While reading the King James Bible, Septuagint and watching The 10 Commandments there are many things that stood out to me, some of which angered me. I really got annoyed when I was reading Chapter 16 in the King James Bible and when the Israel children started to murmur, they didn’t do this once, they did this on multiple occasions. In King James it says “And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness” (16:2) and then God goes on to say later in the chapter “ I have heard murmuring of the children of Israel” (16:12). This in my eyes is selfishness, how can you be selfish when you were just saved and set free by Moses and God.
In the Movie 10 Commandments there were two scenes that stood out to me that I can relate to these chapters. The first one is when Moses is in the Palace and was just announced as being a Hebrew (1:31:00-1:33:54), he even openly admitted he was Hebrew and stood firm ground of his belief that his people shouldnt be enslaved. Moses was then punished and erased from the books and tablets at the orders of the Pharaoh. Moses, although this was unplanned, put his life out on the line to stand up for his people, when Moses led these people through the wilderness they were not very nice to him and often didn’t follow his orders. This angers me because it is selfish that these people who are now free are acting this way. Another scene that I want to compare to the readings is when Moses goes through the desert as his punishment (1:41:25-1:49:30), he is released with one day’s worth of food, this is very much impossible. He was severely hot, hungry and dehydrated. There were many times where Moses had to drag himself, but he never stopped, he kept fighting for his people and with help from God he reached civilization. This relates perfectly to being greedy, Moses received one day’s worth of food and didn’t say anything, he didn’t argue he just went on his way. While when Moses was leading the Israel children they were complaining about food and even when told not to keep food until the morning, they did so, “And Moses said to them, Let no man leave of it till the morning. 20 But they did not listen to Moses, but some left of it till the morning; and it bred worms and stank: and Moses was irritated with them.” (16:19-20 Septuagint)
Moses had risked his life for his people, even earlier in the movie saving a Hebrew man from getting punished for releasing the water girl. Moses is a leader and he is the sole reason these people are free. The people are selfish, ungrateful and greedy humans. Maybe it’s because they had been enslaved for so long, but that still doesn’t give them a pass to treat a savior like Moses this way.
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