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HISTORICITY OF THE EXODUS
Decisive proof for the historicity of any event is virtually unattainable. Events can be shown to be possible, plausible or even probable, depending on the nature and amount of evidence supporting them. But they cannot be proved in any ultimate sense.
Little historical evidence offers corroboration of an escape of slaves from Egypt on the order of the large-scale exodus described in the Bible. There is one aspect of the Biblical narrative, however, that has a fair amount of circumstantial evidence in its favor: the enslavement of Israelites in Egypt. This evidence, apart from the Biblical text itself, is sufficient to argue for the plausibility of this event. The Egyptians used a particular term, often translated “Asiatics,” to refer to Semitic people groups. This term typically applied to those who hailed from the regions of western Asia, such as Syria and Palestine, and it could easily have been used of Israelites. Asiatics entered Egypt by one of several means: as prisoners of war; as part of tribute payments from Asiatic rulers to the Egyptian king; as victims of slave trade; as merchants on business trips to conduct trade and related activities; and as hungry people in search of food and water for themselves and their flocks. The first three ways usually led to enslavement, often at the hands of official institutions, such as the palace, the temple or the military.
Many scholars believe that the book of Exodus places the events it recounts in a time period that fits best within the second half of the second millennium BC. In Egypt, this is known as the New Kingdom (1550–1069 BC). For the area of Syria and Palestine in western Asia, this time period includes the Late Bronze Age (c. 1550–1200 BC) and the first part of the Iron Age (referred to as Iron I, 1200–1000 BC).
In Palestine it is in the Iron I period that remains of a distinctly Israelite character begin to appear and continue to predominate throughout the Iron II period (1000–586 BC; in 586 BC Jerusalem and much of Judah were overrun by the Babylonians). Any departure of Israelites from Egypt would presumably have taken place before this settlement process begins, and there are no compelling reasons to consider time periods prior to the New Kingdom in Egypt and the Late Bronze Age in Palestine. Moreover, in Palestine, the transition from the Late Bronze to the Iron Age is primarily one from Egyptian domination to a marked absence of Egyptian control.
It was during the New Kingdom that Egypt’s imperialistic ambitions grew. One of its early kings, Amenhotep I, led Egypt to renewed military success in Nubia (modern Sudan) to the south, and his kingdom began to reap economic benefits. Later, during the reign of Thutmose III, Egypt expanded its power into Syria and Palestine, subjecting a number of city-states to its control. This provided Egypt with access to a variety of raw materials, an important source of human labor from prisoners of war, military spoils and tribute payments from vassal rulers. Such rewards motivated subsequent kings to continue to exert control over Syria and Palestine. An archive of letters from the site of el-Amarna (see note on Ex 1:15) amply attests to this.
Much of the evidence for Asiatic slaves in Egypt comes from the New Kingdom. Beginning with Thutmose III in the 1400s BC, Egyptian kings brought back unprecedented numbers of Asiatic slaves from their military campaigns into Syria and Palestine. From the 1300s BC, the Amarna letters (see note on Ex 1:15) show a fairly active slave trade between Palestine and Egypt. Kings from the 1200s BC, such as Seti I and Rameses II, continued forays into Palestine, capturing large numbers of prisoners.
Craig S. Keener and John H. Walton, eds., NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible: Bringing to Life the Ancient World of Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016), 116.
THE RED SEA
The Hebrew phrase translated “Red Sea” is yam sup; it is not clear to which body of water this phrase refers. The term sup in Hebrew means “reed(s)”; it is among the sup that Moses’ mother placed the waterproof basket that served as his hiding place shortly after his birth (Ex 2:3). Perhaps, then, the yam sup is not the Red Sea but a body of water known as the “Sea of Reeds.” However, the Septuagint, the pre-Christian Greek translation of the OT, translates yam sup with a Greek phrase that means “Red Sea.” This term refers, depending on context, to three potential areas: the Gulf of Aqaba (Nu 21:4), the Gulf of Suez (Nu 33:10–11), or the place where Israel crossed or encountered the “yam sup.” Most scholars today believe the Hebrew text intends a body of water around which reeds grew in abundance—perhaps one of the lakes found north of the Gulf of Suez. Others still opt for the Red Sea, the large body of water south of the Sinai peninsula that runs between Egypt and Arabia.
Among those who reject the Red Sea, at least four main possibilities stand out. The first is Lake Menzaleh, located in the northeast corner of the Nile delta along the Mediterranean coast. About 30 miles (48 kilometers) to the south were the Balah Lakes, most of which were drained during the construction of the Suez Canal. A smaller lake south of the Balah Lakes is Lake Timsah. Finally, the Bitter Lakes are located even farther south. All of these bodies of water were situated along ancient Egypt’s eastern border, where it meets the Sinai peninsula, between the Mediterranean Sea in the north and the Gulf of Suez in the south.
A strong case can be made in favor of the Balah Lakes. First, Ex 14:2 indicates that the Israelites made a turn to the north (they were to “turn back”) after having traveled in a southeasterly direction. This would have taken them away from Lake Timsah and the Bitter Lakes, since they were still north of both, and toward the Balah Lakes. Second, Egyptian literary sources seem to indicate that the yam sup lay in fairly close proximity to the site of Tjaru; of the four major possibilities, Tjaru is closest to the Balah Lakes. Third, Abu Sefeh, the modern Arabic name for a site probably located on the edge of the Balah Lakes in ancient times, may be related linguistically to the Egyptian term from which Hebrew yam sup comes. Ultimately, the evidence is inconclusive, but it is unlikely to be the Red Sea because the Israelites were not that far south and they would have no reason to travel along the western shore of the Red Sea if they were trying to get to Sinai.
Craig S. Keener and John H. Walton, eds., NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible: Bringing to Life the Ancient World of Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016), 133–134.
THE TIMING OF THE EXODUS
The two major candidates for the date of the exodus are the fifteenth century BC and the thirteenth century BC. Biblical information supporting the fifteenth century BC includes a calculation from numbers given in 1Ki 6:1 and Jdg 11:26, and the requisite time necessary for an extended period in Midian before Pharaoh dies (40 years) and another extended period of time in the wilderness before entering Canaan (40 years). The former may require a long-lived pharaoh for the oppression (e.g., Thutmose III). If the long-lived pharaoh were Rameses II (thirteenth century BC) there is not enough time for Israel to be in the wilderness before Rameses’ successor, Merneptah, says that Israel is in the land.
Biblical information supporting the thirteenth-century BC date includes the fact that one of the cities the Israelites are working on is named Rameses (Ex 1:11). It is far-fetched to think that the Israelites were building a city names Rameses two centuries before there even was a Rameses.
Each of these pieces of Biblical information, however, can be mitigated without casting aspersions on the credibility of the Bible. First, numbers in the ancient world sometimes took on a schematic, rhetorical sense. If that is how the speakers meant them, that would be how we should read them. We cannot assume that it is just a matter of “doing the math.” Second, when Moses is told that those who wanted to kill him were dead (Ex 4:19), that does not mean that they had just died. Therefore a long-lived pharaoh (over 40 years) is not necessary. Third, the reference to the city of Rameses in the Biblical text could easily be an updated name. The city named Rameses is located at what is today Tell ed-Dab’a. Rameses rebuilt it as his capital, but it had formerly been built as the Hyksos capital, Avaris. If the exodus was in the fifteenth century BC, the Israelites were building Avaris and later scribes put the more recent name, Rameses, in the text as it was being copied.
Consequently, the Bible does not give the answer. Unfortunately, neither do ancient texts. The most important evidence is provided by the so-called Merneptah Stele, also referred to as the Israel Stele. This monument contains an inscription regarding a military campaign that the Egyptian king Merneptah apparently led into Syria and Palestine around 1210 BC. It refers to several sites that Merneptah claims to have conquered, including “Israel.” This is the earliest non-Biblical historical reference to Israel, and suggests that any Israelite departure from Egypt would have had to take place in the first half of the thirteenth century BC at the latest to allow for a generation in the wilderness and time for Israel to get somewhat settled. Beyond this stele, no Egyptian document mentions Israel either in slavery or escaping.
From fourteenth-century BC Egypt (i.e., between the two proposed dates of the exodus), letters from the city of Amarna document the political situation that existed in Canaan. We learn that the city-states of Canaan were being threatened by people they referred to as Apiru, renegade groups of disenfranchised people. In those texts, some of the major cities are the same as in the book of Joshua (e.g., Jerusalem), but some that are prominent are largely absent from Joshua (e.g., Shechem, where the Israelites seem to be able to go with impunity). Others that are prominent in Joshua are totally absent from the Amarna correspondence (e.g., Jericho). It cannot be determined whether the Amarna period is after the exodus and the Israelites are among the Apiru who are causing trouble, or whether the exodus is after the Amarna period and others have paved the way for Israel’s entrance into the land.
Another possible source of information to make a determination would be the excavations at the sites involved in the conquest. Unfortunately, the information from excavations does not offer solid evidence for either of the proposed dates.
Craig S. Keener and John H. Walton, eds., NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible: Bringing to Life the Ancient World of Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016), 119.
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