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This book suggests a regional paradigm for understanding the development of the traditions about Egypt and the exodus in the Hebrew Bible. It offers fresh readings of the golden calf stories in 1 Kgs 12:25-33 and Exod 32, the Balaam oracles in Num 22-24, and the Song of the Sea in Exod 15:1b-18 and from these paints a picture of the differing traditions about Egypt that circulated in Cisjordan Israel, Transjordan Israel, and Judah in the 8th century B.C.E. and earlier. In the north, an exodus from Egypt was celebrated in the Bethel calf cult as a journey of Israelites from Egypt to Cisjordan, without a detour eastward to Sinai. This exodus was envisioned in military terms as suggested by the nature of the polemic in Exod 32, and the attribution of the exodus to the warrior Yahweh, Israel??s own deity. In the east, a tradition of deliverance from Egypt was celebrated, rather than the idea of a journey, and it was credited to El. In the south, Egypt was recognized as a major enemy, whom Yahweh had defeated, but the traditions there were not formulated in terms of an exodus. While acknowledging the reshaping of these traditions in response to the exile, Images of Egypt argues that they originated in the pre-exilic period and relate to Syro-Palestinian history as it is otherwise known.
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Stephen C. Russell Images of Egypt in Early Biblical Literature Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Herausgegeben von John Barton · Reinhard G. Kratz Choon-Leong Seow · Markus Witte Band 403 ≥ Walter de Gruyter · Berlin · New York Stephen C. Russell Images of Egypt in Early Biblical Literature Cisjordan-Israelite, Transjordan-Israelite, and Judahite Portrayals ≥ Walter de Gruyter · Berlin · New York 앝 Printed on acid-free paper which falls within the guidelines of the ANSI 앪 to ensure permanence and durability. ISBN 978-3-11-022171-8 ISSN 0934-2575 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de. 쑔 Copyright 2009 by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, 10785 Berlin All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Printed in Germany Cover design: Christopher Schneider, Laufen for Nadia Acknowledgments This book is a revised version of my 2008 New York University doc‐ toral dissertation, supervised by Mark S. Smith. The project had its immediate genesis in a paper written for a reading course on penta‐ teuchal criticism that I took with Mark in the spring of 2005. That paper surveyed biblical references to the exodus that could arguably date to the eighth century B.C.E. or earlier. Its central intuition was the possibil‐ ity that at least part of the biblical exodus tradition may have had its roots in the withdrawal of Egypt from Syria‐Palestine at the end of the Late Bronze Age, a suggestion that I soon discovered had been made by several scholars. Mark thought that the central ideas of the paper were worth exploring, and his contributions have been invaluable at every stage of the project. I am particularly thankful for his extensive written comments, and for the energy he continued to devote to the project even while he was