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The Old Testament as History
Part 3


Rex Banks



The Conventional Chronology

Israelites in Egypt?

Joseph's Tomb?

The Exodus.

Balaam.

Jericho.


The Conventional Chronology

From Genesis chapter 37 many of the events described take place in Egypt, as Jacob and his sons are providentially brought into that land to grow into a great nation. (Gen. 45:7; 46:3; 50:20) In order to appreciate the contribution of archaeology to the study of Scripture, we need at this point to say something more about a topic which we touched upon in our Introduction, namely the matter of chronology. There we pointed out that the so-called "conventional chronology" of Egypt grew out of certain assumptions made by J.F. Champollion, the "father of Egyptology" in the 19th century. We also emphasised that the great importance of this chronology becomes evident when it is understood that it has been used to date the archaeology of other countries around the Mediterranean. Clearly then any inaccuracy in the "conventional chronology" will have far- reaching implications for the study of ancient history, and because of this it is important to be aware of the fact that in recent years more and more archaeologists have argued that the "conventional chronology" is seriously flawed and must be revised. These ancient historian revisionists are adamant that commitment to a demonstrably false historical reconstruction has created problems for the study of many ancient civilisations, and that the"conventional chronology" must be abandoned.

Now these revisionists differ among themselves about just how to correct the "conventional chronology," but they are united in the conviction that a correction must be made, and this is extremely significant for the field of biblical archaeology. In a nutshell the situation is this: if the "conventional chronology" is set aside it is possible to suggest a number of correspondences between the biblical record and archaeological findings which are not possibilities otherwise. In a word, if the rigid time line of the "conventional chronology" is not permitted to impose a straitjacket upon the interpretation of certain historical facts, it becomes easier to interpret those facts in light of events recorded in the books of Genesis, Exodus, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings and Chronicles. It becomes easier to place the early period of the nation of Israel in an historical context, and our appreciation of the Bible as an historically accurate document is enhanced. Not only is some kind of revision very welcome to the student of Scripture, but it also solves some real problems for archaeology in general.

Briefly, the question of Egyptian chronology is important because archaeological evidence of Egypt is much greater than that of any other contemporary civilisation, and for this reason the chronology of Egypt has become the basis upon which the chronology of other civilisations for certain periods has been worked out. Now clearly this process of coordinating various chronologies depends upon finding matches between events in the histories of the civilisations in question, and this brings us to the crux of the problem. The Assyrian sack of Thebes in 664 B.C. is one point at which Egyptian history can be confidently tied to that of her neighbours and fortunately the date of this event is not in question. However problems arise with the attempt to match an event recorded in the Bible with a corresponding event in Egyptian history. In 1 Kings 14:25, 26 we read the following:

"Now it came about in the fifth year of King Rehoboam, that Shishak the King of Egypt came up against Jerusalem. And he took away the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the King's house, and he took every-thing, even taking all the shields of gold which Solomon had made." (cf. 2 Chron. 12)

Now the 19th century archaeologist Champollion concluded that the biblical Shishak was a pharaoh of the Egyptian 22nd dynasty named Sheshonq. Champollion believed that he had found reference to "Judah the Kingdom" in an Egyptian record of this pharaoh's conquests. Later it was discovered that Champollion had incorrectly translated the hieroglyphs at this point. However the identification of the biblical Shishak with Sheshonq was not overturned, and became the cornerstone of the "conventional chronology." Since it seemed apparent that Rehoboam reigned between about 925 and 932 B.C. the conclusion was drawn that Shoshenk 1 of Egypt also reigned at this time. In turn, using the supposed date of Shoshenk's reign as a guide, archaeological material from Egypt was used to work out the dates of other dynasties, periods and reigns, and it was concluded that Rameses 2nd was the pharaoh at the time of the oppression of the Israelites in Egypt. Clearly then this identification of the biblical Shishak with Sheshonq was a crucial matter.

However many today are convinced that this identification was incorrect. They point out that according to the biblical record, Shishak "captured the fortified cities of Judah (i.e. the southern kingdom) and came as far as Jerusalem" (2 Chron. 12:4) removing the treasures of the temple and of the King's house. However according to the Egyptian inscription, with but one exception, Shoshenk attacked the cities of the northern Kingdom of Israel. The biblical Shishak is not said to have plundered the northern Kingdom. Also significant is the fact that before becoming ruler of the northern Kingdom, Jeroboam fled to Egypt for protection from Shishak against Solomon. What's more, according to the Septuagint, the Egyptian king "gave to Jeroboam, Ano the eldest sister of Thekemina his wife to be his wife". (3 Kings 12:24)

It seems unlikely that this one-time protector of Jeroboam who has gone out of the way to forge bonds of friendship with him by way of a marriage arrangement would subsequently attack him while carefully avoiding invading the territory of Solomon's son Rehoboam.

For these and other reasons the revisionists deny the Shishak-Sheshonq identification, although there is no general agreement as to the identity of Shishak. To my knowledge some identify him as Rameses 2nd , 3rd or 4th, others as Tuthmoses 3rd, while still others believe that he was an Egyptian King who lived sometime before Tuthmoses 3rd or after Rameses 3rd. Those who would like to investigate this further will find a great deal of challenging material in A Test of Time, by David Rohl and Centuries of Darkness (principal author Peter James). Rohl believes that Shishak is Rameses 2nd and James identified him as Rameses 3rd.

Now predictably opposition to the revisionists has been intense, and the arguments and counter arguments of the scholars are not easy to follow for those us who lack specialist knowledge. Hopefully further investigation will resolve some issues, but the real point is this: in the past, certain events and situations which harmonise well with the scriptural record, were not recognised as evidence of the Bible's historicity because, according to the "conventional chronology" these events and situations occurred at the wrong time. Recognition that this chronology is not set in concrete has enabled us to reassess the evidence, and the Bible has been the winner. In the following paragraphs we will consider some of this evidence.


Israelites in Egypt?

"And they took their livestock and their property, which they had acquired in the land of Canaan, and came to Egypt, Jacob and all his descendants with him." (Gen. 46:6)

Settling in the "land of Goshen" (Gen. 47:1-11) this group of about 70 people "were fruitful and increased greatly, and multiplied, and became exceedingly mighty, so that the land was filled with them." (Ex. 1:7) Although Jacob and his family were initially welcomed by the pharaoh of Joseph's time (Gen. 47:5, 6) their descendants were perceived as a threat by a later King of Egypt, who used them as slave labour to build "storage cities, Pithom and Rameses". (Ex. 1:11)

Is there any extra-biblical evidence for the presence of Semites in Egypt at the appropriate time?

Under the heading Avaris we have in the following in Britannica:

"(A)lso called Pi Ramesse, biblical Raamses, modern Qantr, Khat'na, or Tall Ad-daba'a... Situated in the northeastern delta about 62 miles (100 km) northeast of Cairo, the city lay in ancient times on the Bubastite branch of the Nile."

David Rohl tells us the city of Avaris (biblical Rameses) was located by Manfred Bietak of the Austrian Institute of Egyptology in the 1960's and that Bietak made the "startling discovery" that most of the tombs which were excavated were of Asaitic origin. It turns out that the "people who had populated the sprawling city of Avaris originated from Palestine and Syria!" Rohl tells us that "Bietak has identified eleven main levels of occupation (during this period of Asiatic occupation) ....indicating a considerable time interval between the arrival and departure of the foreigners." He also tells us that an anthropological analysis of the skeletal remains showed that "more adult women were buried in the settlement than adult men" and that "there was a higher percentage of infant burials...than is normally found at archaeological sites of the ancient world." Clearly this is consistent with the biblical account, where we read of the Egyptian king's edict that male children born to the Israelites be put to death. (Ex. 1:15 ff)

Also consistent with the biblical account is information gleaned from a papyrus roll (Brooklyb 35.1446) which contains the names of ninety five slaves/servants. Rohl tells us that "over fifty per cent of the ninety-five names are Semitic in origin" and that a number are biblical names. He adds: "The great American philologist William Foxwell Albright long ago recognised that the names of these Asiatic people belong to the north west semitic language group which includes biblical Hebrew." (emphasis mine) Rohl tells us that Bietak discovered shallow burial pits all over the city of Avaris containing the remains of victims of some terrible disaster. He adds:

"What is more, analysis of the site...suggests that the remaining population of the town abandoned their homes and departed from Avaris en masse." Clearly such an abrupt departure harmonises with the biblical account of the Exodus under Moses."

Rohl argues that it is only because of his new chronology that he has been able to identify the discoveries at Avaris with the biblical account of the Israelite sojourn in Egypt. However others who do not accept his chronology have also made this connection. Certainly in light of Scripture Bietak's findings at Avaris are exactly what we would expect.


Joseph's Tomb?

The story of Joseph's rise to power in Egypt after having been sold into slavery by his brothers is one of the most memorable in Scripture, and David Rohl is convinced that Bietak's work at Avaris has uncovered evidence of Joseph's presence there. Briefly the facts are these: in 1987 Bietak uncovered the largest sepulchre so far found at Avaris, and this funerary monument appears to be one of the earliest at the site; the tomb was empty and "all the signs pointed to a careful clearance of the vault rather than the usual ransacking;" the remains of a twice-size statue reveal that the owner of the tomb held high office but was a foreigner; the head of the statue was badly damaged, the nose having been smashed off, the eyes having been gouged out, and an attempt having been made to cleave it in two. (See a picture of the reconstructed statue at <http://www.knowledge.co.uk/xxx/cat/rohl/joseph.htm>. [Reconstructing the Joseph Cult Statue]) Rohl is convinced that Bietak has uncovered the tomb of Joseph.

At present here is just not enough information available to decide the matter, but Rohl's suggestion is intriguing. It does seem evident that Joseph had a residence in the land of Goshen (Gen. 45:10; 50:22) and of course if this is the case he would have been among the earliest Semites living at the site. Too, Joseph held high office among the Egyptians and he was a foreigner. His body was removed from his tomb at the time of the Exodus. Furthermore the plagues upon Egypt would have brought great suffering upon the land, and it would be quite understandable if the statue of a venerated Israelite became the object of vandalism by those left in the land. Perhaps future work at the site will decide this question.


The Exodus

It would be difficult to exaggerate the historical and theological importance of the Israelite departure from Egypt under Moses recorded in the second book of the Bible, and this alone is enough to explain why controversy surrounds virtually every detail of the biblical record at this point. Many insist that the Exodus never took place. Some believe that the account of this incident in Scripture represents a distorted memory of another event, namely the expulsion from Egypt of foreign rulers known as the Hyksos. Even among those who accept the scriptural record as it stands and who are guided by chronological notes in the Bible, (e.g. the fourth year of Solomon's reign was the 480th year after the Exodus [1 Kings 6:1]) differing interpretations have resulted in a diversity of opinion concerning the date of the Exodus. I hope to discuss some of these questions in a separate article, but we can at least touch upon some matters which have a bearing upon the historicity of the Exodus from Egypt.

First of all let's keep in mind the discoveries at Avaris (biblical Rameses). We recall that (1) Avaris had been populated by people from the region of Palestine and Syria, (2) that a considerable period of time elapsed between the arrival and the departure of these foreigners, and (3) that the population abandoned the city en masse apparently after some disaster. Clearly evidence of such an abrupt departure harmonises well with the biblical account of the Exodus.

Then there is an intriguing fragment from the writings of Manetho which has been preserved for us by Josephus. Manetho was "an Egyptian priest who wrote a history of Egypt in Greek, probably for Ptolemy I (305-282)...(whose) work was based on good native sources". (Britannica) Josephus quotes from Manetho's account of certain events in the reign of Tutimaos:

"There was a king of ours whose name was Timaus. Under him it came to pass, I know not how, that God was averse to us, and there came, after a surprising manner, men of ignoble birth out of the eastern parts, and had boldness enough to make an expedition into our country, and with ease subdued it by force, yet without our hazarding a battle with them. So when they had gotten those that governed us under their power, they afterwards burnt down our cities, and demolished the temples of the gods, and used all the inhabitants after a most barbarous manner; nay, some they slew, and led their children and their wives into slavery." (Josephus Against Apion 1:14. Christian Classics Ethereal Library. [http://www.ccel.org/j/josephus/works/apion1.htm <[http://www.ccel.org/j/josephus/works/apion1.htm>])

Manetho does not here explain just how God was against Egypt, but his account suggests that some catastrophe occurred which enabled the foreigners to take the land without even a battle. Again this is consistent with the biblical record. We are told that when Pharaoh attempted to pursue Israel through the Red Sea "the waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen, even Pharaoh's entire army that had gone into the sea after them; not even one of them remained". (Ex. 14:28) Another early writer Theopilus, tells us that Manetho "charged Moses and the Hebrews who accompanied him with being banished from Egypt on account of leprosy." Later Theophilus adds: "So that Manetho has unwillingly declared to us, by his own writings, two particulars of the truth: first, avowing that they were shepherds; secondly, saying that they went out of the land of Egypt". (ibid) (Theophilus to Autolycus, Christian Classics Ethereal Library. [http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-02/anf02-43.htm#P2066_554206 <[http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-02/anf02-43.htm>])

Now Manetho was a third century B.C. Egyptian priest who had access to the historical records of his nation, and so clearly these records had preserved some kind of account of the events surrounding the Exodus. It is important to keep in mind that the fragments of Manetho's writings which have been preserved " have been of much service to scholars in confirming the succession of kings where the archaeological evidence was inconclusive, and (that) Manetho's division of the rulers of Egypt into 30 dynasties is still accepted". (Britannica) Thus his independent testimony is very valuable.


Balaam

A conversation with a talking donkey ensured that Balaam, the son of Beor would be a memorable Bible character (Num. 22:28) but a recent archaeological discovery has brought him to our attention in another context. We recall that the Israelites encountered Balaam, a pagan prophet during their wilderness wanderings, when Balak the Moabite king, fearing an invasion of his land, called upon Balaak to curse the Israelites. (Num. 22:5) In Numbers chpts 22-36 we have the account of the events in the plains of Moab.

In 1967 excavations at a site of an ancient Ammorite city known as Deir Alla uncovered an incomplete inscription which is of great interest to students of Scripture. According to archaeologist Andre Lemaire "The principal personage in the Deir Alla text is the seer Balaam, son of Beor, well known to us from the stories in Numbers". (Biblical Archaeology Review Sept-Oct 1985). The text contains the following:

"Inscription of Balaam, son of Beor, the man who was a seer of the gods. Lo, the gods came to him at night and spoke to him. According to these words, and they said to Balaam, son of Beor thus: 'There has appeared the last flame, a fire of chastisement has appeared!' And Balaam arose the next day and he could not eat and he wept intensely. And his people came to him and said to Balaam, son of Beor: 'Why do you fast and why do you weep?' And he said to them: 'Sit down! I shall show you how great is the calamity! And come, see the deeds of the gods!"

An online publication, Jerusalem Archaeological Review (Volume 10, Internet Edition [http://www.kccs.pe.kr/arch047.htm <[http://www.kccs.pe.kr/arch047.htm>] discusses the significance of this discovery in an article entitled Words of Biblical Prophet Found on Stone Tablets! We read that these tablets "reveal a completely independent account of the story of the Prophet Balaam. The perspective is not from the Israelites, but from those they conquered during their conquest of Caanan." We are told:

"The area in which the ancient fragments were found is known in the Bible as the Valley of Succoth. (Psalms 60:8, 108:89) It is not far from the Plains of Moab, the site of Balaam's encounter with the Israelites..."
"This momentous discovery," says the biblical historian, Prof. Ory Mazar, "seems to confirm the existence of the prophet Balaam, an epic figure of the Bible and a contemporary of Moses."

So the Deir Alla inscription takes its place alongside many other archaeological finds which provide independent confirmation of the biblical text.


The Final Stages of the Journey.

In Num 33:45-49 we have a description of the route which the Israelites took on their journey to Canaan. We read:

And they journeyed from Iyim, and encamped in Dibon-gad. And they journeyed from Dibon-gad, and encamped in Almon-diblathaim. And they journeyed from Almon-diblathaim, and encamped in the mountains of Abarim, before Nebo. And they journeyed from the mountains of Abarim, and encamped in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho. And they encamped by the Jordan, from Beth-jeshimoth even unto Abel-shittim in the plains of Moab.

Clearly the Bible is very specific here in its list of places along the final stage of the Exodus route, but unfortunately "this very specificity... has made it vulnerable to criticism from some scholars. Many of the places in question, they say, did not exist pig the Exodus is said to have occurred" (Biblical Archaeology Review, September-October 1994). However once again facts have proved to be stubborn things, and the article goes on to quote Charles Krahmalkov, a professor of ancient Near Eastern languages as follows:

"In short, the Biblical story of the invasion of Transjordan that set the stage for the conquest of all Palestine is told against a background that is historically accurate. The Israelite invasion route described in Numbers 33:45b-50 was in fact an official, heavily trafficked Egyptian road . . ."

Krahmalkov is justified in making this claim because he has been able to show from three ancient Egyptian maps that the biblical route involved four stations, namely Iyyin, Dibon, Abel, and Jordan. The confident claim that the Bible does not contain a true account of Israel's origin and history is becoming more and more difficult to sustain.


Jericho

In recent years various theories have been proposed to explain how Canaanite culture ended and how Israel came to obtain possession of so much of the land of Canaan (e.g. the "peaceful infiltration" theory, the "peasant revolt" theory). According to the Bible, in fulfilment of the divine promise made to the patriarchs, Israel took possession of the land following the Exodus from Egypt and following 40 years of wilderness wanderings. We are told that under Joshua, Israel engaged in a military conquest of the land. The fortress city of Jericho was the first to fall to Joshua, and the account of the city's destruction accompanied by trumpet blasts and collapsing walls is well known to all. According to Britannica, "Old Testament Jericho has been identified in the mound known as Tall As-Sultan (at the source of the copious spring 'As-Sultan) which rises 70 feet (21 m) above the surrounding plain. A number of major archaeological expeditions have worked at the site..."

Discoveries at the Jericho site by such well-known archaeologists as John Garstang and Kathleen Kenyon have given rise to decades of speculation, debate and controversy, and we will make a comment about the central issue in a moment. But first let's say a word about the biblical narrative in light of certain facts concerning the destruction of Jericho which archaeology has brought to light:

1) An article entitled Jericho's Walls Fell Down, which appears in Archaeological Diggings (Dec 1999/Jan 2000) has the following from Garstang's The Story of Jericho:

"The main defences of Jericho in the late Bronze Age...comprised two parallel walls, the outer six feet and the inner twelve feet thick. Investigations along the West side show continuous signs of destruction and conflagration. The outer wall suffered most, its remains falling down the slope. The inner wall is preserved only where it abuts the citadel, or tower to a height of 18 feet. Elsewhere it is found largely to have fallen, together with the remains of buildings upon it into the space between the walls which was filled with ruins and debris....the power that could dislodge hundreds of tons of masonry in the way described must have been superhuman. Earthquake is the one can only known agent capable of the demonstration of force indicated by the observed facts." (emphasis mine)

Of course the Bible also speaks of a great wall surrounded the city of Jericho and tells us that this wall "fell down flat, so that the people went up into the city, every man straight ahead, and they took the city". (Josh. 6:20; cf Heb. 11:30) Reference to the fact that the wall had "buildings upon it" reminds us that Rahab's house was "on the city wall". (Josh. 2:15)

2) From the same article we obtain the following quote from Garstang:

"Traces of intense fire are plain to see, including reddened masses of brick, cracked stones, charred timbers and ashes. Houses along the wall were found burnt to the ground, their roofs fallen upon the domestic pottery within."

According to be scriptural account "they burned the city with fire, and all that was in it". (Josh. 6:24)

3) In the course of summarising the findings of Bryant Wood with respect to the destruction of Jericho, Randall Price says "The destruction occurred at harvest time in the spring, as indicated by the large quantities of grain stored in the city". (emphasis mine) He draws our attention to the fact that according to Scripture, Jericho was destroyed at harvest time. (Josh. 3:15; 5:10)

4) Randall Price mentions two other conclusions drawn by Wood from the presence of great quantities of grain among the ruins. First the siege was short "since the grain stored in the city was not consumed" and second the grain was not plundered "as was usually the case in antiquity." Clearly this also harmonises well with the scriptural account which tells us that the city fell in a matter of days (Josh. 6:15, 20) and that the Israelites were forbidden to take items from the city because it was "under the ban". (Josh. 6:17, 18)

5) Finally we are told that Jericho lay abandoned for a long period of time following her destruction, a fact which reminds us of the oath which Joshua extracted from the people: "Cursed before the Lord is the man who rises up and builds this city Jericho; with the loss of his first - born he shall lay its foundation, and with the loss of his youngest son he shall set up its gates". (Josh. 6:20) It was not until the time of Ahab that the city was rebuilt. (1 Kings 16:34)

In light of all this, it appears that excavations at Jericho have once again supported the biblical narrative, and certainly this was Garstang's view as a result of his work at the site in the 1930's. Garstang dated the destruction of the city at about 1400 B.C., despite the fact that 1230-1220 B.C. was the more popular date. We recall that Scripture places the Exodus in the 480th year prior to the fourth year of Solomon's reign (1 Kings 6:1) which was likely sometime about 975, and so Gerstang's 1400 B.C. date certainly fits the biblical chronology.

However the work of Kathleen Kenyon in the 1950's changed the picture entirely. Kenyon concluded that the destruction took place in about 1550 B.C., and that no fortified city existed on the site in 1400 B.C. What's more she argued that a wall thought by Garstang to have been the one destroyed by Joshua, was in fact from a much earlier period.

Now the Jericho dating saga has gone on for decades and we cannot examine the issues here, but hopefully we were able to demonstrate earlier that dating techniques involving pottery, carbon decay, cross referencing and suchlike are not precise. For this reason it would be quite unreasonable to render a negative verdict upon the historical accuracy of Scripture simply because it fails to conform to a particular chronology. Rohl's new chronology is just one example of how a chronological adjustment reinstates the 1400 B.C. date for the conquest, and other proposals have been made by those who do not take Rohl's position but who accept the Biblical account. Without the constraints of fallible, man-devised chronologies, the archaeological data supporting the biblical account of the conquest of Canaan is impressive.

Archaeological Diggings magazine (April/May 99) carries an article entitled Where Did The Israelites Come From? containing the following quote from Kenyon's book Archaeology in the Holy Land:

"The final end of the Early Bronze Age civilisation came with catastrophic completeness. The last of the Early Bronze Age walls of Jericho was built in a great hurry, using old and broken bricks, and was probably not completed when it was destroyed by fire. Little or none of the town inside the walls has survived denudation, but it was probably completely destroyed, for all the finds show that there was an absolute break, and a new people took the place of the earlier inhabitants . Every town in Palestine that has so far been investigated shows the same break. The newcomers were nomads, not interested in town life, and they so completely drove out or absorbed the old population, perhaps already weakened and decadent, that all traces of the Early Bronze Age civilisation disappeared." (emphasis mine)

The article continues:

"An absolute break...a new people...every town in Palestine....newcomers were nomads...completely drove out or absorbed the old population".
"Could we expect to find a more apt description of the Israelite invasion, nomads from the desert who initially were not interested in living in the cities?" (emphasis mine)

The bottom line is that there is every reason to regard the archaeological evidence from Jericho as further confirmation of the historicity of the biblical account. Home|Contents