Biblical Geography and History

by Charles Foster Kent

THE NOMADIC AND EGYPTIAN PERIOD OF HEBREW HISTORY

The Entrance of the Forefathers of the Hebrews Into Canaan. The biblical traditions regarding the beginnings of Hebrew history differ widely in regard to details, but regarding the great movements they are in perfect agreement. They all unite in declaring that the forefathers of the race were nomads and entered Palestine from the east. The fourteenth chapter of Genesis contains later echoes of a tradition which connects Abraham, the forefather of the race, with the far-away glorious age of Hammurabi (Amraphel) who lived about 1900 B.C. Interpreted into historic terms, this narrative implies that the Hebrews traced back their ancestry to the great movement of nomads toward Palestine which took place about the beginning of the second millennium B.C. It was about this time that the earlier non-Semitic population in Palestine was supplanted by the Semitic races, known to later generations as the Canaanites. In tracing their ancestry to these early immigrants, the Hebrews were entirely justified, for the mixed race, which ultimately occupied central Palestine and was known as the Israelites, in time completely absorbed the old Amorite and Canaanite population. The Jacob traditions point to a later movement of nomadic peoples toward Palestine. In the light of the contemporary history of Canaan it is exceedingly probable that this is to be identified with the incoming wave of the Habiri, among whom were undoubtedly to be found many of the early ancestors of the Hebrews. These successive waves of nomadic invasion were the inevitable result of the physical conditions already considered and were a part of that prolonged mixing of races which has gone on in Palestine through thousands of years and which contributed much to the virility and enduring power of the Israelites.

References to the Israelites During the Egyptian Period. The references to the Habiri in the Tell el-Amarna letters and in the inscriptions found in the mounds in Palestine imply that the majority of the Habiri either conquered the older Canaanite population or else coalesced with them and thus found permanent homes in the land. This infusion of new blood was, in fact, an inevitable consequence of Egypt's cruel, destructive policy in the treatment of Palestine. Seti I and Ramses II, of the Nineteenth Egyptian Dynasty, in the record of their campaigns in Palestine, refer to a state called Asaru or Aseru in western Galilee. This was the region occupied by the Hebrew tribe of Asshur and would seem to indicate that by 1300 B.C., half a century after the invasion of the Habiri, this tribe was already firmly established in the land of Canaan. Merneptah, the son of Ramses II, refers to Israel in a connection which leaves no reasonable doubt that a people bearing this name were to be found in his day in Palestine. This is the earliest and only reference to Israel thus far found on the monuments prior to the ninth century B.C. That many if not a majority of the ancestors of the later Hebrews were already established in Palestine by the beginning of the thirteenth century B.C. must now be regarded as a practically established fact.

The Habiri in Eastern and Central Palestine. The bounds of Palestine were narrow and the ancient population numerous. Some of the Habiri appear to have found homes in the east-Jordan land, where they gradually acquired the habits of agriculturists and reappear in later history as the Moabites and Ammonites. Naturally, some of these invaders retained their flocks and herds and nomadic mode of life. This was possible because of the peculiar character of Palestine. In the uplands of the central plateau, and especially in the south, the traveller still frequently comes upon the flocks and black tents of the Bedouin. According to the earliest biblical narratives it was here that certain of the Hebrew tribes remained for a generation or more, with their flocks and tents, tolerated by the city dwellers who cultivated the plains even as are the Bedouin by the inhabitants of Palestine to-day.

The Trend Toward Egypt. The Hebrew narratives imply that some of these tribes lived in the South Country of Judah, beside the great highways which led to Egypt. The early Egyptian records contain frequent references to the movements of Semitic nomads from southwestern Asia toward the Valley of the Nile. In the tomb at Beni-Hassan there is a picture of thirty-seven Semitic warriors being received by a local Egyptian ruler. To-day, at certain seasons of the year, the visitor at Cairo may find encamped on the eastern side of the city hundreds of Bedouin, who after months of wandering in the Arabian desert find the banks of the Nile a desired haven of rest. All the highways from southern, eastern, and northeastern Arabia, as well as from Palestine, converge at the Wady Tumilat, the natural gateway of Egypt. When the pressure of population increased in Palestine and Egyptian rule was re-established, as it was by 1280 B.C., the nomadic ancestors of the Hebrews sought homes elsewhere. For them a change of abode to the attractive pasture land along the eastern delta of the Nile was easy. The biblical narratives state that they also went at the invitation of their powerful kinsman, Joseph.

The Land of Goshen. According to the oldest Hebrew records, the part of Egypt in which the Hebrews settled was the land of Goshen. The word has not yet been found on the Egyptian monuments, but there is little doubt regarding its general situation. In its broadest bounds, it apparently included the Wady Tumilat, and extended from the Crocodile Lake, the modern Lake Timsah, to the Pelusiac or the Tanitic branch of the Nile. It was a narrow strip of land thirty or forty miles long. On the west, where the Wady Tumilat opened into the Nile Delta, it broadened into an irregular triangle. Its angles were at the modern cities of Zigazig, in the northwest, Belbeis in the south, and Abu Hammâd at the beginning of the valley on the east. By many scholars this triangle is regarded as the original land of Goshen. Until the days of Ramses II the entire region, including the Wady Tumilat, was given up to the shepherds. Here, therefore, the Israelites could keep their flocks and maintain their tribal unity and practical independence.

The Wady Tumilat. The Wady Tumilat is a low-lying, shallow valley bounded on either side by the hot, rocky desert. In ancient times it was dry except when its narrow bed was occasionally flooded by the inundations of the Nile. On the west it opened into the Nile Delta. At an early period the Egyptians had established at the eastern part of the Wady Tumilat a fortress (known as the "Wall of the Prince"), for it was the most vulnerable spot on all the Egyptian frontier. Amidst these more favoring conditions on the borders of the Nile Delta it was inevitable that nomads, possessed of virile physiques, but hitherto restricted by lack of food and water, would rapidly multiply. The modern East presents many analogies. The alarm which, according to the biblical narrative, this increase aroused in the minds of the Egyptians is in perfect keeping with the fear with which the dwellers of the Nile always regarded the Bedouin.

Ramses II's Policy. The great change in the fortunes of the Hebrews was in all probability the result of the policy of Ramses II. To carry out his ambitious building enterprises it was necessary for him to enlist the services of vast bodies of workmen. Into this service he naturally pressed the foreigners resident in or on the borders of Egypt. In order to connect Egypt more closely with its Palestinian provinces, and above all to develop its resources to the full, this famous organizer conceived and carried through the plan of converting the eastern Nile Delta and the Wady Tumilat into tillable land. To this end he probably repaired and enlarged the canal that had been constructed as early as the days of the Twelfth Dynasty. It was about fifteen yards in width and sixteen to seventeen and a half feet in depth, and ran eastward from the Nile Delta through the Wady Tumilat into the Crocodile Lake. According to Pliny, it was sixty-three miles in length. It is paralleled to-day throughout most of its course by the fresh-water canal, which irrigates this region and supplies the towns on the Suez Canal with drinking water. The ancient canal was constructed primarily for navigation, but it was also essential in reclaiming the land on either side.

Building the Store-Cities of Ramses and Pithom. To effect the transformation of this region, Ramses II built two important cities. One of them bore his name and became the designation of the surrounding territory, which was known as the country of Ramses. It probably stood at the western end of the Wady Tumilat. The other, the Pithom^[(65)] of the biblical records, has been proved in the light of modern excavation to have been the ancient P-atum, that is, the House of the God Atum. This city was situated near the eastern end of the Wady Tumilat, at the present Tell el-Maskhutah, ten or twelve miles west of Lake Timsah. This was probably also the site of the older fortress known as the "Wall of the Prince." Several inscriptions have been found here containing the name P-atum. In later Egyptian geographical lists this was also the name of a local province. Here Naville discovered what appear to have been great store chambers with walls two or three yards in thickness, made of crude, sun-dried bricks. These chambers were not connected and the grain was put into them through openings in the top. Here, apparently, Ramses II gathered the vast supplies of grain necessary for his Palestinian campaigns, for these cities were built during the earlier, warlike period of his reign.

Condition of the Hebrew Serfs. In the light of the well-established facts of Egyptian history and of the geographical background, it is easy to appreciate the condition of the nomadic Israelites. Their pasture lands were transformed into cultivated fields and occupied by Egyptian colonists. The sons of the desert, ever restive under the restraints of civil authority, were put at forced labor and compelled to build the border fortresses which made their bondage the more hopeless. Palestine was in the control of their royal Egyptian task-master. The wilderness that stretched almost from their doors far out into the wild, rocky desert, offered the one possible place of escape; but under the iron rule of Ramses II and his successor, Merneptah, the escape of large bodies of fugitives was practically impossible.