Exodus 1:8-2:10
Psalm 138
Matthew 16:13-20
From Genesis to Exodus
As the summer days come to an end, it seems to me that the stories in the Lectionary get longer and longer! Last week, we would have heard the twenty-eight verses of the end of Genesis. The last portion of the story of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, Joseph and his brothers come together in Egypt, reuniting the twelve tribes of Israel into one family. Far from the Promised Land though safe from famine, the Israelites came to reside as sojourners in the land, at peace with Pharaoh.
For a time.
The Sacrifice of the Innocents
This week, we hear an even longer story. Many years passed in the land, so long a time that the honors given to Joseph faded out of memory. Where once the people of the Nile and the people of the Jordan understood each other, that time had now come and gone. Where once they labored in common—shepherds, farmers, builders—now the Israelites were held as servants. Justice was lost, common ties no longer bound. Once welcome immigrants, the Israelites were now a hated “burden” on the economy of the Pharaoh’s kingdom—a second class, ordered to the most menial jobs in order to feed their families.
Now, challenged with a perceived threat to society, the “New King” of Egypt makes an incredible decision. It would be better for all, he says, if those people were no more. The Hebrews could revolt, and side with the enemies of Egypt. Rather than seeking to mend the breech, The King decides a path that will take Egypt to a chairos moment. Calling to the throne the two midwives for the Hebrew people, he orders these caregivers to first, do harm. All of the males born to Hebrew women shall be killed. Being God-fearing people, the midwives Shif’ra and Pu’ah disobeyed the King of Egypt. Their actions of salvation went so far as lying to Pharaoh, protecting the future of the Israelites into the next generation.
Their noble effort did not end Pharaoh’s injustice, though. The King of Egypt chose another path, slaughtering the innocents, ordering that all the males born to the Hebrews be cast into the Nile.
It would seem to me that Pharaoh would be a more frustrated with the midwives than comes from the scriptures. We know from the scripture that these two were honored for the salvation of their people. And, though Pharaoh chose a path to destruction, ultimately he would receive just what he asked for.
Misunderstandings (but not in God’s ears)
I want to step away from the story for a moment, and into a hidden “joke” within the scripture. During my time at Michigan State, I had a professor who deeply loved Philology-the study of words. His passion took him a little too deeply at times into the study of the etymology, the historic moment, the context of words. He infected me with this virus. And as I read my Bible, I sometimes get caught in the oddest places seeking the philology of the scriptures.
There is a great artistry in the Hebrew Scriptures, and a mastery of word-play and hidden meanings. We find here (in two places), the difficulty of hearing what one wants to hear, over what God is still speaking.
There is a theory in psycholinguistics, the study of how the brain interprets the words we hear, that in any given conversation between two people who share a common second language, more than ten percent of the conversation is lost to homonyms (words that sound the same in the language) and cognates (words that translate differently in different languages).
There is a famous urban legend about General Motors. In the 1970’s, a marketing campaign in Spain and Central America promoted the redesigned Chevrolet Nova. The legend tells that the entire marketing department was fired subsequent to the first quarter evaluation of sales. The executives could not figure out why this model sold so poorly, until a Spanish national on the team told them a bit of wisdom. Nova = No Va = No go. The legend says that the company changed the model name to “Caribe” (which means Caribbean), and the cars sold out off the lot.
It’s important to know what you are saying, and to whom you are speaking!
Pharaoh gets caught with this problem, assuming what he desires is exactly what he is hearing. Like many words in many languages, Shif’ra and Pu’ah mean different things in Egyptian and Hebrew. When the King called Shif’ra (????) to his aid, he called the “one who destroys.” When he called Pu’ah (????), the King though he had called “The one who scatters things like the wind.”
Pharaoh’s mind must have been eased by calling these agents of distruction. However, to the Israelites, these women were agents and things of Beauty and Splendor, for that is what their names mean in Hebrew. When this story was retold in the years after the Exodus, you can almost hear the Hebrew children snickering, “How could Pharaoh not understand?” When the King wanted to destroy, God sent beauty and splendor as protection to the Israelites.
From the River
It would have been enough if Pharaoh had ended his genocidal thoughts after this failed plot. We know what comes next, though. The infants weren’t enough. Pharaoh ordered the death of the infants. And from here, God’s savior to the Israelites was born, saved, and his life set in motion. From now to the end of the season of Ordinary Time, we will walk with Moses and the Israelites through slavery to freedom, through the wilderness of faith to the promised land of redemption.
Pharaoh’s daughter, too, does not quite understand what she had found. The Hebrew word translated “basket” literally means little ark: a reminder that just as God saved Noah, he will save Moses and the Israelites. In Egyptian, Mose, meaning son of, was often part of a name, (Rameses = Ra-mose, son of Ra), but in Hebrew, it means to draw out, or to save. Perhaps the princess knows a little Hebrew. So Moses is brought raised as an Egyptian. His story will continue for several weeks to come, leading us to Advent.
The Story So Far..and Going
If it had not been God on their side, Shif’ra and Pu’ah would not have saved the children of Israel. If it had not been God who had been his help, Moses would not have been bound into his calling, and he would not have drawn the children of Israel to freedom.
There were things hidden here, gifts from God waiting for the right moment—for God’s time and place. In the historical moment, the Egyptians had just expelled an occupying empire, and were fearful that the Israelites might reverse the fortunes of the “new king.” The sadness here was in Pharaoh’s narrow vision for the nation. Rather than celebrate diversity, and unite the people under what they held in common, he divided the nation in fear. Hidden fears, bolstered by a hate-filled regime. Where was God in that time for the children of Israel? I am sure that question was asked often, “Why, O God, have you forsaken us?”
Hear me clearly: I do not believe that God allows suffering in order to “teach” us what is good. Rather, God has given us stories like this one in Exodus to lift us up when we feel “scorned…and despised.” It is these moments when we can ask, “Who, God, do you think that I am? What are you asking me to do and to be?” These are our stories, to lift us up to live, and love, and be the gifts that God has called us to be.
This is the hard question of faith in our time. We must always remember that God is always here for us, and calling us to live for exactly the time in which we live, in such a moment as this. How can we answer?
Christ’s question, and Christ’s answer
Once, Jesus asked his followers, “Who do the people say that I am?” Their answers unsatisfying, Christ asks a second question, “Who do you say that I am?”
Those two questions, so human in their quest, could have been echoed in the past by Shif’ra and Pu’ah, and by Moses. They challenge us. They drive us to places where our faith is challenged, and rarified into the purpose to which we have been called. At various points in our lives we need to “step up to the plate.” As scary as the times in our lives have been, they usually have been moments that have initiated some transitions in our lives and offered us the opportunity to drawn upon the memories of our early years.
Today’s lessons end by asking all of us to step up, to own the living out the answer to the question: “But who do you say that I am?” As I said before, it is important to know what you are saying, and to whom you are speaking!
This is not easy to answer, for behind our responses we have our own histories, our own working through all of those messages from our own childhood, our own disappointments and failures, our own physical and emotional pains, our own experiences of loneliness or feeling of little worth. We come to this place from the contexts of our living, a place one might call “tall grass.” In this tall grass, we are buffeted by many things, some which we cannot see. Life is complex and full. Sometimes the tall grass becomes a haven where we can hide out. Sometimes it is a maze where we don’t know where we are going or who is around us. At other times we like to smell its uniqueness and at other times we feel choked by its overbearing sameness. Life is full in all of its complexities, and we bring all those complexities here at this moment in this place. So we are a people of the context.
From that context, we come to ask Christ’s question ourselves, “Who do you say that I am?” We hope for the burning bush. We know from our past that this is rare, but glorious. Still, we are who God made us to be, gifted by the grace given to us, each according to the measure of faith with which God has blessed us. Baptized, beloved, bound by water, and loosed in service, we know that this question is the ultimate concern in our lives.
For our time and place
We know that others have lived through such times of question, and have come to be God’s hands and feet in their time and place. In the midst of our fears and hesitation, it is the stepping out in faith and being alive and present to ourselves and to others, and to the world around us, that is the source of our future hope and promise. So with courage and hopefulness, we dare come again to the holy table and to a special presence with each other in prayer.
Who would know that as a result of our hearing Christ’s simple question, we and the world around us will never be quite the same again? Be on the alert, for God’s spirit is dwelling in our midst!
Today, and every day, seek the time to ask Christ’s question of yourself. Discover how you are an agent of God’s beauty and splendor, Set free that gift that God has hidden in you, and let it shine for all to see. Share the Christ that you know, that part of God that lives in you, with the whole world. Today is the day when your answer can be shared with the whole world! Go with God, and uncover the answer.
Who does God say that you are?
Amen.
Lowrey, Tina M. “Psycholinguistic Phenomena in Marketing Communications.” p.233. Online edition via Google Books, 2007
It is noted that this is purely an urban legend. See the following for complete information”: http://www.snopes.com/business/misxlate/nova.asp
Blue Letter Bible. “Dictionary and Word Search for Shif’ra (Strong's 08231)”. Blue Letter Bible. 1996-2008.
Blue Letter Bible. “Dictionary and Word Search for Pu’ah (Strong's 06326)”. Blue Letter Bible. 1996-2008.
Mays, James L. ed. “Harper’s Bible Commentary
Psalm 22:1
Ibid.