The end [of the life] of the great lawgiver [Moses] especially was surrounded with legends. “While, after having taken leave of the people, he was going to embrace Eleazar and Joshua on Mount Nebo, a cloud suddenly stood over him, and he disappeared, though he wrote in Scripture that he died, which was done from fear that people might say that because of his extraordinary virtue he had been turned into a divinity” (“Ant.” 4:8, § 48). Philo says: “He was entombed not by mortal hands, but by immortal powers, so that he was not placed in the tomb of his forefathers, having obtained a peculiar memorial [i.e., grave] which no man ever saw” (“De Vita Moysis,” 3:39). Later on, the belief became current that Moses did not die, but was taken up to heaven like Elijah. This seems to have been the chief content of the apocryphon entitled “Assumptio Moysis,” preserved only in fragmentary form (comp. Charles, “The Assumption of Moses,” 1897, Introduction; Deut. R. 11; Jellinek, “B. H.” 1:115-129, 6:71-78; M. R. James, “Apocrypha Anecdota,” pp. 166-173, Cambridge, 1893). No sooner was the view maintained that Moses was translated to heaven than the idea was suggested that his soul was different from that of other men. Like the Messiah, he is said to have been preexistent; he is thus represented in “Assumptio Moysis” (1:12-14); so too “He was prepared before the foundation of the world to be the mediator of God’s covenant, and as he was Israel’s intercessor with God during life [xi. 11, 17], so is he to be the intercessor in all the future.” While his death was an ordinary one (1:15, 10:14), “no place received his body” “his sepulcher is from the rising of the sun to the setting thereof, and from the south to the confines of the north; all the world is his sepulcher” (11:5-8). Philo also calls Moses “the mediator and reconciler of the world” (ib. 3:19). Especially in Essene circles was Moses apotheosized: “Next to God,” says Josephus (“B. J.” 2:8, § 9), “they honor the name of their legislator, and if any one blasphemes him he meets with capital punishment” (comp. “Ant.” 3:15, § 3). Against such excessive adoration of a human being a reaction set in among the Rabbis, who declared that no man ever ascended to heaven (Suk. 5a).
To continue reading this Bible article, click here.
Author: Jewish Encyclopedia
Keywords: Moses, Assumption of Moses, Preexistence of Moses, Moses preexistence, Death of Moses, Abarim, Mount Abarim, Mt Abarim, Jewish preexistence, Death of Moses
Bible reference(s): Exodus 2:10, Deu 32:49-52, Deu 34:5-7, Num 27:12-14, Joh 1:2, Joh 3:13, Joh 8:58, Jude 1:9
Source: Isidore Singer (editor), The Jewish Encyclopedia (12 Volumes), (1906).
Page indexed by: inWORD Bible Software.