Modern Egyptian Attitudes: I’ve no doubt there is seething resentment in Modern Egypt of Modern Israel. This proves little because of the effect of modern religious and political tensions. The tensions that likely exist today are the results of events that took place in 1948 and afterwards, not in some indistinct, shadowy past of indeterminate date.

Ancient Government: No society can exist without a government of some kind for forty years. Moses’ leadership of the Israelites after the Exodus is not described as democratic in any sense of the word, nor would democracy have been thought of as a good thing in historical or cultural context. Good government in those days was having a great, glorious, and powerful king. The historical Egyptians claimed that their Pharaoh was literally a god himself (the legendary Egyptians seem to have made no such claim). No one would claim to have a weak, cowardly, or two-faced ruler. Consistent with this notion, Moses is portrayed as a commander, a dictator; his “treason” against Egypt is portrayed as loyalty to the true god — which is consistent with the story being legend rather than history; Exodus is pro-Mosaic propaganda. The Torah is also careful to frequently point out Aaron’s role in the command structure as well, as “proof” of Aaron’s legitimacy to rule in Moses’ absence, and both Aaron and Joshua after him claim a divine mandate. They are for all practical purposes kings, although I’ll concede that the text does not assign them that title.

What we call the book of Exodus is propaganda supporting the rule of these de facto kings, who claimed a mandate to rule tracing back to these figures of myth for the same reason that the early kings of Rome (and indeed most of Rome’s noble houses during the Republican era and the Julio-Claudian dynasty in the early Principate) traced their lineage back to Romulus and Remus. And it may be some of the most effective propaganda in human history — although it is devoid of any resemblance to actual, documentable historical events and instead packed to the gills with laughable claims of greatness attributed to a warlord, people today continue to insist that it is literally the truth.

Viewed as a legend, though, its moral lesson is actually quite simple: obedience to the priestly leaders of Mosaic tradition is morally good; disobedience will be punished both in this world and the next.

I really didn’t intend to get into the veracity of the text. I admit up front that I lean toward the side of acceptance but the intention is to explore evidence within the text not the evidence for the text. But, in a discussion of this nature there will always be a tendency to stray beyond the text in looking for something to argue for or against some detail within it. I agree that there is a lot to be gained from the study even if it is fictional.

You’re correct. I am certain the event would not have been represented the way I wrote it but that was the point. It was irony. If they reported the event what would they really say. They were not free to say what they really thought so whatever they may or may not have said guarantees little and this story, presented in any fashion, could not be written with a positive twist. This was beyond propaganda.

Yes, Moses believed in a different God but not a foreign God. Before Moses, Joseph outspokenly gave testimony to faith in his God, in prison and publicly, in the court of Pharaoh. Moses’ family demonstrated a faith in the Hebrew God and I doubt that was uncommon for Israelites. In defying Pharaoh’s command to destroy male born sons, the midwives demonstrated a very strong sensitivity to Israel’s God. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to think religious ideas bled from and to both sides (Israel did construct a golden calf at Mt. Sinai) so Egypt clearly knew about Israel’s God.

Moses was a traitor but not in the cowardly sense of the word and I doubt it surprised Pharaoh. As you mentioned, he was raised in Pharaoh’s house and tradition indicates he was a great military leader. We can’t verify the tradition but even though the Exodus Pharaoh is not the one he deserted I’m sure he would have known something about him at least distantly. Moses was not the only “alien” trained in Pharaoh’s court. The Egyptians took in trainees from other cultures as a matter of course so Moses wasn’t alone.

Additionally, his dereliction on the one hand, was an act of faith on the other. I am sure that wasn’t lost on either Pharaoh. The God issue was a prevalent difference between Israelites and Egyptians. I think Pharaoh was surprised when Moses chose the Hebrew God over Egyptian prominence but he wasn’t unaware of the possibility. There is evidence in the story itself that Egyptians did cross over to the Hebrew side and Pharaoh’s counselors did recommend he acquiesce. So, was Moses really a traitor or did he make the unpopular but right choice?

Your comments do prompt an interesting thought about Pharaoh’s perspective. For him to agree with Moses on any level was tantamount to not only acknowledging Moses’ God but admitting His supremacy. Since ancient kings justified their right to rule by suggesting God ordained it or, more extremely, suggesting they were God in person, Moses’ demand was really an “in your face” sort of thing.

As to the external record, there is documentary evidence that extraordinary events took place in Egypt. That should be expected.

Regarding slavery, however, that is another issue. Slavery in the ancient world was very different to slavery in the modern world. It was normal, usual, customary, the smart thing to do, not out of the ordinary. It could be very humane or excessively barbaric but it was very normal. Every society had slaves.

Governments were built and economies sustained on the backs of those who did the menial tasks and they did those tasks primarily because they had no other options. It was forced labor. Nations regularly conquered other nations and proceeded to make them servant states, literally enslaving certain individuals or even groups and this is common knowledge despite the absence of documented evidence for the enslavement of any group. It “goes without saying” so to speak.

In the case of Israel, there were no bragging rights to be mentioned. Israel went to Egypt willingly and made respectable contributions to the economy without being conquered first. Their enslavement was a protective measure.

But slavery as a concept was not so clearly defined. It was a fact of life. Public consciousness had not been raised on the issue. It was the obvious thing to do not a political wart. No one considered it inhumane or a topic worth writing about.

Slave owners weren’t stupid and on occasions made good use of a slaves talents. Joseph became the top manager of Potiphar’s household – a powerful position but he was still a slave. What happened in Joseph’s case is well documented elsewhere in ancient history. Even Moses education and development may be interpreted in the same way. He was a formidable fighter evidenced by the fact that he killed an Egyptian single handedly and drove off an entire gang from the well his future father-in-law used, which may be reason he rose to military prominence. He also never married an Egyptian which in this case would have signaled a sure commitment to Egypt.

The Roman economy was squarely built on the contributions of slaves but also allowed slaves to earn freedom by using their special talents. Luke, in the NT was a medical doctor who earned freedom in this way. That isn’t to suggest they were entirely humane. I’m merely pointing out the difference between their perspective and ours on a particularly sensitive issue.

Here is the point. Writing about the maltreatment of servants was not a respected journalistic pursuit. It was not an issue. The fact that the Bible places any restriction at all on the ownership of slaves represents a break with the trend and a good one at that.

As to archeological discoveries, it is overstating the effort to say “There is likely no place in the world that has been more thoroughly combed over by archeologists than Egypt.” The following quote puts the effort and the findings into perspective:

Archaeologist Edwin Yamauchi points out the limits of this science when he explains: (1) Little of what was made or written in antiquity survives to this day; (2) few of the ancient sites have been surveyed and a number have not even been found; (3) probably fewer than 2 percent of the known sites have been meaningfully excavated; (4) few of these have been more than scratched; and (5) only a fraction of the fraction that have been excavated have been published and data made available to the scholarly world (The Stones and the Scriptures, 1981, chapter 4).

You can find the article in which he was sited here.

Obviously, we don’t expect to find artifacts leaning against odd bits of stone and brush. Their survival over the last 3,000 plus years is due only to burial and by now they might be quite deep, considering the “sands of time” and all.

On top of that, there is also the fact that communication was not very advanced. No pens, paper, typewriters, publishing houses, newspapers, magazines, TV’s, telephones or internet. They did have ways of communicating quickly but there was no free speech so any official documents would have been highly censored. I believe there are oral traditions of the Exodus.

We can use archeological findings to cast doubt on a theory but not as conclusive proof for or against the biblical record.

As to Egyptian Israeli relations, maybe the tour guides didn’t mention it, then or now, but there is no question about the seething. Even recently, some have suggested Egypt is tooling up to mount an attack on Israel. Aside from discussing which side is right, the issue of tension between these two states and the history, both modern and ancient, that feeds it, to my knowledge, is not questionable.

As to Moses’ navigational abilities there is no problem with the text. The stated purpose for Israel was to become a great nation and the center for that development was Palestine not Egypt. As a statesman he did remarkably well. They had no real government to speak of but he handled many grievances. They had no infrastructure but became organized quickly. They were far more democratic than the monarchies that surrounded them and instructions in the biblical record indicate God endorsed the approach.