Exodus Analytical Essay

In Chapter three and four of Exodus, Moses has an encounter with God. God appears before Moses in the form of a burning bush to give him a mission; he is to go to Egypt to talk to Pharaoh about releasing the Israelites from slavery in the land. This passage is significant, because it establishes the employing of Moses to speak for God to both the Pharaoh and the Israelites. The commission that Moses is given in this passage is what leads to the Exodus, the giving of the Law at Mt. Sinai, and the eventual establishment of the Israelites in the land, called the Promised Land, that God had promised to them as the descendants of Abraham. If Moses had not had this encounter with God, many of the events described in the Hebrew Bible might never have taken place. Overall, God’s commissioning of Moses as His spokesperson is the true beginning and basis for the development of the subsequent events of the Pentateuch. …show more content…
God’s appearance to Moses in the burning bush is the first event of this nature due to its personal atmosphere. The idea that God’s appearance to Moses was more personal than most of His other interactions is shown when He tells Moses His real name, I AM, which is something that was very special in the ancient world, because it was believed that knowing a god’s name gave a person some sort of power over them. This passage is also one of the first to introduce the idea of God appointing a person to speak for Him to a certain person or group of people on such a large scale. It is in this encounter that the reader is able to sense that Moses had a special relationship with God, not that Moses himself established, but that it was God that did