Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 8:08 PM, James Christian
<jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>wrote:

> OK. I think you're talking about this:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Israel_stela1.jpg
>
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Israel_stela1.jpg>Merneptah, as far as
> I
> know is dated as 13th century and not 12th century. In summary, here's the
> evidence have.
>

You should know better than to rely on wikipedia   ;-)

Seriously, your whole argument is based on a house of cards. Wikipedia
assumes that that house of cards is a foundation of stone, when in reality
it is no better than soft sand, at best. What it shows is that the field of
history has had the same corruption as was revealed about climate science in
the Climategate revelations. Wikipedia is just as much a victim of that,
largely because of its own policies.

In short, the field of ancient history has been taken over by a clique of
historians who believe that Manetho was basically accurate in his histories.
That is the position of Prof. Kitchen. They have taken over the peer
reviewed journals, choose who get allowed into universities as professors,
in short, who can be considered as a professional historian. If someone
challenges their conclusions, they sniff that the challenger is not a real
historian, because he didn’t publish in a peer reviewed journal. But because
they control the editorial boards of the peer reviewed journals, they refuse
the challengers’ papers because they challenge the status quo. (Notice the
circular argument?)

For six decades, people who have compared the official histories with
archeology, have noticed sharp discrepancies between the two. Some go as far
as accuse Manetho of taking advantage of the fact that pharaohs had multiple
names to list pharaohs, even dynasties, twice in order to pad the list, to
make Egyptian history older. Yet these challengers to historical orthodoxy
have been forced to publish in the popular press, and now online, because of
the censorship of the peer-reviewed system.

Already Sir Flanders Petrie found clear evidence of the Exodus, but he
didn’t recognize it because it was connected to the 12th and 13th dynasties,
supposedly long before the Biblical Exodus. By the time of the 18th dynasty
and the Amarna letters, we are dealing with post united Israel, where even
the remaining parts were far smaller than even what was controlled during
the times of the Judges. Further, neither was called “Israel”. So why should
we expect to find the name “Israel” in such late documents?



> … Still no mention of a kingdom of Isreal…4) Merneptah Stele talks about
> the Ysrir as a people in a fixed area but in
> a context which makes it clear that they are not nations… If
> we are to identify the Ysrir with Isreal they are still not large enough or
> settled enough in cities for them to be considered city states but a large
> semi permanent yet still nomadic group in the Canaan region.
>

Oh? Or could this refer to a people who had been removed from their land by
Nebuchadnezzar?


> 5) Mesha Stele (9th century) clearly relates a victory over 'Omri King of
> Isreal'. There is explicit reference to YHWH. A reconstruction of line 31
> could indicate a reference to a house of David. This is our first
> unambiguous reference to a nation of Isreal with a King and an unambiguous
> association with YHWH.
>

This stone is dated not by Manetho, but by its connection to the Bible.

>
> All in all the evidence looks like this. … No clear references
> to a nation of Isreal in the times of these Kings. … Finally, the deal is
> sealed with an explicit reference to a King
> of Isreal named Omri on a stone tablet from a neighbouring nation. …
>
> There seems to be no doubt in the data.


On the contrary, there’s plenty of reason to doubt the “data”. Much of it
was religiously generated to make Egypt appear older, hence a more mature
and honored society. It contradicts much of what has been found through
archeology throughout the Mid-East.


> We are seeing signs in the data of
> growth of a Shashu people associated with a god Yhw from the time of
> Amenophis III to a clear witness of a Kingdom of Isreal with a King about 4
> centuries later. This data fits well with the chronology and related events
> we can glean from the Torah, Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings. A nomadic
> people introduce Yhw to Egypt, leave Egypt, start causing trouble in
> Canaan,
> grow in size in Canaan but don't really become a Kingdom as such straight
> away and then years later become a fully established Kingdom known by its
> neighbours as being associated with the god Yhwh.
>

Let’s contrast that with the picture from archeology. Though the surviving
Egyptian records don’t mention when they arrived, by the 12th dynasty, there
were swarms of “Asiatic” slaves, many with recognizably Hebrew names,
throughout Egypt. Then during the 13th dynasty, they left suddenly, so
suddenly that some men neglected to take their tools and some women,
surprisingly, forgot their jewelry. Further, before they left, they had had
a surprising infant mortality rate, specifically of infants between the ages
of 2–4 months, as shown by burials below the slaves’ houses.

Within a couple of years after those slaves left, the Hyksos were able to
invade and take over Egypt “without a battle”.

About the same time, a rich and powerful Canaanite culture was suddenly
destroyed. The walls of Jericho fell down and the city burned after such a
short siege that the granaries were still full. The city of Ai was so
thoroughly destroyed that we are not even sure where it was. Most of the
other cities were either abandoned or continued on as relative villages with
far less material wealth and a recognizably different culture.

Egyptian records don’t mention much about this period of history, as they
were under the heel of the Hyksos. Even after the Hyksos were expelled, it
took a while before they were able to assert authority outside of Egypt
itself.

These are just the broad outlines of just some of what archeology shows us.
When we get to finer grained details, we find even more discrepancies. While
I have read about some of those, I have not studied them in depth.

I think the above is sufficient to show that the Hyksos invaded about 1445
BC, that the big and powerful city of Jericho was destroyed about 1400 BC,
and many other redatings of historical data. Then the archeology fits the
Bible almost perfectly.

>
> James Christian
>

Given the sorry state of scholarship, as clearly demonstrated by
Climategate, but known indirectly in other scholarly areas, can we trust
those dates propagated in the official histories?

Karl W. Randolph.