An atheist riffs on the Bible (New International Version): Exodus 6

Regular paragraphs are the verses as written in the Bible.
Indented italicized paragraphs feature my comments on the previous paragraph.
Note that I might appear especially nitpicky and I know that some of these verses are not taken literally by everybody; I'm just having some fun basically.
Why the New International Version or NIV? Why not? The Bible has already been translated countless times before and I can't read or speak the original languages in which it was written, which is why it is stupid in the first place to assume that a divine being would communicate with us through a book.

New International Version

Exodus 6

¹ Then the LORD said to Moses, "Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh: Because of my mighty hand he will let them go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country."

Wait, Moses hasn't told Pharaoh yet that his firstborn risked death. But one thing I'm not going to let pass is that God doesn't need to act in such subtle ways as send sickness on the land and things like that. No deaths are even necessary. All he needs to do is magic, like he did when he created the world. Just say "Let the Israelites move out of Egypt." and there you go.

² God also said to Moses, "I am the LORD. ³ I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, ^[a] but by my name the LORD ^[b] I did not make myself known to them. ^{[c] 4} I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, where they lived as aliens. ⁵ Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant.

"I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name the LORD I did not make myself known to them.": actually, I'm pretty certain Abraham knew your name. When you asked him to slay his son (which was just a test, but still), he went to the region of Moriah searching for one particular mountain where the task was to be done. Then you told him to not slay his son and he was grateful and all, calling the place The LORD Will Provide, a lame name if you ask me, but only if he knew your name was the LORD would he name a place that way. So the fact that the name the LORD was seen before Exodus wasn't just for the reader to know, the characters knew it too. (Why would God hide his name anyway?) The footnotes might suggest that there's no error in this verse, so I'm not sure I can call this a 100% real error, but still... "Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant.": about damn time! You were supposed to remember it much before that actually.

⁶ "Therefore, say to the Israelites: 'I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. ⁷ I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. ⁸ And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the LORD.' "

You know what? By that point I'd need to see the LORD in person to be certain of his intentions, because I sure as hell wouldn't believe Moses telling me the same thing twice when he just made things worse by doing so the first time (in fact, I wouldn't believe a guy like that even the first time around, but since God is real in this book, they might assume that someone was truly a man of God if he said so).

⁹ Moses reported this to the Israelites, but they did not listen to him because of their discouragement and cruel bondage.

No! They didn't believe because for all that matters it seems exactly as if he was telling them lies the first time. Listening to him again could just cause more trouble.

¹⁰ Then the LORD said to Moses, ¹¹ "Go, tell Pharaoh king of Egypt to let the Israelites go out of his country."

Yeah right!

¹² But Moses said to the LORD, "If the Israelites will not listen to me, why would Pharaoh listen to me, since I speak with faltering lips ^[d] ?"

Are we going through that routine again? But there's something interesting here. We have to consider that maybe Moses was not a bad speaker (as in shy or not having the right words coming to mind fast enough), but he had a real speech impediment, which is so far from what movies or people think of him. One really has to wonder why the LORD would choose him to represent the Israelites (not that I have anything against handicapped people, but God is playing with people's fates here, so he needs the best speaker he can get). The second interesting or rather funny thing to consider is the original Hebrew words which were "uncircumcised lips". I've seen people struggle with that minor passage, going as far as to say that he might have been disfigured or that he was speaking symbolically saying that because of his speech impediment he didn't consider himself part of the covenant (which if you remember required circumcision as a sign of being part of the covenant).

Family Record of Moses and Aaron

¹³ Now the LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron about the Israelites and Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he commanded them to bring the Israelites out of Egypt.

Yeah OK, I'm beginning to understand that. This is what the Bible is, mostly words and little actions. But when actions are taken, damn! Just damn! (Same thing in real life, like believers, extreme believers I'll give you that, killing homosexuals. Also think about the extremists of another major religion who said to Mr. Plane that he should go visit Mr. and Ms. Tower one sad morning; the visit was unexpected and scarred them for life.)

¹⁴ These were the heads of their families ^[e] :
The sons of Reuben the firstborn son of Israel were Hanoch and Pallu, Hezron and Carmi. These were the clans of Reuben.

It's really confusing how this damn book is written, because here I'm pretty sure Israel stands for Jacob, yet at other points it seems to stand for the people of Israel rather than the man itself. I say, why not always call him Jacob anyway? No more confusion, the change of name was never complete anyway and it's a dumb idea at that.

¹⁵ The sons of Simeon were Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jakin, Zohar and Shaul the son of a Canaanite woman. These were the clans of Simeon.

Beware of Shaul, the son of a Canaanite woman.

¹⁶ These were the names of the sons of Levi according to their records: Gershon, Kohath and Merari. Levi lived 137 years.

Strange, why is Levi's age when he died mentioned here while we don't know about Reuben's?

¹⁷ The sons of Gershon, by clans, were Libni and Shimei.

And now for some strange reason they decide that it's important that I know who the sons of Levi's son were. I'm sure there's no meaning though.

¹⁸ The sons of Kohath were Amram, Izhar, Hebron and Uzziel. Kohath lived 133 years.

Sure, tell me all these names. I really hate these huge bits of the Bible. In fact, I might hate them more than the bad morals, because they're usually full of factual errors, they serve no special purpose and are especially boring.

¹⁹ The sons of Merari were Mahli and Mushi.
These were the clans of Levi according to their records.

Am I to understand that when they don't mention the sons of the sons, it's because they had no children? Because I can see no other reason why they spend some time on Levi's legacy, but not on the others, like Reuben's legacy for example.

²⁰ Amram married his father's sister Jochebed, who bore him Aaron and Moses. Amram lived 137 years.

I presumed earlier that Moses' father had fucked his cousin (we didn't know much at the time), but here now it's confirmed that it was his aunt. At least I was right; once again we had incestuous sex.

²¹ The sons of Izhar were Korah, Nepheg and Zicri.

You know, I shouldn't complain so much when we have confirmed incestuous sex, because at least it makes these passages less boring, slightly less boring. I can tell you that this verse for example, featuring no incestuous relation we know of, is very very boring.

²² The sons of Uzziel were Mishael, Elzaphan and Sithri.

Very very very boring.

²³ Aaron married Elisheba, daughter of Amminadab and sister of Nahshon, and she bore him Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.

And to say I was wondering all this time who were the members of Moses' brother's family and the answer was just there all along. Now I can live a full meaningful life. The more you know...

²⁴ The sons of Korah were Assir, Elkanah and Abiasaph. These were the Korahite clans.

OK seriously why are we talking about the sons of the son of the son Levi's son?

²⁵ Eleazar son of Aaron married one of the daughters of Putiel, and she bore him Phinehas.
These were the heads of the Levite families, clan by clan.

Clan by clan, as if anyone needed that much information to be moral.

²⁶ It was this same Aaron and Moses to whom the LORD said, "Bring the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions." ²⁷ They were the ones who spoke to Pharaoh king of Egypt about bringing the Israelites out of Egypt. It was the same Moses and Aaron.

Thanks, I kind of figured that out. It looks like: "They were the same Moses and Aaron, I tell you. Don't believe me? I really mean that, they were the same people you've heard about. No really!"

Aaron to Speak for Moses

²⁸ Now when the LORD spoke to Moses in Egypt, ²⁹ he said to him, "I am the LORD. Tell Pharaoh king of Egypt everything I tell you."

I told you I was right when I said God suffered from Alzheimer's disease.

³⁰ But Moses said to the LORD, "Since I speak with faltering lips, why would Pharaoh listen to me?"

Oh no, Moses too!

Footnotes:

a. Exodus 6:3 Hebrew El-Shaddai
b. Exodus 6:3 See note at Exodus 3:15.
c. Exodus 6:3 Or Almighty, and by my name the LORD did I not let myself be known to them?
d. Exodus 6:12 Hebrew I am uncircumcised of lips ; also in verse 30
e. Exodus 6:14 The Hebrew for families here and in verse 25 refers to units larger than clans.