steve_bnk

No one is saying it did not happen, only that there is no support for your belief.

It would appear it is you that needs to shore up your faith against the issue of a lack of evidence. Not our problem.

judge

Why would Manetho bother arguing against it. He, unlike us, didnt have the help of archeology.
Manetho lived many many centuries after the alleged event. Many people today, if we didn't have the help of archeology, would probably just accept that some kind of exodus did happen.

However today we can, quite unemotionally say, "oh OK that story just like the story of angels mating with humans or the great flood is just a myth."

stephan huller

Holocaust deniers have archaeology and still ignore it

Toto

The archaeologists say that if the nation of Isreal had wandered in the desert for 50 years, there would be some indication. There is nothing.

Of course, if you are going to redefine the Exodus so it was just a few people returning from vacation in Egypt, that would be impossible to disprove.

Manetho probably never mentions the Jews. He describes the expulsion of the Hyksos. Josephus identifies this event in Egyptian history with the Exodus, and some modern writers have followed suit (e.g. Gary Greenberg.) But it is stretching things to say that this is evidence in Egyptian records of the beginning of the Israelites.

There are some notable differences in the stories.

From OsarsephThe idea that the Exodus never happened has been fairly well accepted, since the publication of The Bible Unearthed (or via: amazon.co.uk). Most rabbis in Los Angeles have accepted the idea. I am surprised that you are trying to drag Holocaust denial into this, which is an entirely different phenomenon.

Sheshbazzar

Nothing like that ought to suprise you by now Toto. Happens about as often as a dog shits.

Yes, I know that you were only using a common 'figure of speech', but damn, how many excuses can people come up with to drag the Holocaust into these threads?

stephan huller

I am not defending the authenticity of the Biblical records. You 'mythicists' have a tendency to turn everything into black and white. The fact that Manetho and Apion did not reinforce the exact details of the Exodus narrative does not mean that we can discount the fact that they applied a story found in the Egyptian priestly records and applied it to the origin of the Israelites. This is beyond dispute. Both Philo and the apologists for the Judeo-Christian tradition and the 'enemies' of that tradition (Manetho, Apion, Poseidonus etc) agreed on what they believed was a historical exodus of some sort.

If you want to come along and argue that they were misreading their sources that's a nice theory. It isn't beyond the realm of possibilities. But we begin with a universal agreement in antiquity that the Egyptian priestly records described an event which was taken by all sides to be the historical exodus of the Israelites. You want to discount that - fine). But how do you do that?

The argument that no physical evidence has been found. I am sure that those looking for physical evidence (no less than you mythicists) are confining their searches to the path that is described in the Bible. In other words, everyone in this idiotic battle isn't really arguing over the fact that the Hebrew and Egyptian records agree that something like a historical exodus took place. No that isn't the starting point - (a) because the pious don't want to admit that authenticity of the embarrassing details of the Egyptian report, lepers etc and (b) because the pious and the atheists are really debating about the sanctity of the Bible.

I couldn't give a flying f--- if the Pentateuch is accurate. The question for me is - should we believe that the oral traditions of the Jews and the priestly traditions witnessed by Manetho meet up at some kind of historical event. I think they do. That the Israelites took a different route than described in the Pentateuch is highly probable. They could have even taken boats for all I care. Something happened in Egypt - a revolt as Celsus references it - which led to the beginnings of Israel.

I see no reason to disbelieve in a vague glimmer of truth shining through all of the evidence. But then again I am not motivated by hate and resentment.

stephan huller

The Holocaust and the events of the Exodus are naturally related with one another (especially if you read Manetho's account). The reason atheists take aim at the Exodus narrative is because it is fundamental to the experience of the religion. Hitler wanted to exterminate the Jewish people, atheists want to 'save' the people through 'enlightening' them to the fact that they aren't special, that they aren't beloved by the Almighty and to embrace the nihilistic 'truths' that all people are the same, equally insignificant, equally abandoned, equally thrown into geworfenheit.

Sure. I think Jews are going to rush into the camp of 'no longer chosen.' And those that do are simply dishonest. Who's going to pick a 'sure nothing' over a 'maybe something' especially when you have that 'maybe something' birthright drilled into your head since birth? Coming from a family of Jewish atheists I find the complexities of the Jewish mind difficult to fathom, but the one thing I am sure of is that nothing is as it appears. I am inherently suspicious of any professed claims of 'Jewish atheism.'

The truth is - you just never know.

Vorkosigan

Try to relax and take a deep breath. There's no need to lash out wildly or to group people into classes to make it easier to bash them. The idea that there was never any Exodus is entirely mainstream and is based on multiple lines of argument. As I noted in the post to Duvduv --

(1) there is no archaeological evidence for any ancient Hebrew presence in Egypt that could correspond to the Exodus tale. Nor is there any evidence of the Sinai excursion, etc.

(2) the archaeology instead suggests that the Hebrew population grew out of the population in Canaan.

(3) Analysis of the texts indicates that the in-out of Egypt tale was invented at a later date.

Now, you can invent a strawman and claim that this position reduces to simply (1) or that it is held out of hate, but unfortunately for you hardly anyone now holds the position that there was an Exodus etc. That includes Minimalists, Maximalists, atheists, believers, etc.

As for Manetho, he was a third century BC chronicler. He knew some Greek history, and his general interest in compiling history suggests that he probably heard the Jews' tales about their own history at some point. It's not difficult to explain the concordances.

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

You are aware that the scholarship that has lead to the mainstream conclusion that there was no Exodus is not primarily atheist in origin and dates back more than 150 years, right?

Vorkosigan

Chili

Not sure if I dare tell you this but just as food for thought, let me say that but the Exodus was real and still is the greatest fear in Judaism as an event with permanence 'to lead a Jew astray' and 'drag him' (or her) to the cross and there 'make a confession and believe' instead of become a believer first and then confess . . . in God's own time so that the 'water will not be parted' and early access gained.

And of course Jews are Gods favorite people as heaven has their name on it but they cannot enter it as Jew and must be crucified as well . . . which does not mean that a pagan can do that for them as only the Chief priest can be the prosecutor in this event to make Nazareth known, and he was Zechariah in Luke as the mainstay of Tradition that yielded the Sacred Annunciation in the mind of Joseph.

So it is a total 'hands-off' event and no evangelist is needed, lest he rips their heart out as son of man and not as Lamb of God.