Chapter 39: Moses Meets God on Mount Horeb
Since Moses came to the land of Midian, Moses' life was much more comfortable, and he enjoyed a life that he had never enjoyed before.
After his birth, he was adopted by an Egyptian princess, but he was often insulted at court because of the Hebrew characteristics that he showed as he grew up.
Later, after the death of his adoptive mother, he was also deprived of the right to live in the court, and was only able to live outside.
Later, because the sun god Atun wanted to usurp the throne of his brother Amun as the main god, the Egyptian royal court was in turmoil for decades, and several successive pharaohs failed to leave heirs, and the capital moved back and forth.
Of course, none of this had anything to do with Moses, who lived in the city of Thebes, the capital of a hundred gates, recognized his family, and learned his Hebrew identity.
Then, he looked at his suffering people and began to use his vast knowledge to seek fair treatment for them. Even for this, he lived to be forty years old, but he could not find a wife.
However, the reality was a slap in the face for Moses, who killed Egyptian soldiers for helping the Hebrews, but was accused by the two Hebrews he helped, and began to flee.
Thanks to the messenger of the stars, Sisyphus, who had ascended to the throne of the gods, helped him escape from the Egyptians and made him safe in the land of Midian.
It was a place controlled by their kindred, who worshipped the same god, the same god who made their ancestors and was also worshipped by their ancestors.
Reuel, the most prominent elder in the land of Midian, welcomed Moses' arrival and married his youngest daughter, Zipporah, the pearl of Midian, to Moses.
After that, Moses began his life as a shepherd in Midian.
He said that he was shepherding sheep, but in fact Moses had nothing to do and took the work of his servants himself. He loved shepherding sheep, watching the sunset with Zippora on the edge of the desert, arguing with Sisyphus on the meadows, and meditating on the holy mountain.
In the course of these times, Moses had even forgotten about his people who had suffered in Egypt, or rather, he did not want to think of them.
Especially after his son Ge Nian was born, he didn't have the heart to think about things that seemed far away from him.
In the land of Midian, everything was peaceful, and the only thing that displeased him was that his wife, Zipporah, was not as godly as she had been. Sometimes he even says some inexplicable things, saying that it is better to ask God for help than to ask for oneself to forge ahead.
Moses was very dissatisfied, they worshipped God and worshiped God, but it was only a covenant they made with God to keep God in the hearts of their people.
It's true that you want to forge ahead on your own, but what does it have to do with believing in the gods, and what does it have to do with asking for God's help?
Moses knew why, and it is said that a few years before he came to Midian, Zipporah was a woman who was extremely faithful to the gods. But at that time, a man and a woman, who were said to be gods, lived in the only temple of an Egyptian god in the area, and taught Zippora how humans could become gods.
Ever since she learned that humans can become gods, she has lost her original fear of the gods. In her own words, she was already a demigod, and in a few years, maybe she would become a god, and then the people of Midian, she could protect herself.
Zipporah didn't go on with the rest of the sentence, but Moses thought about it and probably knew that she was trying to say that the gods almost never answered them.
Moses always felt that what Zipporah was thinking was wrong, that it should not be what they were Israelite, and that they should have served God since they were born.
After years of communication, Moses had completely lost all his intention of reversing Zippora's attitude, and he devoted all his energy to raising his son, Ge Chen.
However, once when he was having a routine debate with Sisyphus, his son Ge was amazed by Sisyphus's deeds and even worshipped Sisyphus as a teacher.
Who was Sisyphus? Moses already knew very well that he came from outside the land with the Lord of the Stars, and before he became a god, he had kidnapped the god of death outside the land so that death would not appear in the world.
Although his wife, Zippora, no longer worships the gods as she once did, she is still godly on the whole, and even reminds him often in some ordinary subsections, admonishing him: "Since you claim to worship the gods, you must also be careful not to break the covenant between your ancestors and the gods in some very small places." ”
Sisyphus, on the other hand, disdained almost all the gods except for his incomparable worship of the Lord of the Stars. And the reason why he worships the Lord of the Stars is not because this god is great, but because this god once wandered the world, preached to the world, and created a method to make human beings become gods. His wife, Zippora, learned the method that this deity created.
Moses naturally admired such a god, but he had already become a citizen of their God with his ancestors, so he could only be a person of God. No matter how great other gods are, they will not affect the brilliance of God in his heart.
Moses had not gone far to make Sisyphus his son's teacher, but he could not bear the invitation of his wife and son, so he made a bet with Sisyphus.
They decided that both of them would guess the outcome of the Hittite war with Egypt and guess correctly that the man would win the bet. If Sisyphus guessed correctly, his son would become a student of Sisyphus, and if Moses guessed correctly, Sisyphus would have moved away from his son.
In the end, the two guessed wrong at the same time, this is a war without such a thing as victory or defeat. So Moses consulted with Sisyphus, who could only teach his son how to become a god, but could not say anything else to him.
After that, Moses placed greater emphasis on educating his sons, often telling Gechen about the past about their Israelites.
He begins with the patriarch Adam and Eve, the expulsion of Cain, the father of many nations, Abraham, the father of many nations, Isaac, the patriarch of their Israelite names, and Jacob, who gave the Israelites a status in Egypt.
He wanted Ge Nian to find something that moved him from the history of their ancestors, and to give birth to admiration for God. When Moses was in the royal court of Egypt, his biological mother could only treat him as a wet nurse, and could not teach him to read, but could only tell their history one by one.
Moses benefited from this and believed in God, and he hoped that his son would develop a sense of identification with the Israelites from this history.
After telling his son the history that day, Moses led the flock of his father-in-law, Reuer, to a distant hill.
This is the only high mountain in this desert land, and the mountains are lush and green, and it is extremely asymmetrical with the yellow sand and meadows that are everywhere here.
It is said that this mountain suddenly appeared here when the Midianites first moved here, and the Midianites claimed that it was a mountain made by the gods, calling it and the mountain of fire, also known as the mountain of the gods.
Mount Horeeth was full of thorns, but Moses still liked to stay here and think alone, especially after every failed argument with Sisyphus, and he even slept on the ground in the wilderness.
That night, he was often guided by the gods, and messengers of the gods often came into his dreams to teach him knowledge.
When Moses sat down again under a great tree and meditated, suddenly a raging fire appeared from the thorns not far from him, and in the light of the fire, these thorns were not half destroyed.
Moses had a question in his heart, and he set out to go to the thorn, and he wanted to know what kind of thorn it was, and how it could be so magical.
"Moses, Moses. ”
Suddenly, in the light of the thorn fire, a gentle voice arose, calling Moses to come over.
"Here I am, who called me from among the magical thorns?"
Moses faintly saw a vague figure in the light of the fire of thorns, and he went there.
"Do not come near, for the mountain on which you have set is a holy mountain, and the place where you stand is a holy place, and take off your sandals from your feet. As if aware of Moses' doubts, this gentle voice took his own name: "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, and the Lord is my name, and this will be my honorific name among your people." ”
Moses was amazed and delighted, and did not expect the gods to appear before him. So Moses removed his shoes and blindfolded himself so that he could not look directly at their God, which Moses had been taught at a very young age.
His birth mother, her wet nurse, had told him many times that God could not look directly.