Something Rich and Strange:

The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes

to your adventure …. the adventure of the hero—

the adventure of being alive.

Joseph Campbell

Chapter One: Transformation, the Hero’s Adventure

I never thought I’d be here. Never expected this. Don’t want it. Yet here I am, walking down from the Sinai—of my own free will—back into Egypt. Well, my own free will? Yes, but with that strange experience a few weeks ago, things have somehow shifted for me. I see more clearly now. It doesn’t mean I’m not afraid. I know fear—of death by sword or serpent, of loneliness so great it chokes, of meaning nothing and belonging nowhere—and I am afraid now of all those things.  Bbut Zipporah was right, as she so often is. She said, “When God speaks to you, what choice do you have? All roads but Hhis are lesser things, and your soul knows it.” She said, “Moses, you must go.”

Egypt. I see it lying green and fertile before me, delta of the life-giving Nile. It is the land of my birth, yet somehow never home. I am going down to challenge Ramses, whom they call the Great.[1] I know him well, grew up with him.  Stubborn and proud, from birth held divine, nothing denied him. He has intelligence, but of a crafty kind, schooled in the intrigues of the court, the priests. This will not be easy.

I am going down to set my people free. That’s what the voice said from the bush that did not burn: “I have heard the suffering of my people in Egypt. I intend to set my people free.” My people, my mother and brothers and sisters, descendents of Jacob called Israel, groaning in slavery, abused and shamed, neglected and used. Yes, that is a worthy goal, an honorable task. It disturbs but it also thrills me. The ember of outrage, so long banked under deep ashes, was fanned by those flames that did not consume, aroused by the voice calling my name. It is glowing now, ready to burst into flame. So I am afraid of myself. I am afraid I am not able to carry out this task, but I am more afraid of that flame within me. It has been destructive before, destroyed a life, and then destroyed the life I had. Yes, that is the deeper truth. I am less afraid of my death or my weakness than I am afraid of my anger and my power, a consuming fire,.  bBut, when God speaks to you, what choice do you have?

Let us go.

~~~~~~~

So we might imagine Moses as he stood on the cusp of a choice and an adventure, both for himself and for the people of Israel. His choice—returning to Egypt to accomplish an impossible and beautiful task because he heard a voice and saw a mystery—was the beginning of a story that has molded human history.

Stories can be powerful things, and human beings are story-telling, story-loving people. “Let me tell you a story” is an irresistible invitation for young and old, regardless of such incidentals as history or culture. Stories are how we make sense of our world, our lives, and each other, and stories are how we remember. Stories have been chanted, written, filmed, sung, acted, mimed, and you could even say that the thoughts going on inside our heads are the stories we tell ourselves. History, psychology, art and literature, holy Scripture—all stories. In the pages that follow, we will explore many stories:  biblical stories of the Exodus and of Jesus’ death and resurrection, clinical stories of some of my patients[2], bits of my own story, psychological stories or theories, and stories told by artists in poetry and literature. 

The Exodus journey of the children of Israel has served as a core metaphor or story for both Judaism and Christianity and is also embraced by Islam. It has been told and retold around campfires and Sabbath dinner tables, from pulpits and in the writings of monks and mystics[3] for more than three thousand years. Its power to fire the human imagination and feed the soul comes from the truth it tells of a universal process of deep transformation—one we may seek, or one we may try to avoid; one that lights our individual paths toward wholeness. Its message is as important and current today as it has been for millennia.

My own interest in the deep truth of the Exodus story was sparked by one of my patients.  Depressed and anxious, Joanna[4] was caught in repetitive patterns of personal and professional relationships in which she found herself ambivalent, passive, and passive-aggressive. She felt “stuck in the muck,” neither giving her all nor moving on. Perhaps most painful was her exquisitely attuned awareness to her own emotional and psychological state. One day she returned from celebrating Passover and said, “The children of Israel went to Egypt for security and it became their slavery.  Where is my internal Moses?”

Joanna was using the Exodus story to understand what was happening in her own life. Her comment opened broad avenues of thought for me about the Exodus story as a journey of transformative change. How often do we find ourselves in circumstances or patterns of behavior that began for security but ultimately became a kind of slavery? Do we each have elements within us that can lead us into new freedom and new life? What are the signposts guiding us through that journey of deep transformation? Are there predictable stages in the journey? The Exodus story points us toward true and practical answers to each of these questions, answers we will explore in the pages that follow.  Let’s get an overview of the journey now.