summary:
. passover is about fulfillment of the god's promise
to use Egypt to build the blessed nation,
not about a savior for the enslaved.
. Judaism's most important prophet is Moses
who lead the Israelites out of Egypt
after Egyptians had turned them into slaves.
. Moses gave Judaism its most important laws
and the holiday about leaving Egypt, passover,
is the first holiday in their calendar:
its month was made the first month.
. but contrary to the obvious,
passover is not about a savior for the enslaved;
it is about the god promising to
use Egypt as an incubator.
. the Egypt story is about how
the god has a plan for his people
to make them numerous in a foreign land
in order to make them strong enough
for conquering the Promised land.
. the Egypt story also has parallels to
the Noah story:
the god's chosen family is saved
while everyone else is purged in a flood;
likewise in the Egypt story,
one family is turned into a blessed nation
while everyone else in the story
are turned into adversaries fit for death.
. just as Egypt was an incubator nest
preparing them to conquer the Promised land;
and enslavement pushed them out of the nest;
so too after the fall of 2nd-temple Israel
Israelites grew among the nations,
and after being pushed out by the holocaust,
they came back to the Promised land
stronger than ever,
and super-blessed with many powerful allies.
prophesy of the Egypt story:
Genesis 12:1 Now the Lord said to Abram,
Go out from your country and family
and from your father’s house,
into the land to which I will be your guide:
2 And I will make of you a great nation,
blessing you and making your name great;
and you will be a blessing:
3 To them who are good to you
will I give blessing,
and on him who does you wrong
will I put my curse:
and you will become a name of blessing
to all the families of the earth.
...
6 Abram went till he came to Sh’khem[Shechem],
to the holy tree of Moreh.
At that time, the Canaanites
were still living in the land.
7 And ADONAI came to Abram, and said,
I will give all this land to your seed;
then Abram made an altar there to ADONAI
who had let himself be seen by him.
...
10 And because there was little food,
he went south, down into Egypt.
Genesis 15:
7 And [the god] said to Abram,
I am ADONAI,
who took you from Ur of the Chaldees,
to give you this land for your heritage.
8 And Abram said, O ADONAI God,
how may I be certain that it will be mine?
… [he is then told by ADONAI
to perform a special sacrificial ritual ]
11 And evil birds came down on the bodies,
but Abram sent them away.
12 Now when the sun was going down,
a deep sleep came on Abram,
and a dark cloud of fear.
13 And ADONAI said to Abram,
Truly, your seed will be living in
a land which is not yours, as servants
to a people who will be cruel to yours
for four hundred years;
14 But I will be the judge of
that nation which enslave yours,
and yours will come out from among them
with great wealth.
...
16 And in the fourth generation
your seed will come back here;
[among the Emori, people from 2100BC Syria
who also occupied large parts of Mesopotamia]
for at present
the sin of the Amorite[Emori] is not full.
[ie, the god conquers only sinners;
so, Abram's seed waits for sin .]
18 In that day
ADONAI made an agreement with Abram,
and said,
To your seed have I given this land
from the dry riverbed of Egypt
to the great river Euphrates:
Keni, K’nizi, Kadmoni, Hitti,
[ Kenite, Kenizzite, Kadmonite, Hittite ]
P’rizi, Refa’im, Emori, Kena’ani,
[Perizzite, Rephaim, Amorite, Canaanite]
Girgashi Y’vusi.
[ Girgashite, Jebusite ].
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