“Is this your god…killer of children?” Israel’s ‘Childish’ Deity and the Other in Exodus: Gods and Kings

 

Presented May 16, 2016 at the Vancouver School of Theology (Encountering the Other: An Inter-Religious Conference)

Abstract:

The plague bringing divinely-ordained death to all firstborn male Egyptians, as narrated in the biblical book of Exodus, is a particularly disturbing story element for many contemporary readers, religious and secular alike. This deadly plot point is inevitably included in film adaptations of this ancient legend of destruction and deliverance, most recently in the 2014 epic Exodus: Gods and Kings. In a unique twist, Israel’s god appears to Moses at the burning bush as the shepherd boy Malak, but this perpetually youthful “I AM” proves to be no angel. With a cruel smirk, the petulant lad unleashes a series of horrific disasters on the inhabitants of Egypt, culminating with a nocturnal slaughter of helpless children, including the Pharaoh’s infant son. Drawing on insights from both childhood studies and film spectatorship, this paper explores the movie’s portrayal of Israel’s god as “childish”. I will argue that the depiction of Israel’s deity as a boy seems to involve an “othering” of children that is used to negatively characterize religion. Given cinema’s dominance as a medium of contemporary storytelling and the persistence of religiously-motivated hostilities in global contexts, text-to-film adaptations of “sacred” violence present as subjects for urgent and critical examination.