Should the Exodus be re-dated?

Last week I got to attend the premiere of a new film, “Patterns of Evidence – Exodus.” I can safely say it was the exact opposite of the last movie I reviewed, “Noah.”

 

 

 

After the Noah movie experience, I was skeptical. I knew it was nothing like that, but I’ve seen other documentaries about biblical subjects that seemed to be bending the evidence to suit their preconceptions. One that comes immediately to mind is the James Cameron film, The Exodus Decoded.

So I went into Patterns of Evidence warily, half expecting to be bombarded with someone’s religious claptrap, hoping nevertheless that I could find a few nuggets among all the dross. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised to find a calm, well-reasoned discussion of the subject by filmmaker Timothy Mahoney.

Mahoney’s premise was laid out early. We are treated to interviews with people like famed “biblical” archaeologist Israel Finkelstein, a professor with Tel Aviv University, saying flatly:

“Exodus did not happen in the way it is described in the biblical text on the background of the 13th century B.C.”

Norma Franklin, “biblical” archaeologist with the University of Haifa:

“I don’t believe there was a single event that we can call the Exodus.”

And rabbi David Wolpe telling interviewer Michael Medved:

“The Exodus certainly didn’t happen the way the bible depicted it… Scientifically it is virtually indefensible to make the Bible’s case.”

When Medved pushes him on how someone can base their faith on something incorrect, he comes up with this winner:

“Things that aren’t ‘facts’ can be ‘truths'.”

Excuse me? Way to go, rabbi. Really helpful.

On that foundation, Mahoney poses this fundamental problem:

“If the leading scholars are siding with the leading atheists and agnostics, that there is no evidence that the Exodus ever happened, what are the rest of us supposed to think?”

The Bible account says this:

• Abraham, a descendant of Shem, left the city of Ur and lived among his fellow Semites in Canaan.
• His great-grandson Joseph, wearing a multi-colored robe, was sold into slavery in Egypt. By predicting and helping an unnamed Pharaoh prepare for a severe famine, he rose to the position of prime minister, making the Pharaoh wealthy and powerful in the process.
• Joseph moved his family from Canaan to Egypt and, since they were shepherds, gave them the best grazing land, an area called Goshen in the Nile delta area.
  
• The family multiplied and prospered.
• A few generations later they became slaves of the Egyptians.
• An attempt was made to wipe out Israelite males at birth.
  
• When God, using Moses, freed his people, Egyptian society took a horrific downturn: they suffered horrendous plagues, the loss of their wealth, health, crops, their firstborn - including Pharaoh's firstborn - and their army.
• After the Exodus, the Israelites returned to the land of Canaan. There they brought down the walled cities of Jericho, Hazor and Shechem among others, and burned them. 
  
•  
• What does the archaeology show? 

• More than 20 archaeological sites with Semitic remains have been found in the Goshen region in Egypt. The largest so far excavated is a city called Avaris, under the remains of a defunct city that was called Ramses. The residents of Avaris, while Semites, seem to have had – originally at least – the approval and help of the Pharaoh.
• The finds include many sheep and goat bones, indicating the inhabitants were shepherds.
• A large house was found built in the style of houses in Ur. It was later modified into an Egyptian-style palace. 
• Associated with the house is a tomb in the shape of a small pyramid – normally associated only with kings and high officials - but this one containing a statue of someone with Semitic features, wearing a multi-colored robe. 
• Significantly, no bones were found in this tomb.

Doesn’t all this back up the Genesis account of Joseph’s family living in Egypt? Could this be the remains of a palace and tomb built for Joseph? Could the absence of bones in the tomb, of no value to grave robbers, be an indication of the Israelites taking Joseph’s bones with them when they left Egypt, as the Bible says happened? 

No, says the chief Egyptologist on the site, James Hoffmeier. Why not? “It is simply too early in history.” The "Generally Accepted Date" for the Exodus is as early as 1290 to as late as 1225 B.C.E., nowhere near the Bible's date of 1513.

• Excavations at Avaris show a severe change in lifestyle: wear and fractures in skeletons indicate extreme physical labor. The lifespan drops precipitously, many people dying at about 32 years of age. Also, there is a 60/40 ratio of female skeletons to male. Could this reinforce the Bible’s account of the enslavement of the Israelites and the murder of male babies? 

No, says the same Egyptologist – “Too early.” 

• A couple pharaohs named Amenemhat were involved in building a canal and lake which, at different points in history, bore the name “bahr Yusef” (waterway of Joseph). This waterwork is credited with enormous grain production and prosperity for these pharaohs. Could this be related to the account of Joseph averting a famine? 

No, say archaeologists. Why not? “Too early.” 

• An ancient Egyptian document now called the Brooklyn Papyrus recounts the efforts of an Egyptian noblewoman of the Thirteenth Dynasty (1809-1743 B.C.E.) to establish her legal ownership of 94 slaves. 45 of the slave names are Semitic. Could this be proof that the Israelites were enslaved in Egypt at that time? 

No, say “biblical” archaeologists. Why not? “Too early.” 

• The Ipuwer papyrus, housed in the Leiden Museum in the Netherlands, sounds like an eyewitness account of the plagues on Egypt. It is a copy of the original, whose date is believed to have been somewhere before the late 13th century B.C.E. It talks about the rich becoming poor and the poor rich, slaves leaving their masters, the Nile becoming blood, mourning in every household, grain crops being lost, and the light becoming darkness. Could this be a parallel to the 10 plagues recorded in the Bible? 

No, says museum curator Martin Raven. “It pretends to be an eyewitness account, but in fact it isn’t.” Why not? Among other things… too early. 

• Archaeology at Jericho, Hazor, and Shechem have all shown clear signs their walls were destroyed and the cities burned by an enemy. In particular, excavators at Jericho found, in nearly every house, jars nearly full of grain, burned. Their being full indicates two things: Jericho’s destruction happened soon after the harvest (spring in that part of the world) and that the siege that conquered the city didn’t last long enough for the occupants to be scraping the bottom of the grain barrel. The account in Joshua describes a 7-day siege, in the spring. Could the Jericho archaeology prove the Bible account true? 

No, claimed "biblical" archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon. Why not? You guessed it: too early. She placed the destruction of Jericho’s walls somewhere in the 16th century B.C.E.

Why are they all claiming these events happened too early? Because the GAD, the Generally Accepted Date, of the Exodus, is 1250 B.C. Why that date? As Mahoney shows in his film, the evidence for that date is scanty: 

1. The Bible says the Israelites lived in a part of Egypt called Rameses (Genesis 47:6, 11). 
2. There was a Pharaoh named Ramses II who named a city after himself, and died about 1203 B.C.

So, the “biblical” archaeologists assume the Exodus, if it happened, had to have happened after Pharaoh Ramses II named a city Rameses. There couldn't have been a city with a similar name before there was a Pharaoh with that name, could there? 

 

Their reason for not believing the biblical date is based on a chronology they created using their own misunderstanding of a coincidence of a name in the Bible.

 

Obviously, then, Mahoney’s suggestion is: Why not throw away the tenuous association to Pharaoh Ramses, and re-date the Exodus to line up with the archaeological and historical realities? Unfortunately, like a biologist espousing Intelligent Design, these archaeologists and Egyptologists would be bucking a huge, complex, and most importantly, a closed system if they suggested any re-dating. 

 

Israel Finkelstein said outright, ‘The chronology is locked. You might see a correction of a decade here or there, but on the whole it is not open to adjustment.’

 

It's not the chronology that's "locked". It's the minds of the so-called Bible scholars. And they call us fanatics.

You can learn more about the movie and the book here.

 You can read my next column about biblical chronology here.

Please leave a comment. 

 

Bill K. Underwood is a columnist and author of several books. You can help support this site by following this link to Amazon.com.