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The Bible, Archaeology, and the Origins of Israel

Prof. Daniel M. Zucker - 10/24/2006

David Storobin's essay on the origins of the Jewish People ("The Origin of the Jewish People and the Land of Canaan", Global Politician, May 10, 2006) while presenting a very different view of Jewish origins than that of the traditional Biblical text, actually comes close to the current theories afloat in the world of archaeology and critical biblical studies. There are however some important details in the presentation of his theory that are in need of clarification and/or correction; this essay seeks to do just that.

Storobin essentially is correct that there is no evidence of an Israelite presence in Egypt or the Sinai during the period in question (the Late Bronze Age, c.1550-1200 BCE). There is however the controversial finding by Frank L. Yurko of the University of Chicago, made in the winter of 1976-1977 and published in 1990 of a Thebes inscription and diagram of battles between Pharaoh Merneptah and Israel. The inscription does indicate the presence of an ethnic group identified by the Egyptians as “Israel” in the territory of the land of Canaan. Like the famous “Merneptah Stele” from Merneptah’s mortuary temple in Thebes, discovered in 1896 by Sir Flinders Petrie, and a similar fragmentary inscription from a temple in Karnak, Yurko’s discovery attests to the existence of Israel at this early period (c.1220 BCE) but it does nothing to prove an Israelite presence in Egypt proper. So too, Storobin is correct in writing that the walls of Jericho had tumbled down (due to seismic activity) centuries before the theoretical time period of Joshua (c.1200 BCE).

The Late Bronze Period (c.1550-1200 BCE) began with strong Egyptian control of Canaan, but as the centuries wore on that control faded in and out. The el-Amarna period(end of the 18th dynasty, in the mid-14th century BCE) when Amenophes IV took the name Akhenaton and Egyptian imperial concerns were neglected in favor of a theological revolution did much to weaken Egyptian control of its Asiatic territories. The early 19th dynasty under the aggressive early Seti I and II and Ramses I and II did much to reestablish Egyptian control of Canaan. The huge southeast Balkan emigrational upheavals that led to the destruction of the Hittite empire in the mid-13th century BCE however created an almost universal societal distress that marked the end of the Late Bronze period throughout the Levant.

It was at the beginning of the Iron I period (c. 1200 -1000 BCE) that the Egyptian control of the land of Canaan grew weakest, particularly shortly after 1200 BCE when Ramses III had to defend Egypt from the invasions of the Libyans and the Sea Peoples. In the chaotic conditions where imperial control vanished, the Canaanite urban elites began to oppress the pesantry so that many began to flee the larger urban centers of the lowlands and retreat to the safety of the rural hill country, slowly developing a counter culture to that of the wealthy Canaanite aristocracy and the new Sea People invaders, especially the Philistines.

Although once a popular theory, the suggestions that there is a direct link between the Biblical word for Hebrew (Ivri) and the Egyptian hieroglyphics for the Akkadian HABIRU/APIRU has been demonstrated by Amarna tablet expert Professor Anson F. Rainy of Tel Aviv University, to be incorrect. Rainey, incidentally, uses philological evidence to suggest a minority view of a soft invasion of Arameans as the background for the “Israelite Conquest”. The old idea of Hebrews as “caravaneers” or “donkey drivers”-- the latter term suggested by no less a scholar than the famous William Foxwell Albright - likewise has been cast into history’s dustbin.

Today, led by such archaeologist-historians as William G. Dever, the prevalent though not universally accepted theory about the “Conquest” of Canaan by Joshua, as recorded in the biblical book of Joshua, is that the text is a pious fraud; it never happened. Rather, as Israeli archaeologist Israel Finkelstein, of the Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University, has demonstrated through his studies of the archaeology of the hill country in Ephraim and Judah during the twelfth and eleventh centuries, it seems that the disaffected Canaanite peasants that fled to the hill country appear to have organized themselves into a counter-culture that evolved over time into the Israelite tribes. Perhaps the truth lies with both camps: the majority of the “tribes” were indigenous disaffected Canaanites, but Aramean stock could have migrated southwest into Canaan as well. We should not be too quick to dismiss the considerable biblical traditions (most likely originally oral) of connections to Haran and northern Aram. The general disunity of the tribes certainly would support the idea that it was a variety of groups that eventually came together to form biblical Israel.

Storobin’s suggestion of catastrophic earthquakes and disasters sounds appropriately dramatic, but there is no concrete evidence that the period in question suffered any more seismic activity than usual (keeping in mind that the land of Israel sits on the largest fault line known, stretching from Turkey to north-east Africa). The suggestion that the Israelites wandered around in the Judean desert does not fit well as it seems that Judah altogether had a very sparse population before 900 BCE and miniscule before 1000 BCE. Besides, we should be very careful about taking the Biblical text too literally; it uses the literary conventions of its day (brilliantly) but it is not a video tape of the events of the period. Rather the biblical text is what the Germans term “heilsgeschicte”, which means “holy history” or the “history” of the relationship of Israel with God. As a religious text, it uses religious terminology, which is to say, it is not a factual account, but rather a faith based document.

The proto-Israelite tribes were not monotheists; indeed the Bible itself testifies to the fuzzy theology of the Israelites at the time of the Judges (c.1200-1000 BCE). The Israelite tribes probably worshipped a variety of deities that includes the Canaanite gods Baal, El, and Astarte, as well as the southern Hebrew deity YHWH. Over time the cult of YHWH won out against the competition, but as the Elijah narratives record, the outcome was not clear for quite some time. Jeremiah still complains at the end of the 7th century BCE that women are baking raisin cakes and bringing them to the Jerusalem Temple to offer to the Queen of Heaven! Solid monotheism was not present in the First Temple period, although the prophets, especially Amos, Isaiah and Jeremiah championed the idea. But the people weren’t there yet as the material culture (Kenyon’s discovery of dozens of Astarte figurines from the City of David [monarchic Jerusalem] ) and a careful

reading of the narrative texts clearly indicates.

Archaeologist Israel Finkelstein has suggested that the Hebraic taboo on pork may have been due to an aversion to anything that was popular with the Philistines, who as an Aegean people, brought domesticated pigs to the Levant, which the Canaanite lowlands then accepted into their diet. “If they like it, we will shun it” seems to be the basis for the taboo on pork according to Finkelstein, who noted that pig bones, while common in Canaanite lowland sites, were virtually non-existent in hill country sites. Finkelstein’s theory would accord well with the text in Leviticus 18:3 which suggests that Israel’s behavior is at least in part governed by a desire to reject both the practices of the Egyptians and the Canaanites. As far as the name “Israel” itself is concerned, we do not know what the name really is meant to signify; the explanation in the biblical text itself (Genesis 32:28) is not a clear etymology.

Now, if the Israelites were not slaves in Egypt, and most Israelites were actually of Canaanite stock, where did ancient Israel get the story about being slaves in Egypt? Is the Bible completely mythical as some deconstructionist biblical scholars like Thomas L. Thompson and the Copenhagen School suggest? What really occurred?

We probably will never know all the details, but critical biblical scholars such as the late Stanley Gevirtz of Hebrew Union College and Richard Elliot. Friedman of the University of California at San Diego have suggested that it seems likely that some of the tribes did experience an Egyptian enslavement. The tribe of Levi is recognized to have a large number of Egyptian names. Names such as Moses, Miriam, Hofni, and Phineas are Middle Egyptian in origin. The tribe of Levi never received a separate tribal allotment, and the tribe of Simeon, with which it is linked in many blessings as well as the Israelite vengeance upon the denizens of Shechem for the rape of Dinah (Genesis 34) likewise did not retain its theoretical allotment, being swallowed up by Judah. Gevirtz, Friedman, and others have suggested that the tribe of Levi probably did experience a period of servitude in Egypt. Gevirtz also suggested that the Joseph narratives record Simeon’s imprisonment in Egypt which might echo that tribe’s experience as well. The other tribes would have developed in the Ephramite, Galilean, and Gilead highlands in the early stages of the Iron I period. The less than cordial first attempts at (re-?) unification are reflected in the Levite-Simeonite massacre of the people of Shechem in Genesis 34 and the Judges 9 story of Abimelek’s failed attempt to forge a kingdom. The Book of Judges reflects accurately the disunity of the Early Iron I period. (1200-1050 BCE)

We do know that King David used the Levites as his agents for the administration of the tribal districts in his united kingdom. We also know that David chose Zadok as his high priest over Abiathar of the Shilonite priesthood. Although Zadok is called an Aaronide, there seems to be some question about this. Gevirtz noted that the city of Jerusalem, or Urusalmu as it is termed in Akkadian and Egyptian texts, had a long history of names of its rulers with the root ö-ã-÷. Going back to the “Melchezedek” text in Genesis 14 which theoretically would describe the 20th century BCE and stretching forward to Zedekiah, the last Davidic king before the fall of the city in 586 BCE we have the following names: Melchezedek, Adonizedek (Joshua 10:1,3), the same name possibly mentioned in the 14th century Amarna tablets, Zadok (II Samuel & I Kings), and Zedekiah (II Kings and Jeremiah). “Zedek” was the name of the Canaanite god of justice, a fact reflected in Psalm 97:2. Some scholars have suggested that Zadok may have been the original Jebusite priest of Jerusalem. If such is the case, the following theory may explain why Israel assumed an Egyptian experience that included slavery and redemption.

David, as the first ruler of a United Kingdom of Israel and Judah not only needed administrators to help him control what had been roughly twelve different tribal entities with very different identities and beliefs, but also had great need for a unifying “myth” [the term myth (mythos) is used here in the original Greek sense of a foundation story rather than a falsehood] to help him unify these diverse groups. In exchange for their serving as his administrative agents, David accepted the history of the Levites as the history of all Israel. By the force of his personality and that of his son Solomon, the unification and its underlying mythos worked. But when Reheboam came to the throne, his lack of tact in dealing with the northern tribal elders resulted in their rejection of the entire unification enterprise, mythic history and all. The Levites had done their job well enough that the basic outlines were still accepted by the people. Also, Levites continued to live in the northern kingdom, particularly in Shiloh, and so they would have had additional opportunities to teach their history to the nation. But the union was finished. When the northern kingdom of Israel succumbed to Assyrian domination and destruction in 721 BCE, the northern Levites fled to the south, bringing their version of Israel’s history with them, which eventually was integrated into the “history” of Judah.