The Promised Land Episode 2: Recap & Review
- Kevin Keating
- Sep 26
- 8 min read
Updated: Oct 7
The Promised Land adapts the biblical story of the Exodus but with a twist: instead of giving us a straight dramatic retelling, the show applies the mockumentary style popularized by The Office to highlight the ironies and human foibles embedded in the biblical source material. When the Pilot Episode was released last summer, I went into my first viewing a bit skeptical, but I was pleasantly surprised by how it turned out to be both a genuinely funny comedy and a thoughtful adaptation of Exodus 18. While maintaining a skillful balance between humor and biblical fidelity, Episode 2 “Sinai” picks up in Exodus 19 with Israel’s arrival at Mount Sinai, the people consecrating themselves for their upcoming encounter with God, God’s arrival in a thick cloud, and Moses’ first ascent up Mount Sinai. Below I’ll give a brief summary of the episode and evaluate it as both a Bible adaptation and a comedy. (You can watch Episode 2 of The Promised Land now on YouTube.)
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Summary of The Promised Land Episode 2 “Sinai”
Episode 2 continues to follow all of the major characters introduced in the Pilot: Moses, Aaron (Moses’ brother), Miriam (Moses’ sister), Zipporah (Moses’ wife), Joshua (Moses’ assistant), Korah (a rival leader), and Chisi (an Egyptian soldier pretending to be an Israelite), while also introducing us to Caleb (one of the future faithful spies (Numbers 13-14), who functions as an antagonist/straight-man to Joshua.
The Promised Land Episode 2 Cold Open: Thousands, Hundreds, Fifties, and Tens
The Pilot ended with Moses recognizing the need to delegate his leadership to chiefs of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens (Exodus 18:18-24). The gradation of Israelite leadership is the kind of detail that most Bible readers skim over without much thought, but the Cold Open imagines what this selection/assignment process might have looked like to great comedic effect, as we see the arrogant Korah receive an assignment that doesn’t quite live up to his expectations.
Moses, Aaron, & Zipporah in The Promised Land Episode 2
As the main episode begins, Moses gathers the people and recounts how God bore them on eagles’ wings and now wants them to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (Exodus 19:4-6). Before they can encounter God, however, they must take a couple days to cleanse themselves and their clothes. Until then, anyone or any animal that touches Mount Sinai will be killed (Exodus 19:9-15). In spite of Moses’ somewhat stiff delivery, his charismatic brother, Aaron, gets the crowd to reply, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do” (Exodus 19:8).
When the Bible mentions the Israelites all washing their clothes in order to prepare to meet with God, most of us gloss over it without a thought. But washing thousands of sets of clothes while in the middle of a desert would indeed be daunting (and hilarious). Moses, having just decided to share responsibility and power with Aaron and the other leaders, feels tempted to step in and take control. That temptation is made all the more acute because of his own insecurity. Moses envies the way his charismatic and funny younger brother can command a crowd and perhaps fears losing the love of the people, now that he has delegated some of his own special prerogatives. Nevertheless, Aaron and Miriam encourage Moses to take the day off while they handle leading the people.
Moses isn’t used to having free time, but soon finds himself enjoying a game of soccer and a “relaxing” rest against a gnarled tree. But returning home to Zipporah, Moses confesses that his day off made him feel a bit useless. Looking at Aaron, he can’t help but wonder why God chose him and not his brother. But Zipporah helps Moses realize that he has his own unique gifts – wisdom and passion and concern for what God wants, even when the Israelites want something different.
Meanwhile, Aaron gets a taste of the complications of helping the contentious Israelites sort through their difficulties. Although his humor is sometimes helpful, eventually his jokes end up making matters worse and lead Aaron to come looking for Moses’ help. Moses explains to Aaron that the people need to respect him as a leader and not just see him as a funny friend. But Moses also encourages Aaron to keep growing as a leader, recalling how he once felt like an imposter when the people were grumbling about the bitter water they found in the desert (Exodus 15:22-27).
As the time of consecration comes to a close, a storm cloud covers Mount Sinai, causing some of the Israelites to despair, fearing that they have failed their consecration. But Moses urges the people to stay calm. Confirming that the cloud is, in fact, the Lord, he prepares to head up the mountain.
Miriam in The Promised Land Episode 2
Having just been appointed to look after the women, Miriam announces a women’s hour at the Tent of Meeting. To her disappointment, hardly any women show up – and the woman who does almost immediately shuts up when men disrupt the time and tell her to go do some chores. Miriam realizes that the women are used to feeling like property in Egypt and need to learn how to have a voice.
Eventually Miriam is able to get one of the women, Leah, to open up about her very real complaints about life, and Leah expresses appreciation. Miriam realizes that the women need their own separate tent, a safe space where they can talk to each other apart from the men. She brings this idea to Moses, who assigns Korah and his troop to build the women a new tent.
Joshua and Caleb in The Promised Land Episode 2
After instructing the Israelites to consecrate themselves to the Lord, Moses notes that any person or animal who even touches the mountain is to be killed. The job of actually patrolling the mountain and killing anything that touches it is assigned to Moses’ always-eager-to-please assistant, Joshua. But watching an entire mountain for two days and nights is harder than Joshua expected. Especially when the rambunctious youth of the camp, led by Caleb, lose their soccer ball on the mountain and are trying to get it back. Things only get worse when the boys decide to steal the bow that Joshua is using to patrol. Fortunately, Caleb feels a pang of conscience and returns the bow, while still laughing at Joshua for taking his job too seriously.
The Sons of Korah in The Promised Land Episode 2
Undeterred by the small size of the troop assigned to him by Moses, Korah sets out to demonstrate his leadership skills by whipping them into shape through trust activities and hard physical exercise. Chisisi, who is part of his group, notices the similarity between Korah’s relentless demands and those of Pharaoh.
Although Korah hopes that his efforts will convince Moses to give him a larger command, instead Moses offers him a special assignment: with the help of Bezalel, Korah’s men are put in charge of building the Tent of the Women.
Review of The Promised Land Episode 2 (“Sinai”)
As I suggested above, Episode 2 of The Promised Land continues to strike a good balance between thoughtful biblical adaptation and clever comedy. Indeed, some of the best jokes are a result of the writers thinking deeply about the details and implications of the biblical story A few of my favorite bits:
The arrogant Korah getting blindsided when Moses assigns him to lead a group of only ten men – including the knucklehead Chisisi.
The Israelites being confused about God saying he bore them out on eagles’ wings
The Israelites having to figure out how to wash all at the same time
Joshua’s desperate efforts to keep the Israelite youth from touching the mountain
Critics of Bible adaptations often express concern that they may cause people to read their Bible less. In reality, serious adaptations like The Chosen seem to have the opposite effect – fans want to dig deeper into the underlying source material. Ironically, I suspect The Promised Land will have a similar effect, but primarily through its humor. While many of the jokes can be enjoyed by those who are not familiar with the underlying Scripture, viewers will naturally want to search out the reference points in order to appreciate them more fully.
To be clear, The Promised Land isn’t trying to be as biblically or historically precise as The Chosen or other more “serious” Bible adaptations. Israelite boys probably didn’t play soccer and the men probably didn’t do trust falls. I’m sure the process of assigning leaders to different-sized groups wasn’t nearly so haphazard and random as it appears in the show. But the little bits of anachronism here and there are meant to help us see ourselves and the dynamics of our world in the Israelites – which is probably a more important truth than any of the small imprecisions.
I suspect some Bible readers will object to portraying Moses (and some of the other leaders of Israel) in a somewhat humorous light. But I’d actually argue that The Promised Land is actually capturing a genuine aspect of Moses’ biblical characterization that is often lost in more “serious” depictions. As Wasim No’Mani (who plays Moses) pointed out to me in our interview, Scripture doesn’t portray Moses as a larger-than-life, self-confident hero – it portrays him as a self-doubting leader who constantly feels out of his depth. The Promised Land captures this under-represented dimension of Moses’ character – without minimizing his genuine zeal for God or even his wisdom.
In addition to considering how The Promised Land relates to its biblical source material, it’s also interesting to notice how it fits into the mockumentary genre. Many (myself included) have described The Promised Land as The Office meets Scripture/Moses, but the connection between the two shows actually goes deeper. Both stories are about somewhat hapless leaders who are forced to lead an under-motivated group through difficult circumstances. But while The Office mostly just exposes the folly of arrogant buffoons like Michael Scott and Dwight Schrute, The Promised Land takes a more constructive/uplifting approach. It doesn’t shy away from exposing and laughing at the insecurities and foibles of characters like Moses, Aaron, Miriam, Korah, and Joshua, but it also provides them (and us) with meaningful opportunities to learn and grow. The lessons that Moses, Aaron, and Miriam learn in Episode 2 are simple but important. Instead of sending the message that most leaders are hopeless fools who don’t know what they’re doing, The Promised Land suggests that there’s hope even for fools (like us) who don’t know what they’re doing. God sees how ridiculous we all can be – and yet he also chooses to use people like us.
Episode 2 demonstrates what The Promised Land does best: finding humor and humanity in venerated biblical figures like Moses by engaging deeply with Scripture and imagining the full implications. Whether you’re simply looking for a funny but uplifting diversion or want to see familiar biblical passages and characters in a new light, it’s a worthy way to spend a half-hour.
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