By
Victor Umaru
+2348060052887; +2349048305454
honagombi@gmail.com
Baptist College of Theology, Obinze-Owerri
1.0 INTRODUCTION
The entire Bible is centered on Jesus Christ. His arrival as the Saviour is anticipated in the Old
Testament. His noble person and atoning work are revealed in the Gospels. His method of salvation
by faith is described in the Epistles. Then his majesty as King is praised in the book of Revelation.
It revolves entirely around Jesus from start to finish. Christians had good reason to have come
across Christ while studying Exodus. They can recognize him in the birth of Moses as the Saviorin-waiting, the infant in the basket. They may see him at the burning bush where Moses first
encountered the Great I Am. They can also recognize him in God’s miracles and signs. The gnat
famine was God’s finger pointing at Jesus and his miracles. They may be reminded of his worst
hours on the cross by the plague of darkness.
Then, at the Red Sea, where God’s people were baptized from death into life, they could
see Jesus. Jesus is also seen to them in the wilderness. The manna tasted like the food from Heaven
that gives life to the world, and the delicious desert springs revived them with his living water.
The story of Israel’s salvation in Christ is the history of their deliverance. Therefore, the paper
employs an eclectic exegetical approach of both diachronic and synchronic, which would allow
the exegete to be flexible in data presentation to purposefully achieve the study’s aim application
of the text to contemporary believers. The latter aspect of the approach would allow the exegesis
to accept Exodus 17:1-7 text as the final matured text accepted by the Israelite religious
.community. At the same time, the former approach would allow the exegete to dig into the wealth
of the text’s historical background.
2.0.Historical Background to the Book of Exodus
The name “Exodus,” of Greek origin, comes from the LXX name for the second book of the
Pentateuch. “Exodus” means “exit, departure,” or “exodus from Egypt.” The Vulgate, the Latin
version, also retained this name; the Jewish author Philo, a contemporary of Christ; and the Syriac
version, according to Fitzmyer.1 The name “Exodus” is a proper designation only for the first part
of the book (1:1–15:21, where the concept of God, Moses, or Moses and Aaron “leading the people
out” of Egypt is a frequent assertion. Sanderson, in his observation, says the second half of the
book describes the covenant God made with Israel (15:22–40:38).2 However, the name is so
enshrined in history that it has become the most convenient way to refer to the entire book.
The Hebrew name for the book derives from the first words of the text: “And these are the
names of” ‘tAmv. hL,a eªw>, or simply Shemoth. This phrase also occurs in Genesis 46:8, where it likewise
introduces a list of the names of those Israelites “who entered Egypt with Jacob” (1:1).3 This
connecting phrase and the observation that the book begins with the conjunction “and” emphasize
the fact that Exodus was never intended to exist separately but was thought of as a continuation of
a narrative that began in Genesis and was completed in three more books, making up the first
division of the Hebrew canon known as Torah (“law, instruction, teaching”).
Keywords: WATER FROM THE ROCK
