Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yahale Yadede <yadede AT sbcglobal.net>]

Abdi-Heba could have conceivably sent 5,000 some
people to Egypt, not in the ordinary sense of sending
people, but if this was an evacuation of much or all
of the population of Jerusalem, fleeing enemy forces.
Perhaps a term like 'porter' would reflect that in
Egypt they were reduced to some kind of servitude in
exchange for refuge.

One reason for some hesitation about putting great
emphasis on the Amarna writings is that this reflects
events going on in a fairly limited period of time, if
I recall correctly someone wrote here that it covered
seventeen years. Could developments connected to, say,
all the Patriarchs, the Exodus from Egypt, this, that
and the other, all come out of such a fairly short
period of time? So i think that the Amarna letters are
incredibly valuable but we can't answer all enigmas
from ancient times through them.

If fear of the Hittites was such a key consideration,
how do we, or Mr. Stinehart, explain the emphasis on
proper or even close ties with Hittites, as indicated
in the accounts of Abraham's purchase of the Machpela
cave from Ephron the Hittite?

                       Yahale 
 
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2007 13:13:05 EST
> From: JimStinehart AT aol.com
> Subject: [b-hebrew] Amarna Letters Once Again
> To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
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> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Kenneth Greifer:
>  
> You wrote:  ?It sounds like you are saying that the
> patriarchal narratives 
> are a falsified version of Egyptian history that you
> think is truly explained in 
> the Amarna letters. I read some of the letters and
> the patriarchal stories, 
> and it is obvious that you don't mind saying the
> writer of the patriarchal 
> narratives is a liar telling a bunch of lies with
> only a few vaguely similar 
> themes in the stories. You have the right to believe
> that, but I don't feel 
> convinced that the similarities are enough to make
> up for all of the differences that 
> have to be explained as lies by the author of the
> patriarchal narratives.  
> Why don't you ever say the patriarchal narratives
> are full of lies? You keep 
> saying how great they are, but then you seem to show
> that they are also false. Am 
> I misunderstanding what you are saying??
>  
> How could you possibly misunderstand my view of the
> Patriarchal narratives 
> like that?
>  
> Consider the Decapitation of the Shechem Offensive.
>  
> The Wellhausen Documentary Hypothesis holds that the
> Decapitation of the 
> Shechem Offensive is a totally fictional event, that
> was dreamed up by one of four 
> Hebrew authors in the mid-1st millennium BCE.
>  
> My view, on the contrary, is that chapter 34 of
> Genesis is closely based on 
> the historical Decapitation of the Shechem Offensive
> in the secular history of 
> the mid-14th century BCE.  The Patriarchal
> narratives are not ?full of lies?. 
>  On the contrary, the Patriarchal narratives are
> very closely based on what 
> actually happened in secular history in the
> historical Patriarchal Age, which 
> in my view was the mid-14th century BCE.
>  
> In secular history, the first Hebrews probably did
> get a tempting offer from 
> the sons of the leader of Shechem.  The landless,
> tent-dwelling Hebrews were 
> probably promised, as many other tent-dwelling
> habiru certainly were, the 
> possibility of being able to become landowners in
> the future, if they would only 
> help the men of Shechem take over central Canaan
> now.  That is not a ?lie?.  
> That is actual secular history.  In the Amarna
> Letters, the leader of Shechem 
> has to make the lame claim to Akhenaten that the
> leader of Shechem supposedly 
> did not know that any of this was going on, that is,
> that he supposedly did not 
> know that his sons were trying to recruit the
> landless tent-dwelling habiru 
> and Hebrews to help Shechem take over central
> Canaan:  ?I did not know that my 
> son was consorting with the habiru.?
>  
> The Patriarchal narratives are not ?false?.  Rather,
> in this instance they 
> accurately portray the tempting offer that the first
> Hebrews historically 
> received from the city-state of Shechem in the
> mid-14th century BCE.  The Hebrews, 
> to their great credit, refused to become
> second-class citizens of Shechem, and 
> certain of Akhenaten?s allies unilaterally killed
> the leader of Shechem, 
> thereby ending the threat that the Hebrews would
> become dominated by the 
> city-state of Shechem.
>  
> Are you complaining because I do not see Jacob?s
> sons Simeon and Levi as 
> literally, in secular history, killing the men of
> Shechem?  What I can say on that 
> score is that historically, the Hebrews supported
> the historical Decapitation 
> of the Shechem Offensive, and the Decapitation of
> the Shechem Offensive is an 
> historical event from the mid-14th century BCE,
> rather than being fiction 
> dreamed up in the mid-1st millennium BCE.
>  
> I myself see a tremendous amount of secular
> historical accuracy in the 
> Patriarchal narratives.  But the author has
> brilliantly used artistic license to 
> weave these historical events into a mesmerizing
> storyline, where actions 
> actually taken by Gentiles in secular history are
> often attributed to the early 
> Hebrews.  I do not see the author of the Patriarchal
> narratives as passively 
> recording what literally happened in secular
> history.  But he is not telling ?lies?
> .  No, he is weaving these actual historical events
> from the mid-14th century 
> BCE into what became the magnificent founding
> document of the Hebrews.  The 
> author of the Patriarchal narratives was desperate
> to save Canaan and the new 
> Hebrews from being wiped out in a possible invasion
> of Canaan by the dreaded 
> Hittites.
>  
> All of my posts come from this same perspective.  I
> see the Patriarchal 
> narratives as being composed in the mid-14th century
> BCE, by the first historical 
> Hebrew, and as being closely based on the traumatic
> events that historically 
> affected the first Hebrews in that time period.
>  
> I do not view the Patriarchal narratives as being ?a
> falsified version of 
> Egyptian history?, as you allege.  Rather, I view
> the Patriarchal narratives as 
> closely reflecting the dramatic historical incidents
> that threatened to wipe 
> out the first Hebrews in the mid-14th century BCE. 
> It?s all told from a Hebrew 
> perspective, with a Hebrew mindset, and for the
> purpose of securing a goal 
> desperately needed by the first Hebrews.  The strong
> Egyptian connection that is 
> there is simply that the first Hebrews historically
> needed 
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