Bible Books
Exploring Exodus
Nahum Sarna
(New York: Schocken, 1986) 277 pp., $17.95
One of the most critical issues in contemporary exploration of biblical literature emerges for both the general reading public and the professional biblical scholar when the problems of historical data enter the discussion. It is unfortunately a familiar scene when Bible study attempts to move quickly through the shapes and content of the literature passed down to our generation from the ancient world of the Bible in order to reconstruct the historical process apparently described by that literature. Nahum Sarna asserts in the preface of his new book on Exodus: “Since the Torah is not a book of history, but one that makes use of historical data for didactic purposes, that is for the inculcation of spiritual values and moral and ethical imperatives, Exploring Exodus consistently stresses these aspects of the narratives.”
The author deserves highest commendation for that orientation as the guiding principle for the book. Indeed, one might add that in addition to the purposes of spreading values and their corresponding moral and ethical imperatives, the narratives in Exodus capture a significant aesthetic appeal, a classic example of artistic beauty from the ancient world of Israel. Moreover, the author’s expert attention to the historical data from the world that gave life to Israel serves to set the scene that produced the literature.
Yet, the author appears to slip from that kind of concentration on the beauty and moral value of the literature for capturing the essence of early Israelite life into a more common concern for reconstructing the historical process of the people reflected by the literature. For example, he observes that “Joseph’s family did not have the influence with the Egyptian authorities to be able to secure for him a similar privilege [to the one secured for Jacob] …. Joseph himself seems to have been aware of the gathering storm clouds, for his dying words are: ‘God will surely take notice of you ….’ ” The issue here is not what Joseph’s dying words might have been. The issue for understanding both Genesis and Exodus is the character of the literature that constructs the story of Joseph’s death in just this peculiar way. What kind of story is it? What is the character of the story’s claim to beauty, truth and even historical facticity. To be sure, the data from the historical period illumine the literature. But they are not the goal of the literature. And one’s ability to reconstruct what the historical process might have been not define the value of the text.
Sarna’s treatment of the Moses story reflects the same concern. The character of the story as literature commands attention. In describing the story about the birth of Moses, Sarna observes that “this simple narrative is spiced with conscious irony directed against the king.” Moreover, he observes that the role of women in the story highlights an explicit element in the fabric of the story. But the development of Sarna’s description seems more concerned with reconstructing a Moses biography from the data available in the story than with consideration of the character of the story as an object of beauty, open for evaluation in itself. “At the well, Moses experiences the third test of his character. He witnesses rough local shepherds pushing aside a group of girls who were first in line to draw water. Once again, he cannot remain indifferent.” But again, the primary issue in this story is not the ability of the story to reveal what Moses really did in defending the girls; it is the ability of the story to communicate its own particular character as a work of an, a literary painting that depicts its hero in its own particular way. An exploration of Exodus must uncover not only historical events; it must also catch the character of the literature as literature. The character of the story’s characters in their real historical process as an item of reality that lies behind the story cannot be the primary focus in an exegesis of Exodus.
Contemporary society would like to know what really happened to their ancient ancestors. But contemporary society also knows that the truth of that past can emerge in the brightest light of the present not only by reconstructing the details of the past but also by participating in the creativity of the past. Fortunately, Sarna does not concentrate all of his energy on Exodus as a biography of Moses. It is to his credit that the character of Exodus as literature does take shape in the exposition: “In the pagan religions where the gods inhere in nature and are not outside it and independent of it, upheavals of nature … are literally taken to be aspects of the lives of the gods themselves. In the Bible … they are simply powerful poetic images that register the consciousness of the intensified Presence of God at a particular moment of time.”
Two elements in the later parts of the book deserve special consideration as examples of Sarna’s insight. The first is the discussion of the law, a major section in the Book of Exodus. For Sarna, the law from Sinai is not an absolute and divine code, given one time for the control of Israel at all times. To be sure, the laws in Exodus reveal parallels with collections of laws from other peoples of the ancient Near East. But the law in Exodus is not a part of a larger, singular code. The laws “are to be looked upon as records of amendments, supplements or annulments of an already-existing body of practice that had long governed the lives of the Israelite tribes.” In other words, the law of the Torah represents the product of many generations, the layers of legal tradition from the earlier generation to the later ones who shaped these laws to meet their own needs.
One aspect of the law, the second element isolated here for comment, is Sarna’s description of the Tabernacle and the golden calf. Moses’ function in communing with God in the Tabernacle is not designed to serve private needs. It is for the sake of the Israelite people. Thus, the role of Moses in the cultic context depicted by Exodus is like his role in the political context. Moses functions in both as the hero of the people. But what about the golden calf? The story depicts the creation of the golden calf as negative, the result of the people’s desire to replace Moses as their leader. Sarna captures the contrast to the Tabernacle in a sharp statement “The situation in the wilderness thus produced two different, contradictory, and mutually exclusive responses: the one illegitimate and distortive, the golden calf; the other legitimate and corrective, the Tabernacle.” One may nonetheless raise a question: Is it possible that the golden calf and the Tabernacle were complementary, not opposite poles? What would such a scenario do for a reconstruction of the cult of Israel that traced its origins to the wilderness?
The commentary on Exodus in this delightful exposition not only enhances the scholarly exploration of the Exodus-Moses traditions, but also facilitates an appreciation of the literature set in its own historical time. By meeting its own stated goals, the book wins an appropriately warm welcome from all who would profit from the Bible’s insight into humanity.
From Exploring Exodus …
Biblical religion revolves around two themes, Creation and the Exodus. The former asserts God’s undivided sovereignty over nature, the latter His absolute hegemony over history. These essential themes are inextricably linked, inform one another, and are complementary.
A creator-god who withdraws from his creation and leaves his creatures entire to their own devices is a functionless deity, an inactive being, remote and aloof from the world of men and women. He represents no ideal, makes no demands, enjoins no obligations, provides no moral governance of the world, imposes no moral law ….
Not so the Creator-God of the Bible. He is vitally concerned with the welfare of his creatures, intensely involved in their fate and fortune. An unqualifiedly moral Being, He insistently demands human imitation of His moral attributes. He imposes His law on the human race, and He judges the world in righteousness. History, therefore, is the arena of divine activity, and the weal and woe of the individual and of the nation is the product of God’s providence, conditioned by human response to His demands. It is no wonder that the Exodus is the pivotal event in the Bible, and that the experiences connected with it—the slavery of the Israelites, their liberation from Egypt, the covenant between God and His people at Sinai, and the journey in the wilderness toward the Promised Land—all constitute the dominant motif of the Scriptures in one form or another. (pp. 1, 2)