User:Lcm7712/To what extent is 'The Prince of Egypt' faithful to the Biblical account of Moses?
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I. Who is Moses?[edit]
- Moses (hv,mo) was, according to the Exodus 32, “a brave promise keeper (Jinwoo Kim), the receiver of the Law (Candace L. Coleman), judge (David Flores), God’s Mouthpiece (Gail Davis), the Struggler (Mickey Correa), a man used by God (Kyeong H. Kim), leader (Sung Soo Kim), politician (Tae Kyoung Kim) and the epitome of humankind (Monica Eady).”
- 1) Name. Scholars fail to reach accord on root of name, Moses. According to Fausset’s Bible Dictionary, “Hebrew Mosheh, from an Egyptian root, "son" or "brought forth," namely, out of the water. The name was also borne by an Egyptian prince, viceroy of Nubia under the 19th dynasty. In the part of the Exodus narrative which deals with Egypt, words are used purely Egyptian or common to Hebrew and Egyptian.” According to other dictionary, ISBE Bible Dictionary, “Royal family names in Egypt then were usually compounded of some expression of reverence or faith or submission and the name of a god, e.g. "loved of," "chosen of," "born of," Thoth, Ptah, Ra or Amon. At this period of Egyptian history, "born of" (Egyptian mes, "drawn out") was joined sometimes to Ah, the name of the moon-god, making Ahmes, or Thoth, the scribe-god, so Thothmes, but usually with Ra, the sun-god, giving Rames, usually anglicized Rameses or Ramoses.”
- 2) Jew’s perspective. “Along with God, it is the figure of Moses (Moshe) who dominates the Torah. Acting at God's behest, it is he who leads the Jews out of slavery, unleashes the Ten Plagues against Egypt, guides the freed slaves for forty years in the wilderness, carries down the law from Mount Sinai, and prepares the Jews to enter the land of Canaan. Without Moses, there would be little apart from laws to write about in the last four books of the Torah.” Moses is number one prophet in most of Jew history. According to Joseph Telushkin, “Despite these two sad episodes, Moses impressed his monotheistic vision upon the Jews with such force that in the succeeding three millennia, Jews have never confused the messenger with the Author of the message. As Princeton philosopher Walter Kaufmann has written: "in Greece, the heroes of the past were held to have been sired by a god or to have been born of a goddess ... [and] in Egypt, the Pharaoh was considered divine." But despite the extraordinary veneration accorded Moses — "there has not arisen a prophet since like Moses" is the Bible's verdict (Deuteronomy 34:10) — no Jewish thinker ever thought he was anything other than a man. See And No One Knows His Burial Place to This Day.”
II. Outline of animation the Prince of Egypt?[edit]
- “The Prince of Egypt is a 1998 American animated musical film and the first traditionally animated film produced and released by DreamWorks Animation. The film is an adaptation of the Book of Exodus and follows the life of Moses and from being prince of Egypt to his ultimate destiny to lead the Hebrew slaves out of Egypt. The film was directed by Brenda Chapman, Simon Wells and Steve Hickner. The film featured songs written by Stephen Schwartz and a score composed by Hans Zimmer. The voice cast featured a number of major Hollywood actors in the speaking roles, while professional singers replaced them for the songs. The exceptions were Michelle Pfeiffer, Ralph Fiennes, Ofra Haza, Steve Martin, and Martin Short, who sang their own parts.” “Story line is the extraordinary tale of two brothers named Moses and Ramses, one born of royal blood, and one an orphan with a secret past. Growing up the best of friends, they share a strong bond of free-spirited youth and good-natured rivalry. But the truth will ultimately set them at odds, as one becomes the ruler of the most powerful empire on earth, and the other the chosen leader of his people! Their final confrontation will forever change their lives and the world.”
III. Difference between the Bible, scholars and the animation Prince of Egypt[edit]
- 1) Birth
- According to the Bible, “Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him for three months. When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him, and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him.” (Exod. 2:1-4) The animation was Moses from Hebrew too. However on this matter no agreement was reached because some scholars had other opinion. According to Moses & Multiculturalism, “Assmann’s Moses the Egyptian gives solidity to Freud’s claim. But it does more: Assmann makes a useful distinction between history and memory, traditions and “what really happened.” This distinction suits Egypt in Europe’s memory almost better than anything else. It is this distinction that explains the effect of Egypt on Europe and even, by contrast, the image of Greece as Europe’s pure childhood-an image of European origins that was fundamental to philosophical birth and literary theory. The other important point Assmann makes is that the birth of monotheism is the birth of religious intolerance and, in general, that to claim a religion as “true” is to claim all other religions as “false”.” Freud also had similar opinion about monotheism.
“I venture now to draw the following conclusion: if Moses was an Egyptian and if he transmitted to the Jews his own religion, then it was that of Ikhnaton, the Aton religion… I thus believe that the idea of an only God, as well as the emphasis laid on ethical demands in the name of god and the rejection of all magic ceremonial, was indeed Mosaic doctrine, which at first found no hearing but came into its own after a long space of time and finally prevailed.”
- 2) Moses’ nurse
- According to the Bible, “Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, ‘Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?’ Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, ‘Yes.’ So the girl went and called the child’s mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, ‘Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.’ So the woman took the child and nursed it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and she took him as her son.” (Exod. 2:7-10a)
The animation makes no mention of this situation. It is big mistake. The Bible didn’t mention about Moses’ childhood, but people can imagination about Moses grew up to be Hebrew because people character has been molded by the environment especially, mother in which person passed own childhood. However, no mention about it, Moses was only birth Hebrew but, he was Egyptian. Even if, he was Egyptian, people couldn’t find about the motive of murder.
- 3) Moses’ mother
- Moses had two mothers, one was real mother and the other was Pharaoh’s daughter (Exod. 2:7). The Bible mentioned only two times in Exodus 6:20 and second Numbers 26:59 about Moses’ real mother. People don’t know about what kind of person she was. Only we can know that Moses’ real mother would save and love her baby through Exodus 2:2-3. However we don’t know about the other mother as Pharaoh’s daughter.
The animation focus on other mother but, the mother was not Pharaoh’s daughter. She was Pharaoh’s wife. “One of the first changes from the Biblical account is that Moses was drawn from the water by Seti's wife, not the daughter of pharaoh. Actually, this might not be as far off as some believe. It was not uncommon for pharaohs to marry their half-sisters. Remember, the pharaoh was considered divine, and it was not a good idea to pollute that divine bloodline by marriage to common folk.” This is very different between Moses’ mother was Pharaoh’s wife and daughter because son of Pharaoh’s daughter was not first place of royal authority. However son of Pharaoh’s wife was different, because he will become a king anytime. So they were on good term with Moses and Ramses like in the animation.
IV. Conclusion[edit]
Animation of the Prince of Egypt’s rentals was over two hundred million dollars since 20th Feb 1999 worldwide except U.S.A. ($37,111,000 USA). Officially the animation distributed in France, Switzerland, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, Turkey, South Africa, Argentina etc. over forty nations. In these countries, some country didn’t know the Bible and Moses. People didn’t know about how many persons saw the animation. Many different viewpoints have between the animation and the Bible, however a strong point is easily understanding for anybody. This is sometimes danger, but good method for person who didn’t know the Bible and Moses, because break down the wall of preconception idea about Christianity. “For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.”(Ephesians 2:14) I thought this animation was like that break down the wall as religion and nation.