© Charles Chandler

 

Once in Moab, Ramose found that he could stand on the banks of the Jordan and look at the Promised Land, but he could not enter it.¹ So Ramose contented himself with preaching to Habirus on the East Bank.

 

Here we have to acknowledge what an extraordinary thing happened, when high priests started preaching to pastoral nomads. In Egypt, religion was not generally accessible in the modern sense. The prayers found on the walls of tombs (such as Psalm 104) were previously known only to Egyptian royalty. To the common people, "religion" was a matter of making an offering to a priest, who then disappeared behind the curtain and whispered secret incantations. Commoners were not allowed to see the inner sanctuary, or hear the prayers, since only the priests were qualified to wield the powers that could be so invoked. Thus there was no spirituality to it for the general public — it was just tribute paid to the dominant priesthood. Then we hear in the Midrash (Devarim Rabba 9:4),

Before his death, Moses wrote 13 Torah Scrolls. Twelve of these were distributed to each of the 12 Tribes. The 13^th was placed in the Ark of the Covenant (with the Tablets). If anyone would come and attempt to rewrite or falsify the Torah, the one in the Ark would "testify" against him. (Likewise, if he had access to the scroll in the Ark and tried to falsify it, the distributed copies would "testify" against him.)

The distribution of religious texts throughout the community crossed a theological watershed, making spirituality accessible to the general public for the first time. The established priesthood was understandably upset. Secret incantations and magic potions that only they could prepare were replaced by Mosaic Law, which was a set of practical guidelines for maintaining a healthy community. This was perhaps the greatest gift in the history of humankind, which we now take for granted, but which in the 1200s bce was a kind of benevolence that had never been seen before. It's no wonder that the Hebrews cherished the legacy, and preserved it so faithfully for future generations.

 

So the Habirus were taught Atenism, including its most essential tenet (i.e., that God cannot be fully conceived in any sort of material way, and therefore should not be represented, in iconography or idolatry), the faith's only artifact (i.e., the Ark of the Covenant), the proper attire for priests when saying prayers (e.g., talit and shaatnez), and the practice of marking a doorpost to identify residents as members of a cult (mezzuzeh). But those who abided by such practices were confined to the East Bank.