Moses: - Was raised in Egyptian royal culture, so would have absorbed Egyptian priestly and mystery lore. - Preserved Mesopotamian influences already embedded in Genesis: flood myth, Eden motifs, divine council language. - Codified a Torah that blends Egyptian ritual (tabernacle/ark with parallels to Egyptian sacred barks and shrines) with Mesopotamian covenantal-legal forms (treaty law, suzerainty covenants).
Knight & Lomas’ claim is that this created a “royal line” of initiates—Moses not just as lawgiver but as hierophant who transmuted Egyptian death-and-resurrection initiation into Israelite covenant.
- Sumerian Influences: Biblical creation/flood stories (Genesis) parallel Sumerian epics (e.g., Enuma Elish, Gilgamesh). Moses' birth legend (basket in reeds) echoes Sargon of Akkad's (c. 2300 BCE), suggesting adaptation for a "royal" motif—Sargon as foundling king, Moses as liberator-prophet founding a divine kingship line. Some argue Moses "debunked" pagan myths by monotheizing them (e.g., one God vs. polytheism).
- Egyptian Elements: Raised in Pharaoh's court, Moses' name may derive from Egyptian "ms" (born of, e.g., Thutmose). Parallels: Staff-to-serpent (Exodus 7) evokes Egyptian magic; Horus as divine child/king models Moses' role in establishing a covenantal "royal" people.
Synthesis for Royal Line: In esoteric views Moses merges these to create a monotheistic "royal" theology—Sumerian kingship (divine mandate) with Egyptian pharaonic divinity, birthing Israelite theocracy (e.g., Davidic line as eternal kingship, Psalm 89).
- Moses' Basket and the Nile's Prophecy
- Moses' Stammering Tongue from Hot Coal
- The Staff of Moses' Creation Origins
- The Plagues as Midrashic Retributions
Midrash in Exodus Rabbah (1:22) recounts Pharaoh's astrologers prophesying a Hebrew savior born to drown him, leading to the infant decree; baby Moses' basket, woven by Miriam, miraculously floats unharmed amid crocodiles, with God's angels protecting it until Pharaoh's daughter, guided by divine hand, retrieves him as her son.
In Legends of the Jews and Exodus Rabbah (1:26), young Moses in Pharaoh's court grabs the king's crown, prompting fears of usurpation; tested with jewels and coals, an angel pushes his hand to the coal, burning his tongue and causing his lifelong stutter, symbolizing divine humility over worldly ambition.
Midrash in Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer (40) traces Moses' staff back to Adam's Edenic branch, passed through patriarchs like Jacob and Joseph, engraved with divine names; it blooms miraculously in Jethro's garden, only Moses can retrieve it, using it for plagues and sea-parting as a vessel of primordial power.
Exodus Rabbah (9:8-12) expands each plague as targeted justice: blood for drowned Hebrew babies, frogs for Egyptian cruelty, hail for stolen labor; during darkness, hidden righteous Egyptians join the exodus, while angels debate the merits, underscoring divine measure-for-measure judgment.