Autor: Voegelin, Eric

Buch: Israel and Revelation

Titel: Israel and Revelation

Stichwort: Sohn Gottes; Erstgeborener (Exodus 4:21); Rettung am Schilfmeer

Kurzinhalt: there is no reason why the formula should not be dated in the Mosaic period; the Egyptian ruler has been spiritually demoted and must surrender his position as Son of God to Israel

Textausschnitt: (21) Yahweh said to Moses:
As you go to turn toward Egypt, see:
All the portents, which I lay in your hand, you will do before Pharaoh,
but I shall strengthen his heart, that he will not let the people go.
(22) Then you will say to Pharaoh:
Thus Yahweh has said:
My son, my first-born, is Israel;
(23) I said to you: "Let my son go, that he may serve me";
and you refused to let him go;
So now I shall slay your son, your first-born.
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20/12 Relevant for our present purpose, however, are 4:22-23, since the motifs assembled in them concern the historical substance. The conflict between the Yahwist experience and the pharaonic order is brought on a formula as simple as it is perfect. We remember the Pyramid Text in which the Pharaoh is greeted by the gods:
This is my son, my first-born;
and we find now opposed to it in 4:22 the new formula: My son, my first-born, is Israel. (390; Fs) (notabene)

21/12 In adapting the Egyptian symbol to the new experience the same method is followed as in the Abram episode of Genesis 14, where the symbols of the berith and the bawl-berith are transferred from the Canaanite El-Elyon to the god of Abram. The argument with regard to the date of both experience and symbol used on that occasion will also apply to the present problem. Experience and symbol fit the situation of the conflict with Egypt; there is no reason why the formula should not be dated in the Mosaic period, or why its authorship should not be ascribed to Moses himself. (390; Fs) (notabene)
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... In the course of the retardations it becomes, furthermore, increasingly clear that the Exodus is not an affair of Israel alone, but that the Pharaoh is fatally involved in the reordering of relations between God and Man. The emigration of Israel means more than the loss of a working force; the Egyptian ruler has been spiritually demoted and must surrender his position as Son of God to Israel. Yahweh demands Israel for his service, but he commands the Pharaoh to recognize the new order; he reminds the ruler, through Moses, that he could efface the Egyptians from the earth, but that he wants to spare them (9:16):
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23/12 Still, there is a rest of resistance. When Israel has gone, the Pharaoh and his advisers reconsider. They go in pursuit with their army to bring the people back. And Yahweh has to enforce the new order with symbolic finality through the miracle of the Red Sea: