Dating the Exodus - Egyptian vs Bible chronology

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Dating the Exodus - Egyptian vs Bible chronology.
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• Chapter 24
  Doesn’t Egyptian Chronology Prove That the Bible Is Unreliable?
  by Dr. Elizabeth Mitchell on July 22, 2010; last featured April 28, 2015
  Share:
  Discrepancies between traditional Egyptian chronology and the Bible are used to attack the Bible’s historical accuracy.
  
  Egyptology, originally expected to support the history recorded in the Old Testament, has produced a chronology that contradicts the Bible. This so-called traditional Egyptian chronology would have the pyramids predate the flood of Noah’s day; such cannot be the case, for pyramids could never withstand a worldwide flood. And when traditional Egyptian chronology is used to evaluate archaeological findings, landmark events such as the mass exodus of Hebrew people from Egypt appear to have left no evidence. Such discrepancies between traditional Egyptian chronology and the Bible are used to attack the Bible’s historical accuracy. Instead of simply assuming the accuracy of traditional Egyptian chronology and modifying the Bible, people should carefully examine traditional chronology to see if it is as reliable as some claim it to be.
  
  Traditional Egyptian Chronology
  
  Patterns of Evidence: The Exodus unlocks the mystery and reveals evidence that matches and confirms the biblical account. If you have heard that there is no evidence for the Exodus, or for Joseph and the Hebrews in Egypt, prepare for a whole new view of history!

• 
  Though traditional Egyptian chronology dominates modern understanding of ancient history, traditional chronology is inconsistent with the Bible. When there is a discrepancy between traditional chronology and the Bible’s chronology, scholars usually ignore the Bible. Though many claim that traditional chronology is indisputable, a close look at this chronology reveals its shaky foundation. Dr. Rene Grognard of the University of Sydney says, “It is important to show the weaknesses or errors in our understanding of a theory in order to leave our minds free to think of a more acceptable alternative.”1 Before exploring an acceptable alternative to traditional Egyptian chronology, this chapter will show some of the errors it is built on.

• Traditional Egyptian chronology is built on Manetho’s history and the Sothic theory. In the third century B.C., Manetho compiled a list of pharaohs and the lengths of their reigns. The Sothic cycle theory assigns familiar calendar dates to those reigns. However, both Manetho’s history and the Sothic theory have flaws that make them an unreliable foundation for chronology.
  
  Manetho’s History
  Ptolomy II commissioned a priest named Manetho to compile a history of Egypt. Traditional Egyptian chronology bases its outlines of Egyptian dynasties on Manetho’s history (see chart). However, Manetho’s writings are unsuitable for establishing a reliable Egyptian chronology because Manetho’s history:
  
  
• • was never intended to be a chronological account of Egyptian history,
  • is inconsistent with contemporary Egyptian sources.
  
  
  Traditional Egyptian Chronology (simplified overview)2
  
  Old Kingdom Dynasties 1–6 2920–2770 B.C.
  Great Pyramids of Giza 4th Dynasty 2600–2500 B.C.
  First Intermediate Period Dynasties 7–11 2150–1986 B.C.
  Middle Kingdom Dynasties 12–13 1986–1759 B.C.
  Second Intermediate Period Dynasties 14–17 1759–1525 B.C.
  New Kingdom Dynasties 18–20 1525–1069 B.C.
  Third Intermediate Period Dynasties 21–25 1069–664 B.C.
  Late Period (Persian) Dynasties 26–31 664–332 B.C.
  Alexander the Great 332–323 B.C.
  Ptolemaic Period 323–30 B.C.
  Roman Period began 30 B.C.
  
  
  
  Several Egyptian pharaohs may have ruled at the same time in different regions of the land, as archaeologist David Down suggests in his revised chronology.
  
  
• Manetho, whose writings only survive as a partially preserved “garbled abridgement,”3 did not intend for his history to be a chronological account of Egyptian history. Like everyone else in the ancient world, Manetho measured time in regnal years (“in the fifth year of King So-and-So”). Eusebius, the fourth-century historian who quoted Manetho extensively, did not believe that Manetho intended for his regnal years to be added up consecutively. Eusebius says, “Several Egyptian kings ruled at the same time. . . . It was not a succession of kings occupying the throne one after the other, but several kings reigning at the same time in different regions.”4 Because Manetho’s history lists the reigns of kings who ruled simultaneously, historians should not add the years of the kings’ reigns together as if the kings ruled one after another.
  
  Manetho’s history is also inconsistent with contemporary Egyptian sources. Professor J. H. Breasted, author of History of Egypt, calls Manetho’s history “a late, careless and uncritical compilation, which can be proven wrong from the contemporary monuments in the vast majority of cases, where such documents have survived.”5 Manetho’s interpretation of each variation in spelling as a different king creates numerous nonexistent generations. Because Manetho’s history contradicts actual Egyptian records from the time of the pharaohs, historians should not consider Manetho’s history authoritative.
  
  The Sothic Cycle
  Eduard Meyer created the Sothic cycle in 1904 to give Egypt a unified calendar6 that aligns Egyptian regnal years with modern historians’ B.C. dates. Historians combine the Sothic cycle dates with Manetho’s history to get traditional Egyptian dates. Meyer proposed that the Egyptian calendar, having no leap year, fell steadily behind until it corrected itself during the year of the “rising of Sothis.” The theory says the Egyptians knew that 1,460 years were necessary for the calendar to correct itself because the annual sunrise appearance of the star Sirius corresponded to the first day of Egypt’s flood season only once every 1,460 years.7 Sothic theory claims that the Egyptian calendar was correct only once every 1,460 years (like a broken watch that is correct twice a day) and that the Egyptians dated important events from this Great Sothic Year. In reality, there is no evidence for this Sothic cycle in ancient Egypt.
  
  The Sothic cycle is not reliable because it
  • is based on contradictory starting points,
  • has little historical support.
  Meyer had to depend on later non-Egyptian writers to establish a starting point for his calculations, and those sources are contradictory. Censorinius, a third-century Roman writer, and Theon, a fourth-century Alexandrian astronomer, give different starting points. According to Censorinius, the Great Sothic Year occurred in A.D. 140, but according to Theon, it occurred in 26 B.C. Meyer subtracted multiples of 1,460 years from A.D. 140 and proposed 4240 B.C. as a totally certain date for the establishment of Egypt’s civil calendar.8
  
  The Sothic cycle finds little historical support. History gives no hint that the Egyptians regularly dated important events from the rising of Sothis. The second-century astronomer Claudius Ptolemy never mentions the rising of Sothis.9 Furthermore, whenever Egyptian writings mention the rising of Sothis in connection with a regnal year, the pharaoh is unnamed,10 or the reference is ambiguous.11 For these reasons, many Egyptologists have consistently rejected Sothic-cycle-based chronology.
  
  Discrepancies
  Whenever two chronologies disagree, at least one must be wrong. Traditional Egyptian chronology disputes the Hebrew chronology recorded in the Bible as well as secular data from neighboring nations. As Damien Mackey summarized in his thesis:
  
  The value of any one nation’s absolute chronology must ultimately depend on its ability to integrate with all known data from other regions as well. It would be useless to establish a complete system of chronology that can exist only in isolation, but that cannot stand up to scrutiny by comparison with other systems. For the Sothic scheme [of Egyptian chronology] to be valid—just as for Mesopotamian, Palestinian, Greek or Anatolian chronologies to be valid—it is necessary for each period of Egyptian history to be capable of perfect alignment with any relevant period of history of one or another ancient nation. This is most especially true in the case of Egyptian history because . . . the historians of other nations tend to look to Egyptian chronology as the rule according to which they estimate and adjust their own chronologies12 (emphasis added).
  Biblical Discrepancies
  Traditional dates for Egyptian pyramids predate Noah’s flood (see chart). Since the pyramids could not have survived a global flood, some people question the reliability of the Bible’s chronology. Others use the traditional dates for the pyramids to support the idea that Noah’s flood was a local flood that did not affect Egypt.13 The pyramids do not come with labels declaring their dates, and the traditional dates used for them create an irreconcilable discrepancy with the Bible.
  
  Bible Timeline (B.C.)
  4004 2348 1491 586 4
  Creation Noah’s flood Exodus Temple destroyed Christ’s birth
  Traditional Egyptian Dates (B.C.)
  315014 to 2920 2600 to 2500 1290
  Zoser’s pyramid Great Pyramid Exodus
  Traditional dates for the Old Testament stories involving Egypt remain unconfirmed by archaeology and actually contradict Scripture. The characters of the Bible stories left no archaeological evidence of their existence in the times traditionally assigned to them. Bible-believing Egyptologists assigned these dates in error. The early Egyptologists, hoping to find the Bible confirmed in Egypt, contributed to the errors in traditional chronology by incorrectly applying the Bible in two instances. They incorrectly:
  • assumed that Ramses the Great was the pharaoh of the oppression,
  • identified Shoshenq as Shishak of the Bible.
  The first error assigned an Exodus date inconsistent with the rest of Scripture. The second error provided support for the excessive antiquity of traditional dating. Both errors caused scholars to assign inconsistent, unsupported dates to the Bible accounts.
  
  Scholars routinely disregard the biblical date for the Exodus.15 As Gleason Archer says, “But notwithstanding . . . consistent testimony of Scripture to the 1445 date (or an approximation thereof), the preponderance of scholarly opinion today is in favor of a considerably later date, the most favored one at present being 1290 B.C., or about ten years after Ramses II began to reign.”16 The traditional date for Ramses II “the Great,” a 19th dynasty king, is nearly two centuries after the Exodus. Because Exodus 1:11 says that the Hebrew slaves built the city Ramses, early Egyptologists assumed that Ramses II was the pharaoh who oppressed the Israelites. On that basis, most scholars assign Ramses’ traditional date to the Exodus and ignore the Bible’s testimony.
  
  The name Ramses should not restrict the oppression to the 19th dynasty because this name is not unique to the 19th dynasty. Ramses, which means “son of Ra—the sun god,” was a name commonly used to honor pharaohs. For instance, Ahmose, the founder of the 18th dynasty, was also called Ramses, as was a later 18th dynasty king, Amenhotep III.17 Archaeology of the 18th and 19th dynasties shows no evidence of enslaved Israelites because the Hebrews had left Egypt centuries before. Scholars should neither assume that Ramses II was the pharaoh of the oppression nor assign his date to the Exodus.
  
  Jean Champollion,18 the father of Egyptology, unwittingly gave support to biblically inconsistent chronology when he erroneously identified pharaoh Shoshenq as the Shishak of the Bible. Champollion found an inscription about Shoshenq, founder of the 22nd dynasty, at the temple of Karnak. Because the names sound similar, Champollion assumed that Shoshenq was the Shishak who plundered Jerusalem in the fifth year of King Rehoboam.19 Using the biblical date for Rehoboam as a starting point, chronologists used Manetho’s list to outline the next three centuries of Egyptian history.
  
  The two problems with Shoshenq’s identification involve military strategy and phonics. According to the inscriptions, Shoshenq attacked the northern part of Israel, not Rehoboam’s Jerusalem or Judah. During Rehoboam’s time, Jeroboam ruled the northern kingdom. Jeroboam was Shishak’s ally.20 If Shoshenq were Shishak, then Shoshenq attacked his ally and ignored his enemy. Furthermore, the phonetics of these two pharaohs’ names only sound similar in their transliterated forms, not in the original languages.21 Because of this faulty identification of Shoshenq with Shishak, Egyptologists ignore the rest of the biblical facts relating to the geography and characters involved. Because the dates constructed from this biblical misinterpretation actually coincide with the traditional dating of the third intermediate period, many Bible scholars trust the traditional chronology even when it disputes the Old Testament.
  
  Secular Discrepancies
  Traditional Egyptian chronology disputes not only biblical chronology but also information from nonbiblical sources. Egypt’s traditional dates clash with secular data in at least two areas:
  • The Hittite connection with Assyrian chronology
  • Carbon dating
  The Hittites built a powerful empire based in Asia Minor, but scholars have to depend on dates from other ancient nations to determine Hittite chronology. Synchronisms are events shared by two cultures, and Egypt shares many synchronisms with the Hittites. Therefore, Egypt’s erroneous dates have been assigned to the Hittites. For instance, the traditional date of 1353 B.C. for pharaoh Akhenaten’s accession22 to the throne is assigned to Hittite king Supiluliumas because Supiluliumas sent to a letter of congratulations to Akhenaten.23 The date 1275 B.C. for the battle of Kadesh,24 at which both Ramses II and Hittite king Muwatalli II claimed victory, comes from the traditional dates for Ramses the Great. (His dates derive from Sothic theory and Manetho’s history.) Finally, when Ramses III recorded his traditionally dated 1180 B.C.25 victory over sea people, he said that the sea people had already annihilated the Hittites. According to these Egyptian dates, the Hittites became extinct about 1200 B.C. (see chart).
  
  Traditional Timeline (B.C.)
  
  315026 2600 1290 1275 1200
  Zoser’s Pyramid Great Pyramid Exodus Kadesh Hittites extinct
  The Egyptian version of Hittite chronology falls apart, however, when compared to more recent Assyrian archaeological discoveries. Assyrian inscriptions record wars with the Hittites during the eighth and ninth centuries B.C., centuries after the Hittites supposedly ceased to exist. These inscriptions describe wars during the reigns of Assyrian kings Shalmaneser III and Sennacherib and even name the same Hittite kings as the Egyptian records27 (see chart). The Assyrian timeline is consistent with well-established dates such as Nebuchadnezzar’s conquest of Jerusalem. Traditional Egyptian dates must be wrong.
  
  Problems Timeline (B.C.)
  
  2600 2348 1275 1200 800s–700s
  (trad.) (bib.) (trad.) (trad.) (Assyr.)
  Great Pyramid flood Kadesh Hittites extinct Hittite/Assyrian wars
  Acceptance of the biblical account of Hittite history could have prevented the incorrect dating of the Hittites even before the discovery of the Assyrian monumental inscriptions. According to 2 Kings 7:6, during Elisha’s lifetime the Hittites were as formidable as Egypt. One explorer, Irish missionary William Wright, correctly evaluated the hieroglyphics he found in Asia Minor because he accepted the Bible’s history. In 1872, despite scholarship that insisted the Hittites and the Bible were unhistorical, Wright believed that the inscriptions he had found “would show that a great people, called Hittites in the Bible, but never referred to in classic history, had once formed a mighty empire in that region.”28
  
  Carbon dating29 also disputes traditional chronology. According to the Cambridge Encyclopedia on Archaeology:
  
  When the radiocarbon method was first tested, good agreement was found between radiocarbon dates and historical dates for samples of known age. . . . As measurements became more precise, however, it gradually became apparent that there were systematic discrepancies between the dates that were being obtained and those that could be expected from historical evidence [i.e., the traditional dates]. These differences were most marked in the period before about the midfirst millennium B.C., in which radiocarbon dates appear too recent, by up to several hundred years, by comparison with historical dates. Dates for the earliest comparative material available, reeds used as bonding between mud brick courses of tombs of Egyptians Dynasty I, about 3,100 B.C., appeared to be as much as 600 years, or about 12% too young30 (emphasis added).
  Just as carbon dating is more consistent with a young earth than most people realize, carbon dating is consistent with a much younger Egyptian civilization than traditional chronology claims.
  
  Revised Chronologies
  In Centuries of Darkness, Peter James calls traditional chronology a “gigantic academic blunder.”31 David Rohl writes, “The only real solution to the archaeological problems which have been created is to pull down the whole structure and start again, reconstructing from the foundations upward.”32 Revised chronology reflects the relationships between ancient nations more accurately and reveals “remarkable agreement between the histories of Egypt and Israel.”33 Revised chronology bolsters the Christian’s trust in the Bible and equips him with answers for a skeptical world.
  
  Efforts to assign familiar dates to events of antiquity require a starting point, a known date. Four starting points provide secure anchors for the chronology of the Middle East. By counting both backward and forward from these four dates, the chronologist can assign familiar dates from creation to Christ34 and combine the annals of the ancient nations to build a consistent chronology. These four anchor points are summarized on the “Starting Points” chart.
  
  Starting Points
  
  664 B.C. 621 B.C. 605 B.C. 586 B.C. A.D. 26
  Thebes sacked Lunar eclipse Battle of Carchemish Temple destroyed 15th year of Tiberias
  
  Taharka Dies Nabopolassar’s 5th year Nebuchadnezzar’s 1st year (sole rex) Nebuchadnezzar’s 19th year Christ’s 30th year
  Space does not permit analysis of all the revised chronologies. A number of scholars, including Peter James, David Rohl, D.A. Courville, and David Down, have produced fine work in this area. Some begin with the Bible, while others begin with starting points such as the battle of Thebes. The Christian should only accept revised chronology that is consistent with the Bible. New evidence may someday shed new light on the identity of a pharaoh, but nothing should ever rock the Christian’s faith in the trustworthiness of God’s Word.
  
  David Down, in Unwrapping the Pharaohs, has synthesized the work of many experts into a cohesive narrative consistent with the Bible. He points out many synchronisms between the histories of Israel and Egypt, providing a highly plausible identification for many of the characters in the Old Testament. Furthermore, his work is consistent with the history of surrounding nations and allows the Hittites to slip into their proper niche in the context of their Assyrian and Egyptian neighbors.
  
  The Revision Compared to the Absolute Authority—the Bible
  Synchronisms between Old Testament characters and Egypt include the following:
  • Pre-Dynastic and Old Kingdom
    • Mizraim, Abram
  • Middle Kingdom
    • Joseph, Moses
  • New Kingdom
    • Solomon, Rehoboam, Asa, Ahab
  • Third Intermediate and Late Periods
    • Hezekiah, Josiah, Jeremiah
  Predynastic Egypt and Old Kingdom—the Post-Flood World
  Most histories begin with the unsubstantiated notion that primitive people slowly developed civilization from rudimentary beginnings. Archaeology around the world has instead revealed advanced ancient technology without discernible periods of evolution.35 This sudden appearance of cultures possessing advanced technology approximately 4,000 years ago is consistent with the Bible’s account of the Flood, the proliferation of intelligent people on the plains of Shinar, and their subsequent scattering from the Tower of Babel.36
  
  1. Mizraim’s Family
  Each group leaving Babel took with it whatever skills its members possessed.
  
  Mizraim, Noah’s grandson, founded Egypt around 2188 B.C., a date consistent with both biblical and secular records.37 The Egyptians, the Sumerians, and the Mayans all retained the technology to build pyramids. Imhotep designed Egypt’s first pyramid for third dynasty pharaoh Zoser. The Great Pyramid of Giza, built for pharaoh Khufu of the fourth dynasty, is “the largest and most accurately constructed building in the world.”38 This pyramid required advanced optical, surveying, mathematical, and construction techniques, an impressive leap beyond the technology demonstrated in earlier pyramids.
  
  2. Abram and Khufu’s Pyramid
  Abram’s visit to Egypt may explain Egypt’s sudden advance. Abram grew up in the advanced but idolatrous culture of Ur about three centuries after the Flood. Josephus wrote that Abram “communicated to them arithmetic, and delivered to them the science of astronomy; for before Abram came into Egypt they were unacquainted with those parts of learning; for that science came from the Chaldeans into Egypt.”39 Based on Josephus’s statement, Abram’s visit to Egypt may well have occurred during the fourth dynasty.
  
  Middle Kingdom—Joseph and Moses
  In contrast to the lack of evidence for an Israelite population in Egypt during the New Kingdom of Ramses’ time, there is significant evidence of the Israelite presence during the Middle Kingdom. The 12th and 13th dynasties provide the backdrop for the stories of Joseph, the oppression of the Israelites, Moses, and the Exodus. The biblical dates for these events can provide dates for these dynasties (see chart).
  
  1. Joseph as Vizier
  Sesostris I of the 12th dynasty had a powerful vizier named Mentuhotep. Mentuhotep held the office of chief treasurer and wielded authority “like the declaration of the king’s power.”40 “Mentuhotep . . . appears as the alter ego of the king. When he arrived, the great personages bowed down before him at the outer door of the royal palace.”41
  
  Compare Mentuhotep to Joseph in Genesis 41:40, 43. Furthermore, Ameni, a provincial governor under Sesostris I, had the following inscribed on his tomb: “No one was unhappy in my days, not even in the years of famine, for I had tilled all the fields of the Nome of Mah, up to its southern and northern frontiers. Thus I prolonged the life of its inhabitants and preserved the food which it produced.”42 Ameni sounds like a man with the inside track on the agricultural forecast! Ameni’s employer, vizier Mentuhotep, may have been Jacob’s son Joseph.
  
  2. Israelite Slavery
  The late 12th dynasty reveals evidence for Israelite slavery. Sesostris III, the fifth king of the 12th dynasty, built cities in the delta including Bubastis, Qantir, and Ramses. The building material of choice in the Middle Kingdom was no longer stones but rather bricks composed of mud and straw.43 A large Semitic slave population lived in the villages of Kahun and Gurob during the latter half of the 12th dynasty. On one papyrus slave list, 48 of the 77 legible names are typical of a “Semitic group from the northwest,”44 many listed beside the Egyptian name assigned by the owner.45 The presence of Semitic slaves in Egypt during this time is consistent with the biblical account of the oppression of the Israelites.
  
  3. Moses’ Adoption
  Traditional chronology has tried to fit Moses into the 18th or 19th dynasty where there is no evidence of Semitic slavery on a large scale, but Moses’ unusual adoption does fit into the late 12th dynasty. Amenemhet III, the dynasty’s sixth king, had two daughters but no sons. Josephus describes a childless daughter of pharaoh finding a child in the river and telling her father, “As I have received him [Moses] from the bounty of the river, in a wonderful manner, I thought proper to adopt him for my son and the heir of thy kingdom.”46 Amenemhet III’s daughter Sobekneferu was childless and eventually ruled briefly as pharaoh herself, making Sobekneferu a likely candidate for Moses’ foster mother.47
  
  4. Testimony of the Dead
  Examinations of cemeteries at Tell ed-Daba and Kahun, areas with high Semitic slave populations, have been particularly supportive of the biblical narrative. Graves at ed-Daba reveal that 65 percent of the dead were infants.48 This extraordinarily high figure is consistent with the slaughter of Israelite infants ordered by Pharaoh. Also consistent with the prescribed slaughter are “wooden boxes . . . discovered underneath the floors of many houses at Kahun. They contained babies, sometimes buried two or three to a box, and aged only a few months at death.”49
  
  Examination of graves in a more recent section, datable to the late 13th dynasty, reveals shallow mass graves without the customary grave goods. These disorganized, crowded burials suggest the need for rapid burial of large numbers of people.50 The death of the firstborn in the tenth plague would have created just such a situation.
  
  5. The Exodus
  In the 13th dynasty, during the reign of Neferhotep I, the Semitic slaves suddenly departed from Tel ed-Daba51 and Kahun.
  
  Completion of the king’s pyramid was not the reason why Kahun’s inhabitants eventually deserted [Kahun], abandoning their tools and other possessions in the shops and houses. . . . The quantity, range, and type of articles of everyday use which were left behind suggest that the departure was sudden and unpremeditated.52
  Furthermore, Neferhotep I’s mummy has never been found, and his son Wahneferhotep did not ever reign, Neferhotep being succeeded by his brother Sobkhotpe IV.53 The sudden departure of the Semitic slave population fits the biblical account of the Hebrew slaves’ sudden exodus from Egypt after the tenth plague. The pharaoh’s mummy is missing because he died in the Red Sea with his army when he pursued the slaves, and his son never ruled because he died in the tenth plague.
  
  6. The Hyksos
  Just a few years after the Exodus, the 13th dynasty ended, and the Second Intermediate Period, the time of Hyksos rule, began. The Hyksos have puzzled scholars, and everyone has a pet theory as to the Hyksos’s identity. Manetho reported:
  
  Men of ignoble birth out of the eastern parts . . . had boldness enough to make an expedition into our country and with ease subdue it by force, yet without our hazarding a battle with them. . . . This whole nation was styled Hycsos54 (emphasis added).
  Manetho places this conquest at the end of the 13th dynasty.55
  
  Since no evidence of chariots had been found in pre-Hyksos Egypt, tradition has held that the Hyksos were able to defeat Egypt because they possessed chariots. Therefore, since Exodus 14 describes Pharaoh’s pursuit with chariots, many have thought that the Exodus occurred after the Hyksos conquest. However, discoveries in recent years have confirmed the use of horses and chariots in the 12th and the 13th dynasties, prior to the Hyksos invasion. For example, an engraving from the 13th dynasty shows Khonsuemmwaset, a pharaoh’s son and army commander, with a pair of gloves, the symbol for charioteer, under his seat.56
  
  The drowning of the Egyptian army in the Red Sea explains the conquest of the powerful nation of Egypt without a battle. Some have hypothesized that the Hyksos were Amalekites.57 Whoever the Hyksos were, they ruled Egypt from Avaris in the delta as the 15th and 16th dynasties, while their puppets in the 17th dynasty ruled from Thebes nearly 500 miles to the south. The 17th dynasty overthrew the Hyksos58 and began the New Kingdom.
  
  New Kingdom—Israel’s Early Monarchy
  1. David and Tahpenes’s Husband
  During David’s reign, a young Edomite named Hadad found refuge in Pharaoh’s house and married Queen Tahpenes’s sister.59 Hadad and the queen’s sister had a son named Genubath. Genubath eventually became king of Edom. Records of the 18th dynasty’s founder, Ahmose, refer to a name that resembles Tahpenes.60 Later in the 18th dynasty, Thutmosis III received tribute from the land of Genubatye.61
  
  2. Solomon and the Egyptian Princess
  Thutmosis I of the 18th dynasty had two daughters, Hatshepsut and Nefrubity. Nefrubity dropped out of the Egyptian records and may have been the Egyptian princess that Solomon married to seal his 1 Kings 3:1 treaty with Egypt.62
  
  3. Queen of Sheba and Hatshepsut
  Another mysterious Bible character emerges from the 18th dynasty. The female pharaoh Hatshepsut’s trip to the land of Punt is famous, but the identity of Punt has remained a mystery despite engravings commemorating the treasures she brought home. First Kings 10 says the queen of Sheba visited Solomon, giving and receiving great gifts. Josephus identified this queen of Sheba as “queen of Egypt and Ethiopia.”63 In Matthew 12:42 the Lord Jesus refers to the queen of Sheba as “the queen of the south.” “The south” is a biblical designation for Egypt.64 Thus, Hatshepsut was probably the queen of Sheba.
  
  4. Rehoboam and Shishak
  When Thutmosis III became pharaoh, he conquered much of Palestine, ultimately taking away the treasures in Rehoboam’s Jerusalem without a battle. He listed these treasures on the wall of the temple at Karnak. His list mirrors the Bible’s account from 1 Kings 6:32, 10:17, and 14:25–26, including the 300 gold shields and doors overlaid with gold.65 Thutmosis III was Shishak.
  
  5. Asa and Zerah the Ethiopian
  Asa, Rehoboam’s grandson, had an encounter with Egypt. Second Chronicles 14 describes God’s miraculous defense against an overwhelming attack by Zerah the Ethiopian. Ethiopia (Kush) refers to southern Egypt or Sudan. The 18th dynasty’s headquarters was in southern Egypt, so this reference likely refers to another 18th dynasty pharaoh, possibly Amenhotep II.66
  
  6. Ahab and Akhenaton
  Late in the 18th dynasty, one of Egypt’s most famous families set the stage for both biblical and Hittite synchronisms. Clay tablets found in Akhenaton’s archives at Tel el-Amarna in 1887 included 60 letters from the king of Sumur, likely the Egyptian name for Samaria. The city of Samaria, according to 1 Kings 22:26, had a governor named Amon (an Egyptian name). The Amarna letters call this governor Aman-appa and describe a severe famine that is consistent with the famine in the days of Ahab and Elijah.67
  
  7. The Hittites and Tutankhamen
  Akhenaton’s son, the famous King Tutankhamen, died young, leaving no heir and a widowed queen called Ankhesenamen. According to the Deeds of Suppiluliuma as told by his son Mursili II in the Hittite archives, Tut’s widow wrote to the powerful Hittite king Supililiumas, pleading, “Give me one son of yours . . . he would become my husband. . . . In Egypt he will be king”68 Had Supililiumas’s son Zannanza survived his trip to Egypt, the balance of power would have shifted against Assyria in favor of a Hittite-Egyptian coalition. Zannanza was assassinated, and Tut’s general, Harmheb, assumed power. Upon Harmheb’s death, his vizier, Ramses I the Great, took the throne as the first pharaoh of the 19th dynasty.
  
  The dates for Ramses the Great’s reign69 and his battle of Kadesh with the Hittites are uncertain, because historians have no biblical parallels and no way to assess the preceding dynasty’s duration. The rest of the revised chronology shifts the 19th dynasty dates three to five centuries later than the traditional dates. Ramses III, of the 20th dynasty, reported the annihilation of the Hittites during his reign. Revised chronology allows the Hittites to still exist at the time the Assyrians claimed to be at war with them.
  
  8. “Israel Is Laid Waste”
  The real 19th dynasty was concerned with the power of Assyria, not the plagues of Moses. Merneptah, the son of Ramses the Great, recorded the change in the region’s power structure by listing many places Assyria had seized. His monument states, “Israel is laid waste, his seed is not.”70 This inscription not only places the latter part of the 19th dynasty in the 8th century B.C.; it also documents that Israel was an actual nation by the time of the 19th dynasty.
  
  Third Intermediate and Late Periods—Judah’s Late Monarchy and Captivity
  The Third Intermediate Period contains dynasties 21–25, but some of these dynasties were concurrent, not sequential as assumed in the traditional chronology. In fact, the Royal Cache at Luxor contained a labeled 21st dynasty mummy wrapped in 22nd dynasty linen!71 The linen label names Sheshonq, the same pharaoh earlier mistaken for Shishak.
  
  1. Hezekiah and Taharka
  The biblical synchronism in this period involves Hezekiah. The imminent arrival of Assyria’s enemy Taharka,72 the last pharaoh of the 25th dynasty, helped Hezekiah by putting Sennacherib to flight in 709 B.C. Taharka later rebelled against the Assyrian domination of Egypt, dying in 664 B.C. when Ashurbanipal sacked Thebes.73
  
  2. Josiah and Necho
  After Ninevah’s destruction, Pharaoh Necho II of the 26th dynasty marched to Carchemish, where the Assyrian remnant was making its last stand. On the way, according to 2 Chronicles 35, Necho killed Judah’s king Josiah at Megiddo. Returning from his 605 B.C. defeat at Carchemish, Necho took Jehoahaz as a hostage and placed Jehoiakim on the throne of Judah.
  
  3. Jeremiah and Hophra
  One final biblical synchronism occurs in connection with the fate of 26th dynasty pharaoh, Hophra. Following a coup, Hophra fled to Babylon. There, he acquired an army and returned to reclaim his throne. Jeremiah predicted his defeat, and the prophecy recorded in Jeremiah 44:30 was fulfilled.
  
  Table of Biblical and Egyptian Synchronisms74
  
  Date B.C. Bible Egyptians Dynasty
  4004 Adam
  2348 Noah’s flood
  post-Babel Mizraim
  late 1900s Abraham Khufu 4
  1706 Joseph; Jacob to Egypt Sesostris I 12
  1635 Joseph dies
  after 1635 enslavement Sesostris III 12
  1571 Moses born Amenemhet III 12
  1491 Exodus Neferhotep I 13
  Judges Hyksos 15-17
  late 1000s David (1 Kings 11:19) Ahmosis or Amenhotep I 18
  1012 Solomon starts temple Thutmosis I 18
  Queen of Sheba Hatshepsut 18
  971 Rehoboam; Shishak invades Thutmosis III 18
  late 900s Asa; Zerah the Ethiopian Amenhotep II 18
  late 900s Ahab; Elijah Akhenaton 18
  uncertain Raamses II 19
  722 Assyria destroys Israel Merneptah 19
  709 Hezekiah; Assyrian invasion Taharka 25
  664 Manasseh Taharka dies 25
  609 Josiah dies Necho 26
  605 Necho; Carchemish 26
  589 Jeremiah Hophra 26
  586 Temple destroyed
  525 Cambyses of Persia
  Conclusion
  Viewing the evidence from a biblical framework makes the histories of Egypt and the Old Testament fit together like two sides of a zipper.
  Isaiah warned against going down to Egypt for help (Isaiah 31:1). This phrase has come to symbolize a warning not to go to the world for truth. God determines truth. Historians examine fragmentary clues and fill in the gaps based on their presuppositions. Those presuppositions may be biblical or traditional. Accepting traditional Egyptian chronology necessitates rejection of biblical truth. Accepting biblical chronology allows a reconstruction of ancient chronology on a foundation of truth. Viewing the evidence from a biblical framework makes the histories of Egypt and the Old Testament fit together like two sides of a zipper.
  
  Since the original publication of this chapter, Isaac Newton’s work on revised chronologies has become available in English. Newton’s Revised History of Ancient Kingdoms makes available much additional information and insight about the history of ancient Egypt as well as the history of other ancient kingdoms. For further studies of revised chronologies, because the Bible is the ultimate standard, I suggest consulting Dr. Floyd Jones’ book The Chronology of the Old Testament.
  
  Previous Chapter Aren’t Millions of Years Required for Geological Processes? Next Chapter What about Satan and the Origin of Evil?
  The New Answers Book 2
  
  People complain about The New Answers Book. They say that it’s so good at giving short, substantive answers that they want more. Well, we listened! In The New Answers Book 2 you’ll find 31 more great answers to big questions for the Christian life. Many view the original New Answers Book as an essential tool for modern discipleship. Both of these books answer such questions as: Can natural processes explain the origin of life? Can creationists be real scientists? Where did Cain get his wife? Is evolution a religion? and more!
  
  Read Online Buy Book
  Footnotes
  1. D. Mackey, “Sothic Star Dating: The Sothic Star Theory of the Egyptian Calendar,” abridged thesis, Sydney, Australia, 1995; available at www.specialtyinterests.net/.
  2. D. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest (New York: Crown Publishers, 1995), p. 24. Dynasties are grouped in sets called Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom, and New Kingdom. After each set is an Intermediate Period whose history is less clear. Duration of dynasties comes from Manetho. Dates come from various interpretations of the Sothic cycle. Note: Meyer, Breasted, and many others give even earlier dates.
  3. A. Gardiner, Egypt of the Pharaohs (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961), p. 46, quoted in D. Mackey’s thesis. Manetho is quoted by Josephus, Eusebius, Africanus, and Syncellus.
  4. J. Ashton and D. Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2006), p. 73.
  5. D. Mackey, “Sothic Star Dating.”
  6. D. Mackey, “Fall of the Sothic Theory: Egyptian Chronology Revisited,” TJ 17 no. 3 (2003): 70–73, available at www.answersingenesis.org/tj/v17/i3/sothic_theory.asp.
  7. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 129–130.
  8. Mackey, “Fall of the Sothic Theory: Egyptian Chronology Revisited.”
  9. Ibid.
  10. Ibid.
  11. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 134–135. The famous Ebers Papyrus allegedly confirms a 1517 B.C. date for the ninth year of Amenhotep I. However, this document refers to a monthly rising of Sothis, an astronomical impossibility.
  12. D. Mackey, “Sothic Star Dating: The Sothic Star Theory of the Egyptian Calendar,” abridged thesis, Sydney, Australia, 1995. available at www.specialtyinterests.net/.
  13. The inconsistency of the local flood idea with both science and the rest of the Bible is discussed in chapter 10 of The New Answers Book (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2006).
  14. Earlier date comes from W. Durant, Our Oriental Heritage (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1954), p. 147.
  15. Conservative Bible scholars calculate the Exodus to have occurred sometime between 1491–1445 B.C. Solomon began to build the temple in the fourth year of his reign, in the 480th year after the Exodus from Egypt, according to I Kings 6:1. Accepted dates for the beginning of Solomon’s reign, as calculated from the lengths of the reigns of Old Testament kings, range from 1015 to 970 B.C. From this data, the Exodus occurred around 1491 to 1445 B.C. The dates are confirmed by additional Scriptures. See Dr. Jones’s Chronology of the Old Testament for a full discussion.
  16. G. Archer, A Survey of Old Testament Introduction (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1994), p. 241.
  17. F.N. Jones, Chronology of the Old Testament (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2004), p. 50–51.
  18. Jean Champollion translated the famous Rosetta stone, unlocking the secret of Egyptian hieroglyphics.
  19. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 120–121. See 1 Kings 14:25.
  20. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 122–127 and 1 Kings 11:40. Jeroboam had fled to Shishak during Solomon’s lifetime.
  21. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 185.
  22. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 20.
  23. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 75.
  24. Anatolia: Cauldron of Cultures (Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1995), p. 64.
  25. Ibid, p. 69.
  26. W. Durant, Our Oriental Heritage (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1954), p. 147.
  27. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 75–76.
  28. Anatolia, p. 41.
  29. Carbon dating is discussed in chapter 7 of The New Answers Book (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2006).
  30. D. Downs, “The Chronology of Egypt and Israel,” from Diggings, available at biblicalstudies.qldwide.net.au/chronology_of_egypt_and_israel.html.
  31. P. James, Centuries of Darkness, 320, quoted in Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 184.
  32. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 9.
  33. Down, “The Chronology of Egypt and Israel.”
  34. Jones, Chronology of the Old Testament, p. 23, 123, and 309. Claudius Ptolemy documented a lunar eclipse that occurred on April 15, 621 B.C. (Gregorian calendar), during the fifth year of Nabopolassar, Nebuchadnezzar’s father. Counting forward gives the 605 B.C. and 586 B.C. dates. Ashurbanipal’s sacking of Thebes in 664 B.C. comes from several independent ancient sources. (See Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 119.) Contemporary Roman writers confirm the Tiberius date. (See Jones, Chronology of the Old Testament, p. 218.)
  35. D. Chittick, Puzzle of Ancient Man (Newberg, OR: Creation Compass, 2006), p. 8–15.
  36. Archbishop Ussher calculated the date for the Tower of Babel 2242 B.C. from Genesis and from Manetho’s statement that the confusion occurred in the fifth year of Peleg’s life. L. Pierce, “In the Days of Peleg,” Creation 22 no. 1 (1999): p. 46–49, available at www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v22/i1/peleg.asp
  37. Ibid. The 12th-century historian Constantinus Manasses wrote that Egypt endured for 1,663 years. Egypt lost her independence around 526 B.C. with the Persian conquest. Hence, 2188 B.C. is a reasonable date for Egypt’s founding and is consistent with a 2242 B.C. date for the Tower of Babel.
  38. Ibid, p. 106.
  39. Josephus, The Works of Josephus: New Updated Edition, book 1, chapter 8, as translated by William Whiston (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1987), p. 39.
  40. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 83, quoting from James Henry Breasted’s History of Egypt.
  41. Ibid, quoting from Emille Brugsch’s Egypt Under the Pharaohs.
  42. Ibid, p. 83–84.
  43. Ibid, p. 79.
  44. Ibid, p. 92, quoting from Dr. Rosalie David’s The Pyramid Builders of Ancient Egypt.
  45. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 275–276.
  46. W. Whiston, transl., book 2, chapter 9, section 7, The Works of Josephus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1987), p. 68.
  47. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 92.
  48. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 271.
  49. D. Down, “Searching for Moses,” TJ 15 no. 1 (2001): 53-57, available at www.answersingenesis.org/tj/v15/i1/moses.asp.
  50. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 279.
  51. Ibid., reporting findings by Professor Manfred Bietak of Austrian Institute for Egyptology.
  52. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 100, quoting Dr. Rosalie David’s The Pyramid Builders of Ancient Egypt.
  53. Ibid., p. 103.
  54. Ibid.,, p. 102, quoting Josephus.
  55. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 280–281.
  56. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 285.
  57. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 103, referencing Courville’s The Exodus Problem and Its Ramifications.
  58. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 106. Rebellion arose after the Hyksos king picked a fight with the Theban king Seqenenre by claiming the hippopotamus noise from the new canal in Thebes was keeping him awake at night.
  59. 1 Kings 11:15–20
  60. Phonetic similarity is certainly no guarantee of identity, as the case of Shishak’s misidentification has shown. However, the occurrence of both of these names in the time sequence consistent with the times of David’s and Solomon’s reigns is at least a strong suggestion of synchronism.
  61. “Contemporary Personalities and Affairs of the Early Israelite and 18th Dynasty Egyptian Kings,” from The California Institute for Ancient Studies, www.specialtyinterests.net/solsen.html.
  62. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 111. See 1 Kings 3:1.
  63. Ibid., p. 121.
  64. Daniel 11:5 and 8–9.
  65. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 126–128.
  66. Ibid., p. 134.
  67. Ibid., p. 154.
  68. G. Johnson, “Queen Ankhesenamen and the Hittite Prince,” 1999, available at www.guardians.net/egypt/georgejohnson/queenankhesenamen.htm.
  69. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, places him in 900s B.C. (p. 175); Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, in 700s B.C. (p. 209) depending on uncertain 18th dynasty co-regencies.
  70. Ashton and Down, Unwrapping the Pharaohs, p. 178.
  71. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, pp. 75–76.
  72. 2 Kings 19:9, referred to as Tirhakah king of Ethiopia.
  73. Rohl, Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest, p. 22.
  74. Dates for biblical events are from Dr. Floyd-Nolen Jones’s Chronology of the Old Testament, chosen for its careful analysis and internal consistency with regard to Scripture.

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I don't know enough about Egyptian history to comment on it's accuracy, I do know enough about scholarship that it's bad scholarship to not scrutinize every primary source, the author is assuming that Genesis and Exodus are historically correct. What the author fails to realize is that ancient historians were not as concerned with getting all of the technical facts and information right as we are today.

Many were killed anyway,
and not for making a mistake - history was often re-written on purpose "by the victors" as the saying goes, with totally different results and even opposed to the original purpose and outcome.
This is particularly evident on this website seeing the horrible results of religions / religious history that has been falsified on purpose starting thousands of years ago.

hebrewcalendar12 said:

Furthermore, during times where monarchies ruled, in both recent European and ancient Middle Eastern history it was far more than just your academic career you risked losing when making a mistake. You also risked losing your head!!! The kings of those times didn't play. Even if you look at King Henry the Eighth and King James' King James Bible.

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"Modern" ? is almost laughable. It has been falsified on purpose so often that that is perhaps the actual "standard" - falsify but don't get caught, and if you do get caught, we will dis-avow any knowledge of your doing so and you will be on your own.
Mostly of course, same as always, for power (that corrupts) and money (the god of most people).

hebrewcalendar12 said:

This does not mean ancient historians were perfect of course. They lacked modern technology and where there were pieces missing in the history of a people, or event, they too, like modern historians, had to simply go with whatever they had at the time, as best they could.

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"as best they could" ?
Want to see "PERFECT" ?

Look up online how they copy TORAH by hand with no mistakes in thousands of years.

(in all of TORAH, about 10 minor and insignificant glitches were found comparing TORAH in JERUSALEM TODAY
with TORAH from 2000 years ago.
This is the EXPECTED OUTCOME as well. )

At one point in began to look into histories and how timelines of various cultures were being constructed. I ended up concluding that it was all uncertainty based on uncertainty, and not really of any real value. Chronological history is impossible to reconstruct in any meaningful way. A person can produce a model, but we can never falsify the model in any substantial way. It's useless.

hebrewcalendar12 said:

John, not sure how you can say that. What about when the dating of major events is identical across different sources from different nations in ancient times. If they are in agreement, there is a good chance those dates are correct, if not, then unlikely.

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Bear in mind, I'm never saying "that's wrong" but what I'm saying is that, it contains enough uncertainty to render the output useless. Any event that is recorded is recorded according to the sequence of timing of that culture. Meaning, of course, no ancient culture recorded things as occurring along our modern timeline of BC/AD. But according to some counting of time relative to them. So even when ancients cultures are recording the same event, they are recording by a relative count. When we go back to evaluate, we have to attempt to reconstruct their relative count relative to our relative count. This means that now, I'm having to rely on the ability of men to competently reason and form cogent conclusions. Unfortunately, I've witnessed the most esteemed of men making the most colossal blunders in reasoning and deduction without even realizing it. I've seen colossal blunders repeated by others, which are in turn repeated by others. I no longer consider "appeal to authority" as valid. This, again, is not to say "all authority is wrong" but to say, I've seen enough to conclude that authority cannot be trusted as a certain source of verification. It is prone to error through both bias and incompetence. Thus, useless. Not "factually wrong" but "uncertain enough to be useless in any endeavor to provide meaningful answers"

For instance, when you say "dating of major events is identical across different sources from different nations" I would ask "What do you mean by 'identical?'" They all use the same identical count? All of the differing sources from different nations all record the same event as occurring in XXXX BC? Example?

A few thoughts and some background information:

The problem is that our history begins with the Greeks. From about 500 BC we have a timeline of what is happening more or less. Previous records were written for a specific people and often dated from well known events or from the reign years of kings. This makes it exceedingly difficult to piece the various reigns together and create a coherent narrative.

Now what Historians did was use the Greco-Roman narrative and try and fit other peoples events onto this and try and fill in the gaps. Further they then tried to fit the various fragments of narrative one to another.

This means though that one error and it can have startling consequences. For instance the Fall of Nineveh has been redated 4 times in the last 150 years.
Now Egypt is in many ways the lynchpin of a lot of these narratives as it has a long record of monumental inscriptions to draw from and was a major power.
This has allowed a fairly consistent series of dynasties to be constructed and these to be fitted to other narratives to make a nice clear whole.

The problem though is that our entire Egyptian Chronology is based on two points where we can fit it to the Greco-Roman narrative: one rising of Sothis and that Shesonq I is the biblical Shisaq. David Rohl makes quite a good argument for Shisaq to be Ramesses II based on a Hebrew transliteration of the end of his name and the Biblical Shisaq was a far more active pharoah than the historical Shesonq I and would fit someone of Ramesses's stature better. This dramatically implodes the Egyptian dynasties as it renders many dynasties duplicates based on similar names and eliminates problems like the Greek Dark age which we have not been able to solve in the contemporary chronology.

Unfortunately, Rohl's chronology creates a whole new set of problems such as equating Hittites and Phyrgians and causing disconnect with the Neo-Hittites in Syria as they now need to fall within our known Greek histories.

So at the moment, the majority of Egyptologists support the traditional chronology but they are still organising and revising it. They are by no means finished as there are many problems like Akhenaton's reign vis-a-vis his father Amenophis III's, late period dynasties or some of the two Intermediate periods' dynasties that may be running concurrently etc. A lot of work still needs to be done and there will likely still be major revisions of Middle Eastern history in future.

On the other side are Rohl's supporters. Rohl himself is a noted Egyptologist (a degree in Egyptology, multiple digs in Egypt and a former director of the Western Desert Survey in Egypt) in spite of opponents trying to paint him as a rockstar or a crackpot. His theories are taken seriously and discussed in Egyptology journals as he backs them up with archaeology. His new Chronology though has a lot of ground to cover to achieve acceptance and at the moment the truth likely lies somewhere between the two Chronologies, but with the balance tilted toward the traditional one currently.

As to Manetho: His Aegyptica is not extent, only quoted in other sources. The modern scheme of 30 dynasties was derived from him, but we only have a fragmentary record of what his 30 dynasties actually were. Egyptian history was a jigsaw of various events dated by the Reign Years of various Pharoahs that had to be fitted together and more or less jerry-rigged into the 30 dynasty scheme, but although not perfect, it seems more or less coherent.

Some of our extent quotes from Manetho's work such as the part about Osarseph or the Hyksos, does support some form of Exodus narrative. However a large scale Exodus is exceedingly unlikely in the traditional chronology, but more likely in the New one. However a much smaller movement is still possible in the traditional chronology as well.

The big problem with Exodus narratives is the lack of Egyptian sources. The thing is that we have few papyrus sources and mostly depend on monuments. This is like trying to recreate US history based on the monuments on the Mall in Washington. Obvious lacunae will appear, especcially for events that do not place the builders of the monuments in a good light. For these reasons it is unlikely that there would be an Egyptian narrative extent nor is it reasonable to expect one. Manetho's accounts though are an Egyptian account of something similar and this coupled with the ancient Jewish tradition, makes some form of exodus-style event at least plausible. I doubt though that it can ever be demonstrated.

While we cannot be completely sure of our dates or chronologies in the ancient Near-East, there is far too little reason to jettison 200 years of scholarly work at the moment. It is a good sign though that historians are re-examing and discussing alternate ones as well. Over time the history will correct itself as new discoveries come to light, so we shall see (as far as surviving sources allow. With bloodthirsty extremist destruction of sites though, this becomes less and less likely).

As an aside: I find the New Chronology's equating of Saul and Labayu very compelling and ingenious, so I am hoping more evidence supporting it will come to light.

I haven't the time to look it up just now, but if memory serves, AiG has trotted out the figures that Bp. Usshur worked up several centuries ago. When one looks at Biblical chronology prior to the United Kingdom period, it is all somewhat ambiguous. There are three main timelines, just among Biblical scholars: late date, early date, and fundamentalist (ie. slavish followers of Bp. Usshur's work). I had to construct a timeline of the OT for a survey class a couple of years ago and chose to late date the exodus for various reasons. If you would like to further discuss that, I will dig up my research later when I have some time.

Hi all,

I don't necessarily agree with the comments made about the victors writing history. That may be true for the moment in time that the victors are in charge, but I don't think that modern scholars that do these historical accounting pay much attention to what one culture may have written as history. A lot of these tie-ins come from the work of matching one culture's historical account with other cultures of that day.

So, this is simply to say that if the history of one culture that was not involved in the some war in which the victor might try to give an unrealistic account of how everything worked out, then these scholars are going to look for evidences to support which account is the truth. Are we actually to believe today that the Japanese or the Germans don't recount historical events the same as we do? Yes, they might assign different motives for why some event occurred, but that the event occurred, as far as I've ever found, is never in question.

Most of these historical studies are not about the motives or intentions of why historical events occurred, but merely that they did occur. The Japanese surely don't deny in their accounts of history that the United States dropped an atomic bomb on their large cities. They may well disagree on why the United States dropped the bombs, but that they did drop is never in question by either culture. I doubt seriously that there are any Germans who deny that there were death camps in German occupied lands. Yes, they may disagree as to why there were such death camps, but that they were there can hardly be denied by anyone.

So, I'm not one to really believe that actual historical events are affected much by who the victor or loser might have been in some conflict. I would allow though, that the motive or intention of such an event might be colored by who is writing the historical narrative. But honestly, I have serious doubts that even these assignments of motive and intention really stand for very long if they are incorrect.

I had watched the show regarding this subject a few months ago and was personally impressed that there really is very qualified data that would suggest that historians have long miscalculated these dates that have been assigned to the history of Egypt.

However, just as in the discussions that boil down to the age of the earth having been 'scientifically' proven to be longer than the Scriptural dating, I've always merely assumed that the Scriptures are correct and man's work is wrong. But, even if we do authenticate the Scriptural account of the enslavement of Israel in Egypt and the subsequent exodus, it isn't likely to change the minds of those bent on denying God His rightful place as Creator and King of all that exists. They'll just come up with 'new and improved' arguments.

God bless you and thank you for this post.
In Christ, Ted

What's your question? If you use the chronology of the Bible, Adam was created in 4276 BC, the flood was from 2620–2619 BC, and the exodus was in 1547 BC. King David reigned from 1010–970 BC. Saul reigned for 40 years, from 1050–1010 BC. Acts 13:20 says it was 450 years from the conquest of Canaan until Samuel the prophet. Samuel was the last judge and anointed Saul. This brings us to the conquest of Canaan in 1500 BC. Joshua judged for seven years as determined by the age of Caleb (Deut. 2:7; Deut. 2:14; Josh. 14:10). The Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years after the exodus. This brings us to the exodus in 1547 BC. The Israelites were strangers in Egypt for 430 years (Ex. 12:40). This means that Jacob went to Egypt in 1977 BC. Jacob was 130 when he went to Egypt (Gen. 47:9). This means he was born in 2107 BC. Isaac was 60 years old when he begat Jacob (Gen. 25:26). This means Isaac was born in 2167 BC. Abraham was 100 years old when he begat Isaac (Gen. 21:5). This means Abraham was born in 2267 BC. From there you can count the years of the genealogies from Adam to Noah and Noah to Abraham.

hebrewcalendar12 said:

I am re-posting another article below from answersingenesis.org - a creationist website which I am not personally affiliated with in any way. This article is less about creation and more about:

Dating the Exodus - Egyptian vs Bible chronology.
(I will post a link to the original article if allowed - moderators, please notify me before moving, or editing this thread.)

I am posting the entire article under fair use copyright law in the interest in promoting historical and religious education for Christians and atheists alike. If the moderators feel that I am infringing on copyright by posting the entire article, please shorten it for me and provide an additional copy of the link I prove, but at the end of where you decide to cut the article. Copyright laws, according to Wikipedia, are interpreted by courts in the US quite differently in different cases when it comes to fair use clauses, so there is no "one size fits all".

If some links, charts, or photo's do not display correctly, please go to original source of this article.

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hebrewcalendar12 said:

I am re-posting another article below from answersingenesis.org - a creationist website which I am not personally affiliated with in any way. This article is less about creation and more about:

Dating the Exodus - Egyptian vs Bible chronology.
(I will post a link to the original article if allowed - moderators, please notify me before moving, or editing this thread

Click to expand...

Which bible chronology do you use: the Masoretic Text, Septuagint, or Samaritan Torah? And why?

The Bible even records the first Egyptian

Bible Gateway passage: Genesis 10:6 - Modern English Version

Egyptian chronology don't account for bad news nor does it tell us much about the origin of other nations. I trust the Biblical account as the most reliable account.

There are obvious striking parallels with the Monotheistic faith of Akhenaten of the Amarna period in the 14th century BC under the XVIII dynasty. Some have even identified Joseph with the powerful vizier Yuya who married into the dynasty such that the monotheistic Pharaoh Akhenaten was his descendant.

The name "Moses" was very popular under the ensuing xenophobic XIX dynasty in the 13th century BC:

• Ra-moses ("born of Ra", Ramses)
• Amun-moses ("born of Amun", Amenmesse)

Pharaoh Ramses II is strongly suggested by the Biblical account:

• traditional Jewish memory has always viewed Rameses II as the Pharaoh of oppression
  
• treasure cities of On, Pithom ("house of Atum", Per-Atum) and Ramses
• he reigned 80 years, consistent with Moses growing to age 40, then hiding in exile for 40 more years before the powerful, oppressing Pharaoh passed away
• his successor, Merneptah, acknowledges sending out a force against "Israel" in his 5th year (Merneptah stele) circa 1208 BC, and his reign ended in chaos

It is a true fact that the Koran claims Pharaoh had a chief advisor named something like "Haman" or "Aman", which could possibly be a reference to Amenmesse who succeeded Merneptah, briefly in southern Egypt, during the period of political chaos after Merneptah's reign. The Koran also claims that the plagues on Egypt lasted several years, consistent with Moses returning to Egypt circa 1212 BC, after Pharaoh Ramses II was no longer on the throne... the plagues begin and persist for several years... until the [children of] Israel escaped and were pursued in 1208 BC...

Biblical archeology confirms early Israelite square houses & culture entering into Canaan beginning around 1200 BC...

It all appears to line up -- traditional Jewish memory, Biblical archeology, Egyptian archeology, even the "Midianite memories" apparently preserved in northwestern Arabia and the Koran

Erik Nelson said:

.

The name "Moses" was very popular under the ensuing xenophobic XIX dynasty in the 13th century BC:

• Ra-moses ("born of Ra", Ramses)
• Amun-moses ("born of Amun", Amenmesse)

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I've always wondered myself if the name Moses is really part of an Egyptian theophoric name, like Ra'moses. It looks as if "Moses" means "son of - " with the Egyptian deity element of the name missing. Perhaps Moses' name fulfills a criterion of embarrassment?

Yekcidmij said:

I've always wondered myself if the name Moses is really part of an Egyptian theophoric name, like Ra'moses. It looks as if "Moses" means "son of - " with the Egyptian deity element of the name missing. Perhaps Moses' name fulfills a criterion of embarrassment?

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The fact that such a revered Israelite figure bears an Egyptian name, is already a criterion of embarrassment perhaps, and does argue for an Exodus of some sort along with the tradition. It need not be a theophoric name with an Egyptian deity dropped, as based on the Torah form, some argue the second part means 'water'. This would render Moses, 'son of the Nile', which functionally is a theophoric name, and fits the Biblical story and its reported folk etymology.

Yekcidmij said:

I've always wondered myself if the name Moses is really part of an Egyptian theophoric name, like Ra'moses. It looks as if "Moses" means "son of - " with the Egyptian deity element of the name missing. Perhaps Moses' name fulfills a criterion of embarrassment?

Click to expand...

Just a thought perhaps Moses was originally named Ramses or Amenmesse, "born of" some Egyptian God. But after his flight as a fugitive into the wilderness, he distanced himself from his Egyptian. Upbringing and dropped the name of the Egyptian deity?

Plausibly, Israel arrived in Egypt circa 1400 BC, during the reign of the 18th dynasty Pharaoh Tuthmoses IV ("born of Thoth"), famous for his dreams and the interpretations of them:


Then, Abraham arrived in Canaan circa 1650 BC, about the time of the Thera Santorini super-eruption...which devastated the eastern Mediterranean, and led to the decline of the Aegean Minoan civilization, allowing the early Mycenaean Greeks to enter Greece...also when the Asiatic (Canaanite?) Hyksos conquered Egypt from Canaan

Somewhat after that time, the 18th dynasty was founded by its first Pharaoh Ahmose ("born of Yah")...

The 71 years attributed to Joseph as Vizier correspond well with the reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmoses IV "the dream Pharaoh". The Israelites' high-water mark was the Monotheistic reign of Joseph / Yuya's grandson, Akhenaten (cp. Adonai, "Sovereign Lord"). But his reign ended in chaos around 1335 BC, and within 10 years the boy-Pharaoh Tutankhamun had changed his name to honor "Amun" over "Aten" and, evidently, the Israelites were increasingly marginalized into abject slavery soon afterwards.

By 1292 BC, the new 19th dynasty Pharaohs "who knew not Joseph" had fully rolled back the monotheistic reforms, and outright enslaved the Israelites.

(everything lines up for that narrative)