Exodus

Meyers' Exodus (NCBC, 2005) is a learned work with genuine strengths: her Egyptian and ancient Near Eastern contextualisation is expert, her attention to literary technique is careful, and her recovery of female figures in the narrative is welcome. However, the commentary is controlled by a "mnemohistory" framework that consistently replaces the text's own theological claims with sociological analysis — treating the exodus not as God's acts in history but as Israel's "collective cultural memory," Moses not as the inspired covenant mediator but as "a larger-than-life figure, if not a demi-god" comparable to George Washington, and the Passover not as a divinely commanded memorial but as a repurposed agricultural festival. This framework produces a series of serious problems: the plagues are described as "neither miraculous nor unusual" once stripped of "exaggerated language"; the death of Egypt's firstborn is mitigated by declaring it "ahistorical"; and Exodus 34:6–7 — the theological climax of the book — is treated as an interesting creedal formula rather than the supreme self-disclosure of the God of mercy. Most damaging is Meyers' claim that in Exodus 32 "Moses comes off better than God — representing mercy and forgiveness in contrast with God's unremittingly punitive stance," a reading sourced from Whybray's "immorality of God" thesis that is both exegetically indefensible (it contradicts the text's own disclosure in 34:6–7) and internally inconsistent (Meyers herself writes, in the same section, that "God can be both punitive and merciful"). Throughout, divine commands are framed as community policy, the holiness concept is explained partly as property-protection strategy, the Canaanite expulsion passages are labelled "ethnic cleansing," and the kappōretis stripped of atonement theology in favour of a "neutral" translation. Readers wanting sociocultural background to Exodus will find much of value here; those seeking a commentary that takes seriously what the text claims about the God who redeems, covenants, and dwells among his people should look to Childs, Fretheim, Sarna, or Moberly instead.

Die Verfasserin hat einen in Umfang und Art der Reihe—The New Cambridge Bible Commentary—entsprechenden Kommentar zum Buch Exodus vorgelegt. C. Meyers gelingt es dann aber in diesem engen Rahmen ein eigenes Konzept vorzulegen und dem Kommentar so ihr eigenes Profil zu verleihen. Dies besteht in erster Linie darin, dass die Verfasserin das Buch Exodus als kulturelles Zeugnis der kollektiven Erinnerung Israels aus der Spätzeit der Hebräischen Bibel zu verstehen sucht. Sie folgt damit dem Ansatz, den Jan Assmann in zahlreichen Werken, vorgelegt hat (vgl. vor allem: „Moses, der Ägypter“ [München 1998] und die Sammlung einschlägiger Aufsätze zum Thema: „Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis“ [München 2000]). Wie Assmann die Gedächtnisspur, die die Figur des Mose durch alle Epochen und Zeiten hinterlassen hat, rekonstruiert, so versucht Carol Meyers die kulturelle bzw.kollektive Erinnerung des Volkes Israel, aus dem gesamten Exodusbuch zu entziffern. Was in Bezug auf das Exodusereignis als Ganzes wie auch im Blick auf Institutionen des Kultes, die Exod 25–31 und Exod 35–40 zur Sprache kommen, einleuchtet und nachvollziehbar gelingen mag, wird schwieriger, wenn es im Sinne eines traditionellen Kommentars Kapitel für Kapitel an einem Buch entlanggehend entwickelt werden soll. [Full Review]