Talk:The Exodus - Misplaced Pages

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WikiProject Ancient Egypt to-do list:

Needed articles.

We should have an article on every pyramid and every nome in Ancient Egypt. I'm sure the rest of us can think of other articles we should have.

Cleanup.

To start with, most of the general history articles badly need attention. And I'm told that at least some of the dynasty articles need work. Any other candidates?

Standardize the Chronology.

A boring task, but the benefit of doing it is that you can set the dates !(e.g., why say Khufu lived 2589-2566? As long as you keep the length of his reign correct, or cite a respected source, you can date it 2590-2567 or 2585-2563)

Stub sorting

Anyone? I consider this probably the most unimportant of tasks on Misplaced Pages, but if you believe it needs to be done . . .

Data sorting.

This is a project I'd like to take on some day, & could be applied to more of Misplaced Pages than just Ancient Egypt. Take one of the standard authorities of history or culture -- Herotodus, the Elder Pliny, the writings of Breasted or Kenneth Kitchen, & see if you can't smoothly merge quotations or information into relevant articles. Probably a good exercise for someone who owns one of those impressive texts, yet can't get access to a research library.

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Visiting Moses

Back in the 70's while doing some historical research I was invited to a local Jewish library. Material on Moses was in the fiction section. I found this very interesting since Christians stress Moses as a historical figure. This has always struck me as being a bit ODD: Moses' staff (obviously a magic wand), the 7 or 10 plagues, the parting of the red or reed sea, (My favorite OVERLOOKED version of this story is the one where the Egyptians troops pursue the Moses escapees in BOATS! See: Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the history and the religion of Israel by Frank Moore Cross, Harvard University Press, 1973), the receiving of the 10 commandments (Exodus 20:2-17), their destruction (Exodus 32:19), and REVISION usually NOT accepted (Exodus 34:1-26) and the STRANGE time line of taking 40 YEARS to cross the Sinai desert when Yahweh is GUIDING them with divine signs both day and night. They are lead to the promised land of Canaan, a land inhabited by terrible cannibal giants. (Numbers 13:1-31) DUH!! What we have here is likely fantasy literature. Miistermagico (talk) 01:01, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

Miistermagico: You posted a comment similar to this one at Talk:Moses not long ago, and while you somewhat offhandedly mention Cross's book, you seem to be expressing your opinion on the topic rather than suggesting improvements to the article. Do you have any specific changes to suggest? A. Parrot (talk) 01:20, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

Dear A. Parrot, Every time I offer changes to the article, my favorites being the Egyptians troops pursue the Moses escapees in BOATS! (See: Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the history and the religion of Israel by Frank Moore Cross, Harvard University Press, 1973) and Moses' band wandering aimlessly across the Sinai desert guided by Yahweh's divine signs both day and night for 40 years to the promised land of Canaan, a land inhabited by terrible cannibal giants (Numbers 13:1-31) where Moses' spies are the size of INSECTS!!, it is removed as UNNECESSARY data. I suggest the addition of this eldritch data is an IMPROVEMENT. I also suggest my UNNECESSARY data is UNDESIRABLE to THEM. Miistermagico (talk) 14:03, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

If you can find reliable sources mentioning specific details of the story as unbelievable, then it's possible to mention them. Otherwise, you are merely offering your own opinion on the matter. The giants are already mentioned in the body of the article.--Ermenrich (talk) 14:16, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

Dear Ermenrich, You are correct I should have cited (Numbers 13:32-33) 32 And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. 33 There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.” I was a bit hasty. Sorry about my error. This indicates I am NOT offering my own opinion on this matter. There is data to support my stuff. Miistermagico (talk) 19:23, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

The Bible is not a reliable source for making statements about the believability about the Bible. If scholars mention these things as unbelievable, you can add them, you can't simply state that there are in the Bible and are unbelievable. Plenty of people do believe them, after all.--Ermenrich (talk) 20:04, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

You appear to have misunderstood the passage in question anyway: the Israelites are not literally the size of insects, they are being compared to insects when one sees how large the giants are. That's a metaphor and definitely does not belong in the summary.--Ermenrich (talk) 20:16, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

@Miistermagico: However, the variant of the story in which the Hebrews cross by boat would be worth including, as long as the article specifies where that variant comes from—is it implied in an obscure biblical passage or in some extrabiblical text, and if the latter, when is that text from? Cross's exact words would be worth quoting on the talk page. A. Parrot (talk) 00:35, 2 May 2019 (UTC)

Dear A. Parrott, I no longer possess a copy of Cross's book. I'll leave the identification of the variant up to you. Besides since Numbers 13: 33 "There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.” keeps getting omitted from this article I see digging out Cross' primary source as a waste of my time. But let me conclude with this in my Religious Studies class on the Old Testament our text book was Understanding the Old Testament by Bernhard W. Anderson. The Exodus and Moses were barley touched on. If I remember correctly, the only thing that was brought up in the text was there are 2 different versions of the so-called plagues, seven and ten in the Old Testament. The so-called historical criticism began with the Jewish captives returning from their captivity in Babylonian exile in 539 BCE. I am a bigger fan of the Old Testament than the New Testament. Its popularity, influence, and proselytizing in Western society astonishes me. So it goes...Miistermagico (talk) 09:09, 2 May 2019 (UTC)

Pecking order

@Jgriffy98: I suggest that you read WP:FIXBIAS, WP:NOTNEUTRAL, WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE. That's quite some reading, take some time to read all that. You see, there is no pecking order of Misplaced Pages editors, but there is a pecking order of WP:RULES and of course we closely follow the pecking order that already exists in the academia. Lewine, Edward (November 18, 2007). "The Encyclopedist's Lair". The New York Times. Retrieved December 26, 2017. Greatest misconception about Misplaced Pages: We aren't democratic. Our readers edit the entries, but we're actually quite snobby. The core community appreciates when someone is knowledgeable, and thinks some people are idiots and shouldn't be writing. I want you to know that the stuff about idiots is not predicated about you, I mention in there because it makes a general point; it is not meant as an offense. Tgeorgescu (talk) 03:20, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

@Tgeorgescu: I shall read through them. Thank you. Jgriffy98 (talk) 03:28, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

@Jgriffy98: And for a shorthand introduction to the scientific revolution that happened in respect to biblical archaeology, see https://web.archive.org/web/20011110114548/http://lib1.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/jerques.htm Tgeorgescu (talk) 03:31, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

@Tgeorgescu: I'll check that out too. Thanks. By the way, I just wanted to make it clear that I'm perfectly willing to admit that I could be wrong about all the accusations I have made. I was just taken aback by what I perceived as an extremely biased article. I'm a rookie at being an editor, and I have a lot to learn. I also can have a fiery temper. My apologies for that. Jgriffy98 (talk) 03:37, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

@Jgriffy98: Apologies accepted. You should keep in mind that:

the rules which apply to debate championships (Debatepedia) don't apply to Misplaced Pages;
the rules which apply to Academic Publishing Wiki don't apply to Misplaced Pages;
the rules which apply to MBTI don't apply to Misplaced Pages;
the rules which apply to Hindawi don't apply to Misplaced Pages;
the rules which apply to the academia don't apply to Misplaced Pages.

If I were stubborn and unwilling to learn from others, I would not have lasted that long as an editor. I don't dictate, the community dictates. I am not the community. Anyway, if you try to undo WP:RS/AC, this talk page is not the venue for it. You could try your luck at Misplaced Pages talk:Reliable sources, but I am afraid it will be taken for WP:SNOW. WP:RS/AC is an essential tool in respect to WP:DUE, so it is highly unlikely that it will be overturned. Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:39, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Pyramids of Giza

New and unsourced content in the article compares the working condition of the supposedly enslaved Israelites with the workers who built the Giza pyramid complex. How is this relevant? The pyramid complex was constructed by the 4th Dynasty (27th to 25th century BCE), and the Exodus story is typically seen as depicting the 2nd millennium BC. Dimadick (talk) 16:37, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

I've removed that text, which was wildly out of place. One could perhaps make a general point about the nature of the Egyptian corvée system, which was probably responsible for the pyramids as well as any major monument built in the New Kingdom—but only if there's a reliable source that directly contrasts those working conditions with what Exodus describes. A. Parrot (talk) 04:27, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Agreed. Moreover, the offered source doesn't mention Israelites or the Exodus, so WP:SYNTH applies. Zero 08:22, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Agreed...Modernist (talk) 11:40, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Four points:

The evidence showing that the pyramid builders were well fed, does not mean they were NOT slaves. One does not starve a valuable animal like a horse or camel or dog, so why would one starve a slave?
I am not aware of ANY source anywhere that "proves" that Israelite workers were present in Egypt in significant numbers, at any time in history. There may well have been handfuls of Israelite slaves here and there, as the Levant was conquered and ruled by Egypt at various stages, but not a workforce or an "army" of Israelite slaves as suggested by the Bible.
The "Hyksos" are "believed" to be from Canaan, but were probably not Israelites in the Biblical sense. Some of them may well have been slaves, but again, not remotely in the numbers as suggested by the Bible.
The pyramids of Giza were probably built in the 3rd millennium BC, perhaps earlier, but certainly not later. Did the "Israelite people" even exist as such in that time period, or did they only originate much later in history?

Wdford (talk) 13:56, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

The royal workforce in Egypt was made up primarily of corvée laborers, so it's assumed that that's what the pyramid builders were. As for the Israelites, the first appearance of that ethnonym is on the Merneptah Stele, circa 1200 BC, roughly 1300 years after the construction of the Great Pyramid. It's assumed that their ethnogenesis was sometime earlier than that, but not by much, and even the conservative biblical scholars of past generations, the ones who wrongly thought the patriarchs had a historical basis, didn't place the patriarchs earlier than 2000 BC. And, as has been discussed repeatedly on this page, the massive Israelite population described in Exodus cannot be historical. A. Parrot (talk) 16:19, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Lede Edits Good To Go?

Anon editor, Fajkfnjsak, has made repeated edits that almost dramatically change the context of the lede. I haven't been as involved in this page as I used to be, but I know the lede went through a quite extensive overhaul and this one person has changed it on his own. Is everyone ok with that? It also seems odd that the contextual changes are similar to anon editor, Jgriffy98, who repeatedly had his changes reverted - is this a coincidence? Ckruschke (talk) 19:49, 1 July 2019 (UTC)Ckruschke

I personally do not like the changes but Fajknjsak has reverted me every time I've reverted anything he's done. As they aren't terrible, I let it go, but if other users prefer the old wording I certainly would as well.--Ermenrich (talk) 20:22, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

I agree that the changes aren't "terrible", but allowing an IP to run the page isn't how things are supposed to work. It seems very odd to me that several IP editors over the last 6 months have made very similar changes to this page. Smacks of Sock Puppetry especially since Fajknjsak hasn't been heard of since I brought this up... Ckruschke (talk) 13:30, 9 July 2019 (UTC)Ckruschke

Well, sockpuppetry issue aside, ideally it shouldn't matter if the IP is an IP or not. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:54, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

"Ideally" However, IP editors are often anon for a reason. Ckruschke (talk) 15:02, 10 July 2019 (UTC)Ckruschke

@Fajkfnjsak:, would you care to discuss your edits here?--Ermenrich (talk)

It doesn't look that different to me, & still contains howlers like the book being "published" in the 5thC BC! The escape from oppression theme was of great importance to Early Christians, and other Christian groups (under Muslim rule) etc, and if African-Americans are mentioned these should be too. Johnbod (talk) 17:38, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I don't disagree with Fajkfnjsak's POV, but he edits too bluntly. Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:19, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

BTW, he's doing the exact same thing on Plagues of Egypt and also reverting long established editors. Ckruschke (talk) 19:05, 11 July 2019 (UTC)Ckruschke

He's currently blocked for 24 hours for edit warring. I'd just like him to use the talk page to discuss what he's doing. He hasn't responded to my ping and he completely removed my attempt at rewording to avoid saying the exodus "was published", taking out a long stable part of the text with reference in the process. I've tried a reworded version so hopefully he'll actually engage here when his block is up.--Ermenrich (talk) 19:44, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

This edit here strikes me as far more problematic. He removed sourced material claiming it was unsourced.--Ermenrich (talk) 20:25, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

Torah or Bible?

I noticed in reviewing the recent edits that the term Bible was replaced with Torah in at least one place in the lede. Now I realize that this topic has a special relevance to Judaism, but Torah is certainly the less familiar term to most people who will be reading this article. I would advocate sticking with Bible or, possibly, the first five books of the bible, rather than Torah.--Ermenrich (talk) 20:19, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

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