Did Exodus Really Happen? Most likely NOT

Danbones
moses is a plagerizm

Well .. the 10 Commandments came from human sources. That's well established.
10 Commandments - Doctrine of Men
So the rest of the Moses story may indeed be a 'lifted' fabrication as well.
It's really unclear ...

Snarl
Why do people have to take the Bible literally? Can't people understand an allegorical text for what it is and move on? Most of the higher-ups in faith are fully aware of this ... and yet they preach this stuff like it really happened just-like-it-says. Sheesh!!

You might just walk away from the Bible understanding something if it wasn't jammed down your throat.

An allegory of what? How the heir apparent, perfectly situated to free his people from inside the system failed? And then shows back up 40 years later with a powerful god that literally kicks Egypt into a junk yard and forces Pharaoh to let His people go?

reply to post by FlyersFan
[more

The Bible says they were in Egypt for 430 years. It doesn't say they were slaves for 430 years. It says they were strangers in the land and by the time Moses came they had become slaves. But they weren't slaves the whole time. Simply read the story and it becomes super clear.

Yeah I clicked your link and saw a lot of religious Egyptian stuff, but I was wondering if you have a link to any of their slave records. I understand the Israelite may have never been slaves in Egypt but we know the Egyptians did have some slaves. We also know they kept excellent records of those slaves and their financial transactions when buying and selling the slaves.

So, I was hoping you have the link to whatever slave records we do have for the Egyptians?

To me it looks like christianity is a version of "diefication of the ( aryan, goth, sumerian ) pharoh" perpetrated by the secret societies which have thier roots in ancient egypt

ps
...and not for the benefit of sheepies

tinfoilman
I was hoping you have the link to whatever slave records we do have for the Egyptians?

Oh gee ... we'd have to scour the online records of universities and museums and such.
Honestly .. I'm just going to take the word of the scholars and archeologists.
I really don't feel like spending hours looking for them.



Hebrews were ALLEGEDLY slaves in Egypt ... no one knows how long they supposedly were.
Anywhere from 650 years to 215 years.

The LORD] said to Abram, "You must know that your offspring will be strangers in a land that is not theirs; [the inhabitants of that land] will enslave them and oppress them for 400 years." (Gen 15:13)

Jewish Daily

How long were the Hebrews supposedly slaves in Egypt?

More on Exodus - Numbers problems

According to Exodus 12:37-38, the Israelites numbered "about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children," plus many non-Israelites and livestock.[15] Numbers 1:46 gives a more precise total of 603,550 men aged 20 and up.[16] The 600,000, plus wives, children, the elderly, and the "mixed multitude" of non-Israelites would have numbered some 2 million people,[17] compared with an entire Egyptian population in 1250 BCE of around 3 to 3.5 million.[18] Marching ten abreast, and without accounting for livestock, they would have formed a line 150 miles long.[19]

No evidence has been found that indicates Egypt ever suffered such a demographic and economic catastrophe or that the Sinai desert ever hosted (or could have hosted) these millions of people and their herds.[20] Some scholars have rationalised these numbers into smaller figures, for example reading the Hebrew as "600 families" rather than 600,000 men, but all such solutions raise more problems than they solve.[21] The view of mainstream modern biblical scholarship is that the improbability of the Exodus story originates because it was written not as history, but to demonstrate God's purpose and deeds with his Chosen People, Israel.[3] Some have suggested that the 603,550 people delivered from Egypt (according to Numbers 1:46) is not a number, but a gematria (a code in which numbers represent letters or words) for bnei yisra'el kol rosh, "the children of Israel, every individual;"[22] while the number 600,000 symbolises the total destruction of the generation of Israel which left Egypt, none of whom lived to see the Promised Land

reply to post by FlyersFan

The earliest examples of written Hebrew date from the 10th century BCE

wiki.answers.com...

reply to post by Danbones

Yep ... 1000 BC .... and Exodus was MUCH earlier than that.
IF Moses and Exodus happened (which it doesn't look like it did as told in the bible)
then I'd imagine Moses, being well schooled in higher up Egyptian schools
would have written the 10 Commandments in Egyptian ....
And 9/10 of those commandments were taught in Egyptian schools already.
They were part of the Egyptian Book of the Dead as well as international law.
Both are things a high prince of Egypt would have been expected to know about.
So they were really nothing new ...

I rarely visit this forum but it should be interesting to see what happens to this discussion. Let's hope it doesn't get hijacked by ancient pyramid-building aliens...

I just finished re-reading Genesis in this form. What a — pardon me — revelation. Hairy people behaving badly in a generational soap opera dripping with jealously and betrayal, sex and violence. No wonder it's so popular.

reply to post by FlyersFan


But they weren't slaves the whole time. They were strangers in the land the whole the time, but not what you would call slaves according to our modern meaning of the phrase.

Exodus 1:7
7 but the Israelites were exceedingly FRUITFUL; they multiplied greatly, increased in numbers and became so numerous that the land was filled with them.

8 Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power in Egypt. 9 “Look,” he said to his people, “the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. 10 Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.”

As you see things went well for them for a while. You have to read the whole story and get the details.

As for the scholars. Well I know they say there's no record of the Israelite being slaves in Egypt but that's because while they kept records, they weren't great historical records really.

Like most cultures of that time the Egyptians kept mostly religious records and such like that. They didn't really keep slave records. Some slave owners had slave contracts, we found some of them, but we don't really have many of them and they didn't really say much but I am your slave and you are my master.

Just like the pyramids. We have no idea how they were built? Why not, the Egyptians kept such great records? Didn't they record how they built the pyramids? Well, maybe but we don't have much on that. We do know a lot about their God's Ra and Horus though and the Egyptian book of the dead though right?

That's because they kept great religious records and not much else. Not like how we keep records today where you can go down to the city building and get blueprints if you need them and what not. And they kept records of maybe wars they fought and stuff.

But when it comes to a record of slaves on file at the City Hall that kept track of which slaves were Israelite and which slaves were Egyptian? Well they never had anything like that. So, it's not like you can go down the list and be like look none of these slaves are Israelite! They just didn't keep those kind of records.

In other words the ancient Egyptians kept good records for the TIME, but considered to modern day record keeping it's not all that great and not the type of records one would need to prove or disprove anything about what type of slaves they had.

FlyersFan
reply to post by Danbones

 

Yep ... 1000 BC .... and Exodus was MUCH earlier than that.
IF Moses and Exodus happened (which it doesn't look like it did as told in the bible)
then I'd imagine Moses, being well schooled in higher up Egyptian schools
would have written the 10 Commandments in Egyptian ....
And 9/10 of those commandments were taught in Egyptian schools already.
They were part of the Egyptian Book of the Dead as well as international law.
Both are things a high prince of Egypt would have been expected to know about.
So they were really nothing new ...

He actually wouldn't have written it in Egyptian if he could help it. If he didn't know another language he would have made one up. The Exodus was all about leaving Egypt and their GODs behind. This is important to understand. The Egyptians believed their writing system was given to them by the god Thoth

Writing was a very related to your religion at the time. If they wished to go off and worship a different religion then changing or reverting back to another language was probably very high on their list of concerns. They wouldn't want to be writing their religion book about Yahweh in the Egyptian writing system that was supposedly created by an Egyptian god Thoth.

EDIT: Or whichever god they attributed to writing at the time anyway as their beliefs in different gods shifted around a bit over time.

Rosinitiate
I don't know, Im starting to thin that either Jews had the most atrocious bad luck a "people" can possibly have or has mastered the art of deception and actually created "playing the victim" role in early history.

So its either:

Their life is a drama with a beginning, a middle and noooooo #ing end.

Or

By way of deception thou shalt wage war.

*shrug*

It's not "bad luck". They are specifically targeted for a reason. The story is laid out in the Bible from Genesis to Revelations. I will give you the briefest summary I can. Mankind fell into sin after Adam and Eve. Right then God promised to send his seed (Jesus) through Adam's bloodline to save mankind. The forces against God have done everything possible to eliminate or corrupt the direct seed-line of Adam in order to make it impossible for God to fulfill his promise. The Jews are this bloodline.

i might be stirring up the pot a little, and i know many don't put much stock in this. i think that the hebrews were in egypt, just known by a different name.

Apiru, Habiru, Hebrews, are described to have many similarities with the hebrews.
the Apiru are mentioned in egyptian records.

they also are said to have come from Canaan, many that are mentioned by name, have the same names used by the isrealites. and were mercenaries, herders and framers at first, and then became slaves. if you read the bible you will see that abraham, and his people fought, and had herds, issac lived in a more peaceful time and dug wells. jacob and his brother esau were known to be great warriors. and herders.

there are many sources for this on the web, some pro some con.

i really think they should be considered.

reply to post by FlyersFan


imho
it's too late to convince the believers that it never happened
no matter how accurate the fact is (and supported with strong evidence)

even israel, prob, was just a made up name.
there was no israel in the past, just like there was no camelot, avalon, etc
bible are just a collection of folklore that worked as a time capsule for the teachings

peace.

reply to post by hounddoghowlie


Interesting if true. Can you provide sources for it?

tinfoilman
reply to post by FlyersFan
[more

So, I was hoping you have the link to whatever slave records we do have for the Egyptians?

edit on 6-11-2013 by tinfoilman because: (no reason given)

I found this discussion interesting and it made me go looking for systems of writing and sources of information. I ran across this link for a presentation by Shawki M. Farag, of The American University in Cairo: aaahq.org...
You might try to get in contact wih this person as he might be able lend some answers.

I think FlyersFan is correct, this would take more time to find through informational institutions, universities, museums and such. I'll trust that people did honorable research. Something to remember is that history is usually written by the victor and it is from that perspective that we must begin our search. It does seem odd that that amount of persons and an event of that magnitude would seemingly leave scarce evidence of it ever occurring. Perhaps the biblical portrayal skews the importance because it was a story of value for the followers. The importance to the Egyptians may not have been noteworthy.

The current population of the Sinai is about 500,000 under more modern conditions, I'm not sure how well a population of 600,000 to 2,000,000 would have done with a meandering leadership for 40 years in those conditions. We can't stand our own leaders and trust them for even a period of a year or two, sometimes less. Human nature is prickly that way. Perhaps Exodus is more about faith than truth.

jjkenobi

Rosinitiate
I don't know, Im starting to thin that either Jews had the most atrocious bad luck a "people" can possibly have or has mastered the art of deception and actually created "playing the victim" role in early history.

So its either:

Their life is a drama with a beginning, a middle and noooooo #ing end.

Or

By way of deception thou shalt wage war.

*shrug*

It's not "bad luck". They are specifically targeted for a reason. The story is laid out in the Bible from Genesis to Revelations. I will give you the briefest summary I can. Mankind fell into sin after Adam and Eve. Right then God promised to send his seed (Jesus) through Adam's bloodline to save mankind. The forces against God have done everything possible to eliminate or corrupt the direct seed-line of Adam in order to make it impossible for God to fulfill his promise. The Jews are this bloodline.

But Adam was the first man ever so we all should be of his bloodline

reply to post by tinfoilman

he would have made one up.

no offence but things like that we can't know, and so probably don't advance the arguement much.

Really it only takes ONE hole in the fabric to really badly effect the literal interpretation of the bible dogma, and then once thats gone, whats left of any interpretation of it?

ps
like what Brian G just observed above

You are, of course, free to believe what you wish. Thankfully however, what you believe to be true has NO bearing on what i believe to be true. I CHOOSE to believe that the Iberu people were in Mizriam, and that Moshe, called by Yahuwah,, led them out sometime after the Iburu people were tricked into slavery.

The documentation is there, IF you choose to believe. This video explains the path that the Iburu people took as they left Mizriam (Egypt) to Sinai.

Confirmation of the actual Exodus route has come from divers finding coral-encrusted bones and chariot remains in the Gulf of Aqaba . ONE of the most dramatic records of Divine intervention in history is the account of the Hebrews' exodus from Egypt The subsequent drowning of the entire Egyptian army in the Red Sea was not an insignificant event, and confirmation of this event is compelling evidence that the Biblical narrative is truly authentic. Over the years, many divers have searched the Gulf of Suez in vain for artifacts to verify the Biblical account. But carefully following the Biblical and historical records of the Exodus brings you to Nuweiba, a large beach in the Gulf of Aqaba , as Ron Wyatt discovered in 1978

reply to post by trumpet


It does seem odd that there would be no record of it at all. This is true. However, like I said, there is a record of it. In the Bible. Like I said what's more interesting is if it's not true, why would they write a "fake" history of themselves. Applying Occam's razor and all that? What the heck why didn't they just write down their real history?

So you could say, well maybe we just lost the Egyptian side of the story? But then people come in with this other myth, basically, that the Egyptians were such great record keepers, but they say it out of context. It's true in one way and not another.

What they imply is that there's some great list of Egyptian slaves with who bought them, who sold them, what country the slave was originally from and we go down that list and don't see any Israelite on it and see proof the Bible is wrong! But that's really misleading. We're missing the real story.

While the Egyptians were great "record" keepers you have to know what kind of record they kept. Just like every other culture at the time it was mostly religious junk about their gods and what wars they fought and their history but it was told through the view of their religion just like every other culture at the time.

For example, the Egyptians, the great record keepers, how did they invent their writing system? Well according to their "records" their writing system was passed down to them from the GOD Thoth. As we see, this is not an accurate historical document of where their writing system came from. This is a RELIGIOUS TEXT! That's the kind of records they kept.

This is why we know so much about Horus but don't know how to build a pyramid. Their religious stuff like every other culture at the time was deemed to be more important and so now we have no idea how to friggin build the pyramids, but we have a crap load of copies of the Egyptian Book of the Dead.

Pretty much the same thing with the slaves. We found a few slave contracts between master/servant and so forth but we don't have much. We know they had servants and slaves and we even know things like they got paid sometimes and went on strike sometimes, but just to figure this out researches had to research a but load of crap.

And that's about all we know. We don't know what country each individual slave came from, who their owners were, who sold them. We don't really have those sort of records. So there's not really anything there to disprove that they had some Israelite slaves because as far as I know the Egyptians didn't have a central slave registration authority.

We're just left to wonder why the Israelite wrote what they did and where they really came from. Sort of like how we're just left to wonder how they build the pyramids. Because both stories are mostly just religious texts and neither culture was really into the objective historian type of thing we do today when we record our history.

reply to post by occrest


Finding a chariot wheel and a human bone or two in the Red Sea isn't proof that the Hebrews crossed and that the Egyptian Army was wiped out. The fact is that if the Egyptian Army got wiped out in the Red Sea, then Egypt would have fallen to it's enemies. But instead, during that time and afterwards, there is no mention of a massive military loss like that and Egypt thrived militarily.