A different way to look at the issue is to consider that
the OT in four separate locations assoicates the Isrealites
with a region of Egypt called "Rameses" which appears to be
located in the North-East corner of the delta (Gen 47:11,
Exd 12:37 Num 33:3, Num 33:5). " Rameses " is not
inconsistent with the city of "Pi-Rameses ", near "Pi-Thom".
Although it is not certain when Pi-Ramesses was built, it
was probably not built before Ramesses I (who was born in
the north eastern delta and died in 1290 BC) although it
may have been built by Seti I. If we take the OT at face
value and assume that "Rameses " is the same as "Pi-
Ramesses ", then according to Gen 47:11 Joseph settled in
Rameses no earlier than the mid 1200?s BC.
Of course this may be an anachronism. If it is assumed
that the author(s) of Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers were
writing many centuries after the fact, they may have used
the name of a region of Egypt that they and their readers
were familiar with, not knowing it was built after then
exodus.
All of this is assuming the actually was a battle of
Jericho. If for the moment that it is assumed that City IV
was in fact destroyed by fire as Kenyon argued, that does
not mean that it was destroyed by the Isrealites or that
the fire was the result of warfare. Both the cities of
Chicago and London were destroyed by fire that had nothing
to do with war. In 1908 most of San Fransisco was
destroyed by fires caused by an earthquake. If three
thousand years from now archeologists were to examine the
ruins of San Fransisco, they would find a layer of upended
foundations and carcoal. They might conclude that San
Fransisco was destroyed by invading isrealites.
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