Originally Posted by Atheos

It's already been mentioned that the book of Exodus is the only evidence of any mass exodus of over 2 million slaves from Egypt. If one is going to accept that the Exodus account is true in spite of the incredible dearth of supporting evidence then any intellectually honest assesment of the economic impact of that event must account for the impact of the entire Exodus account, not just the part where the slaves actually leave.

It strains the limits of credibility to imagine that that many people could have evacuated the area and traveled in the desert for 40 years without leaving copious evidence of their journey. The fact that there is absolutely no evidence is signifigant and cannot be dismissed with a brush of an apologetic hand.

But if the exodus itself would have had major economic impact, the events surrounding the exodus would have left even more severe economic impact.

In the first "plague", all the water in Egypt was turned into blood. According to the Exodus account this even included water that was stored separately in wood or stone vessels. All the fish in the Nile river were destroyed. Interestingly, Pharoah's magicians were able to do this trick as well although it is unclear where they would have obtained water to turn to blood if all the water had been turned to blood already. This event alone would have left a major economic impact on the entire area. Drinking water would have skyrocketed in value and it would be decades before the natural ecosystem of the Nile River was restored so fishing could resume.

While "Frogs", "Lice" and "Flies" wouldn't have necessarily caused the sort of economic impact that the first plague caused they would certainly have been noticed if at the magnitude suggested by the story.

But the next plague, which destroyed all the livestock of the Egyptians (cattle, horses, asses, camels, oxen, sheep) would have had tremendous impact. Now they had neither fish nor meat to eat. It's difficult to imagine the amount of commerce that would have arisen as surrounding countries bartered lucratively with Egypt to replenish their livestock. But once again there is not even a single scrap of evidence that this massive shipping of livestock occurred.

The next plague, "boils and blains" supposedly stopped the entire commerce of Egypt as every egyptian was completely debilitated with boils and blains. Even the magicians couldn't stand up. How long this lasted and how much work stoppage occurred as a result is a mystery. But what's more of a mystery is, if every Egyptian was in this condition, what was to stop the Israelites from just going ahead and taking their leave then and there? Not one Egyptian soldier would have been in a position to attempt to crawl in front of them and block their path. But Pharoah said, "No", and I guess some folks just wanted to hear "Yes, and I really, really, really mean it this time".

Interestingly enough, in the next plague (fiery hail) all the cattle of Egypt get killed again. But this time all the plants were destroyed as well. It's understandable why the Israelites would worship a cow later as the cows seemed to have the uncanny ability to come back from being completely destroyed at least three times during the 10 plagues. But the economic impact of every fish, every piece of livestock and every crop in the field being destroyed would begin to add up. At least one would think so.

But the wheat and the rye wasn't destroyed in the plague of fiery hail (which seems peculiar as fire consumes plants whether they're shoots or bearing fruit). Just to be thorough, a plague of locusts is sent and the locusts finish all the rest of the crops off. Not so much as a blade of grass is left. Even assuming some cows remained after the second time they were all destroyed, what would they pasture them on?

But wait! The final plague, "death of the firstborn" once again involves all the firstborn of the Egypt (including Egyptian cattle) dying. Those pesky cows. You try murrain. You try fiery hail. Seems nothing you try will get rid of the damn things.

So, after losing all their fish, all their livestock, all their crops, no telling how many days of labor for "boils and blains" leave, the Egyptians now lose 2 million slaves. But wait, that's not all! If you act now we'll throw in 600 "Chosen" chariots, all the rest of the chariots of Egypt, captians for all the chariots, horses and the entire Egyptian army! And we'll toss the lot of them into the Red (or Reed?) sea!

Call me crazy, but I can't help thinking there would be abundant archaeological evidence that would be easy to uncover using modern methods of the entire egyptian army's demise in the Red Sea. Not to mention the incredible economic impact that would be suffered by Egypt as invading marauders came in to rape, pillage and plunder everything of value, knowing there was no army there to repel them.

Unless, of course, none of this ever actually happened.

Which it didn't.

Originally Posted by Atheos

It's already been mentioned that the book of Exodus is the only evidence of any mass exodus of over 2 million slaves from Egypt. If one is going to accept that the Exodus account is true in spite of the incredible dearth of supporting evidence then any intellectually honest assesment of the economic impact of that event must account for the impact of the entire Exodus account, not just the part where the slaves actually leave.

It strains the limits of credibility to imagine that that many people could have evacuated the area and traveled in the desert for 40 years without leaving copious evidence of their journey. The fact that there is absolutely no evidence is signifigant and cannot be dismissed with a brush of an apologetic hand.

But if the exodus itself would have had major economic impact, the events surrounding the exodus would have left even more severe economic impact.

In the first "plague", all the water in Egypt was turned into blood. According to the Exodus account this even included water that was stored separately in wood or stone vessels. All the fish in the Nile river were destroyed. Interestingly, Pharoah's magicians were able to do this trick as well although it is unclear where they would have obtained water to turn to blood if all the water had been turned to blood already. This event alone would have left a major economic impact on the entire area. Drinking water would have skyrocketed in value and it would be decades before the natural ecosystem of the Nile River was restored so fishing could resume.

While "Frogs", "Lice" and "Flies" wouldn't have necessarily caused the sort of economic impact that the first plague caused they would certainly have been noticed if at the magnitude suggested by the story.

But the next plague, which destroyed all the livestock of the Egyptians (cattle, horses, asses, camels, oxen, sheep) would have had tremendous impact. Now they had neither fish nor meat to eat. It's difficult to imagine the amount of commerce that would have arisen as surrounding countries bartered lucratively with Egypt to replenish their livestock. But once again there is not even a single scrap of evidence that this massive shipping of livestock occurred.

The next plague, "boils and blains" supposedly stopped the entire commerce of Egypt as every egyptian was completely debilitated with boils and blains. Even the magicians couldn't stand up. How long this lasted and how much work stoppage occurred as a result is a mystery. But what's more of a mystery is, if every Egyptian was in this condition, what was to stop the Israelites from just going ahead and taking their leave then and there? Not one Egyptian soldier would have been in a position to attempt to crawl in front of them and block their path. But Pharoah said, "No", and I guess some folks just wanted to hear "Yes, and I really, really, really mean it this time".

Interestingly enough, in the next plague (fiery hail) all the cattle of Egypt get killed again. But this time all the plants were destroyed as well. It's understandable why the Israelites would worship a cow later as the cows seemed to have the uncanny ability to come back from being completely destroyed at least three times during the 10 plagues. But the economic impact of every fish, every piece of livestock and every crop in the field being destroyed would begin to add up. At least one would think so.

But the wheat and the rye wasn't destroyed in the plague of fiery hail (which seems peculiar as fire consumes plants whether they're shoots or bearing fruit). Just to be thorough, a plague of locusts is sent and the locusts finish all the rest of the crops off. Not so much as a blade of grass is left. Even assuming some cows remained after the second time they were all destroyed, what would they pasture them on?

But wait! The final plague, "death of the firstborn" once again involves all the firstborn of the Egypt (including Egyptian cattle) dying. Those pesky cows. You try murrain. You try fiery hail. Seems nothing you try will get rid of the damn things.

So, after losing all their fish, all their livestock, all their crops, no telling how many days of labor for "boils and blains" leave, the Egyptians now lose 2 million slaves. But wait, that's not all! If you act now we'll throw in 600 "Chosen" chariots, all the rest of the chariots of Egypt, captians for all the chariots, horses and the entire Egyptian army! And we'll toss the lot of them into the Red (or Reed?) sea!

Call me crazy, but I can't help thinking there would be abundant archaeological evidence that would be easy to uncover using modern methods of the entire egyptian army's demise in the Red Sea. Not to mention the incredible economic impact that would be suffered by Egypt as invading marauders came in to rape, pillage and plunder everything of value, knowing there was no army there to repel them.

Unless, of course, none of this ever actually happened.

Which it didn't.

Originally Posted by anders

Unfortunately, the Red/Reed confusion isn't a very good argument against the Exodus; already the Septuagint writes thalassan eruthran 'Red Sea', or similar, obviously not depending on English. This mentioning is in its turn criticized as perhaps referring to a name, not the colour etc.

Originally Posted by Garabato

Nice post Atheos, but it would be much better if you explained us what kind of evidence we should expect if the exodus story was true. Specific items please; forgive my ignorance, but is there any kind of papyrus or whatever thing the Egyptians used to keep track of their economical issues?

Nevertheless, I agree that something like the ten plagues would really represent a massive impact on any country. And its clear that a society with no ruler, no food, no water, no army, and no laborwork ( plenty of missing slaves, death and sick people) would probably collapse within a few weeks.... but I still feel like its a weak thesis unless someone shows what evidence we should expect if the bible was an accurate description of events.

Originally Posted by DrZoidberg

He did. He said any evidence. Regarding the plagues. Is there any evidence for Egypts entire economy collapsing over and over again? We can compare it to similarly destructive disasters to strike other empires, like the Harappan empire. It destroyed the empire. Since Egypt didn't collapse, but survived from one of these instances, I'd say that's ample proof it didn't happen exactly as described.