KES Chapel Reflection, Week of 16 October
And she named him Moses
Who named him? The daughter of Pharaoh, the King (and God figure) of ancient Egypt. And who is Moses? The founding figure of Judaism. It might seem passing strange that the history of the Hebrews as the people of God begins in Egypt and in a situation of uncertainty and tension, of slavery and infanticide.
With the exception of Sanatana Dharma, that is to say, Hinduism, all of the major religions of the world have a founding figure and all of them have birth narratives about their founding figures. There are the birth narratives of Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha in Theravada Buddhism and in the various forms of Mahayana Buddhism and Vajrayana Buddhism. There are the birth narratives of Jesus in Matthew and Luke (and in a different and much more philosophical sense in John), narratives which reflect intentionally on aspects of the birth of Moses in Exodus. Then there are the Al-sira traditions within Islam that treat the birth and upbringing of Muhammad. They all point to the significance of the founding figure for what defines these religious and philosophical traditions and for what develops within them.
In the case of Moses, the birth narrative marks the beginning of Philo of Alexandria’s treatment of Moses as the great lawgiver and the embodiment of the truth of our humanity, a theme which will be taken up by Gregory of Nyssa’s consideration of Moses as embodying the path of spiritual perfection. In other words, Moses becomes an exemplar of the way of being human through his attention to the things of God.
Exodus is the Greek name given to the second book of the Bible, what has come to be known as the Second Book of Moses in the Torah, the first five books which are traditionally known as the Books of Moses. This does not imply authorship by Moses. Rather it shows the spiritual significance of Moses as the figure through whom God gives the Law to Israel and through Israel to the world.
