I want to note at the outset that I’m not necessarily trying to convince you that the Exodus happened. I mean I believe it did, but the part about the weakness of ancient sources was what I actually wanted to say here. That said, since you responded along these lines I might as well, so instead my argument is that Exodus is a plausible interpretation of the available evidence. Also for clarity’s sake I’ll be working off the Islamic narrative, which differs from the Biblical one but not by much (mainly the lack of outlandish numbers, or indeed any numbers at all).
You’ll notice my opinion of apologists are rather low- this kind of lie is common, and either they’re to ignorant not to believe it or it’s intentional.
They didn’t strike me as the most trustworthy, but still: The text says the things they say it says (CTRL+F “Jew”), which is what I wanted to get at with that link. That’s one way we might expect the Exodus to appear in a native Egyptian secondary source.
Things like the trash heaps that have pork bones in them- or no pork bones- or the kinds of weapons, tools, and armor, the vehicles, the remains of humans themselves, the fossil record. all that kind of stuff.
The ban on pork postdates the Exodus, and I’m not sure how you want the other stuff to be distinguishable from the stuff locals leave behind (assuming it survives, which weapons and armor at least almost certainly won’t).
It was built by the Hyksos in the 1600’s and served as their capital city; where as Osareph and Amenophis were probably in the mid 1400’s.
Cities outgrowing their walls isn’t exactly unheard of, but more importantly I think we ought to forgive the guy on stuff like that given that he’s writing more than a thousand years later. The narrative is bound to get a little (or very) jumbled up.
Neither do we have any evidence at all that the 80,000 were forced to work in stone quarries…
With the obvious caveat that we can’t trust the numbers here, what kind of evidence are you expecting? Slaves are notoriously archaeologically invisible.
Which is ludicrious to imagine that the Kush would have harbored them. the Kush and the Egyptians did not get along particularly well. (that is to say, they absolutely hated each other.)
I mean, while it’s possible that Manetho or his sources are confused or lying (in particular it sounds like something the Kushite pharoahs would want on the books), and while this isn’t necessary for my point, Nubia isn’t fully unified in this time period, so it’s plausible that the Egyptian pharaoh had an ally or similar in the region.
It’s absolutely ludicrous that you would expect us to believe that 2-3 million Israelites somehow managed to live in the nile delta (where the population at the time is also estimated to number 2-3 million…) without leaving so much as a trace.
And here’s where I play the Muslim card, because yeah that’s right, and in any case they’d have starved on the way.
I want to note at the outset that I’m not necessarily trying to convince you that the Exodus happened. I mean I believe it did, but the part about the weakness of ancient sources was what I actually wanted to say here. That said, since you responded along these lines I might as well, so instead my argument is that Exodus is a plausible interpretation of the available evidence. Also for clarity’s sake I’ll be working off the Islamic narrative, which differs from the Biblical one but not by much (mainly the lack of outlandish numbers, or indeed any numbers at all).
They didn’t strike me as the most trustworthy, but still: The text says the things they say it says (CTRL+F “Jew”), which is what I wanted to get at with that link. That’s one way we might expect the Exodus to appear in a native Egyptian secondary source.
The ban on pork postdates the Exodus, and I’m not sure how you want the other stuff to be distinguishable from the stuff locals leave behind (assuming it survives, which weapons and armor at least almost certainly won’t).
Cities outgrowing their walls isn’t exactly unheard of, but more importantly I think we ought to forgive the guy on stuff like that given that he’s writing more than a thousand years later. The narrative is bound to get a little (or very) jumbled up.
With the obvious caveat that we can’t trust the numbers here, what kind of evidence are you expecting? Slaves are notoriously archaeologically invisible.
I mean, while it’s possible that Manetho or his sources are confused or lying (in particular it sounds like something the Kushite pharoahs would want on the books), and while this isn’t necessary for my point, Nubia isn’t fully unified in this time period, so it’s plausible that the Egyptian pharaoh had an ally or similar in the region.
And here’s where I play the Muslim card, because yeah that’s right, and in any case they’d have starved on the way.