Clay Lane

The Copy Book

A Library of History and Literature in English

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991

Hailstones and Coals of Fire

Moses asks Pharaoh to let the Israelites go, but every wonder God performs only makes Pharaoh more obstructive.

Moses has returned to Egypt, which he fled forty years before, to ask Pharaoh to let the enslaved Israelites leave as a free people. But everything God says and does through Moses serves only to make Pharaoh more determined to refuse.

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Picture: By John Martin (1789-1854), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.

992

‘I Will See Thy Face Again No More’

Pharaoh dismisses Moses’s embassy for the last time, and Moses prepares the Israelites for a hasty departure.

With every miracle shown to him, Pharaoh’s heart has become harder towards the Israelites, and now he tells Moses that his embassy to Egypt’s court is at an end. Moses accepts the decree, knowing that more much is to come.

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Picture: By Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1836-1912), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.

993

Moses at the Red Sea

Pharaoh has the Israelites trapped on the shore of the Red Sea, but God has yet another surprise for him.

Moses has failed to persuade Pharaoh to let the Israelites leave Egypt, so he has taken matters into his own hands and brought them out anyway. Pharaoh quickly puts aside grief for his firstborn son, taken by God’s angel of death, and rides after the escaped slaves with vengeance in his heart.

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Picture: By Chris Hadfield, courtesy of the NASA Johnson Space Center, Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.

994

The Story of Moses

Jochebed hides her baby son from Pharaoh’s soldiers, only for him to be discovered by Pharaoh’s daughter.

The story of Israel’s deliverance from slavery in Egypt begins long ago, perhaps as long ago as the 13th century BC. The children of Jacob have come with Pharaoh’s blessing to Egypt to join their respected brother Joseph, but their descendants have multiplied, and later Pharaohs see them as a burden, even a threat.

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Picture: By William Hogarth (1697–1764), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.

995

Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh

Abbot Elfric unpacks the meaning of the gifts of the Three Wise Men.

In Anglo-Saxon England, January 6th was named the Epiphany, referring to the showing forth of Christ’s divinity. On this day, Abbot Elfric tells us, the English Church celebrated chiefly the Baptism of Christ, but also the Wedding at Cana, and the visit of the Three Wise Men to Bethlehem.

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Picture: By Georgios Kastrofylakas, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.

996

Caught in the Act

Young Thomas Arne goes to extreme lengths to conceal his musical talent from his family.

Thomas Arne (1710-1778) remains one of England’s greatest composers, though overshadowed now by his contemporary George Frideric Handel. He wrote the music for the National Anthem and ‘Rule Britannia!’ and composed dozens of popular songs and operas, but if his father had had his way, Thomas would have been a bored London attorney.

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Picture: © ruth and johnny, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.. Source.