# The story of the Jews escaping slavery in Egypt and wandering the desert is fiction, right? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 18, 2026, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800 "2026-01-18T16:14:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/181 "2026-01-22T14:37:13Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > The descendants of those groups were part of a Hellenic, then Roman world for a very long time, from Alexander’s conquest in the 300s BC until the Arab conquest in the 600s. They were somewhat assimilated and Hellenized, then Romanized and eventually converted to Christianity, and then with the Arab conquests converted to Islam and Arabized. Other than being mistaken about the Philistines, though, Sage Rat is basically right that the Canaanites weren’t successfully genocided by the Jews, which means that parts of the Bible that say otherwise are wrong. (As opposed to the other parts of the Bible which flatly contradict those parts) That stuff is all in the early prophets, though, not in Exodus itself. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/182 "2026-01-22T14:48:16Z")
> [@Thing.Fish](#): > > Other than being mistaken about the Philistines, though, Sage Rat is basically right that the Canaanites weren’t successfully genocided by the Jews, which means that parts of the Bible that say otherwise are wrong. Even _in_ the Bible, what I remember is that they’re _told_ to wipe out certain tribes, but they _fail to do so_ (and are punished for it, either by expliciltly divine punishment or by the tribe they didn’t wipe out coming back and conquering them later). But I could be mixing up different stories. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/183 "2026-01-22T15:00:14Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > > [@Babale](#): > > > > Between the Roman conquest and the aftermath of the Bar Kochba revolt > > ..and the perfectly voluntary emigration _to other Roman areas_ and Babylonia. I was listing start and end times, not causes of emigration. Between those two events the population greatly decreased, and mostly _not_ because of voluntary emigration, although some of that did occur. There was also a lot of slavery. > [@MrDibble](#): > > That is not in doubt. They FAFOed all right. You could certainly make that argument. And there’s a certain irony to the heirs of the Hannukah story being huge entitled assholes (as royalty tends to be) and eventually drawing in Rome in their power struggles. But on the other hand, it’s not like regions of the Empire that were nicer subjects _didn’t_ get heavily Latinized anyways. And it’s not like the Hasmonean kingdom was going to escape Rome’s notice for long anyways. ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Tan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/charlie_tan/32/12582_2.png) [@Charlie\_Tan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Tan)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/184 "2026-01-22T15:17:59Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > I’m not denying the _possibility_ of some LBAC influence, but I’m saying there’s zero _demonstrability_ there. Which was kinda the point I was trying to make. Cline’s book, which go into depth (as much as pop.science do) about the Ugarit show clearly that many of the towns/villages of Canaan that are mentioned in Ugarit sources ofvarlap with names of villages/towns of Joshua. Now I know this is about Exodus, but without the ‘conquest of Canaan’ there is no resolution to the story. They arrive at the border and (spoiler:) Moses kicks the bucket. Yahweh really has a way of rewarding the fiathful doesn’t he. /s So to to uncover any historicity of Exodus, it pays to look at what happened after. Considering that the ‘Mighty Walls of Jericho’ were in fact maybe a fence in the time purported invasion is but one of many examples where archeology and extra-biblical sources- contemporaneously written at the time frame as Exodus - does not make room for the events described in Joshua. It is - hypothetical example since I don’t have the books at hand - not possible to have the Israelites conquer Megiddo at the same time as the Ugarit sources have the ‘Sea Peoples’ razing it. The Ugarit sources mention numerous places in Canaan but there is never anything about Israelites at all. Most nations - yes modern nations too - need to invent a glorious continuous past, stretching back as far as possible, in order to justify their existence (I lean heavily on Benedict Anderson and Ernest Gellner here). The LBAC made the whole area, with its interconnected trade networks, dynastic rulers, Minor kingdoms vying for favor with the big powers and the same big powers seeking advantages against the others. In less than a century, the whole world they’d know vanished, hence the label Collapse. This is around 1200 BCE, and lines up fairly well with Joshua, Judges and so on. The people who would form Judea as a regional power after the fall of Israel (Northern Kingdom) needed their myths to create the nation. And the LBAC coulld (I know, I know) could very well have been inspiration for the mythology. A conquest of the land, turmoil, upheaval. Yes, it was written - at the earliest - some 500 years after LBAC, but people in the Italian peninsula probably had their myths about the ruins of what was still standingof Imperieal Rome around 1200 CE. And so, the retconning and creation myth of Judea/Israel reached back and took fragments that were known mixed with the doctrines and strictures of the Yahwists and other popular folk tales that were transmitted orally. And so, there never was a cohesive group of Israelites in Egypt, keeping the faiht of Yahweh alive for 430 years, slaves or not. They didn’t wander the Sinai desert for 40 years. Even on foot, they’d be walking around in circles and a four year shlep is beyond believable. And since this didn’t happen, neither did Joshua’s conquest. We don’t know why some Judeans turned away from El to Yahweh, probably around or after the purported exile in Babylon. And, I repeat myself: The writers were not trying to tell facts. They told the Truth, as they saw it, not unlike a fable. The idea that this is fiction (in the modern sense) or some cabal of scribes inventing a story to unite the people, is just silly. The people didn’t need to be united. Those that carried water and chopped wood should do that, pay their taxes, and fear the leaders. The creation myth was to unite the elites. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/185 "2026-01-22T15:25:06Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > In those times, they were enlisted to build the pyramids, but they were not slaves. They got a salary of bread and beer and were well nurtured, because starving people couldn’t have done the hard physical labor. “Bread and beer” for working like a dog in that kind of heat simply for the self-aggrandizement of some narcissist Pharoah?! No thanks! How about I organize a rebellion and behead the Pharoah instead? 🤨 ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/186 "2026-01-22T15:27:40Z")
> [@Jasmine](#): > > “Bread and beer” for working like a dog in that kind of heat simply for the self-aggrandizement of some narcissist Pharoah?! No thanks! How about I organize a rebellion and behead the Pharoah instead? 🤨 What can I say, that was the basic food at the time. Beer was much weaker in alcohol content, but still nutritious. The workers surely also got their share of vegetables and sometimes meat. And don’t forget that of course the workers were controlled by loyal royal forces, and that the Pharao was not only a ruler and king, but a living god the people thought their lives and well-being depended on. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/187 "2026-01-22T15:32:10Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > and that the Pharaoh was not only a ruler and king, but a living god the people thought their lives and well-being depended on. I want to scoff at this and denigrate them, but people are pretty much as stupid now as they were back then, so I’ll give them a pass on that. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/188 "2026-01-22T15:36:53Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Between those two events the population greatly decreased, and mostly _not_ because of voluntary emigration, although some of that did occur. “Some” here is quite large - modern scholarship suggests as much as a third. And the population was _already_ moving away before that. There were _already_ as many, if not more, Jews outside Judea than in it before the revolts. Roman rule encouraged and enabled that already ongoing diaspora in more than just a push fashion. There are enough diaspora locales from early on that show that there was clearly a strong pull even before. > [@Charlie\_Tan](#): > > Which was kinda the point I was trying to make. Your point was to tell a just-so story that has no basis in the archaeology? > [@Charlie\_Tan](#): > > A conquest of the land, turmoil, upheaval Except - _there was none of that_ in the Canaanite hillside settlements. Iron I highland settlements show continuity rather than disruption. _Why_ would they base their myths on a temporally distant collapse that largely didn’t affect them even at the time? As opposed to the events of the Exile, which very much immediately did. ---
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/189 "2026-01-22T16:31:09Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Even _in_ the Bible, what I remember is that they’re _told_ to wipe out certain tribes, but they _fail to do so_ (and are punished for it, either by expliciltly divine punishment or by the tribe they didn’t wipe out coming back and conquering them later). But I could be mixing up different stories. The text itself is wildly inconsistent. Clearly, the reality is that there were many centuries of conflict between Israel and the Canaanite nations (or the “other” Canaanite nations if you prefer). God’s alleged promise of a quick and decisive military victory, as depicted in the book of Joshua, was not fulfilled. The redactors had to choose between acknowledging the widely known historical facts and insisting that God’s promises are always reliable, and as usual they chose option C, go with both and don’t worry about consistency. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/190 "2026-01-22T17:42:43Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > The Philistines were not really Canaanites, though. As best we can tell, their god, Dagon, was the father of Baal Hadad. This makes “Dagon” a variant name for El, the more common term for the god of the early Canaanites. Most evidence points to their language being Northern Canaanite. > **[Canaanite languages | North Canaan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canaanite_languages#North_Canaan)** > > 1.Philistine – attested by several dozen inscriptions in Phoenician script scattered along Israel's southwest coast, in particular the Ekron Royal Dedicatory Inscription. It is noted as being similar to Phoenician, in particular the Byblian dialect. | > 2.Phoenician – The main sources are the Ahiram sarcophagus inscription, the sarcophagus of Eshmunazar II, the Tabnit sarcophagus, the Kilamuwa Stela, the Cippi of Melqart, and the other Byblian royal inscriptions. There were two main dialects 1.Amm... I’d have to verify but I also believe that if you follow the adventures of Abraham, that it places some of his descendants in the land of the Philistines. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/191 "2026-01-22T18:08:07Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > “Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years” Exodus 12:40 (NIV) > [@DrDeth](#): > > The numbers are entirely mythical, of course. > [@MrDibble](#): > > You’re alleging the Egyptians possibly commanded their slaves in a language _other_ than Egyptian? If they normally spoke some other language sure. > [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > Historians think so. Yep. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/192 "2026-01-22T18:13:21Z")
Yes, Abraham meets Abi **melech** in Gerar (Philistine). “melech”, like the word “moloch” is a Canaanite word for “Lord/Mighty”. The man’s name is, “My father is the Mighty”. When we see groups of Canaanites worshipping “Moloch”, they’re not worshiping a god named “Moloch”, they’re worshiping their “Lord” who could be either of El or Baal Hadad, depending on the time period. I generally see hints that there may have been a general move in the region to shift from the father to the son, across the related religious pantheons, with the Canaanites shifting from El as the Lord to Hadad as the Lord. Similarly, just as the Greeks took up writing, they may have shifted from worshiping Cronus to Zeus, preserving some tales about how Zeus overtook prominence; the Hurrians may have shifted from Kumarbi to his son, Teshub, preserving some tales about how he took precedence; the Egyptians wrote that the ruler of the Hyksos, Apepi, worshipped a god like Set, the son of Ra rather than a god more equivalent to Ra. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/193 "2026-01-22T18:14:10Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > I’d have to verify but I also believe that if you follow the adventures of Abraham, that it places some of his descendants in the land of the Philistines. Yes, but anachronistically so. It places the Philistines in the Negev at a time when they had not yet invaded the area as part of the Sea People invasion and migration of the Late Bronze Age. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/194 "2026-01-22T18:16:36Z")
The archaeological angle is for one side, the Biblical angle is for the other side. Intermixing them is madness, except where they agree. That generally doesn’t occur any earlier than Kings so for this particular time, you have to view the two arguments as distinct and unrelated, despite showing up in a single post together. In the Biblical view, there was no Sea People invasion of the Late Bronze Age (or, at least, not one that’s sticking out in my memory - maybe there’s some small reference to some event that might have been equated by someone…) ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/195 "2026-01-22T18:39:52Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > “melech”, like the word “moloch” is a Canaanite word for “Lord/Mighty Wrong, it doesn’t mean that. מֶלֶך Melekh has the specific meaning of ‘king’. It’s related to the Semitic root that means ‘owner’. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/196 "2026-01-22T18:45:19Z")
Ah, but still under the Canaanitic family, I presume? ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/197 "2026-01-22T18:46:32Z")
Yes, of course. Hebrew and Phoenician are just two dialects of the Canaanite language. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/198 "2026-01-22T18:50:49Z")
Checking my dictionaries, I gather that both Moloch and Melech are “King” (the same). So the general concept was correct, just an incorrect English translation on my part. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/199 "2026-01-22T18:52:42Z")
And Jews today pray to melech haolam, king of the universe. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2026, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/200 "2026-01-22T18:53:00Z")
That’s right. In Semitic languages, words that are spelled with the same consonants are linked in meaning. Words arise from roots in a tree-like pattern. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800.md?page=11)