Moses, Man of the Mountain

by Zora Neale Hurston

  “How about them Israelites? They’re down there in Egypt without no god of their own and no more protection than a bareheaded mule. How come you can’t go down there and lead them out?”

  “Who, me? I tried some missionary work down there twenty-odd years ago and that is just how come I got to be an exile. No, I’m satisfied with things the way they are going.”

  “You still letting love run you after all these years?”

  “No, it ain’t that, Jethro. I think the world of my wife. But it ain’t love I feel for her no more. It’s the recollection of love that comforts me and makes me want her to be happy.”

  “Well, what is it then, Moses, that you don’t want to go?”

  “I’m just satisfied with my life right here. I got everything that a man could want. I’ve been to Koptos. I just want to sit on the mountain and ask God some questions about life.”

  “You won’t go?”

  “Not to turn you a short answer, Jethro, but I’m through messing in other folks’ business. I can’t go, no.”

  Jethro’s feelings took his features and formed a face that was wretched. “I sort of counted on you, Moses. In fact, all my dependence was in you.”

  “I just couldn’t do it, nohow. I’m not cut out for that. I love silence and quiet places. I want to enquire. I don’t want to be enquired of. With a mob of people around me like that I couldn’t hear my ears.”

  “Those people, I mean those Hebrews, need help, Moses. And besides, we could convert ’em, maybe. That really would be something—a big crowd like that coming through religion, all at one time.”

  “I don’t say it wouldn’t. But I don’t want to be the preacher. I’m through trying to regulate other folks’ business. There ain’t no future to it at all—just a whole lot of past. If you find a cow stuck in the mire, and pull her out, she’ll hook you sure. I just want to practice up on all this new stuff I done learned.”

  “Get them folks out of Egypt and use them to practice on, why don’t you?”

  “How am I going to do that, Jethro? Pharaoh is getting too much benefit out of those Hebrews. He wouldn’t let them leave. And another thing, why should they trust me? They don’t know anything about me. They wouldn’t believe I meant them any good. They wouldn’t follow me.”

  “You could try. It would make a mighty big man out of you, Moses, if you did. You could even be King if you wanted to.”

  “I don’t want other folks’ property enough for that.”

  “You wouldn’t have to call yourself a King. You could just sort of rule along without taking on the title.”

  “Jethro, it’s not the title I am afraid of, it’s the thing itself. It makes no difference what he calls himself, king or ruler, who sends the young men out to be killed and takes the people’s cattle away from them. Titles ain’t nothing but nicknames.”

  So Moses went back to herding sheep on Mount Horeb and went on asking Nature her secrets. He was at peace with himself, but not for long. The spirit of Jethro’s tongue was docile, but he never let up on the subject. Moses kept on refusing but it got harder and harder to do so. Jethro had a feather touch but he crowded Moses farther and farther into a corner until Moses went around with a harried look. To make it worse the whole family was of the same mind. It followed him around the place and went to bed with him. One night he felt that he couldn’t bear it any longer so he gave Jethro and his wife a flat refusal, and went off to bed.

  Jethro and the full-bloomed Zipporah sat looking after him until he was out of hearing.

  “Well, that’s the end, I reckon,” Zipporah sighed. “If he won’t, he won’t. But I can’t see to my soul how come he don’t want to be a King. I don’t ask for much. I don’t bother him when he stays off on that mountain days at a time. I don’t part my lips when he prowls all over Asia and Africa from one nation to another fooling with bugs and worms. All I ever asked for myself was to be Queen and he won’t do it. Me with my two boys getting grown—it’s hard on me.”

  “And a better piece of ruling material ain’t never been born on earth,” Jethro agreed. “It’s a sin and a shame. He is a great priest. Jehovah went out of His way to make him. His kind may never be seen no more on earth. He could call sinners to repentance, he could preach the socks off of sin if he only would. If he don’t want to be a King, that’s all right. But he sure ought to go get that passel of Hebrew people and convert ’em to Jehovah. He could do it easy, with the power he’s got. The man is just running over with spirit.”

  “Just a fine King going to waste,” Zipporah said bitterly. “Look at the shape the man’s got on him! Portly and strong and everything. He sure would look noble in a crown. So far as the Queen is concerned, I would do just as well as the next one with the right clothes on. It’s a shame that Moses is that stubborn.”

  “Well, he might think I’m through with the thing, but first and last he’s going to find out different. I ain’t been to Koptos, it is true, and had no fight with no never-dying snake, but maybe there is still something about snakes that he can learn. The backside of that mountain may get too hot to hold him yet.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Moses sat up on the mountain passing nations through his mind. Way late in the day he climbed up to a place where he had been resting every afternoon for a long time. He was watching the development of a family of reptiles under a rock beneath a bushy growth. So he went on up putting words into the mouths of the various little creatures that he saw on the way. What these creatures had to say about people had plenty of seasoning.

  Moses rounded a large boulder in sight of the spot where he was going and went on easily. There was the bush, and there was the rock under it. He was within a few feet of it when the bush burst into furious flame. Moses could not believe his eyes, but neither could he shut them on the sight. Because the bush was burning brightly but its leaves did not twist and crumple in the heat and they did not fall as ashes beneath charred limbs as they should have done. It just burned and Moses, awed though he was, could no more help coming closer to try and see the why of the burning bush than he could quit growing old. Both things were bound up in his birth. Moses drew near the bush.

  “Moses,” spoke a great voice which Moses did not know, “take off your shoes.”

  “How come, Lord? I know no voice like that can’t be like mine.”

  “This ground you are walking on is holy ground. Take off those shoes.”

  “Yes, sir, Lord.” Moses loosened his shoes and took them off without once taking his eyes off of the burning bush that did not wither. Moses stood barefooted and bareheaded and trembled with awe.

  “Moses!”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “Come closer, Moses. There is something that you must hear.”

  “I’m coming.” Moses faltered nearer the flame and stood. For the first time in all his life he felt naked, meek and void.

  “Moses, look on the ground in front of you.”

  Moses looked down, and started back in terror.

  “What is it you see, Moses?”

  “It’s a snake! It’s a deadly poison snake,” Moses said in fear, and started to run away down the mountain.

  “Moses!”

  “Yes, sir, Lord.”

  “Come back here.” Moses came because the mysterious voice commanded, but he came in fear. “Moses,” the voice ordered, “pick up that snake.” Moses shrivelled and shrank from the order. “Pick it up by the tail.”

  Moses gathered his strength and stooped. He seized the snake by the tail expecting to be bitten immediately. But except for a curious tremor of life that somehow communicated itself to the hand of Moses and from his hand to his arm and from his arm throughout his body, it might have been the wooden image of a snake. It was heavy for its length in wood, but it was stiff and motionless like stone. Moses was amazed that the writhing serpent on the ground could have become so quickly the lifeless thing in his hands. It was a walking stick carved in imitation of a snake.

  “Moses
, put it down.” Moses dropped the rod and it became a living snake again. Suddenly his fear left him. He picked up the snake in that certain way again and it became again a rod to his right hand. It was his, he knew by the feel of it. It was the rest of him. But the voice came again.

  “Moses, I want you to go down into Egypt.”

  “Into Egypt? How come, Lord? Egypt is no place for me to go.”

  “I said Egypt, Moses. I heard my people, the Hebrews, when they cried, when they kept on groaning to me for help. I want you to go down and tell that Pharaoh I say to let my people go.”

  “He won’t pay me no attention, Lord. I know he won’t.”

  “Go ahead, like I told you, Moses. I am tired of hearing the groaning in my ear. I mean to overcome Pharaoh this time. Go on down there and I’ll go with you.”

  “And those people, Lord, they won’t believe in me. I don’t talk their kind of talk in the first place and then again, I got a stammering tongue. I never could make a speech. Send somebody else, Lord.”

  “You go on; I’ll go with you. Open your mouth and I’ll speak for you.”

  “Well, Lord, if I go, tell me what to say; they won’t believe in me,” Moses said with hopeless resignation. “I don’t even know your name. Who must I tell them sent me?”

  “Tell them I AM WHAT I AM.”

  “Yes, sir, I’ll go tell them, but I know it won’t do any good.”

  “Somebody with a speaking mouth will be provided to talk for you. Go down into Egypt, Moses, and lead my people to the place I have provided for them. I AM WHAT I AM.”

  The Voice was hushed. The bush no longer burned. In fact, it looked just like it had yesterday and the day before and the day before that. The mountain was just as usual with the wind yelling “Whoo-youuu” against its rocky knots. There was nothing to speak to the senses of Moses and verify what he had heard and to hold him to what he had so unwillingly promised. That is, nothing but the rod he held in his hand. Therefore it was not a vision and neither was it a dream. This bush had blazed with fire before his eyes, but it had not burned as was natural. A serpent had become a rod to his hand and a rod had become a serpent and back again. Life could never be again what it once was. He had promised a god to go down into hated Egypt and command a man whom he hated and who hated him to permit a people whom Pharaoh hated to leave his servitude and go free. Moses dropped to a shady rock and sat with his face covered until the sun got low and red. Then he dragged himself home behind his mumbling sheep.

  CHAPTER 18

  Jethro was very helpful when Moses told him about it. In fact he seemed to Moses to glow and to swell with pleasure. “No need in you taking the thing so serious, Moses. It might not be as hard to do as you think.”

  “No, it’s just ten times as hard. I can’t do it, and that I AM WHAT I AM ought to know it. It’s going to be just about as hard to talk to them Hebrews as it is to Pharaoh. But the promise done been made, so—”

  “Oh, I don’t know, Moses. It stands to reason that anybody in slavery would be glad to be free.”

  “Humph!”

  “And when you look at it again, a nation of folks with no particular god would naturally be glad for a god to choose them for his own and then pick out a land to give them.”

  “When they can get loose from slavery in Egypt and fight the folks that already got the land and lick ’em, they got it. It don’t seem such a much to me—that land part don’t.”

  “Oh, I don’t know, now. With a good military leader, they might make out top-superior to everything they meet.”

  “Did you ever lead an army? It takes more than promise of some land to make a fighting army out of folks that just got free. Men fight with more than their hands.”

  “Well, anyhow, Moses, I can help you out some.”

  “How?”

  “On one of those trips down into Egypt I met up with some of those Hebrews and I think I could maybe find a sort of headman among them who could help you out some.”

  “That would be mighty convenient if you could. Why, I don’t talk their language. I don’t talk with their thoughts. I don’t know the first thing about them and they know next to nothing about me. I just can’t go.”

  “How about your promise on the mountain?”

  “It wasn’t so much my promising as it was a command. I got to go, but I feel like the job don’t belong to me. I never could talk to crowds, and least of all these people that is so strange to me.”

  “I’ll go down into Egypt, Moses, and bring out a man to help you handle the people until you feel you can manage. His name is Aaron.”

  “And what am I going to say to him, Jethro, to get him to work with me?”

  “Why can’t I tell him the Voice mentioned him by name?”

  “Tell him whatever you want to, Jethro,” Moses said and walked away with his head hung down. “I’m going off to the wilderness to think. I am a man that has been called.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Moses talked with Aaron and got more aggravated and put out every time they sat down together to plan. This Aaron was a short, squatty man who wanted things. First he wanted clothes like an Egyptian noble with ornaments. Then he wanted titles. Then Moses must recognize him as a brother. Moses refused at first to even listen, but Jethro persuaded him that the connection might be useful down in Egypt. He could make the old legend serve him. So Moses consented by a freezing silence. Then he wanted things for his family, and then he wanted things for his tribe. He was a Levite and the Levites must lead in all things or he could not consider a thing.

  “This sounds like the very kind of thing I hate,” Moses said with some heat, “and before I’ll be bogged down in a lot of politics, I’ll call the whole thing off.”

  “But the Voice,” Jethro reminded him quickly.

  “Oh, I’ll go back and ask that Voice again. I’ll find out if I have to go through all this to save people that think more of personal preference than they do of rescuing a whole people and making up a nation.”

  So Jethro convinced Aaron that he really must give up some of his demands, or he would find himself back in Egypt and in the same fix he was before he, Jethro, had smuggled him out. This frightened Aaron and no more was said about his offices and prerogatives for a while. He did mutter something about people who wanted to make kings out of themselves, but didn’t want anybody else to advance themselves the least bit. But Moses ignored all this and finished his plan of campaign.

  It wasn’t long after that he was saying goodbye to Midian and to his family. Jethro and the family mounted camels and went with Moses and Aaron for a day’s march.

  “It may be a month and it may be a year, but I won’t be back until I march out with the children of Israel. We have no army to face Pharaoh with. I got to fight all Egypt with my right hand.”

  Jethro had dismounted and stood by Moses, showing all the old affection he felt.

  “Be sure and come back, son. I hope you don’t come by yourself, but come back home.” He leaned his old head on Moses’ broad chest like a child. “I wish I was in your shoes, Moses. Going on missions is a great privilege.”

  “I thought you was over-anxious for me to go, Jethro. That feeling helped me to consent to the Voice. I could feel how much it meant to you.”

  “I’m anxious for you to go, but I’m more anxious for you to come back. I realize it now when you are going. Don’t let old Pharaoh kill you. You got power. Use it. Nothing can stand against your hand when you lift it up. All my love and all my powers go with you, son. And don’t hold my impatience against me. You will know what it is to get tired of waiting on visions when you get old like me.”

  Moses looked past the outline of Aaron mounted on a camel toward the Red Sea, and for a moment he wavered. Then he looked back at the shape of Mount Sinai with its shoulder-wrapping of clouds and heard the mutter of thunder from its throat. He embraced Jethro affectionately and turned his feet resolutely towards Egypt. Jethro stood watching him for a long time, but Moses was
on his way. He never looked back.

  CHAPTER 20

  Moses was back in Egypt and the people of Goshen knew it. The leaders in Israel had known that Aaron had slipped out of Egypt to meet him, and they had been listening and looking for his return. Aaron had sent the tremor along the grapevine immediately after he returned—“our man of god is in Egypt.”

  Tremendous excitement rippled down the secret ways of Goshen.

  “They say he owns a god” was whispered in hopeful emotion.

  “Sure enough?” others questioned. “Wonder how do folks get hold of gods?”

  “That’s more than I can tell you because it’s more than I know. But that ain’t the point. The point I’m coming out on is, this god wants to work in our behalf. He aims to put us in power with the Egyptians.”

  “Hush your mouth! You don’t mean to tell me that!”

  “That’s what he claims.”

  “It sure is something if it’s so.”

  “They say he can really do what he says.”

  “What you say his name is?”

  “The new god or the man—which one you talking about?”

  “The man, fool.”

  “They call him Moses, because they say he came out of the water in some way or other. So they call his name Moses.”

  The other man paused and scratched his head and thought. “Look like to me I heard that name before somewhere a long time ago. Wasn’t there a Prince of Egypt named Moses?”

  “This is the same one.”

  “Well, what is he doing with a strange god and how come he wants to help us out? I ain’t never seen no Egyptian with that sort of a notion.”

  “It seems like that’s how come he had to leave Egypt a long time ago—because he had sympathy for us. He took and killed an Egyptian overseer for beating on Hebrews, so old Pharaoh, I don’t mean this Pharaoh we got now, I mean the old gentleman, got in behind him to kill him, so he had to run on off.”