Circumscribing a Strange Circumcision
Exodus 4:24-26 in Reception History
“Tzipporah at the inn” represents one of the most perplexing episodes in the Hebrew Bible. Tucked into the end of the fourth chapter of Exodus, this very brief narrative disrupts the flow of Moses’ journey back to Egypt with a sudden, violent encounter that defies simple explanation. Each element of the story has generated centuries of confusion and debate, as translators and interpreters have struggled not only to understand what happens in these three verses but also why even such a story appears at this particular moment in the Exodus narrative. The placement itself raises questions … coming immediately after God’s instructions to Moses about confronting Pharaoh and the threat to Egypt’s firstborn along with his promise of support, this pericope seems oddly positioned and disconnected from the surrounding material.
The Hebrew text compounds these difficulties through its ambiguous use of pronouns, leaving readers uncertain about who does what to whom, and notably shifts between characters without clear identification, making it challenging to determine whether violence is to be done to Moses or his son. The narrative vocabulary, style, and theological assumptions don’t align smoothly with the surrounding material, suggesting a complex history of transmission and incorporation into the larger narrative.1 These technical challenges mean that before translators or interpreters could even begin to work with this text, they had to first navigate the fundamental questions about what it’s trying to do.
What may be the most unsettling element, though, is the theological tension at the heart of the it. The same God who, just verses earlier, commissioned Moses for the liberation of Israel and promised divine protection, in an instant reappears as the aggressor seeking to attack. This jarring reversal troubled several historical translators and interpreters to such an extent that many tried to artificially distance God from the act of taking Moses’ life. Some texts introduce an ‘angel of the Lord’ as the attacker, with others using the language of a ‘destroying angel’. Notable translators and interpreters such as Philo of Alexandria or Josephus don’t even mention this text in their own works and thus add nothing to its reception history at all.2 The remaining textual reshaping and interpretive choices reveal a deep discomfort with the idea of God taking life, leading to a consistent pattern across distinct traditions of deflecting this divine violence elsewhere.
You must say to Pharaoh, ‘This is what the Lord has said, “Israel is my son, my firstborn, and I said to you, ‘Let my son go that he may serve me,’ but since you have refused to let him go, I will surely kill your son, your firstborn!”’” Now on the way, at a place where they stopped for the night, the Lord met Moses and sought to kill him. But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off the foreskin of her son and touched it to Moses’ feet, and said, “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me.” So the Lord let him alone. At that time she said, “A bridegroom of blood,” referring to the circumcision. (Exodus 4:22-26)
But you yourself will say to Pharaoh, ‘The Lord says this: “My firstborn son is Israel.” I have said to you, “Release my people so that they may worship me! If, however, you are not willing to release them, then see, I am slaying your firstborn son.”’” It happened during the journey, an angel of the Lord met him at the lodging-place and was seeking to slay him. And then Shiphrah, taking a flint stone, cut around the foreskin of her son and fell at his feet and said, “The blood of the circumcision of my child is accomplished.” (LXX Exodus 4:22-26)3
The Greek translation of Exodus in the Septuagint represents one of the earliest examples of this interpretive practice of distancing God from violence. Where the traditional Hebrew text directly states that ‘the Lord’ sought to kill ‘him’, notably leaving in the ambiguity of who is to be killed, the Septuagint introduces an intermediary figure in ‘an angel of the Lord’ that instead meets them. This one change significantly and immediately transforms the theological shape of the passage. Adding to this, the Septuagint also makes another interesting translation choice, describing Tzipporah ‘falling at his feet’ after performing the circumcision instead of placing the circumcised skin on the ‘feet’ which was likely an original Hebrew euphemism for the genitals.4 These modifications suggest that even by the time of this early translation, readers were already struggling with the passage’s theological implications.
During the sixth year of the third week of the forty-ninth jubilee, you went and lived there for five weeks and one year. Then you returned to Egypt in the second week, during the second year in the fiftieth jubilee. You know who spoke to you at Mt. Sinai and what Prince Mastema wanted to do to you while you were returning to Egypt — on the way at the lodge. Did he not wish with all his strength to kill you and to save the Egyptians from your power because he saw that you were sent to carry out punishment and revenge on the Egyptians? I rescued you from his power. You performed the signs and miracles which you were sent to perform in Egypt against the pharaoh, all his house, his servants, and his nation. (Jubilees 48:1-4)5
The book of Jubilees represents an even more radical departure from the original Hebrew text than the Septuagint. Rather than introducing a divine intermediary or representative as the attacker, Jubilees reshapes the entire narrative even further by identifying ‘Prince Mastema’, a Satan-like adversary, as the one who wanted to kill Moses, motivated to attack him before he could enact God’s judgment on Egypt. In this retelling, God even addresses Moses about the incident and claims to have rescued Moses from the adversary, showing how Jubilees completely inverts the original flow of the story as God is no longer the threat but becomes the protector and rescuer.
This adaptation of the story in Jubilees reflects a well-known pattern that begain in early Second Temple Jewish literature where actions deemed theologically problematic when attributed to God are transferred to other divine or angelic beings. This retelling may have been following the pattern from the books of 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles which also replaces God with Satan in the retelling of David’s census.6 The usual solution in these cases was not to eliminate these difficult stories but to recast them with different actors.
Then you shall say to Pharaoh, “This is what the Lord says: Israel is My firstborn son. I say to you, let My son go so that he may worship Me. But if you refuse to let him go, I will take the life of your firstborn son.” But along the way, at a place where they stopped for the night, the angel of the Lord confronted Moses and intended to kill him, because his son Gershom had not been circumcised. This was because Jethro, his father-in-law, had not allowed him to do it. However, Eliezer had been circumcised by a mutual agreement between them. Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, circumcised Gershom, and placed the foreskin at the feet of the angel, the Destroyer. She said, “My husband wanted to circumcise him, but his father-in-law prevented it. Now let the blood of this circumcision make atonement for my husband.” (Targum Pseudo-Jonathan Exodus 4:22-26)7
The Aramaic targums, beginning with Targum Onkelos, the earlier and more literal of the major Targums, follows the Septuagint in replacing the direct divine attack with ‘the Angel of the Lord.’ Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, however, goes considerably further in its interpretive expansions, constructing an elaborate backstory that attempts to resolve nearly every question raised by the Hebrew text. This Targum not only identifies the attacker as ‘the angel of the Lord’ but designates this figure more specifically as ‘the Destroying Angel’ that appears elsewhere in both Christian and Jewish tradition. The text continues its interpolations, adding that Moses’ other son, Eliezer, had been circumcised ‘by a mutual agreement,’ suggesting a complicated family negotiation possibly over Midianite verses Hebrew circumcision practices, all in an effort to fill in the many narrative gaps and make the story more comprehensible.8
Moreover, the circumcision in which they trust has been abolished, for He said there must be a circumcision of the heart rather than of the flesh. But they violated this because a wicked angel taught them trickery. He says to them: ‘This is what the Lord your God says (this is the command I discover): Sow not among thorns; be circumcised to the Lord.’ And what does He say? ‘Be circumcised in the hardness of your hearts, and then do not stiffen your necks.’ Take this further: ‘Look,’ says the Lord, ‘all the nations are uncircumcised in the flesh, but this people is uncircumcised in their hearts.’ (Epistle of Barnabas 9:3-4)9
While earlier interpreters were motivated to protect God’s character by transferring the violent attack to either intermediaries or adversaries, the early Christian text of the epistle of Barnabas radically extends this logic to unfortunately attack the very institution of circumcision. This text, while using ‘abolished’ language, still heavily implies that physical circumcision was never truly God’s intention but rather the result of deception by ‘a wicked angel’ who ‘taught them trickery.’10 This connects the letter, not with perhaps the expected reading found in the Septuagint, but closer to that of Jubilees and its reference to ‘Mastema’, all in service to rhetoric that may be one of the earliest forms of supersessionism in Christian literature.
As is often the case, these reactionary readings and developing traditions evolving out of difficult Hebrew texts reveal as much about the interpreters and their communities as they do about the original texts themselves. Each successive interpretation represents an attempt to make some kind of sense of what had to be seen as remarkably difficult and resisting easy understanding, all while trying to find or make meaning of it.
Willis, John T. Yahweh and Moses in Conflict: The Role of Exodus 4:24-26 in the Book of Exodus (pp. 48-49) Peter Lang AG, 2010
Gurtner, Daniel M. Exodus: A Commentary on the Greek Text of Codex Vaticanus (pp. 230-231) Brill, 2013
Willis, John T. Yahweh and Moses in Conflict: The Role of Exodus 4:24-26 in the Book of Exodus (pp. 48-49) Peter Lang AG, 2010
Galbraith, Deane “The Origin of Archangels: Idealogical Mystification of Nobility” in Myles, Robert J. (ed.) Class Struggle in the New Testament (pp. 209-240) Fortress Academic, 2019
Willis, John T. Yahweh and Moses in Conflict: The Role of Exodus 4:24-26 in the Book of Exodus (pp. 16-18) Peter Lang AG, 2010
Lookadoo, Jonathon The Epistle of Barnabas: A Commentary (pp. 220-221) Cascade Books, 2022
This was very interesting to see how much logic is inserted into translations and commentaries in these ancient texts in their attempt to make sense of difficult texts.
The best explanation I have heard concerning this pivotal passage is that both Pharaoh and God were after each other's son and Moses was in a dubious position as somewhat the son of both. Moses was carrying the death sentence to Pharaoh's son so he was in mortal danger until Zipporah enacted the blood covenant with the God of Israel on behalf of Moses in her role as his blood bride and so establishing Moses' inclusion into the Israelite side of the equation.
Carmen Imes has explained this really well I think.
Great study on one of the most bizarre passages in the Torah!
I agree there was a connection between Moses' first-born and the message Moses had to deliver of Elohim's first-born.
Additionally, the Book of Jasher (chapter 79) gives an account very similar to the Targum identifying Gershom's lack of circumcision as a result of Jethro's wishes.