Apart from all the other fantastically ridiculous things in Exodus 7, I'd like to focus today on the staff that god turns into a snake. god sends Moses and Aaron to talk to Pharaoh and tells them to have Aaron throw his staff to the ground, which would then turn into a snake. This, supposedly, would show Pharaoh that god is serious and has powers. (Again, I'm ignoring the part about how god already knew it wouldn't work on Pharaoh since he had hardened his heart...maybe I'll post about that later...) Anyway, is Pharaoh impressed? Nope, not one bit. He calls his people together and they all throw down their staffs which all turn into snakes. So much for that magical power, right?
Granted, Aaron's snake eats all the other snakes there, but that's not the point. Where did Pharaoh's people get this power from?
3 comments:
It was a magic trick, like hand over an empty tin of peanuts to someone and out pops a spring coiled cloth covered snake.
Pharoah's men were so scared by that coil spring snake that they just handed victory over to Aaron and Mo as per recorded by the stenographer.
The snake is one symbol of Enki, the god who created man.
The snake also represents life in ancient times. It is also part of the symbol we modern people use to identify the medical field.
Enki's son Marduk fought three wars with all of the other gods, and finally won. A few folks believe that the last battle was an atomic-like war.
The Jewish writers used this story to indicate that the "reign" of false gods were over. The One True God has vanquished all of the other gods. Thus, Jehovah's snake was mightier than Enki/Marduk's snake.
This account was for both political and religious teaching and policies. The message to the Jews: you had better get on aboard the new agenda.
And where did Pharaoh's people get their powers from? Here, we clearly see that the intent of the authors was to show that their god was mightier than the other gods. This means that the original authors were not monotheists in the sense that they believed that other gods existed; they just didn't follow those other gods. This is damaging to many Xian claims.
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