A Journey Through The Old Testament - Elmer Towns

God, Eliphaz was instructed, “Take for yourselves seven bulls and seven rams, go to My servant
Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and My servant Job shall pray for you” (v. 8).
They were to go to their sick friend and ask him to do something they had not thought of doing
for him, pray on their behalf. It seems strange that these men should speak so piously so long yet
not once answer the plea of their friend to pray on his behalf.
“And the Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends” (v. 10). Before the
Lord was through, Job had ten more children and his original wealth was doubled. The servant of
the Lord was more than compensated for his troubles.
TWENTY-THREE
MOSES:
The Gods of Egypt
(Exodus 1:1-14:31)
During the years Israel sojourned in Egypt, the family of seventy grew into a nation of
thousands. While Joseph and his memory remained alive, the nation was the beneficiary of special
political and economic benefits. But after the death of Joseph, the memory of what he had
done for Egypt began to fade even as a new dynasty arose in Egypt.
THE PHARAOHS OF EGYPT
From about 1675-1570 B.C., Egypt was ruled by a Semitic group of people known as the
Hyksos. Racially and linguistically, these rulers were very similar to the Hebrew people. Because
of this it would be easy for an Egyptian to confuse the Hebrew and Hyksos much as a non-
European might confuse an Italian with a Portuguese or a non-Asian might confuse people from
Korea and Japan. While this may have worked to the advantage of the Hebrews during the reign
of Hyksos, it also worked to their disadvantage in the anti-Semitic reaction of the Egyptians in
the eighteenth dynasty which followed.
In 1570 B. C., Ahmose I ascended the throne of the new kingdom to begin the eighteenth
dynasty. He reigned till his death in 1546 B. C. and was followed by Thutmosis I (1546-1518 B.
C.) and Thutmosis II (1518-1504 B. C.). Each of these Pharaohs died without a son to succeed
him. This seeming lack of stability within the new kingdom would no doubt only serve to
magnify the concerns of the people over both real and perceived threats to their national security.
The memory of the mighty Hyksos who had ruled the nation during the previous century could
only cause the Egyptian people and their leaders to view the prosperous and growing nation of
Israel living in the prime agricultural region of their land with suspicion. The kind of oppression
described in the opening chapters of Exodus, including the enslaving of the people and planned
genocide of male children, is the kind of reaction one might typically expect of a nation like
Egypt under those circumstances.
Then a remarkable thing happened in the history of Egypt. A woman named Hatshepsut
became the Pharaoh and ruled from 1504-1482 B. C. Under her leadership, the eighteenth
dynasty solidified its control over the land. Egyptologists today view Hatshepsut as one of the