Reading: "The Exodus" by C. R. Conder ISBE

THE EXODUS

ek'-so-dus:

Contents

I. THE ROUTE

1. The Starting-Point  2. Rameses to Succoth  3. Succoth to Etham  4. Passage of the Sea  5. Other Views of the Route

II. THE DATE

1. Old Testament Chronology  2. Date of Conquest of Palestine  3. Date of Exodus  4. Relation between Date of Exodus and Date of Patriarchs  5. Agreement between Monuments and Old Testament Chronology  6. A Text of Minepthah

III. THE NUMBERS

1. Colenso's Criticism of Large Number  2. Increase of Population  3. Number a Corruption of Original Statement  4. Review

I. The Route.

1. The Starting-Point:

On the 14th of Abib (early in April) the Hebrews were gathered at Rameses (Numbers 33:5) where apparently the hostile Pharaoh was also living (Exodus 12:31). From Psalm 78:12,43 it appears that the wonders preceding the Exodus occurred in the "field of Zoan," where the starting-point may be placed. Dr. Naville has suggested that the court was at Bubastis, not at Zoan, and that the route lay from near Zagazig down Wady Tumeilat--a line well fitted for a people driving flocks and herds. On the other hand, in favor of the starting-point having been at Zoan, we read that the "way of the land of the Philistines" was "near" (Exodus 13:17). This route, which was not taken lest the people should be discouraged by defeat at Gaza where the Egyptians always had troops, reached Egypt at Migdol, and ran thence to Daphnai--some 15 miles--and to Zoan by a second march of the same length. The route from Bubastis to Daphnai (some 50 miles) is less likely to have been described as "near." Although an Arab will march 30 miles in a day on foot, yet when moving camp with camels, who travel only about 2 miles an hour, with women and children and herds, he only covers about 12 or 15 miles a day. We cannot suppose the Hebrew cattle to have covered more than this distance without water on any single march.

2. Rameses to Succoth:

We are not told how many days were occupied on the way from Rameses to Succoth, though the general impression is that the stages mentioned (Numbers 33) represent a day's journey each. Measuring back from the first camp after crossing the Red Sea, we find that Succoth probably lay in the lower part of Wady Tumeilat, where there was plenty of water and herbage. The direct route from Zoan leads to Phakousa (Tell Faqus) by a march of 15 miles through well-watered lands. A second march, across the desert to Heroopolis and down the valley to Succoth, would be of the same length. The Hebrews departed "in haste," and no doubt made as long marches as they could. If the whole of the people were not in Rameses, but scattered over Goshen, it is possible that some came down the valley from near Bubastis, and that the whole force concentrated at Succoth.

3. Succoth to Etham:

The next march (Exodus 13:20; Numbers 33:6) led Israel to Etham, on the "edge of the wilderness" which lies West of the Bitter Lakes, not far from where the Nile water then entered them, and no doubt made them sweet. The intention of Moses probably was to reach the desert of Shur by rounding the head of this stretch of water; but we are told (Exodus 14:2) that he was commanded to "turn"--evidently to the south--and to encamp before "the mouth of the lakes", in order that Pharaoh might conclude that the Hebrews were "entangled in the land," and shut in between the lakes on their left and the desert mountains on their right. This camp would seem to have been west of the lakes, and some 10 miles north of Suez. It was perhaps two days' journey from Etham, since the lakes are 30 miles long; or, if Etham was farther south than the head of the lakes, the distance may have been covered by one forced march of 20 to 25 miles, the beasts being watered from the lakes if they were then filled with fresh water, as they would be when having an outlet to a tideless sea.

4. Passage of the Sea:

The sea which Israel crossed is not named in the actual account of the journey, but in the Song of Moses (Exodus 15:4) it is called the "Red Sea" in the English versions of the Bible, following the Septuagint, the Hebrew name being Yam Cuph, or "weedy sea," a term which applied not only to the Gulf of Suez (Numbers 33:10), but also to the Gulf of 'Aqabah Deuteronomy 28; 1 Kings 9:26). We are also told that the route chosen was "the way of the wilderness by the Red Sea" (Exodus 13:18). It is generally supposed that the head of the Gulf of Suez at the time of the Exodus was farther North than at present; and, as the Bitter Lakes were then probably filled by the Nile waters flowing down Wady Tumeilat, they would no doubt have carried the Nile mud into this gulf, which mud had gradually filled up this Nile branch before 600 BC. The probable point of passage was the narrow channel (about 2 miles across) by which the lakes discharged into the sea, and was thus about 10 miles North of Suez. We are told that the water was driven back by "a strong east wind from the LORD" in the night (Exodus 14:21), and the sea was thus "divided," a shoal being formed and the waters being heaped up (Exodus 15:8), so that when the wind ceased they rushed back; whereas, during the passage, they were a "wall" or "defence" (Exodus 14:22) against any flank attacks by the Egyptians (compare 1 Samuel 25:16, where David's men are said to have been a "wall" when defending Nabal's shepherds). The Hebrews crossed in the morning, and a march of 15 miles would bring them to the springs from which Suez is supplied, called 'Ain Naba' and 'Ayyun Musa ("the gushing spring" and "the spring of Moses"), from which point their wanderings in the desert of Shur would begin.

II. The Date.

1. Old Testament Chronology:

The actual statements of the Books of Kings, giving parallel reigns from the time of Solomon's death down to the fixed date of the fall of Samaria in 722 BC, place the foundation of the Temple within a few years of 1000 BC.

2. Date of Conquest of Canaan:

We have several statements which show that the Hebrew writers believed the conquest of Canaan by Joshua to have occurred early in the 15th century BC, and this date fully agrees with the most recent results of monumental study of the history of the XVIIIth (or Theban) Dynasty in Egypt, as about to be shown, and with the fact that Israel is noticed as being already in Canaan in the 5th year of Minepthah, the successor of Rameses II. In 1 Kings 6:1 we read that the temple was founded "in the 480th year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt," this referring to the conquest and not to the Exodus, as appears from other notices. The Septuagint reads "440 years," but the details show that the Hebrew text is preferable. In Judges 11:26 the first victory of Jephthah is said to have occurred 300 years after Joshua's conquest. The details given for this interval, in other passages of the same book, amount to 326 years; but the periods of "rest" may be given in round numbers, and thus account for this minor discrepancy. Samuel judged for 20 years (1 Samuel 7:2), and Saul (the length of whose reign is not stated in our present text of this same book) very probably ruled for 20 years also, as Josephus (Ant., VI, xiv, 9) states. Thus 175 years elapsed between Jephthah's victory and the foundation of the Temple--a total of 475 years, or rather more, from Joshua's conquest.

3. Date of Exodus:

The popular belief that many of the judges were contemporary does not agree with these facts, and is indeed in conflict with ten definite statements in Judges. In Acts 13:19,20 we read that after the conquest there were judges about the space of 450 years, and this rough estimate (including the rule of Samuel) agrees pretty nearly with the 415, or 420, years of the various passages in the Old Testament. According to the Pentateuch and later accounts (Amos 5:25; Acts 7:30), Israel abode in the desert 40 years. We therefore find that Joshua's conquest is placed about 1480 BC, and the Exodus about 1520 BC. According to the revised chronology of the XVIIIth Dynasty of Egypt, which rests on the notices of contemporary Kassite kings in Babylon, it thus appears that the Pharaoh of the oppression was Thothmes III--a great enemy of the Asiatics--and the Pharaoh of the Exodus would be Amenophis II or Thothmes IV. If Moses was 80 at the time of the Exodus, he must have been born when Thothmes III was an infant, and when his famous sister Hatasu was regent, and bore the title Ma-ka-Ra. She therefore might be the "daughter of Pharaoh" (Exodus 2:5) who adopted Moses--no king being mentioned in this passage, but appearing (Exodus 2:15) only when Moses was "grown"; for her regency lasted more than 20 years, till Thothmes III came of age.

4. Relation between Date of Exodus and Date of Patriarchs:

As regards the relation between the earlier date for the Exodus (about 1520 BC) and the chronology of the Hebrew patriarchs, the Hebrew text gives an interval of 645 years, and the Greek text of 430 years between the Exodus and the call of Abraham; and the call would thus be dated about 2165 BC or 1950 BC. Abraham is very generally held to have been contemporary with Hammurabi of Babylon, whose accession dates in 2139 BC.

5. Agreement between Monuments and Old Testament Chronology:

There is in fact no discrepancy between the actual results of monumental study and the chronology of the Old Testament. If the Exodus occurred under Thothmes IV, it would have been useless for Israel to attempt the entrance into Palestine by the "way of the land of the Philistines," because at Gaza, Ashkelon and in other cities, the road was still held by forces of Egyptian chariots, which had been established by Thothmes III. But about 40 years later the rebellion of the Amorites against Egypt began, in the time of the Egyptian general Yankhamu, and general chaos resulted in Southern Palestine The Egyptian garrison at Jerusalem was withdrawn in his time--about 1480 BC--and it is then that a fierce people coming from Seir, and called the 'Abiri or Chabiri, are noticed by the Amorite king of Jerusalem as "destroying all the rulers" of the country. They are not named in any of the other Amarna letters (the term gum-gaz, or "man of war," though once applying probably to them, being used of other warriors as well); and the name is geographical for they are called "people of the land of the 'Abiri." The first sign has the guttural sounds 'A and Chronicles, and has not the sound K, which has been wrongly attributed to it, making the word to mean Kabiri, "or great ones." Nor can it be rendered "allies," for it is the name of a people, and quite another word is used for "allies" in this correspondence.

6. A Text of Minepthah:

Dr. Flinders Petrie (Contemporary Review, May, 1896) has published an important text of the 5th year of Minepthah, from Thebes. A slab of black syenite, bearing this text, was reused from a temple of Amenophis III. In it Minepthah boasts of his conquest of the invaders who--as elsewhere stated- -attacked the Delta, and penetrated to Belbeis and Heliopolis. He says that "Sutekh (the Hittite god) has turned his back on their chief"; "the Hittites are quieted, Pa-Kan'ana is ravaged with all violence"--this town being otherwise known to have been near Tyre--"the people of Israel is spoiled, it has no seed"; "Ruten has become as the widows of the land of Egypt." Thus, so far from the Exodus having occurred in the 15th year of Minepthah, Israel is noticed 10 years earlier in connection with a place near Tyre with Hittites yet farther North. Even if the Hebrews had only just arrived, they must have left Egypt 40 years before--in the reign of Rameses II; whereas the notice of the 'Abiri, two centuries before Minepthah's accession, is quite in accord with this allusion to Israel, as well as with Old Testament chronology.

III. The Numbers.

1. Colenso's Criticism of Large Number:

The historic difficulty with respect to the Exodus does not lie in the account of plagues natural to Egypt even now, nor in the crossing of the Red Sea, but in a single statement as to the numbers of Israel (Exodus 12:37), `about 600,000 footmen- -strong men--with many children, and also many wanderers.' The women are not mentioned, and it has been supposed that this represents a host of 2,000,000 emigrants at least. The objection was urged by Voltaire, and the consequences were elaborately calculated by Colenso. Even if 600,000 means the total population, the "heroes," or "strong men on foot" would, it is urged, have been as numerous as the largest Assyrian army (120,000 men) employed in the conquest of Syria. With an army of more than half a million Moses would have held control over Egypt and Palestine alike; and the emigrants, even in close column of companies, would have stretched for 20 miles; the births would occur every ten minutes; and the assembly before Sinai would have been impossible.

2. Increase of Population:

It is also difficult to suppose, on ordinary calculations of the increase of population, that in 430 years (Exodus 12:40), or in 215 years as given in the Septuagint, a tribe of 70 males (Genesis 46:26; Exodus 1:5; 6:14) could have increased to 600,000, or even 100,000 men. But on the other hand we are specially told (Exodus 1:7-20) that the children of Israel "increased abundantly," and the comments of Dr Orr (Problem of the Old Testament, 1906, 363-65) on this question should be studied. A young and vigorous nation might multiply much faster than is now usual in the East. Dr. Flinders Petrie has suggested that for "thousand" we should read "families"; but, though the word ('eleph) sometimes has that meaning (Judges 6:15; 1 Samuel 10:19; 23:23), it is in the singular, and not in the plural, in the passage in question (Exodus 12:37).

3. Number a Corruption of Original Statement:

It should not be forgotten that variations in numbers are very commonly found in various texts and parallel passages of the Old Testament. Thus for instance (1 Samuel 13:5) the Syriac version reads 3,000 for the 30,000 chariots mentioned in the Hebrew and Greek; and the Septuagint (1 Kings 5:11) gives 20,000 for the 20 measures of oil noticed in the Hebrew text. The probable reason for these discrepancies may be found in the fact that the original documents may have used numeral signs--as did the Egyptians, Assyrians, Hittites and Phoenicians--instead of writing the words in full as they appear in the New Testament. These numeral signs--especially in cuneiform--were apt to be misread, and the sign for "unity" could easily be confused with those denoting "sixty" (the Babylonian unit) and "an hundred"--if, in the latter case, a short stroke was added. In the opinion of the present writer the difficulty is due to a corruption of the original statement, which occurred during the course of some fifteen centuries, or more, of continued recopying; but the reader will no doubt form his own conclusions as to this question.

4. Review:

No reference has yet been found in Egyptian records to the presence of Israel in the Delta, though the Hebrews are noticed as present in Palestine before the 5th year of Minepthah. The Pharaohs as a rule--like other kings--only recorded their victories, and no doubt reckoned Israel only as a tribe of those "hostile Shasu" (or "nomads") whom the Theban kings of the XVIIIth Dynasty drove back into Asia. It would be natural that a disaster at the Red Sea should not be noticed in their proud records still extant on the temple walls in Egypt.

C. R. Conder