Dean Anderson

Unfortunately, the link you provided only shows that there is archaeological support for events that happened in the 7th-5th centuries BCE, and does not show any support for your alleged 1453 BCE exodus.

Indeed, if we assume the Bible to be accurate, the evidence on your site actively disproves a 1453 BCE exodus.

The Bible is quite clear on the relative dates involved, and a 1453 BCE exodus requires King Hezekiah to have ruled Judah from 684 BCE to 655 BCE.

However, the website you linked to shows King Sennacherib of Assyria besieging Jerusalem in 701 BCE - during the reign of Hezekiah.

Therefore, if that site is correct and the Bible is correct, then the Exodus cannot have been in 1453 BCE.

If, on the other hand, you wish to claim that the exodus happened in 1453 BCE and that the Bible is correct, then that site - by definition - must be wrong and therefore cannot be used to support your claims.

In other words, you have not shown how archaeology "fully supports" (or even "shows vague support for") an exodus in 1453 BCE. You have instead shown that archaeology contradicts the implications of a 1453 BCE exodus.

If we assume hypothetically that your 1453 BCE date for the exodus is correct, and assume that the Bible is correct, then that has the following implications:

1) The world was created in 4121 BCE.

2) The flood happened in 2465 BCE.

3) The 7 years of plenty / 7 years of famine in Egypt started in 1890 BCE.

4) Sennacherib besieged Jerusalem somewhere between 684 BCE and 655 BCE.

5) The Exile occured in 567 BCE.

The mere existence of the first two of these events are flatly contradicted by the archaeological evidence that we have. According to the evidence, they simply never happened.

The third merely has none of the expected evidence. Whilst you may argue that the lack of records of the Exodus was because countries don't like recording defeats - these events show Egypt at its greatest, surviving a famine because of its clever planning and growing rich from all its neighbours as they come begging for help. Such prosperity at the expense of its neighbours is exactly the sort of thing that we would expect a country to boast about in its records.

The fourth and fifth of these events have plenty of archaeological evidence supporting their existence - but this evidence contradicts the dates that your 1453 BCE exodus gives for them.

Ebonmuse

So, your argument is that no Near East nation recorded defeats other than Israel, except for the ones that did, but they don't count, and therefore because there is no evidence for the Exodus, we know it must have happened. Good luck with that.

FatherMithras

Wow. So... Tell me again how poor scholarship that conflicts with the Exodus in the Bible supports the Bible? Man, Christian apologetics get worse every day.

Diogenes the Cynic

Since WILLOWTREE can no longer respond to this thread, I'm going to lock it. We've had plenty of other threads on this subject but if anyone else wants to take up the mantle of defending a historical Exodus they are more than welcome to start a new thread.

DtC, Modertor, BC&H