Ancient Israel’s National Anthem

A climactic moment in the Exodus narrative comes in this week’s Torah reading of B’shalaḥ (Exodus 13:17-17:16). Just after God finally and definitively saves the Israelites from their Egyptian oppressors at the Sea of Reeds, Moses leads the people in a song of thanksgiving. This is the first of two or three such poems in the Pentateuch; indeed, in the narrative portion of the Hebrew Bible that extends from Genesis through the second book of Kings, it is one of only a handful of passages where the authors abandon prose. Like the other instances, the Song at the Sea presents an alternate version of a story that has already been relayed in prose. In doing so, it raises new perspectives, both literary and religious, that the biblical text as a whole might otherwise lack.

To put the song in context: Moses and the Israelites have finally been expelled from slavery in Egypt amid miracles and wonders. Pharaoh, however, has a change of heart and sends his troops and chariots after the now-terrified Jews. In a magnificent display of His power, God parts the Sea of Reeds so that the Israelites may pass through on dry land. The Egyptian troops, in their futile attempt at pursuit, are subsequently drowned in the waters of the sea.

This seems, then, a natural place to burst into song—until one asks why exactly the Israelites sing here and here only. No other full-length biblical poem is recited collectively by the nation as a whole. Why don’t the people sing as they depart from Egypt? Or while sacrificing the paschal lamb, or at the theophany at Sinai? And what is the perspective that the content of the Song introduces? By seeking an answer to this last question, I think we can come to answer the others.