1
¶ And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
2 Sanctify unto me all the firstborn,
whatsoever openeth the womb among the children of Israel, both of man and of
beast: it is mine. 3 And Moses said unto
the people, Remember this day, in which ye came out from Egypt, out of the
house of bondage; for by strength of hand the LORD brought you out from this
place: there shall no leavened bread be eaten. 4 This day came ye out in the month Abib.
5 And it shall be when the LORD shall
bring thee into the land of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites,
and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, which he sware unto thy fathers to give
thee, a land flowing with milk and honey, that thou shalt keep this service in
this month. 6 Seven days thou shalt eat
unleavened bread, and in the seventh day shall be a feast to the LORD. 7 Unleavened bread shall be eaten seven days;
and there shall no leavened bread be seen with thee, neither shall there be
leaven seen with thee in all thy quarters. 8
And thou shalt shew thy son in that day, saying, This is done because of
that which the LORD did unto me when I came forth out of Egypt. 9 And it shall be for a sign unto thee upon
thine hand, and for a memorial between thine eyes, that the LORD’S law may be
in thy mouth: for with a strong hand hath the LORD brought thee out of Egypt.
10 Thou shalt therefore keep this ordinance
in his season from year to year.
The word sanctify means to set apart for God, to make holy. As an example see;
Leviticus
20:7 Sanctify yourselves
therefore, and be ye holy: for I am
the LORD your God.
Deuteronomy
14:2 For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar
people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth.
For these Hebrews, the firstborn of man
and beast was set apart for God’s purpose, like the firstborn he took from the
Egyptians.
In verse 3 Egypt is called the house of bondage. It is a type of
the world from which the Christian must remove his standard of ethics and his
practice of morals. In a figurative sense we leave our house of bondage when we follow Christ out of it. First, in the
sense of what the world and our flesh holds as valuable and important.
Adam and Eve were taken in by three things
that still plague us.
Genesis
3:6 ¶ And when the woman saw that the
tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be
desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave
also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.
1John
2:15 Love not the world, neither the
things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father
is not in him. 16 For all that is in the
world, the lust of the flesh [good
for food] , and the lust of the eyes
[pleasant to the eyes] , and the pride of life [a tree to be desired to make one wise], is not of the Father, but is of the world.
17 And the world passeth away, and the
lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.
Jesus warned about this.
Luke
16:15 And he said unto them, Ye are they
which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that
which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.
Matthew
6:24 No man can serve two masters: for
either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the
one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon (money, the
economic system, or riches).
Second, we are in bondage to our fear of
death and dying and our desire to cling to one more minute of biological life
in our flesh.
Hebrews
2:15 And deliver them who through fear
of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
Christians should be willing and desire to
be with Christ and leave this mortal existence.
2Corinthians
5:8 We are confident, I say, and willing
rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
The bondage we feel to this body of flesh
was a big issue to the early Christians as it is to Christians today in lands
where they are murdered and martyred. One of the major spiritual battles in the
early church was whether to permit those who had submitted to the pagan demand
to renounce Christ as God under persecution back into the fellowship of the
church with those who had not submitted to persecution.
2Timothy
2:8 ¶ Remember that Jesus Christ of the
seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel: 9 Wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil doer,
even unto bonds; but the word of God is not bound. 10 Therefore I endure all things for the elect’s
sakes, that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with
eternal glory. 11 It is a faithful
saying: For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him: 12 If we suffer, we shall also reign with him:
if we deny him, he also will deny us: 13
If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself.
The point is that we can view the world as
a type of Egypt, a house of bondage, as well as our fear of death, both of
which the Christian must overcome.
In verse 3 it is said that they are
brought out by strength of hand the LORD.
Later, the Holy Spirit, working through Moses’ understanding, will use the
poetic phrasing of eagle’s wings.
Exodus
19:4 Ye have seen what I did unto the
Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself.
He uses a land flowing with milk and honey as a reference to the abundance
of the Promised Land of Canaan. It was also used in 3:8,17. It will be used
again many times.
Is verse 9 figurative or are they supposed
to have something written on their hand and between their eyes? Are the
following figurative for emphasis or do they refer to physical objects?
Deuteronomy
6:8 And thou shalt bind them for a sign
upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.
Proverbs
1:9 For they shall be an ornament of
grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.
Proverbs
6:20 ¶ My son, keep thy father’s
commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother: 21 Bind them continually upon thine heart, and
tie them about thy neck.
The reference to phylacteries in Matthew 23:5 is about the Pharisees of Jesus’s time
doing just that, wearing small cases on their arms and foreheads. They had
these verses from Exodus 13 and Deuteronomy 6 plus chapter 11 in these little
cube-shaped cases. They even considered these verses attached to them as
amulets to ward off evil spirits and trouble.
Matthew
23:5 But all their works they do for to
be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of
their garments,
Don’t mock the Jews in your heart because
Fundamentalists often do the same kind of thing, taking admonitions about
church attendance, Bible reading, and daily prayer as some kind of business
deal with God where if they do it enough He should protect them from evil.
Pagan Christianity is prevalent today as pagan Hebraism was during Jesus’time.(4)
(4) Mike Scott, “What Were the Phylacteries
that the Pharisees Wore,” in What Do the
Scriptures Say, http://www.scripturessay.com/what-were-the-phylacteries-that-the-pharisees-wore/
(accessed on 10.12.2017).
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