“On the trip, at an overnight campsite, it happened that the Lord confronted him and intended to put him to death. So Zipporah took a flint, cut off her son’s foreskin, threw it at Moses’s feet, and said, ‘You are a bridegroom of blood to me!’ So he let him alone. At that time she said, ‘You are a bridegroom of blood,’ referring to the circumcision.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of my favorite Monty Python movies is “Now for Something Completely Different.” It’s just a string of sketches, each one totally different from the last. Every time they switch from one to another, something completely random comes across the screen and one of the comedy troupe members looks right at the camera and says, “And now for something completely different.” This story would fit rather snuggly in that category. It seems to come totally out of left field and doesn’t make a lot of sense. Let’s talk about what may be going on here, and how it fits in the larger story.

The basic elements of the story here are pretty clear just from reading the passage. On the journey from Midian back to Egypt, the Lord went after Moses to kill him in some way because his son had not yet been circumcised. Moses is either too obtuse or, more generously, too incapacitated by God’s attack, to do anything helpful to resolve the situation, so his wife, Zipporah, jumps into action. She grabs a knife, circumcises their son, touches Moses’ feet with the bloody foreskin, and the whole episode comes to an end.

As for what all of this means and how it functions in the context of the larger story of the Exodus and of the Scriptures as a whole…nobody seems to have any ideas. Now, that hasn’t stopped commentators from spilling ink over it. Ambitious young Old Testament scholars by the dozens have submitted articles to various scholarly journals analyzing the episode. None of them, however, have come to any firm or clear conclusions (at least the wisest among them haven’t). While there are a few scholars from a more conservative bent who seem to have a bit of a misogynistic streak who try to blame the whole thing on Zipporah, this says a whole lot more about them than the text given that there isn’t a shred of supporting evidence for such a conclusion. It is to the shame of the theologically conservative movement that so many of its members exhibit such an anti-woman bias in their writings.

All of this back and forth, though, still doesn’t answer the question of what we are supposed to do with this story. Like it or not, though, the best answer is a firm and clear, “We don’t know.” One commentator whose work is a staple of mine whenever I’m studying in Exodus lists out nine different questions this little passage produces and goes on to answer none of them in his section on it. Another actually notes that he is just trying to offer something on it because the passage was included in the Scriptures and must be for our good somehow.

I’ll share my own thoughts toward a making sense of these verses in just a second, but first it seems worthwhile here to note that perhaps the most important thing this strange passage does is remind us of the posture of humility we must take when approaching the Scriptures. These are God’s words. He intends them for our use and benefit to grow in righteousness, faith, and purity, but they are His words first. We aren’t going to be able to understand any of them without the direct and abiding help of His Spirit leading the way. While there are certainly some parts about which we can be supremely confident in our understanding, there are others that utterly defy all our attempts at dogmatism. I submit to you that this is one of those.

Because of the profound lack of clarity here, it is incumbent upon us that we not use this passage as a lens to evaluate God’s character. This is not a place we should dare turn to form any kind of doctrine. I think we can absolutely point to the Gospel from this verse. God was holding Moses responsible for his failure to uphold the law through his son. A bit of a sacrifice on his son’s part was the thing that saved his life. In a larger sense, the sacrifice on the part of God’s Son would save the lives of all of humanity. Mostly, though, this passage reminds us that without God’s help, we’re not going to understand any of the Scriptures as fully or rightly as we could or should.

That all being said, and to second the commentator who said that we have to be able to say at least something about it since it is here, here is one tentatively offered thought on what this passage could mean both in the context of the story itself, as well as through the lens of the Gospel. We just came off a lengthy dialogue between God and Moses in which God was exceedingly patient with Moses’ weaknesses and struggles with accepting God’s invitation to action. Here, though, we find Him punishing Moses rather severely for his failure to keep God’s covenant with Abraham and his descendants. He is saved by the quick thinking and acting of his wife, which, contrary to that strain of misogynistic commentators actually makes her the hero of the story.

Perhaps the point we are to take is that while God will indeed be exceedingly patient with our feeble attempts to follow Him, and gently encouraging when we are slow to respond, He still expects – demands even – righteousness on our part. It reminds me of Jesus’ parable of the rich man who invited a bunch of his rich friends to a party, and they all turned him down. Undeterred, he sent his servants out to invite the entirety of skid row to the party instead. Once the festivities had started, though, he found a man who was not properly dressed for the occasion, and immediately has him thrown out because of it.

God is extremely tolerant of our weaknesses, but not our sinfulness. Perfect righteousness is the only way to be in His holy presence. We can achieve that only in Christ. If we finally concede to following Him, but approach Him by means other than the covenantal terms He has made available for us, we won’t be able to get to Him. We won’t be accepted by Him. God absolutely receives everyone who desires to come to Him, but there is still only one way to get to Him. Moses had finally agreed to follow God’s lead, but he was still trying to do it on his own terms, and those were absolutely not going to be acceptable. The same is still true for us today. Go to God, but go on His terms. No other terms will work.