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53-411: The Elohist source is characterized by, among other things, an abstract view of God, using Horeb instead of Sinai for the mountain where Moses received the laws of Israel and the use of the phrase "fear of God". It habitually locates ancestral stories in the north , especially Ephraim , and the documentary hypothesis holds that it must have been composed in that region, possibly in the second half of

106-471: A covenant with Yahweh, who promises to make them a " holy nation , and a kingdom of priests" on condition of their faithfulness. He gives them their laws and instructions to build the Tabernacle , the means by which he will come from heaven and dwell with them and lead them in a holy war to conquer Canaan (the " Promised Land "), which has earlier, according to the myth of Genesis , been promised to

159-575: A fifth column . He hardens their labor and orders the killing of all newborn boys. A Levite woman named Jochebed saves her baby by setting him adrift on the Nile in an ark of bulrushes . Pharaoh's daughter finds the child, names him Moses , and brings him up as her own. Later, a grown Moses goes out to see his kinsmen. He witnesses the abuse of a Hebrew slave by an Egyptian overseer. Angered, Moses kills him and flees into Midian to escape punishment. There, he marries Zipporah , daughter of Jethro ,

212-466: A Midianite priest. While tending Jethro's flock, Moses encounters God in a burning bush . Moses asks God for his name, to which God replies with three words, often translated as " I Am that I Am ." This is the book's explanation for the origin of the name Yahweh , as God is thereafter known. God tells Moses to return to Egypt, free the Hebrews from slavery and lead them into Canaan , the land promised to

265-510: A complete document) in the 6th century as an introduction to the Deuteronomistic history (the history of Israel that takes up the series of books from Joshua to Kings ). The Priestly writers later added their supplements to this, and these expansions continued to the end of the 4th century BCE. In the E source God's name is always presented as " Elohim " or " El " until the revelation of God's name to Moses , after which God

318-458: A heavily Canaanite origin for Israel, with little suggestion that a group of foreigners from Egypt comprised early Israel. However, a majority of scholars believe that the story has an historical core, though disagreeing widely about what that historical kernel might have been. Kenton Sparks refers to it as "charter myth" and "mythologized history". Biblical scholar Graham I. Davies notes that several literary texts from Ancient Egypt document

371-640: A history of God's saving actions that give identity to Israel – the promise of offspring and land to the ancestors, the Exodus from Egypt (in which God saves Israel from slavery), the wilderness wandering, the revelation at Sinai, and the hope for the future life in the Promised Land . A theophany is a manifestation (appearance) of a god – in the Bible, an appearance of the God of Israel, accompanied by storms –

424-432: A location somewhere more to the north or the east, places more familiar to the northern tribes than the deep southern Sinai. Christian tradition considers Mount Horeb to be Willow Peak , located adjacent to Saint Catherine's Monastery . Book of Exodus The Book of Exodus (from Ancient Greek : Ἔξοδος , romanized :  Éxodos ; Biblical Hebrew : שְׁמוֹת Šəmōṯ , 'Names'; Latin : Liber Exodus )

477-410: A preamble, historical prologue, stipulations, deposition and reading, list of witnesses, blessings and curses, and ratification by animal sacrifice. Biblical covenants, in contrast to Eastern covenants in general, are between a god, Yahweh, and a people, Israel, instead of between a strong ruler and a weaker vassal. God elects Israel for salvation because the "sons of Israel" are "the firstborn son" of

530-461: A small band of wandering Israelites living in the Sinai: "The conclusion – that Exodus did not happen at the time and in the manner described in the Bible – seems irrefutable [...] repeated excavations and surveys throughout the entire area have not provided even the slightest evidence". Instead, they argue how modern archaeology suggests continuity between Canaanite and Israelite settlements, indicating

583-504: Is also alluded to in Hebrews 12:18–21 . The location of Horeb is disputed. Jewish and Christian scholars have advanced varying opinions as to its whereabouts since biblical times. Elijah is described in 1 Kings 19:1–21 as traveling to Horeb (taking 40 days to walk there from Beersheba ), in a way which implies that its position was familiar when that was written, but there are no biblical references set any later in time. Additionally

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636-457: Is arguably the most important book in the Bible, as it presents the defining features of Israel's identity—memories of a past marked by hardship and escape, a binding covenant with their God , who chooses Israel, and the establishment of the life of the community and the guidelines for sustaining it. The consensus of modern scholars is that the Pentateuch does not give an accurate account of

689-848: Is built adjacent to the Egyptian Mount Sinai and to Willow Peak , the latter is considered to be the Biblical Mount Horeb. "Horeb" is thought to mean dry place or glowing / heat , which seems to be a reference to the Sun , while Sinai may have derived from the name of Sin , the Ancient Mesopotamian religion deity of the Moon , and thus Sinai and Horeb would be the mountains of the Moon and Sun, respectively. The name Horeb first occurs at Exodus 3:1, with

742-520: Is mentioned several times in the account of the wanderings of the Israelites in the wilderness. Moses recalled in Deuteronomy 1:6 that God had said to the Israelites at Horeb, "You have dwelt long enough at this mountain: turn and take your journey", confirming that Horeb was the location from which they set off towards Canaan. Other mentions of Horeb in Deuteronomy are found in the account of

795-496: Is much disagreement on how these sources were used to write the first five books of the Bible. This documentary hypothesis dominated much of the 20th century, but the 20th-century consensus surrounding this hypothesis has now been broken down. Those who uphold it now tend to do so in a highly modified form, giving a much larger role to the redactors (editors), who are now seen as adding much material of their own rather than as simply passive combiners of documents. Among those who reject

848-470: Is physically present, where, through the priesthood, Israel could be in direct, literal communion with him. The heart of Exodus is the Sinaitic covenant . A covenant is a legal document binding two parties to take on certain obligations towards each other. There are several covenants in the Bible, and in each case they exhibit at least some of the elements in real-life treaties of the ancient Middle East:

901-514: Is referred to as יהוה ‎, often represented in English as " YHWH ". E is theorized to have been composed by collecting the various stories and traditions concerning biblical Israel and its associated tribes ( Dan , Napthali , Gad , Asher , Issachar , Zebulun , Ephraim , Manasseh , Benjamin ), and the Levites , and weaving them into a single text. It has been argued that it reflects

954-639: Is the second book of the Bible . It is a narrative of the Exodus , the origin myth of the Israelites leaving slavery in Biblical Egypt through the strength of their deity named Yahweh , who according to the story chose them as his people. The Israelites then journey with the legendary prophet Moses to Mount Sinai , where Yahweh gives the Ten Commandments and they enter into

1007-672: The Ark of the Covenant contained only the tablets delivered to Moses at Horeb. In 1 Kings 19 :8-18, Elijah visits "Horeb the mount of God", and encounters God there. According to the documentary hypothesis , the name Sinai is used in the Torah only by the Jahwist and Priestly Source from Judah, whereas Horeb is used only by the Elohist and Deuteronomist from Israel, which is part of

1060-906: The Septuagint : Χωρήβ , Chōrēb ; Latin in the Vulgate : Horeb ) is the mountain at which the Ten Commandments were given to Moses by God , according to the Book of Deuteronomy in the Hebrew Bible . It is described in two places (the Book of Exodus and the Books of Kings ) as הַר הָאֱלֹהִים the "Mountain of Elohim". The mountain is also called the Mountain of YHWH . In other biblical passages, these events are described as having transpired at Mount Sinai . Although most scholars consider Sinai and Horeb to have been different names for

1113-580: The golden calf ). E also emphasizes the importance of Ephraim, the tribe from which Jeroboam , the King of Israel, happened to derive. Some independent source texts thought to have been embedded within E include the Covenant Code , a legal text used in Chapters 21–23 of the Book of Exodus . Mount Horeb Mount Horeb ( / ˈ h ɔːr ɛ b / ; Hebrew : הַר חֹרֵב Har Ḥōrēḇ ; Greek in

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1166-548: The "seed" of Abraham , the legendary patriarch of the Israelites. Traditionally ascribed to Moses himself, modern scholars see its initial composition as a product of the Babylonian exile (6th century BCE), based on earlier written sources and oral traditions, with final revisions in the Persian post-exilic period (5th century BCE). American biblical scholar Carol Meyers , in her commentary on Exodus, suggests that it

1219-517: The 9th century BCE. Because of its highly fragmentary nature, most scholars now question the existence of the Elohist source as a coherent independent document. Instead, the E material is viewed as consisting of various fragments of earlier narratives that are incorporated into the Jahwist document. Modern scholars agree that separate sources and multiple authors underlie the Pentateuch , but there

1272-595: The Egyptians with ten terrible plagues , such as a river of blood , an outbreak of frogs , and the thick darkness . Moses is commanded by God to fix the spring month of Aviv at the head of the Hebrew calendar . The Israelites are to take a lamb on the 10th day of the month, sacrifice the lamb on the 14th day, daub its blood on their mezuzot—doorposts and lintels, and to observe the Passover meal that night, during

1325-673: The God of Israel, descended through Shem and Abraham to the chosen line of Jacob whose name is changed to Israel. The goal of the divine plan in Exodus is a return to humanity's state in Eden , so that God can dwell with the Israelites as he had with Adam and Eve through the Ark and Tabernacle, which together form a model of the universe; in later Abrahamic religions Israel becomes the guardian of God's plan for humanity, to bring "God's creation blessing to mankind" begun in Adam. List of Torah portions in

1378-601: The Hebrews and repeats to them the commandments he has received from God, which are to keep the Sabbath and to construct the Tabernacle. The Israelites do as they are commanded. From that time God dwells in the Tabernacle and orders the travels of the Hebrews. Jewish and Christian tradition viewed Moses as the author of Exodus and the entire Torah , but by the end of the 19th century the increasing awareness of discrepancies, inconsistencies, repetitions and other features of

1431-440: The Israelites complain and long for Egypt, but God miraculously provides manna for them to eat and water to drink. The Israelites arrive at the mountain of God, where Moses's father-in-law Jethro visits Moses; at his suggestion, Moses appoints judges over Israel. God asks whether they will agree to be his people – They accept. The people gather at the foot of the mountain, and with thunder and lightning, fire and clouds of smoke,

1484-462: The Pentateuch as growing through the gradual accretion of material into larger and larger blocks before being joined together, first by a Deuteronomic writer, and then by a Priestly writer (6th/5th century BCE), who also added his own material. The "supplementary" approach is exemplified in the work of John Van Seters , who places the composition of J (which he, unlike the "fragmentists", sees as

1537-525: The Pentateuch had led scholars to abandon this idea. In approximate round dates, the process which produced Exodus and the Pentateuch probably began around 600 BCE when existing oral and written traditions were brought together to form books recognizable as those we know, reaching their final form as unchangeable sacred texts around 400 BCE. Although patent mythical elements are not so prominent in Exodus as in Genesis , ancient legends may have an influence on

1590-501: The altar and its appurtenances, procedures for the ordination of priests, and the daily sacrifice offerings. Aaron becomes the first hereditary high priest . God gives Moses the two tablets of stone containing the words of the ten commandments, written with the "finger of God" . While Moses is with God, Aaron casts a golden calf , which the people worship. God informs Moses of their apostasy and threatens to kill them all, but relents when Moses pleads for them. Moses comes down from

1643-519: The body of evidence for the hypothesis. There are no references to Horeb in the New Testament . In Galatians 4:24–25 , Mount Sinai is mentioned: "One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: This is Hagar . Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem , because she is in slavery with her children." Mount Sinai/Horeb

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1696-564: The book's form or content: for example, the story of the infant Moses's salvation from the Nile is argued to be based on an earlier legend of king Sargon of Akkad , while the story of the parting of the Red Sea may trade on Mesopotamian creation mythology . Similarly, the Covenant Code (the law code in Exodus 20:22–23:33) has some similarities in both content and structure with the Laws of Hammurabi . These potential influences serve to reinforce

1749-522: The book's title is שְׁמוֹת, shemōt , "Names", from the beginning words of the text : "These are the names of the sons of Israel" ( Hebrew : וְאֵלֶּה שְׁמֹות בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל ). Most mainstream scholars do not accept the biblical Exodus account as historical for a number of reasons. It is generally agreed that the Exodus stories were written centuries after the apparent setting of the stories. Archaeologists Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman argue that archaeology has not found evidence for even

1802-426: The commandments, although "the individuals who [had been] present had all perished with the exception of Moses, Joshua, and Caleb. [The] nation survived, and as it was with the nation as an organic whole that the covenant had been made. It might be with propriety said that it was made with those whom Moses addressed at this time, inasmuch as they constituted the nation." 1 Kings 8:9 and 2 Chronicles 5 :10 state that

1855-579: The conclusion that the Book of Exodus originated in the exiled Jewish community of 6th-century BCE Babylon , but not all the potential sources are Mesopotamian: the story of Moses's flight to Midian following the murder of the Egyptian overseer may draw on the Egyptian Story of Sinuhe . Biblical scholars describe the Bible's theologically motivated history writing as " salvation history ", meaning

1908-459: The covenant between them (chapters 20–40). The text of the Book of Exodus begins after the events at the end of the Book of Genesis where Jacob 's sons and their families joined their brother Joseph in Egypt , which Joseph had saved from famine. It is 400 years later and Egypt's new Pharaoh , who does not remember Joseph, is fearful that the enslaved and now numerous Israelites could become

1961-480: The delivery to Moses of the Ten Commandments , and in subsequent references back to the occasion: Deuteronomy 4:10 , 4:15 , 5:2 , 9:8 , 18:16 , and 28:69 . There are similar references at Psalm 106 and Malachi 4:4 . Deuteronomy 5:2 ("The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb") creates the sense that the current generation to whom Moses was speaking had been present at Mount Horeb when Moses descended with

2014-463: The documentary approach altogether, the most significant revisions have been to combine E with J as a single source, and to see the Priestly source as a series of editorial revisions to that text. The alternatives to the documentary approach can be broadly divided between "fragmentary" and "supplementary" theories. Fragmentary hypotheses, seen notably in the work of Rolf Rendtorff and Erhard Blum, see

2067-442: The earth trembles, the mountains quake, the heavens pour rain, thunder peals and lightning flashes. The theophany in Exodus begins "the third day" from their arrival at Sinai in chapter 19: Yahweh and the people meet at the mountain, God appears in the storm and converses with Moses, giving him the Ten Commandments while the people listen. The theophany is therefore a public experience of divine law. The second half of Exodus marks

2120-453: The full moon. The 10th plague comes that night, causing the death of all Egyptian firstborn sons, prompting Pharaoh to expel the Israelites. Regretting his decision, Pharaoh commands his chariot army after the Israelites, who appear trapped at the Red Sea . God parts the sea , allowing the Israelites to pass through, before drowning Pharaoh's pursuing forces. As desert life proves arduous,

2173-412: The mountain and writes down God's words, and the people agree to keep them. God calls Moses up the mountain again, where he remains for forty days and forty nights, after which he returns, bearing the set of stone tablets . God gives Moses instructions for the construction of the tabernacle so that God may dwell permanently among his chosen people , along with instructions for the priestly vestments ,

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2226-413: The mountain, smashes the stone tablets in anger, and commands the Levites to massacre the unfaithful Israelites. God commands Moses to construct two new tablets. Moses ascends the mountain again, where God dictates the Ten Commandments for Moses to write on the tablets. Moses descends from the mountain with a transformed face ; from that time onwards he must hide his face with a veil . Moses assembles

2279-553: The name of the place Massah and Meribah , because of the contention of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying, 'Is the Lord among us or not?'" The only other use of the name in Exodus is in chapter 33, where Horeb is the location where the Israelites stripped off their ornaments. This passage (i.e., Exodus 33:1–6) suggests that Horeb was the location from which the Israelites set off towards Canaan as they resumed their Exodus journey. In Deuteronomy , Horeb

2332-605: The origins of the Israelites, who appear instead to have formed as an entity in the central highlands of Canaan in the late second millennium BCE (around the time of the Late Bronze Age collapse ) from the indigenous Canaanite culture. The English name Exodus comes from the Ancient Greek : ἔξοδος , romanized :  éxodos , lit.   'way out', from ἐξ- , ex- , 'out' and ὁδός , hodós , 'path', 'road'. In Hebrew

2385-437: The passage identifies a cave large enough to lodge in. Also in the beginning of Deuteronomy, where Mozes delivers his last speech on the plains of Moab, the location is given to be 11 days to Horeb, which is already an indication that it is not Mount Sinai (ca 500 km distance). If Horeb was the same mountain as Mount Sinai, then Beersheba should be closer to the mountain than the location of the plains of Moab. This strongly suggest

2438-407: The point at which, and describes the process through which, God's theophany becomes a permanent presence for Israel via the Tabernacle . That so much of the book (chapters 25–31, 35–40) describes the plans of the Tabernacle demonstrates the importance it played in the perception of Second Temple Judaism at the time of the text's redaction by the Priestly writers: the Tabernacle is the place where God

2491-440: The presence of Semitic peoples working for building projects under the 19th Dynasty of Egypt , suggesting a possible historical basis for the account of Israelite servitude to the Egyptians. However, there is an increasing trend among scholars to see the biblical exodus traditions as the invention of the exilic and post-exilic Jewish community, with little to no historical basis. There is no unanimous agreement among scholars on

2544-470: The same place, there is a minority body of opinion that they may have been different locations. The Protestant reformer John Calvin took the view that Sinai and Horeb were the same mountain, with the eastern side of the mountain being called Sinai and the western side being called Horeb. Abraham Ibn Ezra suggested that there was one mountain, "only it had two tops, which bore these different names". Locally, around Saint Catherine's Monastery , which

2597-537: The seed of Abraham in Genesis. On the journey back to Egypt, God seeks to kill Moses. Zipporah circumcises their son and the attack stops. (See Zipporah at the inn .) Moses reunites with his brother Aaron and, returning to Egypt, convenes the Israelite elders, preparing them to go into the wilderness to worship God. Pharaoh refuses to release the Israelites from their work for the festival, and so God curses

2650-541: The sound of trumpets, and the trembling of the mountain, God appears on the peak, and the people see the cloud and hear the voice (or possibly sound) of God. God tells Moses to ascend the mountain. God pronounces the Ten Commandments (the Ethical Decalogue ) in the hearing of all Israel. Moses goes up the mountain into the presence of God , who pronounces the Covenant Code of ritual and civil law and promises Canaan to them if they obey. Moses comes down from

2703-415: The story of Moses and the burning bush . According to Exodus 3:5, the ground of the mountain was considered holy , and Moses was commanded by God to remove his sandals. Exodus 17:6 describes the incident when the Israelites were in the wilderness without water. When Moses was "upon the rock at Horeb", he strikes the rock and obtains drinking water from the rock. Verse 7 goes on to say that Moses "called

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2756-411: The structure of Exodus. One strong possibility is that it is a diptych (i.e., divided into two parts), with the division between parts 1 and 2 at the crossing of the Red Sea or at the beginning of the theophany (appearance of God) in chapter 19. On this plan, the first part tells of God's rescue of his people from Egypt and their journey under his care to Sinai (chapters 1–19) and the second tells of

2809-515: The views of northern refugees who came to Judah after the fall of the Kingdom of Israel (Samaria) in 722 BCE. E has a particular fascination for traditions concerning the Kingdom of Israel and its heroes such as Joshua and Joseph . E favors Israel over the Kingdom of Judah (e.g., claiming that Shechem was purchased rather than massacred ) and speaks negatively of Aaron (e.g., the story of

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