching plot of the Exodus, which subsequently could have given credence to a series of diplomatic plague threats against Egypt, was Yahweh‑Seth's killing of the Egyptian Horus-to-be; that is, the ruling pharaoh's firstborn son. For good measure it is said as well that the Hebrew God has killed all the firstborn sons in all Egyptian houses not marked with Sethian "red" blood.

The initial diplomatic bait that Moses might have offered to the pharaoh is now coming into better focus. In exchange for letting the Hebrew slaves serve their God in his distant desert, the land of Egypt would be spared the typical calamities that a foreigner's god, like Seth, would be able to inflict. Positively stated, Moses had offered Egypt a conditional blessing.

But diplomatic positivism of the "deal" offered by Moses was overshadowed, in the narrative, when subsequent Hebrew storytellers got carried away celebrating their escape. For good measure they celebrated all the punishments their mighty God could possibly have brought down upon those hated Egyptians.

The death of the pharaoh's firstborn son may be pondered in terms of historical realism still a little further. If Moses actually had approached the Egyptian pharaoh so as to appear to him as a spokesman of a God like Amun‑Seth, and if we consider how at some point during these negotiations Moses must have become desperate, then a conditional curse laid by him on the Egyptian crown prince could have been a logical next step. The story has it that the king's firstborn son actually died and that, in a subsequent state of grief, the disparaged pharaoh finally ordered the Israelites to get out.

Was this story merely the product of Hebrew wishful thinking? Was it all generated by priestly Levites to anchor an ancient herder ritual in the bedrock of Palestine historical relevance, to commemorate liberation? Possibly, yes. But then, if such thinking was possible by Hebrew minds at all—and the existence of the story testifies to the fact that it was—then it also is conceivable that a desperate Moses could have unloaded on the pharaoh's son some conditional “curse” or “cause” of death. With his Sethian mission, an impatient Moses easily could have cursed the entire sacred Egyptian tradition of royal succession. A strong Amun‑Sethian curse laid on the crown prince, possibly even pronounced within hearing range of the lad, conceivably could have contributed to bringing a sensitive young royal heir to his deathbed.

The Hebrew storyteller seems to have remembered that Moses acted like a God! Inasmuch as the curse was conditional, only the pharaoh himself could have removed it by liberating his Hebrew slaves. Thus, in consideration of Egyptian religious beliefs current at the time, and in light of experiences that had accrued for Moses, the basic steps of the Exodus appear to have been undertaken in accordance with a well-reasoned strategy.

In all likelihood Yahweh's commissioning of Moses, at the site of the burning bush, was no more than the turning point from theory to practice. While he lived at Midian, Moses had many years to ponder Egyptian weaknesses and Hebrew points of leverage. He probably still knew personally some key Egyptians at the court, and he knew their religio-psychological strengths and weaknesses. He would have been able to exploit these.

Still another question may be asked concerning the Hebrew Exodus, about what exactly might have happened on the Egyptian side. Was a divine curse really sufficient to scare and to kill the crown prince? Was it enough to create confusion, by which Moses and his people could escape? Or, were other death‑dealing measures resorted to in the process, perhaps with some inside help at the court? Could Moses have lent a helping hand in the Passover plot by sending a human angel of death into the pharaoh's house? But then again, bodily inflictions may not have been necessary. Curses were taken seriously enough in those days. Could the original Exodus plot indeed have been that simple?

Maybe—and maybe not. The exact historical sequence of events eludes those of us who live over three millennia later. Nevertheless, the religio-political affinity that exists between the Egyptian-educated aristocrat Moses and the man who in Hebrew literature we have come to know as the lawgiver of Yahweh still can be surmised in broad outlines. With help from the history of religions it may be possible to excavate some fresh hypotheses, perhaps with improved historical clarity, beyond what hitherto has been imagined.