John Kesler

Larsguy47's source is the Bible:

Niall Armstrong

The arguments of the OP are pretty confusing. I’m not sure I’ve understood them correctly, so please correct me if I get something wrong! It seems, though, as if Lars is getting a bit ahead of himself, and should slow down and look more closely at the arguments.

Let’s try to look at the evidence presented regarding Rehov:
a) A C14 dating, of burnt grain from a grain store at Rehov, to 920 – 820 BCE (2 Sigma uncertainty; 905-845 BCE at 1 Sigma uncertainty. Rounding the dates up is standard practice, due to the uncertainties involved.)
b) A text (1 Kings 11:40; 14:25; 2 Chronicles 12:2-9, I forget which is prior) where an Egyptian pharaoh named Shishaq ravaged the countryside of Judea in the fifth year of Rehoboam’s reign (sometime around 921-917 BCE. There seems to be some disagreement about the date of Rehoboam’s reign.)
c) A monument erected by pharaoh Shoshenq in 925 (-3?) BCE (triumphal relief at Karnak?) which mentions the destruction (?) of Rehov. (some interpret the monument as listing the towns of Israel “liberated” from Rehoboam, as they all are in the north)
d) I’m uncertain where the dates “874-867 BCE” come from. They seem to be simply lifted from the maximum amplitude of the probability curve. If so, then we may safely disregard this point. The maximum amplitude of a single C14 dating is of minimal consequence. If, on the other hand, there is some other chronological theory (though not Rohl’s as this would se Shishaq as the 13th century Ramsess II) that suggests the later date for Shishaq’s campaign, it would be interesting to know.

(The anomaly between the dates given for Rehoboam and Shoshenq is a bit confusing, since they probably are based one on the other. But this is of no consequence for the discussion.)

Two things should be said about c14 dates, though:
Firstly, my experience with c14 dating is that one should treat it similarly as historical sources: one source is no source. Samples may be polluted (though I agree that the context at Rehov sounds pretty secure,) and you never know when you get that 1 out 20, way-off, statistical anomaly. It is preferable to have a series of c14 dates to back each other up, and correlate this with other dating evidence.
Secondly, c14 dating is pretty hopeless at exact dates. The science provides us with statistical ranges and probabilities. When it comes to gritty details like the year of a military campaign, c14 dating may tell us whether we’re in the ballpark or not, but seldom lets us choose between options few years apart (But the more C14 dates at hand, the greater chance we have of distinguishing between two choices.)

Even if several radiocarbon datings were performed, giving exactly the same range as the one presented, this would still not give us 874-867 BCE as the range for the burning of the grain store. In such a circumstance I would state confidently that the burning occurred within the 1 Sigma range (i.e. 905-845 BCE). Only if other relevant data suggested a narrower range would I go further than that.

This suggests at least three possibilities:
1) The Egyptian chronology is wrong. (I generally hold Egyptian chronology in high esteem, but there may be, for all I know problems with Shoshenq’s dates, beyond the two year margin alluded to above.) But a lot more than a single C14 date will be needed to upset the Egyptian chronology.
2) This grain store was not burnt by Shishaq’s army (Note that the inscription of Shoshenq is ambiguous as to whether Rehov was destroyed. Perhaps the destruction was done later by Judean forces?).
3) The single radiocarbon date is wrong, and the traditional interpretation still valid. (I expect the excavators don’t base their whole interpretation upon a single radiocarbon date. More information about the excavation would be nice.) As it stands, in the OP, the discrepancy between the C14 date range (at 2 Sigma) and the traditional dating of the campaign is minimal, and can hardly challenge the latter. Indeed, the 3 Sigma uncertainty range obviously amply encompasses the traditional date. There is therefore no need to consider this single

It is impossible to discuss the options further without getting more secure dates for the destruction of Rehov. Until then option 3 above may be seen as the most likely. After that, option 2, and other such scenarios, should be explored. As to option 1, a lot more data would have to be presented to make such an assumption valid. (How much more, I do not know. It depends upon the security of the traditional dating.)

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The dating of the destruction of Rehov doesn’t affect the discussion about the exodus in any meaningful way. Basing a reinterpretation of the Egyptian chronology upon a single c14 date would be mistake of great proportions. Using a single C14 date to discuss events 2-3-400 years earlier is absurd. An argument using a burnt grain store from ca 900 BCE to discuss a probable myth supposedly occurring hundreds of years earlier is a sad derangement.

MortalWombat

Except that archaeologists have actually found Persian arrowheads at Marathon and Thermopylae. Where is the corroborating archaeological evidence for the Exodus?

John Kesler

There is a problem with your supposition that the Egyptian sojourn lasted 215 years--Yahweh predicted that the Israelites would be afflicted in Egypt for 400 years:

Until you reconcile a 215-year sojourn with the prediction the Israelites would be oppressed for 400 years--not just in Egypt but oppressed in Egypt, which they were not while Joseph was alive (Exodus 1:8 ff)--your other calculations are moot.

John Kesler

Inerrantists have an answer for this, Dean, because the Septuagint of Exodus 12:40 states that the 430-year sojourn included the time that Israel was in Canaan:

With this "wiggle room," they can crunch the numbers as needed to get the Egyptian portion of the sojourn to whatever is required for the chronology being proposed. The passage that I quoted in my previous post, Genesis 15:13-14, allows the inerrantist no such luxury, which is why I chose it.

Larsguy47

Hello Toto. Sorry I misread your post the first time. THIS IS NOT ROHL'S CHRONOLOGY. Rohl simply made popular the astronomical text, KTU 1.78, as a reference to year 12 of Akhenaten, which matches on four possible dates for his interpretation. He chose the 1012BCE dating for this eclipse. The conventional dating by others has always been 1375 BCE, the dating related to this chronology. So in no way am I endorsing Rohl, so actually I now AGREE with you that he's quite dismissible.

The difference in Rohl's translation of the text and mine is that he did not consider the language in the text, such as the "sun entering into HER GATE" as a reference to the Egyptian concept of the sun passing through 12 gates of the goddess ('her') Hathor and emerging through her vulva at sunrise. The observation of the zodiac house is a key reference to any eclipse event, which is only observed at sunrise so this is merely noting the zodiac house, RESHEP, in which the sun rose. RESHEP in the Egyptian pantheon is connected with a bull, his title is "Lord of Heaven" or "Bel/Bull of Hevaen" the name for TAURUS. The sun, of course, rises in Taurus during the month is Hiyyaru, the month of the eclipse. With this better translation, though, and especially using the reference of "btt" as six or sixth in relation to the actual hour of the eclipse, there is no match except 1375BCE. Thus Rohl has subsequently limited his reference to this eclipse event and emphasizes now the literary comparisons between Akhenaten and David for his argument. So as challenged as Rohl used to be, he has lost a key foundation and cornerstone for his theory in this eclipse reference which now is solidly linked to 1375BCE and only 1375BCE for the only eclipse event that occurs in the sixth hour, which is between 5am and 6am.

Thanks for your reference. But this is by no mean's Rohl's New Chronology. My only reference to him was the introduction of this eclipse that always had four possible dates (not now though); Rohl used a late date in 1012 BCE, this chronology uses the earliest in 1375BCE.

Sorry for confusion!

Larsguy47

aa5874

You may be confusing a wholly fictitious event with a real event with certain parts that are fictitious.

The story of Exodus appears to be wholly fictitious, and I am not aware of Herodotus' calculation with respect to the Persian War.

But, 40 years could also mean a short time, millions could mean a small number when dealing with billions. Have you ever lost a 100 meter race by 2 seconds? That's a very long time to lose by.

Are you claiming that once Exodus is fiction that your Herodotus is fiction as well?

Larsguy47

Sorry RED DAVE, but all the so-far evidence from the wilderness shows is that the Jews lived in tents and didn't want people tracking their movements!

Do you realize that as great as the Persian Period was, that only because the Greeks encouraged Darius I to actually build something out of stone that there would be nothing of that empire left for us to examine archaeologically? If something isn't preserved by stone, then there's nothing to examine.

The plains native American indians lived in tents. What did they leave behind, compared to the Aztecs or the Incas, who built great monuments? The tribes were very frugal and self-sufficient and even traveled in single file to hide their numbers. Who knows if the Jews, perhaps afraid of surrounding nations didn't do something similar? That is, burning all their disposables , traveling in a limited trek and then covering their tracks after that so they couldn't be tracked.

And what DISPOSABLES would there be? They had animals but they would eat those, use the hides and use the ashes to make soap. Why leave evidence of their camp for others to find them. If they had some selected stones for their fires, why would they leave those in hope of finding new ones? It would be been prudent to carry the ones they had already found. So there's no basis for thinking there would be strewn capsites anywhere.

Remember these are bedouin type people, living in tents, and enjoying the nomadic life? Something other "Arabs" have done for centuries. They don't leave much behind.

So you'd be looking for very little for a people who wanted to be as invisible as possible to their surrounding enemies, and who likely, with short supplies would have utilized everything available to them. They likely took good care of the pottery vessels they did have as well, perhaps repairing them if they broke accidentally. IN the meantime, they could use wood and metal, which was more practical, but not something they would throw away and something that would last and be handed down.

So yeah, right, RED DAVE, where is all the evidence of self efficient TENT CITY in the wilderness, of a people who didn't want their neighbors to know their numbers or location? Please enlighten me.

Evidence from peoples who write or build with stone comes down to us. People who write on papyrus and who live in tents don't.

Deal with it.

Larsguy47

Random Evil Guy

god scooped all the poop.

spin

This is a Ugaritic text forchrisake. It's got nothing to do with Egypt.


spin