Biblical Series: Exodus | Pharaoh, Free Will, and Punishment | Episode 5 Clip

And the man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt in the sight of Pharaoh's servants and in the sight of the people. And Moses said, "Shall we have a Pharaoh who did not know Joseph but loved Joseph? And now what do we have? Another Jew who the Egyptians adore? It's just ironic, right? Right? Joseph and now Moses, that language is used of Joseph as well, isn't it? Yeah, let's see.

With regard to the people, no, I don't think so, but they knew he saved their lives. So, but in this case, did they? I don't know if they adored him. At least it says Joseph. No, Moses, they say he was great. Okay, so both of them were great in this question for sure. Joseph, they love, that's for sure.

Where are you emotionally? I'm just curious about this. Are you, when you're reading this or you're reading this in eager anticipation of the Pharaoh being punished? Are you reading this in trepidation? Because I remember it was just me. It's more trepidation. It's like I think because I probably identify with the Pharaoh.

You do? Well, yeah. You think about losing a child, yeah. Just about the consequences of your own stupidity. It's like, are you feeling vindicated, right? Like vengeful that you're hoping that the Pharaoh is going to get his? Are you feeling remorse and empathy for what's coming? What is your emotional state? Because I remember I used to read in like high school history, when you'd read like World War One and World War Two, it's like you have that sense of being. It's constant, like I really hope that America wins, right? Like you have this emotional positioning in relation to reading history, even if you know the outcome.

And I'm just curious, but in this, like there's this growing looming threat as if God is saying, "This is don't know, if you don't listen, this is where we're going." He's not telling you where we're going yet. It's almost like a very... it's like in a movie, right? You can feel the music like coming up and you can feel the threat. And you know, like please let it stop before it reaches that point. You don't even know where it's going.

And then once it gets there... I don't think... is it possible to not feel sad for the Egyptians and to not feel sympathy and to not wish that the Pharaoh had broken before? And it's like you get there and you're like, "Dennis, how about you?"

"I hope Pharaoh gets his."

Yeah, I admit I knew I can count on him. What about the Egyptians? I was like that's why I was just waiting. I was like, is that a good sign or bad stuff? He's clearly the villain, and yes, exactly! I want villains to get punished.

I don't know. I'm... but do you want the villains to learn before they have to pay the ultimate price? That's such a Christian question.

I know, that's why I don't get the damage. They learned before they die? I want them to die! Yeah, because I’m more concerned with good people. I don't want good people to suffer. So whether Pharaoh learns or not is between Pharaoh and Pharaoh, but between Pharaoh and me, he has to be punished. But the great lesson, which is of course unlearned like most great lessons, is people really like tyrants. I mean, there’s no way around that.

One of you mentioned this, and I didn't, so I didn't bother commenting on it, but polls in Russia prior to Ukraine showed the increasing proportions of the Russian people adore Stalin. Yeah, well that's the same thing that happens to the Israelites. They complained to Moses because they want a monarch. No, they want to go back to Egypt.

Okay, order and the greatness of Russia. I know Russians now also might admire the order. There's always order under tyranny. That's okay, but they still are happy when the tyrant... There's also some question about the veracity of polling under Stalin. Nostalgia for him, but some of that’s ignorance too. You know, they look back and they just see the greatness so to speak, right?

But it's willful ignorance. Yeah, I know, but don't you think in this text it is clear? It's either like, in the second... it's clear that there is this... it's trying to show us that the people of Egypt now find these Israelites find favor in their sight. They're giving them jewels and things for them to leave. And they see Moses as being very powerful in their sight.

And then in the text itself, it switches right away to saying, "Now all the firstborn will die." And he says of the Pharaoh, and then he says to the woman behind the mill. And so it's like right in the text, a few verses from each other, you see that people have compassion for the Israelites. And then it says, "No, but their children are going to die too." That's why I feel like there’s a sense in which we're meant to have compassion even for the Egyptians.

Take off! And how many Germans were grateful for the order that Hitler seemed to bring? And then they suddenly realized chaos. Pretend not to defend the Germans, but it is fair to say that Hitler didn't get a majority of the vote. The Nazis didn't get a majority vote, but between the Communists and the Nazis, they did get a majority. The tyranny parties did win out.

I'm with you. Yeah, yeah, thank you. Daily, that Putin monkey has come up. I really do pray your point of willful blindness. I mean, that holds both ways. Like you have polling now about communism, right? You have polled... I think this has to do with a generational remove from the horrors of both Stalin and what happened in communism, right?

So, right, it is both directions. You mean both willful and just normal? Is that what you're saying? I mean that it's not just that people look back fondly on tyrants. People look back on communism that they were removed from a certain distance of it.

So the willful blindness and the ignorance isn't... listen, the number of Americans and English who gave Stalin the bomb... the flirtation with tyranny on the part of western intellectuals is among the most depressing facts of the 20th century. The Eastern Europeans have experienced that.

That's right, but I mean what, like when we're polling today? Yeah, in the west, if you poll down communism, right? And likewise with tyranny, like if you know... if Stalin's... what percentage of Harvard seniors do you think could identify Pol Pot? Like I would say five percent.

Yeah, I think you're probably being optimistic on that. Okay. I mean when I taught about the Gulag catastrophes or the catastrophes... never heard of any of that, really. Any of them, today have heard of Solzhenitsyn? Oh, that's a given. But Pol Pot? You know, what the great mass murderers... he killed a quarter of his own people, by the way.

These tyrants killed... Hitler is the only of the tyrants that didn't mostly slaughter his own people. Pol Pot killed Cambodians, Mao killed Chinese, Stalin killed Russians. It's... and they're still held in esteem.

How about Mussolini? Well, he wasn't a mass murderer. He's not in their category. He was a tyrant, but he's not in their category. Italians don't make that type. Yeah, the Italians make lousy tyrants.