Moses in the Hebrew Bible and Eawahtah in Oahspe are both lawgivers called by a voice out of fire. Some readers take Moses’ first encounter as one with Elohim, and see the later YHWH narrative as a reframing of it. Eawahtah’s story, they argue, keeps the older pattern.
Moses: from Egypt to Sinai
Moses, a Hebrew raised in Egypt, sees a bush that “burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed” (Exodus 3:2, KJV). There he is called to free the Israelites from slavery (Exodus 3).
At the bush both divine names appear in one verse.
And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.
Exodus 3:4, KJV
In the Hebrew, “the LORD” here is YHWH and “God” is Elohim. After the crossing of the Red Sea (Exodus 14), Moses goes up Mount Sinai, where there are “thunders and lightnings” and the LORD “descended upon it in fire” (Exodus 19:16 to 18). There he receives the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20).
The commandments open with Elohim speaking and YHWH naming himself.
And God spake all these words, saying, I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Exodus 20:1 to 3, KJV
The Hebrew of verse 1 has Elohim alone, while verse 2 has YHWH. The story then goes on with YHWH, the God of Israel, leading the people forty years in the wilderness (Numbers 14:33) toward the promised land. See also Moses, Mount Sinai and I am what I am.
Eawahtah: the son of Egoquim
Eawahtah comes from Oahspe (1882), which the American dentist John Ballou Newbrough said he wrote by automatic writing. The story is in its First Book of God, chapters 26 to 27. A note in the modern Standard Edition says he was “Known later as Hiawatha”. The Creator, the Great Spirit, calls him to gather the scattered tribes of Guatama, America.
The Creator names him.
Then said the Creator: For which reason, I name thee Eawahtah, spirit and flesh even balanced, best of men.
Oahspe (1882), First Book of God 26:15
The Great Spirit tells him to call Him after the wind, and Eawahtah hears “E”, “Go” and “Quim”. From these comes the name Egoquim, and then the eight Egoquim laws. When Eawahtah accepts, “a Light came over him, dazzling”, and when he comes to a river he rises “like an angel” and lands on the other side (27:28 to 29). The people call I’tura, who “called himself the Savior”, a wicked God (27:33). Later, while Eawahtah is with Took-shein and his queen Che-guh, a “ship of fire” comes down from heaven and Egoquim speaks out of it (27:37 to 39).
Egoquim promises to drive out every God born of woman.
I will chase away all Gods and Saviors born of woman. Only the Great Spirit shall all men worship.
Oahspe (1882), First Book of God 27:42
Egoquim says that “in this land will I found My earthly kingdom” (27:43). For many years Eawahtah travels over Guatama, and he teaches the tribes “writing and engraving”, the secret name Egoquim and the seventh day of worship (27:45 to 46). For the false gods of Oahspe, see Oahspe’s false gods.
He is told to found forty nations.
Forty mighty nations shalt thou found, O My son; and every nation shall be an independent nation…
Oahspe (1882), First Book of God 27:48
They are to be one brotherhood called O-pah-E-go-quim, “signifying one”, and Eawahtah names them “the nations of Opahegoquim” (27:48 to 49). Chapters 26 to 27 tell of no long wandering in the wilderness.
Elohim and YHWH
Those who link the two stories point to three parallels. Moses hears Elohim at the bush and at Sinai, and Eawahtah hears Egoquim out of light and a ship of fire. Moses brings commandments to a freed people, and Eawahtah brings eight laws and unites the tribes. Elohim’s “no other gods” (Exodus 20:3) matches Egoquim’s rejection of Saviors “born of woman”.
The idea of an older Elohim layer comes from the documentary hypothesis, in the form most linked with Julius Wellhausen (1878). In that view the Torah joins several sources, among them the Jahwist and the Elohist. The Elohist calls God Elohim until the name is revealed to Moses at the bush, and it names the mountain of the law Horeb rather than Sinai. On this reading, the Elohim lawgiving of Exodus became part of a longer Yahwist national story. Some see Eawahtah’s account, which keeps the one name Egoquim, as closer to that earlier form. See also YHWH might be a later insertion replacing Elohim and Elohim.
