3. Judaism Moses Torah Exodus 2 thru 2.C
2. Was there a Moses and an Exodus?
From four different sites in Egypt and the Sinai Douglas Petrovich found various references to three separate biblical figures, one of which was Moses or M-sh as he saw it. Petrovich claimed he scrutinized and eliminated all other possibilities for different meanings before he concluded it was Moses, during his final year in Egypt of 1446-1447 BC. In the inscription is described a man who the Hebrew community saw with awe. If this is true, and Moses was real, much of the Bible is validated.
Mr. Petrovich's interpretations of inscriptions could be groundbreaking or just wrong. It is too soon to know for certain. That's if it can ever be known for sure, which I doubt. There will always be room for interpretation. I have found in general the more I examine and look into something in depth the more elusive its real nature becomes. It is possible this applies here. However, as said, even the chance it might be true and Moses was a real figure is mind boggling. It changes one's perspective if one reads the stories as real as opposed to being tales.
Even if a tale, it doesn't make Judaism invalid. The story of Moses, as stated before, could answer an undercurrent that had been brewing in humanity for years and becomes its expression. As such it represents a real need and lesson for humanity. It's study and message and subsequent years of commentary still provide a consistent reference point to judge things by, elaborate on, and see nuance in. Turning even a mythological figure into a relatively fixed point can still lead to truth on many levels.
The question remains, if Moses existed, did he write the Torah as the traditionalists claim. We have the old inscriptions that date back at least to perhaps 700 BC. The priestly benediction has remained the same. Hebrew was organic and from it's first find by Tappy around 100 BC of the original Hebrew the language evolved just as English does today. As a non expert looking in, it is unclear to me if the prayers and writings are the same in different time periods or if they were modified? If they were modified through time do they still meet the claims of the ultra-orthodox that not a letter could be changed or the entire Torah is invalid? That's quite a claim? I wonder if they take into account the evolvolution of the language?
The Shema from Ketef Hinnom seems to match the Shema of the Masoretic texts and the Dead Sea Scrolls. That is amazing consistency considering the age of the finds. However, from what I read in some other passages there are some stylistic changes in the writings. Would this discredit the Torah for some of the Orthodox? The oldest complete Torah dates back to 1200 AD. To claim all Torahs dating back to Moses times, around 1400 BC are exactly the same to the letter is a stretch. A general overall consistency with minor modifications would still be impressive in my opinion.
However, we are left with a mystery. Until the 17th century it was thought Moses was the sole author of the Torah. The various archaeological finds allude to this possibility. If there were no finds faith in Moses' authorship would be blind faith. With the finds discussed in this writing, there seems to be a lineage of some authorship dating at least back to 700 BC. The findings go back far enough to lend some support to the claim Moses was the author. They don't go back far enough to make this conclusive, and therefore doubts are justified
2. A. The text
Moving away from the archaeology for a time, we can look at the text of the Torah to see if it confirms singular authorship by Moses. Upon examination, it becomes clear there are many discrepancies. On the video 'Inside Judaism' Michael Coogan brings up the conundrum where Moses' funeral and burial is described by himself, an obvious impossibility. Coogan also says one text describes Noah's passengers as one pair of each beast and in another text seven pair of clean beasts journeying along with two pair of unclean beasts.
Elsewhere the narrator says the flood in Noah's time lasted 40 days and 40 nights and in another place it lasted 150 days. When finished in one sentence Noah sent out a dove and in the previous sentence a raven. Many other discrepancies exist. Either Moses did not have a good editor or something else is taking place. It is not a perfect work perfectly inspired by God for every letter and dot. If the ultra orthodox claim these errors are from God, than that is a self contradiction. If the claim is the original writing was perfect than there was error in the copying which means it was changed and therefore not acceptable in certain orthodoxies.
2. B. JEPD
What are we left with? To verify Moses wrote the Bible completely we would need a complete bible around his time 1400 BC. We don't have it. If we had it, the inconsistencies within the text would still raise doubts. What we do have are fragments of writings dating to ancient times that repeat certain themes and prayers and stories. This suggests a vision carried out by various writers over a long period of time, perhaps 1000 years. Coogan refers to it as an anthology, where through time writers added and subtracted and revised the main text.
Perhaps this main text was originally put together by Moses. Perhaps an original core of writings had these layers added to them, referred to as supplementary models. Perhaps numerous shorter texts were combined later into one overall writing, a fragmentary model. 'Inside Judaism' proposes the Document Hypothesis which claims 4 groups of writers composed the texts of the Torah, with the last combining and organizing them all into a finalized version. The video is smooth and after reading subsequent theories about the theories, I realize a little packaged. Document Hypothesis was the main hypothesis realized in the 1900's, but recently it seems the most current scholars no longer accept it and lean towards the other models. It seems there is an art to interpreting history and as with art sometimes opinions vary. The Document Hypothesis discussed in the video 'Inside Judaism' still gives us a way to order history and gives it some form so at the very least it's a convenient starting point.
Researchers divide the writers into four groups. Scholars found the oldest writings referred to God in two different ways. Group one, J, referred to God as Yahweh and group two referred to God as Elohim And they referred to that group as E. J was perhaps written in Solomon's day around 950 BC in ancient Judah. E appears to have been written in the North around 850 BC. Julius Wellhausen, who formulated the theory in 1883, aptly describes them as writing about a primitive, spontaneous and personal world, paralleling the beginning of Israel's history. J includes much of Genesis and parts of Exodus and Numbers. E starts around Gen 15 and covers material similar to J. Both J and E derived their material from oral stories, prayers and songs.
'J' source supposedly has a vivid direct style reflected in Genesis 2-3 whereas source E has a more abstract style and is less anthropomorphic. The story of Abraham begins here.
The D source was written approximately 620 BC and reflects much of Josiah's reform. Jews were still worshiping many Gods and Josiah discovered an old scroll of Deuteronomy and insisted they return to the only God of Israel. He read Exodus and an ethical revolution and a code of morality was begun. Josiah spoke the way he did because Jews believed when they broke their covenant with God and worshiped many gods an outside force would punish them. In this case it was the Assyrians who had a huge empire. Josiah, inspired by the old scroll, insisted they return to monotheism and the God of Israel and stop Assyrian domination. This scroll which retold the Exodus story inspired the writers of D and gave way to basic concepts for Western civilization.
People continued to worship many gods and not heed the warnings and there were punishments. In 586 BC the ancient temple was destroyed by the Babylonians. The city was destroyed, the Jewish king Zedekiah was blinded along with all his sons slayed. After 400 years Israel is destroyed and taken in captivity to Babylon. Far away in a distant land, with some scrolls saved from the fire, priests and scribes started to compile, rewrite and write and complete much of the Bible, or the Torah. This group is called P for the priestly source. They emphasize the Abraham story of their roots and try to reaffirm themselves as a people with a covenant with God. To reaffirm their differences from their surroundings, circumcision was encouraged. The Babylonians had become the new elite Canaanites from which they had long ago rebelled. Interestingly, these 6th century writers placed the beginning for Abraham in ER, just down the river from Babylon.
To stay in favor with God and return to Israel, prayer with community was encouraged along with the Sabbath. Exile or not, together they can still worship God and hope for a return some day. Within this framework, P created the first 5 books of the Bible.
Post priestly sources are scrutinized by modern researchers , ranging from the Persian periods of 450-350 BC or later, and the Hellenistic period from 333-164 or even 140-37 BC (a minority viewpoint). In the recent past, style and language nuances become not as important as the thesis and plot of the document. Religious and ritual changes of Israel's evolution are not germane to their view. Most of these adherents are from North America and Israel. For some reason, although an outsider looking in, this makes sense to me, for it's putting content over style and viewing religion as a evolutionary occurrence.
Just to note, the different voices meaning styles and emphasis in discovered texts is something I relate to when writing this overview. The information I absorb is from different sources and each source has its own angle and I reflect that when I use its information. Therefore, to some extent, even though I'm one person, different styles and ways of thinking are reflected in what I write. If I had studied the content for years and integrated it all internally, my voice would be more singular. But that is not the case. I'm grabbing information here and there, not all of it totally digested. This being so, I still think it is worthwhile to get the information written down, recorded and out there. Unity sometimes has to be sacrificed somewhat for urgency.
Scholars often have a single voice. It took decades for them to reach their conclusions, and all the rough spots were refined. They can't, however, hop around in their thinking. It all has to be data related. I can hop around because the discipline is not foremost. Irresponsibility is the pitfall I have to be careful of and I'm aware of this.
2. C. Another take on Exodus
We're all familiar with the Exodus story. It's the most ancient story in the Bible, written in the oldest writing, originally in poetic form called the 'Song of the Sea.' It certainly has value and captures universal truths. If it is true, well, then it's true. If it's a story that combines certain themes and messages, then while not fully factually true it still serves a purpose.
Fairly recent archaeology finds and thinking offer some different explanations for the beginning of the Jews and the Exodus. Egyptian stone inscriptions after the Pharaoh Ramesses became king around 1275 BC and before the inscription of Ramesses II's son's stele of around 1208 BC places the Israelite's in Canaan. The biblical account coincides by also having the Jews leaving Egypt and ending up in Canaan in that time vicinity
In the Bible Moses would not see the promised land but Joshua was supposed to lead 600,000 Jews into the land conquering 31 cities along the way. In the 1930's British archaeologist John Garstang. claimed he found the very walls 'that came tumbling down' in Jericho. Amnon Ben-tor, an Israeli archaeologist, observed destruction by tremendous heat in this the important city of Hazur in Canaan. By process of elimination he attributes it to Joshua. Hani Nur El-Din, another archaeologist, observed the destruction of the beautiful palaces and structures in the city of AI, also attributed to Joshua. The problem with these finds was the eventual determined dates for their destruction. AI was leveled in 2200 BC and Jericho in 1500 BC, both way before the exodus.
The only viable date of destruction was for Hazor in 1250 BC, the same time period for Joshua's conquests. Sharon Zuckerman differs from her co-director Ben-tor on how this destruction took place.
Many factors lead to a different conclusion. In the 31 city states many showed little signs of armed combat, and if they were destroyed it was from hands other than the Israelis. One military sweep did not explain how the Israelis arrived in Canaan. Interesting stuff.
Zuckerman found statues with heads and hands cut off, but little signs for fighting in Hazor. Something else had taken place. From the excavations it seems that there was an upper city and a lower city. The upper city consisted of the elites, privileged and rulers. The lower city contained serfs, slaves and commoners. It was how the city state system was run at the time. She finds signs of abandonment and disrepair, signs of civilization falling apart rather than being invaded. Some inner tension had befallen Hazor, some inner rebellion had taken place. She sees an internal revolt taking place as the poorer people wanted their freedom from being taxed, mistreated and enslaved. There seemed to be a break down in that system. It seems that these revolts were widespread in Mesopotamia around 1200 BC.
What seems to come to light is that the common people of Canaan had moved to the highlands, replacing the city state system with a more egalitarian one valuing freedom to choose their destiny over exploitation. The houses were simple, the pottery basic, with few adornments and art.
The archaeologist Israel Finkelstein reached some interesting conclusions from his research that relate to Hazor and Canaan. For 7 years he with numerous helpers and students scrutinized the 400 square miles where the Israelites were said to have wandered for 40 years in the Bible. No pottery, human or animal bones, or various artifacts were found to substantiate this. There was just no evidence for a migration.
Secondly, Finkelstein carefully researched the highlands where the Canaanite common people were said to have migrated to after the breakdown of the city.state. The span examined was from 1200 to 1000 BC. Around 1200 BC and before there were roughly 25 settlements with about 3 to 5000 total inhabitants. 200 years later there were 250 settlements with approximately 45,000 inhabitants. He claims for the times this was not a normal growth pattern but a meteoric one.
So where were the Israelites? Well, perhaps right before our eyes. These Canaanites who wanted freedom to choose their paths might be one and the same. The writers of the Bible harped on this quest for freedom in the stories of Abraham, Moses, and Joshua, all seeking a promised land. This motley crew of slaves, serfs, and workers might just be the 'chosen,' who actually chose to seek their own destiny.
What was this destiny or identity that emerged? The Egyptian records talk of a victory in the city of Shazu in southern Canaan, coinciding with the time the Israelites emerged. Within Shazu was a place called YHW, most probably the name of their patron God. In the Jewish Bible similar lettering is used to refer to God, YHWH. In the Bible the place where the Shazu lived is Midian, where Moses in the Bible experienced the burning bush from God. Although not a massive migration of people, perhaps there is some truth in the exodus story which is worthy of reexamination.
A possible hypothesis is that a small group of Canaanites were actually slaves in Egypt, escaped, and when journeying occasioned the city of YHW where they had a special experience with their deity. When they arrived at their destination in the highlands of Canaan, they carried this experience with them. The other Canaanites listened to their story of seeking freedom and their interaction with YHWY, and the concept of one god. This idea of freedom and of one god seemed to spread among the Canaanites and at some moment in time they became a chosen people with a certain ideology. It is somewhere around this point in time the Israelite identity had its genesis.
The scholar Carol Meyers said these nomads spread the word of deliverance and freedom from oppression lead by YHWH and the other formerly oppressed people adopted it. Their goal was to keep and maintain themselves with their own labor and serve this singular god and message.
One interesting note by Michael Coogan is that the introduction of the god YHWH did not eliminate Israel worship of other gods. The introduction of the concept of monotheism might have been introduced, but took centuries to take hold. For a long time as the artifacts point to, other gods were served, and there became a push and pull between the one god and the many gods. For a while polytheism and monotheism might have coexisted without tension, but the concept of one God became a very Israel theme.
2. Was there a Moses and an Exodus?
From four different sites in Egypt and the Sinai Douglas Petrovich found various references to three separate biblical figures, one of which was Moses or M-sh as he saw it. Petrovich claimed he scrutinized and eliminated all other possibilities for different meanings before he concluded it was Moses, during his final year in Egypt of 1446-1447 BC. In the inscription is described a man who the Hebrew community saw with awe. If this is true, and Moses was real, much of the Bible is validated.
Mr. Petrovich's interpretations of inscriptions could be groundbreaking or just wrong. It is too soon to know for certain. That's if it can ever be known for sure, which I doubt. There will always be room for interpretation. I have found in general the more I examine and look into something in depth the more elusive its real nature becomes. It is possible this applies here. However, as said, even the chance it might be true and Moses was a real figure is mind boggling. It changes one's perspective if one reads the stories as real as opposed to being tales.
Even if a tale, it doesn't make Judaism invalid. The story of Moses, as stated before, could answer an undercurrent that had been brewing in humanity for years and becomes its expression. As such it represents a real need and lesson for humanity. It's study and message and subsequent years of commentary still provide a consistent reference point to judge things by, elaborate on, and see nuance in. Turning even a mythological figure into a relatively fixed point can still lead to truth on many levels.
The question remains, if Moses existed, did he write the Torah as the traditionalists claim. We have the old inscriptions that date back at least to perhaps 700 BC. The priestly benediction has remained the same. Hebrew was organic and from it's first find by Tappy around 100 BC of the original Hebrew the language evolved just as English does today. As a non expert looking in, it is unclear to me if the prayers and writings are the same in different time periods or if they were modified? If they were modified through time do they still meet the claims of the ultra-orthodox that not a letter could be changed or the entire Torah is invalid? That's quite a claim? I wonder if they take into account the evolvolution of the language?
The Shema from Ketef Hinnom seems to match the Shema of the Masoretic texts and the Dead Sea Scrolls. That is amazing consistency considering the age of the finds. However, from what I read in some other passages there are some stylistic changes in the writings. Would this discredit the Torah for some of the Orthodox? The oldest complete Torah dates back to 1200 AD. To claim all Torahs dating back to Moses times, around 1400 BC are exactly the same to the letter is a stretch. A general overall consistency with minor modifications would still be impressive in my opinion.
However, we are left with a mystery. Until the 17th century it was thought Moses was the sole author of the Torah. The various archaeological finds allude to this possibility. If there were no finds faith in Moses' authorship would be blind faith. With the finds discussed in this writing, there seems to be a lineage of some authorship dating at least back to 700 BC. The findings go back far enough to lend some support to the claim Moses was the author. They don't go back far enough to make this conclusive, and therefore doubts are justified
2. A. The text
Moving away from the archaeology for a time, we can look at the text of the Torah to see if it confirms singular authorship by Moses. Upon examination, it becomes clear there are many discrepancies. On the video 'Inside Judaism' Michael Coogan brings up the conundrum where Moses' funeral and burial is described by himself, an obvious impossibility. Coogan also says one text describes Noah's passengers as one pair of each beast and in another text seven pair of clean beasts journeying along with two pair of unclean beasts.
Elsewhere the narrator says the flood in Noah's time lasted 40 days and 40 nights and in another place it lasted 150 days. When finished in one sentence Noah sent out a dove and in the previous sentence a raven. Many other discrepancies exist. Either Moses did not have a good editor or something else is taking place. It is not a perfect work perfectly inspired by God for every letter and dot. If the ultra orthodox claim these errors are from God, than that is a self contradiction. If the claim is the original writing was perfect than there was error in the copying which means it was changed and therefore not acceptable in certain orthodoxies.
2. B. JEPD
What are we left with? To verify Moses wrote the Bible completely we would need a complete bible around his time 1400 BC. We don't have it. If we had it, the inconsistencies within the text would still raise doubts. What we do have are fragments of writings dating to ancient times that repeat certain themes and prayers and stories. This suggests a vision carried out by various writers over a long period of time, perhaps 1000 years. Coogan refers to it as an anthology, where through time writers added and subtracted and revised the main text.
Perhaps this main text was originally put together by Moses. Perhaps an original core of writings had these layers added to them, referred to as supplementary models. Perhaps numerous shorter texts were combined later into one overall writing, a fragmentary model. 'Inside Judaism' proposes the Document Hypothesis which claims 4 groups of writers composed the texts of the Torah, with the last combining and organizing them all into a finalized version. The video is smooth and after reading subsequent theories about the theories, I realize a little packaged. Document Hypothesis was the main hypothesis realized in the 1900's, but recently it seems the most current scholars no longer accept it and lean towards the other models. It seems there is an art to interpreting history and as with art sometimes opinions vary. The Document Hypothesis discussed in the video 'Inside Judaism' still gives us a way to order history and gives it some form so at the very least it's a convenient starting point.
Researchers divide the writers into four groups. Scholars found the oldest writings referred to God in two different ways. Group one, J, referred to God as Yahweh and group two referred to God as Elohim And they referred to that group as E. J was perhaps written in Solomon's day around 950 BC in ancient Judah. E appears to have been written in the North around 850 BC. Julius Wellhausen, who formulated the theory in 1883, aptly describes them as writing about a primitive, spontaneous and personal world, paralleling the beginning of Israel's history. J includes much of Genesis and parts of Exodus and Numbers. E starts around Gen 15 and covers material similar to J. Both J and E derived their material from oral stories, prayers and songs.
'J' source supposedly has a vivid direct style reflected in Genesis 2-3 whereas source E has a more abstract style and is less anthropomorphic. The story of Abraham begins here.
The D source was written approximately 620 BC and reflects much of Josiah's reform. Jews were still worshiping many Gods and Josiah discovered an old scroll of Deuteronomy and insisted they return to the only God of Israel. He read Exodus and an ethical revolution and a code of morality was begun. Josiah spoke the way he did because Jews believed when they broke their covenant with God and worshiped many gods an outside force would punish them. In this case it was the Assyrians who had a huge empire. Josiah, inspired by the old scroll, insisted they return to monotheism and the God of Israel and stop Assyrian domination. This scroll which retold the Exodus story inspired the writers of D and gave way to basic concepts for Western civilization.
People continued to worship many gods and not heed the warnings and there were punishments. In 586 BC the ancient temple was destroyed by the Babylonians. The city was destroyed, the Jewish king Zedekiah was blinded along with all his sons slayed. After 400 years Israel is destroyed and taken in captivity to Babylon. Far away in a distant land, with some scrolls saved from the fire, priests and scribes started to compile, rewrite and write and complete much of the Bible, or the Torah. This group is called P for the priestly source. They emphasize the Abraham story of their roots and try to reaffirm themselves as a people with a covenant with God. To reaffirm their differences from their surroundings, circumcision was encouraged. The Babylonians had become the new elite Canaanites from which they had long ago rebelled. Interestingly, these 6th century writers placed the beginning for Abraham in ER, just down the river from Babylon.
To stay in favor with God and return to Israel, prayer with community was encouraged along with the Sabbath. Exile or not, together they can still worship God and hope for a return some day. Within this framework, P created the first 5 books of the Bible.
Post priestly sources are scrutinized by modern researchers , ranging from the Persian periods of 450-350 BC or later, and the Hellenistic period from 333-164 or even 140-37 BC (a minority viewpoint). In the recent past, style and language nuances become not as important as the thesis and plot of the document. Religious and ritual changes of Israel's evolution are not germane to their view. Most of these adherents are from North America and Israel. For some reason, although an outsider looking in, this makes sense to me, for it's putting content over style and viewing religion as a evolutionary occurrence.
Just to note, the different voices meaning styles and emphasis in discovered texts is something I relate to when writing this overview. The information I absorb is from different sources and each source has its own angle and I reflect that when I use its information. Therefore, to some extent, even though I'm one person, different styles and ways of thinking are reflected in what I write. If I had studied the content for years and integrated it all internally, my voice would be more singular. But that is not the case. I'm grabbing information here and there, not all of it totally digested. This being so, I still think it is worthwhile to get the information written down, recorded and out there. Unity sometimes has to be sacrificed somewhat for urgency.
Scholars often have a single voice. It took decades for them to reach their conclusions, and all the rough spots were refined. They can't, however, hop around in their thinking. It all has to be data related. I can hop around because the discipline is not foremost. Irresponsibility is the pitfall I have to be careful of and I'm aware of this.
2. C. Another take on Exodus
We're all familiar with the Exodus story. It's the most ancient story in the Bible, written in the oldest writing, originally in poetic form called the 'Song of the Sea.' It certainly has value and captures universal truths. If it is true, well, then it's true. If it's a story that combines certain themes and messages, then while not fully factually true it still serves a purpose.
Fairly recent archaeology finds and thinking offer some different explanations for the beginning of the Jews and the Exodus. Egyptian stone inscriptions after the Pharaoh Ramesses became king around 1275 BC and before the inscription of Ramesses II's son's stele of around 1208 BC places the Israelite's in Canaan. The biblical account coincides by also having the Jews leaving Egypt and ending up in Canaan in that time vicinity
In the Bible Moses would not see the promised land but Joshua was supposed to lead 600,000 Jews into the land conquering 31 cities along the way. In the 1930's British archaeologist John Garstang. claimed he found the very walls 'that came tumbling down' in Jericho. Amnon Ben-tor, an Israeli archaeologist, observed destruction by tremendous heat in this the important city of Hazur in Canaan. By process of elimination he attributes it to Joshua. Hani Nur El-Din, another archaeologist, observed the destruction of the beautiful palaces and structures in the city of AI, also attributed to Joshua. The problem with these finds was the eventual determined dates for their destruction. AI was leveled in 2200 BC and Jericho in 1500 BC, both way before the exodus.
The only viable date of destruction was for Hazor in 1250 BC, the same time period for Joshua's conquests. Sharon Zuckerman differs from her co-director Ben-tor on how this destruction took place.
Many factors lead to a different conclusion. In the 31 city states many showed little signs of armed combat, and if they were destroyed it was from hands other than the Israelis. One military sweep did not explain how the Israelis arrived in Canaan. Interesting stuff.
Zuckerman found statues with heads and hands cut off, but little signs for fighting in Hazor. Something else had taken place. From the excavations it seems that there was an upper city and a lower city. The upper city consisted of the elites, privileged and rulers. The lower city contained serfs, slaves and commoners. It was how the city state system was run at the time. She finds signs of abandonment and disrepair, signs of civilization falling apart rather than being invaded. Some inner tension had befallen Hazor, some inner rebellion had taken place. She sees an internal revolt taking place as the poorer people wanted their freedom from being taxed, mistreated and enslaved. There seemed to be a break down in that system. It seems that these revolts were widespread in Mesopotamia around 1200 BC.
What seems to come to light is that the common people of Canaan had moved to the highlands, replacing the city state system with a more egalitarian one valuing freedom to choose their destiny over exploitation. The houses were simple, the pottery basic, with few adornments and art.
The archaeologist Israel Finkelstein reached some interesting conclusions from his research that relate to Hazor and Canaan. For 7 years he with numerous helpers and students scrutinized the 400 square miles where the Israelites were said to have wandered for 40 years in the Bible. No pottery, human or animal bones, or various artifacts were found to substantiate this. There was just no evidence for a migration.
Secondly, Finkelstein carefully researched the highlands where the Canaanite common people were said to have migrated to after the breakdown of the city.state. The span examined was from 1200 to 1000 BC. Around 1200 BC and before there were roughly 25 settlements with about 3 to 5000 total inhabitants. 200 years later there were 250 settlements with approximately 45,000 inhabitants. He claims for the times this was not a normal growth pattern but a meteoric one.
So where were the Israelites? Well, perhaps right before our eyes. These Canaanites who wanted freedom to choose their paths might be one and the same. The writers of the Bible harped on this quest for freedom in the stories of Abraham, Moses, and Joshua, all seeking a promised land. This motley crew of slaves, serfs, and workers might just be the 'chosen,' who actually chose to seek their own destiny.
What was this destiny or identity that emerged? The Egyptian records talk of a victory in the city of Shazu in southern Canaan, coinciding with the time the Israelites emerged. Within Shazu was a place called YHW, most probably the name of their patron God. In the Jewish Bible similar lettering is used to refer to God, YHWH. In the Bible the place where the Shazu lived is Midian, where Moses in the Bible experienced the burning bush from God. Although not a massive migration of people, perhaps there is some truth in the exodus story which is worthy of reexamination.
A possible hypothesis is that a small group of Canaanites were actually slaves in Egypt, escaped, and when journeying occasioned the city of YHW where they had a special experience with their deity. When they arrived at their destination in the highlands of Canaan, they carried this experience with them. The other Canaanites listened to their story of seeking freedom and their interaction with YHWY, and the concept of one god. This idea of freedom and of one god seemed to spread among the Canaanites and at some moment in time they became a chosen people with a certain ideology. It is somewhere around this point in time the Israelite identity had its genesis.
The scholar Carol Meyers said these nomads spread the word of deliverance and freedom from oppression lead by YHWH and the other formerly oppressed people adopted it. Their goal was to keep and maintain themselves with their own labor and serve this singular god and message.
One interesting note by Michael Coogan is that the introduction of the god YHWH did not eliminate Israel worship of other gods. The introduction of the concept of monotheism might have been introduced, but took centuries to take hold. For a long time as the artifacts point to, other gods were served, and there became a push and pull between the one god and the many gods. For a while polytheism and monotheism might have coexisted without tension, but the concept of one God became a very Israel theme.