I am inclined to
suspect a conflation of separate historical personages in all this. Five hundred years from the Exodus to the
founding of the temple is a long time.
Previous considerations discussed here led me to suspect that the exodus
coincided with the expulsion of Aton followers some two to three hundred years
earlier which is sufficient for a folk movement to establish itself with a new
religion and generate a new mythology perhaps reaching back to Egyptian legend.
Then again, all
this was reshaped another five or so hundred years later upon the return from
Babylon to clearly establish a foundational National narrative for the new
state. What is pretty clear is that
these personages surely existed and they hugely affected their times and left a
powerful legacy.
I look forward
to more of graham’s efforts here. It is
road well trod.
The Perplexing
Historical Moses
By Scotty Roberts
Moses is a perplexing historical character. And,
yes, I say “historical,” because I believe there is not reason to doubt his
existence in real history simply because he is predominantly mentioned in books
of faith. But even more perplexing than Moses, is the event inextricably linked
to his name: the Exodus.
Dr. John Ward and I are working on the text for our
upcoming book exploring the historical evidence for the so-called “Great
Exodus,” as well as the historicity of its main character and his links to
sitting monarchs in Egypt. Dating the man is fairly easy, depending on which
dating system and chronology of kings you engage, but proving his existence is
nearly impossible without speculative extrapolation and attribution.
The Exodus itself fairs no better when under the
scrutiny of historical data, archaeological research and academic study. Even
the bible itself is weak on providing verifiable historical facts, which can
obviously be attributed to the nature of the book in which these events are
recorded, that being an offering to build faith as opposed to provide research
material for future generations.
According to the biblical narrative and rabbinic
tradition, Moses grew up in the royal courts of Egypt, the adopted son of
“Pharaoh’s Daughter.” He was born to a Hebrew couple of the tribe of Levi, the
eventual priestly caste of Israelites. They and all the Hebrews were, according
to the book of Exodus, slaves to the Pharaoh of Egypt, and had been for some
350 years since their original family migrated from Canaan to Egypt during a
time of famine.
In the biblical narrative found in the book of
Exodus, it was at this time that the (unnamed) Pharaoh of Egypt - I believe him
to be Thutmosis I – determined that the Hebrews were growing too numerous, and
in order to “thin out their herd,” under fear of potential uprising, he sent
out an edict that all Hebrew babies under the age of three years be killed.
This bloody program was enacted, but Moses’ mother kept him hidden until he had
grown too big to hide. She then put him in a papyrus basket smeared with pitch
to make it water-tight, and floated him down the Nile River with clear
intention of having him picked up by someone who would care for him, playing
into the spiritualism and superstition of the times. She sends Moses’ older
sister, Miriam, to follow the basket along the banks of the river, to ensure
the babe’s safety along the way – and perhaps to even guide him to a
pre-intended destination. The basket and baby drift down the river shallows and
wash into the pools outside the palace in Thebes, and the very young daughter
of Pharaoh discovers Moses. According to the biblical account, she is
confronted by Miriam, who offers to take the baby to “a woman she knows” as wet
nurse. The Royal Princess agrees and sends the baby with Miriam, back to his
mother to be weaned and until she is old enough to claim him as her own.
Four-to-six years later, he is returned to the palace to start his life as a
son of the House of Pharaoh. And there he remained, according to the Jewish
story, for 40 years.
While there are many theories surrounding the dating
of Moses and the Exodus, my focus remains in the middle of the fifteenth
century BC, placing the event of Exodus in 1446 BC, during the fifth year of
the reign of Amenhotep II. I arrive at this date based on an Old Testament
reference that includes an event that is a “rock solid” date in history: the
founding of Temple 1 in Jerusalem, also known as Solomon’s Temple. While there
is great dispute over the very existence of King Solomon of Israel, there is no
dispute over the dating of the temple attributed to him, as it is historical
and archaeological fact. The date of the founding of Temple 1 – give or take a
disputed three-to-six years in either direction – is 966 BC.
In the Hebrew bible’s book of 1 Kings 6:1, it states
that on the day that Solomon founded the Temple in Jerusalem, it had been 480
years since the Exodus. Boom. 966 + 480 = 1446.
Is it really that easy? If the biblical narrative is
accurate, 480 years had passed since the Exodus, and Temple 1 was built in 966
BC. That gives us 1446 BC as the date of the Exodus, the date when Moses was
about 80 years old, according to the Jewish story. If that is so, then Moses
would have been born in 1526 BC, under the reign of Thutmoses I, who’s only
daughter was a young girl named Hatshepsut, who actually bore the distinctive,
singular title of “Pharaoh’s Daughter,” meaning, “Pharaoh’s Only Female Heir.”
If it was indeed the remarkable Hatshepsut who found Moses in a basket in the
Nile, and she indeed raised him as her own – once she became of age to claim
him five-to-seven years after 1526, Moses would have been an amazing man,
indeed.
Hatshepsut bore no royal heirs to succeed her on the
throne, save for her daughter Nefrure, who died around the age of sixteen,
sometime between year eleven and sixteen of her mother’s reign. Hatshepsut had
been married to her own weak and sickly brother, Thutmoses II, who died,
leaving his very young son of a “lesser/harem” wife as heir, Thutmoses III.
Hatshepsut became co-regent with her dead husband’s son, then absolutely
usurped his throne, completely dominating his reign as the Pharaoh, herself,
until the day she died around 1482 BC. An interesting speculation, however, is
that Hatshepsut, having a deeply set hatred of her brother/husband, who died
leaving a son of a lesser wife whom she also despised, found in her own adopted
son Moses, someone whom she could groom to take the throne in her place,
pushing Thutmoses III completely out of the picture. With vast evidence as to
the immense hatred Thutmoses III bore for his step-mother, Hatshepsut, after
her death, lends some credence to the foundation of this theory. After she
died, Thutmoses III struck her image from every wall, painting, sculpture and
relief – even those on her own temple of Dier el Bhari. It is also recorded
that he spoke of Hatshepsut on the day of his ascent to the throne of Egypt as
“that hated, lying, despicable woman.”
When Moses is forty years old, according to the
biblical narrative, he and his royal entourage encounter an Egyptian task
master beating a Hebrew slave. In anger, Moses strikes out and murders the task
master. Fearing this would become known, he flees Egypt and runs to the land of
Midian, where he becomes a shepherd and marries the daughter of the pagan high
priest of the region. Then his story falls silent for 40 more years.
In the meantime, one must wonder what really
happened behind the scenes of the biblical story. It is my contention that a
likely candidate for Moses during his forty years of life at the Egyptian
palace was a man named Senenmut, who was the tutor to Hatshepsut’s daughter,
Nefrure, as well as Hatshepsut’s most trusted advisor. Keep in mind, a royal
tutor was not necessarily a scholarly, educator type, they were generally men
of military accomplishment and some importance. According to Jewish traditional
stories in the Mishnah, Moses had been a fiercely ambitious general under the
pharaoh.
###
Hatshepsut’s image chiseled away from her own temple of Dier el Bhari.
Senenmut lived under the gracious and benevolent eye
of Hatshpsut, some accounts even hailing to their relationship as possible
lovers, despite the nearly ten-year age difference between them. Senenmut was
granted nearly twenty titles bestowed on him by Hatshepsut, everything from
Vizier to Chief Royal Architect. The last title she bestowed on Senenmut was
“Mother’s Brother,” in essence a title elevating a son to the status of equal
with his mother, allowing him to claim equal status of “brother to the gods”
with his pharaonic parent. But somewhere around 1486 BC, Senenmut disappears
completely off the Egyptian scene. Empty, unused tomb and no record of what
happened to him. He simply vanished. Incidentally, if you’re keeping up on the
mathematics, if Moses was born in 1526, he would have turned 40 in 1486 BC.,
the same year he is said to have murdered the Egyptian task master and fled
Egypt.
So we are now back to Moses in Midian, where he
lived as a shepherd for the next forty years, so says the biblical account. He
had his burning bush experience, and was sent back to Egypt by none other than
God for the purpose of freeing the Hebrews from slavery. Moses, as we read in
the book of Exodus, balked, hemmed, hawed and came up with excuses to not go,
but lost the argument with the Almighty. But this brings up a deeper question
for me: if Moses was indeed the adopted son of Hatshepsut, and being groomed to
take the throne in her place, why would the murder of a task master, one step
above a slave, jeopardize his life and career as a member of the royal
household? Simple answer, it wouldn’t. So why did he flee?
It is my contention that there is obviously much
more at play than what we read in the Hebrew scripture, and I speculate that
since Moses could very well have been raised to take his adoptive mother’s
place on the throne of Egypt, he had a voracious political foe in her other
step-son, Thutmoses III, and I believe it was this murdering of the Egyptian
task master that gave Thutmoses III the political opportunity to off his rival
as well as his hated mother’s favorite. The dates fit, the timeline works, but
there simply is no proof beyond speculation built upon the circumstantial acts
of the historical figures. And when Moses is commanded by God to return to the
pharaoh of Egypt and demand the release of the Hebrews, what is his first
refusal? “I can’t go back there, the Pharaoh is seeking my life!” Again, I must
ask, why, after 40 years in hiding, was Moses still worried that the Pharaoh of
Egypt was seeking his life? Was it because he murdered a taskmaster? I think
not.
And when Moses did return to Egypt, he had the court
of the pharaoh, whom I believe was Amenhotep II, living in fear of his words.
His old royal training kicked in, and he had them living in awe of his very
shadow. I think this is because he may have been recognized for who he had once
been in those alabaster courts of the Royal House of Egypt.
As for the perplexity I have maintained over the
Exodus event itself, perhaps we can best showcase the issue with an example:
The bible mentions that there were 600,000 Hebrew men on foot, including their
wives, children, elderly, cattle and other livestock. How long do you suppose
it took an estimated 1.2 million Hebrew slaves, with no traveling experience,
hauling families, small children and elderly grandparents, to traverse the
ancient Egyptian and Arabian trade routes in such a way?
Indeed, if the essence of the tale has its basis in
fact, it is a perplexing mystery.
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