032. XIX. The Oppression Of The Hebrews In Egypt
§ XIX.THE OPPRESSION OF THE HEBREWS IN EGYPT
1 .Rapid increase of the Israelites. Now Joseph died and all his brothers and all that generation. And the Israelites became numerous and powerful. Then there arose a new king over Egypt, who knew not Joseph. And he said to his people, See, the Israelite people are becoming more numerous and powerful than we; come, let us deal subtly with them, lest they become so numerous that, if a war arise, they will join our enemies, and fight against us, and go out of the land.
2.Measures to prevent their increase. Therefore the Egyptians set over them taskmasters to impose tasks upon them. And they built for Pharaoh store- cities, Pithom and Ramses. But the more the Egyptians afflicted them, the more numerous they became and the more they spread abroad so that the Egyptians became apprehensive of the Israelites. Therefore they made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and in brick, but the people became very numerous and powerful.
3. Slaughter of the male- children. And the king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, of whom the name of one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah; and he said, When you perform the office of midwife for the Hebrew women, and see them upon the birth-stool; if it be a son, then you shall kill him; but if it be a daughter, she shall live. But the midwives feared God, and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the male-children alive. Therefore the king of Egypt called for the midwives, and said to them, Why have you done thus and saved the male-children alive? The midwives answered Pharaoh, Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous; before the midwife comes to them, they are already delivered.
Therefore God dealt well with the midwives. And it came to pass, because the midwives feared God, that he built up their families. Then Pharaoh commanded all his people saying, Every son that is born to the Hebrews you shall cast into the river, but every daughter you shall save alive.
I.The Stories Regarding the Bondage and Exodus. The book of Exodus marks the transition from early tribal stories to the real history of the Hebrews. The book itself is divided at the second verse of the nineteenth chapter into two distinct parts. The latter part consists of laws and detailed directions regarding the building of the ark, but the first half continues the history of Genesis. The same three great strands of narrative run through these first eighteen chapters, and, as in Genesis, they are so closely combined that they make one consecutive history. The late priestly material is comparatively unimportant. The main narrative is the early Judean, supplemented by extracts from the Northern Israelite prophetic stories. Each of these prophetic histories has its marked peculiarities. Thus, for example, in the Judean the Hebrews are settled in Goshen, an Egyptian province east of the Delta and bordering on Arabia. There they retain their flocks and tribal organization and soon become very numerous. The northern history, on the contrary, represents them as living among the Egyptians, and so few that two midwives suffice for the needs of the Hebrew mothers. In general, however, the two prophetic narratives closely agree. Both pass over the oppression very briefly and focus attention on Moses, the great prophetic character of the period. No definite dates are given in these early histories. Not even the names of the Pharaohs of the oppression and of the exodus are remembered. As in Genesis, the personality of the great leaders, the significance of Israel’s varied experiences, and the religious import of the different stories chiefly concern the prophetic writers. While the narrative contains much valuable historical data, it is more than a mere record, it is a religious philosophy of history. In the text adopted (in § XIX) the two prophetic versions of the oppression have been combined. The northern account has been placed at the end, since it contains the natural introduction to the birth of Moses.
II.The Serf Class in Egypt. Changes in dynasties, with corresponding changes in policy, were frequent in Egypt. The victorious foreign campaigns conducted by the kings of the eighteenth dynasty
(Introd. III, V) brought back many captives to swell the large serf class in Egypt. The policy of the later kings also called for vast levies of forced labor. The result was that the serfs so far outnumbered the free Egyptians that there was abundant ground for the fears suggested in the biblical narrative. Doubtless the painful memories of the Hyksos invaders also led the Egyptians to look with hatred and fear upon the Asiatic shepherds, settled on their eastern borders. Throughout most of its history, Egypt’s conquerors came from the east. In case of war these foreign Semitic settlers would naturally join with the foe.
III.The Discovery of Pithom. As a result of the excavations of the Egypt Exploration Fund in 1883, Pithom has been identified with certain ruins in the Wady Tumilat, not far from the eastern terminus of the modern railway which runs from Cairo to the Suez Canal. It lay, therefore, within the biblical land of Goshen. Naville, who excavated at this point, found several inscriptions apparently bearing the Egyptian name of the city, P-atum, House of the god Atum. In later Egyptian geographical lists P-atum appears as the name of a local province. The excavations disclosed a great square brick wall with the ruins of a temple and store-chambers inside. These large store-houses or granaries were peculiar to these ruins. They were large structures containing many rectangular chambers of various sizes, surrounded by walls, two or three yards in thickness, made of crude bricks. The chambers were not connected. From contemporary inscriptions it appears that they were filled with grain from the top and were emptied in the same way, or through a door at the side. The excavations have also shown that the city was founded by the great builder, Ramses II. During the first twenty years of his reign, he developed and colonized for the first time the territory lying east of the Delta. This was the region known to the biblical writers as the land of Goshen or Rameses. An Egyptian papyrus also states that one of the chief cities founded by him in this territory and evidently not far from Pithom was “the house of Ramses,” with a royal residence and temples. A later poet speaks of it as being situated between Egypt and Syria. From this it may be inferred that it was one of the fortified cities that guarded the Asiatic frontier.
IV.The Pharaoh of the Oppression. In the light of these facts there is little doubt that Ramses II, who reigned from about 1292 to 1225 B.C., was the Pharaoh of the oppression. All that is stated in the biblical narratives is in perfect harmony with the character and policy of that energetic, splendor-loving, tyrannical king, who filled all Egypt with huge statues of himself and memorials of his vast building enterprises.
V.The Absence of References to the Hebrews in Egypt. The fact that the Egyptian inscriptions contain no reference to the Hebrews in Egypt has led certain scholars to question whether or not the Israelites were ever in the land of the Nile. The one contemporary allusion to Israelites is found in the recently discovered triumphal stele of Merneptah, son of the great Ramses II (cf. vii). The Israelites there referred to are clearly living in the land of Palestine. In the face of this definite contemporary testimony, it is necessary to weigh carefully the comparative evidence. That certain Israelite tribes were for a time found in the land of Egypt is attested by the following considerations: (1) Nearly all the earliest Old Testament writers allude to it as a well-established incident in their national history. Their unanimous and independent testimony is best explained by a common basis of historical fact. (2) It is improbable and practically inconceivable that a story, so humiliating to the pride of the Hebrews, would have been invented in a later period when Egypt was their ally, as in the days of Solomon, or when it was but a weak and waning power. (3) There is fundamental agreement between the earliest biblical narratives and the contemporary inscriptions regarding the attitude of the Egyptians toward the foreigners in their midst. (4) In the light of Egyptian usage it is not strange that there is no reference to the Israelite serfs in the land of Egypt. Under the nineteenth dynasty, as a result of the many successful campaigns and the building policy of the reigning Pharaohs, an exceedingly large serf class was found in the land of the Nile. These aliens are designated, not according to their racial origin, but as a distinct class. Therefore, if any reference was made to the Israelites, it would have been by this general designation.
VI.Duration of the Sojourn. While there is little doubt that there were Hebrews in the land of Egypt, it is evident that the biblical narratives must be interpreted in the light of contemporary records and conditions. The different sources are not in agreement regarding many details. The early Judean narrative is silent regarding the duration of the sojourn. In Genesis 15:16, which belongs to the Northern Israelite history, it is stated that the Hebrews were to return to Palestine in the fourth generation. This implies a period of between one hundred and one hundred and fifty years. The same duration is suggested by the priestly writer in Numbers 26:57; Numbers 26:59. The late priestly writer of Exodus 616-20 states that Moses was of the fourth generation from Levi, which would give the same relative period of one hundred and fifty years. On the other hand, a late editor, in Genesis 15:13, predicts that the period of foreign sojourn was to last exactly four hundred years. Another compiler, in Exodus 12:40, affirms that the time the Israelites dwelt in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years. With this passage definitely in mind, the author of Galatians 3:17 assigns four hundred and thirty years to the period from Abraham to Sinai. Josephus and the translators of the Samaritan and Greek versions, give the duration of the sojourn as two hundred and fifteen years, which is evidently a compromise between the shorter and the longer periods suggested by the earlier writers. With this conflicting biblical data the final decision must turn upon the testimony of the contemporary Egyptian records. If Amenhotep IV was, as seems very probable, the Pharaoh who raised the young Syrian, known to the Hebrews by the name of Joseph, to a position of commanding authority, the beginning of the Hebrew sojourn in Egypt would fall under the rule of that king (who reigned from 1375 to 1358 B.C.). Accepting Ramses II (who reigned from 1292 to 1225 B.C.) as the Pharaoh of the oppression, and dating the exodus about 1200 (cf. § XXII,V), the duration of the sojourn would be about one hundred and fifty years. It is significant that this conclusion is in substantial agreement with the earliest Hebrew records. On the other hand, if Joseph’s Pharaoh be identified with one of the Hyksos, who were expelled about 1580 B.C., the total period of the sojourn would be about four hundred or four hundred and thirty years. Josephus even went so far as to identify the Hebrews with the Hyksos. The longer period assigned by the latest biblical writers is probably the result of a similar identification. Either of these periods would give a sufficient time for the increase in the numbers of the Israelites suggested by the earlier traditions; but the shorter period on the whole accords best with the facts of Egyptian and Hebrew history.
VII.The Hebrew Tribes in Egypt. Although inferred in the Joseph stories, it is by no means certain that all the Hebrew tribes went down to Egypt. References in the record of the campaigns of Seti I and Ramses II to a state called Asaru or Aseru, situated in western Galilee, would seem to indicate that the Northern Israelite tribe, which bore the corresponding name Asher, was already settled in Palestine. The reference in the account which his son Merneptah gives of the victorious campaign in Palestine, leaves no doubt that at that time a consider able portion of the people, which later crystallized into the Hebrew nation, was to be found in Canaan. The reference is as follows:
Plundered is Canaan with every evil;
Askalon is carried into captivity;
Gezer is taken;
Yenoam is annihilated, Israel is desolated, her seed is not, Palestine has become a widow for Egypt.
All lands are united, they are pacified.
Every one who is turbulent has been bound by King Merneptah. The earliest Hebrew records also indicate that several of the Arab tribes, which later coalesced into the tribe of Judah, had at an early time secured a foothold in southern Palestine. In the light of these facts it seems probable that only a part of the twelve Hebrew tribes went to Egypt. The prophetic narratives themselves suggest that these were the Joseph tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, and possibly the ancestors of certain other clans that ultimately found their home in central and southern Canaan. The earlier narratives do not agree regarding the number of Hebrews found in the land of Egypt. The fact that, according to the Northern Israelite version, two mid wives sufficed to meet the needs of the mothers in Israel implies that the Israelites at that time were to be numbered by hundreds rather than by thousands (cf. § XXIII, ii).
VIII.The Effects of the Egyptian Sojourn. In addition to their rapid and important increase in numbers, the Hebrews clearly profited in many ways by their sojourn in Egypt. Although they appear to have largely retained their nomadic habits and traditions, and to have maintained their connection with the neighboring tribes of Palestine and the desert, they must have been influenced by the civilization of Egypt. That influence appears to have been material rather than religious. Living near the eastern frontier, they had ample opportunity to study the Egyptian methods of warfare and military equipment. To a certain degree they would also acquire a knowledge of the Egyptian arts of agriculture. Under the rule of the great Ramses II they were strongly affected, even though against their wills, by the highly organized social and political system which then bound together all the peoples in the land of the Nile. The influence, which appears to have left the deepest and lasting impression upon them, was, however, their reaction against the customs and religious ideas of their hated oppressors. The oppression itself also tended to bind together by the common bond of suffering the various clans who later, under the leadership of Moses, sought freedom and deliverance in the wilderness. Their suffering and need thus prepared the way for the work of Moses and the birth of the Hebrew nation.