davidH

I've got some time - so I'll answer some of your questions Mendeh.

There are so many different names for the tablets on the different sites, I just chose one of them.
In the link I'm giving you now you will find them referred to as the el-Amarna tablets.
This translation is (I think) neutral - I spent a while searching for a site that gave the particular letter I mentioned.

<a href="http://nefertiti.iwebland.com/a-abdu-heba1.htm" target="_blank">This should be it</a>

There are other letters there too - addressed Akhenaten who was pharoh at that time - they are quite interesting as they give details of what was going on around Egypt at that time.

This is one of the 350 tablets that where found.If anyone knows a site that contains translations of all the letters and documents I'd be interested to know of it.




I'm not really sure what you are getting at here.
Maybe it's the confusion of names...

"Unusually there are a number of sons of Amenhotep II that are known (normally it is just the daughters of pharaoh which are documented rather than sons - this could also be another effect of the Hatshepsut 'factor'); Amenhotep, Tuthmosis, Khaemwaset(?), Amenemopet, Ahmose, Webensenu, Nedjem and two shadowy princes referred to as Princes A and B."

Ok so when you are referring to Amenhotep's death and the power struggle that insued - are you referring to the death of the Amenhotep (one of his sons) or the pharoh Amenhotep II ?

The passage I put in speech marks refers to Amenhotep being the eldest son (I'm assuming that because his name come first) - are you refering to him?

Since you have refered to a power struggle - I would like to see the evidence that the eldest son was involved in this power struggle to the throne.


I made no claim - I merely asked a question.

A mixture of incompetence and lack of interest - you said "it suggests".
Yes, it does seem to indicate that he was incompetent and had a lack of interest - but then the evidence doesn't prove that does it?
All the evidence shows was that he didn't defend his territory, and built his own city where he lived. - The incompetence and lack of interest of Akhenaten - is only a theory.
What else could it be blamed on? If you look only at Egyptian history, it could only be as a result of his own incompetence and lack of interest...

As far as I know the Egyptian army would have had generals - these would most likely be defending their territory, so why in the world would the army not have fought to defend?
Did he have an army that just stood around watching as their territory was being taken from them? - Surely that sound ridiculous?

What if the army wasn't fit to fight, wasn't large enough, couldn't defend without showing it's weaknesses.... Akhenaten would rather sacrifice his territory than show the weakness of his army to his enemies - if they knew, Egypt would be invaded.
But then this theory is wrong because there's no evidence of there being anything wrong with Egypt's mighty army that was feared........ doesn't something not seem quite right, I can't believe that Egypt's mighty army would let territory slip away...even if the pharoh happened to show a lack of interest.

Whenever I mentioned that Amenhotep II had a large building program you wrote this

This is exactly why I find the theory that Akhenaten was incompetent and lazy very hard to believe. - It came with his job description to flout his power as much as possible - yet there was little building, territory on every front was lost...he did neither war or build.
Is the reason only because he was lazy? That does seem very hard to believe.

Could you provide me with the date when this break ended? - i.e the date that is proposed for this Exodus?

One last thing that I would like to address.

Could you show me the evidence that the Torah (old testament) was complied in the 1st century BC?

I'll post later on about the inscription you asked about - the one that Hatshepsut talks about them living in ignorance of Re - that is if you are still skeptical of it.

I think that's all that I'll put down now.

Ps. I had been thinking about getting that book you mentioned - what are you thoughts on it?
Are there areas that the book concentrates more on than others?
Just so I know exactly what I'm getting before I buy it! - You think some books are good until you open them up! lol.

Kosh

Likewise, we would like to see evidence that the eldest son was killed by a plague brought about by Yhwh.

It seems you are exhibiting quite a double standard here David. Your posts contains lots of phrases like "probably", and suppositions and conjectures from which you draw conclusions, then you ask for evidence when another explanation is proposed.

davidH

Kosh - I merely asked for evidence because it interested me greatly. Not because I was in anyway trying to discredit the information given.

Also my answers are containing the words probably and maybe, because I don't know for sure. I'm only taking the evidence that I have available to me on the internet, and applying it to the date the Bible gives for the Exodus.

I would rather that I had the evidence that you want - maybe a tablet or inscription saying that the eldest son was killed along with every other firstborn in Egypt. However I haven't found evidence like that - maybe there isn't any, maybe there is - maybe it hasn't put up on the internet.
I don't know.
All I can do is put up what I know exists and then let you make your own ideas in accordance with the evidence I have provided.

I'm willing to examine any evidence you have to offer that shows that the Exodus couldn't have taken place in that time peroid.
Any evidence you have - bring it and we'll discuss it. So far no one has contradicted my evidence, it's up to you to examine all of it together and see if it makes the Biblical account any more accurate than you previously believed.

However it is a pity that the timing of the holiday is going to interupt all this - but until then I'll continue to post evidence.
I'm not sure what has happened to Mendeh -though I know from the internet sites that a decent and clear timeline is hard to find.

Do you know of any good ones on the 18th dynasty Kosh?

Something that I have come across on various sites is the statement that some of the pharohs - may not be 2 separate pharohs at all but the same.
Not sure if that has any basis, that's why I would appreciate it if any of you could post a timeline, like the one I mentioned above - it would be interesting to work from it.

Mendeh

Amenhotep II.

Don't assume that.

As far as I know, we're not sure who the eldest son is. As I said, Amenhotep II left behind a very messly line of succession, and the only reason we think that Thutmose IV wasn't the eldest son is that he's not named as successor by Amenhotep II.


AKHENATEN AND HIS ATTITUDE TO EGYPT'S EMPIRE: EVIDENCE & EXTENT OF NEGLECT.

Akhenaten showed little interest in expanding and maintaining his empire, but that doesn't mean he neglected it altogether. The army didn't just stand around; it was made use of to quash rebellions (ex. Nubia, regnal year 12 of Akhenaten's reign), as well as to carry out work to make the transition to Atenism easier - (removing references to other gods, building works, etc.) In fact, the role of the army has long been underestimated, partly because Akhenaten used to be thought to have been a pacifist. The army was used in a confrontation with the Hittites, as well as police-work in Syria to keep its alliance to Egypt.

Nubia suffered comparitavely little as a result of Akhenaten's governance; the situation is Syria-Palestine, however, was very different. Most of the vassals in charge there were either of Egyptian origin, or had family members hostage at court to ensure their loyalty, and although Egypt's northernmost borders had always been flexible, most of the vassals had usually managed to maintain order in their provinces.
quoted from Egypt's False Prophet Akhenaten by Nicholas Reeves (the director of the Armarna royal tombs project):
We can see the lack of interest Akhenaten showed in foreign affairs through the Armarna letters, and the terrified response of the vassals, very well through the letter that you specifically linked to:
These are the writings of someone frantic for assistance, but no help is coming for him, even after he's said many times that all pharaoh's lands will be lost if he doesn't receive reinforcements.
Please note that the term 'Apiru' (translated 'Habiru' in your link) does not equal 'Israelites', as you claimed earlier. It is, in the words of Reeves, "a pejorative term applied to those who rejected Egyptian control".
Other letter fragments:
Rib-Hadda of Byblos, in one of the many warnings about the duplicity of one of Akhenaten's allies, Abdi-Ashirta, who was taking advantage of the situation to siphon off Egyptian territories and property.
"May the king, my lord, know that the war of Abdi-Ashirta against me is severe, and he has taken all my cities...", and in a later letter: "you are going to come into an empty house. Everything is gone."
Akhenaten's response was simply to complain that Rib-Hadda "writes to me more than all the other mayors," refusing to believe that his plaintive cries for help were any more than him crying wolf, when nothing could be further from the truth; Rib-Hadda repeated his pleas, both to Akhenaten and Amenopet, his representative, and the number of letters that he sent indicates how low Rib-Hadda estimated the odds of their eventual arrival. These letters were still ignored; Rib-Hadda was dispossessed, escaping to an ally's camp until he was inevitably killed. This same picture repeats all over; a complaint from Shuwardata, mayor of Qiltu: "Be informed, O king, my lord, that all he lands of the king, my lord, have been taken away...".

Nothing was done, and according to Reeves, "by the time the urgency of the situation could be pressed home to the king, his troops had other, more serious matters on their hands - propping up an increasingly unpopular regime at home."
Why were no reinforcements sent to the garrisons of Syria-Palestine? Not because of some fear Akhenaten had of his enemies, but because at first he demonstrably didn't understand or care enough to do something about it ("he writes to me more than all the others"), and by the time that it was realised there was a problem with the area, there were more pressing internal matters that the army had to be used to deal with.

AKHENATEN'S BUILDING PROJECTS
This shows a complete lack of research. As I've already pointed out, Akhenaten made a hell of a lot of use of his army, ESPECIALLY for building projects. In fact, his building projects were so huge, they could only have been completed with the help of the Egyptian army. Akhenaten flouted his power internally to a great extent:
Quote from Oxford History of Egypt:
In addition, the King held a sed-festival within the first five years of his reign, which further flouted his prestige and potency - this is remarkable: usually, a sed-festival was only held once the king had been ruling for thirty years. One of the Karnak temples is devoted entirely to this festival.
Then, early in the fifth regnal year, Akhenaten decided to build an ENTIRELY NEW CITY ON VIRGIN SOIL, dedicated to Aten: Akhetaten (Amarna).
These are two examples of huge building projects, and in addition a lot of time was spent revamping old monuments as well. The king flouted his power internally a huge amount; his foreign policy was mainly concerned with either financing his internal ambitions (ex. an expedition for gold from Nubia), or gaining greater self-sufficiency.

I said, it's a break between the last Hyksos stratum and the beginning of the fifteenth dynasty. I presumed that, in your project of collecting evidence for the Exodus, you would have actually got hold of a time-line of the relevant period of history. Never mind, I present you a time-line below (which given the fact that you've already confused Thutmose IV and Amenhotep IV several times, and seem to have no idea at all what either of them did in relation to each other, is probably a good idea anyway).

Please note several things:
(1) the break occurs at c.1550 (because it's a break in the styles that the 15th Dynasty set, which occurred after the last Hyksos stratum).
(2) There is about 50 years difference between the ascendency of Thutmose IV and Amenhotep IV, they're not the same bloke, and Amenhotep IV's the one that introduced Atenism.

You're right, it wasn't. When I looked it up, it turns out the Torah was compiled in c.100 AD at the Council of Janua. The earliest source for Exodus, though, according to Encyclopaedia Britannica, was aural, and dates to around 1000 BC, about 200 years after your proposed date for the event. In addition, there are three different traditions that were combined into the book of Exodus.

It's a general history of Ancient Egypt, which seems just what you need right now.

[ July 17, 2002: Message edited by: Mendeh ]</p>

Mendeh

So far, you've not actually posted much in the way of evidence, although you've managed plenty of assertions. You asserted Thutmose IV was Akhenaten, as well as that the Armarna letters talk specifically about Israelites. You're trying to prove the historicity of the Exodus, yet so far you've only managed to turn up a few scrapts of circumstantial evidence that's actually pretty dodgy, and no evidence at all for the great event itself!

I wasn't online yesterday. A decent timeline is available in any decent book on Egyptian history, available for your perusal in your local library. I've given you a timeline above from the Oxford History of Ancient Egypt.

Which two Pharaohs? If you're talking about Amenhotep IV and Akhenaten, then yes, you're right. But if you'll refer to the timeline above, you'll see that Akhenaten's a few decades too late to have been involved in your suggested time period for the exodus.

KoopaFanatic

Hey folks...it's borderline off-topic, but could any of you tell me the titles of some good books on ancient Egyptian history? I've always had a mild interest in the period (the lingering effects of confirmation class, I think), and it was rekindled by watching a miniseries on the History Channel narrated by Peter Woodward a few months ago.

I'm looking for some titles in the reputable-scholarship-but-approachable vein, since I don't really know that much about Egyptian history to begin with.

Thanks!

Kosh

It's all right there in "The Bible Unearthed". I know you have the book, have you read it? The archealogical evidence is quite clear, it contradicts the Exodus story. As Finkelstein points out, the Pentatuch was written around the 7th century BC, for political reasons.

BTW - I invited Israel Finkelstein here to participate in the discussion, but his reply was that he's on a dig and can't do so.

It does not.

Radcliffe Emerson

Read this book. Here is a description from the bookstore right here at infidels.org.

The Bible Unearthed
by Neil Asher Silberman

Synopsis:

Subtitled: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of its Sacred Texts

I am reading the book currently. The very latest findings over the past few years at archaeological digs in Israel and surrounding areas do not support an Exodus. In fact, Mr Silberman and his co-author flat-out state there is no support for ANY of the events in the Old Testament the way the bible describes them.
No Abraham, no David, no Exodus, all myths.

Marduk

"Egypt and Israel in Ancient Times" by Egyptologist Redford

KoopaFanatic

"Egypt and Israel in Ancient Times" and "The Bible Unearthed" are available in a package deal on Amazon.com right now, too. Most convenient

Thanks!