Egypt’s so-called Sixth Dynasty as an example of kinglist repetitions

by Damien F. Mackey The effect of Dr. John Osgood’s revision of ancient Egypt will be to have Joseph’s Famine in Abram (Abraham’s) Famine era, and Joseph himself in the era of Moses. Consequently, Moses gets squeezed out. Revisionist historians, whilst being keenly aware of the fact that the biblical chronology cannot be fitted to the enlarged conventional chronology of ancient Egypt, on the one hand, are nonetheless falling into the trap of, on the other hand, imagining that they must account for each and every ruler in the over-inflated Egyptian king lists. Regarding my first point here, Dr. John Osgood has nicely summed up his view, and that of others – which would also be my view – in the Preliminary Comments to his article: exodus_egyptian-history_osgood_reply2.pdf “The Place of the Exodus in Egyptian History: Reply #2” (Answers Research Journal 15 (2022): p. 129): Let me point out that Porter, Habermehl, and myself hold that the scriptural chronology is basic to understanding the history of the ancient world. We all hold that the presently accepted secular history/chronology, based on a particular interpretation of Egyptian records in no way represents the real timeline of the ancient world. All of us hold to a sincere attempt to find a satisfactory correlation. But as with all such complex tasks, there will obviously be differences of opinion, which will be open for reasonable criticism. …. [End of quote] While Dr. Osgood will progress from there, basing himself upon the helpful research of Dr. Donovan Courville (The Exodus Problem and its Ramifications, 1971), chronologically to fold – though not to merge – Egyptian kingdoms (Old and Middle), he will not, in his revision, take the less adventurous, but vitally necessary, step of merging dynasties and rulers. He continues on from those Preliminary Comments, with an explanation of his and Courville’s Old-Middle reform: One factor that has emerged, however, is the fact that quotes are made, I believe in sincerity, without adequately understanding the original author’s presentation. And this factor has clearly emerged in the foregoing presentations, both by Habermehl (2022) and Porter (2022). Both Courville (1971) and my own presentations have clearly not been fully grasped, as I will point out. First, Habermehl (2022) has suggested that my placement of the Exodus on the Egyptian secular timeline dates to 2150 BC. That is not so. On that timeline it fits at approximately 1750 BC, that is, just after the secular date for the fall of the Twelfth Dynasty. The correct date that I adhere to is the biblical one, reasoned at 1446 BC. Second, while I hold to, at least a partial parallel rule of the Sixth Dynasty with the Twelfth Dynasty, at no stage have I expressed the sentiments that the Exodus occurred at the fall of the Sixth Dynasty, but rather the fall of the Twelfth Dynasty, which was the dominant one of the period. Parallel Dynasties Habermehl (2022) appears to show some exasperation with Courville’s suggestion of parallel dynasties, but such is misplaced, as even at least one secular Egyptologist accepts that this was the case. I quote Olga Tufnell (1984, 155), re the Turin Canon: There is one point about the composition of the Turin Canon—indeed all ancient king-lists—which needs emphasizing since it plays a significant role in the present chapter. Dynasties or other groupings of kings are usually listed as if in a single chronological sequence so that exterior controls are required in order to define contemporary, competing or overlapping dynasties. Precisely this situation is evident in the Turin Canon in both the First and Second Intermediate periods. I have pointed out (Osgood 2020) that Manetho’s king-list is arranged sequentially on a geographic basis, so that widespread overlapping is still consistent with that author’s arrangement. Parallelisms should not surprise anyone. When Ethiopian Piye invaded Egypt he found at least 20 kings, as did Assurbanipal in 664 BC. Now it is clear that Habermehl (2022) has mistaken Courville’s arrangement of the Archaic period, having Courville (1971) claiming a parallel arrangement of Second and Third Dynasties. That is not correct. Courville’s arrangement is a parallelism of the Third Dynasty with the end period of the First Dynasty. Moreover, he devotes considerable space to detail that arrangement. Courville (1971) points to a king of the First Dynasty, that is only in Manetho’s king-list, and not the others, with a Greek name “Kenkenes”. He makes a considerable case for this person being Sekhem Ka, Kha-Sekhem and later Kha-Sekhemui, who he suggests is the founder of the Third Dynasty during the time just before Uadji (Uenephres) of the First Dynasty, after concluding the religious wars and setting up an administration in Memphis parallel with the First Dynasty. Such would make the famine of Uadji the same famine as that of Djoser, and the same as the famine of Abraham’s day. Moreover, it would bring Kha-Sekhemui into close timeline with Djoser. He therefore places Kha Sekhemui, not as the last of the Second Dynasty as suggested in the sequential arrangement, but the first of the kings of the Third Dynasty, parallel to the later First Dynasty. In contrast, these were arranged by Manetho sequentially. Habermehl (2022) rightly points to the idea that we both accept a contemporaneity of the Sixth Dynasty and Twelfth Dynasty but mistakes my arrangement. First, the Sixth Dynasty was not only in the south, as it was centred in Memphis. It almost certainly had a subordinate rule, but not necessarily without a degree of independence. Second, as a result of the findings at the heavily trade-related city of Byblos, it is clear that the reign of the last significant king of the Sixth Dynasty, Piopi II, was over by the time of Amenemhet III of the Twelfth Dynasty, and that the Sixth Dynasty thus almost certainly began slightly before the beginning of the Twelfth Dynasty. The next and following kings at Memphis were some distantly related kings to the Twelfth Dynasty. They represented the early Thirteenth Dynasty as a sub-administration at Memphis, during the last few years of the Twelfth Dynasty. I have a paper in preparation outlining this early Thirteenth Dynasty in some detail. [End of quotes] In the space of a few paragraphs here, Dr. Osgood has, unwittingly to be sure, managed (my opinion, only) to undo the force of the noble sentiments as expressed in his Preliminary Comments, “to … attempt to find a satisfactory correlation”, whilst wisely allowing that “there will obviously be differences of opinion, which will be open for reasonable criticism”. For, the effect of Dr. John Osgood’s revision of ancient Egypt will be to have Joseph’s Famine in Abram (Abraham’s) Famine era, and Joseph himself in the era of Moses. Consequently, Moses gets squeezed out. Chaldean lists set the pattern The much later Chaldean king lists can provide us with a working model of how I think one ought to proceed. In my article: Chaotic King Lists can conceal some sure historical sequences (2) Chaotic King Lists can conceal some sure historical sequences I argued that the Chaldean succession (I also discussed the Assyrian lists) can by no means be fitted to the clear biblical evidence, for example from the Book of Daniel. Daniel 5 has (i) Nebuchednezzar the Great (v. 18), followed by his ill-fated son (ii) Belshazzar (v. 22), followed by (iii) Darius the Mede (v. 31). Bang, bang, bang - no ifs and buts, no gaps! The over-inflated Chaldean lists will not allow for a meeting between “secular history” (Dr. John Osgood’s description) and the biblical facts. Here is the too lengthy version of the Chaldean list with which the text books ‘gift’ us: Nabopolassar Nebuchadnezzar [II] Evil-Merodach Neriglissar Labashi-Marduk Nabonidus Let us unpack this. Biblically, there should be, not six, but only three kings – and so, in actual fact, there are. Firstly, as pointed out in my article (above), there is the need for the merging – not just overlapping as Drs. Courville and Osgood would have it – of kingdoms (Middle and Neo in the case of Assyro-Babylonia). Thus, Nebuchednezzar so-called II was the same as Nebuchednezzar so called I (the same goes for Merodach-baladan I and II, and for the Elamite Shutrukids, and so on): The 1100 BC Nebuchednezzar (3) The 1100 BC Nebuchednezzar Nebuchednezzar has been triplicated in the Chaldean list: Nabopolassar = Nebuchadnezzar [II] = Nabonidus The assassinated Belshazzar, who should follow in the list after Nabonidus, his father, has been duplicated: Evil-Merodach = Labashi-Marduk The one who succeeded him, Neriglissar, Nebuchednezzar’s long-serving high official, Nergal-sharezer (cf. Jeremiah 39:3), is the 62-year old Darius the Mede (Daniel 5:31). It is well known that Belshazzar was the son of Nabonidus. And Baruch 1:11, 12 reveals Belshazzar to have been the son, likewise, of Nebuchednezzar. Evidence that Evil-Merodach (Amēl-Marduk), prior to his rule – and exactly like Belshazzar – had to take control of Babylon while his father was indisposed/absent, can be read in my article: Book of Daniel sorts out Babylonian kings (7) Book of Daniel sorts out Babylonian kings Consequently, I have no doubts whatsoever that Evil-Merodach (Amēl-Marduk), the son of Nebuchednezzar, was the very same person as Belshazzar, the son of Nabonidus. Egyptian king lists must likewise be shortened Now our biblically compatible matrix as presented for the Chaldeans and Medo-Persia shows precisely what must be done with Egypt’s Sixth Dynasty, as well as the dynasty with which Drs. Courville and Osgood have approximately aligned it, the mighty Twelfth Dynasty. As radical, indeed, as is the revision of Dr. Courville, of Dr. Osgood, neither has gone far enough with it (my simple opinion). The reality is even more radical yet! As with the Chaldean (and Medo-Persian) lists, the names given in Egypt’s so-called Sixth Dynasty, in its so-called Twelfth Dynasty, need to be at least halved in number. But that is not all. Instead of the Sixth and the Twelfth being only partly over-lapping, as according to what Dr. Osgood has written above, referencing Olga Tufnell (“competing or overlapping dynasties”): “… the Sixth Dynasty thus almost certainly began slightly before the beginning of the Twelfth Dynasty”, the Sixth Dynasty needs to be actually recognised as the Twelfth Dynasty. This Sixth-Twelfth is the very dynasty of the Egyptianised Moses. {I am focussing only on these dynasties here, but a full revision of the life of Moses needs also to include the Fourth, Fifth, and, partly, the Thirteenth, dynasties}. If I am right in saying this – and I believe the evidence to be overwhelming – then, as in the case of the Book of Daniel for the Chaldeans, and following Dr. Osgood’s principle that “… the presently accepted secular history/chronology, based on a particular interpretation of Egyptian records in no way represents the real timeline of the ancient world”, the Exodus account of the life of Moses in Egypt and Midian will determine the number of major pharaohs involved. Biblically and traditionally there were only two kings (plus a short-reigning female), after which dynastic termination there will emerge the Pharaoh of the Exodus. The first Pharaoh is the “new king” of Exodus 1:8, who began the Oppression of Israel - the infanticide king (vv. 15-18). The second Pharaoh is the one who sought the life of Moses, who thereupon escaped to the land of Midian (2:15). During that time the dynasty came to an end (4:19), with a female ruler concluding it. Let us unpack this. The Sixth Dynasty is given conventionally as: Teti Userkare Pepi I Merenre I Pepi II Merenre II Nitocris The Twelfth Dynasty is given conventionally as: Amenemes I Sesostris I Amenemes II Sesostris II Sesostris III Amenemes III Amenemes IV Sobekneferure The repetition of names in these two lists, especially the Twelfth Dynasty one, is far more apparent than was the case with the Chaldeans, in which we had a triplication. But let us begin with a strong link, that will enable us to span the conventional period from Teti (d. c. 2330 BC) to Amenemes (Amenemhat) I (c. 1990 BC) – approximately three and a half centuries apart. Teti was Amenemes, the first Oppressor king of Israel (Exodus 1:8), during whose reign Moses was born. Teti Sehetepibre was Amenemes Sehetepibre. Teti Sehetep-tawy was Amenemes Sehetep-tawy. Previously, I have written on this comparison, noting that Egyptologist Nicolas Grimal had also pointed it out (A History of Ancient Egypt, 1994): {Teti, I have tentatively proposed as being the same pharaoh as Amenemes/ Ammenemes I, based on (a) being a founder of a dynasty; (b) having same Horus name; (c) being assassinated. Now, Pepi I and Chephren were married to an Ankhesenmerire/Meresankh – I have taken Chephren to have been the foster father-in-law of Moses, with his wife Meresankh being Moses’ Egyptian ‘mother’, traditionally, Merris. Both Pepi I and Chephren had substantial reigns}. Grimal notes the likenesses: “[Teti’s] adoption of the Horus name Sehetep-tawy (‘He who pacifies the Two Lands’) was an indication of the political programme upon which he embarked. … this Horus name was to reappear in titulatures throughout subsequent Egyptian history, always in connection with such kings as Ammenemes I … [etc.]. Manetho says that Teti was assassinated, and it is this claim that has led to the idea of growing civil disorder, a second similarity with the reign of Ammenemes I”. Merenre is also thought to have been assassinated, which surely connects him to Teti/ Amenemes. He is to be found wandering through the king list, as Merenre I and II, just like Nebuchednezzar has been spread through the Chaldean list. In The Story of Sinuhe, the somewhat Moses-like hero has to flee Egypt after a possible assassination of Amenemes, Sinuhe now being in mortal fear of Sesostris I. In terms of the Twelfth Dynasty, this, the passing of Amenemes and the rise of Sesostris so-called I, is close to the very point of time when Moses flees to Midian. Dr. Osgood, though, by following Dr. Courville in identifying Joseph as the great Vizier of Sesostris I, Mentuhotep (see below) – and not as Imhotep of the Third Dynasty at the time of a seven-year Famine (Djoser’s), whom other revisionists, including I, firmly favour for Joseph – has effectively bundled out the historical Moses and has also situated the actual Joseph Famine right back at the time of Abram (Abraham). Thus he has written on Joseph’s Famine (“The Place of Dynasty VI and of the Exodus in Egyptian History: Further Comments”, Answers Research Journal 17 (2024), p. 413): “…. I have argued elsewhere (Osgood 2020, 153–190), in agreement with Courville (1971), that the Twelfth Dynasty was the Dynasty of Israel’s sojourn, and the collapse and Exodus occurred in the early Thirteenth Dynasty. No other collapse period in Egypt remotely resembles that event. Joseph’s famine on this revision then is the famine that lasted for many years starting in Sesostris I’s twenty-fifth year (1663 B.C.). It was prepared for in advance as mentioned under vizier Mentuhotep in Sesostris I’s eighteenth year, 7 years before (Grajetzki 2006, 42). This famine was also mentioned by the Upper Egyptian official/nomarch Ameny, known to be a contemporary, a famine which he also claimed to have prepared for in advance”. I fully agree with Dr. Osgood insofar as he writes: “… that the Twelfth Dynasty was the Dynasty of Israel’s sojourn, and the collapse and Exodus occurred in the early Thirteenth Dynasty. No other collapse period in Egypt remotely resembles that event”. He is able to reach this conclusion, quite amazingly, even though he has Joseph and the 7-year Famine pitched as late as the reign of Sesostris I, because he has taken the Twelfth Dynasty at its over-inflated face value. For, as I said right at the beginning: “Revisionist historians …. imagining that they must account for each and every ruler in the over-inflated Egyptian king lists”. There was nothing like a 7-year Famine at the time of the mighty Sesostris so-called I, who, in my scheme, that greatly shortens the Twelfth Dynasty, to: First Oppressor Pharaoh (Exodus 1:8) Amenemes I-IV Second Oppressor Pharaoh (Exodus 2:15) Sesostris I-III Female Pharaoh Sobekneferure equates to the second Pharaoh who oppressed Israel: Pharaoh Senusret I “Most records indicate Senusret’s [Sesostris’s] years as pharaoh as peaceful and prosperous for Egypt, despite indications of a possible famine during his rule. Trade flourished and provided Egyptians with cedar, ivory and other foreign goods. The many golden artifacts attributed to his reign reveal his rule to be one of wealth and affluence”. There is no compelling evidence to support any lengthy preparation for an impending disaster by the Twelfth Dynasty Vizier Mentuhotep. There is, on the other hand, massive evidence to show that Third Dynasty Egypt underwent enormous infrastructural development in preparation for the Famine: dams, waterways, canals, great grain enclosures such as Gisr el Mudir, etc., etc. Regarding all of this, see e.g. my article: Imhotep Enigma, his pharaoh was not Djoser, and proof for Egypt’s Third Dynasty Famine (10) Imhotep Enigma, his pharaoh was not Djoser, and proof for Egypt’s Third Dynasty Famine And it all becomes even more greatly amplified once the Third Dynasty is coupled with its so-called ‘Middle’ Kingdom partner, the Eleventh Dynasty – Imhotep (Joseph’s) pharaoh, Horus Netjerikhet, being the same as Horus Netjerihedjet (Mentuhotep II) of the Eleventh Dynasty. Nor does it stop there. The insignificant famine for Egypt (but not for Syro-Palestine) at the time of Abram (Abraham) cannot be the “great famine” (Manetho) at the time of Horus Uadji/Djet, as Dr. Osgood would have it. For the First Dynasty’s Horus Djet was the very same ruler as the Eleventh Dynasty’s Horus Netjerihed-djet at the time of Joseph’s long-enduring Famine: Taking a Djet to Djoser’s Famine (12) Taking a Djet to Djoser's Famine And, regarding Dr. Osgood’s Sixth and Twelfth correlation, while I would agree with his approximate date for the Exodus: “The correct date that I adhere to is the biblical one, reasoned at 1446 BC”, I would disagree with his follow-up to this: “Second, while I hold to, at least a partial parallel rule of the Sixth Dynasty with the Twelfth Dynasty, at no stage have I expressed the sentiments that the Exodus occurred at the fall of the Sixth Dynasty, but rather the fall of the Twelfth Dynasty, which was the dominant one of the period”. For, (so I believe) the Sixth and Twelfth were simply one and the same. Moses in the Sixth Dynasty Putting the Sixth Dynasty into its proper Mosaïc context, we have the founding Oppressor Pharaoh (Exodus (1:8), Teti, who equates to Amenemes - and recurring in Merenre I and II. At the other end, we learned that this dynasty terminated, just like the Twelfth did, with a female ruler (Pharaoh). In between there is Pepi I and II, from whom Moses would flee. Thus the conventional arrangement: Teti Userkare Pepi I Merenre I Pepi II Merenre II Nitocris ought now to become: First Oppressor Pharaoh (Exodus 1:8) Teti (like Amenemes) = Merenre I and II Second Oppressor Pharaoh (Exodus 2:15) Pepi I and II Female Pharaoh Nitocris (= Sobekneferure) That leaves only the short-reigning Userkare. Well, this Userkare was Moses, who, as according to tradition, ruled, then abdicated. The jealous Pepi would later write Userkare out of history with a damnatio memoriae, assigning his kingship to the “desert” (Midian): Userkare - Wikipedia “Although Userkare is attested in some historical sources, he is completely absent from the tomb of the Egyptian officials who lived during his reign and who usually report the names of the kings whom they served. The figures of some high officials of the period have been deliberately chiselled out in their tombs and their titles altered, for instance the word "king" being replaced by that of "desert". Egyptologists thus suspect that Pepi might have tried to erase all memory of Userkare from official records, monuments, tombs and artefacts. The Egyptian priest Manetho, who wrote a history of Egypt nearly 1,700 years later in the 3rd century BC, stated that Userkare's predecessor Teti was murdered, but is otherwise silent concerning Userkare. Consequently, some Egyptologists consider Userkare to have been a short-lived usurper to the throne. Alternatively, he may have been a legitimate short-lived ruler, younger brother to a more ambitious Pepi I, or a regent who ruled during Pepi I's childhood before his accession to the throne”. Moses according to Tradition What gives power to this seemingly insane (some would more gently call it “fiction”) revision that I am proposing here – and it is something that I do not find interwoven into other revisions – is that two names handed down to us by the Jewish historian, Artapanus of Alexandria (C2nd BC), weave like golden threads through my revision. These names are “Merris”, the daughter of Pharaoh who drew baby Moses from the water (cf. Exodus 2:5-10), and “Chenephres”, who married her. He, who became hostile to Moses out of jealousy, can be found right through my revision for Moses (from the Fourth to the Thirteenth dynasties), under variations of the Greek name, “Chenephres” (including the inverted version of it, Neferkare). For example, we find him as the Fourth Dynasty pharaoh, Chephren (Khafre), who marries a Meresankh (= “Merris”). Yes, the Hebrew slaves played a big part in building the pyramids (as per Josephus), the Giza pyramids and other Old Kingdom and Twelfth Dynasty pyramids. Our “Chenephres” re-emerges again as the Sixth Dynasty pharaoh, Pepi Neferkare, who damned his predecessor, Userkare (Moses). Pepi married “Merris” (= Ankhesenmerire, an inversion of Meresankh). Again, “Chenephres” is the Sesostris I Neferkare from whom Sinuhe fled. {N. Grimal (op. cit., p. 164) gives Neferkare as his coronation name} And, in the Thirteenth Dynasty, “Chenephres” is probably the Sobek (Crocodile) ruler (like the female Sobek-neferure), Sobekhotep Khaneferre: Egyptian Pharaohs : Second Intermediate Period : Dynasty 13 : Sobekhotep IV “Neferkhare "The appearance of Re is beautiful", sometimes Khaneferre, "Beautiful is the Appearance of Re".”

Exodus East Wind driving back the waters is a phenomenon observed in modern times

“Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided, and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left”. Exodus 14:21-22 We read at: RedSeaCrossingExodusIsraelBallahLakes Map of Israel's crossing of the Red Sea at Ras el Ballah, "Cape Ballah" (Baal-Zephon?) or Qantara and Lake Menzaleh? 20 November 2009 (Revisions through 27 October 2021) Exodus 14:21 and 27 has a sea being pushed back by a strong east wind during the night, then, in the morning, with the wind dissipated (?) the sea "returns to its strength" and refills its formerly empty bed. "Where" was such a phenomenon "documented"? Eventually I found an account of the eastern half of Lake Menzaleh having its shallow waters pushed back by a gale force east wind exposing its lake bottom in January of 1882. It appears then that such a phenonemon is documented for shallow Egyptian marsh-lakes, Menzaleh's waters being generally 4 to 7 feet in depth with a few exceptions according to European visitors to the area in the 1800's. Red Sea in Hebrew is called Yam Suph, yam= sea, suph= reed, "sea of reeds," suggesting an area possessing a fresh water environment for the reeds and marsh grasses to grow in, suiting the area of Lake Menzaleh. Professor Humphreys (2004) sought to explain the drying up the Red Sea via physcial phenomena. He argued that "wind setdown" was the mechanism that created a passage in the sea. He said this worked only on large bodies of water (he noted it being documented at Lake Erie in the United States). Wind setdown "removes" water whereas wind setup "adds" water. He noted some thought the crossing was at the Gulf of Suez. He dismissed this location however because only a wind from the northwest could blow back this gulf's waters exposing dry land and the Bible said it was an east wind. He then noted that at the Gulf of Aqaba it would take a wind from the northeast to blow black the waters and expose the sea's bottom. He favored Aqabah as the crossing point of the Red Sea, despite the fact that an east wind could not blow back the gulf's waters only a northeast wind could do this. He was apparently unaware of the 1882 report of an east wind blowing back Lake Menzaleh's waters in this lake's eastern sector near the mouth of the Suez Canal. This lake is roughly 43 miles in length and 12 miles wide so it is big enough for wind set-down to work (cf. pp. 246-252. Colin J. Humphreys. The Miracles of Exodus: A Scientist's Discovery of the Extraordinary Natural Causes of the Biblical Stories. HarperCollins. 2004) A British officer who lived in Egypt reported a phenomenon that somewhat paralled the Exodus account as related by Professor Kent (1914) of Yale University: "...Major-General Tulloch, who states that the shallow waters of Lake Menzaleh, which lies only a short distance to the north and is subject to the same conditions, were driven back by the wind for seven miles, leaving the bottom of the lake dry (Journal of the Victorian Institute, Vol. XXVIII, p. 267, and Vol. XXVI, p. 12)." (pp. 113-114. Charles Foster Kent. Biblical Geography and History. New York. Charles Scribner's and Sons. 1914, 1916, 1926) C.R. Conder (1915) stated that Tulloch beheld this wonder in 1882 (the Suez Canal was completed by 1869): "In 1882 Sir Alexander Tulloch saw the waters of Lake Menzaleh driven back more than a mile by the east wind." (C. R. Conder. "Exodus, the Route." James Orr. Editor. The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. 1915) Professor Haupt of Johns Hopkins University (1904) noted that the receding water was in the eastern portion of Lake Menzaleh, near ancient Pelusium and the mouth of the Suez Canal (the mud-flats area west of Pelusium and et-Tina, which as late as 1856 was subject to flooding by the Nile which left its characteristic dark silt): "In my paper on Archaeology and Mineralogy...I mentioned the fact that Major-General Tulloch observed that under a strong east wind the shallow waters of Lake Manzaleh at the northern entrance to the Suez Canal receded for a distance of seven miles. There is therefore no reason for doubting the historical character of the passage of the Red Sea." (p. 149. Paul Haupt. "Moses' Song of Triumph." The American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures. Vol. 20. No. 3. April. 1904) Another account has the 1882 east wind diminishing the water level by 6 feet (my note: A depth capable of drowning Pharaoh's army!): "Major General Tulloch of the British Army (Proceedings of the Victoria Institute. XXVIII, pp. 267-280) reports having witnessed the driving off of water from Lake Menzaleh by the wind to such an extent as to lower the level 6 feet, thus leaving small vessels over the shallow water stranded for a while in the muddy bottom." (BibleExplore.Com, "Red Sea," on the internet) A variance of 7 feet was documented for Lake Erie in the United States between Buffalo New York and Toledo, Ohio: "The power of the wind to affect water levels is strikingly witnessed upon Lake Erie in the United States, where according to the report of the Deep Waterways Commission for 1896 (165, 168) it appears that a strong wind from the southwest sometimes lowers the water at Toledo Ohio on the western end of the lake to the extent of more than 7 feet, at the same time causing it to rise at Buffalo at the eastern end a similar amount..." A description of Lake Menzaleh (1868) has its depth as 4-5 feet, 43 miles long, 12-11 miles wide and full of marsh reeds: "...Lake Menzaleh...the bottom is a mixture of mud and sand, generally covered in reeds, but quite level; so that the greatest depth of the lake does not vary more than 6 or 8 inches, being rarely much under 4 feet, and seldom materially above it, except where the sea enters." (p. 386. General Francis Rawdon Chesney. Narrative of the Euphrates Expedition: Carried on by the Order of the British Government During the years 1835, 1836 and 1837. London. 1868) Bonar (ca. 1843?) understands Lake Menzaleh's deeper parts are 10 feet, but mostly 4 to 5 feet: "...Lake Menzaleh...It is nowhere more than ten feet deep, and in general only four or five...at evening we entered a canal among immense reeds...we reached San about ten...the ruins of Zoan..." (Andrew Bonar. The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne. Note: M'Cheyne lived 1813-1843) ("Red Sea," BibleExplore.Com) Tulloch's account of the eastwind blowing away Lake Menzaleh's waters appears in his published military memoirs of 1903, he witnessed the event apparently at the end of January of 1882 while he was at Port Said inspecting the Suez Canal's embankments for acts of sabotage. The dried up Menzaleh Lake was to the west side of the canal "as far as the eye could see" (Haupt's 7 miles?). Of interest here is that the wind apparently began blowing during the day, continued all through the night and was still blowing in the morning and the lake bed was empty. Yahweh, overnight, dries up Yam Suph, and Lake Menzaleh, overnight, is dried up too: ""We landed at Port Said the end of January...I made a curious discovery. An easterly gale came up very rapidly, and at last was so strong, driving the sand from the dry side into my face, that I had to cease work. Next morning the wind having a good deal gone down, I went on to the canal bank again, when, to my astonishment, I noticed that Lake Menzaleh on the west side of the canal had disappeared beyond the horizon in that direction, and that the Arabs were walking on the mud where the day before large boats had been floating. When thinking over this extraordinary effect of wind on shallow water, it suddenly flashed upon me that I was witnessing a similar event to that which had taken place between three to four thousand years ago, at the time of the passage of the so-called Red Sea by the Israelites. Subsequently, when I had time for it, I examined the shores of the Bitter Lakes, and came to the unquestionable conculsion that the Red Sea of Pharaoh's day extended to the head of the Bitter Lakes, and it was here the passage took place, and that the description of it in Exodus is literally correct, word for word." (pp. 245-246. Major-General Sir Alexander Bruce Tulloch, K.C.B., C.M.G. Recollections of Forty Years' Service. London & Edinburgh. William Blackwood & Sons. 1903) My note: In the 1880s many scholars believed that the head of the Gulf of Suez in antiquity was at Lake Et-Timsah, which included the Bitter Lakes, hence, probably Tulloch's notion that the Red Sea Crossing was at the Bitter Lakes. Today we know the head of the Suez Gulf has always been at its present location at least since the days of the Pharaohs. The evidence? Archaeologists have found ancient Egyptian mining camps on the Suez Gulf's shore revealing its level today was nearly the same 5000 years ago. DeLesseps visited in 1856 Pelusium before the Suez Canal was built and crossed the mud-flats on camels which sank a bit into the mud, by December no sinking occurred: "The rise of waters this year had been less than usual, and had dried up quickly, and at the end of December we crossed these seas of mud dry-footed and without our camels sinking into it at all." (p. 47. Joseph Everett Nourse. The Maritime Canal of Suez: From its Inauguration, November 17, 1869 to... Naval Historical Foundation. Washington, D.C. 1974, using source material from 1884?) I note that such mud could clog pharaoh's chariot wheels. The "drying up" of a sea's bed by an east wind pushing the waters away near the Pelusium and et-Tina mud-flats (which are subject to Nile inundations) seems to _identify_ the "pre-biblical source" for the biblical story as being this area. Below a map from the 1897 Encyclopedia Britannica showing the northern mouth of the Suez Canal, where in 1882, an east wind blew away a portion of Lake Menzaleh's waters for a distance of 7 miles from the vicinity of the canal's entry point. I have set my compass to create a 7 mile arc from Port Said, the canal's entry point, to show the viewer what 7 miles looks like from any given direction from Port Said. I have colored the exposed lake bed yellow (I am using the map's scale, marked off in numbers every 2 miles, 0-10, in the upper right corner to determine the 7 mile arc from) The area exposed "may have been" even greater extending along the whole of the eastern coast of Menzaleh from Said to Qantara/Kantara if the "line of view" from Said is restricted to only 7 miles? The 4/5 foot drop in water on the east side of Menzaleh probably caused a 4/5 foot height increase on the west side of the lake as happened at Lake Erie. Note: Tulloch said it was on the west side of the Suez Canal that the waters of lake Menzaleh had blown away; the canal's high embankment would prevent the lake water east of the canal from being blown away. So the "yellow" area on the below map should more properly be restricted to the area west of the Suez Canal's entry. Below, a map of Ras el Ballah, alternately called Ras el Moyeh ("Cape of Water"), on the west side of the Ballah inlet showing water on either side of two tracks. The Pink track from Salhieh in the delta takes one north to Qatieh in the northern Sinai; the Orange route goes to Bir Abou Rouq. I understand that Baal-Zephon is Ras el Ballah and Pi-ha`hiroth is the northern opening or "mouth" to the El Kraieh marsh east of Ras el Ballah. Israel probably used the orange track "to cross the Reed Sea" (Ex 14:21-22). Israel camped before Baal-Zephon (Ras el Ballah) on the orange route, west of the marsh-ford in front of Ras el Ballah. Going from west to east, as Israel passed over the dried up marsh-ford, she saw a "wall of water" on either side, the deeper waters of the Ballah inlet colored in a deeper blue, the lighter blue lined areas are marshy ground with green marker for tufts of sedge or swamp grasses and reeds, hence its name Yam Suph "sea of reeds" (Exodus 14:22). Note that this track does cross the marsh-swamp, there apparently was a shallow ford at this location which "might" dry up at times (Map of 1826, Paris, France. Titled "Canal de Suez" sheet no. 31. Surveyed 1797-1799 by Napoleon Bonoparte's Corps of Engineers and Cartographers). Note: Bir Abou Rouq is transcribed variously as: Abou-el-Rouq; Abou Erouq; Abu Ruk; Abu Rukk; Bir Abou el Rouq; Bir Abou Erouq; Bir Abou Rouq; Bir Abu el-Uruq; fountaine d' Abou el `Arouq (cf. p. 1132. Vol. 2. Herbert Verreth. The Northern Sinai From the 7th Centrury BC till the 7th Century AD, A Guide to the Sources. Leuven, Belgium. 2006. Available for download on the internet as two PDF files). The transcription Erouq, for me, most closely parallels the biblical Hiroth (Pi-Ha`Hiroth). Erouq is described as possessing "two wells and a few palm trees" according to Verreth, and cared for by a Bedouin family. So Hiroth appears to be possibly preserved in Erouq. The problem? The proper pronounciation in Hebrew is not Hiroth, its Chiroth/Khiroth which is best preserved at the marsh of El Kraieh (Karach, Karash on various maps). Verreth translates Ras el Ballah as "Cape of [lake] Ballah," noting it is alternately called Ras el Moyeh "the Cape of the Lakes" (Verreth. p. 827. Vol. 1) but I understand "lake" is birket while moyeh means "water" (Aramaic moyeh= water; Hebrew: mayim= water; Egyptian: mu= water; Arabic ma= water; vulgar Egyptian: moyeh= water), so I would translate "Cape of Water" or "Headland of Water." This headland appears on a map of 1885 as Ras el Ballah el Ras el Moyeh, "the headland or cape of Ballah/Water." Ballah's water is from Nile flooding via Lake Menzaleh; Menzaleh is classed as a "salt-marsh" (17% salinity in 1926), so Ballah would be a salt-marsh too. Exodus 14:22 RSV, "...Israel went into the midst of the sea on dry ground _the mayim_ being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left." Both "water" and "waters" in Hebrew is mayim (Strong 4325), is there a relationship here to Ras el Moyeh, "the Cape of the Water"? The "waters" Israel passed through on her right and left hand as shown on the above map? In other words "the water/waters" Israel passed through at Baal-Zephon (Ras el Ballah?) are alluding to Ras el Moyeh, "the Cape of Water." Below, another view of the track from Salhieh on the edge of the Egyptian delta (viewer's left, not shown on this image) to Ras el Ballah, "the Headland of Ballah," which lies on the west side of the Ballah inlet and its marshes. To the ESE of Ras el Ballah is Bir Abou rouq (marked by two concentric red circles, other, later maps' `Ruk, Aruk, Erouq, `Uruq). A track in orange marker passes through the southern swamps of the Ballah inlet east of Ras el Ballah to Bir Abou Rouq. At Rouq one has two tracks in orange to go south to Lake Et-Timsah (Etham?). The western track goes directly to Lake Et-Timsah, the middle track (orange) passes by Timsah on its east side headed for the Bitter Lakes region. The far right orange track heading east of Bir Abou Rouq takes one to Bir el Makdal (probably Pi-ha`hiroth's and Baal-Zephon's Migdol). Alternately, Migdol might be the below map's conical "Ruines" tell ENE of Ras el Ballah. Without explanation Hazlitt identifies Migdol, classical Magdolum, with Ras el Moyeh! If he is correct then Migdol/Magdolum at Ras el Moyeh puts Israel at Ras el Ballah (cf. p. 212. "Migdol." William Hazlitt. The Classical Gazetteer of Ancient Geography, Sacred and Profane. London. Whittaker & Company. 1851). As Israel, after crossing Yam Suph, is headed for the wilderness of Etham, Israel could have taken any of the three orange tracks at Bir Abou Rouq to Birket Et-Timsah. The first orange track going south (viewer's left) from Bir Abou rouq takes one directly to Et-Timsah via Marais de Karach (the 1799 marsh of Karach, 1885: El Kraieh), the second orange track headed south bypasses Et-Timsah's east side. The third orange track (viewer's right) continues to Bir El Makdal (my proposal for Migdol of the Red Sea Crossing). From Makdal a track goes due south headed for the Bitter Lakes called Murrat in Arabic (The Exodus' "bitter waters of Marah"?). Bir el rouq (`Ruk, `Aruk, Erouq, `Uruq) may preserve the Exodus' Pi-ha`hiroth _if_ Hiroth is the correct pronounciation, if _not_, then Chiroth/Khiroth is preserved in El Kraieh (1885 map). In any event, Israel had to cross through or "ford" the marshy lower portion of the Ballah Inlet east of Ras el Ballah to get to Rouq and continue south to Etham/Timsah and Marah. From Pi-hahiroth, Baal-Zephon, and Migdol and the crossing of the Reed Sea Israel spent three days crossing the wilderness of Shur/Etham. She had herds of cattle (Ex 12:38) and cattle drives to Abilene, Texas did not exceed more than 10 to 15 miles a day. If the "waters" of Marah (Hebrew plural and singular: mayim) is an allusion to more than one water source the two salt-marshes of Murrat, today's two Bitter Lakes would seem to fit the bill; Murrat in Arabic means "bitter" and Hebrew Marah also means "bitter." Three days to cross the wilderness of Shur/Etham from Pi-ha`hiroth at 10 to 15 miles a day suggests that the crossing point of the Red Sea is roughly 30 to 45 miles north of some location at the two Bitter Lakes. 15 miles south of Bir Abou rouq (Pi-ha`hiroth?) we are in the vicinity of Lake Et-Timsah (Etham?); at 25 miles we are at the northern part of the Great Bitter Lake (al-Buhayrah al-Murrat al-Kubra); at 40 miles we are at the Little Bitter Lake (al-Buhayrah al-Murrat as-Sughra); at 45 miles we are just south of the Little Bitter Lake Please Click Here to access an interactive version of the below map and see the Ballah inlet in greater, clearer, more focused detail. The Jews in Jerusalem would know of these sites (Baal-Zephon/Ras el Ballah, etc.) via caravan merchants as they served as major sign posts along the way for the caravans plying their trade goods back and forth between Canaan/Judah and Egypt. The Jews apparently, by 562-560 BC when Genesis-2 Kings appears in its final format, understood that Yam Suph extended from in front of Egypt (Exodus 13:18; 14:21-22, 27) to the Solomonic ports of Elath and Ezion-Geber (Nu 33:35, 36, De 2:8, 2 Ch 20:36); a "huge" sea indeed, in their imagination, but they had, in error, confounded and conflated the reed marshes of Menzaleh, Ballah/Moyeh, Karash/Kraieh, Timsah and the Bitter Lakes with the gulfs of Suez and Aqabah. So the crossing of a shallow marsh ford under the eastern slopes of Ras el Ballah (my Baal-Zephon), which on occasion was probably dry, became Israel crossing the Reed Sea/Yam Suph extending from before Egypt all the way to Edom! In other words, because a great sea was envisioned as east of Egypt and extending to Edom, the crossing on dry land of this sea under the slopes of Baal-Zephon (Ras el Ballah) became Israel's God performing a wonderous miracle, allowing his people to flee Egyptian bondage. The humble marsh-ford at Ras el Ballah (Baal-Zephon) had _mistakenly_ come to be envisioned as the great depths of the sea of Suez and Aqaba and because of this error, a mighty miracle had been performed by God, the drying up of the Reed Sea for his people's benefit and salvation. I just now finally realized that the _only_ event that people would regard as "a miracle" would be the sudden drying up of a portion of Lake Menzaleh for a distance of 7 miles as reported by Tulloch. That is to say the sea that dried up under a wind's influence _is_ Lake Menzaleh rather than the Ballah inlet! Imagine yourself in the center of circle 7 miles in diameter: whichever direction you turn and face: north, east, south or west for a distance of 3 1/2 miles all you see is lake bottom where formerly there was water (assuming you can see 3 1/2 miles away). This would have to be regarded as a miraculous event worth remembering and recounting to anyone you chanced to come into contact with. To the degree that the Ballah Inlet is an extension of Menzaleh the two lakes probably came to conflated together into one great sea, Yam Suph, extending from Menzaleh to Edom. That is to say miracle of an east wind drying up the eastern half Menzaleh came to be conflated with the drying up of the Ras el Ballah ford which is an extension of the eastern half of Menzaleh. The main road from Egypt to Canaan and Judah passes by the east side of this lake. The local natives would surely pass on to the caravans passing over Qantara to Egypt the story of their Reed Sea (marshland) being dried up for a distance of eight miles by a wind and the caravaneers and merchants would pass this story on to the Jews in Jerusalem. So the Red Sea (Reed Sea, Yam Suph) that dried up was Lake Menzaleh, or at least a portion of it, probably the eastern part near Qantara. As the Qantara traderoute is the _major_ track leaving Egypt for Canaan and the most famous of the tracks going to and from Egypt, it would make sense that the Jews would associate the leaving of Egypt by their ancestors with this track which skirts the southeast edge of Lake Menzaleh. So the drying up Menzaleh or a part of it _plus_ a major track leaving Egypt for Canaan, became Israel's Egyptian Exodus and the miracle of the drying up of the Reed Sea; the east side of Manzela is very shallow and not navigable and is full of marshes, reeds, and miry mud-flats under Moses. There is a problem: The Qantara crossing is on the biblical "way to the land of the Philistines" which the Bible says Israel did _not_ take (Ex 13:17). This leaves, then, by default, the Ras el Ballah route as the body of water Israel crossed north of Etham (Et-Timsah?) and Marah (the Bitter Lakes?). Coptic pi-akhirot "place where the sedge grows" is another suggestion for Pi-ha`hiroth's Egyptian etymology (cf. the Jewish Encyclopedia on the internet). Sedge embraces various forms of marsh-growing plants including reeds and grasses. The appearance of a marsh with grasses and reeds in the midst of the Isthmus of Suez at Ras el Ballah and the El Kraieh marsh would be a remarkable sight for caravans crossing an otherwise arid wilderness from Judah to Egypt and would serve as a reference point for caravans which would cross this marsh-ford for Egypt. Below, a map (1848) showing that two caravan tracks leaving Egypt for the town of Katieh (Qatieh) in the Sinai cross the Ballah inlet, an extension of Lake Menzaleh. The German cartographer has grossly over simplified this area as revealed in the above 1797-1798 maps of this region by Napoleon's cartographers, nevertheless, in _both_ cases, a track must cross a body of water, the Ballah inlet. The northern track crosses the water at Qantara (on pre 1860 maps rendered Kantara or Tresor), the southern track crosses the Ballah inlet between Ras el Ballah, west of the inlet and Bir Abu Ruk (1797 Bir Abou rouq) east of the inlet. Red circles mark the possible sites for the crossing of the Red Sea (the Ballah inlet) on each of the below maps. The northern crossing of the Ballah inlet at Qantara is on the biblical "way to the land of the Philistines," a route the Bible says Israel did _not_ take (Ex 13:17), leaving by "default" the southern crossing of the Ballah inlet at Ras el Ballah. This map shows the area about Tineh (et-Tineh) and Pelusium (not on this map) were marshy and subject to inundations of the Nile before the Suez Canal was built. In this very area in 1882 near the mouth of the Suez Canal, Lake Manzelah's bottom was exposed for 7 miles by an east wind. Below, 1832 map, John Arrowsmith, London, notes "Inundations of the Nile" from Lake Menzaleh to Birket el Karash (El Kraieh marsh on 1885 map) south of Birket el Ballah. Below, 1853 map, Heinrich Keipert, Germany showing three tracks crossing the Ballah inlet. There are _two_ northern tracks from Taphne (Biblical Tahpanes, a colony of Greek mercenaries; Arabic: Safnas on an 1802 map) one to Pelusium the other to Katieh via the "Ruins of Magdolum" (Tell es Smoot on other 19th century maps). The third track is at Bir Abu Ruk (1797-1799 Bir Abou rouq) near the south end of Lake Ballah. For those wishing to argue Baal-Zephon is recalling Greek Dafnae, biblical Tahpanes, Arabic Safnas (1802 map) and Migdol being Tell es Smoot/Classical Magdolum (?) the Qantara land bridge would be "the crossing point" of the Red Sea. The second possible location for the crossing of the Red Sea would be at Ras el Ballah (Baal-Zephon?). Undoubtedly the Qantara crossing is the "major" exit point from Egypt, it was heavily guarded and several Forts or Migdols exist near this route that could be the Bible's Migdol. In favor of Qantara over Ras el Ballah is that the Qantara land bridge is nearer to the drying-up of Lake Menzaleh by a wind and the landbridge's height would provide a better view for Israel when she crossed over it on dry land and saw two walls of water on either side of her, the left-hand wall of water would be Lake Manzaleh and its marshes on its eastern periphery while the right-hand wall of water would be the Ballah inlet and its marshes. Against the Qantara proposal is that this land bridge never was submerged so an east wind pushing back waters here is not called for. Also against this proposal is that Qantara is part of the Way to the land of the Philistines, a route not taken by Israel. Both bodies of water (Menzaleh and Ballah) possess marsh and reeds making them candidates for the Reed Sea or Yam Suph. The Ballah inlet is part of Lake Menzaleh, in Jewish eyes, when Israel crossed "the sea that dried up by a wind" (the eastern shore of Menzaleh) this sea existed on both the Menzaleh and Ballah sides of the crossing point. Some notes on Yam Suph: Yam Suph (the Reed Sea) for the Exilic narrator (562-560 BC) apparently embraced (1) the marshes of Lake Menzaleh, (2) the marshes of Birket Ballah, (3) the marshes of Birket Karach/Karash, (4) the marshes at Birket Timsah, (5) the marshes of the two bitter lakes, (6) the gulf of Suez, and (7) the gulf of Aqabah. When Israel left Rameses she headed for the "way of the wilderness of Yam Suph" (Ex 13:18) at Etham (Ex 13:20), Birket Timsah, today's Et-Timsah, a marshy lake which periodically received its freshwater via Nile inundations before the Suez Canal was constructed in the 1860s. Then Israel turns about to Pi-ha`hiroth and camps at Yam Suph (Ex 14:1-2) leading Pharaoh to think they are lost in the wilderness west of Yam Suph, from Pi-ha`hiroth to Etham (Ex 14:3). After crossing Pi-ha`hiroth/Yam Suph they backtrack three days to Marah via the wilderness of Shur named after Abu Suweir (?) west of Lake et-Timsah where caravan routes intersect each other, today's Isthmus of Suez from Qantara to the Bitter Lakes called Murrah, meaning "bitter" in Arabic (Ex 15:23). However this 3 day backtrack is called the wilderness of Etham in Numbers 33:8. Both are correct as Shur (Hebrew shuwr) is probably Abu-Suweir-by-Lake-Et-Timsah. I suspect that Suweir/Timsah are but alternate names for the Isthmus of Suez between Ras el Ballah and Marah (the Bitter Lakes). Then Israel camps at Elim (Ayun Musa?), day 4 since the Red Sea crossing at Ras el Ballah ( Ex 15:27), Day 5 Israel camps at Yam Suph, south of Elim/Ayun Musa on the shore of the gulf of Suez (Nu 33:10-11), then they camp in the Wilderness of Sin (Nu 33:11). Israel later leaves Kadesh-Barnea to camp at Ezion-Geber on the Yam Suph (Nu 33:35-36). Numbers 21:4 has Israel at Mount Hor near Arad in the Negeb and Edom when Israel journeys to ":the way to the Red Sea" (Ezion-Geber). By comparing Exodus 14 with the Numbers 33 itinerary it is obvious to me that Yam Suph was _incorrectly envisioned_ as extending from Lake Menzaleh to the Gulf of Aqabah and Edom without any landbridge breaks in it (land passages do exist south of Ballah, south of Karach/Karash, south of Timsah, and south of the Bitter Lakes above the Suez Gulf but the Exilic narrator apparently was unaware of them. It is the pushing back of the sea's waters by a powerful east wind that allows Israel to escape Egypt and cross over into the Sinai. Because of the depth of Yam Suph at Elath and Ezion-Geber (the Gulf of Aqabah) Pharoh's army was portrayed as sinking in the depths of the sea when it returned to its strength in the morning watch when the wind stopped blowing (not a tidal action, not a tsunami, but an east wind setdown). The reality was that the shallow waters, varying from one to five feet on Lake Menzaleh's east side were what was blown away by a wind, but the Exilic narrator was apparently unaware of this, he knew only of Yam Suph/Aqabah's deep waters. The below map from the Bible and Spade website, based on Hoffmeier's research (figure 1. James K. Hoffmeier. Ancient Israel in Sinai, the Evidence for the Authenticity of the Wilderness Tradition. Oxford University Press. 2005). I reject the notion of there being 3 Ballah Lakes as the maps made before the 1865 Suez Canal changed the Ballah topography reveal it was merely an inlet of Lake Menzaleh, the crossing of the Red Sea being Ras el Ballah, "the headland of Ballah," or "Cape Ballah," a prominent height or elevation west of the Ballah inlet crossing.Hoffmeier shows the Qantara landbridge area as being the site for Israel's crossing of the Reed Sea, yet the Bible says Israel avoided this location as it was part of the "way to the land of the Philistines." Contra Hoffmeier I understand that the area north of Qantara was periodically covered in water from Nile inundations, a shallow freshwater lake with marsh grasses and reeds and that this is "where" the sea's bottom was exposed by a wind for 7 miles as noted by Tulloch. So via a series of errors, not understanding the real geography of Yam Suph, the shallow marshes east of Egypt were confused and conflated with the depths of Yam Suph at Elath and Ezion-Geber (the Gulf of Aqabah). I find rather ironic that this confused geography is a "foundation stone" of sorts for Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Israel's Red Sea Crossing via a wind blowing back a sea's waters exposing its bed. Below, my route of the Exodus in pink marker -compare it with Hoffmeier's above map- Hoffmeier has the Crossing of the Reed Sea in the northern sector of Ballah, "the way to the land of the Philistines," whereas I have the crossing in the southern sector of Ballah; from Goshen (Fakoos) to Etham (Birket Tamsah, modern Lake Et-Timsah), "turning about" from Etham at the "edge of the wilderness" (lands receiving Nile water) to Pi-ha`hiroth by Baal-Zephon (Ras el Ballah, "the headland of Ballah," not on this map but west of the track crossing the southern tip of Birket Ballah, west of Beer Mooktool/Migdol (?). I associate the waters (mayim, can mean both water or waters) of Marah with the two Bitter Lakes called Murrah, the Septuaginta's Merra (for the map cf. Keith Alexander Johnston, London, 1861 Map at the David Rumsey Historical Maps Archive on the internet). Note: The ancient Egyptian language did not have the letter "L" instead they used "R." The word Baal-Zephon however does appear in inscriptions found in Egypt, not in Egyptian, but in _Greek_ at Tell Defenneh (Greek: Dafnae), a settlement for Greek mercenaries to guard Egypt's borders circa the 7th-6th centuries BC and into Greek Ptolemaic times of the the 3rd-1st centuries BC. This suggests for me that the word Baal-Zephon is really Greek, circa the 7th-6th century BC (the Exodus account being written in the Exile, in Babylonia circa 562-560 BC during the reign of the Neo-Babylonain King Evil-Merodach, Amel-Marduk, who reigned between those dates cf. 2 Kings 25:27), not Egyptian, and is "marker" that the Exodus account is very late (not written by Moses circa 1445-1404 BC for some Conservative Protestant scholars) and after the 7th century BC and settlement of Greek mercenaries at Dafnae (Jeremiah's circa 572 BC Tahpanhes Jer 43:7-9; 44:1; 46:14). Migdol or "fort" in Egyptian would be Maktar or Magtar. Jeremiah suggests that following the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians some Jews fled to Tahpanhes, where they would have come into contact with accounts in Greek of a Baal-Zephon. It is also possible that Greek mercenaries stationed in Judah to pacify it after Egypt conquered it (after killing king Josiah at Megiddo who opposed them) the Jerusalem Jews learned of a "Ras Ballah" in the northern part of the Isthmus near a major trade route going into Egypt. The Wikipedia on Baal-Zephon in Greek texts: "Gmirkin (2006) also notes that a Ptolemaic era geographical text in the Cairo Museum mentions the sites Baal Zephon and Migdol, listing four border guard stations and fortresses, the third being called 'Migdol and Baal Zephon thought to be located on a route to the Red Sea Coast..." Judaica Encyclopedia. Gale Group. Jewish Virtual Library: "BAAL-ZEPHON... is identified with a Migdal Baal-Zephon mentioned in a papyrus from the Hellenistic period (Cairo papyrus 31169)... W. F. Albright has identified Baal-Zephon with the Egyptian port Taḥpanḥes (Daphne). Michael Avi-Yonah BIBLIOGRAPHY: O. Eissfeldt, Baal Zaphon… (Ger., 1932); Bourdon, in: RB, 41 (1932), 541ff.; Albright, in: BASOR, 118 (1950), 17; EM, 2 (1965), 291–2; Aharoni, Land, 179; M. Dothan, in: Eretz-Israel, 9 (1969), 48–59. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: H. Niehr, DDD, 152–54. Below, two maps of the Qantara area, 1826, Paris Map. "Canal de Suez," Sheet 31, Surveyed 1797-1799. Blue is deep water, blue lines on yellow is shallower water. Marshes exist on many of the "islands" scattered all about. The Orange line is the Qantir route from Salhieh on the eastern edge of the Delta to Qatieh in the northern Sinai east of Pelusium. The Pink route links Salhieh to Qatieh as well but it passes the east side of the Ballah inlet and crosses via a shallow ford at the southend of the Ballah inlet east of Ras el Ballah for Salhieh. In either case, a "reed sea" or "marsh" must be _forded_ on both routes leaving Salhieh, Egypt for Qatieh in the northern Sinai. That is to say, one cannot get away from the Egyptians without "crossing" (fording) a reed sea or marsh (Yam Suph, the Reed Sea?) at either Qantara or Ras el Ballah. Below, a map of 1885 showing the Suez Canal traversing the Ballah Inlet. It is more detailed than the preceding French map surveyed in 1797-1799. "Ras el Ballah el Ras el Moyeh" is shown as being to the west of six small lakes, ponds, or pools. "Missing" on the below map is the track from Bir Abou Rouq to Ras el Ballah going to Salhieh on the 1797-1799 survey. The below map however shows the marshes of El Kraieh as extending to the six pools. When the missing track from the 1799 survey is superimposed on the below 1885 map it appears that the track passed between the six pools. Perhaps El Kraieh preserves Pi-ha`hiroth rendered by some as Pi-ha`Chiroth or Pi-ha`Khiroth? If so, then Israel, camped "before" Pi-ha`Khiroth, is on the west side of the six pools of water on the below map, then, later, she passes between them (?) to Bir Abou Rouq. Migdol is Bir el Makdal "at the end of the track" from Salhieh, Ras el Ballah, and Bir Abou Rouq. The 1799 survey reveals two important tracks from Bir el Makdal to Egypt: (1) The northeastern track: Makdal, Rouq, Ras el Ballah, Salhieh; (2) Belbeis via Wadi Tumilat to Makdal. So biblical Migdol, is a key reference point for caravans to and from the Egyptian delta from Salhieh and Belbeis and I believe it is a reference point for the location of Pi-ha-Khiroth (the marsh of El Kraieh 1885), bounded on the north by Ras el Ballah (Baal-Zephon?) and on the east by the track from Makdal to Ras el Ballah from Bir el Makdal (Migdol?). Click here to visit the below interactive version of the map allowing scrolling and magnifying. The Graeco-Roman Geographer Strabo said that areas of marsh and pools were called barathra, were the 6 pools at Ras el Ballah called barathra? Ezekiel's Pi-beseth in Egypt was called by the Greeks Bubastis, apparently Hebrew pi- can become Greek bu-? Is barathra a Greek rendering of Pi-ha-hiroth, the six pools of Ras el Ballah in a marshy setting? If so, then the Pi-ha`hiroth Israel camped "before" was the six barathra pools surrounded by marsh east of Ras el Ballah. Strabo (Geography. Bk. 17.1.19-21): "Pelusium itself is surrounded by marshes and pools, which some call clefts or pits (barathra)." (p. 42. Vol. xliv. Robert Jameson. The Edinburgh New Philosophocal Review. Edinburgh, Scotland. October 1847 to April 1848) TANAKH, The Holy Scriptures (1985. Philadephia & New York. The Jewish Publication Society): Exodus 14:2 "Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, before Baal-zephon; you shall encamp facing it, by the sea...the Egyptians ...overtook them encamped by the sea, near Pi-hahiroth, before Baal-zephon...a strong east wind all that night...turned the sea into dry ground. The waters were split, and the Israelites went into the sea on dry ground, the waters forming a wall for them on their right and on their left...at daybreak the sea returned to its normal state..." Numbers 33:7-8 "They set out from Etham and turned about toward Pi-hahiroth, which faces Baal-zephon, and they encamped before Migdol. They set from Pene-hahiroth [Pi-hahiroth] and passed through the sea into the wilderness; and they made a three-days' jpurney in the wilderness of Etham and encamped at Marah." Pi-ha`hiroth is "between" Migdol and the sea: The marsh of el Karieh is between Bir el Makdal (Migdol) and the el Ballah lake. Alternately, if the 6 pools east of Ras el Ballah are Barathra/Pihahiroth, they are "between" Bir el Makdal on the east and Ras el Ballah on the west. Israel camps before Pi-ha`hiroth: Israel is on the westside of the northern opening to the El Kraieh marsh; alternately, if the 6 pools are bartahra/pihahiroth, Israel camps west of these pools. Israel is also camped "before" the sea and "before" Baal-Zephon: Israel is east of Ras el Ballah and west of the Ballah inlet, 6 pools and El Karieh marsh opening. Numbers 33:7-8 Pi-hahiroth "faces" Baal-zephon: East of Ras el Ballah is the northern opening of the El Kraieh marsh (Pi-ha-Khiroth?) and the 6 pools (barathra/pihahiroth?). Israel camps before Migdol: Israel is on the westside if the Ballah marsh-ford and on the track which will take them to Pi-ha`hiroth (the northern opening of the El Kraieh marsh and 6 pools or barathra/pihahiroth) and will also continue to the end of the track at Bir el Makdal (Migdol is before Israel as it is at the end of the track Israel will use to cross Yam Suph (Ballah marsh) south of Baal-zephon (Ras el Ballah?) to arrive at Pi-ha`hiroth. Pharaoh's pursuit of Israel is from Salhieh, said track crossing the Ballah marshes and splitting near Ras el Ballah (Baal-zephon?) one track goes north to Qatieh, or east to Bir Abou Rouq and Bir el Makdal (Migdal?) from which point Israel will turn south to the Bitter Lakes (Arabic: Murrah, biblical Marah?). Below: 24 November 2009 12:10 Noon, my proposal for the "Crossing of the Red Sea": The pink marker is my proposal for Israel's route from Qantir (Rameses?) in Goshen (Faqous?), via Salhieh to Etham (Lake Et-Timsah?) at the edge of the wilderness, then, from Etham, "turning back" to Yam Suph the "Reed Sea" at the Ballah marshes. Israel camps west of the Ballah marsh at the very end of the track from Salhieh (ancient Pharaonic Sile?), from which Pharaohs traditionally launched their military campaigns with chariots into Philista, Canaan and Syria. Israel waits like "bait" on this track for Pharaoh's direct arrival from Salhieh (track of small red circles). The track from Salhieh ends at Ras el Ballah (Baal-Zephon?); normally Pharaoh's army would turn north at Ras el Ballah, paralleling the east shore of the Ballah marsh inlet (Yam Suph?) to Qatieh and on to Syria. Upon Pharaoh's arrival Israel crosses the marsh ford south of Ras el Ballah on the track headed for Bir Abou Rouq; the sea is envisioned as engulfing Pharaoh's army at this ford south of Ras el Ballah. Israel continues from Pihahiroth, the north opening to the el Kraieh marsh (Marais de Karach) to Bir el Makdal (Migdal?) where she turns south on the track going to the Bitter Lakes, Arabic Murrah (the waters of Marah). As this track from Bir el Makdal to Marah is "east of Lake Et-Timsah," this wilderness is called alternately the wilderness of Etham or of Shur. Why Shur? There exists a track from Judah's Negeb crossing the Sinai and terminating near Lake Et-Temsah called by the bedouin the "Darb es Shuwr, "the way to Shuwr." Probably referring to Bir Abou Suweir on the north side of Wady Tumilat, just west of Lake Timsah, where several caravan tracks intersect each other for different parts of Egypt. The below map is sheet No. 2. Printed 1818 at Paris France. The Cartographic Survey was done circa 1797-1799 by Napoleon Bonoparte's Army personnel. "...the geographical setting of Exodus 14 is the area between the north side of the el-Ballah Lake system and the southern tip of the eastern lagoon... (p. 108. James K. Hoffmeier. Ancient Israel in Sinai, The Evidence for the Authenticity of the Wilderness Tradition. Oxford University Press. 2005) Hoffmeier's below map of the Crossing of the Red Sea is at the northern tip of Ballah Lakes (dark gray area) the light gray area is "wetlands," from Abu Sefeh to Ahmar and T-78 Migdol of Seti (?) (figure 10. James K. Hoffmeier. Ancient Israel in Sinai, The Evidence for the Authenticity of the Wilderness Tradition. Oxford University Press. 2005) To get one's bearings have a look at the location of Tell el-Herr on the above maps 1797-1865. Note: Hoffmeier's below map suggests that Lake Menzaleh (including the sites of et-Tineh and Pelusium) did _not_ exist in Ramesside times as he has the Mediterranean Sea near a "paleo-lagoon" and the Ballah Lake. An eastwind setdown would then (if this map is correct?) be limited to the lagoon and Ballah Lake. Hoffmeier's notion that the Pelusium mud flats did not exist appears to be indebted to a map by the Egyptologist Manfred Bietak (cf. Fig. 1. "Map of the Eastern Delta and a reconstruction of the ancient environment and Nile branches." facing p. 3. Manfred Bietak. Avaris, The Capital of the Hyksos, Recent Excavations at Tell el-Dab'a. London. British Museum Press. 1996). There is a problem, the Bible says that a "wall" of water appeared on either side of Israel as she crossed the dried up sea (Ex 14:29) and the Hebrew term suggests for some scholars the waters were "piled" or "heaped up" like a fortress wall. In this situation, we have a "miracle" as such does _not_ occur in Nature! Wind set down can push water back from a broad area but it can _not_ make a dry path in the middle of a sea with water piled up 7-30 feet or more like a high fortress wall as shown in the below pictures of the Crossing of the Red Sea by Israel: Below, a modern map of the sea area and of Lake Menzaleh where in late January of 1882 seven miles of lake bottom were exposed by a powerful east wind according to Major-General Tulloch. Below, a panorama view of Lake Menzaleh. Tanis (red square) is ancient Zoan where Israel dwelt and Moses performed God's miracles before Pharaoh (Psalm 78:12,43 ). Below a map showing this area was subject to flooding by the Nile as late as 1856 before the Suez Canal was built, its dark mud being recognized by DeLesseps on his visit to Pelusium, as being left by Nile inundations. In December the mud flats had dried and hardened allowing men and camels to walk where once there was a sea, the Menzaleh Lake being called a "sea" or Bahr in Arabic (For the below map cf. figure 19. James K. Hoffmeier. Ancient Israel in Sinai, The Evidence for the Authenticity of the Wilderness Tradition. Oxford University. 2005) Note: The dark line going from viewer's left to right is the remains of Pelusiac branch of the Nile ending near ancient Pelusium (Farama). The dark line going from bottom to top is the "eastern canal" ending in the vicinity of et-Tineh (Perhaps Pharonic Ta-Denit "The Dividing Water"? seen as Egypt's border?) Below, a map of Lake Menzaleh showing it lined by reeds and swamp grasses in Graeco-Roman times. Tanis is biblical Zoan where Israel dwelt (Psalm 78:12, 43) and it lies on a channel from the Nile lined in reeds emptying into Menzaleh, probably on this channel Moses was placed among the reeds in a reed basket. ….

MBI Israel and the fall of cities Jericho and Ai

by Damien F. Mackey “Analysis of the archaeology directed Courville … to the fact that Israel entered the Promised Land at the close of Early Bronze III …. Widespread destruction of Canaanite population centers, especially Jericho and Ai, occurred at this time”. Ronald P. Long JOSHUA’S JERICHO Drs. Donovan Courville and John Osgood, both largely ignored, have nonetheless been able to demonstrate that a true pattern for the Joshuan Conquest, archaeologically, must be one that recognises the nomadic Israelite conquerors, the Middle Bronze I (MBI) people, as those who conquered the Early Bronze III (EBIII) cities of Palestine, such as Jericho and Ai. The popular model today, as espoused by the likes of Drs. Bryant Wood and David Rohl, arguing instead for a Middle Bronze Jericho at the time of Joshua, ends up throwing right out of kilter the biblico-historical correspondences. Ronald P. Long (MA) writes as follows when reviewing Dr. Courville’s historical revision set (http://www.asa3.org/ASA/BookReviews1949-1989/12-73.html): Analysis of the archaeology directed Courville … to the fact that Israel entered the Promised Land at the close of Early Bronze III …. Widespread destruction of Canaanite population centers, especially Jericho and Ai, occurred at this time. All acknowledge the parallelism between the end of the Old Kingdom (specifically Dynasty VI) and the end of Early Bronze III. It is at this juncture in Egyptian affairs that Courville rediscovered that the Exodus happened. The contemporaneity of the Exodus with the end of Early Bronze III and the end of the Old Kingdom has chronological ramifications which alter to a considerable degree the historic structure of the ancient world. Locating the Exodus in the fifteenth century B.C. gives chronological orientation to Early Bronze and the Old Kingdom. Courville brings the beginnings of Early Bronze and Dynasty I down to the post-Flood era towards the end of the third millennium B.C. This development confronts us with the realization that the accepted Manethonian dynastic scheme, of placing one dynasty after another while not admitting the existence of contemporary dynasties, is fallacious. Within the framework of Biblical chronology Courville concludes that the Old and Middle Kingdoms of Egypt were roughly equivalent in time - that this period was brought to climax and swift collapse with the intervention of God in the Exodus. …. Velikovsky over two decades ago drew similar conclusions regarding the Second Intermediate. It has been recognized that the Papyrus Ipuwer is the Egyptian version of what happened. …. Dr John Osgood, I find, brings a perspective to biblico-historical archaeology that is often quite lacking in other revisionist efforts. Regarding the MBI people, Dr. Osgood has written, correcting the conventional timetable (“The Times of the Judges - The Archaeology: (a) Exodus to Conquest”): http://creation.com/the-times-of-the-judges-mdash-the-archaeology-exodus-to-conquest Characteristics of MB I Middle Bronze I was primarily a nomadic culture between two settled cultures. This point seemed to bring some weight of unanimity earlier but is being disputed much today for complex reasons, and is now the subject of new theories embracing both nomadic parts and sedentary parts, a theory which itself does little to clear up the historical enigma of this archaeological culture. Kenyon strongly states this nomadic character in a discussion on Jericho: — “In one area seventeen successive stages in the town walls can be identified. The seventeenth was violently destroyed by fire and its destruction marks the end of the Early Bronze Age town, probably ca.2300 B.C. The catastrophe was the work of nomadic invaders who can be identified as the Amorites, and the succeeding period can best be described as Intermediate Early Bronze—Middle Bronze. The newcomers for long only camped on the site, and when they ultimately built houses, they were of flimsy construction. They never built a town wall.” …. Kenyon’s identification of the invaders as the Amorites is speculative and is here disputed. Indeed, this claim has fallen into some disrepute of late. However, we wish to put forward a new model based on the evidence to be presented. Ruth Amiram comments: “We have refrained in this discussion from dealing with the most intriguing problem of the MB I culture in Palestine, namely its nomadic character usually connected with the Amorites.” …. Albright also comments: “The settlements were clearly seasonal, since the only time of the year in which such arid districts could provide enough water for beasts, men and growing crops is during the months December–May (preferably January–April). Here people lived in round stone huts of “beehive” type, terraced small valleys and suitable hillsides, utilizing flash floods (suyul) to irrigate specially prepared fields. After the harvest, they probably did not remain long since…” …. To be sure, the nomadic nature of this has been challenged, (e.g. Cohen and Dever ….) but the belief still stands as Amiram has said: “This theory has long been contested, but much more stratigraphical evidence is required than available at present for any significant advance towards its verification.” …. Sadly, the biblical model of Israel’s wandering and conquest has not been consulted, yet it provides the logical answer, viz, a people nomadic for period, yet stationary in Sinai and the Negev I periods of up to a year at least, at any one spot, but, journeying for ultimate conquest, encampment and settlement. This model, which is the logical model fitting the facts, will continue not to be consulted so long as the present stubborn resistance to biblical historicity remains, and so the argument over the MB I culture will continue. One ought to read in full on this matter of the MBI people Dr. Rudolph Cohen’s authoritative, “The Mysterious MBI People” (BAR 9:04, Jul-Aug 1983). In part, he writes: I have been studying the MBI sites in the Central Negev for almost two decades now. The result of this study can, I believe, elucidate some of the outstanding issues. My own conclusion is that the MBI culture must be differentiated from those both preceding and following it. MBI is, in this sense, intermediate. But I also agree with Dever that some MBI pottery types represent a continuation of Early Bronze types. In this sense I see clear connections between the MBI and the Early Bronze Age which preceded it. But other new aspects of MBI culture, including burial customs and social structure, imply a new ethnic element. Thus, the MBI culture is also intrusive; migrating peoples who destroyed the existing urban centers must be involved. But this new ethnic element was neither Amorite nor “Kurgan” peoples who supposedly came from the north and east. In my view, the new MBI population came from the south and the Sinai, the route of the Israelites on that journey known as the Exodus. This is a new hypothesis published here for the first time. …. … Arad, until now assumed to have been destroyed at the end of EBII, was in fact destroyed at the end of EBIII. The excavator of Arad may have assumed there was no EBIII material at Arad because of the absence of Khirbet Kerak ware, but as noted above, Khirbet Kerak ware may not have penetrated this far south. Accordingly, the hole-mouth jars and other material from Arad may evidence EBII and EBIII settlement. If I am correct, Arad was destroyed at the end of EBIII by the MBI people—perhaps they were incipient Israelites, what we might call “proto-Israelites.” Incidentally, this destruction of Arad would coincide with the destruction of Jericho at the end of EBIII. The MBI newcomers, to be sure, transformed the basic nature of the Central Negev settlement. While the scattered EBII sites were closely connected with fortified urban centers such as Arad, the MBI people were self-sufficient without any connection with urban centers. If one accepts this reconstruction of events, we can demonstrate a northerly migration—from the Sinai—of the MBI population …. Note that a large concentration of MBI settlements existed in the Nahal Nissana-Be’erotayim-Be’er Resisim vicinity. From here, the settlements spread out across the southwestern part of the Central Negev to the area of Har Yeruham, then to the region of Horvat Telma and the Dimona Hills, and from there, on the one hand, along Nahal Dimona and Nahal Ef’e, northwards to the Arad environs, and on the other, eastwards into the southern Dead Sea district and Transjordan. There is evidence too for another route from the Avdat-Nahal Zin area eastwards into the Aravah and then into Transjordan. Another route led from the Kadesh Barnea area southward to the Uvdah Valley and from there eastward into Transjordan. It appears that the MBI people, as they went along, destroyed the EBII settlements, and for the most part, reoccupied the ruins. Although these settlements are customarily dated to the EBII period, in my view they continued to exist in the EBIII period, as I stated in my discussion of Arad above. A slow-moving invasion of this sort would explain some of the unusual characteristics of the MBI material culture, such as the use of EBII prototypes in its pottery repertoire. The MBI peoples apparently had few technical traditions of their own and adapted those they found in use among the settled population they conquered. Naturally, they adapted the EBII forms to their own way of life, and the result was the characteristic MBI vessels, which recall the earlier models but employ different techniques and decoration. This hypothesis, of course, contradicts the prevailing assessment, which describes the MBI sites in the Central Negev as a movement that came from the north. It is interesting, however, to note that this migratory drift, as I have reconstructed it, bears a striking similarity to that of the Israelites’ flight from Egypt to the Promised Land, as recorded in the book of Exodus. The concentration of MBI sites in the relatively fertile district east of Kadesh-Barnea recalls the tradition that the Israelites encamped near this oasis for 38 of their 40 years of wandering after leaving Egypt (Deuteronomy 1-46). If the EBII communities were still flourishing in the Negev and Sinai at the time of this MBI incursion, then the capital city of EB Arad with its satellites in the desert no doubt formed a kind of league like that of the Canaanite king of Arad, described in Numbers 21-1, and like that of the Amalekites in Exodus 17-8–13. Both no doubt offered fierce resistance to the northward-advancing MBI Israelites. The establishment of the MBI settlements directly over the ruins of the EBII–EBIII sites in the Central Negev is consistent with the tradition that the Israelites dwelled in the area previously inhabited by their Amalekite foes (Deuteronomy 25-17–19). The northeastward migration of the MBI population into Transjordan has parallels in the Biblical recollection that the Israelites remained in Moab before crossing the Jordan River and laying siege to Jericho (Deuteronomy 3-29). In this connection, it is interesting to note that Early Bronze Age Jericho was destroyed by a violent conflagration, and the site was thinly reoccupied by MBI newcomers, who were apparently unaccustomed to urban dwellings. In the central and northern parts of Israel, the EBIII urban culture flourished. The MBI invaders in the south overwhelmed this urban Canaanite civilization and destroyed their cities but thereafter persisted in a semi-nomadic way of life. This bears a striking similarity to the tradition of Joshua’s devastating campaign against the Canaanite centers in central Palestine and his ban on rebuilding some of them (e.g., Joshua 8-28). Both Jericho and Ai were fortified cities at the end of the Early Bronze Age. According to the Biblical account, they were both destroyed by the Israelites; God specifically instructed that these cities should not be rebuilt. Interestingly enough, after the EBIII destruction of Jericho and Ai, both cities lay in ruins for hundreds of years. Having successfully taken over Palestine, the MBI tribes were profoundly influenced by the mores of the people they conquered, and many of their artifacts and customs have their origin in the Early Bronze Age. I do not necessarily mean to equate the MBI people with the Israelites, although an ethnic identification should not automatically be ruled out. But I am suggesting that at the very least the traditions incorporated into the Exodus account may have a very ancient inspiration reaching back to the MBI period. The migration of the MBI population from the southwest and their conquest of the Early Bronze civilization evidently made a very deep impression, and the memory of these events was preserved from one generation to the next. The late Yohanan Aharoni … made a similar suggestion when he noted that the Biblical tradition concerning the destruction of the two Canaanite cities Arad and Horma could not be placed, archaeologically speaking, in the Late Bronze/Early Iron Age (there were no cities there then)—although this is the period to which the arrival of the Hebrews is normally ascribed—but had remarkable parallels in MBII, when these two strategic outposts in the Beer-Sheva basin guarded the country’s southern approaches. (Aharoni identified Biblical Arad with MBII Tel Malhata and Horma with MBII Tel Masos.) He maintained that the recollection of these two important sites was perpetuated among the local populace and appeared in the Biblical saga of the conquest. The similarity between the course of the MBI migration and the route of the Exodus seems too close to be coincidental, and a comparable process may have operated here. The Late Bronze Age (1550–1200 B.C.)—the period usually associated with the Israelites’ flight from Egypt—is archaeologically unattested in the Kadesh-Barnea area (as elsewhere in the Central Negev, for that matter), but MBI remains abound and seem to provide a concrete background for the traditions of settlement. Whether the Israelites’ trek from Egypt actually occurred in this period or was based on a dim memory of an earlier migration and conquest along this route cannot yet be determined with certainty. But the background of the journey seems clearly to be related to that mysterious archaeological period we so dryly call MBI. …. Dr Osgood likewise will show, with the use of various maps, how the archaeological distribution of the MBI people substantially accords with that of the invading Israelites at the time of Joshua. Further on, Dr. Osgood will present this argument for the EBIII Jericho as being the level attacked by the forces of Joshua, before concluding that: “The correspondence is exact”. …. Region 4—The Conquest of Palestine The MB I people of Palestine were a new people, a new civilization, and a new culture. Some have disputed this, but the evidence remains strong. For example, Kathleen Kenyon says: “The final end of the Early Bronze Age civilization came with catastrophic completeness. The last of the Early Bronze Age walls of Jericho was built in a great hurry using old and broken bricks and was probably not completed when it was destroyed by fire. Little or none of the town inside the walls has survived denudation, but it was probably completely destroyed, for all the finds show that there was an absolute break, and that a new people took the place of the earlier inhabitants. Every town in Palestine that has so far been investigated shows the same break. The newcomers were nomads, not interested in town life and they so completely drove out or absorbed the old population perhaps already weakened and decadent that all traces of the Early Bronze civilization disappeared.” …. Ruth Amiram also presses very hard the point that the MB I was a new culture: “The break with the preceding period was indeed a sharp one and allowed only few left–overs of previous traditions to persist. The succeeding period, however, follows a normal course of development. The MB IIA period, epitomised in the strata G–F at Tell Beit Mirsim and Strata X1V–XIIIB at Megiddo, constitutes the link between the culture of the period under discussion and the ‘true Middle Bronze Age’ (Kenyon’s description of the MB IIB loc.cit.). Some of the characteristic types of pottery have been arranged in Table form in Figure 1 to show their development from MB I through its Megiddo family to MB IIA. This line of continuity constitutes our main reason for retaining the old term and rejecting the new.” …. The end of the Early Bronze Age and the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age, starting with Middle Bronze I therefore, is the most serious contender for the period of the Conquest, and if that be the case, then Middle Bronze I pottery must be a serious contender for the pottery of the nomadic Israelites in the wilderness and in their first settlement of the land. Likewise, Ruth Amiran rejects a distinct cultural break at the end of Late Bronze as needed by the accepted chronology, and clearly places the new beginning at the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age after the end of Early Bronze III. I quote: “In the discussion pertaining to the transition from the Early Bronze period to the Middle Bronze, we have emphasized the sharp cultural break between these two worlds. From the MB I onwards, the development from the material culture (to judge by its reflection in the pottery) is continuous, gradual and evolutionary to the end of the Iron Age or even later.” …. Not that Ruth Amiram was proposing a new chronology. On the contrary, she accepted the belief that the Israelite invasion occurred at the end of Late Bronze, and sadly I believe has missed the significance and poignancy of her own words, as has Kenyon before her. Let us look at the biblical narrative of the Conquest and follow it step by step, looking at what cities have been excavated to see the consistency with the biblical narrative both historically and geographically. JERICHO The first conquest of Joshua in Palestine was Jericho. Garstang originally identified the destruction period of Jericho’s Canaanite city as the end of Late Bronze Age. However Kathleen Kenyon in her monumental excavation of Jericho has identified the destruction level which Garstang uncovered as the end of the Early Bronze Age III. Of this, she says that it came with “catastrophic completeness” …. This was succeeded by a temporary occupation by the MB I people (Kenyon’s Early Bronze—Middle Bronze). She says: “It is thus probable that there was a phase of occupation of the tell in which there were no solid structures. That there was such a camping phase would fit the evidence from the tombs of the nomadic and tribal organization of the newcomers.” …. Such a description matches exactly what we would expect of some of the Israelite host camping on the site after its destruction, until they were finally settled elsewhere. Jericho at the end EB III is the logical place to see Joshua’s conquest. The same holds true for Ai, Joshua’s next battle zone (Joshua chapters 7 and 8). AI Ai has been identified with Et Tell, west of Jericho. This site has been excavated by several expeditions which have concluded that occupation of Et Tell occurred as follows: …. Early Bronze Ib Early Bronze Ic—destruction Early Bronze II—destruction—? earthquake Early Bronze IIIa Early Bronze IIIb—destruction Iron Age I Et Tell was left a ruin for a long period of time at the end of Early Bronze III. “Violent destruction overtook the city of Ai ca.2400 B.C. during the Fifth Dynasty of Egypt and a ‘dark age’ fell upon the land with the appearance of nomadic invaders from the desert. The site was abandoned and left in ruins.” …. This was the end of EB III. As Calloway, the Biblical Archaeologist author just quoted, has accepted the Israelite conquest placed at the end of the Late Bronze Age due to his reliance on the Egyptian and evolutionary–based chronology currently held, an absence of a Late Bronze period at Et Tell was a problem. This has resulted in many doubting that Et Tell is in fact biblical Ai. To quote Calloway: “It will be seen that the absence of any Canaanite city later than EB greatly complicates interpretation of the biblical Israelite conquest of Ai, for the mound was unoccupied at the time and had not been occupied since before the end of the third millennium BC.” …. The time referred to as “the biblical conquest” in that author’s view was the end of Late Bronze. No question is raised by the author as to the correctness of that currently held chronology, but simply a strained interpretation of the biblical narrative and thus a question of its credibility as an historical document is inferred. “Whether the tradition in Joshua claims for Israel a conquest in reality attributable to her predecessors in the land (over 1,000 years before!) or whether Israel’s conquest of a different site has in the tradition been transferred to Ai can only be conjectured.” …. Not even the slightest question of the credibility of the accepted chronology is raised. Its hold on the discipline is too great. Had the biblical documents been taken at face value and allowed to be the prime measure, the end of EB III at Ai, as well as at Jericho and other sites, would have confirmed the record of Scripture so vividly that all questions would have dissipated. But the confusion of the accepted chronology is allowed to continue. It is my claim that the biblical documents must be the rule and these allow the profound destruction of EB III all across Palestine to be identified as the destruction of Joshua’s conquest. It is so at both Ai and Jericho. The correspondence is exact. …. Back in 1986, I, still early in the process of trying to come to grips with the conflicting revisionist models for the Conquest (whether (EBA or MBA), wrote to the Journal of Creation as follows: https://creation.com/techlets I have just finished reading your excellent Journal of Creation, vol.2, 1986, and I decided to send you some material and some contacts which should be of special help to you. I am very taken with your re-arrangement of stratigraphy and your new model for the Stone Age. I had been convinced that Bimson’s MBA = Conquest was the correct one, but lately half of the revisionists overseas have been developing a new scheme of EB III = Conquest, and they too, like Bimson, come up with some very telling arguments. All revisionists of course reject the conventional placing of the Conquest in Late Bronze. I note that your references in your revised history include Velikovsky, Courville, Dr Taylor and Bimson (one book only). I wonder if you are aware of the tremendous amount of research that is going on overseas—and has been for about a decade—on the revision. Scholars from all over the world have been examining, analysing and revising Velikovsky’s work in minute detail and have corrected many mistakes and have brought the revision to a greater perfection. Unfortunately in your excellent work you have not tackled the major criticisms which have been levelled at the revised stratigraphies of Conquest = EBA, or MBA. Some of these difficulties I hope to point out in the course of this letter. I think that your articles would have been much more encouraging had you tackled and overcome these apparent anomalies. I should like to put before you the following queries, not by way of criticism, but for my own enlightenment: Jericho The Bible says that there was no city at Jericho between the Conquest and the reign of Ahab. I think in your scheme that you would run into the strongly fortified MB II city filling what should be an empty period. Hazor Hazor was burned to the ground, yet there is no evidence of destruction by burning of this city at the end of EBA. Megiddo The Bible says that the Israelites were unable to take this city, yet EBA shows evidence of devastation and a hiatus. Ai and Bethel I strongly recommend that you read D. Livingston’s ‘Location of biblical Bethel and Ai reconsidered’, Westminster Theological Journal, 33 (1970), pp.20–44), if you have not already done so. Livingston uses biblical data to show that the conventional location of Ai (and consequently Bethel) at Et-Tell contradicts biblical evidence. Ai must be re-located. My supervisor, who is not necessarily a fan of Velikovsky (Dr Noel Weeks), has been to Et Tell and believes that Livingston is right in saying that this is not biblical Ai. I think too that Shechem might be a problem in your scheme of things. From the Bible it would seem that Shechem was a small settlement at the time of Abraham, but a city at the time of Jacob. It seems to me that according to your scheme Shechem would be the same size in Jacob’s time as in Abraham’s. Correct me if I am wrong. Also Prof. Stiebing, who has criticised at various times the schemes of all revisionists (see Biblical Archaeological Review, July/August 1985, pp.53–69), raises the problem of the absence of LBA remains at Samaria as regards the EBA Conquest Reconstruction. Dr. John Osgood was kind enough to answer my queries: Dr John Osgood responds Thank you for your comments. I will endeavour to answer the queries you raise. Jericho:- You point out that by my revision I would be confronted with a strongly fortified city at Jericho during MB II, and of course you are correct. This, however, is not such a problem as it would at first seem. For while the Bible makes it clear that the old EB III city of Jericho (destroyed by Joshua in my scheme) was not rebuilt until the days of Ahab, 1 Kings 16:34 (beginning of Iron I in my revision), it does make it clear that a fortress city, with a palace, capable of stationing 10,000 troops was built somewhere associated with the site of old Jericho, ‘the city of palm trees’, by Eglon, king of Moab; who in turn was driven out by Ehud ben Cera, no comment being made about the fate of the city so built (see Judges 3:12–30, and Deuteronomy 34:3 and 2 Chronicles 28:15). This is the end of MB IIA—beginning of MB IIB by my scheme, and is detailed in ‘Times of the Judges’, part 2(b) (this volume). One can assume that some repopulation by Israelites took place in this strong city, and it is certain that there was a place of habitation at Jericho during David’s reign (see 2 Samuel 10:5) MB IIC/LB I by this scheme. The MB II city of Jericho fits these characteristics exactly. Moreover, Eglon assumed power with the help of Amalek. The equation Amalek = Hyksos of Egypt I fully accept, as suggested by Velikovsky and Courville, and I have detailed this in my papers in Journal of Creation, vol. 1 (1984) and this volume. It is certain that this MB II city was heavily associated with Hyksos artifacts, as one would expect under such circumstances. Regarding the destruction of Hazor,—there are no findings at the end of EB III Hazor that are inconsistent with the Israelite conquest. It is true that no destruction by burning has been found, but a brief consideration of the likely historical scenario and the excavation details should dispel any insurmountable problem. First, the EB III strata were deep, the uppermost being stratum XIX, found only on the Tell and not on the Plateau. Consequently the chance of getting a fully representative area of any size was small, so arguing from the silence has difficulties. Second, the biblical record only tells of burning, not of any other type of malice committed against the superstructure. The Israelites would have camped over a wide area of the Plateau and not necessarily the Tell to any great extent, so the amount of deposit available for encapsulating in time is totally speculative and most likely small considering the size of the Plateau available for habitation. Assuming the correctness of my identification of the MB I people (Albright nomenclature) with the conquering Israelites, then it is clear that their habitation through MB II and LBA also included the Plateau. It is highly likely therefore that the density of people on the Tell may have been as scanty as the number of MB I artifacts testify. Furthermore the elements (rain, etc.) may well have taken their toll over a significant period of time. It is clear, however, that the population of Hazor EB III disappeared from the Tell. I find, therefore, no difficulties whatsoever in accepting the end of EB III Hazor as being consistent with the biblical record of the Israelite conquest. Megiddo. This city rather than contradicting the EB III conquest, confirms the details of scripture in a remarkable way. The excavators of Megiddo originally identified stratum XVI as the last of the EB III and this was totally destroyed. However, subsequent study has confirmed that stratum XV, originally dated by the excavators to MB IIA also belonged to the EB III (Encyclopaedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land III, p.837), so that the destruction of stratum XVI dates to a time during the EB III and not at the end. I suggest that Jabin may well be a candidate for that destruction in the course of his taking control of Megiddo. (I believe the Khirbet Kerah ware should be understood against the background of Jabin’s hegemony.) Moreover, Megiddo is distinguished by the absence of a clear stratum dating to the MB I. Stratum XII is MB IIB. The intervening strata (XIII–XIV) show admixture of more than one type of culture. In my papers in Journal of Creation, vol. 2 (1986) and this volume I have attempted to show that the pottery culture represented from Megiddo during these periods, which is Amiram’s family C, shows features of EB III and MB I–II giving a late culture called by some EB IV which I have insisted is a syncretic culture that represents the compromised Israelite culture with Canaanite admixture described in Judges 1. I believe Megiddo confirms the biblical details. The Bible indicates that Megiddo became a compromise culture. The excavations at Megiddo confirm elements of a new culture, MB I, and yet the continuation of the EB III traditions in some respects, e.g. the continuation of the use of the EB III sacred precinct (Encyclopaedia III, p.841 and signs suggestive of a return to pottery traditions of earlier periods (Amiram, Ancient Pottery of the Holy Land, p. 81; also Oren, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 210]. Ai and Bethel are a different situation altogether, and I do not believe we can be assured of a solution at this point in time. I have not seen a copy of Livingston’s paper as yet, but certain other details are worth mentioning. W. Ross in Palestine Exploration Quarterly (1941), p.22–27 reasoned, I believe correctly, that the Bethel of Jeroboam must be Shechem, since it alone fills the requirements. The Bethel of Jacob, and of Joshua-Luz, was found on the border of Benjamin, so it is this Bethel around which our argument must revolve. The question is whether Beiten is this Bethel and hence Et Tell is Ai, or whether we look for another. Another location may be needed, but it does not particularly affect the revised chronology I have presented. Beiten did appear to have some EB occupation, but the findings were not up to the expectation of the Judges 1 narrative. Major occupation with the MB I culture began and continued thereafter. It is Et Tell, however, which I feel should have some comment. If the MB I people were the Israelites, then Et Tell in isolation would fit the narrative extremely well. It shows termination of occupation at the end of EB III, and no reoccupation until Iron II (perhaps Aiath in Isaiah 10:28; see also the exiles in Ezra 2:28). Its topography fits the story of Joshua, with a northern Wadi a small distance away enabling Joshua to draw the people out of the city, and a close western slope near the city where the ambush could hide, yet quickly enter the city as needed. I am not entirely convinced with the arguments I have seen rejecting it on either excavation details or topography, although I sense that geographical argument may carry more weight. In any case, those who have rejected it on excavation grounds have done so on the basis of an end of LB conquest, which is here rejected. Whatever may be the truth of the identities of Ai and Bethel, at this point in time it does not materially affect the chronology here espoused. Shechem: This is no problem to the revised chronology presented here, since the passage concerning Abraham and Shechem, viz. Genesis 12:6, does not indicate that a city of any consequence was then present there. On the other hand, Jacob’s contact makes it clear that there was a significant city present later (Genesis 33 and 34), but only one which was able to be overwhelmed by a small party of Jacob’s sons who took it by surprise. I would date any evidence of civilisation at these times to the late Chalcolithic in Abraham’s case, and to EB I in Jacob’s case, the latter being the most significant. The Bible is silent about Shechem until the Israelite conquest, after which it is apparent that it developed a significant population until the destruction of the city in the days of Abimelech. If the scriptural silence is significant, then no evidence of occupation would be present after EB I until MB I and no significant building would occur until the MB IIC. Shechem was rebuilt by Jeroboam I, and continued thereafter until the Assyrian captivity. Moreover, Shechem was almost certainly the Bethel of Jeroboam, during the divided kingdom. So I would expect heavy activity during the majority of LB and all of Iron I. This is precisely the findings at Shechem, with the exception that the earliest periods have not had sufficient area excavated to give precise details about the Chalcolithic and EB I. No buildings have yet been brought to light from these periods, but these periods are clearly represented at Shechem. MB IIC at Shechem was a major destruction, so almost certainly it was the city of Abimelech. The population’s allegiance to Hamor and Shechem could easily be explained by a return of descendants of the Shechem captives taken by Jacob’s son, now returned after the Exodus nostalgically to Shechem, rather than by a continuation of the population through intervening periods (see Judges 9:28, Genesis 34). For Jeroboam’s city and after, the numerous LB and Iron I strata are a sufficient testimony (see Biblical Archaeology, XX,XXVL and XXXII). Samaria again is better explained by this revised chronology. Cultural periods must show blurring into one another depending on conditions. On my revision the Omri Dynasty would occupy a LB II/Iron I position, with more likely emphasis on Iron in view of the newness of the building at Samaria, whereas in Judah at the same time, which did not have the turbulent politics of the northern kingdom, we may expect some carry over from the LB II. Hence, by my revision I would expect a beginning of Samaria to be dated to the beginning of the Iron I period, with the first buildings being dated to both Omri and Ahab. Absence of LBA remains at Samaria therefore do not trouble me. I believe that the nexus Ahab/Jehoshaphat defines the turnabout to the early Iron I period, and that the frequent casemate walls found throughout this part of the Iron I are to be seen against the building activities of these two kings, especially those found throughout Judah (see 2 Chronicles 17:12—storage cities), particularly in the Negev. They are not Solomon’s cities as so frequently assumed. ….