WORD STUDY YOU ARE A חתנ ME HUSBAND OF BLOOD TO דמימ אתה לי Exodus 4:24-26: And it came to pass by the way in the inn, that the LORD met him, and sought to kill him. Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast [it] at his feet, and said, Surely a bloody husband [art] thou to me. So he let him go: then she said, A bloody husband [thou art], because of the circumcision. This is a rather strange story that covers three verses and then we hear no more about it. There has been much speculation as to what this is all about. As Moses and his family arrive back in Egypt he meets up with the Lord who seeks to kill him. Zipporah immediately takes a sharp stone cuts the foreskin off of her son and throws it at the feet of Moses and declares he is a bloody husband. As a result the Lord decides not to kill Moses. This is not exactly an account you want to include when you are teaching little children the story of Moses in Sunday School.
So why is this even in the Bible, did it actually take place? Well, if it is in the Bible then I believe it is a real event. Not only do I believe it to be a real event, but I also believe it carries a very powerful message for the church today. First we need to look at who Zipporah was. She was the daughter of Jethro who is in introduced in Exodus 2:18 as Reuel of Midian. In Islam Jethro comes under the name of Shuaib or Shu ayb and is revered as a Prophet of Isalm. It is believed that he is a descendent of Ishmael which is very likely as Ishmael was known to settle among the Midianites. This then would make Jethro a descendent of Abraham and would explain his empathy for the Jewish God Jehovah. I was reading in the Talmud Sanhedrin 106a that the Pharaoh consulted with Jethro, Balaam and Job regarding what to do with the Hebrews. Balaam said to exterminate them, commit genocide. Job sat on the fence and did not say harm or bless them and Jethro said to leave them alone. Because of Jethro s stand on behalf of the Hebrews his descendants the Rechabites were allowed to sit with the Sanhedrin in the Temple. Jethro was a good man and sought to follow God Jehovah according to the best of his knowledge. However after generations and generations of having no guidance in the ways of Jehovah syncretism, the mixing of various religions, took place. Exodus 2:16 tells us that Jethro was a priest of Midian. What that means is not altogether clear, however, it is safe to assume he mixed some of his belief in Jehovah with the pagan religion of Midian which is believed to be an early form of
Druze which is monotheistic and Abrahamic and eventually evolved to Isamailism which is a branch of Shia Isalm. The important thing to keep in mind is that there is an element of the true worship of Jehovah mixed in with all this. As the descendants of Ishmael had not religious training in the ways of Jehovah, a lot of pagan beliefs wandered into this religion as the generations formed. One basic element of the Hebrew religion that was initiated by Abraham was circumcision. By the time of Zipporah, however, circumcision was still practiced but it was done by the bride on her wedding night, yeah go figure. Who wants to be circumcised on your wedding night. So to make this more viable a belief arose that on one s wedding night a demon would come around to kill the new bridegroom To appease this demon the new bride would cut the foreskin off of her husband as a blood sacrifice and throw it at his feet as an atonement of sorts so that the demon would have no cause to take the husband s life. Somewhere in all that mish mosh you see an element of the original belief of blood sacrifice for atonement of sins. Anyway, the husband would be so grateful to his new bride for saving his life that he would then consummate the marriage, after a little time of healing for his wife s surgical procedure. But she would declare to her new husband chatan damim atah li you are a husband of blood to me. This is a colloquial expression meaning I saved your kester buddy so you had better be faithful to me. So come the wedding night of Zipporah and Moses as Zipporah gets his martial knife ready to save her husband from this demon that is to come around to kill him she discovers to her horror that the old boy is already circumcised. Now she lives in anxious watch, waiting and sensitive for this supernatural being to come around to kill her husband. They have their first male child and on the eighth day as Moses gets ready to have the Brit milah old Zipporah steps in and says Not on
your life kiddo, you may have escape that demon for now, but no way are you going to endanger my son s life. He keeps his foreskin until he gets married. They argue, they fight over it and of course as men have done throughout the ages he eventually gives in to get some peace in the house. Only for Moses this peace came at the cost of disobedience to God. Now that Moses has entered Egypt and is ready to really move in the power of God, here he is about to declare a plague that would kill the first born of the Egyptians and his family is not in obedience to God because his wife is clinging to some pagan belief that her son would be protected from this angel of death through a perversion of one of the key commands of God, the rite of circumcision. Ironic, isn t it. Zipporah senses the presence of a supernatural being that is not at all pleased with the household and she is suddenly struck with the fear, This is it, that demon has come to kill my husband and he has no foreskin for me to cut off to save his life. In the Hebrew the phrase seeking to kill is yibaqesh hamitho which really means desiring for the death (of Moses). It does not mean God was seeking to kill him but only desired his death. The word death is moth which simply means an end to life. Paul said: For me to live is Christ to die is to gain, Philippians 1:21. If Moses was not in obedience to God he could not be used for this great task so his mission on earth was over, God was ready to take him home and hire someone else who was in complete obedience. So in desperation Zipporah cuts the foreskin from her son and tosses it at the feet of Moses and says, You are now a husband of blood to me. Moses and God simply says, You are now in compliance, let s get these Hebrew children out of Egypt already. I think there is a great lesson for us in this. I thought of this yesterday as my pastor shared with the congregation that
we all have a mission from God, God has called everyone of us to serve him in some capacity. So why is it that we are all not in that service or mission. Perhaps like Moses there is some form of disobedience in our lives and because of that God cannot exert his power through us to accomplish this mission. You really feel called of God, you have prayed over and over for God to bring this ministry about, but it has not materialized. Perhaps there is some foreskin that yet needs to be cut off. There is some disobedience in your life and home that is blocking the power of God. But cheer up, like with Zipporah, God has way of bringing you and your home into compliance. Zipporah was sensitive to a spiritual presence, she misinterpreted that presence when it came, but it still brought her into compliance. If you are unaware of what that disobedience might be just continue to pray, draw close to God and be sensitive to His spirit and He will make it know as to just what that bit of foreskin is in your life or home and Jesus can be a husband of blood that will bring the disobedience to an end.