Taken from: "Diggings":
http://www.diggingsonline.com/pages/rese/dyns/kings.htm....
Lazare also takes a swipe at the record of the Israelite slavery in Egypt and the subsequent Exodus. He wrote, "There was no migration from Mesopotamia, no sojourn in Egypt and no Exodus ... The slate was blank concerning the nearly five centuries that the Israelites had supposedly lived in Egypt prior to the exodus as well as the forty years that they supposedly spent wandering in the Sinai. Not so much as a skeleton, campsite or cooking pot has turned up." Wrong, Mr Lazare, though I excuse you on the grounds that you are correctly reflecting the opinions of the main body of archaeologists who still cling to the traditional chronology. But Dr Rudolph Cohen, recently retired Deputy Director of the Israel Antiquities Service has excavated for twenty five years in the Negev (southern Israel) including Kadesh Barnea where the Israelites stayed for 40 days while the twelve spies searched the promised land. He claims there is so much evidence for the presence of a large number of people there at the beginning of the MBI period that he is of the firm conviction that these were the migrating Israelites. In the July 1983 edition of Biblical Archaeology Review he wrote an article entitled "The Mysterious MBI People, in which he stated, "In fact, these MBI people may be the Israelites whose famous journey from Egypt to Canaan is called the Exodus." BAR p. 16. He even claims that, from the pottery they left behind, he could trace the route the Israelites took. He wrote, "It is interesting, however, to note that this migratory drift, as I have reconstructed it, bears a striking similarity to that of the Israelite's flight from Egypt to the Promised Land, as recorded in the book of Exodus." ibid. p. 28. In 1993, my Australian group and I worked with Dr Cohen in his excavations at Ein Hatzeva, south of the Dead Sea. During the course of the excavations site supervisor Egal Israel came by to see what we were finding. I asked him whether he agreed with Dr Cohen's views identifying the MBI people with the Israelite migration. Without hesitation he replied, "Of course I do, and so do all the archaeologists down here." I said, "The archaeologists in the north do not accept it." He replied, "They do not know what they are talking about." Later that year I was talking with Dr Ami Mazar and asked him what he thought of Dr Cohen's views. "They are a lot of rubbish," he snapped. So there is this conflict of opinions in Israel. The majority hold to the traditional chronology but it would not be the first time in history that a minority were right. At least readers should be aware that there are alternative views. But what about carbon dating? Does not that establish the traditional chronology? I do not know of any archaeologist who has ever altered his dates from the results of carbon 14 testing. Dates are assigned on pottery styles. Samples of organic material may be sent for testing but the results will not influence the conclusions already reached. As David Rohl says in his book, "All too often a dozen or so radiocarbon dates are included in an archaeological site report merely as scientific window dressing. This attitude is clearly reflected in a regrettably common practice: when a radiocarbon date agrees with the expectation of the excavator it appears in the main text of the site report; if it is slightly discrepant it is relegated to a footnote; if it seriously conflicts it is left out altogether ... As the senior radiocarbon scientist Professor Ingrid Olsson frankly concluded at the Gothenburg conference: 'Honestly, I would say that I feel that most of the dates from the Bronze Age are dubious. The manner in which they have been made ... forces me to be critical.'" A Test of Time p. XIX As for the evidence from Egypt, it is strikingly supportive if you look in the right place. The Biblical date for the Exodus, based on the figures in 1 Kings 6:1, is approximately 1445 BC. By the usual chronology this would be during the powerful and well-recorded eighteenth dynasty which ruled from Luxor rather than Memphis or the Delta where the Israelites were concentrated. There is no trace of Israelite slaves during this dynasty, nor of the disaster that befell Egypt as the result of the ten devastating plagues and the destruction of the Egyptian army in the Red Sea. However, a revised chronology would locate the Israelite slavery during the late twelfth dynasty and the Exodus at the beginning of the thirteenth dynasty. Dr Rosalie David, Curator of the Manchester Museum wrote a book in 1986 entitled, The Pyramid Builders of Ancient Egypt. Sir Flinders Petrie excavated in the Faiyyum and sent many of his finds back to the Manchester Museum. He excavated a city called Kahun where he found evidence for many Semitic slaves. Because he had the wrong chronology neither he nor Dr David identified them as the Israelite slaves, but their presence there and subsequent disappearance puzzled them. Dr David wrote, "It is apparent that the Asiatics were present in the town in some numbers, and this may have reflected the situation elsewhere in Egypt ... Their exact homeland in Syria or Palestine cannot be determined ... The reason for their presence in Egypt remains unclear." The Pyramid Builders p. 191. "It is apparent that the completion of the king's pyramid was not the reason why Kahun's inhabitants eventually deserted the town, abandoning their tools and other possessions in the shops and houses." ibid. p. 197. "There are different opinions of how this first period of occupation at Kahun drew to a close ... The quantity, range and type of articles of everyday use which were left behind in the houses may indeed suggest that the departure was sudden and unpremeditated." ibid. p. 199. Slaves cannot say to their masters, "OK boss, sorry to leave you, but we are all going tomorrow." Yet this is about what happened at Kahun. The only plausible explanation is that these were the Israelites who packed up and left in a hurry. Curiously enough, Josephus, the Jewish historian from the first century AD, records a tradition that his ancestors in Egypt built pyramids. This has usually been dismissed with scorn, for by the conventional chronology, all the pyramids were built centuries before the first Israelite arrived in Egypt. If we accept a revised chronology, however, the oppression of the Israelites occured during the Twelfth and Thirteenth Dynasties, when rather impoverished pyramids were still being built. The pyramid at Lahun on which the slaves from Kahun were working was made of millions of bricks made of mud mixed with straw - the very building material the Bible specifies as used by the Israelites in Egypt. As for the devastating plagues and the destruction of the Egyptian army; there is in the Leiden Museum in Holland a papyrus written by a scribe named Ipuwer. Its time of origin is not known for sure but it could have been written after the Exodus. It says in part, "Nay, but the heart is violent. Plague stalks through the land and blood is everywhere ... Nay, but the river is blood. Does a man drink from it? As a human he rejects it. He thirsts for water ... Nay, but gates, columns and walls are consumed with fire ... Nay but men are few. He that lays his brother in the ground is everywhere ... Nay but the son of the high-born man is no longer to be recognised ... The stranger people from outside are come into Egypt ... Nay, but corn has perished everywhere. People are stripped of clothing, perfume and oil. Everyone says 'there is no more'. The storehouse is bare ... It has come to this. The king has been taken away by poor men." Ipuwer Papyrus Leiden Museum. Quoted from The Ancient Egyptians, a source book of their writings pp. 94-101. These "stranger people" were the mysterious Hyksos who invaded Egypt during the thirteenth dynasty. Concerning them the Egyptian historian Manetho, quoted by Josephus, wrote, "There was a king of ours whose name was Timaus. Under him it came to pass, I know not how, that God was averse to us, and there came, after a surprising manner, men of ignoble birth out of the eastern parts, and had boldness enough to make an expedition into our country and with ease subdued it by force, yet without our hazarding a battle with them." Josephus against Apion 1:14. Without a battle? Where was the well-trained Egyptian army? Maybe it was at the bottom of the Red Sea. Exodus 14:22-28 So, yes, there are arguments against the reliability of the historical records of the Bible, but there are also some powerful arguments supporting them. © David K. Down 2002
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