But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt?” Exodus 3:11
Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the sons 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.” Exodus 3:13f.
Out of the blue, and with divine enthusiasm, YHWH hits Moses up with the command to go to Pharaoh and deliver his people (Ex. 3:10). Though Moses is experiencing the mysterium tremendum, the awful numinous presence of God, both frightening and exhilarating at the same time, we have no insight into his feelings. All we have is the question, “who am I that I should go to Pharaoh….” We find no enthusiasm here. This was what God was waiting for all these years. When a young man in Egypt, with a princely upbringing, Moses thought he knew what he was but in reality did not. Now he is older and does not know who he is, at least in relation to the great task before him, but in reality he knew well who he was, especially in his limitations. What will soon be revealed, he had learned the simple and humble art of staying out of the way when God is doing something. For the most part, young people do not comprehend this, and for that matter, many of the aged don’t as well.
There is, however, an answer to Moses’ question hidden in v. 12 about Moses’ identity. God assures him with a sign that He will be with him and that he will succeed in his task of delivering the people and will “serve (Heb. `ābad) God upon this mountain.” As we have established earlier, Eden was surely a mountain, the source of the river of life that flowed into the garden and from there to the four corners of the earth. Moreover, Adam was to “work (Heb. `ābad) and keep (šāmar)” the garden (Gen. 2:15). These verbs are used throughout the Pentateuch to describe the work of the tabernacle and the keeping of the law. The one idea, or motif, that best expresses what humanity was made for is to be a “gardener” charged to make things grow, both physically and spiritually, and thus serve God. The verb used here for “serve” (`ābad) is the very same word “to work” the garden. This combined with the motif of the “mountain” of God suggests Moses’ real identity. He is the “gardener” who will bring humanity back to the Mountain of God. True, there was no garden on Sinai, but as we shall see, there are all sorts of garden imagery in the Tabernacle that Moses was to build, which will become the new “mountain,” or Eden, where God will once again dwell in the midst of mankind.
Moses then asks God what His name was. Evidently Moses knew God by the generic word for deity ʹelōhîm, perhaps forgetting with the people the ancient name YHWH, the God of their fathers. The word ʹelōhîm is a common divine epithet in the Ancient Near East, and says nothing specific about Him. Moses knew that God must reveal something about Himself if the people were to get on board with the plan. But by doing so, God makes himself vulnerable to the people. Names in the ancient world were considered to be part of the very essence of one’s personhood, as real as an arm or a leg. To reveal one’s name is to share and entrust one’s very self to that person. It means entering into a covenantal relationship where one could harm the other’s reputation. When it comes to God, this is a very serious moment in the history of humanity.
God is very engaging here, ready to reveal. He immediately responds with ʹehyeh ʹašer ʹehyeh, “I am who I am,” but when spoken by humanity, pronounced “Yahweh” in the third person, translated “He is.” This is called the Tetragrammaton, or the four letters transliterated as YHWH, translated reverently in many Bibles simply as, “the Lord.” The name is ingenious in that it is not a noun, thus limiting God to a thing, nor is it properly a verb, thus limiting God to an action. Rather it is stative, indicating pure essence of being. The Church Fathers collectively dig deep into the implications of this name in light of Greek philosophy and its terms like “being,” “essence,” “first principle,” “eternality,” etc.
As important as this is, the Hebrews at this juncture were not ready for such theological reflection. In the original context, it was most probably understood with a future meaning, “I will be what I show myself to be,” They do not know Him now, but they will know Him by what He is about to do in fulfilment to the promises made to their fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (so Driver, Cassuto, von Rad).
We see that Moses’ questions of identity, “who am I” and “who are you” are fundamental. Everything turns on self-knowledge and knowledge of God. Nothing can happen further in the narrative without these preliminaries. Nothing of ultimate value can happen in our own lives without this relational interchange of knowledge.
Takeaway: Before we enter into the greatness God has called us to, we must know ourselves, and we must know God.
Questions: 1) Moses’ question “Who am I” comes from a deep sense of personal inadequacy. What do you do with your own sense of inadequacy? 2) How do you reflect on your own identity in relation to God’s revealed identity here in Exodus?
Resources Used:
ACCS, pp. 19-23 for reflections of the divine name by Origen, Eusebius, Gregory of Nazianzus, Hilary of Poitiers, Augustine, etc.
Cassuto, U. A Commentary on the Book of Exodus, p. 38.
Driver, S.R. The Book of Exodus in the Cambridge Bible, Cambridge University Press, 1929, p. 22.
Von Rad, G. The Book of Exodus, p. 76.