The Exodus

The Exodus (Hebrew: יציאת מצרים, romanized: Yəṣīʾat Mīṣrayīm, lit. 'Departure from Egypt') is the founding myth of the Israelites whose narrative is spread over four of the five books of the Pentateuch (specifically, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy). The narrative of the Exodus describes a history of Egyptian bondage of the Israelites followed by their exodus from Egypt through a passage in the Red Sea, in pursuit of the Promised Land under the leadership of Moses.

The story of the Exodus is central in Judaism. It is recounted daily in Jewish prayers and celebrated in festivals such as Passover. Early Christians saw the Exodus as a typological prefiguration of resurrection and salvation by Jesus. The Exodus is also recounted in the Quran as part of the extensive referencing of the life of Moses, a major prophet in Islam. The narrative has also resonated with various groups in more recent centuries, such as among African Americans striving for freedom and civil rights, and in liberation theology.

The consensus of modern scholars on the historicity of the Exodus is that the Pentateuch does not give an accurate account of the origins of the Israelites, who appear instead to have formed as an entity in the central highlands of Canaan in the late second millennium BCE (around the time of the Late Bronze Age collapse) from the indigenous Canaanite culture. Most modern scholars believe that some elements in the story of the Exodus might have some historical basis, but that any such basis has little resemblance to the story told in the Pentateuch. While the majority of modern scholars date the composition of the Pentateuch to the period of the Achaemenid Empire (5th century BCE), some of the elements of this narrative are older, since allusions to the story are made by 8th-century BCE prophets such as Amos and Hosea.

The Exodus tells a story of the enslavement of the Israelites, the Plagues of Egypt, the departure of the Israelites from Egypt, the revelations at Mount Sinai, and the Israelite wanderings in the wilderness up to the borders of Canaan. Its message is that the Israelites were delivered from slavery by Yahweh their god, and therefore belong to him by covenant.

The story of the Exodus is told in the first half of Exodus, with the remainder recounting the 1st year in the wilderness, and followed by a narrative of 39 more years in the books of Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, the last four of the first five books of the Bible (also called the Torah or Pentateuch). In the first book of the Pentateuch, the Book of Genesis, the Israelites had come to live in Egypt in the Land of Goshen during a famine, under the protection of an Israelite, Joseph, who had become a high official in the court of the Egyptian pharaoh. Exodus begins with the death of Joseph and the ascension of a new pharaoh "who did not know Joseph" (Exodus 1:8).

The pharaoh becomes concerned by the number and strength of the Israelites in Egypt and enslaves them, commanding them to build at two "supply" or "store cities" called Pithom and Rameses (Exodus 1:11). The pharaoh also orders the slaughter at birth of all male Hebrew children. One Hebrew child, however, is rescued and abandoned in a floating basket on the Nile. He is found and adopted by Pharaoh's daughter, who names him Moses. Grown to a young man, Moses kills an Egyptian he sees beating a Hebrew slave, and takes refuge in the land of Midian, where he marries Tzipporah, a daughter of the Midianite priest Jethro. The old pharaoh dies and a new one ascends the throne.

According to Ezekiel 20:8-9, the enslaved Israelites also practised "abominations" and worshiped the gods of Egypt. This provoked Yahweh to destroy them but he relented to avoid his name being "profaned".

Meanwhile, Moses goes to Mount Horeb, where Yahweh appears in a burning bush and commands him to go to Egypt to free the Hebrew slaves and bring them to the Promised Land in Canaan. Yahweh also speaks to Moses's brother Aaron, and the two assemble the Israelites and perform miraculous signs to rouse their belief in Yahweh's promise. Moses and Aaron then go to Pharaoh and ask him to let the Israelites go into the desert for a religious festival, but he refuses and increases their workload, commanding them to make bricks without straw. Moses and Aaron return to Pharaoh and ask him to free the Israelites and let them depart. Pharaoh demands Moses to perform a miracle, and Aaron throws down Moses' staff, which turns into a tannin (sea monster or snake) (Exodus 7:8-13); however, Pharaoh's magicians are also able to do this, though Moses' serpent devours the others. Pharaoh refuses to let the Israelites go.