The Death of Moses

The Death of Moses

When the saga of Moses comes to an end with the prophet's death, the

narrative voice in Deuteronomy 34:9-11 states: "Since then no prophet has

risen in Israel like Moses whom the LORD knew face to face." Were the

prophets that came after Moses equal to his stature? In determining the

answer to this question, by researching this topic I will discuss and look

at the entirety of Moses' life as recorded in the Scripture. There are

certainly many unique aspects of Moses' life that were not duplicated

in the lives of any of the subsequent prophets.

For example, Moses was raised as an Egyptian prince. There is noting in the Bible to indicate that he knew of his Israelite heritage until

adulthood. True, his own mother was recruited by the Egyptian princess to

nurse him through infancy, but there is little to suggest that Moses

would have retained any memory or inclination of his heritage from this

period (Neufeld, 1993). Yet, despite his acculturation as an Egyptian, he

was able to not only accept, but rejoice in his relationship to the

Israelite slaves of Egypt. This is certainly a unique characteristic of

Moses' life that was not duplicated.

Furthermore, no other prophet, save Moses, had the experience of

meeting God "face to face" as Moses did on Mt. Sinai with the burning bush.

However, the Bible does clearly indicate that other prophets "spoke" to

God and received guidance in their own way. As this suggests, it is

also possible to argue that there were prophets after Moses equal to him

in their relationship to God. This stance is supported, somewhat, in the

biblical verses that describe how Moses felt on this topic of shared

responsibility for leading the people.

These verses describe how two men in the Hebrew camp, Eldad and Medad,

felt that the spirit of God came upon them and they began to prophesize

within the camp. A young man ran and told Moses what these two men were

doing. Joshua, son of Nun and minister to Moses reacted quickly and

implored Moses to forbid the men from doing this. However, Moses said to

him, "Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord's people were

prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them." After which,

Moses and the elders of Israel returned to the camp (Numbers 11:24-30).

As this suggests, Moses, certainly, had no qualms about supposing that

others could have a relationship with God as close as the one that

inspired him. In fact, in these verses in Numbers, he indicates that this

would be his fondest wish and hope for the future of Israel. Moses

obviously did not see himself in terms of superlatives, as the "greatest" or

even the most important prophetic voice that the Hebrew people had ever

heard. Rather, Moses was concerned for the spiritual welfare of all

Israelites, therefore, in Numbers 11:24-30, he sounds quite pleased to

hear that two men feel inspired to speak and implore the people to remain

righteous and follow scriptural teaching.

Beck (1999) outlines additional passages that indicate much the same

message. He states that "Moses had a problem with success" (Beck, 1999,

p. 531). Moses was successful in obtaining freedom from Egyptian slavery

for the Hebrew people, but now he had to shoulder the responsibility of

leading them, caring for them, tending to their physical needs (food,

water, etc), setting their disputes and keeping up their hopes (Beck,

1999). In Exodus, the Bible relates how Jethro, Moses' father-in-law,

suggests to him that judges should be appointed to share the work of

settling conflicts (Beck, 1999). Subsequently, in the Book of Numbers, when

the elders have gathered away from the camp, God instructs Moses and

tells him that some of the spirit that has been placed on Moses shall be

placed on the appointed judges. - "they shall bear the burden of

the people with you so you do not bear it all by yourself" (Beck,

1999., p. 160).

As this indicates, God intends the burden of service to be shared

(Beck, 1999). This perfect sense because the more people who are empowered

to serve, the greater the good that will be accomplished in the world

(Beck, 1999).