Evidence - Moses' beginnings
Were the Hebrews in Egypt?
The story goes that Moses led two million Hebrews out of Egypt and they lived for 40 years in the Sinai desert - but a century of archaeology in the Sinai has turned up no evidence of it. If the Hebrews were never in Egypt then perhaps the whole issue was fiction, made up to give their people an exotic history and destiny.
Some archeologists decided to search instead in the Nile Delta: the part of Egypt where the Bible says the Hebrews settled.
They combed the area for evidence of a remarkably precise claim - that the Hebrews were press-ganged into making mud-bricks to build two great cities - Pithom and Ramses. Ramses II was the greatest Pharaoh in all of ancient Egypt - his statues are everywhere. Surely his city could be traced? But no sign could be found. There were suggestions it all been made up by a scribe.
Until a local farmer found a clue: the remains of the feet of a giant statue. An inscription on a nearby pedestal confirmed that the statue belonged to Ramses II. Eventually, archeologists unearthed traces of houses, temples, even palaces. Using new technology, the archaeologists were able to detect the foundations and they mapped out the whole city in a few months. The city they had discovered was one of the biggest cities in ancient Egypt, built around 1250BCE. 20,000 Egyptians had lived there.
But was this city actually built by Hebrew slaves? There is a reference in ancient Egyptian documents to a Semitic tribe captured by Pharaoh and forced to work on the city of Ramses. A clay tablet lists groups of people who were captured by the Pharaoh and one of the groups was called Habiru. Could these be the Hebrews? No-one can be sure.
The tale of the basket
The story of the infant Moses being set adrift in a basket bears remarkable similarities to an old Babylonian myth about a great King called Sargon who was discovered as a baby in a basket in a river.
Between 600 and 300 BCE, Jewish scribes in Jerusalem set out to record all the old tales of their people, handed down from generation to generation. What if the scribes had wanted to add a bit of spice to their tales to make them more interesting? Could they have used the myth of Sargon and made up the tale of Moses? It's certainly possible as we know the Jews were captured by the Babylonians in 587 BCE and held in exile in Babylon (modern Iraq) for some time. They could have picked up the Sargon legend there.
Egyptologist Jim Hoffmeier studied the original Hebrew text. He found that key words in the story - bulrushes, papyrus, Nile, riverbank - were all ancient Egyptian words, and not Babylonian.
But what about the name 'Moses'? It is an Egyptian name meaning 'One who is born'. It uses the same root as 'Ramses'. It's hard to believe that a Hebrew scribe, one thousand years later, could have come up with a story using authentic Egyptian words.
Well actually there are many stories of babies being put in baskets and exposed or put in water. This was an ancient way of putting a child out to the fate of the gods. Today people put babies in baskets and put them on church doorsteps.Jim Hoffmeier, Egyptologist
The tale of the burning bush
The Bible says that when Moses was 80, he was living peacefully as a shepherd in the desert. One day, as he was tending his flock, he heard the voice of God coming from a burning bush. God ordered Moses to go and force the Pharaoh to let his Hebrew people go. At first Moses was afraid, he didn't think he could do this. Then God gave him special powers.
Did Moses hear the voice of God? Clinton Bailey, an expert on Bedouin folklore, believes that such a desert experience is perfectly plausible:
If you have to survive out here in this heat and in this desolation... You're closer to God... And I have seen Bedouin praying on their own in the middle of the desert... and when they do pray you get a connection between themselves and Allah, God, which is very very strong and it's like saying 'You up there, help me out, I've got nothing else down here to keep me going except your providence'.Clinton Bailey, expert on Bedouin folklore
Whatever happened, this was a turning point for Moses and the Hebrew people. Jews believe that at the moment the Hebrews forged a special and unique relationship with God. In return, God gave them the right to occupy a certain land.
It was the Promised Land: the land we now know as Israel. From that moment on, Moses resolved to lead his people out of Egypt to the land of milk and honey.
The tale of the Pharaoh's daughter
The Bible claims that Moses was rescued by the Pharaoh's daughter, who adopted him. He was then educated and brought up in the palace as a prince. Can this possibly be true?
The picture we have here is very authentic because the young boys in ancient Egypt were under a tough master. In fact we have the testimony of some of the scribes who talked about how their scribe master beat them when they were lazy and made sure they wrote their letters right.Jim Hoffmeier, Egyptologist
But where's the proof that Moses was taken in by the king and put into a class like this?
Of course we have no proof but what's interesting is that during the general period we place Moses, during this time non-royal children were also introduced. The royal children of foreign kings, kings from Canaan, Syria, were entered into this institution to learn how to read and write.Jim Hoffmeier, Egyptologist
The Pharaohs did keep records, the records show that palaces had nurseries where royal children were educated, and that they did bring foreign children into these nurseries. It may have been easy for the Pharaoh's daughter to introduce a baby she had found into one of these nurseries.