Israel in Egypt – Historical Fact or Later Fiction? Part 1

Israel in Egypt – Historical Fact or Later Fiction?

Part 1

After listening to the recent episode of the Imaginary Friends Show podcast that I was a guess on, I have received many comments from my friends here on facebook. Many of them have been very encouraging and appreciative of my comments on the show. Others have been challenging in their comments – both from Christians and Atheists. But one of the most common questions that people have been asking me is concerning the section on this history of Israel. I was surprised by many of the comments usually for one of two reasons. They either seemed blissfully unaware that any real problems existed in the dating of the composition of the Exodus narrative (let alone in the historicity of a proto-Israel outside of the Levant), or they thought it was such an open and shut case that the narratives were composed in the late First Millennium and that the Biblical accounts were total fabrications. Both extremes seem totally out of touch with the research on the issue.

In response to these questions/comments, I will be spending several sections dedicated to explaining why I believe in the historicity of the Egypt/Exodus narrative and hold to the traditional early dating of their compositions. This does not mean that I do not recognize that there are difficulties in adopting such a position. I simply think the weight of the evidence is in that direction.

Before I begin I want to also deal with one objection that I know will be raised against my overall method and then state one presupposition that I will be working off of. The objection is that because I believe the Bible already that I am simply arguing in a circle in order to affirm the Bible. I think that any commonsense reading of what I am about to present will refute that claim on its own, but I would also like to specifically state that I am giving arguments here for exactly WHY I believe the Biblical accounts. We Christians are commonly asked for “evidence” for why we believe what we believe. It is to that end that I wish to attempt to achieve in these next few notes. I will not be arguing that the Bible is true because it is inspired or anything of that nature – but rather that the accounts are historically reliable, composed at the traditional early dates and accord with everything we know about the Ancient Near East (ANE) during that time frame. I think this objection is more ideologically driven against anyone who attempts to defend the Bible in any manner and is not substantive in the slightest.

The presupposition that I will be working with is one that I think any historian or any student of history will have no problem conceding. That presupposition is merely that ancient writers are not modern writers. It seems somewhat redundant and unnecessary to make this point explicitly but let me hash it out a little bit. By this assumption I mean to imply several things. Firstly, the ancient writer should be understood to write within the confines of normal literary structures that were contemporaneous with their culture and should not be forced to keep a standard of modern historiography our journalistic exactitude (if we can even say that is accomplished today). This means that the ancient author should be read according to his original authorial intent within the structures of literature at the time – including factors such as genre, context (historical, cultural, political, etc), themes, polemics, rhetoric, etc. Secondly, is that ancient writers did not spend 4 years for an undergraduate degree, several years for a Masters, even countless more for a PhD or post doctorate work, all focused on the historical insights of centuries of historical study, archeology, epigraphy, onomasiology, etc. They would have been almost completely unaware of the cultural practices, linguistical structures, etymologies, rhetorical devices, etc. from generations past of their own culture, let alone centuries removed from another culture. This will come into play most dramatically when we realize that a late First Millennium Hebrew scribe would have known next to nothing about the finer nuances of Second Intermediate or Empire Age Egyptian culture, politics, rhetoric, polemical devices, culture, etc.

Let me also list my sources for the next few notes that I will be composing on this subject. I will primarily be relying on the following texts (though this list is not even close to being exhaustive)

ed. Block, Darrell. Israel: Ancient Kingdom or Late Invention (collection of essays)

Currid, John. Ancient Egypt and the Old Testament.   

Hoffmeier, James. Israel in Egypt.

Kitchen, Kenneth A. On The Reliability of the Old Testament.

ed. Long, Baker, and Wenham. Windows into Old Testament History.

None of these books are really “page turners” and are sometimes quite technical and dry – which may explain the endurance of the leftist extreme who rejects all arguments for the traditional dating as passé. Though this may also be due to the limited range of “evidence” allowed to be part of the discussion. Many of you who listened to the episode will undoubtedly remember Jake’s comments about the total lack of “shits” found in the Sinai desert. While the discussion was not nearly deep enough to evaluate Jake’s range of acceptable evidences, what I commonly find is that many skeptics will preclude many arguments that do not rely solely on empirically verifiable “evidences”. However, any trained in historical study knows that while these kinds of evidences are great, they are rarer than we think. Yet historical study moves on just fine due to the many other kinds of evidences are arguments available to us.

And now let us look at some of these evidences. Many of them will be of the kind that I call “dovetail” evidence. That is, that the cumulative evidence is better explained by one context than others. For much of this we will see that an earlier Second Intermediate Period or Empire Period Egyptian context fits the composition of the Egypt/Exodus narrative rather than a later post-exilic one.

1.      Source criticism is being strongly reexamined and often abandoned in favor or more literary approaches to the text.

a.       When someone now tries to tout source criticism as if it is gospel truth and not what it really is these days (a theory in crisis) they reveal a reliance of quite outdated research and information. We can find good examples of this in the works of such scholars as Charles Isbell, Gordon Davies, G. Fischer, Thomas Thompson, etc.

                                                              i.      In fact speaking of source theory, Thompson says that it is “no longer sufficient to maintain such a radical interpretation of narrative, one which carries us so far from any immediate reading of the text.” (Thompson, Origin Tradition. p155)

b.      We have come to find that key words, themes, and whole narrative “units” OFTEN cross the boundaries set down by traditional source critics.

2.      There was a massive influx of Semites into Egypt during the Old Kingdom (ca. 2190BCE) to the Second Intermediate Period (ca. 1786-1550 BCE).

a.       Epigraphic and archeological evidence all point to the fact this massive immigration to Egypt from the Levant was to seek relief from drought and famine in Canaan. (we will also see later that there was also some who were brought during this period as military captives).

b.      If a later date is assumed (commonly suggested to be post-exile during the mid to late First Millennium) there seems to be no corresponding period in which the narrative would dovetail with these historical conditions. After the expulsion of the Hyksos at the end of the Seventeenth Dynasty, there seems to be a drastic decline in Semetic presence with no other possible periods of massive migration to Egypt that would correspond to the Biblical events. These massive levels of Semitic presence in Egypt and the  common pattern of migration to escape drought and famine correspond nicely with the “Patriarchical period” of Israel’s history.

3.       Onomasiology (the study of names) reveals that the names used in the Joseph/Moses/Exodus cycles are clearly Egyptian in etymology (though their exact etymological roots are not always agreed upon) and some are only present in their forms during the Second Intermediate and Empire Periods.

a.       Examples are: 

                                                              i.      Potiphar

                                                            ii.      Asenath

                                                          iii.      Zaphenath-paneah

                                                          iv.      Hartummim (the “magicians”)

4.      Joseph’s title as ruler over Egypt had no known comparative during Israel’s monarchy – but was present during the Second Intermediate and Empire Periods in Egypt.

5.      The use of the city names “Rameses” and “Raameses” almost a Millennia after the delta capital was abandoned in 1100 BCE would make little to no sense.

6.      Joseph was bought as a slave for 20 shekels.

a.       The average slave price during the first half of the second millennium was 20 shekels. During the second half of the second millennium, due to inflation, the average price was 30 shekels. By the middle of the first millennium (when many critics want to place the composition of exodus) the average price was between 50 to 60 shekels. Should we expect that the author redacted his own narrative to account for inflation just to try and fool historians that he did not know would ever exist nearly 3000 years later?

These are just an introductory handful of examples. I will be going through my notes that I have made in the past in the sources I listed above and will be compiling a more comprehensive list as I go. But I hope this will be a good start for those who were interested in this topic. There is much more to come.

For Part 2: http://freedthinkerpodcast.blogspot.com/2011/06/israel-in-egypt-historical-fact-or.html

Did Jesus Predict the Rapture within 40 Years of his Death? Part 1

The Problem of “γενεὰ αὕτη” (“this generation”) and
“πάντα ταῦτα” (“these things”) in Matthew 24

Part 1 – Introduction and Summation of Categories of Possible Solutions


Preliminary Thoughts on Methodology:

I would like to start with a preliminary statement about the exhortation to read the passage in its “plain” or “literal” sense. This exhortation comes not surprisingly from both the literalists and the critics. (I use “literalist” in a technical sense to refer to those who ascribe to the method of hermeneutics known as the “literal method” and not merely to all people who hold a “literal” understanding of the Bible because, in some sense, this would include all readers to some degree; and I use “critic” to refer to those skeptics who, despite a total lack of hermeneutical, historical, linguistic or Biblical/theological training deem themselves experts in the field but often reveal a surprising lack of clarity, understanding or even basic skills to read an interpret ancient texts). This is not surprising because the literalists often demand that a text can have but one meaning and that meaning is found in a prima facie reading of the text. (However, they often violate their own hermeneutic when it suits their theological framework and will often interpret clear passages by ambiguous ones thus violating the hermeneutical principle of the analogy of faith – or in plain terms, that the clear and explicit should always interpret the ambiguous and metaphorical.) On the other hand, the critics will often only interact with the literalists and thus assume that their reading of the passage is the only valid one and thus that any Christian who wants to hold to a “literal” reading of the passage (an equivocation of the meaning of “literal” is often glossed over) must understand it as the literalists do or else be in violation of some abhorrent scripture twisting. It is almost humorous that neither perspective sees how much in agreement they actually are even though they think they are diametrically opposed to one another.

However, is a “plain” or “literal” reading of a passage the best? Well the answer is complicated. It seems that it should be yes and no. A “plain” reading is a virtue but what constitutes a plain or literal meaning is much more nuanced than we are aware of at first. The problem should becoming immediately obvious when we consider what the “plain” reading of a text would be for a first century Jew and a 21st century American. They would be drastically different. We must never forget that the Bible was written at a specific time in history, at a specific location, was steeped the normal worldview of the culture, and employed symbols, illustrations, metaphors, grammar, rhetoric, etc. of that time period. A humorous example can be seen if we were to look at the use of “heart” in the Old Testament. If we were to translate “heart” literally from the Hebrew we should actually use a term like “bowels” or “pit of the stomach”. So why do we use heart? Because our English translators have taken the concept meant by the Hebrew (the bowels were seen as the seat of emotion and personhood in the Ancient Jewish world) and translated it into the English parallel (“heart” is the organ we use to represent the seat of emotion and personhood in our western culture). If the translators had simply left it as “bowels” can we imagine what kind of strange interpretations people would have if they had no understanding of the historical and cultural contexts of that idiom?

To make problems even more severe for our text, we can also consider that in writing his Gospel, Matthew was a 1st century Jew, translating the Aramaic sayings of Jesus into Koine Greek in order to present his message to Roman gentiles. In light of this we can see how layers of meaning or contexts begin to build layer upon layer so that a “plain” reading becomes much more work than simply reading it and deciding what makes the best sense to our modern worldviews.

Thus for us to understand the “plain” reading of a passage, it is imperative that we are willing to do the leg work to understand in historical, cultural, political, religious, literary, rhetorical, polemical, grammatical, etc. contexts that may be operating within our given text.



The Problem Stated:

In Matthew 24:34 we find Jesus making the statement “Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.” If “these things” refers to all of the statements made previously in the chapter, and if those statements refer to what will happen immediately preceding the return of Christ and the end of the world, and if “this generation” means the 40 year generation of those present while Jesus was speaking, then it seems that Jesus made a false prediction.

If Jesus was predicting his return within 40 years of the Olivet Discourse, and now nearly 2000 years have passed, the Jesus would have been clearly mistaken. This is an obvious problem for those that want to say Jesus is a messenger from God, let alone the perfect incarnation of the 2nd person of the God-head.



Categories of Possible Solutions:

There are two categories of solutions to this problem. The first has to do with the interpretation of  “γενεὰ αὕτη” and the second has to do with the interpretation of “πάντα ταῦτα”.

Let us look at the three possible solutions that fall under the first category.

1.      “γενεὰ αὕτη” means something other than a 40 year generation. It is possible that “γενεὰ αὕτη” could mean something other than the generation following Jesus’ sermon. The Greek word γενεὰ is commonly used as a synonym for γενóς (“race,” “stock,” “people”) and thus may refer to the Jewish race, or even to a kind of people (such as sinful humanity). However, this seems to be unlikely since ever Biblical example of this kind of usage of the Greek word γενεὰ always has an adjectival modifier. For example, we can see Matthew 12:39, 16:4 - “γενεὰ πονηρὰ καὶ μοιχαλὶς” (“an evil and adulterous generation”); or Mark 8:38 – “τῇ γενεᾷ ταύτῃ τῇ μοιχαλίδι καὶ ἁμαρτωλῷ,” (“in this adulterous and sinful generation”). In all these examples we can see that “generation” could easily be understand as “people” (i.e. in Matthew 12:39 “An evil and adulterous PEOPLE seeks for a sign…” is quite a legitimate rendering). However in Matthew 24:34 such a rendering would seem strained. While we do have extra-Biblical examples of an unmodified γενεὰ referring to kind of people rather than a generation (such as in Homer or Herodotus), and thus is possible in Matthew 24:34, this seems to strain at credulity considering no other Biblical example can be found.

2.      “γενεὰ αὕτη” means something other than the generation of Jesus’ audience. Another option is that “γενεὰ αὕτη” could refer to a generation, but rather than being the generation of Jesus’ audience, it could be the people he referred to previously who would see the signs of his coming. If the signs do not begin until 5000 CE then Jesus would be referring to that generation. It will be that generation who sees the signs that will not perish prior to Jesus’ second coming. However there seems to be two major problems with this view.

     a.       The first problem is that one would have explain why Jesus would use the near demonstrative “αὕτη” (“this”) rather than a form of the far demonstrative “ἐκεῖνος” (“that”). While grammatically both are technically acceptable (since, if this interpretation is correct Jesus had introduced the subject and thus can legitimately refer to it as “this”), it simply strains at feasibility to read “this” as “that” in a future prediction; especially considering that Jesus had no issues with it previously.
     b.      The second problem is that this interpretation seems to make the statement just utterly inconsequential. What sense would it make to explicitly refer to something that is necessarily implied by something else? If the tribulation would only last 7 years (the view commonly held by those who attempt to use this objection to the problem in order to say that Jesus was referring to the generation of Jews living at the time of the tribulation), then what sense would it make to say that that generation would not perish before the end of the tribulation. It would be like stating that a generation would not pass away before Obama will leave office. Well if Obama can only be in office a maximum of 5 more years, then obviously 40 years will not pass before 5 years will. This interpretation simply makes the statement utterly trivial.

3.      “γενεὰ αὕτη”, when reverse translated into Aramaic, means something other than a 40 year generation. While this interpretation is similar to that of the first it has one major advantage. It states that the problem is only an apparent problem with the Greek text, and not a substantive problem for Jesus as a prediction. In fact, in other translations of the NT the problem is also not readily apparent – such as the Syriac Peshitta which uses the term sharbetā which almost equally can mean generation or race. Thus the problem is only in Matthew’s Greek translation (though “γενεὰ” still may have been his best option) and not in Jesus’ actual prediction. In Aramaic it would be equally likely that Jesus could have meant “this generation” as he would have meant “this race/people”. In fact, I will come back to this as a possible double entendre when we consider that the Olivet Discourse often employs the concepts of double fulfillment and typology.

The second part of this essay will deal with the second, and in my opinion the strongest, solutions to the problem. This is the solution that says the problem is resolved not by looking at what “γενεὰ αὕτη” means, but at what “πάντα ταῦτα” refers to. I will argue that “γενεὰ αὕτη” does in fact refer to the generation of Jesus’ audience (though with some implicit and intentional winks to double fulfillment and typology) but that “πάντα ταῦτα” does not primarily refer to the events surrounding the second coming of Christ at the end of the world, but the judgment of God executed against the Temple at the end of the age of the Old Covenant in 70 CE. These events only typologically point us to the return of Christ and the end of the world.

It will be my contention that this would have been the “plain” reading of the passage as it was understood by both Jesus and his 1st century Jewish audience.

Part 2 - http://logical-theism.blogspot.com/2011/05/did-jesus-predict-rapture-within-40_29.html

God Loves a Cheerful Giver

“God loves a cheerful giver.”
(2 Corinthians 9:7)

It is interesting to notice that in the Bible, God’s love for his people is almost always said in the past tense with the occasional “everlasting” or “steadfast” modifier attached. While I am positive of God’s love for the saints past, present, and future and that for anyone to deny any of these is to deny the very heart of the gospel, it is still very curious that God’s word only uses the present tense to describe God’s love for us in reference to two categories: cheerfully giving and disciplining those He loves (Pr. 3:13; Heb 12:6; Rev 3:19). While books can be written, (and probably should be), on God’s discipline of those He loves, this article will only deal with giving cheerfully.
For over a decade I have worked everything from retail to restaurants, cafes to coffee shops, and family dining to fine dining, so it is needless to say that I have had a fair share of exposure to the public as a whole. In doing so, I have noticed a troubling trend among Christians in the marketplace. We are, on a whole, far from generous and can be quite tightfisted or at best calculatingly exact. On Sundays following church services around the nation, Christians flood their local coffee shops, cafes, diners, malls, and supermarkets. One would expect that after being in the presence of God and singing praise of his graciousness to us, we would, in turn, reflect that light to others. If I told you that I had been hit by a semi-truck going 90mph but showed not even a single bruise, you would know that I was either lying or the biggest miracle you had possibly ever seen. Yet Christians do this week in and week out. How can we have an encounter with the Living God and walk away unchanged? Sundays should be the best day of work for those of us who find ourselves in situations where we must work. Sadly it is the worst day for nearly every employee in every customer service based industry. Waiter’s around the country know the cliché, “Well, they gave 10% to God so how could they afford giving 15% to me?” This is an indictment upon the church.
Please do not hear that I am a disgruntled server who is fed up with low percentage tips. Please do hear that I am a disgruntled Christian who is very fed up with my witness being damaged week in and week out because of the undercurrent of tightfistedness among my fellow saints. I am a fellow believer who is tired of hearing my faith, my family and my God mocked because my people are penny-pinching and make sure to tip, down to the penny, the absolute minimum they feel they can get away with.
I do not believe that when God said to be a cheerful giver, he had in mind only what we give at church in tithes and offerings, but rather in every area of our life where money is involved. We do not teach our children to share only so they will share with us alone, but so that they will cultivate an attitude of generosity with everyone that they meet. Our Father is the very same with us and with our possessions. We do not teach our children that the best way to share is so exact that they should only share for 15 minutes if the other child only shared for 15 minutes, or to only share their old doll because their new doll is too precious to them and cost too much for us. Nor do we even teach them to share only with someone who has shared previously with them, but rather to share even in spite of the selfishness of others. Again, this is also what our Father wants for us. Imagine if God sacrificed His only Son’s life just for those of us who shared first! Is this not the gospel? That in spite of our sins, Jesus died for us? (Rom. 5:7)
At Bible college, many of may classmates would be confused on the proper tipping procedure. They would sometimes understand why I would tip $25-$35 on a $100 dinner check, even if they would never do it themselves. Yet when I would tip $5 on a $7 or $8 bill they would protest that it was over 50%. I told them then and I still firmly believe that generosity is not slave to a percentage. The difference between 15% and 65% on a $8 bill is only a couple dollars for me but can make a world of difference for my server. The difference between 15% and 25% on a $100 is two lattes at Starbucks for me, but can completely turn the worst night around for a server. Don’t believe me? Ask anyone you know who works for tips.
Buying a drink at Starbucks can average around $3.50. Will it really hurt to leave them the change for our $5? I guarantee that while you wont feel the difference in your wallet, your barista will remember you from then on out. To prove this point, I once did an experiment with two of my local coffee shops. At one I would tip only the coinage that I received with my change, usually around $.30 to $.50. At the other, I would round up to $5 no matter what I got. This would sometimes be a $2 tip but if all I got was a drip coffee it could sometimes be almost $4. At the end of the month I was just another regular customer at the first coffee shop but at the second I knew all the baristas names, their life stories, who had kids, who was taking what classes and was even invited to several birthday dinners and other special events. What a difference in the opportunities that were now available to witness. A couple dollars here and there can smash down doors to witnessing. Maybe it is possible that God knew what He was talking about with this whole generosity thing?
Another common mistake people make is to give out tracts as replacement for a tip or part of a tip. While it is hard to argue with the logic that a clear presentation of the gospel is of more value than the tip could ever be (in the final analysis), I find that in these instances I must. I promise that a generous tip will have a greater impact when placed in tandem with the tract and not replaced by it. If a tract is given with a stingy tip or no tip at all, it will actually bring more scorn upon it than the person may know. Now, some may say that this is the normal reaction of the lost to mock the gospel which they see as foolishness. While this is true for some who will mock it no matter what, it is more common that the person who leaves the tract is mocked rather than the message of the tract itself when they are stingy.
Remember what Jesus said about giving good gifts, “Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake?” (Mt. 7:9-10) Your server is hoping for a generous tip, but substituting the tract for it is on par with giving them the stone or the serpent. Imagine that your boss replaced a portion of your salary with catalogues or a magazine subscription that you had no interest in. How many of us would be excited about the new change in our pay scale? Your server feels the same. A tract can be a nice supplement to a tip, but should never replace or decrease it.
A co-worker of mine once had a rare Sunday afternoon. She had Christians who actually knew how to be generous. After three or four tables of 25% tips, a table left a nice tip and a tract. This same woman would have normally ridiculed it with everyone in the kitchen, but I saw her tuck it away with her tips in her purse at the end of the night. She did not convert to Christ right then and there because of money, but old stereotypes of cheap Christians were shattered and she was open to something she would have normally had nothing to do with.
Our Lord said that we cannot serve both God and money. When we pull out our calculators and find out the exact tip down to the penny that we can give to just meet the minimum we show an attitude of heart that we are not cheerfully giving but doing it begrudgingly. When we use a coupon and tip on the total after the discount, we tell the server that we don’t want to be generous with them but want to skate by spending the least money possible. What does a cheerful giver look like? Is it someone with an accountants hat on with a calculator in hand, counting out pennies and rounding down where possible? Or is it someone who wants to bless others in a meaningful way to the glory of God because He was so generous with us?
As a server my witness at work is more dependant on the other Christians who walk through the doors than they can ever know. And I am not alone. Christians in the service industry around the country struggle almost every shift with this. If someone tips 8% after saying “we loved the service and may God bless you,” we hear about it. If someone invites their server to church but doesn’t leave more than a few coins, we hear about it. When someone leaves a tract about the generous love of God but then hypocritically cannot even reflect that generosity themselves, we hear about.
Please take seriously when God says that He loves a cheerful giver. We are not buying converts, but we are smashing down barriers that we have sadly placed ourselves.

Book Review

The book review of David McAfee's book Disproving Christianity: Refuting the World's Most Followed Religion is now up and posted. Because of the formatting and footnotes. I thought it would be best to post it on Scribd as a pdf. file so that anyone who wants to read it can either read it there, or upload the pdf. file and read it on any system that supports that file.

The review can be found at:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/37521446/Book-Review-of-Disproving-Christianity

I hope you enjoy it and are challenged by it - no matter what your worldview may be.

Book Review

I am currently in the process of writing a lengthy book review for David McAfee's book Disproving Christianity: Refuting the World's Most Followed Religion. I am finished with the first draft and right now it is in the process of being edited. Once it is publishable, I will post it here, and on Scribd . (Since there is footnoting and those do not translate well on blogspot, I will probably just link the Scribd file here.) I have also been given some offers by Jake Farr-Wharton, host of The Imaginary Friends Show Podcast, and by Nicholas Bruzzese, one of the hosts of The Skeptic's Testament Podcast to come on and do response interviews to the book and answer some questions about the review. McAfee and I have also very briefly discussed a joint point/counterpoint publication as well as possible public debates. We will see what comes of it. Please keep your eyes open for these and other up coming events.

This is Our King

This is a sermon that I preached on Palm Sunday, 2009 at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Hinsdale IL.

Sodom - A Salvation Story

This is a sermon that I preached on the Sodom narrative in Genesis 19. I preached it at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Hinsdale, IL last year.

Ahaz at the Crossroads - Isaiah 7:1-17

This is the sermon that I preached on August 1st at my church (Church in the Canyon, Calabasas CA). I had several requests to post this for people who were unable to make it or live far away. 

I hope it blesses you.

The Great Debate - Part II

This is Part II but wow, the resolution on this one turned out pretty poor because I tried formatting it to use up less space. But the audio should sound the same.

The Great Debate - Part I

My bad... This is part one even though the graphic says that it is part 2. But really, this is part 1.