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What was the Exodus? (God delivering Israel out of Egypt)

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Short answer

The Exodus ('going out') is the Bible's account of God rescuing the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt, through Moses, the founding act of redemption in the Old Testament. The outline:

  • Israel is enslaved in Egypt; God hears their cry and calls Moses at the burning bush to lead them out (Exodus 3:7; Exodus 3:10).
  • After Pharaoh refuses, God sends the ten plagues, culminating in the Passover, when the blood of a lamb spares Israel's firstborn (Exodus 12:13), and Pharaoh finally lets them go (Exodus 12:31).
  • God parts the Red Sea so Israel crosses on dry ground while Pharaoh's army is drowned (Exodus 14:21; Exodus 14:22).
  • At Mount Sinai God gives the Law and makes Israel His covenant people (Exodus 19:5; Exodus 20:2), and they journey toward the promised land.

Question

What was the Exodus? (God delivering Israel out of Egypt)

Analysis

The great rescue

The book of Exodus opens with Israel multiplied but oppressed as slaves. God, remembering His covenant with Abraham, calls Moses from a burning bush with the promise 'I have come down to deliver them' (Exodus 3:7; Exodus 3:8; Exodus 3:10). When Pharaoh hardens his heart, God displays His power in the ten plagues (Exodus 7–Exodus 12), the last of which, the death of the firstborn, is escaped by Israel through the Passover: a lamb is killed and its blood placed on the doorframes, so that judgment 'passes over' those homes (Exodus 12:13). Pharaoh relents, Israel leaves, and God leads them by a pillar of cloud and fire (Exodus 13:21) to the Red Sea, which He splits so they cross safely before the waters return on the pursuing army (Exodus 14:21; Exodus 14:22). At Sinai God gives the Ten Commandments and the Law, forming Israel into a nation bound to Him: 'I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery' (Exodus 20:2).

Why it echoes through the Bible

The Exodus became Israel's defining memory of God as Redeemer, recited to every generation (Deuteronomy 6:21; Joshua 24:17) and celebrated every year at Passover. It also foreshadows the gospel: Paul calls Christ 'our Passover lamb' who has been sacrificed (1 Corinthians 5:7), and the New Testament sees in the rescue-from-slavery pattern a picture of salvation from sin. The forty years Israel then spent in the wilderness (Numbers 14:34) tie into the Bible's number-forty pattern of testing.

Sources, trace every one

Every cited verse, in full. Tap any reference to open it in the reader.

  • Exodus 3:7bsb

    The LORD said, “I have indeed seen the affliction of My people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their oppressors, and I am aware of their sufferings.

  • Exodus 3:10bsb

    Therefore, go! I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring My people the Israelites out of Egypt.”

  • Exodus 12:13bsb

    The blood on the houses where you are staying will be a sign; when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No plague will fall on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.

  • Exodus 12:31bsb

    Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron by night and said, “Get up, leave my people, both you and the Israelites! Go, worship the LORD as you have requested.

  • Exodus 14:21bsb

    Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove back the sea with a strong east wind that turned it into dry land. So the waters were divided,

  • Exodus 14:22bsb

    and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with walls of water on their right and on their left.

  • Exodus 19:5bsb

    Now if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, you will be My treasured possession out of all the nations — for the whole earth is Mine.

  • Exodus 20:2bsb

    “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

  • Exodus 3:8bsb

    I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey— the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites.

  • Exodus 13:21bsb

    And the LORD went before them in a pillar of cloud to guide their way by day, and in a pillar of fire to give them light by night, so that they could travel by day or night.

  • Deuteronomy 6:21bsb

    then you are to tell him, “We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, but the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand.

  • Joshua 24:17bsb

    For the LORD our God brought us and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and performed these great signs before our eyes. He also protected us throughout our journey and among all the nations through which we traveled.

  • 1 Corinthians 5:7bsb

    Get rid of the old leaven, that you may be a new unleavened batch, as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.

  • Numbers 14:34bsb

    In keeping with the forty days you spied out the land, you shall bear your guilt forty years — a year for each day — and you will experience My alienation.

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What was the Exodus? (God delivering Israel out of Egypt) · Bubble Bible