Israel's Exodus Journey

The Egyptians had generously given the people of Israel gold and silver jewellery and clothing,
before the Firstborn-Plague of the Passover vigil night; now following which,

the Lord had warned the people of Israel that –

Israel now leaves together from its Rameses assembly point, moving in its tribal groups –

"about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children". (Exodus 12:37).

armed for battle and bearing Joseph's coffin, they move out early on the 15th day of their first month, while the Egyptians are burying their dead firstborn of all ages. "A mixed multitude also went up with them [out of Egypt], and very much livestock, both flocks and herds."

The people wait in fear and uncertainty, as Pharaoh's elite chariot cavalry pursues them because they appear to have been led into a 'cul de sac' ("entangled in the land" Ex.14:3).

People complain about Moses because the water is bitter. Moses prays and is directed to throw a certain tree into the water and it becomes sweet.
The Lord links the keeping of all His laws to Israel's freedom from the diseases of Egypt.

ELIM CAMP with 12 springs and 70 date palms.

RED SEA (Yam Suph) CAMP
Desert of Sin

DOPHKAH CAMP
Desert of Sin

The people are angry enough to stone Moses to death because of the lack of water.
The Lord gives them water out of a rock on mount Horeb. The place is named Massah (testing) and Meribah (complaining).
• Amalekites attack Israel. Joshua leads the defence while Moses holds up his hands before to God, who gives victory after a full day of battle and commands that a record is to be made that God will completely annihilate the Amalekites. Moses builds an altar called "the Lord is my banner".
• Jethro of Midian, Moses father-in-law, brings Moses' wife and two sons; leads Israel's leaders in worship-sacrifice; and teaches Moses to delegate judicial responsibility.

The Lord sends Moses with an invitation to Israel to become a 'kingdom of priests' in covenant with Him.
The people commit themselves to obey.
They cleanse themselves in preparation for God, and the Lord comes down on the Mountain and speaks the Ten Words (10 Commandments) of the Testimony directly to the them (Exodus 20). 
(46 days into the Journey, from the 15th day of the 1st month)

God then dictates the judicial code of the Book of the Covenant to Moses (Exodus 21-23) which includes the limits of Israel's Promised Land.

   "Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for My name is in him.
   "But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.
"When My angel goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. You shall serve the LORD your God, and He will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from among you. None shall miscarry or be barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days.
   "I will send My terror before you and will throw into confusion all the people against whom you shall come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites from before you. I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the wild beasts multiply against you. Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and possess the land.

And I will set your border from the Red Sea [Aqaba] to the Sea of the Philistines [Mediterranean],
and from the wilderness [Wadi El Arish] to the Euphrates [in Syria],
for I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you."  (Exodus 23:20-31).

• Moses returns to the people and petitions God from his prayer tent outside the camp (Exodus 33:7) –

"How will anyone know that You are pleased with me and with Your people unless You go with us?
What else will distinguish me and Your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?" (Exodus 33:16).

• Moses makes blank replacement tablets and then is alone with God on the Mount for forty days, without eating, and returns with the inscribed tablets, his face shining. He puts a veil over his face so that the people will see the glory fading (Exodus 34; 2 Corinthians 3:13).
• Moses invites a freewill offering from the people for the Tabernacle and its ministries (Exodus 35).
Ithamar son of Aaron supervises the Levite accounting of this voluntary offering (Exodus 38:21-31) –

The Tabernacle is prepared and erected, and the Cloud of the Presence descends upon it.
The priesthood is inducted and all alcoholic drinks prohibited to them during their service as teachers of God's Word (Leviticus 9;10:8-11).
Dietary, hygiene, and social regulation for the people is now given in greater detail (Leviticus 11-20).

Israel is instructed to take Palestine by force and completely destroy all its tribes, for their infant sacrifice and sexual practices, including with animals, which has defiled the land (Leviticus 18:21-30; 20:23).

From Mount Sinai the order of Israel's march is now to be lead by –   1.  Hobab of Midian (a Gentile) with Moses, his brother-in-law (Numbers 10:31),   2.  Followed by the holy blue-covered Ark of the Covenant (Numbers 10:33), carried on the shoulders of the Levites. Then successively, the Battalions break camp, at each silver-trumpet fanfare, and they move out in the following march order (Numbers 10:5-6,13-28) to follow the Ark. Four Marching Battalions with their Families and Livestock

3.1 Judah's Battalion (Judah, Issachar, Zebulun), followed by Gershom and Merari (the two Levite Clans with the disassembled Tent of God on wagons);

3.2 Reuben's Battalion (Reuben, Simeon, Gad), followed by Kohath (the Levite Clan carrying the covered sacred furniture);

3.3 Ephraim's Battalion (Ephraim, Manasseh, Benjamin);

3.4 Dan's Battalion (Dan, Asher, Naphtali) as the rear-guard.

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Beginning of the "great and terrible desert" (Deut.1:19).
God anoints the 70 elders to assist Moses (Num.11:25) in addition to the judicial structure instituted at Rephidim.
God sends a month's supply of meat – quails, c.1 metre deep and a day's journey wide on each side of the camp, and consequent judgment on their complaining.

The average distance between encampments appears to have been between four and eight miles depending on the terrain.

Moses gives God's command to invade the Land – but the people ask and the Lord agrees to scouts being sent in first.
These scouts are –

Of the 12 scouts, 10 bring a negative report on the military situation, so the people refuse to invade and reproach God for bringing their children into this wilderness.

the death of all adults before entry into the Land (except Caleb and Joshua).

Israel tries to reverse God's decision by invading the Land, as God had commanded earlier, but is severely defeated.

• Miriam, older sister of Moses, dies (Num.20:1).
• The tribes wander for many years, with their flocks and herds, and prosper until drought brings them back to God's Tabernacle at Kadesh to seek help.
• God bans Moses also from entering the Land because he strikes the rock for water at Kadesh instead of speaking to it as God had commanded him.
• Moses sends messengers to the king of Edom that their brother nation has come out of Egypt and asks for safe passage, but is refused under threat of war and so Israel moves eastward to circumvent Edom (Numbers 20:14-21).

Aaron climbs the mountain to die, aged 123, (Year 40, month 5, day 1) and Israel mourns for 30 days (Numbers 20:23-29).
• King of Arad in the Negev hears of Israel's invasion and attacks them on the Atharim road. Israel counter-attacks and destroys all towns of Arad (Numbers 21:1-3;33:40).
Israel now heads south to circumvent Edom.

IYE-ABARIM CAMP
Eastern border of Moab (Judges 11:14-22)

The Lord gives water when Israel's nobles dig.
Israel goes to war with Sihon, after negotiations fail, and occupy his land from the Arnon to the Jabbok, up to the fortified border of Ammon.

'PLAINS OF MOAB' CAMP
Along Jordan opposite Jericho, from Beth Jeshimoth to Abel-Shittim.
(Named Moab because the Amorites had previously driven the Moabites out of this area, Num.21:29).

• Unique National Circumcision using only flint knives as God commands (Joshua 5:2-3),
      (probably with respect to circumcision's origin in Neolithic Egypt and Egyptian practice);
• Supernatural manna supply now stops . . . they eat the corn of the Land.

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