Thursday, June 14, 2018

Professor John Walton and the functional ontology of Genesis 1


 Tabernacle-Moses-tribes-of-israel-encampment



  

 

“The Hebrew word translated “create” should be understood within a functional ontology—i.e., it means to assign a role or function. This is evident through a word study of the usage of the biblical term itself where the direct object of the verb is always a functional entity not a material object”.

 

John H. Walton

 
 

 

This approach seems to accord with Jeff Morrow’s consideration of man as homo liturgicus in the conclusion to his article, “Creation as Temple-Building and Work as Liturgy in Genesis 1-3”: http://beyondcreationscience.com/index.php?pr=Creation_as_Temple_Building

 

If Eden is the Holy of Holies in God’s Temple of creation, the implication is that humanity, created for this inner sanctuary, is best understood as Homo liturgicus. Living in the Holy of Holies, humanity is called to give worship to God in all thoughts, words, and deeds.

 


 

It is my belief that when we read Genesis 1 as the ancient piece of literature that it is, we will find new understanding of the passage that will result in a clearer understanding of how the initial audience would have heard it. In the process, we will also find that many of the perceived conflicts with modern science will be able to be resolved. I have explored this in a recent book titled The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate (IVP) and the technical aspects of ancient Near Eastern literature and the Hebrew text will be explored in greater depth in a forthcoming monograph, Genesis One As Ancient Cosmology (Eisenbrauns).

 

Genesis 1 is Ancient Cosmology

 

The Bible was written for everyone, but specifically to Israel. As a result we have to read all biblical texts, including (and maybe especially) Genesis 1 in its cultural context—as a text that is likely to have a lot more in common with ancient literature than with modern science. This does not result in claims of borrowing or suggestions that Genesis should also be read as “mythology” (however defined), but that ancient perspectives on the world and its origins need to be understood.

 

Ancient Cosmology is Function-oriented

 

In the ancient world and in the Bible, something existed not when it had physical properties, but when it had been separated from other things, given a name and a role within an ordered system. This is a functional ontology rather than a material ontology. In this view, when something does not exist, it is lacking role, not lacking matter. Consequently, to create something (cause it to exist) means to give it a function, not material properties.

 

“Create” (Hebrew Bara’) Concerns Functions

 

The Hebrew word translated “create” should be understood within a functional ontology—i.e., it means to assign a role or function. This is evident through a word study of the usage of the biblical term itself where the direct object of the verb is always a functional entity not a material object. Theologians of the past have concluded that since materials were never mentioned that it must mean manufacture of objects out of nothing. Alternatively, and preferably, it does not mention materials because it does not refer to manufacturing. Bara’ deals with functional origins, not material origins.

 

Beginning State in Genesis 1 is Non-functional

 

In Genesis 1:2 the “before” picture, as throughout the ancient Near East, is portrayed in non-functional, non-productive terms (tohu and bohu) in which matter already exists. If this were an account of material origins, it would start with no matter. As an account of functional origins, it starts with no functions.

 

Days 1-3 in Genesis 1 Establish Functions

 

In the ancient world, light was not an object, and day 1 does not recount the manufacture of an object. Verses 4-5 do not make sense unless we understand “light” as referring to “a period of light.” If that is what it means in vv. 4-5, then it logically must mean the same in v.3. Thus on day 1 God created a period of light to alternate with a period of darkness, i.e., God created time—a function. On day two, God created weather (described in accordance with their cosmic geography) and on day three he created fecundity/fertility/agriculture. These three functions are referred to again in Gen. 8:22 and are the principle functions that figure in ancient Near Eastern cosmological texts.

 

Days 4-6 in Genesis 1 Install Functionaries

 

Days 4-6 involve installing the functionaries that will operate within the spheres of the three functions described in days 1-3. The description continues to be functional (notice on day 4: signs, festivals, days and years—all functional in relation to people). This incidentally solves the age old problem regarding how “light” can be created on day 1 and the sun not until day four. The contradiction only exists if this is an account of material origins. In a functional perspective, time is much more significant than the sun; the former is a function, the latter simply a functionary. Everything is designated “good” indicating that it functions properly in the system (notice later, it is NOT good for man to be alone: functional). The description of people is also in functional terms from the image of God through the blessing. And God created (bara’ ) them MALE AND FEMALE—functional categories.

 

Divine Rest is in a Temple

 

In the ancient world, as soon as “rest” is mentioned everyone would have known exactly what sort of text this was: gods rest in temples and temples are built so that gods can rest in them. Rest is not a term of disengagement but a term of engagement, i.e., everything is in place now so the deity can take up his place at the helm in the control room of the cosmos and begin operations. Rest throughout the Bible indicates that everything is stable and secure and life and the cosmos may proceed as they were intended.

 

The Cosmos Is a Temple

 

In the ancient world and in the Bible, the cosmos was understood to be a gigantic temple (Isa. 66:1), and temples were designed to be a micro-cosmos (see description of the Garden of Eden and the Temple vision of Ezekiel; there is symbolism in the tabernacle/temple furniture and décor). Genesis 1 is portraying cosmic origins in terms that would be recognized as a temple building account.

 

The Seven Days of Genesis 1 Relate to the Cosmic Temple Inauguration

 

If cosmic origins are described here in functional terms and follow the pattern of temple building texts, then the point is made that the cosmic temple is here being made functional. When a temple was built, it became functional not when all of the physical work had been done (building, furniture, priests’ garments) but in an inauguration ceremony that in a variety of texts throughout the ancient world lasted seven days. During those seven days, the functions of the temple were identified, the functionaries installed, the priests commissioned and most importantly that which represented the deity was brought into the center of the sacred space where he took up his rest. Then the temple was functional—it existed. If this is the paradigm in Genesis 1, then the seven days can easily be understood as regular days and the account can be understood as an inauguration of the cosmic temple that initiates the functions by which it operates.

 

The Seven Days of Genesis 1 Do Not Concern Material Origins

 

If the seven days refer to the seven days of cosmic temple inauguration, days that concern origins of functions not material, then the seven days and Genesis 1 as a whole have nothing to contribute to the discussion of the age of the earth. This is not to say that God was uninvolved in material origins—it only contends that Genesis 1 is not the story of material origins.

 

“Functional Cosmic Temple” Offers Face Value Exegesis

 

The hermeneutical commitment to read the text at face value elevates this interpretation since it makes an attempt to understand the text as the author and audience would have understood it. It does not reduce the text to a symbolic, figurative, theological or literary reading, as is often done in the attempt to correlate the text to modern science. Concordism applies scientific meanings to words and phrases in the text that are modern—that the ancient readers would never have had. Day-age seeks to make room for an old earth. Both of these approaches struggle because they are still trying to get Genesis to operate as an account of material origins for an audience that has a material ontology and cannot think in any other way.

[End of quote]

 

The professor makes an excellent point here about a common tendency to “reduce the text to a symbolic, figurative, theological or literary reading, as is often done in the attempt to correlate the text to modern science”. I discussed this tendency in my article:

 

What exactly is Creation Science? Part One: Our Western obsession with 'Science'

 


 

 

Jeff Morrow (op. cit.) has, for his part, written on the liturgical significance of Genesis 1:

 

….

 

Genesis 1-3, in its account of creation, presents the cosmos as one large temple, the Garden of Eden as the Holy of Holies, and the human person as made for worship. The very content and structure of Genesis 1-3 is in a very real sense liturgical; the seventh day is creation’s high point.


The Sevenfold Structure of Creation in Genesis 1

 

The number seven is important for the form and content of Genesis 1 as the number of perfection in the ancient Near East, the number relating to covenant, and of course, the number of the day known as the Sabbath, the pinnacle of creation. Genesis 1:1 contains seven words: běrē’šît bārā’ ’elōhîm ’ēt hašāmayim wě’ēt hā’āreṣ. Genesis 1:2 has fourteen words, seven times two. Furthermore, significant words in this passage occur in multiples of seven: God (35 times, i.e., seven times five), earth (21 times, i.e., seven times three), heavens/firmament (21 times), “and it was so” (7 times), and “God saw that it was good” (7 times)...

 

The poetic framework and symmetry of this passage is what allows one scholar to describe its theme as the “Cosmic Liturgy of the Seventh Day.” Creation unfolds as a “cosmic liturgical celebration” culminating on the seventh day.

 

The Tabernacle as a New Creation

 

Numerous parallels exist between the seven days of creation and Moses’ construction of the tabernacle in the Book of Exodus. The tabernacle’s consecration process lasted seven days, indicating another heptadic pattern also connected to the Sabbath ordinances. Furthermore, key verbal correspondences exist between Moses’ construction of the tabernacle in Exodus 39-40 and God’s creation of the world in Genesis 1...

 

The Temple as New Tabernacle and New Creation

 

The parallels between creation and the tabernacle are also mirrored in the parallels between the seven days of creation and Solomon’s construction of the Jerusalem temple. Absent are the striking verbal correspondences, yet there remains cosmic symbolism in the temple construction...

 

Creation as Temple in the Ancient Near East

 

This association between Temple and creation is not unique to the Genesis text, nor is the heptadic structure. In fact, temples throughout the ancient Near East often had cosmological connotations. The building of a temple often accompanied creation, as we find in the Enuma Elish and elsewhere...

 

Creation in Genesis, we may conclude, is described as a temple; it is constructed as an ancient Near Eastern temple would be constructed. The divine fiats are “architectural directives,” in the words of Meredith Kline.

 

The Garden of Eden as the Inner Sanctuary and the Human Person as Created for Worship

 

...Genesis 2-3 depicts the Garden of Eden as the Holy of Holies, and this has implications for our understanding of humanity’s purpose. In this section, I will first discuss Eden’s image as an Inner Sanctuary and then discuss human beings as homo liturgicus, liturgical humanity made for worship.

 

Gregory Beale notes that the distinction of regions of creation described by Genesis are similar to those of the Temple. The heavens represent the holy of holies, the earth the inner sanctuary, and the sea the outer court. Other indications of this similarity appear in the text. In Genesis 3:8, for example, God walks back and forth (using a form of hlk) in Eden, which is also how God’s presence is described in the tabernacle in Leviticus 26:12 and Deuteronomy 23:14.

 

In examining the rest of the canon, we find other evidence that points to intentionality in these parallels that make creation appear as a temple. The Temple, and Mount Zion in general, are frequently associated with Eden, and in some instances actually identified with Eden...

 

Conclusion

 

If Eden is the Holy of Holies in God’s Temple of creation, the implication is that humanity, created for this inner sanctuary, is best understood as Homo liturgicus.

Living in the Holy of Holies, humanity is called to give worship to God in all thoughts, words, and deeds. When we look at the Genesis account of Eden, we find other instances of people portrayed as created for worship. Adam, for example, is told to “till” (from the root ‘bd) and “keep” (from the root šmr). When šmr and ‘bd occur together in the OT (Num. 3:7-8; 8:25-26; 18:5-6; 1 Chr. 23:32; Ezek. 44:14) they refer to keeping/guarding and serving God’s word and also they refer to priestly duties in the tabernacle. And, in fact, šmr and ‘bd only occur together again in the Pentateuch in the descriptions in Numbers for the Levites’ activities in the tabernacle. Such an association reinforces the understanding of Adam as a sort of priest-king, or even high priest, who guarded God’s first temple of creation, as it were. In light of this discussion, therefore, what we find in Genesis 1-3 is creation unfolding as the construction of a divine temple, the Garden of Eden as an earthly Holy of Holies, and the human person created for liturgical worship.

 

Notes of special interest:

 

18 Fletcher-Louis, All the Glory of Adam, 63. This conclusion follows a series of liturgical parallels and themes that Fletcher-Louis had just summarized in his text as follows: “[There exists] a set of literary and linguistic correspondences between creation (Genesis 1) and the tabernacle (Exod 25-40)….the seven days of creation in Genesis 1 are paired with God’s seven speeches to Moses in Exodus 25-31….Each speech begins ‘The Lord spoke to Moses’ (Exod 25:1; 30:11, 16, 22, 34; 31:11, 12) and introduces material which corresponds to the relevant day of creation...

 

47 Beale, Temple and the Church’s Mission, 74-75. On these pages, He comments: “It may even be discernable that there was a sanctuary and a holy place in Eden corresponding roughly to that in Israel’s later temple. The Garden should be viewed as not itself the source of water but adjoining Eden because Genesis 2:10 says, ‘a river flowed out of Eden to water the Garden’. Therefore, in the same manner that ancient palaces were adjoined by gardens, [quoting John Walton] ‘Eden is the sources of the waters and [is the palatial] residence of God, and the garden adjoins God’s residence.’ Similarly, Ezekiel 47:1 says that water would flow out from under the holy of holies in the future eschatological temple and would water the earth around. Similarly, in the end-time temple of Revelation 22:1-2 there is portrayed ‘a river of the water of life…coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb’ and flowing into a garden-like grove, which has been modeled on the first paradise in Genesis 2, as has been much of Ezekiel’s portrayal. If Ezekiel and Revelation are developments of the first garden-temple…then Eden, the area where the source of water is located, may be comparable to the inner sanctuary of Israel’s later temple and the adjoining garden to the holy place….Eden and its adjoining garden formed two distinct regions. This is compatible with…[the] identification of the lampstand in the holy place of the temple with the tree of life located in the fertile plot outside the inner place of God’s presence. Additionally, ‘the bread of the presence’, also in the holy place, which provided food for the priests, would appear to reflect the food produced in the Garden for Adam’s sustenance….the land and seas to be subdued by Adam outside the Garden were roughly equivalent to the outer court of Israel’s subsequent temple...

 

49 ...Fletcher-Louis writes that, “The office of high priest was thought to recapitulate the identity of the pre-lapsarian Adam. This goes back at least as far as Ezekiel 28:12ff. where the prince of Tyre wears precious stones which are simultaneously those worn by the Urmensch in the garden of Eden and those of the Aaronic ephod according to Exodus 28” (Fletcher-Louis, “Worship of Divine Humanity,” 126).

 

52 ...Beale concludes that, “The cumulative effect of the…parallels between the Garden of Genesis 2 and Israel’s tabernacle and temple indicates that Eden was the first archetypal temple, upon which all of Israel’s temples were based” (79-80)...

 

55 ...Beale’s comments about how rabbinic literature treated Adam’s duties in the Garden are insightful. He explains that, “The Aramaic translation of Genesis 2:15 (Tg. Neofiti) underscores this priestly notion of Adam, saying that he was placed in the Garden ‘to toil in the Law and to observe its commandments’ (language strikingly similar to…Numbers [3:7-8; 8:25-26; 18:5-6]….Verse 19 of this Aramaic translation also notes that in naming the animals Adam used ‘the language of the sanctuary’” (67). Beale writes further, “Indeed, Tg. Pseudo-Jonathan Genesis 2:7 says that God created Adam partly of ‘dust from the site of the sanctuary’….Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer 11 and 12, and Midrash Rabbah Genesis 14:8 [among other texts],…all affirm that Adam was created at the site of the later temple, which was also at Eden or was apparently close to it…” (67 n. 90). Finally, “Midrash Rabbah Genesis 16:5 interprets Adam’s role in Gen. 2:15 to be one of offering the kinds of ‘sacrifices’ later required by the Mosaic Law” (67 n. 91)...

 

 


Thursday, June 7, 2018

Historical Moses may be Weni and Mentuhotep


Image result for vizier mentuhotep 12th dynasty

 
by
 
Damien F. Mackey
 
 
“Mentuhotep, prince in the seats of … Splendor … at whose voice they (are permitted to) speak in the king's-house, in charge of the silencing of the courtiers, unique one of the king, without his like, who sends up the truth …”.
 
Inscriptions of Mentuhotep
 
If any revisionist historian had placed himself in a good position, chronologically, to identify in the Egyptian records the patriarch Joseph, then it was Dr. Donovan Courville, who had, in The Exodus Problem and its Ramifications, I and II (1971), proposed that Egypt’s Old and Middle Kingdoms were contemporaneous. That radical move on his part might have enabled Courville to bring the likeliest candidate for Joseph, the Vizier Imhotep of the Third Dynasty, into close proximity with the Twelfth Dynasty – the dynasty that revisionists most favour for the era of Moses.
 
 
Courville, however, who did not consider Imhotep for Joseph, selected instead for his identification of this great biblical Patriarch another significant official, Mentuhotep, vizier to pharaoh Sesostris I, the second king of Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty.
 
And very good revisionists have followed Courville in his choice of Mentuhotep for Joseph.
 
With my own system, though, favouring (i) Imhotep for Joseph; (ii) Amenemes [Amenemhet] I for the “new king” of Exodus 1:8; and (iii) Amenemes I’s successor, Sesostris I, for the pharaoh from whom Moses fled (as recalled in the semi-legendary “The Story of Sinuhe”), then Mentuhotep of this era must now loom large as a candidate for the Egyptianised Moses.
  
Introduction
 
In 1981 I began a search for Moses in the Egyptian records.
The first lesson that I had to learn (and Courville’s two-volume set served as my guide in this) was that the history books and the Bible just did not align.
Now, after decades of effort on this work of revision, I have been blessed to have encountered - and sometimes to have made - exciting discoveries, including the appropriate era for Moses and the Exodus, and the true archaeology for the Israelite (Joshuan) Conquest of Palestine.
But Moses himself, the person, has proved to be most elusive.
 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I now think that - and it has taken me only about 34 years to realise it -
this Mentuhotep may be Moses staring revisionists right in the face.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
In my most recent excursions into this era of biblico-history. I have returned to the view - in line with the thinking of professor Immanuel Anati, in his classic, The Mountain of God - that the famous Egyptian “Sinuhe” tale carried a reminiscence of the historical Moses: “I accept that this famous Egyptian tale is based upon a real biblical event. The semi-legendary Sinuhe may at least provide us with the time of the flight of Moses from Egypt to Midian, during the early reign of Sesostris I”.
And I as well, in line with my revised Old to Middle Kingdom parallelism, tentatively making contemporaneous:
 
4th Dynasty                  6th Dynasty                 12th Dynasty               13th Dynasty
 
also suggested in this article a possible connection of Sinuhe with the Sixth Dynasty’s Weni. Thus:
 
There is a famous Sixth dynasty official, Weni (or Uni), who may be the parallel of the Twelfth Dynasty’s Sinuhe as a candidate for the elusive Moses.
 
I have previously written on this:
 
Now, given our alignment of the so-called Egyptian Middle Kingdom’s Twelfth Dynasty with the Egyptian Old Kingdom’s Sixth Dynasty (following Dr. Donovan Courville), then the semi-legendary Sinuhe may find his more solidly historical identification in the important Sixth Dynasty official, Weni, or Uni. Like Weni, Sinuhe was highly honoured by pharaoh with the gift of a sarcophagus.
We read about it, for instance, in C. Dotson’s extremely useful article (“…. The Cycle of Order and Chaos in The Tale of Sinuhe”)
 
“…. The king gives Sinuhe a sarcophagus of gold and lapis lazuli as a housewarming gift. The gift of a coffin by the king was considered a great honor and a sign of respect.
 
In the Autobiography of Weni from the Old Kingdom, Weni records that the king had given him a white sarcophagus and “never before had the like been done in this Upper Egypt.” ….
 [End of quote]
 
Naturally, Dr. Courville’s radical proposal that the Egyptian Sixth and Twelfth dynasties were contemporaneous - whereas, according to conventional history some four centuries separate the end of the Sixth (c. 2200 BC) from that of the Twelfth (c. 1800 BC) - has not been well received by non-revisionist historians, such as e.g. professor W. Stiebing who has written (https://books.google.com.au/books?id=Yf2NWgNhEecC&pg=PA131&lpg=PA131&dq=co): “There is simply no textual support for making the Sixth and Twelfth Dynasties contemporaneous, as Courville does”.
However, as I have previously noted in my:
 
…. [Dr.] J. Osgood proposes a possible close relationship between the 6th and 12th dynasty mortuary temples ....:
 
Edwards certainly opens the possibility unconsciously when referring to the pyramid of Sesostris the First ....: “... and the extent to which its Mortuary Temple was copied from the Mortuary Temples of the VIth dynasty, as illustrated by that of Pepi II ... is clearly evident.” 
 
The return of a culture to what it was before ... after some three hundred years must be an uncommon event. The theoretical possibility that the two cultures, the Twelfth and the Sixth Dynasties were in fact contemporary and followed a common pattern of Mortuary Temple must be borne in mind as real. 
[End of quote]
 
 
That there is in fact some impressive evidence to suggest that:
 
Egypt’s Old and Middle Kingdoms [Were] Far Closer in Time
than Conventionally Thought
 
 
is apparent from a set of examples that I listed there taken from N. Grimal’s A History of Ancient Egypt (Blackwell 1994). After recalling some striking similarities between the Sixth Dynasty founder, Teti, and the Twelfth Dynasty founder, Amenemes I, as follows: “…. {Teti, I have tentatively proposed as being the same pharaoh as Amenemes/Ammenemes I, based on
 
(a) being a founder of a dynasty;
(b) having same Horus name;
(c) being assassinated. ….}”,
 
I continued:
 
Grimal notes the likenesses:
 
Pp. 80-81
“[Teti‟s] adoption of the Horus name Sehetep-tawy (“He who pacifies the Two Lands”) was an indication of the political programme upon which he embarked. … this Horus name was to reappear in titulatures throughout subsequent Egyptian history, always in connection with such kings as Ammenemes I … [etc.]”.
“Manetho says that Teti was assassinated, and it is this claim that has led to the idea of growing civil disorder, a second similarity with the reign of Ammenemes I”.
P. 84: “[Pepy I] … an unmistakable return to ancient values: Pepy I changed his coronation name from Neferdjahor to Merire (“The devotee of Ra”)”. ….
P. 159:
[Ammenemes I]. Like his predecessors in the Fifth Dynasty, the new ruler used literature to publicize the proofs of his legitimacy. He turned to the genre of prophecy: a premonitory recital placed in the mouth of Neferti, a Heliopolitan sage who bears certain similarities to the magician Djedi in Papyrus Westcar. Like Djedi, Neferti is summoned to the court of King Snofru, in whose reign the story is supposed to have taken place”.
P. 164: “[Sesostris I]. Having revived the Heliopolitan tradition of taking Neferkare as his coronation name …”.
 P. 165: “There is even evidence of a Twelfth Dynasty cult of Snofru in the region of modern Ankara”.
P. 171: “Ammenemes IV reigned for a little less than ten years and by the time he died the country was once more moving into a decline. The reasons were similar to those that conspired to end the Old Kingdom”.
 P. 173: “… Mentuhotpe II ordered the construction of a funerary complex modelled on the Old Kingdom royal tombs, with its valley temple, causeway and mortuary temple”.
P. 177:
“… Mentuhotpe II’[s] … successors … returned to the Memphite system for their funerary complexes. They chose sites to the south of Saqqara and the plans of their funerary installations drew on the architectural forms of the end of the Sixth Dynasty.
…. The mortuary temple was built during the Ammenemes I’s “co-regency” with Sesostris I. The ramp and the surrounding complex were an enlarged version of Pepy II’s”.
P. 178: “The rest of [Sesostris I’s el-Lisht] complex was again modelled on that of Pepy II”.
Pp. 178-179:
“[Ammenemes III’s “black pyramid” and mortuary structure at Dahshur]. The complex
infrastructure contained a granite sarcophagus which was decorated with a replica of the enclosure wall of the Step Pyramid complex of Djoser at Saqqara (Edwards 1985: 211-12)”. “[Ammenemes III’s pyramid and mortuary temple at Harawa]. This was clearly a sed festival installation, comparable to the jubilee complex of Djoser at Saqqara, with which Ammenemes’ structure has several similarities”.
“The tradition of the Old Kingdom continued to influence Middle Kingdom royal statuary …”.
P. 180:
“The diversity of styles was accompanied by a general return to the royal tradition, which was expressed in the form of a variety of statues representing kings from past times, such as those of Sahure, Neuserre, Inyotef and Djoser created during the reign of Sesostris II”.
P. 181:
“A comparable set of statures represents Ammenemes III (Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 385 from Hawara) … showing the king kneeling to present wine vessels, a type previously encountered at the end of the Old Kingdom (Cairo, Egyptian Museum CG 42013 …) …”.
 
[End of quotes]
 
See also:
 
Pharaohs Khufu, Teti, Amenemhet I and II: Four Faces, One Ruler
 
 
 
Moses as Chief Judge and Vizier
 
 
“Weni’s famous “Autobiography” has been described as, amongst other superlatives …
“… the best-known biographical text of the Old Kingdom and has been widely discussed,
as it is important for literary and historical reasons; it is also the longest such document”.
 
 
Comparing Weni - (and Sinuhe)
- with Vizier Mentuhotep
 
About Sinuhe, we learn (http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/texts/sinuhe.htm): “I was a henchman who followed his lord, a servant of the Royal harim attending on the hereditary princess, the highly-praised Royal Consort of Sesostris in the pyramid-town of Khnem-esut, the Royal Daughter of Amenemmes in the Pyramid-town of Ka-nofru, even Nofru, the revered”.
 
We have already learned something of the greatness of Mentuhotep.
 
Weni has, for his part, been described - like Imhotep (Joseph) - as a “genius”. This little excerpt on the “Autobiography of Weni” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobiography_of_Weni) already tells us a lot about the man:
 
Weni rose through the ranks of the military to become commander in chief of the army. He was considered by both his contemporaries and many Egyptologists to have been a brilliant tactician and possibly even a genius. His victories earned him the privilege of being shown leading the troops into battle, a right usually reserved for pharaohs. Weni is the first person, other than a pharaoh, known to have been portrayed in this manner. Many of his battles were in the Levant and the Sinai. He is said to have pursued a group of Bedouins all the way to Mount Carmel. He battled a Bedouin people known as the sand-dwellers at least five times.
 
Weni’s famous “Autobiography” has been described as, amongst other superlatives (https://books.google.com.au/books?id=sgoVryxihuMC&pg=PA352&lpg=PA352): “… the best-known biographical text of the Old Kingdom and has been widely discussed, as it is important for literary and historical reasons; it is also the longest such document”.
This marvellous piece of ancient literature, conventionally dated to c. 2330 BC - and even allowing for the revised re-dating of it to a bit more than half a millennium later - completely gives the lie to the old JEDP theory, that writing was not invented until about 1000 BC.
 
Here I take some of the relevant inscriptions of the renowned Vizier, Mentuhotep (http://www.forgottenbooks.com/readbook_text/Ancient_Records_of_Egypt_v1_10000750), and juxtapose them with comparable parts of the “Autobiography” of Weni (in brown) (http://drelhosary.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/weni-elder-and-his-mor) (all emphasis added):
 
INSCRIPTIONS OF MENTUHOTEP ….
 
531. Hereditary prince, vizier and chief judge
 
The exterior face of the north wall incorporates a large niche, and during excavations here a damaged false door inscribed for Weni the Elder was discovered in situ. Not only does this false door provide a nickname for Weni ("Nefer Nekhet Mery-Ra"--Egyptian nicknames were often longer than birth names!), but it also documents his final career promotion, a fact not recorded in his autobiography: Chief Judge and Vizier.
 
attached to Nekhen,
 
judge attached to Nekhen,
 
prophet of
 
prophet of
 
Mat (goddess of Truth), giver of laws, advancer of offices, confirming … the boundary records, separating a land-owner from his neighbor, pilot of the people, satisfying the whole land, a man of truth before the Two Lands … accustomed … to justice like Thoth, his like in satisfying the Two Lands, hereditary prince in judging the Two Lands …. supreme head in judgment, putting matters in order, wearer of the royal seal, chief treasurer, Mentuhotep.
Hereditary prince, count
 
the count
 
… chief of all works of the king, making the offerings of the gods to flourish, setting this land … according to the command of the god.
 
the whole was carried out by my hand, according to the mandate which … my lord had commanded me.
 
…. sending forth two brothers satisfied
 
pleasant to his brothers
 
with the utterances of his mouth, upon whose tongue is the writing of Thoth,
 
I alone was the one who put (it) in writing ….
 
more accurate than the weight, likeness of the balances, fellow of the king in counselling … giving attention to hear words, like a god in his hour, excellent in heart, skilled in his fingers, exercising an office like him who holds it, favorite of the king
 
I was excellent to the heart of his majesty, for I was pleasant to the heart of his majesty  
 
before the Two Lands, his beloved among the companions,
 
for his majesty loved me.
 
his majesty appointed me sole companion and superior custodian of the domain of the Pharaoh.
 
powerful among the officials, having an advanced seat to approach the throne of the king, a man of confidences to whom the heart opens.
 
his majesty praised me for the watchfulness and vigilance, which I showed in the place of audience, above his every official, above [his every] noble, above his every servant.
 
532. Hereditary prince over the … the (royal) castle (wsh't) … finding the speech of the palace, knowing that which is in every body (heart), putting a man into his real place, finding matters in which there is irregularity, giving the lie to him that speaks it, and the truth to him that brings it, giving attention, without an equal, good at listening, profitable in speaking, an official loosening the (difficult) knot, whom the king (lit., god) exalts above millions, as an excellent man, whose name he knew, true likeness of love, free from doing deceit, whose steps the court heeds,
 
when preparing court, when preparing the king’s journey (or) when making stations, I did throughout so that his majesty praised me for it above everything.
 
overthrowing him that rebels against the king, hearing the house of the council of thirty, who puts his terror … among the barbarians (fp^s'tyw), when he has silenced the Sand-dwellers, pacifying the rebels because of their deeds, whose actions prevail in the two regions, lord of the Black Land and the Red Land, giving commands to the South, counting the number of the Northland,
 
His majesty sent me to despatch [this army] five times, in order to traverse the land of the Sand-dwellers at each of their rebellions, with these troops, I did so that [his] majesty praised me [on account of it].
When it was said there were revolters, because of a matter among these barbarians in the land of Gazelle-nose, I crossed over in troop-ships with these troops, and I voyaged to the back of the height of the ridge on the north of the Sand-dwellers. When the army had been [brought] in the highway, I came and smote them all and every revolter among them was slain.
 
His majesty sent me at the head of his army while the counts, while the wearers of the royal seal, while the sole companions of the palace, while the nomarchs and commanders of strongholds belonging to the South and Northland ….
 
in whose brilliance all men move, pilot of the people, giver of food, advancing offices, lord of designs, great in love, associate of the king in the great castle (wsfi't), hereditary prince, count, chief treasurer, Mentuhotep, he says:
533. …'I am a companion beloved of his lord, doing that which pleases his god daily, prince, count, sem priest, master of every wardrobe of Horus, prophet of Anubis of … the hry ydb, Mentuhotep, prince in the seats of … Splendor … at whose voice they (are permitted to) speak in the king's-house, in charge of the silencing of the courtiers, unique one of the king, without his like, who sends up the truth ….
One to whom the great come in obeisance at the double gate of the king's-house ; attached to Nekhen, prophet of Mat, pillar … 'before the Red Land, overseer of the western highlands,
 
First of the Westerners ….
 
leader of the magnates of South and North … advocate of the people … merinuter priest, prophet of Horus, master of secret things of the house of sacred writings ….
 
Never before had one like me heard the secret of the royal harem.
 
[Sinuhe, too, was] servant of the Royal harim attending on the hereditary princess ….
 
governor of the (royal) castle,
 
governor of the South
 
prophet of Harkefti, great lord of the royal wardrobe, who approaches the limbs of the king,
 
chamber-attendant
 
…. overseer of the double granary, overseer of the double silver-house, overseer of the double gold-house, master of the king's writings of the (royal) presence, wearer of the royal seal, sole companion, master of secret things of the 'divine words’ (hieroglyphics) ….
534. Here follows a mortuary prayer, after which the concluding lines (22, 23) refer specifically to his building commissions at Abydos ….
I conducted the work in the temple, built of stone of Ayan I conducted the work on the sacred barque {nlm * /), I fashioned its colors, offering tables
 
His majesty sent me to Hatnub to bring a huge offering-table ….
 
of lapis lazuli, of bronze, of electrum, and silver; copper was plentiful without end, bronze without limit, collars of real malachite, ornaments (mn-nfr't) of every kind of costly stone. of the choicest of everything, which are given to a god at his processions, by virtue of my office of master of secret things.
[End of quotes]
 
I recall (but do not currently have it with me) that professor A. S. Yahuda had, in his Language of the Pentateuch in Its Relation to Egyptian, Vol. 1 (1933), when discussing the Exodus 5:5 encounter between Pharaoh and Moses and Aaron: Then Pharaoh said, ‘Look, the people of the land are now numerous, and you are stopping them from working’”, referred to the rank of Moses and Aaron (differentiating them from the common people) as something akin to new men. Anyway, that is precisely how Weni is classified in this next piece (http://drelhosary.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/weni-elder-and-his-mortuary.html):
 
Everyone who has studied ancient Egyptian history is familiar with the autobiography of Weni the Elder, an enterprising individual who lived during the 6th Dynasty of the Old Kingdom (ca. 2407-2260 BCE). His inscription, excavated in 1860 from his tomb in the low desert at Abydos in southern Egypt, enthusiastically describes his long service under three kings, culminating in his appointment as "True Governor of Upper Egypt." Scholars have hailed it as "the most important historical document from the Old Kingdom" and have used it to illustrate the rise of a class of "new men" in Egyptian politics and society--persons whose upward mobility rested in their abilities, not in noble birth.
Early in the season, we excavated a number of inscribed relief fragments from this area, including two pieces that, when joined together, furnished the name "Weni the Elder" and a fragment providing the title "True Governor of Upper Egypt," the highest title recorded in Weni's autobiography. Further evidence emerged supporting this association. The exterior face of the north wall incorporates a large niche, and during excavations here a damaged false door inscribed for Weni the Elder was discovered in situ. Not only does this false door provide a nickname for Weni ("Nefer Nekhet Mery-Ra"--Egyptian nicknames were often longer than birth names!), but it also documents his final career promotion, a fact not recorded in his autobiography: Chief Judge and Vizier.
[End of quote]
 
 
Weni was, just like Mentuhotep, “Chief Judge and Vizier”.
Weni was also, as we read above, “commander in chief of the army”.
And Mentuhotep was also “Chief of Police”.
 
Was this also the historical Moses, whose Judgeship, whose Rulership, some of the Hebrews chose to reject (Exodus 2:14): ‘Who made you ruler and judge over us?’
 
 
Image result for exodus 2:14