Chapter 15.
HOW THE HEBREWS UNDER THE CONDUCT OF MOSES LEFT EGYPT.FJAJ 2.88
1. So the Hebrews went out of Egypt, while the Egyptians wept, and repented
that they had treated them so hardly.FJAJ 2.89
- Now they took their journey by
Letopolis, a place at that time deserted, but where Babylon was built afterwards,
when Cambyses laid Egypt waste: but as they went away hastily, on the third
day they came to a place called Beelzephon, on the Red Sea; and when they
had no food out of the land, because it was a desert, they eat of loaves
kneaded of flour, only warmed by a gentle heat; and this food they made
use of for thirty days; for what they brought with them out of Egypt would
not suffice them any longer time; and this only while they dispensed it
to each person, to use so much only as would serve for necessity, but not
for satiety
Whence it is that, in memory of the want we were then in,
we keep a feast for eight days, which is called the feast of unleavened
bread.Now the entire multitude of those that went out, including the
women and children, was not easy to be numbered, but those that were of
an age fit for war, were six hundred thousand.FJAJ 2.90
2. They left Egypt in the month Xanthicus, on the fifteenth day of the
lunar month; four hundred and thirty years after our forefather Abraham
came into Canaan, but two hundred and fifteen years only after Jacob removed
into Egypt.FJAJ 2.91
(28)
Why our Masorete copy so groundlessly abridges this account in Exodus 12:40,
as to ascribe 430 years to the sole peregrination of the Israelites in
Egypt, when it is clear even by that Masorete chronology elsewhere, as
well as from the express text itself, in the Samaritan, Septuagint, and
Josephus, that they sojourned in Egypt but half that time, � and that by
consequence, the other half of their peregrination was in the land of Canaan,
before they came into Egypt, � is hard to say. See Essay on the Old Testament,
p. 62, 63.
It was the eightieth year of the age of Moses, and of that of Aaron three
more
They also carried out the bones of Joesph with them, as he had charged
his sons to do.FJAJ 2.92
3. But the Egyptians soon repented that the Hebrews were gone; and the
king also was mightily concerned that this had been procured by the magic
arts of Moses; so they resolved to go after them
Accordingly they took
their weapons, and other warlike furniture, and pursued after them, in
order to bring them back, if once they overtook them, because they would
now have no pretense to pray to God against them, since they had already
been permitted to go out; and they thought they should easily overcome
them, as they had no armor, and would be weary with their journey; so they
made haste in their pursuit, and asked of every one they met which way
they were gone
And indeed that land was difficult to be traveled over,
not only by armies, but by single persons
Now Moses led the Hebrews this
way, that in case the Egyptians should repent and be desirous to pursue
after them, they might undergo the punishment of their wickedness, and
of the breach of those promises they had made to them
As also he led them
this way on account of the Philistines, who had quarreled with them, and
hated them of old, that by all means they might not know of their departure,
for their country is near to that of Egypt; and thence it was that Moses
led them not along the road that tended to the land of the Philistines,
but he was desirous that they should go through the desert, that so after
a long journey, and after many afflictions, they might enter upon the land
of Canaan
Another reason of this was, that God commanded him to bring
the people to Mount Sinai, that there they might offer him sacrifices.
Now when the Egyptians had overtaken the Hebrews, they prepared to fight
them, and by their multitude they drove them into a narrow place; for the
number that pursued after them was six hundred chariots, with fifty thousand
horsemen, and two hundred thousand foot-men, all armed
They also seized
on the passages by which they imagined the Hebrews might fly, shutting
them up (29)
Take the main part of Reland's excellent note here, which greatly illustrates
Josephus, and the Scripture, in this history, as follows: "[A traveller,
says Reland, whose name was] Eneman, when he returned out of Egypt, told
me that he went the same way from Egypt to Mount Sinai, which he supposed
the Israelites of old traveled; and that he found several mountainous tracts,
that ran down towards the Red Sea. He thought the Israelites had proceeded
as far as the desert of Etham, Exodus 13:20, when they were commanded by
God to return back, Exodus 14:2, and to pitch their camp between Migdol
and the sea; and that when they were not able to fly, unless by sea, they
were shut in on each side by mountains. He also thought we might evidently
learn hence, how it might be said that the Israelites were in Etham before
they went over the sea, and yet might be said to have come into Etham after
they had passed over the sea also. Besides, he gave me an account how he
passed over a river in a boat near the city Suez, which he says must needs
be the Heroopolia of the ancients, since that city could not be situate
any where else in that neighborhood."
As to the famous passage produced here by Dr. Bernard, out of Herodotus,
as the most ancient heathen testimony of the Israelites coming from the
Red Sea into Palestine, Bishop Cumberland has shown that it belongs to
the old Canaanite or Phoenician shepherds, and their retiring out of Egypt
into Canaan or Phoenicia, long before the days of Moses. Sanchoniatho,
p. 374, &c.
between inaccessible precipices and the sea; for there was [on each side]
a [ridge of] mountains that terminated at the sea, which were impassable
by reason of their roughness, and obstructed their flight; wherefore they
there pressed upon the Hebrews with their army, where [the ridges of] the
mountains were closed with the sea; which army they placed at the chops
of the mountains, that so they might deprive them of any passage into the
plain.FJAJ 2.93
4. When the Hebrews, therefore, were neither able to bear up, being
thus, as it were, besieged, because they wanted provisions, nor saw any
possible way of escaping; and if they should have thought of fighting,
they had no weapons; they expected a universal destruction, unless they
delivered themselves up to the Egyptians
So they laid the blame on Moses,
and forgot all the signs that had been wrought by God for the recovery
of their freedom; and this so far, that their incredulity prompted them
to throw stones at the prophet, while he encouraged them and promised them
deliverance; and they resolved that they would deliver themselves up to
the Egyptians
So there was sorrow and lamentation among the women and
children, who had nothing but destruction before their eyes, while they
were encompassed with mountains, the sea, and their enemies, and discerned
no way of flying from them.FJAJ 2.94
5. But Moses, though the multitude looked fiercely at him, did not,
however, give over the care of them, but despised all dangers, out of his
trust in God, who, as he had afforded them the several steps already taken
for the recovery of their liberty, which he had foretold them, would not
now suffer them to be subdued by their enemies, to be either made slaves
or be slain by them; and, standing in midst of them, he said, "It
is not just of us to distrust even men, when they have hitherto well managed
our affairs, as if they would not be the same hereafter; but it is no better
than madness, at this time to despair of the providence of God, by whose
power all those things have been performed he promised, when you expected
no such things: I mean all that I have been concerned in for deliverance
and escape from slavery
Nay, when we are in the utmost distress, as you
see we ought rather to hope that God will succor us, by whose operation
it is that we are now this narrow place, that he may out of such difficulties
as are otherwise insurmountable and out of which neither you nor your enemies
expect you can be delivered, and may at once demonstrate his own power
and his providence over us
Nor does God use to give his help in small
difficulties to those whom he favors, but in such cases where no one can
see how any hope in man can better their condition
Depend, therefore,
upon such a Protector as is able to make small things great, and to show
that this mighty force against you is nothing but weakness, and be not
affrighted at the Egyptian army, nor do you despair of being preserved,
because the sea before, and the mountains behind, afford you no opportunity
for flying, for even these mountains, if God so please, may be made plain
ground for you, and the sea become dry land."FJAJ 2.95