The Naked Bible Podcast

On this episode of the podcast Mike chats with Stovall Weems, lead pastor at Celebration Church in Jacksonville, FL. The conversation focuses on the story of how Mike and Stovall met and how their initial phone conversation was the catalyst to Mike accepting a job offer to start a school of theology for Celebration Church a little over a year later.

Exodus 15 is referred to by scholars as the Song of Moses. The label is due to its poetic nature. On the surface the Song reiterates the crossing of the Red Sea. But there are actually a number of items in the passage that dip into divine council worldview content and ancient Israelite cosmology. This episode engages such items and shows how Exodus 15 is more than a repetition of Exodus 14. Shi-Ho...

In Part 1 of our discussion of Exodus 14 and the Israelites’ journey out of Egypt we focused on the yam suph (“sea of Reeds” / Red Sea) problem and issues related to the ambiguity of physical place names (toponyms). In this episode of the podcast our focus is cosmic geography—namely, how Egyptian conceptions of their gods and physical world can contribute to reading the exodus story as a theologic...

Exodus 14 is one of the major chapters detailing Israel’s departure from Egypt and the miraculous passing through the “Red Sea.” Other chapters include Exod 13:17-22, Exodus 15, and Numbers 33:5-8. The passages do not always agree in the way the event is described, a fact that has produced what scholars call the yam suph (“Red Sea”) problem. What is problematic in that phrase is not the supernatur...

Exodus 13 takes us into the subject of the offering of the firstborn. Certain scholars argue that the passage is to be taken literally, that Yahweh demanded the Israelites to sacrifice their firstborn male child (i.e., human sacrifice). This episode surveys how this argument is made and evaluates it in terms of the data of the text and logical coherence.

Dr. Heiser answers your questions. PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW

This episode continues the early/late date discussion. Scholars who accept the historicity of the biblical story of Israel’s exodus from Egypt have argued for centuries about when it occurred in real time. There are several theories, but the two main approaches are the “Early” Date (1446 BC) and the “Late” Date (1267 BC). This episode continues the explanation of how each date is defended and deba...

Scholars who accept the historicity of the biblical story of Israel’s exodus from Egypt have argued for centuries about when it occurred in real time. There are several theories, but the two main approaches are the “Early” Date (1446 BC) and the “Late” Date (1267 BC). This episode explains how each date is defended and debated. Early Date Resource: Bryant Wood, “ The Biblical Date for the Exodus i...

This episode of the podcast begins our discussion of the circumstances of the exodus event. There are many difficulties and issues that have distracted scholars over the years. Exodus 12:37 and Exodus 12:40 are two that we will discuss in this episode. The first confronts us with the problem of large numbers of people in the Exodus narratives. The second takes us into the duration of the sojourn (...

Exodus 11 and 12 focus on the final plague against Egypt, the death of the firstborn, and the institution of the Passover (Hebrew: pesaḥ / pesach). Like the other plagues, the death of the firstborn is an assault on not only the pharaoh and his people, but on Maat, the principle of cosmic order to be maintained by the gods of Egypt. This episode touches on that polemic, but also on the meaning an...

The previous episode discussed the four scholarly approaches to understanding the plagues upon Egypt in the exodus story. Two of those approaches (polemic, de-creation) were deemed more fruitful than the others, for they cast the plagues in terms of Yahweh’s mastery over creation order (the Egyptian concept of Maat) that in turn serves as a polemic against the theology of the ancient Egyptians. In...

Exodus 7:14-25 is the entry point for the series of ten plagues God sent upon the land of Egypt and its people for pharaoh’s defiance of his command to free his people, Israel. This episode includes an introduction to how scholars talk about the plagues and how that discussion translates to the first plague, turning the Nile to blood. Figure 3 Plagues as Decreation

Aside from the date of the exodus event and the revelation of the divine name, one of the most frequently discussed issues in the book of Exodus is the hardening of pharaoh’s heart. The narrative affirms that both God and pharaoh are the agents responsible for the hardening of pharaoh’s heart. How do we understand this in light of moral human responsibility, human free will, and the righteousness...

This episode of the podcast covers two chapter of Exodus. Aside from some comments that relate to items in previous episodes, our discussion focuses on the biblical motif of the “hand of the Lord” and “outstretched arm” of the Lord. Both expressions are part of the confrontation between Moses and Aaron and Egypt’s pharaoh. Both are also important motifs in Egyptian literature. That isn’t a coincid...

The second half of Exodus 4 presents a series of chronological problems in relation to Moses’ movements to and from Sinai and Jethro’s home and, ultimately, the journey to Egypt. The section includes the bizarre episode in verses 24-26 where God sought to kill Moses. Why was God angry? How does the circumcision of Moses’ son fix the problem? What does it mean that Moses’ wife, Zipporah, touched th...

Exodus 4:1-17 continues Moses’ conversation with God at the burning bush after the revelation of the divine name. It is marked by Moses’ unwillingness to do what God has tasked him to do. This episode covers God’s compassionate responses to Moses and also his anger when Moses refuses the job. The conversation takes us into supernatural sign acts, Egyptian magic, and the concession by God of bringi...

Exodus 3:13-14 are two of the most familiar verses in the Old Testament: “Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.’ ”  God reveals his name here...

This episode builds off Part 2a and our discussion of the Kenite Hypothesis. The episode essentially asks this question: How would a literate ancient Jew, with knowledge of 1 Enoch and the Hebrew Bible, understand the biblical writer’s linkage of the Kenites (relatives of Abraham and Moses) to Cain the murderer, whom the writer of Enoch associated with the sins of the Watchers? The answer may surp...

Exodus 3:1 puts Moses in Midian, a land that, as we saw in Part 1, is closely tied to occupants known as Kenites. The Kenites, in fact, overlap in biblical thought with the Midianites (Judg 1:16; 4:11). Midian is also connected with the idea that Yahweh, the God of Israel, came to his land “from the South,” where “South” is defined as Edom, Teman, Paran, and Midian (Hab 3:3-7; Deut 33:1-2; Judg 5:...

This episode focuses on Exod 3:1 (“Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God”) and how the place names (Horeb, Midian, “mountain of God”) might possibly dovetail with traditions about Yahweh “coming from the South” (from Teman, Paran, Edom, Seir) in other passage...

Exodus 2:11-25 is the story of Moses’ capital offense in Egypt and his subsequent escape to the land of Midian. The story includes several textual and interpretive difficulties, leading to important questions. Where is the land of Midian? What is its relationship to Horeb? Is Horeb Sinai and, if it is, why do other passages distinguish the two? Who is Moses’ father-in-law: Jethro, Reuel, or Hobab?...

In this episode we chat with Dr. Tim Mackie and Jon Collins about their amazingly successful and eminently useful ministry, The Bible Project. We learn a bit about their backgrounds, individually and as friends, how the Bible Project was born, and plans for the future.

Exodus 2:1-10 is the familiar story of the birth of Moses in Egypt. Lurking behind the familiar story is a point of controversy and misunderstanding:  its presumed relationship to ancient stories of the “abandoned child,” most specifically the legend of Sargon the Great’s birth. This episode asks the question of whether the biblical writer stole the Sargon story for Exodus 2:1-10, and how a potent...

This is the second of two episodes on Exodus 1. This episode focuses entirely on how the name “Raamses” in Exod 1:11 can potentially be accommodated by either the early (1446 BC) or late (1250 BC) date of the exodus from Egypt. We explore how the name is used in Egyptian texts, why it’s spelling makes a difference, and why its presence in Exod 1:11 does not require the late date of the exodus. We...

Exodus 1 is short in terms of verse count, but there are a surprising number of items in the text that need some comment—so many that we need two episodes!  In this episode we look at the language describing Israel’s condition under bondage in Egypt long after the time of Joseph. We talk about the reasons the biblical author links his description with Genesis 11:1-9, the Babel story; why the descr...