Exodus - Lesson 15

Dr. Carmen Imes 
Exodus 
OT605-15 
Celebration Song
Lesson Transcript

Okay, so the Israelites have crossed the Red Sea, the Sea of Reeds. They've looked back and seen all of Pharaoh's army covered by the waters. They've seen the Egyptians lying dead on the shore.

This represents the decisive end to Pharaoh and his regime and his control over them. Now they can truly enter into the service of Yahweh without anyone else vying for their attention or for their service. And it's appropriate then that at this juncture in the Book of Exodus, the people break out in song.

This is truly time to celebrate. We might be tempted to skim past the poetry or the song that's here, thinking that maybe it's less important, like a commercial break or something in the narrative. But the Torah often conveys the heart of its theology via poetry.

If you focus in on the poetic sections of Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, you'll find that that's where some of the most important concepts are explored and lingered over. And so I don't want us to rush past this poem. Like liturgy, which we encountered in chapters 12 and 13, songs make history memorable.

So liturgy helps people to live out and remember in embodied ways God's faithfulness. But songs are also memorable. The people are not jubilant about their escape until a body of water stands between them and slavery and their oppressors are brought to justice.

Now they can truly let their hair down. They can truly celebrate. And freedom was not enough on its own.

Leaving Egypt was not enough on its own. As long as the possibility of re-enslavement remains, freedom is incomplete. So the Song of the Sea celebrates ultimate justice, that this oppressor who would not let go of his hold on them is finally out of the picture.

And they are free. And so what we have in chapter 15 is a song. We're told the song is one that Moses and the Israelites sang to Yahweh.

And so I'm going to read it for you and pause to make some comments about the content of the song. Before we do, I want to just notice that after we get the whole song, we have a recapitulation of part of the song by Miriam leading the women in dancing. And it's often this as a result, this whole song is often called the Song of Miriam.

We're told that Moses and the Israelites sang it, but there would be good reason for us to still think of it as Miriam's song. Gerald Janson makes a strong case that the grammar of 15 verse 19, where it says, for Pharaoh's horses, chariots, and horsemen went into the sea. Yahweh brought the waters of the sea back over them, but the Israelites walked through the sea on dry ground.

That is a recap of what happened just before the song, which is the fancy word for that is resumptive exposition, where the part of the narrative is retold again, so that you know you're picking up where you left off. And Gerald Janson calls this analepsis, which is a kind of flashback that fills in more detail to a chronologically prior event. So he notices the repetition of key elements from Exodus 14 verses 26 to 29, the naming of chariots and horsemen, the drowning event, and the exact statement, the people of Israel walked on dry ground in the midst of the sea, which is identical.

And that indicates that these texts are meant to be read together. So by repeating that same information in verse 19, the narrator is signaling the resumption of the narrative sequence of chapter 14. They saw, they feared, they trusted, and they sang.

If Janson is right, as I think he may be, then Miriam initiated the celebration by singing while Moses and the Israelites responded. So this is like a, if this is a flashback, then what we're seeing is the little clip about Miriam was actually in real time prior to the singing of everyone else, and they're responding to her leadership in song. So this hypothesis that Janson proposes would fit with what we know about victory celebration dances after war, which were normally led by women with drums and circle dancing.

In many of the ancient Near Eastern cultures, that's how it works. The warriors come back from battle and the women meet the warriors with drums and dancing, and they sing a song of celebration for the victory that has been won. So I think we're justified in calling this the song of Miriam, and as I will explain in a little bit, the narrator has a good reason to save her part of the song for last, even while signaling that it happens first.

So we already mentioned in our discussion at the beginning of Exodus, of the rescue of Moses, that Miriam plays an important role in the saga of Moses. She witnesses Moses' rescue from death in the reeds in chapter two, and though she was only a child at that time, Miriam brought women together to participate in redemption. She's the one who connects the daughter of Pharaoh with the daughter of Levi, so that Moses can be nursed and then adopted and brought up in the palace.

So she has this role in bringing them together, and now Miriam reappears, and I think it's important for us to recognize that she is now witnessing Israel's rescue from death in the Sea of Reeds. She's took her stand, along with the rest of the Israelite people, in witnessing the death of Pharaoh's army, and now she's a grown woman, but she again brings together the women to celebrate redemption. And although she's witnessed redemption twice, now she can truly celebrate at full volume and with embodied participation, because it is safe to do so, because Pharaoh's army is dead.

Okay, so with that in mind, let's dive into the song itself and see what it has to teach us. Moses and the Israelites sing this, I will sing to Yahweh, for he is highly exalted, both horse and driver he has hurled into the sea. The agency for the victory at the Sea of Reeds is squarely in Yahweh's camp.

Yahweh is the one who's accomplished this. Now we're told that he's accomplished this in the narrative portion. We were told that he sent an east wind, but now we're going to be seeing anthropomorphic language to describe how God did it.

So the east wind from chapter 14 is going to become the breath of God's nostrils in chapter 15. Very vivid and metaphorical language to show that Yahweh is fully responsible for this victory. Yahweh is my strength and my defense.

He has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him. My father's God, and I will exalt him.

Given the uncertainty of Moses' parentage that we talked about in chapter two, where does Moses belong? Who is his father? I think it's significant that he's singing here, my father's God, and I will exalt him. Moses now knows who he is. Yahweh is a warrior.

Yahweh is his name, and we saw in the signs and wonders narratives that Yahweh planned to make his name known to all of Egypt and to all the earth. Pharaoh's chariots and his army he has hurled into the sea. The best of Pharaoh's officers are drowned in the sea of reeds.

The deep waters have covered them. They sank to the depths like a stone. The word deep here is the word to home, which is in back in Genesis 1 verse 2, when we hear that the deep, the deep covered, the waters covered the deeps, and so we're back to uncreation, that the description of the world before God brought order and new life out of it.

Now the deeps have covered the Egyptians. Your right hand, Yahweh, was majestic in power. Your right hand, Yahweh, shattered the enemy, and we sure saw a lot about Yahweh's right hand in the signs and wonders.

In the greatness of your majesty, you threw down those who opposed you. You unleashed your burning anger, and it consumed them like stubble. So stubble, you might remember from chapter 5, is the the cuttings of the the straw harvest that are used to make bricks.

So Pharaoh had forced the people to scatter throughout Egypt to collect stubble to make bricks, and now Yahweh is consuming the Egyptian army like as if they are stubble. By the blast of your nostrils, the waters piled up. Such a vivid depiction of of the wind.

The surging waters stood up like a wall. The deep waters congealed in the heart of the sea. The enemy boasted, I will pursue, I will overtake them, I will divide the spoils, I will gorge myself on them, I will draw my sword and my hand will destroy them.

This language is interesting because gorge myself in Hebrew is fill myself. I will fill myself on the spoils and I will empty my sword. Drawing the sword is emptying the sword, which is probably because it's being taken out of a hilt or a scabbard.

Okay, probably because the sword's being taken out of the scabbard, so it's emptying the sword means to pull it out and use it in battle. So I will fill myself on them, I will empty my sword. Again, vivid language.

But you blew with your breath and the sea covered them. They sank like lead in the mighty waters. Who among the gods is like you, Yahweh? Who is like you? Majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, and working wonders.

The incomparability of Yahweh is now obvious to everyone. No god of the Egyptians was a match for the god of the Israelites. You stretch out your right hand and the earth swallows your enemies.

There's that swallowing we were waiting for. In your unfailing love, you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength, you will guide them to your holy dwelling.

That's where they're going to end up. They're going to end up at Mount Sinai and they're going to discover the dwelling of God and build a tent so that he can dwell among them. The nations will hear and tremble.

Anguish will grip the people of Philistia. The chiefs of Edom will be terrified. The leaders of Moab will be seized with trembling.

The people of Canaan will melt away. Terror and dread will fall on them. So here we're seeing that not this is not just the knowledge of God in Egypt that was accomplished, but as he brought them through the parted Sea of Reeds, there's now a testimony that's going to go out to other nations.

The nations around Canaan, the Philistines, the Edomites, the Moabites, and the Canaanites are all going to be terrified because they see the people of God marching across the desert toward them. And we'll see this, we could just keep our finger here and look in the book of Joshua when the Israelites cross over into the land and they have their first battle at Jericho. They meet a Canaanite woman named Rahab in the city of Jericho and the scouts are there to spy out the city.

And she testifies about the knowledge of Yahweh that has come to her community. And she says it this way in Joshua chapter 2 verse 8. Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, I know that Yahweh has given you this land and that a great fear of you has fallen on us so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how Yahweh dried up the water of the Sea of Reeds for you when you came out of Egypt and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan whom you completely destroyed.

When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and everyone's courage failed because of you. For Yahweh your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below. So this song right as they cross the sea becomes prophetic and comes true in the testimony of Rahab.

The nations have heard of the drying up of the Sea of Reeds and they are trembling, they're gripped with anguish, they're melting in fear. Verse 16, terror and dread will fall on them by the power of your arm. They will be as still as a stone until your people pass by, Lord, until the people you bought pass by.

You will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your inheritance. The place, Yahweh, you made for your dwelling, the sanctuary, Lord, your hands established. The word place in that verse is a rare Hebrew word, makon, which is almost always used to describe the temple and or and or Yahweh's throne.

So it's it's not just any old place, it's a very special place designated for Yahweh's dwelling and God's going to bring them into the promised land into the very mountain where his temple will be established. And the song ends with this declaration, Yahweh reigns forever and ever. The word reigns in Hebrew is malak, which is the verbal form of melek, which means king.

So Pharaoh has been called multiple times throughout the narratives the king of Egypt and now Yahweh is the one king. It's very clear that the narrator does not want us to miss this connection between the defeat of Pharaoh and the exaltation of Yahweh. Now Yahweh is king forever and ever.

Such a beautiful song. One passage that we did not really talk about when we were going through chapter 12 and talking about the Passover is Exodus 12, verse 12, where God announces on that same night, I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am Yahweh.

This is another challenge to the idea that the signs and wonders are attacks on the gods of Egypt because now here we are at the end, at the last of the traditional 10 plagues, and God says, I will bring judgment on the gods of Egypt still in the future. It seems like what we're experiencing here in this song is the result of God having judged the gods of Egypt. He has now struck them in his victory at the sea and they've been rendered powerless.

And as the song reads, who among the gods is like you Yahweh? And so we see this incomparability of Yahweh. Yahweh's reputation has spread to the nations. His renown echoes in all of these other nations and we see the creation out of the destruction of Egypt.

We see the creation of a new nation. We already mentioned the word deeps that cover the Egyptian army and that the Israelites walk through on dry ground. These are creation echoes and the culmination of this deliverance is rest where Yahweh is going to rest in his sanctuary.

His presence will be among them in the land and he will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of his inheritance. So just as we've seen that the deliverance from Egypt is not just freedom for freedom's sake, now we're seeing a clear message through this song that the purpose is worship and that the destination is the land that he promised to Abraham. Such a beautiful song.

Miriam picks this song up and so let's read what she sings and reflect on the possibility. We've already said this could have happened first, that Miriam sings first and the nation echoes back to her grammatically. Let's dig into this section verse 20.

Then Miriam the prophet, Aaron's sister, took a timbrel in her hand or took a hand drum in her hand and all the women followed her with hand drums and dancing. Miriam sang to them, sing to Yahweh for he is highly exalted both horse and driver he has hurled into the sea. Now this song is almost identical to the beginning of the song we read at the beginning of the chapter which is I will sing to Yahweh for he is highly exalted.

This one there's a slight change it's sing to Yahweh not I will sing but sing. Miriam is commanding the people she's exhorting them to worship Yahweh because he is highly exalted and this is another reason to see her as the one initiating this moment. She commands them to sing and they respond in song.

It's striking that she's called a prophet here and some scholars have have tried to kind of work against this and say no Miriam's not functioning as a prophet here look she doesn't she doesn't do any foretelling of the future, predicting anything, she doesn't announce the word of God to the people of God the way we expect prophets to do. I think the problem with that assessment is that it's matching it's comparing this scene against what later prophets do in in the Old Testament and saying well because she doesn't do what they do she's not a prophet. Why might Exodus be calling her a prophet? What what role is she playing? Well she's taking she is exhorting the people to praise God and answering back and leading the people in worship and if we flip back to chapter 7 we saw this interesting statement in an earlier session where God says to Moses after he's complained about not being able to speak God says to him see I have made you like God to Pharaoh and your brother Aaron will be your prophet.

So Moses is going to speak and Aaron is going to what he says and here we're specifically told that Miriam is Aaron's sister Aaron the one who functions like a prophet passing on the words of Moses the way a prophet passes on the words of God and so there's this interesting chain in which now we're reading as we read the song after Moses has sung it it sounds like Miriam is passing along Moses' song which would be a role taking the word through Moses and passing it on to the people and here she's leading all these women with hand drums and dancing just as we would expect after a military victory only it's not the armies of Israel that that are being celebrated but it's Yahweh himself who has won the battle. So Miriam's participation in this scene is really important because it links the two redemption stories the redemption of of Israel and the redemption of Moses and it reminds us again how many times God used women to accomplish his purposes. We had Shifra and Pua the daughter of Levi the daughter of Pharaoh the maidservants Zipporah the women who plundered Egypt and now the women who celebrate what God accomplished.

Her song echoes the theme of the plague narratives that you may know that I am Yahweh by announcing its fulfillment sing to Yahweh for he is highly exalted. She gives God the credit for this great victory and just as a previous pharaoh had mandated that the Israelites hurl their sons into the river now Yahweh hurls Pharaoh's warriors into the sea. It's a wonderful bookend to this story of redemption of the people of Israel and Miriam is there in both stories bearing witness to God's exciting work of deliverance.

We'll meet Miriam a few more times if you continue reading through the Torah she's not mentioned again in Exodus but she does come up in the book of Numbers as somebody who argues against Moses and casts some shade on his leadership. She and Aaron complain about him and that's in the stories in Numbers chapter 12. What's really interesting there is that she and Aaron are both saying hey God doesn't only speak through you he speaks through us too which is true he does they're both they're both seen as prophets in the book of Exodus and even though their attitude really stinks in Numbers chapter 12 and God punishes both of them he does not correct their claim.

He doesn't say no you don't speak on my behalf or no you're not prophets but he does show that they need to be subservient to Moses' leadership that Moses is over them and I find this story interesting and since we have a minute I'll just note that God makes a distinction between his relationship with Moses and his relationship with Aaron and Miriam as prophets because he says when there's a prophet among you I Yahweh reveal myself to them in visions I speak to them in dreams but this is not true of Moses I speak to him face to face and so God gets angry and he puts a cloud over them and when the cloud lifts from the tent Miriam's skin is diseased just like the skin of Moses was diseased when God gave him the sign in Exodus chapter 4. 

Sometimes people are frustrated by the fact or puzzled by the fact that Miriam is struck with this skin disease but Aaron is not and I think actually that's part of the genius of this moment Aaron and Miriam are trying to say they're just as good as Moses but Aaron's inadequacy or his subservience to Moses is clearly shown because he as a priest would have been somebody who inspected skin disease but he had no power to heal it so he ends up having to come to his brother Moses and say will you pray for Miriam so that she'd be healed and then Moses prays for her and she's healed which establishes that he is under Moses authority that his authority is not as great as Moses's so they're both both Aaron and Miriam are shamed in this story and they're shown to be dependent on Moses leadership but in spite of that the book of Micah still refers to Moses Aaron and Miriam as those as the three who led Israel through the desert through the wilderness and upholds them as leaders and I think that's especially clear here in Exodus chapter 15. 

Are there any questions about the song or about Miriam's role before we go on? 

Would you say that it's helpful to remember that when there's songs like this recounting an event that it's good to see that as something that's emphasizing the importance of the event and it's interesting to see who is actually creating the song like both events in the Old Testament and in the New Testament where those are interspersed to enhance the narrative. Yes I think they're very important sometimes it can feel like a struggle because the narrative and the song don't seem to match exactly the songs the songs are more symbolic metaphor there's more metaphor anthropomorphism and so if we want to know the blow-by-blow of what happened we read the narrative if we want to see its theological significance then we read the song and because the song draws out that theological significance and again and again through the Old Testament we have important songs like this one we have this the blessing of Jacob of his sons at the end of Genesis we have a couple of songs when God provides water in Numbers and they're celebrating that we have Moses' song at the end of his life in Deuteronomy that he teaches the people and then we have a number of songs of women throughout the Old Testament that are that turn out to be theologically very significant like the song of Hannah at the beginning of Samuel where God provides for her she's infertile then God provides a son and she sings about it and the themes of her song become the themes of books of first and second Samuel you can just trace out how these are programmatic for what the narrator wants to show us so he's putting this on the lips of of Hannah Hannah's song sets the trajectory for the book and then Mary's song in the New Testament actually revitalizes those same themes because she's witnessing a different kind of deliverance of God in her own generation so really fun to focus in on these songs.