Egypt and the Wanderings
(c. 1500 - 1250 BCE)
The Children of Israel in Egypt
However dim and uncertain Hebrew history is in the age of the patriarchs, there is no question that the migration
out of Egypt around 1250 BC
is the single most important event in Hebrew history. More than anything
else in history, this event gave the Hebrews an identity, a nation, a
founder, and a name, used for the first time in the very first line of Exodus, the biblical
account of the migration: "bene yisrael," "the children
of Israel."
How did this happen? How did this diverse set of tribal
groups all worshipping a god they called "god," suddenly cohere
into a more or less unified national group? What happened in Egypt that
didn't happen with other foreigners living there?
Well, we really can't answer that question, for we have
almost no account whatsoever of the Hebrews in Egypt, even in Hebrew
history. For all the momentousness of the events of the migration for the
Hebrews and the dramatic nature of the rescue, including plagues and
catastrophes raining down on Egypt, the Egyptians do not seem to have
noticed the Hebrews or to even know that they were living in their country.
While we have several Egyptian records of foreign groups during the New
Kingdom, they are records of actively expelling groups they feel are
threatening or overly powerful. The Hebrews never appear in these records,
nor do any of the events recounted in the Hebrew history of the event. The
Hebrews themselves are only interested in the events directly leading up to
the migration; all the events in the centuries preceding are passed over in
silence.
We can make some guesses about the Hebrews in Egypt,
though. It isn't unreasonable to believe that a sizable Hebrew population
lived in the north of Egypt from about 1500-1250 BC; enormous numbers of
tribal groups, most of them Semitic, had been settling in northern Egypt
from about 1800 BC. These foreigners had grown so powerful that for a short
time they dominated Egypt, ruling the Egyptians themselves; this period is
called the Third Intermediate Period in Egyptian history. When the
Egyptians reasserted dominance over Egypt at the start of the New Kingdom,
they actively expelled as many foreigners as they could. Life got fairly
harsh for these foreigners, who were called "habiru," which was
applied to landless aliens (taken from the word, "apiru," or
foreigner). Is this where the Hebrews got their name? It's a hotly
contested issue. Nevertheless, the New Kingdom kings also began to garrison
their borders in the north and east in order to prevent foreigners from
entering the country in the first place. In particular, the Egyptian king,
Seti I (1305-1290), moved his capital to Avaris at the very north of the
Nile delta. This move was a shrewd move, for it established a powerful
military presence right at the entrance to Egypt.
Garrisoned cities, however, don't pop into existence at
a whim; they are labor intensive affairs. Typically, building projects
involved heavy taxation of local populations; these taxes took the form of
labor taxes. It isn't unreasonable to guess that the heaviest burden of
these taxes fell on the foreigners living in the area, which would include
the Hebrews. As best as we can guess, we believe that these building
projects form the substance of the oppression of the Hebrews described in
Exodus.
Moses and the Yahweh Cult
Nothing, however, should have prevented these oppressed and miserable
foreigners from spilling into the anonymity of history—as so many had
done before and since. One figure, however, changed the course of this
history and united some of these foreigners into a distinct people; he also
gave them a religion and a theology that would forever unite them in a
singular purpose in history. That person was Moses. In spite of the masterful
portrayal of him in Exodus , he is a difficult figure to pin down.
Few people dispute that Moses was a reality in history, whether as an
individual or a group of individuals, but there are several perplexing
aspects of the man. First, he has an Egyptian name (as do many of his
relatives). Second, he seems to spend a large amount of time among a
non-Hebrew people, the Midianites, where he marries and seems to learn the
Yahweh religion, and some of its cultic practices, from the Midianites. Are
there two Moses, an Egyptian and a Hebrew? Or an Egyptian and a Midianite?
And are the Midianites the first peoples to worship Yahweh and who then
transmit this religion to the Hebrews? The question is complicated by the
presence of Miriam, Moses' sister, in the migration. For she is the first
individual in the Hebrew bible to be called a "prophet," and
seems to have been an important player in the migration, possibly even
being the principle figure in the climactic battle between the Egyptians
and the Hebrews at the Sea of Reeds. At some point, however, there was a
falling out between Miriam and Moses,
and Miriam gets lost to history.
It is equally difficult to pinpoint exactly who participated
in the migration. Although the focus is on the Hebrews, Exodus claims
that a "diverse group of peoples" left Egypt with Moses. Who were these? Did they include other
Semites? Was the migration to Egypt a staggered affair, or was it a single,
heroic migration as indicated in Exodus? What resistance did the
Egyptians put up? What was the nature of their battle with the Egyptians
at the Sea of Reeds? The account of this battle is vitally important to
Hebrew history, for the deliverance of the Hebrews at the Sea of Reeds
stands as the single most powerful symbol of Yahweh's protection of the
Hebrews. Exodus gives two accounts; in the first, Yahweh blows
the water away to create a ford, and the Egyptians get stuck in the mud
and go home. In the second, Yahweh separates the waters and drowns the
Egyptians when they try to cross. Which is the correct account?
It's difficult to answer any of these questions. In the
end, the only account we have of the migration from Egypt is the Hebrew
account. Several salient aspects give this narrative its foundational role
in the Hebrew view of history. First, Moses is especially chosen by Yahweh to deliver Yahweh's people. In other words,
Yahweh directly intervenes in history in order to bring about his purposes
for his people. Second, the people of Yahweh become a national entity,
identified by the name, "bene yisrael," rather than simply being
a diverse group of tribes. They are united around a specific leader, Moses. Third, the events in Egypt,
including the plagues and the miraculous deliverance of the Israelites at
the Sea of Reeds when pursued by the king's army, are meant to serve as the
primary proof of God's election of the Hebrews. There's no question that
these stories were told and retold among the Hebrews as the most important
events of their history. For in the events leading up to and involving the
migration from Egypt, Yahweh proved once and for all that he would use and
protect the Hebrews as the people, and the only people, selected by Yahweh.
Third, Hebrew religion became the Yahweh religion. The Hebrews did
not worship "Yahweh" before the migration, but learned the cult,
according to Exodus, from Moses during the migration.
This introduction to Yahweh and the Yahweh cult occurred
in the southernmost region of the Arabian peninsula, in an area around
Mount Sinai. This area had been occupied by a nomadic, tribal people called
Midianites. They seem to have worshipped a kind of nature god which they
believed lived on Mount Sinai. It is here, living with a priest of the
Midianites, called Jethro, that Moses first encounters Yahweh (on Mount
Sinai) and learns his name for the first time. The name of god, which in
Hebrew is spelled YHWH, is difficult to explain. Scholars generally believe
that it derives from the Semitic word, "to be," and so means
something like, "he causes to be." Nevertheless, when Moses returns to Sinai with the people
of Israel and stays in the area (this period is called the Sinai
pericope), Jethro declares that he has always known Yahweh to be the
most powerful of all gods (was the Midianite religion, then, a religion of
Yahweh?). During the Sinai pericope, all the laws and cultic practices of
the new Yahweh religion are set down. The laws themselves come directly
from Yahweh in the Decalogue,
or "ten commandments." The Decalogue is a unique part of the
Hebrew Torah in that it is the only part of Hebrew scriptures which claims
to be the words of god written down on the spot .
Whatever happened in the migration from Egypt to Canaan,
it is clear that somewhere in this period the general laws and cultic
practices of the Hebrews settled down into a definite form. These laws and
this new cult of Yahweh would form the eternal character of the Hebrews
down to the present day. What began as a "diverse group of
peoples" has become one people, who then systematically begin to
settle the land of the Canaanites.
Sources: The Hebrews:
A Learning Module from Washington State University, �Richard Hooker,
reprinted by permission.
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