Deuteronomy 21:23

Out of the Deep “In Afternoon”


In Part Four, Paul, I quoted Jonathan Edwards, p. 197f,

“The resurrection of Christ from the dead, is in Scripture represented by his coming up out of deep waters. So it is in Christ’s resurrection, as represented by Jonah’s coming out of the sea; Matt. xii. 40. It is also compared to a deliverance out of deep waters, Psalm lxix, 1, 2, 3, and verse 14, 15. These things are spoken of Christ, as is evident from this, that many things in this Psalm are in the New Testament expressly applied to Christ, (Compare verse 4 with John xv. 25. and ver. 9. with John ii. 17. and ver.2 with Matt xxvii. 34, 48. and Mark xv. 23. and John xix. 29. and ver. 2 with Rom.xi.9, 10, and ver.25 with Acts 1:20.) – Therefore, as the Jewish Sabbath was appointed on the day on which the pillar of cloud and fire rose out of the Red sea, and on which Moses and the church, the mystical body of Christ, came up out of the same sea, which is a type of the resurrection of Christ; it is a great confirmation that the Christian Sabbath should be kept on the day of the rising of the real body of Christ from the grave, which is the anti-type. For surely the Scriptures have taught us, that the type should give way to the anti-type, and that the shadow should give way to the substance.”


Christ was that Substance, and the Sabbath pointed to Him that Substance and awaited Him for the fulfilment of its substance – not the First Day of the week or of its substance.


On p. 300f there, I have said,

Seeing it cannot be denied the day of the entering into God’s Rest is the Day of the Sabbath, one further objection must be considered. It is the problem of the time of Jesus’ entering into Rest through Resurrection from the dead. As says Edwards, “… that the shadow should give way to the substance.”

First, let it be observed the moment creates the Day, not the day the moment. We talk of “Resurrection Day”, not of Resurrection Morning” or whatever portion of the day. The Event – Resurrection – makes of it the Day-of-Resurrection. Thus Edwards also sees things. Says he, “But the day that the children of Israel were delivered from their task-masters and had rest from them, was the day when the children of Israel came up out of the Red sea. They had no rest from them till then. For though they were before come forth on their journey to go out of the land of Egypt; yet they were pursued by the Egyptians, and were exceedingly perplexed and distressed.” Edwards immediately goes on, speaking of this “day”, as the “morning”: “But on the morning that they came up out of the Red sea, they had complete and fina1 deliverance; then they had full rest from their task-masters.” Again he immediately continues, “Then God said to them, "The Egyptians which ye have seen this day, ye shall see no more for ever ;" Exod. xiv, 13. Then they enjoyed a joyful day of rest, a day of refreshment. Then they sang the song of Moses ; and on that day was their Sabbath of rest.” “They enjoyed a joyful day of rest”, says Edwards, but half of it they spent in crossing the deep!

“This coming up of the children of Israel out of the Red sea, was only a type of the resurrection of Christ. … On that morning Christ, in this pillar of cloud and fire, rose out of the Red sea, as out of great waters; which was a type of Christ’s rising from a state of death, and from that great humiliation which he suffered in death.” But Edwards in the next paragraph describes this “morning” as follows, “Therefore, as the Jewish Sabbath was appointed on the day on which the pillar of cloud and fire rose out of the Red sea, and on which Moses and the church, the mystical body of Christ, came up out of the same sea, which is a type of the resurrection of Christ”.


“It is a great confirmation that the Christian Sabbath should be kept on the day of the rising of the real body of Christ from the grave, which is the antitype. For surely the Scriptures have taught us, that the type should give way to the antitype, and that the shadow should give way to the substance.”

 

I then asked:

Is there any necessity in the morning or the afternoon in this scheme of things?

And I answered at that point in time:

Of course not; it necessitates the whole day! The event is much greater than the moment or even the whole day belonging to the moment. We may fairly conclude from this that Edwards makes no clear distinction between the morning and the day of the Israelites’ crossing of the Red Sea. But we do sense he reckons the morning of particular importance in Jesus’ resurrection: As he supposes this was the day of both the Israelites’ entering into the promised land and Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, it also must be the morning of both the Israelites’ entering into the promised land and Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. Now if Jesus rose the morning, it must have been the First Day He rose on; if He rose the afternoon, it, according to the Gospels’ account of events, must have been the Sabbath He rose on. And mortal reason might say, because it was the morning in the type, it also had to be the morning in the anti-type. But just the opposite is necessarily so. Because in the type, it had been the morning, it, in the anti-type, had to be in the afternoon. The type, in early times, fore-shadowed; the anti-type, “in the last days”, fulfilled. Christ came “in the fullness of time”, in its ripeness as being the Fruit of God’s labours, the First Sheaf of late-year harvest. The precise word for such a time-slot of day is epi-fohs-k-ousehi – in-full / after-light / time-being = “afternoon” = “Sabbath’s-time late” – opse sabbatohn!


After several years I have had a closer look at these texts, and now must answer differently on the question of what the word “morning” in these texts mean.

I don’t know Hebrew at all, but with the help of Young’s Analytical Concordance to the Bible, was able to make the following analysis of some relevant words.


“13, And Moses said to the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will show you today … 21, And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the LORD caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and dried up the sea, and the waters were divided. 22, And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea …

19, And the angel of God, which went before the camp of Israel,, removed and went behind them. And the pillar of the cloud went from in front of them, and stood behind them. 20, And it came between the camp (or armies) of the Egyptians and the camp (or hosts) of Israel. And it was a cloud and darkness to the Egyptians; but it gave light by night to the Israelites: so that the one came not near the other all that night.

23, and the Egyptians pursued, and went in after them … 24, And it happened that in the morning watch the LORD looked unto the host of the Egyptians … and troubled the host of the Egyptians – 25, they lost the wheels of their chariots, and they moved with difficulty, so that the Egyptians said, Let us run away of Israel, out of sight! For the LORD fought for Israel against the Egyptians.

26, Then the LORD told Moses, Stretch out your hand over the sea that the waters may close in over the Egyptians, over their chariots and over their horsemen. 27, And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to his strength when the morning appeared; and the Egyptians fought against the waters; and the LORD overthrew the Egyptians in the middle of the sea … 28 … There remained not so much as one of them, 29, but the children of Israel walked on dry ground right through the middle of the sea – to them the waters formed a wall on both sides.

30, Thus the LORD saved Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians; and Israel saw the Egyptians (lying) dead on the seashore (that day).


“That night” / “all that night” the storm raged! “That night” / “all that night”, the LORD was fighting for Israel. It wasn’t done before sunrise. Dawn could not have been when Israel actually stood on the other side, free, and the enemy at last vanquished. It had to have been after “all that night”.

 

I therefore have a problem with the KJV that says “when the morning appeared” (27), “Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to his strength” and everything was over, because “when the morning appeared”, is “dawn” before “all that night” had passed.

“When the morning appeared” is from boqer pahnah. When the “morning” – boqer, “appears” or ‘rises’, it ‘faces’ west. But ‘noon’, it has “turned”, pahnah, and now ‘faces’, east! Ezekiel 43:17, “The stairs of the sanctuary “faced”, or were “turned”, east” – pahnah.

In Ex.14:27, boqer pahnah doesn’t mean “morning appeared” or that it ‘dawned’, but that “the sun turned (and looked east)” – “noon after”.


In Jeremia 2:27 the Lord reprimands his people, blaming them that “they have turned their back on Me” – “turned”, pahnah. The morning having turned its ‘back’ to its rising, is declining!


Jeremia 6:4 says it all: “Prepare ye war against her; arise, and let us go up at noon (tsohar). Woe unto us! For the day (yom) goeth away, for the shadows of the evening (ereb) are stretched out.” Which word here is from pahnah? – “goeth away”!

In Exodus 14:27 “morning appeared” not; it ‘went away’!


What about Exodus 14:24 though? There it says “It came to pass that in the morning watch”, the LORD saw the Egyptians … struggled to get their chariots rolling. If this had been “dawn”, then it simply says by dawn all was not over yet – the battle still raged; the “rest” had not been “entered” yet.

“In the morning watch” is from boqer ashmurah.


Lamentations 2:18-19, “Let tears run down like a river day and night: give yourself no rest … cry out in the night: In the beginning / first – rosh, of watches – ashmurah (first watch after sunset), pour out thine heart…”.

Judges 7:19, “Gideon came … outside the camp in the beginning of the middle (tikon) watch – ashmurah, and they had but newly changed guard.” This is the second and deep night watch.

Psalm 90:4, “For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past; and as a watch – ashmurah, in the night (layelah) (when it is past)”. The last or third watch of night – of dawn – is supposed.


The Hebrew night watches were three; the Roman night watches were four. The Hebrews’ watches of daytime, like the Romans’, were two:

1 Samuel 11:11, “And it was so in the morning (boqer) that Saul put the people in three companies. And they came into the midst of the host in the morning (boqer) watch (ashmurah), and slew the Ammonites until the heat (chom) of the day (yom) (= noon)” – the exact words of Ex.14:24!

The second or afternoon watch, after this, then lasted till sunset.

So in Ex.14:27 we have boqer pahnah, and in verse 24, boqer ashmurah. If the time were the same they would have been called the same; but they are called differently and in fact were of different events.

God had told the Israelites to be quiet and wait for Him while “all night” the wind would blow the seabed dry.

Boqer ashmurah in verse 24 started after the wind had blown “all night” and lasted “during the morning watch” or first watch of daytime. Now the children of Israel moved in and through and out of the sea canyon. Boqer ashmurah was while the LORD fought His battle with the hosts of the Egyptians on the seabed.

Now, after the LORD’s battle, He ordered Moses so that the sea should close in again. Boqer pahnah in verse 27 was when the LORD triumphed. Boqer pahnah says “morning has turned” – it ended. All history has turned about. This was the moment! Victory, and the song of Moses! The People in broad daylight “saw that great work which the LORD did upon the Egyptians” – verse 31. The People “have entered the rest” (in the words of Hebrews); they stood on the soil of the Promised Land.

The Exodus story gives the precise and same time of day for the moment of “Victory” that the Gospels give, epifohskousehi!

 

To remove a last obstacle to the better understanding of the events of the Exodus and their times of day, return to chapter 14 and read the text in its actual order, and not with verses 19 and 20 moved in between verses 22 and 23 as I did. With verses 19 and 20 between verses 22 and 23, I made the time of day when the pillar of cloud and fire changed position from in front of Israel to behind Israel, the “morning watch”, that is, after sunrise. In its actual sequence, this event took place after the Sabbath had started – after sunset and as soon as the night and the wind storm had begun. And thus it remained “all that night” – “the pillar of cloud and fire” “came between the (stationary) camp” – not the chasing army – “of the Egyptians, and the (stationary) camp” – not the moving hosts – “of Israel”. “All that night” the wind blew and dried up the seabed – verse 21. Then only, “The children of Israel went into the midst of the sea … and the Egyptians pursued – verses 22 and 23. Here is where the “morning watch” – boqer ashmurah, started. It ended with verse 27, “morning turned (towards the east)” – with the ending of the morning. It was noon or soon after noon. It was “late Sabbath’s” – about three quarters through its cycle.


Is there any necessity in the morning or the afternoon in this scheme of things?

I at this point in time must answer:

Of course THERE IS; it necessitates the whole day – “THE Sabbath of the LORD your God”, so that “In the end of the Sabbath, being light turned towards the First Day of the week … there suddenly was a great earthquake …!”

I think one may confidently view boqer pahnah as the nearest Hebrew equivalent of the Greek epifohskousehi – “after noon”; and boqer ashmurah as the nearest Hebrew equivalent of the Greek epaurion “daylight morning”.


“In the fourteenth day of the First Month at even .... Ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation shall kill it in the evening.” (Lv23:5 and Ex12:6) “At even” and “in the evening” which are old English for “afternoon” – confirmed through Christ who died “the ninth hour” Jewish time, 3 p.m. “Sacrifice the passover at even at the going down of the sun”, Dt16:6.


Mark the utmost significant words, “Sacrifice the passover at even at the going down of the sun, at the season (or ‘time’) that thou camest forth out of Egypt.” Israel came to stand on the away-shore of the Red Sea “forth out of Egypt”, “midst of the afternoon”! (See book 1/1 p 248, ‘Out on the 15th and In on the 16th Nisan’.)

 

At the time I wrote the above and last edited it in July 2009, I had no idea of "the Selfsame-Whole-Day-BONE-Day" of the passover.

"The fourteenth day of the First Month ... the First Month (Abib) ye shall observe passover ... the Selfsame Whole-Day BONE-Day" enveloped "THREE days thick darkness ... the plague" indistinguishable THEN, emerged as

"the fourteenth day they KILLED the passover"---day 1 CRUCIFIXION-day;

the fifteenth day they "ATE the flesh ... DEPARTED from Rameses ... and BURNED with fire that which remained THAT (next) DAY"---day 2 BURIAL-day;

and now "the third day" :: "that Selfsame WHOLE-Day BONE-Day" commanded, "remember the SABBATH OF THE LORD GOD the day The Seventh Day God thus concerning spake: And God the day The Seventh Day finished ALL his works and RESTED" ... "rested", "BECAUSE JESUS GAVE THEM REST."