De Potentia Promissioque Baptismi - Part III

Chapter II - Baptismal Themes in Exodus: Waters of Regeneration and Redemption*

*Note: I had intended on discussing the ceremonial washings in this installment, but due to the profound subject matter of the exodus of the Hebrews I decided to put off the topic only for now.

Exodus is also replete with significant baptismal themes, and therefore worth our effort to survey these and continue to build upon the Old Testament typology. Those elements which we find later in the New Testament are set in motion in the Old, with pictures and types woven into the historical-redemptive narrative. Particularly, themes of rebirth (beginning anew), redemption (saving from bondage), and purification (washing for service) are of interest to us in this chapter, as they present themselves to this end quite easily.

The Hebrew people, who began to grow and be strong in Egypt after the days of Joseph, were made slaves under the oppressive hand of Pharaoh, that they might not pose a threat to him or his nation (Exodus 1). A decree went out from the Pharaoh that all the sons born to the Hebrew women were to be "cast into the Nile" (1:22).

The future deliverer was slated for death in the Nile, and not unlike Noah before him, was preserved by a vessel that would preserve a race with him. His mother fashioned a basket "of bulrushes" sealed with "bitumen and pitch," and "put the child in it and placed it among the reeds at the river's brink" (2:2) In a miraculous turn of events, the Pharaoh's daughter finds, and eventually adopts, the child whom she names "Moses" because she "drew him out of the water" (2:5-10).

If the figure-head of the Hebrew race was delivered from evil in waters of redemption, no less did the Hebrew race itself find redemption through waters of redemption. For what transpires over the next 12 chapters of Exodus builds up to the monumental salvation of the people through the waters of the Red Sea. To omit the account would be unjust, so we read:

Tell the people of Israel to go forward. Lift up your rod, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, that the people of Israel may go on dry ground through the sea. And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots, and his horsemen.

And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I have gotten glory over Pharaoh, his chariots, and his horsemen.Then the angel of God who went before the host of Israel moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them, coming between the host of Egypt and the host of Israel.

And there was the cloud and the darkness; and the night passed without one coming near the other all night. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the LORD drove the sea back by a strong east wind all night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. (14:15-21)

Of note, the Angel of God and the Pillar of Cloud already demonstrate Water and Spirit, yet another picture of baptism, that will be picked up by St. Paul in I Corinthians 10. But for now we also note that, by God's command and through His minister, the waters of judgment are opened up for the nation that was under a death sentence by him who enslaved them, and they passed in safety. But that is only the first glorious half of the deliverance. The second half recounts the destruction of the old creation (as in the days of Noah). The old life of death would soon be swallowed up in death, reading:

"And the people of Israel went into the midst of the sea on dry ground, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. The Egyptians pursued, and went in after them into the midst of the sea, all Pharaoh's horses, his chariots, and his horsemen... Then the LORD said to Moses, "Stretch out your hand over the sea, that the water may come back upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots, and upon their horsemen."

So Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to its wonted flow when the morning appeared; and the Egyptians fled into it, and the LORD routed the Egyptians in the midst of the sea. The waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen and all the host of Pharaoh that had followed them into the sea; not so much as one of them remained. But the people of Israel walked on dry ground through the sea, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.

Thus the LORD saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians; and Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the seashore. And Israel saw the great work which the LORD did against the Egyptians, and the people feared the LORD; and they believed in the LORD and in his servant Moses. (14:22-31)

And therefore the song of redemption in Exodus 15 is sung by Moses and the people, retelling the salvation God wrought through the Mosaic baptism. True to form found in Genesis, God's Spirit is figured in His breath in the waters of redemption: "At the blast (wind) of Thy nostrils the waters piled up" (15:8); and judgment: "Thou didst blow with Thy wind, the sea covered them" (15:10). This dual aspect of the baptism of the Hebrews is no less preserved in Christian baptism, as we will discover later in our series.