# 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:** 22
**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:** [May 13, 2026, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/421 "2026-05-13T13:10:33Z")
My point is that the Romans could keep as many pigs as they wanted because they ruled the region, and the native Jews couldn’t do anything against the practice. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2026, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/422 "2026-05-13T16:48:27Z")
I suppose, but it’s likely that other groups were already keeping pigs there. Harris’ argument, by the way, is that pigs, unlike horses, goats, sheep, and the like, can’t eat and digest grass. They eat the same things that people eat, and effectively compete with people for food. They also require a “wallow” to survive in hot areas – pigs don’t sweat ( despite the saying “sweat like pig”). All of which makes pigs a high-maintenance date in the social circle of life. If you’re living at a subsistence level yourself in middle-eastern conditions, pigs are a luxury, and groups that keep them might find themselves extinct. It’s only if you’ve got time and money to waste on pigs, or else generate enough garbage for them o live on by scavenging in the streets, that you can afford, in an overall energy-using sense, to keep pigs. ---
**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:** [May 13, 2026, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/423 "2026-05-13T16:53:11Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Have a look at the work of anthropologist Marvin Harris, especially the books _The Sacred Cow and the Abominable Pig_ or _Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches_. He wrote extensively on the practical aspects of pig-raising and how it related to the taboo status of the pig. It’s worth noting that Jews are/were not the only group to taboo pigs. So did the Egyptians and Sumerians, not to mention Muslims. If I remember right, it’s the absence of forests. In wooded areas pigs can forage for themselves from mast on the ground like acorns. Where there’s nothing for pigs to forage, they have to be fed from agricultural crops that could otherwise be feeding humans. That raises questions of whether it’s worth keeping pigs under environmentally marginal conditions. ---
**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:** [May 13, 2026, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/424 "2026-05-13T17:13:09Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > If I remember right, it’s the absence of forests But Israel was historically quite decently forested until major periods of deforestation in the Roman, Crusader, and perhaps most severely Ottoman eras ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2026, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/425 "2026-05-13T17:28:16Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I think the entire nativity story was obviously made up of whole cloth, or embellished to the point where nothing interesting is left. There are a bunch of issues with it. Stars don’t do that, just to start. Meh. The star thing is easily explained as some sort of astrological sign being interpreted. The bigger reason to think they are made up has more to do with the lack of such a story in the earliest surviving gospel (Mark), a contradiction to Mary knowing anything about Jesus being special in one story in Mark, the two mutually incompatible nativity stories, evidence that the nativities were added later, and stuff like that. The tradition that Mary was a virgin came from that interpretation of a verse in Isaiah (filtered through the Septuagint translation using parthenos for “young woman”, then a narrative built up around that. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2026, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/426 "2026-05-13T18:58:12Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > The tradition that Mary was a virgin came from that interpretation of a verse in Isaiah (filtered through the Septuagint translation using parthenos for “young woman”, then a narrative built up around that. A better term is “maiden”. Now “maiden” doesnt necessarily mean virgin, but that is the connotation. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2026, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/427 "2026-05-14T00:19:56Z")
Hogs are excellent at converting carbohydrates into protein and fat. _IF_ you can produce a surplus of grain then feeding some of it to hogs is a better deal than suffering from kwashiorkor. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2026, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/428 "2026-05-14T00:29:25Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > But Israel was historically quite decently forested until major periods of deforestation in the Roman, Crusader, and perhaps most severely Ottoman eras On a similar note, one of the rabbis in the Intro To Judaism class I’ve been taking noted that Abraham’s migration from Ur to Canaan, while also probably mythical, could be a recollection of climate refugees fleeing the Tigris-Euphrates region after rapid man-made deforestation caused the water table to fill up with salt and crops to fail around 2000 BC. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2026, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/429 "2026-05-14T00:42:08Z")
That might have happened in the Bronze Age collapse _ **previous** _ to the one many people have heard about: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/YQ7cMwKwCYA/maxresdefault.jpg "The First Bronze Age Collapse and the Intermediate Bronze Age") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ7cMwKwCYA) ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2026, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/430 "2026-06-08T23:05:43Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > The star thing is easily explained as some sort of astrological sign being interpreted. It might just about be Halley’s Comet, which returned to perihelion in 12 BC - though 4 AD - 6 AD is thought to be more likely for Christ’s birth. ---
**Author:** ![scudsucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scudsucker/32/14101_2.png) [@scudsucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scudsucker)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2026, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/431 "2026-06-09T07:40:10Z")
Perhaps Melchior, Caspar and Balthazar were really bad at planning a road trip, and it took them 15 years to get going. ---
**Author:** ![Zakalwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zakalwe/32/270_2.png) [@Zakalwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zakalwe)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2026, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/432 "2026-06-09T09:04:11Z")
They wanted to wait until the new Buckee’s just outside Babylon opened up. ---
**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:** [June 10, 2026, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/433 "2026-06-10T16:42:49Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I think the entire nativity story was obviously made up of whole cloth, or embellished to the point where nothing interesting is left. The Orthodox Church and time destroyed a lot of the early documentation but reports of early Christian churches from Israel and Syria record that they didn’t have the nativity and largely considered Jesus’ story to begin with the death of John the Baptist, with Jesus receiving a spirit from a bird that came down out of the sky or a giant angel. And then there’s a myriad of issues with the nativity stories, from the lack of consistency to a variety of things that clash with Jewish practice and culture, possibly indicating a writer with not much knowledge of the Jewish lands or connection to anyone that knew anything. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2026, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/434 "2026-06-10T18:21:44Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > The Orthodox Church and time destroyed a lot of the early documentation Cite? ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2026, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/435 "2026-06-13T21:17:29Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > There probably is significance to Methuselah’s 967 years. First, that works out to 12000 months, or 1000 purely-lunar years It’s 12,000 current-year-type months, but presumably this was 967 Jewish lunar years as neither the Julian nor Gregorian calendar was around when they wrote this. 967 Jewish years has 11,962 months in it. ---
**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:** [June 17, 2026, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/436 "2026-06-17T02:09:03Z")
No, Chronos is correct. Seven out of every seventeen Jewish years has 13 months instead of 12. That keeps the slightly shorter lunar months in sync with the solar calendar, so for any period of many years, the number of Jewish and Gregorian years counted will be almost equal. Put another way, an “average” Jewish year contains 12.41 months. 967x12.41=12,000. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2026, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/437 "2026-06-17T02:18:10Z")
AFAIUI, though, the Jewish calendar that exists today was more or less adapted from the Babylonian calendar during the Captivity and the Second Temple era, and we have little information about what the calendar the First Temple Israelites used would have looked like. The names definitely weren’t the same, because Exodus and Deuteronomy both state that the month in which Passover occurs is called Aviv, not Nisan. ---
**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:** [June 17, 2026, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/438 "2026-06-17T02:23:00Z")
I don’t think the change in names of the months is particularly significant. The Torah clearly prescribes a lunar calendar, but it also says Passover is in the Spring, which would make no sense in a purely lunar calendar. So it seems the system of leap years in some form must go back a ways. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2026, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/439 "2026-06-17T02:26:40Z")
My understanding is that the leap year system was formalized somewhere around the 4th century and that before that it was applied on an ad hoc basis - a new month was declared when the Sanhedrin was informed that a new moon had been observed, and months would be inserted as needed to ensure that the pilgrimage holidays aligned with the seasons. The Sanhedrin, of course, was also a product of the Second Temple era. It was probably the Temple priests who were responsible for maintaining the calendar during the First Temple days, and the length of a year would have been based on astronomical observations rather than a fixed table. ---
**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:** [June 17, 2026, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-story-of-the-jews-escaping-slavery-in-egypt-and-wandering-the-desert-is-fiction-right/1026800/440 "2026-06-17T02:29:12Z")
Oh, I see what you mean. That is also my impression. [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=21) [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=23)