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Rabbi Mike

Feb 26 • 42 tweets • 9 min read

Today I was asked to teach the origin of the Exodus myth. If there is no archaeological evidence that the Israelites were ever in Egypt (and there is none), then where did the myth come from? Well friends, let's do this! #thread #threads #exodus #teaching

And God said to Abram, “Know well that your offspring shall be strangers in a land not theirs, and they shall be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years; 14 but I will execute judgment on the nation they shall serve, and in the end they shall go free with great wealth. /2

You'll notice here that Egypt is not mentioned by name.

There is no direct evidence that people worshipping Yahweh sojourned in ancient Egypt, let alone during the time the Exodus is believed to have happened.
The names of the reigning Egyptian kings are not given; /3

...and we have no extra-biblical documentation that directly refers to Israel in Egypt, to the Exodus, or to the conquest of Canaan.

Exodus: 12:40 The length of time that the Israelites lived in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years; 41 at the end of the four hundred.../4

...and thirtieth year, to the very day, all the ranks of Yahweh departed from the land of Egypt.

So, Arguments in counting back to when it happened:
Some say 15th century bCE
Some say 13th century BCE
None of the facts or archaeology can pinpoint or match up.
/5

A reminder: "The Biblical Narrative is a theological exposition – a document of faith, not a historiographical record" – Nahum Sarna

So what do we know?
/6

The Stele of Merneptah
Inscribed monument set up in western Thebes by the Pharaoh of that name (circa 1223 to 1211 BCE) to celebrate victory over invaders of Egypt.
The Stele mentions “Israel” as a people in Canaan but apparently not yet settled down with fixed borders. /7

Near the bottom of the hieroglyphic inscription, a people called “Israel” is said to have been wiped out by the conquering pharaoh. This has been used by some experts as evidence of the ethnogenesis of Israel around that time. /8

Excerpt from the Stele:
"Canaan is captive with all woe.
Ashkelon is conquered, Gezer seized,
Yanoam made nonexistent;
Israel is wasted, bare of seed,
Khor is become a widow for Egypt.
All who roamed have been subdued." /9

Hint: Egypt’s history of winning wars and conquering is embellished. In fact, according to their history, they have never lost a war! Ever!

The Stele of Merneptah (cont.)
The date of the stele is 1205 BCE – the Egyptian military controlled the sinai peninsula at that time../10

...so a mass exodus would have been impossible.
The story of the exodus parallels Egyptian traditions.
such as turning inanimate objects into reptiles, conversion of water to blood, parting of waters, death by drowning, death of the first born.../11

...a spell of three days of darkness. (no the Torah is not original with these ideas).

The exodus story did not come out of nowhere, its authors knew Egyptian culture, traditions and literature.
The brickmaking reflects conditions in Egypt. A 15th century tomb painting.../12

...depicts Canaanite and Nubian captives making mudbricks – almost every detail mirrors Egypt’s 19th dynasty: 1292 BC to 1189 BC.
Canaanite, NOT Israelite.

SO, then what DID HAPPEN??? /13

Two (of many) Theories: 1) A Silence Too loud and 2) A Small Escape.
1. A Silence too Loud: The Exodus story and Sinai Revelation were an invention post-586 BCE, after the destruction of the first Temple.
Scholarly Points:
/14

Moses is strangely absent from prophetic books (dating before 586 BCE). Only 104 times, (58 of which are in Joshua), Not mentioned at all in Ezekiel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zachariah, Proverbs, Job, Lamentations, or Ecclesiastes/15

Sinai is strangely absent outside the Torah (4 times), Horeb occurs only 5 times, but Zion (mentioned 150 times in the Tanakh) Never occurs in the Torah. The prophets didn’t know about Moses or Sinai /16

saiah 2:3 / Micah 4:2
“For Torah comes from Zion, the word of Yahweh from Jerusalem”

“It is no longer puzzling that the Sinai theophany tradition of exodus plays no part in the Zion tradition. It did not come into existence until the exilic period. /17

The understanding of Israel as a covenant community in an exilic, and primarily a diaspora, form of corporate identity that became significant for Israel’s religious life only after the demise of the monarchy and the state. Zion was not the heir of Sinai.../18

…but Sinai the heir of Zion.” -John van Seters
The Exodus story (in fact the whole Torah) begins and ends in the diaspora, because it was created in the diaspora.
The exodus story is a way to show a hopeful return to Zion, but in the meantime, a way to live as in exile! /19

What happens to your religion when the house of your god is conquered and you are scattered across the continent?
This theory suggests that the notion of Sinai was invented as a solution to the destruction of the temple in 587 BCE, and the fall of Zion. /20

Thus, the exodus from Egypt was a hope for those in slavery in Babylon!
What The Torah gives a lasting impression of Sinai and Moses, the Hebrew Bible does not.
Failure to mention such an important historical event such as the revelation at Sinai begs justification. /21

How does something so significant go unmentioned so often?
Are we ready to accept that Sinai was known but considered insignificant? Or that the prophets knew of Sinai but preferred not to mention it?
Moses was the lead character at Sinai, so if they didn’t know Sinai.../22

...they didn’t know Moses, thus they didn’t know the Exodus story as we know it.
More likely, the episode at Sinai (and the character of Moses) were unknown to the prophets, who had an understanding of Zion as a central home of law and Judaism rather than Sinai.../23

...which is outside of Israel.
This puts the Sinai (and Moses character) POST 586 BCE not within the date setting we are led to believe.
THOUGH THIS IS AN ARGUMENT FROM SILENCE, WE WOULD ARGUE THAT THE SILENCE IS DEFINITE.
The Exodus story is overly embellished.../24

with fantastic miracles to the point of absurdity
The authors could not use the word “Babylon” when writing the story for fear of censorship or punishment and thus used “Egypt” to stand for Babylon..../25

NEXT theory: "A Small Escape"
There is no mention of “Israel” in Egypt in Egyptian history But they were not known as Israel then, we don’t know what they would’ve been referred to in Egypt and A small group of aliens escaping Egypt would not have made headlines.../26

...in Egyptian history. Richard Elliot Friedman believes the exodus was actually only done by the Levites (another clan unattached to Israel).
The exodus was actually only done by the Levites (another clan unattached to Israel)
Names: only Levites have Egyptian names.../27

...in the Torah: Hophni, Hur, Phenehas, Merari, Mushi, Pashhur, and….MOSES!
In the story of Moses’ birth, it is a Levite woman who places her baby son in the ark. The name is Egyptian, not Hebrew, but treats it as Hebrew (Mosheh) (to draw out) – “drew” because.../28

...I “drew him out of the water”.
A quick reminder of The documentary hypothesis
J – Yahweh’s name is used (jahwe in german)
E – Yahweh’s name is not used until the time of moses, before that “el” or “Elohim”
P – the priestly source
D – the Deuteronomist school
/29

...E, P, and D were written by levites – the priesthood of ancient Israel came from the levite group, the concerns of the levite priests are all over these sources.

The Exodus story is unclear as to how the Egyptians oppressed the Israelites. /30

...It must be some kind of forced labor because the text refers to “taskmasters”
It has pharaoh trying to diminish their numbers by killing male babies. But it has no specific reference to slavery.
In the Torah the law of not mistreating an alien occurs 52 times! /31

There shall be one Torah for the citizen and for the alien who lives among you…because you were aliens in Egypt (Exodus 12:49)
You shall not abhor an Egyptian because you were an alien in his land. /32

...Only the Levite sources, the Priestly writers mention that we were slaves in Egypt
So who were slaves, and who were aliens?
Merneptah Stele seems to have Israel under Egypt by 1205 BCE
But the stele is not proof that Israel was in Egypt, it is that Israel is in Israel!
/33

Israel the people was already there when the levites arrived. Israel, perhaps, was there all along and not in Egypt . The biblical writers transformed them, claiming that they were a tribe like any of the tribes of Israel and Judah, changing them from “attached persons”.../34

to a related clan, a tribe, genetic descendants of a man named Levi.
Genesis 49 – the blessing of Jacob – identifies Levi as one of the twelve sons of the patriarch Jacob. Each of those twelve sons is pictured as an ancestor to a tribe. Levites are understood to be.../35

...descendants of Levi – this adoption descended from a single ancestor.
During the first temple (10th-6th century) the Levites traced their lineage back to Aaron – and became the temple priests.
Aaronids were Coheins, other Levites were just regular Levites.../36

It was the Levites, the Yahweists, who brought the Yahweh religion to Israel! (monotheism). It was the Levites, the Yahweists, who brought the Yahweh religion to Israel! (monotheism)
The Israelites were polytheists and the Levites brought them monotheism.
/37

..., monotheism may not have occurred for Judaism at all!
The Levites were another people living in Egypt and escaped slavery or oppression
The Levites came to Israel when Israel was a kingdom
The Levites brought with them the ideas of monotheism (Yahwehism) and priesthood. /38

The evidence of polytheism in the torah reflects older Israelite religion before monotheism arrived!
The stories of genesis were redacted and written to include the Levites as ancestors and tribes from a descent called Levi. /39

The exodus story represents an embellished story of the escape of Levites from Egypt
Egypt has no history of Israel in Egypt because Israel was never in Egypt, though perhaps they were vassals under the Egyptian kingdom. /40