The Archregimancy wrote:Egypt and Exodus...
Broadly speaking, both sides in this thread have made some good points, and both sides have made significant mistakes.
My own position is that Exodus clearly isn't an accurate historical narrative, nor can it be taken literally; however, thread participants who've pointed out that Kowani's arguments against a literal Exodus have been deeply flawed are also frequently correct.
Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that the Exodus took place under the Egyptian New Kingdom (c.1550 - c. 1080 BC; the 18th-20th dynasties, including Ramesses II), which seems to be the implicit default position taken in the current discussion. Those who've objected that the lack of relevant historical evidence in Egyptian records isn't an inherent disqualifier are correct. With some rare exceptions, Egyptian royal records are propaganda designed to celebrate the king, whereby even a tactically ambiguous event like the Battle of Kadesh can be presented as a mighty victory for pharaoh; in that regard, Donald Trump had nothing on Ramesses II. Surviving Egyptian records are also highly partial rather than a complete record of events; there are extensive and important gaps. But this discussion over bias and partiality in the Egyptian historical and epigraphic records is a distraction that has virtually nothing to do with the most compelling evidence demonstrating that Exodus is not a literal historical record. This evidence is both historical and archaeological.
The most important point is that if the Exodus took place under the New Kingdom, as is often broadly supposed, then travelling to the Land of Canaan would have done nothing to take the ancient Israelites out of Egyptian control. For the majority of the New Kingdom period, certainly between Thutmose III and the final Ramessides, the territory of modern Israel/Palestine/Lebanon as far north as the Orontes was firmly and unequivocally under the control of the Egyptian state. Escaping Egyptian territory by crossing the Red Sea in order to ... enter Egyptian territory is clearly a profound problem for a historical Exodus.
Furthermore, we know from the sole surviving New Kingdom record of 'Israel' that the latter was most likely a wandering nomadic tribe in the Egyptian Levant. The record in question is the Merneptah Stele, discovered by the British archaeologist Flinders Petrie in the late 19th century, and describing some military campaigns of Ramesses II's son and heir Merneptah. While there are disagreements over the precise interpretation of the Merneptah Stele's mention of 'Ysrir', most scholars agree that it refers to a nomadic or semi-nomadic group in the general vicinity of historical Canaan who were caught up in a campaign by Merneptah to suppress a brief revolt by some cities in the region, and reassert long-standing Egyptian dominance. So there was a group of people called 'Ysrir' in broadly the right area in the New Kingdom period; that much is profoundly interesting. But they were in territory that was firmly under Egyptian control in their only appearance in the Egyptian record.
There are other, subtler, archaeological arguments involving the total absence of any form of identifiable 'Hebrew' material culture in either Egypt or Canaan in the relevant period; these are far more of an issue for a literal Exodus than the lack of historical records, though still not definitive in isolation. But when combined with the points in the previous two paragraphs, the weight of the totality of the evidence comes as close to conclusive as you can come for the period.
The Biblical narrative of the Exodus is therefore best understood as an inspiring allegory rather than as a literal description of historical events.
However, arguments that the Old Testament can't be used as history in any form are wildly overblown. It can; just not uncritically. Let's take an example from later in the Old Testament to demonstrate the point. The 22nd Dynasty (Third Intermediate Period) pharaoh Shoshenq I (c.940-c.920 BC) campaigned extensively in the Levant in an attempt to restore the lost New Kingdom empire in the region; he was temporarily successful, but Egyptian presence in Canaan collapsed again following his death. This isn't the place to get into the nature of the fragmentation of the Egyptian state in the Third Intermediate Period, or dwell on the fact that the rulers of the 22nd Dynasty were actually Libyans. It's enough to note that Shoshenq I campaigned throughout 'Canaan', reaching as far north as Megiddo, and that his campaigns are recorded on several monumental inscriptions from his reign, as far south as Karnak. Shoshenq was very likely the Biblical 'Shishak' recorded in 1 Kings and 2 Chronicles as having attacked the Kingdom of Judah. The two historical narratives - the Egyptian and the Biblical - don't agree on the particulars (there's no mention of Jerusalem in the Egyptian lists of places Shoshenq attacked), but it is at least possible to reconcile the broad narrative, and to argue that differences in specifics are a matter of emphasis and local perspective rather than ahistoricity.
The relationship between Shoshenq I and the Biblical Shishak is, however, another argument against a literal Exodus since it strongly suggests the latter can't have taken place after the collapse of Egyptian power at the end of the 20th Dynasty, which would be the main alternative to a New Kingdom Exodus, and would help explain why Biblical Canaan and Philistia weren't under Egyptian control (which would better fit the Biblical narrative). Shoshenq's campaigns help fix the Biblical narrative of kings Jeroboam and Rehoboam in particular decades in the 10th century BC, in turn strongly suggesting that the Exodus - if historical - must have taken place in the New Kingdom; which is, as we've noted, is profoundly problematic.
Finally, 'archaeology' is spelled with two 'a's unless A) you work for the US national park service or B) embrace a specific theoretical school of thought popular in the United States in the 1960s. Almost everyone else, including most Americans, spells it with both 'a's.
Posted: Thu Jun 20, 2019 9:05 pm
