and that Israel’s existence is unintelligible apart from her mission to the nations. In other words the following argument will seek to demonstrate that the existence and nature of Israel cannot be rightly understood apart from the Lord’s universal mission. Finally, a point about the language Exodus uses to express this missionary commitment. Often, mission in Exodus is expressed in terms of knowing the Lord or knowing his name, such as in the oftrepeated phrase ‘they shall know that I am the LORD’.