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b-hebrew - Re[4]: Nomadic Scribes?

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  • From: Peter_Kirk AT SIL.ORG
  • To: b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu
  • Subject: Re[4]: Nomadic Scribes?
  • Date: Sun, 10 Jan 1999 00:47 -0500 (EST)



Dear Ian,

I don't think I or anyone else claimed on this list that Abraham
brought written documents from Harran or Ur. I would suggest that he
brought culture and oral traditions but not writing. Perhaps the first
literate Israelites were Ephraim and Manasseh, grandsons of the priest
of On. But then I thought writing in Egypt was not just a religious
thing, but was used also (in hieratic script) for "the mundane
purposes of administration" (quoting New Bible Dictionary), even if
the scribes were also nominally priests. If an Israelite called Moses
was indeed brought up at the Egyptian court, he would very likely have
learned to write on papyrus. If there was no papyrus available during
the wilderness wanderings, there were surely animal skins to write on,
and hours to spend just watching sheep which could also be used for
writing. After the conquest of Canaan, papyrus would have been
available again, either from the Jordan valley or imported from Egypt,
and indeed "strangely enough" we have evidence for this, a surviving
pre-exilic Hebrew papyrus as well as impressions of papyrus on the
backs of pre-exilic seals.

Of course it is hard to disprove to you theories that the Exodus
tradition was a post-exilic invention if you reject a priori the main
evidence to the contrary which is the Exodus narrative itself. Maybe
there was indeed a link between the Exodus and the expulsion of the
Hyksos, though I know there are dating problems with that. But then
are there contemporary accounts of the expulsion of the Hyksos? Or do
the arguments in the books you recommend assume (improbably) the
reliability of Manetho and Josephus while giving no weight to
documents such as Exodus?

Peter




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