: ''This article describes the major [[epoch]]al event in the history of [[Israel]]. For the book of the [[Bible]] by this name, see [[Exodus]].''
[[Image:Egypt_David_Roberts.jpg|thumb|500px|[['''Exodus of Israel|Exodus]] ''' of the [[Israelites]] from Egypt by David Roberts (1830).]]The '''Exodus''' (Greek ''ex'' out of, outward and ''hodos'' a road or a way) is the abrupt embarkation of the people of [[Israel]] from [[Egypt]]. It is one of the key [[Epoch|epochalepoch]] al events in the history of the nation of Israel.
== The Biblical Narrative ==
=== Background ===
Centuries earlier, [[Jacob]] had led his vast extended family into Egypt, eventually settling in the province of [[Goshen]]. The number of years is either 215 years ("short Sojourn)" or 430 years ("long Sojourn"). Jacob had done this at the invitation of his son [[Joseph]], whom he had thought dead but who, as it happened, had risen from being a common prisoner to senior prison trustee and eventually [[viceroy]] of Egypt. The story of Joseph, and especially his viceroyship and the circumstances under which he entered into it, is told [[Joseph#The_ViceroyThe Viceroy|here]].
The [[Pharaoh]] who welcomed Joseph was likely [[Sesostris I]],<ref name=Timing>Tas Walker, Steve Cardno and Jonathan Sarfati. "[http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/4190 Timing is Everything: A Talk with Field Archaeologist David Down]." ''Creation'' 27(3):30-35, June 2005.</ref>, the second ruler of the Twelfth Dynasty,<ref>Author unknown. "[http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9066895/Sesostris-I Entry for Sesostris I]." ''Encyclopedia Britannica'', 2007. Retrieved June 23, 2007 from Encyclopedia Britannica Online.</ref><ref>Kinnaer, Jacques. "[http://www.ancient-egypt.org/kings/12/1202_sesostris_i/history.html Entry on Sesostris I]." ''The Ancient Egypt Site'', 2007. Retrieved June 23, 2007.</ref><ref>Kjellen, Tore. "[http://lexicorient.com/e.o/sesostris_1.htm Entry for Sesostris I]." ''Encyclopedia of the Orient'' online, 2007. Retrieved June 23, 2007.</ref> Soon, however, two other Pharaohs, who were considerably harder of heart, succeeded to the throne: [[Sesostris III]] and his immediate successor [[Amenemhet III]].<ref name=Jaroncyk>[http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/4812/ Jaroncyk, Ron]. "[http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/4857 Egyptian History and the Biblical Record: A Perfect Match]?" ''[http://www.creationontheweb.com/ Creation Ministries International],'' January 23, 2007. Retrieved June 25, 2007.</ref> These two (or perhaps the latter of the two) set in motion a chain of events that led to the founding of one nation and a near-total disaster for the other.
=== The Mass Puericide ===
=== The Birth of Moses ===
[[Moses]] was born at about this time, the son of [[Amram]] and [[Jochebed]]. Amram, a [[Levite]] and the son of [[Kohath]], one of [[Levi]]'s three named descendants in the preceding generation, already had two children by Jochebed: a daugherdaughter, [[Miriam]], and a son, [[Aaron]]. Moses' birth presented an immediate problem: how to conceal him from the king's soldiers?
Jochebed solved the problem in a unique manner: she built a basket for the baby, coated the basket with pitch, placed Moses into it, and set it floating down the Nile. In this, Moses' journey recalled the voyage of [[Noah's Ark]].
=== Moses Finds a Wife ===
Moses eventually came to the country of the [[Midianite|Midianites]]s. There he fought against some shepherds who were harassing a number of women who were trying to water their own sheep.<ref>{{Bible ref|book=Exodus|chap=2|verses=17}}</ref> This won him the attention and favor of [[Jethro]], the father of these women. Eventually, Moses married the eldest of Jethro's daughters, [[Zipporah]]. Here the Book of [[Exodus]] records that he sired one son, [[Gershom]].
The Bible makes no attempt to identify these shepherds. Nor does [[Flavius Josephus]].<ref>[[Flavius Josephus|Josephus, Flavius]]. ''The Antiquities of the Jews'', 2.11.2.258-263. William Whiston, trans. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1987, p. 70. ISBN 0913573868</ref>. The historical warrant for the popular supposition that these shepherds were [[Amalekite]]s is therefore lacking. However, the Amalekites ''were'' known to be shepherds--andshepherds—and, more to the point, the Hyksos, which some identify with the Amalekites, were known as the "Shepherd Kings."<ref name=Jaroncyk/><ref name=Hyksos>Authors unknown. "[http://www.specialtyinterests.net/hyksos.html The Hyksos]." ''SpecialtyInterests.com.'' Retrieved June 28, 2007.</ref> If these shepherds with whom Moses clashed ''were'' Amalekites, then this could have been the first hostile encounter that an Egyptian-trained man had with the race that conquered all of Egypt shortly after the Exodus and held it until the reign of King [[Saul]].
=== God Recruits Moses ===
=== The First Message ===
Moses and Aaron initially came in peace to Pharaoh, and asked his leave to lead the Israelites into the desert for a three-day period. Pharaoh indignantly refused, and then issued an order that the Israelites would have to gather their own straw to make bricks, and still make the same quota of bricks. This caused the [[Israelite|Israelites]] s to look on Moses with extreme disfavor. This was probably the lowest point ever in Moses' life.
But this was all part of God's plan--for plan—for God intended to demonstrate His Power in a manner that no one then alive would forget.
=== The Ten Plagues ===
But after Pharaoh let the Israelites leave, he changed his mind. Now he set after them, with his entire army, and determined to overtake them and wipe them out. But what actually happened is that ''Pharaoh'' was wiped out, along with his entire army.<ref>{{Bible ref|book=Exodus|chap=14}}</ref>
Traditionally, this occurred at the northermnost tip of the [[Gulf of Suez]], the western arm of the [[Red Sea]]--though —though some have since suggested that the crossing actually occurred at the [[Gulf of Aqaba]] to the east.<ref name=Kovacs>Kovacs, Joe. "[http://wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33168 Pharaoh's chariots found in Red Sea]?" ''[http://www.worldnetdaily.com/ WorldNetDaily.com],'' June 21, 2003. Retrieved July 8, 2007.</ref><ref name=Innerpeace>Petrovich, Michael, dir. "[http://www.cps.org.yu/Innerpeace/Creation/redsea.html Crossing of the Red Sea]." ''[http://www.cps.org.yu/Innerpeace/english.html Center for Natural Studies],'' n.d. Retrieved July 8, 2007.</ref>
No archaeologist has ever found the mortal remains of Neferhotep I. Furthermore, Neferhotep did not have a son to succeed him, but rather a brother, [[Sobekhotep IV]]. Shortly after Sobekhotep IV came to the throne, the Hyksos came in force, and occupied Egypt virtually without resistance.<ref name=Hyksos/>
== Biblical foreshadowing ==
From the narrative recorded in [[Genesis]] 15:13-18 it appears that the plan of the [[Exodus]] may have been revealed to [[Abraham]] four generations before [[Moses]].In Genesis 15:13 the narrative records that Abraham's descendants will be a stranger in a land that is not their own. The descendants of Abraham will serve the strangers in that land, and these strangers whom Abraham's descendants serve will "afflict them" for 400 years.<ref>Genesis 15:13</ref> In Genesis 15:14, the narrative records that God will judge the nation holding the descendants of Abraham in [[affliction]], "your seed will leave that nation with material wealth".<ref>Genesis 15:14</ref> Genesis 15:15 records that Abraham will die at an old age, and be buried with his father; but after the 4th generation<ref>Genesis 15:16</ref> the things previously hinted at would occur. In Genesis 15:17 the narrative records that the sun went down, but that Abraham saw a smoking furnace and a burning lamp,picturing the "burning bush" of Moses, or the "burning cloud" which lead the Israelites in the Exodus.<ref>Genesis15:17</ref><ref>Exodus 33:7-11</ref><ref name="middletownbiblechurch.org">http://www.middletownbiblechurch.org/oldtesta/ot02.pdf</ref> Finally, Genesis 15:18 records that the borders of the land that the descendants of Abraham will immigrate to after the period of affliction. The land borders are recorded as everything from the [[Nile]] river to the [[Euphrates]].<ref>Genesis 15:18</ref> It should be noted that this verse has been a hotbed, as anti-semitic and anti-Israel bigots note this as a claim to an [[Israel]]i push for living space in the Middle East.<ref name="middletownbiblechurch.org"/>
== Physical evidence of the Exodus ==
Egyptian history is of little to no help in substantiating the Exodus, much less dating it. The reason is that, to an Egyptian, history was not an objective inquiry into past events, but rather was a medium of [[propaganda]]. The willful destruction or defacement by succeeding Pharaohs of the monuments, stelae, and other records of his predecessors is a common theme in Egyptology.
In 2003, amateur diver Peter Elmer discovered coral-encrusted chariot wheels and other chariot parts submerged in the Gulf of Aqaba, the eastern offshoot of the great body of water called the Red Sea today.<ref name=Kovacs/> This is not, however, conclusive. The Biblical narrative indicates that the Israelites made their crossing far too soon for them to have successfully crossed the entire [[Sinai desert]] and peninsula to reach the Gulf of Aqaba. More likely, the Israelites crossed the Gulf of Suez--and Suez—and the destruction of Neferhotep's army was so complete that not a single artifact was left. The Bible does, of course, say that not a single ''man'' was left of that army.
The revised chronology of David Down and John Ashton<ref name=Timing/> strongly suggests that the beginning of the Intermediate Period is the best time for the Exodus. By this scheme, the Hyksos overran Egypt when conditions could not have been more favorable to invaders: a country first devastated by multiple meterologicalmeteorological, agricultural, and epidemiological disasters is suddenly deprived of its leader and its entire army in a single battle.
== Chronological Placement of the Exodus ==
# The Bible's explicit statement that [[Solomon]] broke ground on the [[Temple of Jerusalem]] exactly 479 years after the Exodus.<ref name=Groundbreak>{{Bible ref|book=I_Kings|chap=6|verses-1}}</ref>
Today Ussher's original [[Date of the Exodus|date ]] is sharply [[Biblical chronology dispute|contested]]. The three contenders for the date of the Exodus are:
# 1491 BC (Ussher)
Virtually all of the arguments for the Late Date rest solely on arguments from conventional [[Egyptian chronology]], however. The Early Date is much better supported from Scripture, which specifically requires four hundred eighty years between the Exodus and the groundbreaking of the [[Temple]] built by [[Solomon]].<ref name=Groundbreak/> Several archaeologists have looked for battle-damage and other evidence for the Early Date in and around [[Jericho]], [[Ai]], and [[Hazor]], and have found it.<ref>Lorenzini, D. Massimiliano. "[http://www.angelfire.com/nm/massimolorenzini/exodus.html Evidence for the Early Date of the Exodus]." 2002. Retrieved July 8, 2007.</ref>
The Early Date shown above is actually the date favored preferred by [[Edwin R. Thiele]]. Actually, Thiele's date (labeled "Early Date" above) is only forty-five years later than Ussher's. Thiele's sole warrant for favoring his date over Ussher's is his attempt to reconcile the king lists of the Divided Kingdoms [[Northern Kingdom|Northern]] and [[Southern Kingdom|Southern]] with the [[chronology]] of the [[Assyrian chronology|Assyrians]]. (For a detailed discussion, and a synoptic table showing the differing results for those king lists, see [[Biblical chronology dispute|here]].) Thiele, like Ussher, relies on the Temple groundbreaking interval described above to assign his date for the Exodus.
The Pharaoh of the Oppression, as stated above, was likely Sesostris III, a Twelfth Dynasty king. [[James Ussher]] initially supposed that the Pharaoh of the Exodus was not Ramesses II, but ''another'' Ramesses whom he mistakenly assumed ruled directly before Ramesses II and for the same number of years. Future scholars accepted Seti I and Ramesses II as the Pharaohs of the Oppression and Exodus, respectively, for decades. Recently, some scholars tried to make a case for other pairings of the Pharaohs of the Oppression and Exodus in the Eighteenth Dynasty rather than the Nineteenth. These included:
== The Exodus in Popular Culture ==
The Exodus has been the subject of many [[motion picture]] and [[television]] projects over the last fifty years. Most of these projects contain extra-Biblical interpolations for which no Scriptural warrant and very little archaological archaeological warrant exists. For example, Scripture clearly says that when Moses killed the Egyptian taskmaster, he did so in secret and did not want that fact known--because known—because he was not prepared to face the consequences. (Not every deed of a recognized hero and leader of the Hebrew people was a good or wise deed.) The various motion-picture projects that have treated this story have shown Moses behaving negligently or even recklessly in the killing of the Egyptian, and left out entirely the context in which Moses found out that his deed was no longer secret.
More to the point, most of these projects have assumed that the Pharaoh of the Exodus was either Ramesses II or his son Merenptah. This supposition is based either on Late Date chronology or on [[Manetho]]'s initial mistake in assuming that all Dynasties of Egypt ran consecutively.
== Related References ==
<references/>{{reflist|2}}
== See Also also ==
* [[Joseph]]
* [[Moses]]
* [[Date of the Exodus]]
[[Category:BibleOld Testament]]
[[Category:Egypt]]
[[Category:Ancient History]]