Course:Meetings for teaching/Life of Prophets/Moses

Moses (Some Answered Questions, Chapter 5)

1 Moses was for a long time a shepherd in the wilderness. To outward seeming He was a man Who had been reared in the bosom of tyranny, had become reputed among men as a murderer, had taken up the shepherd’s staff, and was fiercely hated and reviled by Pharaoh’s government and people. It was such a man Who freed a great people from the fetters of captivity and persuaded them to leave Egypt and settle in the Holy Land.

2 That people had sunk to the depths of degradation and were lifted up to the heights of glory. They were captives and were set free. They were the most ignorant of peoples and became the most learned. By virtue of that which He established, they so progressed as to be singled out among all nations, and their fame spread to every land, to such a degree that when the inhabitants of neighbouring lands wanted to praise someone they would say, “Surely he must be an Israelite!” Moses established laws and ordinances that conferred new life upon the people of Israel and led them to attain the highest degree of civilization at that time.

3 Such was their progress that the philosophers of Greece would come to seek knowledge from the learned men of Israel. Among them was Socrates, who came to Syria and acquired from the children of Israel the teachings of the oneness of God and the immortality of the spirit. He then returned to Greece and promulgated these teachings, whereupon the people of that land rose up in opposition to him, accused him of impiety, arraigned him before the court, and condemned him to death by poison.

4 Now, how could a man who was a stammerer, who had been brought up in the house of Pharaoh, who was known among men as a murderer, and who out of fear had long been a fugitive and a shepherd, establish in the world so mighty a Cause that the wisest philosophers of the earth would be incapable of producing a thousandth part thereof? This is clearly an extraordinary feat.

5 A man with a stammering tongue can hardly sustain an ordinary conversation, let alone accomplish what He did! No: Were He not assisted by a divine power, He would never have been able to carry out such a mighty task. These are arguments that none can deny. The materialistic thinkers, the Greek philosophers, and the great men of Rome who became renowned in the world were each versed in but one branch of learning. Thus Galen and Hippocrates were celebrated for their skill in medicine, Aristotle in logic and speculative reasoning, and Plato in ethics and divine philosophy. How can a mere shepherd lay the foundation for all these branches of learning? There is no doubt that He was assisted by an extraordinary power.

6 Observe how the people are subjected to tests and trials. Moses struck down an Egyptian to prevent an act of oppression, became known among men as a murderer—especially since the victim belonged to the ruling nation—and was obliged to flee, and it was after all this that He was raised up as a Prophet. Behold how, in spite of His disrepute, He was aided through an extraordinary power to establish such great institutions and mighty undertakings!

Outline for Chapter on Moses

I. Moses Faced Enormous Obstacles and Overcame Them Tremendously

A. The Severe Obstacles and Disadvantages Faced by Moses

• Humble and fugitive condition: Spent long years as an isolated shepherd in the wilderness; had to flee in fear after striking down an Egyptian to prevent an act of oppression.
• Hostile environment and upbringing: Reared within the very house and bosom of tyranny (Pharaoh's court).
• Severe social stigma: Fiercely hated and reviled by Pharaoh’s government and ruling populace; bore the widespread public reputation of a murderer.
• Physical impediment: Afflicted with a stammering tongue, a handicap that typically prevents a person from sustaining even an ordinary conversation.
• Deplorable condition of His followers: The people of Israel were trapped in the fetters of captivity, degraded to the lowest depths, and considered the most ignorant of peoples.

B. His Tremendous Triumph and Extraordinary Accomplishments

• Liberation and nation-building: Single-handedly delivered a captive people from Egyptian bondage and led them to settle in the Holy Land.
• Total cultural and moral transformation:

1. Raised an enslaved, downtrodden people to the heights of glory, honor, and exceptional learning.
2. Elevated their reputation so widely that "Israelite" became the regional standard and benchmark of highest praise.

• Establishment of civilization and law: Formulated divine laws and ordinances that conferred new life and raised Israel to the zenith of civilization in that era.
• Instruction of world-renowned philosophers:

1. Greek sages traveled to Syria to sit at the feet of the learned men of Israel.
2. Socrates acquired core truths—the oneness of God and the immortality of the soul—from the children of Israel, teachings for which he was later condemned to death in Greece.

II. A True Educator Faces Great Obstacles and Overcomes Them

A. The Criterion of an Educator

• A true educator demonstrates the capacity to transcend severe human limitations, social infamy, and physical disadvantages to establish an enduring, transformative civilization.
• Human capacity alone cannot explain this magnitude of achievement:

1. Renowned worldly scholars, physicians, and philosophers (such as Galen, Hippocrates, Aristotle, and Plato) excel only in a single discipline or branch of learning.
2. The wisest philosophers combined are incapable of achieving a thousandth part of what such a figure establishes across law, morality, theology, and statecraft.

B. The Source of Educational Power

• A mere shepherd afflicted with a speech impediment and branded an outlaw cannot initiate a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary civilization through ordinary means.
• Such towering institutions, established in the face of intense trials and systemic opposition, provide irrefutable proof of the assistance of an extraordinary, divine power.

III. Therefore, Moses Was a True Educator

• The Logical Deduction: Because Moses overcame extreme disrepute, physical speech limitations, and royal tyranny to liberate a degraded nation, confer lasting civilizational life upon them, and lay spiritual foundations that enlightened the greatest thinkers of antiquity, reason and fairness demand the conclusion that He was a true and accomplished Educator.

Study Questions

Paragraph 1

What was Moses' outward status and reputation before He liberated the Israelites?

To outward appearance, He was reared in the bosom of tyranny, reputed as a murderer, carried a shepherd's staff in the wilderness, and was intensely hated and reviled by Pharaoh’s people and government.

What major historical achievement did Moses accomplish despite these outward handicaps?

He freed a great multitude from the bonds of captivity and persuaded them to abandon Egypt to settle in the Holy Land.

Paragraph 2

How does the text contrast the condition of the children of Israel before and after Moses?

They were lifted from the depths of degradation to the heights of glory, transformed from captives into free people, and elevated from being the most ignorant of nations to the most learned.

What common saying in neighboring lands demonstrated the high esteem and fame the Israelites attained?

When inhabitants of neighboring lands wished to praise someone's excellence or learning, they would say, "Surely he must be an Israelite!"

What was the impact of the laws and ordinances established by Moses upon the Israelites?

They conferred new life upon the people of Israel and enabled them to attain the highest degree of civilization of that era.

Paragraph 3

What historical interaction between Greek philosophers and the learned men of Israel is mentioned?

Philosophers of Greece traveled to seek knowledge from the learned of Israel; notably, Socrates journeyed to Syria and acquired teachings directly from the children of Israel.

Which specific spiritual principles did Socrates acquire from the Israelites, and what resulted from his teaching them in Greece?

He acquired the doctrines of the oneness of God and the immortality of the soul; upon returning to promulgate them, the Athenians accused him of impiety, placed him on trial, and condemned him to drink poison.

Paragraph 4

What physical and personal limitations of Moses make the magnitude of His Cause an extraordinary feat?

He had a stammering tongue, was raised in Pharaoh's household, was branded a murderer, and had spent long years living in fear as a fugitive shepherd.

How does Moses' accomplishment compare to the capabilities of the wisest worldly philosophers?

Even the wisest philosophers of the earth would be incapable of producing a thousandth part of the mighty Cause and civilization Moses established.

Paragraph 5

How does the scope of Moses' influence differ from renowned thinkers like Galen, Hippocrates, Aristotle, and Plato?

Each of those renowned figures mastered only a single field—such as medicine, logic, or ethics—whereas Moses, though outwardly an unschooled shepherd, laid a comprehensive foundation across all dimensions of learning, ethics, and civilization through divine power.

What is the ultimate proof that Moses possessed divine assistance rather than mere human skill?

A man who suffered from a stammer and lived as a fugitive shepherd could never have sustained ordinary conversation, let alone created such an enduring global civilization, without the aid of an extraordinary divine power.

Paragraph 6

What test and trial did Moses' background present to the people of His day?

Before His prophetic mission, He struck down an Egyptian to prevent an act of oppression, became known as a murderer of someone from the ruling class, and fled into exile as a fugitive.

What key spiritual lesson does the text draw from Moses succeeding despite His prior disrepute?

It illustrates how people are tested by outward appearances, and demonstrates that God's extraordinary power can raise up a man from apparent disrepute to establish monumental institutions and undertakings.

Examine the following dialogue and consider responses to such possible objections.

Evelyn: I’ve been studying Chapter 5 of Some Answered Questions, where ’Abdu’l-Bahá presents Moses as proof of a divine Educator. But when I started researching modern biblical scholarship and archaeology, I ran into a wall. Many secular historians question whether Moses even existed as an individual, or at least suggest he was a composite legendary figure rather than a single historical leader who led millions out of Egypt.

Dr. Kaveh: It’s a very natural question to encounter when you dig into contemporary historical-critical studies. But it helps to look at how ’Abdu’l-Bahá Himself approached the Exodus narrative. He didn’t view it through a narrow, fundamentalist lens. For example, in an account recorded by pilgrims in Akka, He addressed the journey of the Israelites directly:

"It was both spiritual and physical. They journeyed to the Promised Land and geography and history both prove that this was a physical journey.

"Moses viewed the Promised Land but died before it was reached, having given over his charge to Joshua.

"The crossing of the Red Sea has a spiritual meaning. It was a spiritual journey, through and above the sea of corruption and iniquity of the Pharaoh and his people, or army. By the help of God through Moses, the Israelites were able to cross this sea safely and reach the Promised Land (spiritual state) while Pharaoh and his people were drowned in their own corruption.

"The Egyptian History recorded even trifling events. Had such a wonderful thing happened as the parting of the physical sea it would also have been recorded."

Evelyn: That’s a fascinating perspective—it actually addresses the physical miracle head-on. But on that last point, couldn't the Egyptians have simply whitewashed their records? I have read that royal inscriptions were notoriously propagandistic. Pharaohs rarely carved their catastrophic military defeats or humiliating losses on temple walls.

Dr. Kaveh: That’s true. Royal monuments were designed to celebrate order and victory, not national embarrassment. Yet outside of royal triumphal monuments, the Egyptians kept extensive day-to-day administrative logs, border-patrol dispatches, and bureaucratic correspondence. A total wipeout of an entire royal chariot host and the collapse of a massive enslaved labor force would have left unmistakable administrative ripples, economic distress, and foreign policy crises in surviving records. So while royal spin certainly existed, the silence of the broader administrative record still carries real weight against a literal, cinematic sea-parting.

Evelyn: What about the composite nature of Moses himself? Scholars point to the Documentary Hypothesis—different layers of text with distinct names for God, duplicate stories, and contrasting legal styles written centuries apart. It looks like Moses became a convenient peg upon which generations of later scribes and priests hung their evolving laws and legends.

Dr. Kaveh: The Bahá'í writings actually align quite naturally with the idea that the biblical text is an edited, composite historical record rather than a verbatim diary penned cover-to-cover by Moses. ’Abdu’l-Bahá explicitly made this distinction between the core revelation and the later historical narrative:

"Know ye that the Torah is that which was revealed in the Tablets to Moses, may peace be upon Him, or that to which He was bidden. But the stories are historical narratives and were written after Moses, may peace be upon Him."

So the fact that later scribes codified, edited, and preserved historical traditions over centuries doesn’t mean Moses never existed. Nearly every major legal and religious tradition clusters around an authentic foundational lawgiver. The presence of later editorial layers doesn't dissolve the reality of the historical figure who initiated the movement in the first place.

Evelyn: Thank you, that makes sense. But that brings me to another difficult point in the talk. ’Abdu’l-Bahá mentions that Greek philosophers sought knowledge from the learned men of Israel, and specifically that Socrates traveled to Syria, learned monotheism and the immortality of the soul from the Israelites, and returned to Athens to preach it. But when you read Plato’s Crito, Socrates is explicitly described as someone who almost never left Athens except for mandatory military campaigns. Historians say there’s no evidence he ever went to Syria.

Dr. Kaveh: That’s a classic objection, and it’s true that contemporary Athenian documents don't record such a journey. But when we look at ancient historiography, silence in one archive isn't always decisive. ’Abdu’l-Bahá Himself addressed this very problem regarding omissions in ancient histories:

"The above, however, cannot be found in the Jewish histories; there are many facts which are not included in Jewish history. Not all the events of the life of Christ are set forth in the history of Josephus, a Jew, although it was he who wrote the history of the times of Christ. One may not, therefore, refuse to believe in events of Christ's day on the grounds that they are not to be found in the history of Josephus."

Now, regardless of whether we can historically demonstrate that Socrates literally made that physical journey, we have to look at ’Abdu’l-Bahá’s primary intent. His underlying point was to emphasize the profound, undeniable impact of Semitic, prophetic revelation on the intellectual and moral development of the Mediterranean world.

Evelyn: And that intellectual influence is historically demonstrable, isn't it?

Dr. Kaveh: Absolutely. The ancient Levant was not an isolated silo; trade, migration, and cultural diffusion continually linked the Eastern Mediterranean with the Greek islands. The transmission of the Phoenician alphabet to Greece, the convergence of Near Eastern cosmology with early Greek metaphysics, and later the vibrant intellectual fusion of Hebrew thought with Hellenism in Alexandria all demonstrate that the West's ethical and philosophical foundations did not emerge in a vacuum. The moral impulse of prophetic monotheism fundamentally reshaped Greco-Roman thought.

Evelyn: That makes sense of the broader context. But might not some object that it is hyperbolic for ’Abdu’l-Bahá to say this one man, a former shepherd with a stammer, "established" all these arts, sciences, and civilization single-handedly? No single person creates a civilization by himself.

Dr. Kaveh: Of course. And we shouldn't read that as saying Moses personally drafted medical treaties, conducted astronomical observations, or engineered every craft in the Levant. But a Prophet provides the foundational moral and spiritual seed—an organizing impulse that elevates an oppressed, fragmented people into a coherent, lawful society. That social order creates the fertile soil in which learning, legal ethics, and human discovery can blossom.

Civilization is always implemented gradually over generations by countless individuals, but it requires that initial, seminal catalyst to awaken human capacity and give it enduring direction. Moses was the great catalyst for that time.