How do you read the Exodus stories as a (pro or amateur) philospoher and theologian?

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A lot of the texts in the OT speak of God being a destroyer or killer of people. I am sure the people who wrote the OT did not mean what we think they mean by their way of speaking about God.

I once watched a youtube video in which a Priest said that in the OT their was not philosophy on first and secondary causes like we have today.

It could be that the people in the OT would have said that all the coronaviruses are God punishing us (for a sin we commited) and wanting to destroy us. Many people today would say that God permits this evil that came from our bad ways of living our lives.

I heard a Rabbi saying that Jews could not rejoice in the sufferings of the Egyptians. They could only rejoice in the good things God did to the Jews in the Exodus.

We can say that God permits evil but we cannot say this about the story of the blood of the lamb and the angel of death. This is not God permiting evil. How can we speak about this story without saying that God is not the Father of the Egyptians? Sure He created them but did not act like a loving Father.

Are we simply to say that God permitted this evil?

With the coronaviruses we can say that but now with the Exodus stories. One could say that the OT people were primitive people who did not know much about philosophy and theology but I am not so sure these people were poorly educated.
 
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jesusmademe said:
We can say that God permits evil but we cannot say this about the story of the blood of the lamb and the angel of death. This is not God permiting evil. How can we speak about this story without saying that God is not the Father of the Egyptians? Sure He created them but did not act like a loving Father.

Are we simply to say that God permitted this evil?
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He didn’t? It was evil?

He changed Moses’ staff into a snake and killed the snakes made by Pharoh’s magicians and asked him to free His people – people created by God just like Pharaoh. Pharaoh refused.

God sent ten plagues to Egypt, each time asking Pharaoh to let His people go. Pharaoh refused.

After these ten plagues where the waters turned into blood, when locusts blotted out the sun, when the Egyptians suffered boils on their skin, Pharaoh is asked to let the Israelites go. Pharaoh refuses. He is told all the firstborn of Egypt will die. Pharaoh doesn’t charge his mind upon being told this news, even though he has a son and despite all he has seen the God of the Israelites do. All firstborn die. Pharaoh relents.

The Israelites leave quickly. They don’t hurt or riot against their former masters. And despite this, Pharoah changes his mind again and sends an entire army to get back the Israelites. To enslave them again. When Moses asked Pharoah to free them, he responded by taking away the straw they needed to make bricks and refused to lower their quota. Do you think they’d be treated nicely once they got back? Or even the same?

They arrive at the Red Sea. God parts the waves for the Israelites to pass. Does He send lightning to strike Pharaoh? No. Does He make the ground under his feet like quicksand to sink them? No. Pharaoh is untouched. He witnesses the might and love of God who lets His people pass through the sea untouched by its waves, and defies God anyway. His hatred is beyond reason. He does not care who God is or what He can do, because he’s Pharaoh and wants “his” slaves back. God wanted the freedom of a people that He created and had rightful lordship over. Pharaoh claimed power and ownership he did not have over a people he abused. Pharaoh claimed a lordship that only God had. And God promised He would free the people of Israel. So since Pharaoh wouldn’t stop, since Pharaoh didn’t care who God was, he and his army died.

No, this is not the case of God not being a loving Father. God was a loving Father. If anything, Pharaoh’s behavior in my opinion can be likened to that of Satan’s. Satan knows who God is, but doesn’t care. He is obstinate in his rebellion and defies God despite knowing who He is. He claims power and lordship over a people (us) that he doesn’t have. And he will lose.
 
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From the Summa Theologia
Now, the order of the universe requires, as was said above, that there should be some things that can, and do sometimes, fail. And thus God, by causing in things the good of the order of the universe, consequently and as it were by accident, causes the corruptions of things. Nevertheless the order of justice belongs to the order of the universe; and this requires that penalty should be dealt out to sinners. And so God is the author of the evil which is penalty, but not of the evil which is fault, by reason of what is said above.
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I think you have to differentiate between the plagues and the coronavirus. The plagues were a penalty for the Egyptians sinning against God, and we know that the consequence of sin is Death. This is made plain when the Egyptian first born sons were stricken, while the Israelites were saved.

The coronavirus is affecting seemingly random, and even good, people. Yes people are dying, but in this case, the coronavirus would be an evil caused by the corruption of something, not directly caused by God.

But, as the God is the author of the universe, we know that all evil is allowed to show the power of God, as we see in the Gospel of John 9:
2“Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3Jesus answered, “Neither he nor his parents sinned; it is so that the works of God might be made visible through him
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So we know that the evil of the coronavirus is ordered to some good of the universe, to show the works of God. How? Well that is something I can’t say!
 
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I’ve no problem learning from Exodus - via simply Prayerfully Reading it.

Now if someone without Faith reads it - I’ll presume that it is their very unbelief that would serve as the very means of having trouble relating to it.
 
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