The Sacred History of the Jews Part II: the Exodus and the Wanderings
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The Sacred History of the Jews Part II: The Exodus and the Wanderings © 2012 Student Handouts World History Workbook Series Student Handouts (order #3761093) Part I: Creation and the Patriarchal Period – Page 2 Introduction to Judeo-Christian faiths may find this booklet useful in religious instruction, it This workbook gives an overview of is not designed as a book to be used for early Jewish history, covering the the purpose of indoctrination or lifespan of Moses. Religious tradition instruction. holds that Moses wrote the Torah This workbook is principally aimed (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, at those students raised within other and Deuteronomy), freed the Hebrews ideological systems, and is designed to from bondage in Egypt, received the Ten familiarize readers with the motifs, Commandments from God, and led the stories, and beliefs that permeate so Hebrews through the desert to the much of western civilization’s culture, outskirts of the promised land. history, art, and literature. Biblical The text of this workbook combines information and dates for births and knowledge from the historical and deaths are left unquestioned, while archaeological record as well as biblical supplemental information is included accounts of events. Although adherents where appropriate. Sacred History of the Ancient Jews: The Exodus and the Wanderings The real history of the Israelites as worshiped, but they never fully adopted a nation does not begin until their the idolatrous rites or religion of the departure from Egypt. Abraham and his Egyptians. They were ruled by their own descendants were merely nomads, proper chiefs, who were, in their turn, wandering over the promised land, but directly responsible to the Egyptian owning no part of it. government for the collection of the taxes The Israelites remained in the imposed upon the Hebrew colony. fertile land of Goshen for a period of 215 years, and there prospered in such a 1. Who originally led this group of marked degree that the family of seventy Hebrews into Egypt? persons which entered Egypt with Jacob a. Abraham grew to a nation numbering nearly three b. Jacob million people. They formed a nation c. Joseph quite apart from the Egyptians, with d. Moses their own language, manners, religious worship, and patriarchal government. It 2. imposed: is true that they did not preserve the a. asked worship of God in its original purity, and b. compelled had but a very vague idea of the God of c. delineated Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, whom they d. requested © Student Handouts www.STUDENTHANDOUTS.com Student Handouts (order #3761093) Part I: Creation and the Patriarchal Period – Page 3 During this period, the pharaohs of death at their birth. The females were the Thebaid dynasty had succeeded in spared, as they would furnish wives for driving out the foreign Hyksos dynasty the Egyptians. In this way, the pharaoh and in extending their rule over Lower hoped to entirely destroy the race. Egypt, which now became one kingdom. This native dynasty was one of the most 5. Describe what life was like for the glorious that ever reigned in Egypt, and Hebrews under Ramses II. its kings appear to have favored the ___________________________________ Hebrew colony. ___________________________________ ___________________________________ 3. Which dynasty was native to Egypt? ___________________________________ a. Hyksos ___________________________________ b. Thebaid ___________________________________ ___________________________________ 4. dynasty: ___________________________________ a. lineage ___________________________________ b. nation ___________________________________ c. soap opera ___________________________________ d. territory ___________________________________ ___________________________________ This policy was changed when the ___________________________________ nineteenth Egyptian dynasty came into power. These kings regarded the 6. inaugurated: Hebrews as dangerous because of their a. adjourned numbers and location, and inflicted upon b. assigned them a series of cruel persecutions, the c. celebrated object of which was to reduce their power d. commenced and destroy them as a nation. According to tradition, the king who inaugurated Amram, a man of the tribe of Levi, this policy was called Ramses II (who, had married Jochebed, a woman of the according to Egyptologists, reigned from same tribe. They had two children, a son 1279 B.C.E. until his death in 1213 named Aaron, and a daughter named B.C.E.). According to Hebrew accounts, Miriam. Soon after the cruel edict of the Ramses was a great warrior and a cruel pharaoh was issued, Jochebed gave birth despot. He overburdened the Israelites to a second son, whom she hid for three with work, and compelled them to months from the officers of the king. engage, under cruel taskmasters, in the According to Jewish rabbinic tradition, labor of building cities. His efforts were the birth of Moses occurred in 1391 unsuccessful. In spite of their heavy B.C.E. (which would place Moses’ birth, burdens, the Hebrews continued to according to the historical chronology of increase in numbers. Enraged at this, the Egyptian pharaohs, at the start of the pharaoh gave orders that all the male reign of Amenhotep III of the 18th children of the Hebrews should be put to dynasty). © Student Handouts www.STUDENTHANDOUTS.com Student Handouts (order #3761093) Part I: Creation and the Patriarchal Period – Page 4 Complete the following brief family tree of Moses. Mother: Father: Child 1: Child 2: Child 3: Unable to conceal Moses any In spite of his own fortunate lot, longer, Jochebed laid him in a basket, or and of the favor he enjoyed at court, ark, covered with pitch, and placed him Moses felt keenly the wrongs against the among the flags on the brink of the Nile Hebrews. He brooded over their River. Here he was discovered by the sufferings, and often went among them to daughter of the pharaoh, who had gone cheer them. One day he saw an Egyptian down to the river to bathe. The princess cruelly beating a Hebrew; his indignation was touched with pity, and had the child was aroused, and he killed the Egyptian. brought to her. She gave it to Jochebed, This coming to the ears of the pharaoh, who offered herself as nurse, and Moses was obliged to fly for his life. He commanded her to rear the boy as “the took refuge in the Peninsula of Sinai. son of Pharaoh’s daughter.” 8. Why did Moses flee to the Sinai 7. Jochebed hid Moses along the banks of Peninsula? what river? ___________________________________ a. Danube ___________________________________ b. Euphrates ___________________________________ c. Nile ___________________________________ d. Tiber ___________________________________ ___________________________________ Pharaoh’s daughter named the ___________________________________ child Moses, which means “drawn out of ___________________________________ the water.” When the boy was grown, his ___________________________________ mother took him to the princess, who ___________________________________ caused him to be educated as one of the ___________________________________ royal family, in consequence of which he ___________________________________ learned “in all the wisdom of the Egyptians,” and was taught military 9. indignation: science. There is a tradition that, upon a. displeasure arriving at manhood, Moses held a high b. happiness command in the Egyptian army in an c. joy expedition against Ethiopia. d. rectitude © Student Handouts www.STUDENTHANDOUTS.com Student Handouts (order #3761093) Part I: Creation and the Patriarchal Period – Page 5 the daughters of Jethro by defending them from the violence of some shepherds who sought to drive them away from a well where they were watering their flocks. Jethro, hearing of this, invited Moses to his home, and urged him to remain with him. Moses consented to do so, and Jethro gave him his daughter Zipporah as a wife. Moses remained forty years with Jethro, and during this time, a new pharaoh mounted the throne of Egypt. He pursued towards the Hebrews the iniquitous system of his predecessor. In their sore affliction, the Hebrews besought the assistance of the god of their fathers, and he heard their prayers. 10.What daughter of Jethro did Moses marry? ___________________________________ ___________________________________ ___________________________________ 11.predecessor: a. panderer b. precedent c. precursor d. successor Pharaoh’s daughter finds Moses hidden along the banks of the Nile River. One day, Moses found himself in the territory of the Midianitish tribe, whose chief and priest was named Jethro. Moses is startled by the sight of a burning Moses was enabled to render a service to bush. © Student Handouts www.STUDENTHANDOUTS.com Student Handouts (order #3761093) Part I: Creation and the Patriarchal Period – Page 6 One day, when Moses had led his them. Then, having secured their flock to a remote part of Mount Horeb, he obedience, Moses was to go before was startled by seeing a bush burning Pharaoh and demand permission for the with a bright blaze, but without being Israelites to leave Egypt. God told Moses consumed. He approached it to ascertain that Pharaoh would not grant this the cause of this strange sight, but was demand, but that God would show his checked by a voice from the midst of the power over Egypt and avenge the wrongs bush, which told him that he was against his people by a series of standing in the presence of God himself. punishments such as Egypt had never This voice made itself known to Moses