Tag: Egypt

The Road to Shur

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The angel of the Lord found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur.
Genesis 16:7 (NIV)

After being afflicted by Sarai, Hagar the Egyptian woman flees and is met by the angel at a spring near the road to Shur.

The road to Shur is the path back to Egypt. Sarai’s actions led Hagar to want to return to her old life. Back to destruction. Back to the idols of Egypt.

Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water.
Exodus 15:22 (NIV)

The road to Shur leads to the Desert of Shur. It should be considered miraculous to flee Egypt by way of it. It should be considered certain death to travel back to Egypt through it.

That the people of God would make Hagar flee into certain death is a great shame.

400

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Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and behold, terror and great darkness fell upon him. Then God said to Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years. But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterward they will come out with many possessions.
Genesis 15:12-14 (NASB)

Genesis 15:12-14 echoes Genesis 1:1-3.

The number 400 is represented by the Hebrew letter “tav,” which is the final letter in the Hebrew alphabet. It points to a finality; perhaps captivity in Egypt is a picture of something larger.

It is the past. It is the future. It is now.

The Kingdom of Heaven is Like…

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Now it came about, when Abram entered Egypt, that the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful. Pharaoh’s officials saw her and praised her to Pharaoh; and the woman was taken into Pharaoh’s house.
Genesis 12:14-15 (NASB)

Now it came about, when mankind began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw that the daughters of mankind were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose.
Genesis 6:1-2 (NASB)

The scriptures echo. Or perhaps a better way of describing it is that the later instances are parables to teach you the meaning of the earlier ones.

Genesis 12 Echoes

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Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe.
Genesis 12:10 (NIV)

The seven years of abundance in Egypt came to an end, and the seven years of famine began, just as Joseph had said. There was famine in all the other lands, but in the whole land of Egypt there was food.
Genesis 41:53-54 (NIV)

Earlier, I mentioned Genesis 12 is an echo of Genesis 1.

But the great Famine at the end of Genesis, leading to the deliverance in Exodus is an echo of Genesis 12.

All of scripture echoes. Every last bit of it.

Thick as a Brick

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They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.
Genesis 11:3 (NIV)

The Hebrew word for “bricks” is found twice in this verse, and then seven times in Exodus.

Isn’t that interesting? It’s like the writers want to show us something about this word. They want us to look more closely.

Here, a point is made: Bricks instead of stone.

What’s significant about bricks and stones? Why the distinction? There are clues in the following verse.

And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.”
Genesis 11:4 (NKJV)

Verse 4 shows us arrogance and pride. Maybe it’s our accomplishments and self-sufficiency, and patting ourselves on the back.

But actually, it’s much worse than that.

“Let’s make A NAME for ourselves.”

What’s lost in the English is that this word “name” (שֵׁם) has a quirky meaning in Hebrew. It’s the same word as a certain person’s name: Shem. That’s right. Shem’s name means “name.” And as we learned in the last chapter, Shem is BLESSED.

But the Jewish reader will also note that one of the designations for God is “HaShem,” which means “THE NAME.”

So when the people said “Let’s make A NAME for ourselves,” this is heavily packed with meaning: “Let’s seize our own blessing. Let’s make a god for ourselves.”

This is idolatry, but it’s a kind of idolatry that’s going to be echoed later in Scripture.

When Israel is delivered from Egypt and are given the 10 commandments, it starts with a reminder of their freedom.

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
“You shall have no other gods before Me.
Exodus 20:2-3 (NASB)

It’s in this context of deliverance from slavery that the bricks come up again in the story:

Exodus 1:14 – Bondage and bricks
Exodus 5:7 – Make bricks
Exodus 5:8 – Quota of bricks
Exodus 5:16 – Make bricks
Exodus 5:18 – Quota of bricks
Exodus 5:19 – Daily task of bricks

They were delivered from bondage, from the land of slavery under the Egyptian gods, but they were also spared from God’s wrath, poured like a flood against those who harmed His people.

So God cautioned Israel: Have no other gods; idolatry is intrinsically tied to bondage.

But in the land of Shinar, the people forgot about the flood and God’s mighty hand that preserved humanity in an ark. “Let us make a name for ourselves,” they said, and they stepped into the slavery of brick-making for the first time.

But there’s a problem.

There aren’t enough bricks to make a proper name for yourself, friend. You’ll keep building towards heaven and never get there.

If I make enough money…
If I parent well enough…
If I have enough followers…
If I drive the nicest car…
If I work hard and get that promotion…

“MAKE MORE BRICKS!” the slaver demands.

It’s like Cain’s rejected sacrifice: “Look what I acquired!” as his first-fruits burned to ash. Perhaps his sacrifice was burned atop an alter of bricks.

God doesn’t seem to desire this.

A people who continually provoke Me to My face,
Offering sacrifices in gardens and burning incense on bricks;
Isaiah 65:3 (NASB)

In fact, what God wants is an altar of made of uncut stones, just the way they were found in the ground. Just stones in a pile, big enough to make an offering, as though the rocks are a reminder of who we are, and where we’ve come from. God just wants our whole selves.

And if you make an altar of stone for Me, you shall not build it of cut stones, for if you wield your chisel on it, you will profane it.
Exodus 20:25 (NASB)

So the lesson I see is that every vain pursuit of “making a name for yourself” is ultimately a pursuit of idols. A pursuit of your own claim to a blessing. A pursuit of a god who will reward you and cheer your ever-growing tower.

This always leads to slavery and confusion.

Furnaces of Babylon

Posted on by jovial_cynic

They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.
Genesis 11:3 (NIV)

The sages highlighted the bricks of Babel and point us to the bricks of slavery in Egypt. They also point us to the furnaces of Babylon.

There is a rabbinical teaching: “There are no stones in Babylon.” The story of the Tower of Babel is much darker than it first appears.

Now, you might think that this is strange, but it turns out that the rabbis weren’t simply giving us a metaphor or esoteric teaching about stones. In fact, the region of Babylonia simply has such few rocks that even pebbles were considered precious.

From the Wikipedia article on Babylonian ancient art:

In addition, the want of stone in Babylonia made every pebble precious and led to a high perfection of the art of gem-cutting.

So when Israel was told that they could only make altars from uncut stones (Exodus 20:25), this must have created an ache in the heart of God’s faithful during the Babylonian Exile: no temple, and no stones for altars.

All they had was the scriptures.

In land without stones, the Empire of Babylon grew from their invention of kiln-fired bricks – bricks that were “baked thoroughly,” according to Genesis. In Hebrew, they were “לִשְׂרֵפָ֑ה וְנִשְׂרְפָ֖ה.”

“Burned until burnt.” Totally engulfed with flames.

For the student of the scripture, this should make one’s ears perk up. It was meant to.

Where else have we heard about a furnace —in Babylon— with a fire so hot, the Hebrew word for “burning” is used multiple times to give emphasis?

It’s in Daniel. God’s faithful men were thrown into a giant Babylonian furnace for refusing to bow to the King’s statue.

A furnace meant to product the bricks of slavery. A furnace big enough to be fueled by humanity.

Then Nebuchadnezzar was furious with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, and his attitude toward them changed. He ordered the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual.
Daniel 3:19 (NIV)

The Tower of Babel, which means “confusion,” provides us with a key to unlock understanding: the bricks of Egypt… the furnaces of Babylon… they both point to slavery. Captivity. And they both provide a starting point.

The darkness of the Egyptian empire. The darkness of the Babylonian empire.

But then God said, “Let there be Light.”

Not the light from the flames of humanity’s furnaces, fueled by our efforts, but the very Light of God, which comes to set His people free.

“There are no stones in Babylon.”

Without a temple and stones to build an altar, God’s people longed for deliverance.

When Abraham was first called away from his Babylonian home, God gave him a Promise, and there he built an altar. With stones.

The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.
Genesis 12:7 (NIV)

Friend, God calls us away from Babylon, from the place without stones of remembrance, away from reliance on Empire, and away from the furnaces built to consume you.

Abraham and his family departed “Ur of the Chaldeans.”

“Ur” means flames.

God is delivering you from this.

Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there.
Genesis 11:31 (NIV)

Good vs Beautiful

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The sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose.
Genesis 6:2 (NIV)

Translators do violence to the text.

This word we translated as “beautiful” here? FIFTEEN TIMES this Hebrew word is used before this, and EVERY SINGLE TIME, the word is “GOOD.”

“Good” is how God described the world he created in Genesis 1. It’s the same “good” of the Tree of good and evil knowledge.

The theological paths you can take here are absolutely tremendous.

The daughters of humanity were GOOD. What does this teach us about women? What does it say about God’s view of them? Who or what corrupts them by way of violence?

There is much water to draw from this well.

Another important link:

When Sarai is taken by Pharaoh in Genesis 12, she is described as beautiful (yawfeh), but when Esther is taken by Xerxes in Esther 2:7, she is described as both good (tov) and beautiful (yawfeh). And actually, the whole book of Esther links Haman with the concept of “falling,” which is the same root word as the Nephilim in Genesis 6. One might argue that Haman is Nephilim, and both the Pharaoh and King Xerxes are like “sons of God” who take women they please.

Empires

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Until recently, I’ve assumed that every empire in scripture (Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Rome, etc.) represented wickedness. But the more I’m reading through Genesis 14, the more I’m coming to a different conclusion. Perhaps Empire is not the culmination of wickedness. It is the culmination of man.

The shift for me here is that empire does represent bondage and slavery, and these things are definitely not good. But they are not the same as “wickedness,” which is also not good, but they are different, and treated differently in the text.