Reflection on Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did They Come From? By William G. Dever

               I read this book shortly after finishing Who Wrote the Bible?, with “Bible” being a textual analysis of the Hebrew bible and “Who” being an archaeological analysis of the land of Israel to find evidence of who lived there in the 13^th-10^th centuries. I have to say that I liked “Bible” better because it was more readable, though this was a very thorough look at the latest in archaeology. I love that both books make common reference to the academic communities they work in and in this book, William Dever seemed obsessed with refuting this guy Finkelstein, which was pretty funny. It reminded me of Timmy Turner’s dad and “DINKELBERG!!!”

               I learned some pretty important facts in this book. For example, while people used to think that the Exodus occurred in the 15^th century B.C., scholars now believe it happened in the 13^th century, if there was an Exodus at all. Israelite peoples were potentially indigenous to the region, as the archaeological record does not show a big change in material culture between Canaanites and Israelites during that time period. Perhaps what occurred, according to Dever, is that the Israelites were a group of refugees, semi-nomadic peoples, and “social bandits” who fled to the hill country in Judea and Samaria, out of reach of the invasion of the Pharaoh Merneptah. A nomadic people called the “Shasu” are referenced several times in texts of that period in relation to their God “Yhw,” AKA “Yahweh.” Interestingly, this area would be basically the same as Midian, where Moses supposedly attained knowledge of Yahweh from the burning bush. So it seems like a group of people coalesced on the border of the wilderness near the Jordan River and formed a new social/ethnic group in the 13^th-12^th centuries B.C. They were urban dropouts, “Social bandits” (rebels/brigands in the countryside), refugees, and pastoral nomads.

               Despite this seeming like a random group of people, the Merneptah or Victory Stele of 1208 B.C. refers to Israel as an ethnic group, meaning that by the end of the 13^th century, this was not just a group of people, but a cohesive set of tribes believed to come from the same ancestor. Therefore, when they fled into the wilderness, they had already believed themselves to be one ethnic group, since it was Merneptah that they were fleeing.

               The author argues that some of these Israelites ended up in Egypt or worked as slaves in Israel for the Egyptian Pharaoh and told their story, truly of only a portion of the Israelites, as the story of all of them, inserted into the Pentateuch as the Priestly (P) text. Or at least that’s how I understand it. That explains the lack of a change in material culture- because most Israelites were already living in Israel when a Moses-like leader led the rest out of Egypt or out of Egyptian bondage. While this may seem to “disprove” the Exodus, it really shows that the story is more like Thanksgiving. Both celebrate a group of people that are not the whole people. Most Americans are not descended from the Pilgrims much like most Jews and Israelites were not descended from the Jews of Egypt. However, the story serves as a metaphor that is recognized by the entire people.