Biblical Hebrew Forum

[James Christian <jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>]

On the contrary, just recently I am seeing that much of Egyptian history
seems to sustain the content of the separate historical narrative parts of
the Torah, Joshua and Judges.

As you have observed Israel occupied parts of Canaan for several hundred
years before they could be recognised by their neighbours as a kingdom
proper. And that seems to be precisely what we are seeing in the
contemporary inscriptions. Working backwards we have a concrete witness to
the Kingdom in the days of Omri. A possible witness to a King who cares for
the poor in the rough time of David. A witness to nomads we could identify
with Israel (Ysrir) occupying Canaan in the time of the Judges. Letters to
Egyptian kings complaining about nomadic skirmishes about the time of Joshua
(or just before). A reference to Yhw of the land of the Shashu which could
have been written either about the time the Hebrews would have been
occupying the fertile land of Goshen or have been a later addition to the
temple around the time of the Judges.

James Christian

2010/2/16 K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>

> James:
>
> You need to take the whole of Judges into account.
>
> What we see in Joshua is a quick conquest of Canaan. But it was a political
> conquest that did not drive out all the Canaanites, rather it just smashed
> their political cohesiveness and took over the cities. But what about all
> the people living outside of the cities in the farming villages? Joshua is
> silent on them, but Judges mentions that they were enslaved, not driven out
> or killed (chapters 1 & 2). Afterwards, Israel was repeatedly driven from
> the cities by invaders (did the invaders have help from the Canaanite
> slaves? the text is silent). Only under David was the kingdom finally fully
> secured with all the cities under permanent Israelite control.
>
> That would account for the archeological finds that the cities during this
> period were often abandoned or just small, insignificant towns (contrary to
> the tell Amarna letters). It also accounts for why the cities were often
> reconquered. It also accounts for why those cities that were dwelt were
> relative poor, lacking multi-generational wealth of long settlement.
>
> This is the message imparted by the text of Tanakh.
>
> If you believe, as I do, that Tanakh presents accurate history, then you
> must conclude that Egyptian history is all messed up. The contradictions
> are
> too striking.
>
> Karl W. Randolph.
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