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§ Debates · Ch. 1 · Ancient Israel and Other Ancestors

Did the Exodus occur as a historical event?

2 positions · no single answer

Position A · held by Scholars who connect the account with movement between Egypt and Canaan

A historical core

Movement by workers, enslaved people and fugitives makes it possible that a memory of departure from Egypt lies behind the tradition.

Rests on: p. 9

Reads the same page as : the same source, different readings.

Where the debate comes up

1 quiz question on this debate →

Statements tied to the debate

  1. The authors ask how much of the biblical Exodus can be confirmed as a historical event: whether the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, whether a Moses freed them and whether they trekked across the Sinai wilderness before settling in Canaan.
  2. The Bible's picture of Israelites moving back and forth between Canaan and Egypt, as agents of the Egyptian government or as slaves, is plausible in a general sense. But showing something is possible does not prove the Exodus happened, and the silence of sources outside the Bible leads some to conclude it did not.
  3. The Merneptah Stele is the only reference to Israel in Egyptian literature of this period, and the people it names already live in Canaan: nothing hints at former slaves, plagues or a sea crossing. Even the period of the Exodus cannot be fixed: some place it in the fifteenth century BCE, others in the thirteenth, and the Bible's chronology does not match other sources clearly.
  4. As David's portrait may incorporate stories associated with other heroes, Moses's image may likewise have grown through literary elaboration. A historical Moses remains possible, but the biblical account does not reveal a clear boundary between history and fiction.
  5. The Hyksos expulsion calls the Exodus to mind (a new king who does not remember Joseph and fears the Israelites, followed by Israel's flight), and some see Hyksos rule as the backdrop for Joseph's rise. The Egyptian historian Manetho, over 2,000 years ago, already blended the two stories. The authors, however, hesitate to tie the Exodus to any specific event, since traffic between Canaan and Egypt was constant.