Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Charles David Isbell" <cisbell AT home.com>]

Dear Peter:

We have to stop meeting like this.

I think I now understand the significance which you attach to the
synchronization with a volcano.  For me, I must admit that a 17th century
date creates more problems with the biblical text than it solves.  But I see
the plan on which you are embarking.  I also share your concern that some,
perhaps lay rather than professional persons?, too quickly conclude that
"not history" equates to "never happened."  This is truly unfortunate.
Niels and I have shared many a private exchange on some of these points and
I am convinced that his position, properly and fully understood, does no
violence to the text and is not a nihilistic ["Niels-hilistic?"] conclusion.
What is often missed is what he wishes to say positively that he believes
the biblical text DOES mean and teach.  His understanding and mine are very
close on this point, even though we continue to differ on other matters.
Unless we run up against a "world is flat" fundamentalist mentality on the
one extreme or a "Bible is passe" mentality on the other extreme, the
historical questions in my mind are interesting but not crucial to an
understanding of the theological and paradigmatic role played by the story
in subsequent Judaism.  Thus, for example, I think the perception of YHWH as
the Deity who alone controls the elements ("other gods") of Egypt plays
particularly well in a Babylonian setting where the splendor of Babylonian
power and culture is so visibly a part of existence to a few miserable
captives from Judah.

Briefly, let me note  the following examples.  [1] Numbers 33:4 quite
clearly expresses the idea first expressed in Exodus 12:12,  that YHWH
executed judgment on the deities of Egypt.  [2] Wisdom of Solomon (chapters
11 and 15 in particular) identifies the reptiles and beetles that were
worshipped by the Egyptians as "the idols of the heathen" (15:15).  [3]
Shemot Rabbah teaches that the waters of the Nile were polluted as the first
plague because Pharaoh and the Egyptians worshiped the river as a deity.
[4] Rashi picks up this theme and notes that because the Egyptians worship
the Nile, "He [God] plagued their god [yir'atam] and after that He plagued
them".  {I have developed this idea in "YHWH and the Gods of Egypt," Journal
of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, Winter 1999, 67-80.}

B. W. Anderson spelled out quite a while ago the literary parallels in
Second Isaiah between the "original" exodus from Egypt and the "second"
exodus from Babylon.  Thus the paradigmatic FUNCTION of the exodus story in
all of later Judaism is for me the more significant issue than its
"historicity", provable or otherwise.

Kol Tuv again,
Charles

Short attempt at Jewish humor.  The great Rashi stands before the Holy One,
blessed be He, who is anxious to question the great exegete in person.
"Ha-Rav," asks God, "is your understanding of Exodus ontological,
teleological or epistemological?"  To which Rashi replies:  "Huh?"