Moses’ Song is a Very Long Song

The song in Exodus 15 is a very long song.  I have a hard time imagining 12 tribes of thousands of people singing it together.  We should probably imagine they were doing something other than polyphonic choral singing.  I just learned, for example, that the early Puritans in New England did something called rote singing instead of regular singing: everyone bellowed the words as loud as they could with their own tune and own meter, and they found this experience strangely moving.

It is also very moving.  Even now, oceans and centuries away, I can feel the Israelites’ awe at what the LORD had done for them.  The horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea.   I took accomplishment for granted when I was a kid but now that I am an adult I realize how remarkable and praiseworthy it is that anything gets done, even the simplest task is full of physical and psychological obstacles, and that a thing is done is a thing of awe–and this is not just true by comparison to failed efforts–to have a thing done in the world is a beauty–much less when it is the shattering things that the LORD has done.