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Samaritan Exodus

Samaritan Penteteuch

About this book
Chapter 20

1 And God spoke all these words, saying: 2 “I am Shema your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of slavery. 3 You shall have no other gods before me. 4 You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness [of anything] that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5 You shall not bow down to them, nor serve them, for I, Shema your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sins of their fathers, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 and showing faithful love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. 7 You shall not take the name of Shema your God in vain, for Shema will not consider anyone innocent who takes his name in vain.

8 Observe the Sabbath day, for it is holy. 9 Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to Shema your God. On it you shall not do any work: you, or your son, or your daughter, your male slave, or your female slave, [or] your cattle, or the foreigner who is within your cities, 11 for in six days Shema made heaven and earth, and the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore Shema blessed the Sabbath day, and made it holy.

12 Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land which Shema your God gives you. 13 You shall not kill. 14 You shall not commit adultery. 15 You shall not steal. 16 You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. 17 You shall not covet your neighbor’s house, and you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, his field, his male slave, or his female slave, [or] his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s. And when Shema your God brings you into the land of the Canaanite, which you are entering to take possession of it, you shall set up large stones, and plaster them with plaster. And you shall write on the stones all the words of this law. And when you have passed over the Jordan, you shall set up these stones, which I command you today, on [Mount] Ārgarizem. And there you shall build an altar to Shema your God, an altar of stones; you shall not raise any iron [tool] over them. You shall build an altar to Shema your God of uncut stones, and you shall offer burned offerings on it to Shema your God. And you shall sacrifice peace offerings, and shall eat there, and you shall rejoice in the presence of Shema your God. That mountain beyond the Jordan, beyond the road toward the sunset, in the land of the Canaanites who live in the Arabah, opposite Gilgal, beside Elon Moreh, opposite Shechem.”⁠

18 And all the people heard the thunder, and the sound of the trumpet, and saw the lightning, and the mountain smoking. And when all the people saw [it], they trembled, and stood far away. 19 And they said to Moses: “Look, Shema our God has shown us his glory and his greatness, and we have heard his voice from the middle of the fire. We have seen this day that God does speak with man, and he lives. Now therefore why should we die? For this great fire will consume us. If we hear the voice of Shema our God any more, then we shall die. For who is there among all living people, that has heard the voice of the living God speaking from the middle of fire, as we have, and has still lived? Go near, and hear all that Shema our God will say, and you will speak to us all that Shema our God will speak to you, and we will hear and do it. But do not let God speak with us, so that we do not die.” 20 And Moses said to the people: “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, [and] so that you may keep the fear of him in mind and not sin.” 21 And the people stood far away, and Moses approached the thick darkness where God was. And Shema spoke to Moses, saying:⁠ “I have heard the voice of the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. Everything they have said is good. If only they had hearts like this, so that they would fear me, and keep my commandments always, so that things might go well for them, and with their children forever! I will raise them up a prophet from among their brothers, like you, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I shall command him.⁠ And if anyone does not listen to the words he shall speak in my name, I will demand [it] from him. But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die. And if you think to yourself, ‘How may the word which Shema has not spoken be known?’ When a prophet speaks in the name of Shema, if the word does not happen or come true, that is a word which Shema has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it arrogantly; you need not be afraid of him. Go say to them, ‘Return to your tents.’ But you, stand here by me, and I will speak to you all the commandment, the statutes, and the rules, which you shall teach them, so that they may do them in the land which I give them to possess.”

22 And Shema spoke to Moses, saying: “You shall say to the children of Israel, ‘You yourselves have seen that I have talked with you from heaven. 23 You shall not make gods of silver [to be] with me, nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold. 24 You shall make me an altar of earth, and shall sacrifice on it your burned offerings, and your peace offerings of your sheep and of your oxen in the place where I recorded my name; to that place I will come to you and I will bless you. 25 And if you make me an altar of stone, you shall not build it of cut stones; for if you lift up your tool over it, you have defiled it. 26 You shall not offer deceitfully on my altar, so that your nakedness is not exposed to it’”

Texts in conversation

Compare Samaritan Exodus 20:21 and John 4:25

Samaritan · New Testament

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Summary

The Samaritan version of Exodus has God promise a prophet like Moses who will tell the people everything God commands, a promise central to later Samaritan hope. In John 4, a Samaritan woman tells Jesus the Messiah will tell them everything.

Passages

Samaritan Exodus 20:21

Samaritan · Samaritan Penteteuch
20 And Moses said to the people: “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, [and] so that you may keep the fear of him in mind and not sin.” 21 And the people stood far away, and Moses approached the thick darkness where God was. And Shema spoke to Moses, saying: “I have heard the voice of the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. Everything they have said is good. If only they had hearts like this, so that they would fear me, and keep my commandments always, so that things might go well for them, and with their children forever! I will raise them up a prophet from among their brothers, like you, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I shall command him. And if anyone does not listen to the words he shall speak in my name, I will demand [it] from him. But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die. And if you think to yourself, ‘How may the word which Shema has not spoken be known?’ When a prophet speaks in the name of Shema, if the word does not happen or come true, that is a word which Shema has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it arrogantly; you need not be afraid of him. Go say to them, ‘Return to your tents.’ But you, stand here by me, and I will speak to you all the commandment, the statutes, and the rules, which you shall teach them, so that they may do them in the land which I give them to possess.”
130–120 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Samaritan Exodus

John 4:25

New Testament
19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you people say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You people worship what you do not know. We worship what we know because salvation is from the Jews. 23 But a time is coming—and now is here—when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such people to be his worshipers. 24 God is spirit, and the people who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (the one called Christ); “whenever he comes, he will tell us everything.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I, the one speaking to you, am he.”
90–110 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in John

References

“... Perhaps by using the term “messiah” the Fourth Gospel has her appeal to a concept shared by both Jews and Samaritans (cf. Josephus Ant. 18.85–87), but the Samaritan concept most equivalent to the Jewish messiah appears to be quite different from the Jewish concept. They spoke not of a Davidic messiah, nor actually much of an “anointed” (messianic) agent per se, but of the “Taheb,” the “restorer,” a prophet like Moses. Like Moses (see comment on 6:15), the Taheb would also rule. As best as we can tell, they believed that the era of divine favor (rahutha) ended soon after Moses, in the time of Eli, with Israel’s religious practices becoming defiled from Samuel’s time onward. The era of divine displeasure (panutha) now prevailed, but the Taheb, the prophet like Moses, would restore the era of divine favor. So central was the new Moses idea to the Taheb’s mission that the Samaritan Pentateuch places Deut 18:18 near the Ten Commandments of Exod 20. If members of John’s audience could be expected to catch the allusion, the greater-than-Moses imagery in John 4 would reinforce the picture of Jesus as the Taheb. Although it is important to affirm again the uncertainty of our knowledge of many Samaritan beliefs in this period, it may be relevant that Samaritans apparently expected the Taheb to be a sort of teacher, as in 4:25. ...”
Craig S. Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 619–620.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Samaritan Exodus 20:21 and John 4:25

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