by
Damien F. Mackey
“Now there arose a
new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph”.
Exodus 1:8
Introduction
Did not know Joseph?
The same sort of thing is
repeated in Acts 7:18: “Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to
power in Egypt”.
But surely everyone in Egypt
knew about the great Joseph who had saved the country, and its neighbours, from
a severe seven-year Famine. As the sage Vizier, Imhotep, Joseph’s reputation
would only go on increasing down through the ages, until, by the Ptolemaïc era,
he was a veritable canonised and divinised thaumaturgist to whom the hopeful
Egyptians and pilgrims would pray for cures and other needs.
Imhotep -
Wikipedia
“Two thousand years after his
death, Imhotep's status had risen to that of a god of medicine and healing. Eventually,
Imhotep was equated with Thoth, the god of architecture,
mathematics, and medicine, and patron of scribes …”.
Imhotep—The Man Who Engineered His Own Divinity - The Historian's Hut
“Millennia later, in 525 BCE,
the Persians conquered Egypt. Interestingly enough, the
worship of Imhotep only increased while Egypt was under Persian rule—during
that time, he was promoted from demigod status to that of a full deity. When
the Greeks came in contact with worshipers of Imhotep, they associated the
Egyptian deity with their own god, Asclepius. By 293 BCE,
Imhotep-Asclepius worship spread to Rome, under the name Aesculapius. Just as
the mortal Imhotep was a polymath of many fields of studies, the divine Imhotep
was also a god of many categories. He was considered a god of wisdom, science
and architecture, but he was best known as a god of medicine. As a result, many
people visited his temple at Memphis in search of miraculous healings”.
The “new king” of Exodus 1:8 would have seen all around him evidence of
the massive infrastructural project that Joseph had enjoined upon the Egyptians
to construct in anticipation of a Famine yet years away: large, temporary dams,
waterways and canals, and vast enclosures for grain storage. And he would learn
from much of it.
Joseph had been dead only about half a century before this new king came
to power in Egypt. So the holy man’s architectural works would have been as
familiar to him as are, say, for Londoners today, the 1960’s office blocks in
the City of London.
No, this new, astute king of Egypt, “who knew not Joseph”, would
assuredly have heard of Joseph and of all that he had done during his lifetime.
But he, personally, could not have known Joseph, nor could his close
relatives and friends, separated as they were from the Hebrew saviour by half a
century or so.
Moreover, he was a “new” king, inaugurating a new dynasty, after the one
that had coursed through the long career of Joseph, but had since sunk into the
sands of time.
Our new king was a new dynastic founder, with an agenda quite different
from that of his predecessors - an agenda that aggressively disallowed any favouring
of the foreign Israelites who were growing in size and power before his very
eyes, and who might easily become a threat to the well-being of his Egypt. So,
he embarked upon a cruel program, marking him as a forerunner of the
infanticidal King Herod (Exodus 1:8-16):
Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power
in Egypt. ‘Look’, he said to his people, ‘the Israelites have become far
too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will
become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight
against us and leave the country’.
So they put slave
masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built
Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. But the more
they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread; so the Egyptians came
to dread the Israelites and worked them ruthlessly. They made their
lives bitter with harsh labor in brick and mortar and with all kinds
of work in the fields; in all their harsh labor the Egyptians worked them
ruthlessly.
The king of Egypt said to the
Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, ‘When you are
helping the Hebrew women during childbirth on the delivery stool, if you see
that the baby is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live’.
All that Joseph personally may have meant to this particular king was
that he had belonged to that very race of people, “the Israelites”, who could
now threaten his rule, having
“become far too numerous for us … and, if war breaks out, will join our
enemies, fight against us and leave the country’.
So, effectively,
Joseph meant nothing to
him (Acts 7:18).
Dynastically,
who was this king?
The answer to this question is an extremely complex one, which will
occupy this article. It reminds me of the Gerasene demoniac, the man with an
impure spirit who came out of the tombs to meet Jesus Christ (Mark 5:1).
(V. 9): Then Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’
‘My name is Legion’, he replied, ‘for we are many’.
Our new king had, likewise - as we are going to find - an abundance of names
and dynastic identities (not to mention titles). But where to start?
We start with a female. According to tradition (Eusebius, Artapanus),
pharaoh’s daughter, who drew the baby Moses from the water, was “Merris”, a
name that resonates perfectly with the Egyptian name, Meresankh (Meres + the
ankh symbol). And she was married to “Chenephres”.
These two names, Meresankh (var. Ankhesenmerire) and “Chenephres” have
become like golden threads for me when weaving my way through Egypt’s dynasties
in search of the historical Moses.
Ankhenesmerire I | Egyptopia
“Queen Ankhensemerire … was
the daughter of Khui, one of the noblemen of Abydos, and the wife of King Pepi
II”.
Fourth Dynasty
This vital information, set
during Egypt’s Sixth Dynasty: Khui; Ankhensemerire; Pepi; transfers
perfectly to the Fourth Dynasty, the famed Pyramid-building dynasty.
Khui was the great dynastic
founding king, our “new king”, Khnum-Khuefui, or Khufu, better known to us by
the Greek name of Cheops. Though megalithically attested in terms of his
building and architecture, most notably the Great Pyramid of Giza, Cheops is
otherwise poorly attested. This is about all we have of him (sic transit
gloria mundi).
Meresankh was the daughter (or
grand-daughter), of Cheops, and she married Khafre, better known as Chephren,
who must surely be the traditional “Chenephres”. The name Khafre, “appearing
like Re”, is simply a variation of Khaneferre (“Chenephres”), “Re appears in
glory”. Inverted, the name becomes Neferkare.
Throughout various of my
articles, now, on the historical Moses, most recently:
If Moses belonged to Egypt’s Fifth Dynasty, then
six sun temples ought not to be expected
(1) If Moses belonged to Egypt's
Fifth Dynasty, then six sun temples ought not to be expected
I have established this
dynastic pattern for Moses (removing perceived duplications):
The proper configuration
for an Egyptian dynasty to which Moses belonged, yea, even ruled, must proceed
according to the following pattern:
1. The Founding Pharaoh
(“new king” of Exodus 1:8);
2. Moses as ruler briefly, before
abdication;
3. The traditional pharaoh, “Chenephres”,
rival of Moses,
married to “Merris”,
Egyptian foster-mother of Moses;
4. Female Pharaoh.
The Fourth
Dynasty fits this pattern remarkably well, though with the last one, 4.,
being speculative. Thus:
1. Khufu
(Cheops) as Founder; 2. Djedefre as Moses of short reign; 3. Khafre (Chephren)
(“Chenephres”), married to Ankhesenmerire/Meres-ankh, “Merris”; the dynasty
concluding with 4. the female pharaoh, Khentkaus.
Pyramid of Khentkaus I - Wikipedia
“The pyramid
of Khentkaus I or step tomb of Khentkaus I is a Fourth
Dynasty two-stepped
tomb built for the Queen Mother Khentkaus
I in Giza”.
For more on
Khentkaus, and what conventional Egyptology has done to her, see my article:
Triplicating
woman ruler Khenkaus
(2) Triplicating
woman ruler Khentkaus
What all of this
means is that, when Moses began his life - when “Shiphrah” was an active Hebrew
midwife (the name appears in the Brooklyn Papyrus) - a new dynastic-founding
king had inaugurated Egypt’s Pyramid-building age that would continue for the
first 80 years of the life of Moses.
One of the
tyrant’s purposes was to keep in check the burgeoning Israelites.
No doubt he
wanted also to rival, and outdo, the glorious deeds of the previous dynasty:
build even greater pyramids, use and refine the canals and waterways for
transport purposes, develop Lake Faiyum that had dried up during the great
Famine.
This was to
be a truly cosmopolitan age, trading with the Levant, with Syria (Ebla), and
with the brilliant sea-faring Cretans.
And Moses,
the prince, and heir to the throne, would be right in the thick of it all (Acts
7:22): “And Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was
mighty in his words and deeds” - probably in his written “words”, rather than in
his spoken ones (cf. Exodus 4:10).
Fifth
Dynasty
This
dynasty, too, fits remarkably well into our scheme.
Conventionally
it, like the others, is too long, with duplications, and triplications.
Consequently, Egyptologists are busy (even now) searching for six or seven sun
temples that they think this dynasty produced, but having found only two to
three – which I anticipate is all that they are ever going to find:
If
Moses belonged to Egypt’s Fifth Dynasty, then six sun temples ought not to be
expected
(3) If Moses
belonged to Egypt's Fifth Dynasty, then six sun temples ought not to be
expected
To give just one example of potential duplication here, Pharaoh Menkaure of the
Fourth Dynasty is almost certainly the same as (Menkauhor and) Sahure of
the Fifth Dynasty. They look like identical twins.
Applying our
configuration now to the Fifth Dynasty, we lack in this case a “Merris”,
getting instead the problematical Khentkaus:
1. Sahure
(and Djedkare) as Founder; 2. Niuserre Ini as Moses; 3. Userkaf (=
Khafre) (Chephren) (“Chenephres”), married to Khentkaus; the dynasty concluding
with 4. the female pharaoh, Khentkaus.
But our hoped-for pattern will
be fully restored with the next dynasty.
Sixth Dynasty
Previously,
I wrote:
Such a
configuration is relatively easily recognised in the so-called Sixth
Dynasty, with 1. Teti (and Merenre) as Founder; 2. Userkare as Moses, whose
memory is damned to the “desert” by 3. Pepi Neferkare (“Chenephres”),
married to Ankhesenmerire/Meres-ankh, “Merris”; the dynasty concluding with the
female pharaoh, Nitocris.
When a grandiose
ruler such as the “new king” of Exodus 1:8 is slathered across some half a
dozen supposed dynasties and two supposed kingdoms (Old and ‘Middle’), then he becomes
greatly diminished. We have already noted that he, as Cheops, is almost
non-existent apart from his monolithic building works known to all.
Well, one of his Fifth
Dynasty alter egos, Djedkare Isesi, a long-reigning king, is similarly
lacking in statuary.
Only about two images known for
these two great names!
Finally, our Sixth Dynasty
version of the Dynastic Founder, Teti, morphs brilliantly into the Founder of
the Twelfth Dynasty, Amenemhet (Amenemes):
Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty oppressed Israel
(3) Egypt's Twelfth Dynasty
oppressed Israel
Twelfth Dynasty
In this mighty dynasty the power of the Oppression is fully felt.
World into which Moses was born
As we draw near to the birth of Moses, the ancient world (at least in
the environs of Egypt) enters into a sophisticated new phase of pyramid
building, travel, maritime ventures, harbours, art and architecture, and the
influx of foreign workers.
The Early Bronze Age II will continue on into the Early Bronze III,
which two eras often tend not to be clearly distinguished – except that EBIII
is known to have ended in ‘collapse’. Thus:
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.901.2193&rep=rep1&type=pdf
“Early Bronze II–III was dated from ~3100
to 2300 BC and correlated with the Egyptian Protodynastic period and the Old
Kingdom down to the late 6th Dynasty. Early Bronze IV (also called the
Intermediate Bronze Age) was dated from ~2300 to 2000 BC, to the onset of the
Middle Bronze Age, and roughly correlated with the First Intermediate period in
Egypt (de Miroschedji 2009; Sowada 2009; Harrison 2012). While the Early Bronze
II–III period saw the rise of strong fortified urban centers throughout the
southern and central Levant, almost all of these “first cities” collapsed at
the end of the Early Bronze III period …”.
That ‘collapse’ of these cities belongs to the spectacular
archaeological phase of the Joshuan and Israelite Conquest of Palestine.
From a supposedly Old Kingdom point of view, the cultural surge referred
to above is reflected in the kingship of Snofru (Sneferu), Egypt’s most
prolific pyramid builder:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sneferu
To enable Sneferu to undertake such massive building projects, he would
have had to secure an extensive store of labour and materials. According to
Guillemette Andreu, this is where the king's foreign policy played a large
part. Sneferu's conquests into Libya and Nubia served two purposes: the first
goal was to establish an extensive labour force, and the second goal was to
gain access to the raw materials and special products that were available in
these countries. …. This is alluded to in the Palermo
Stone:
"[Reign of] Sneferu.
Year ...
The building of Tuataua ships
of mer wood
of a hundred capacity, and 60
royal boats of sixteen capacity.
Raid in the Land of the
Blacks, and the bringing in of seven thousand
prisoners, men and women, and
twenty thousand cattle, sheep, and
goats... The bringing of
forty ships of cedar wood (or perhaps "laden with cedar
wood")...".
According to this inscription, Sneferu was able to capture large numbers of
people from other nations, make them his prisoners and then add them into his
labour force. During his raids into Nubia and Libya, he also captured cattle
for the sustenance of his massive labour force. Such incursions must have been
incredibly devastating to the populations of the raided countries, and it is
suggested that the campaigns into Nubia may have
contributed to the dissemination of the A-Group
culture of that region.
Sneferu's military efforts in ancient
Libya led to the capture of 11,000 prisoners and 13,100 head of cattle. …. Aside
from the extensive import of cedar (most likely from Lebanon) described above,
there is evidence of activity in the turquoise mines on the Sinai
Peninsula. …. There would also have been large-scale quarrying
projects to provide Sneferu with the stone he needed for his pyramids. ….
The “Moses” as presented by the later Jewish historian, Artapanus,
bought into – and indeed greatly contributed to – this technological
advancement: “As a grown man
[Moses] was the source of many great inventions for humankind: ships, cranes
for lifting large stones, Egyptian weaponry, devices for lifting water and for
war, and philosophy”:
https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/0195151429.001.0001/acprof-9780195151428-chapter-7
The grandiose Snofru was, according to my reconstruction
(and apart from his other alter egos),
Amenemhet (or Amenemes) I of the Twelfth
Dynasty, who will be a focal point of this article. During his time there
was in Egypt (especially in the Delta region), as we shall find, a large
population of foreigners who had begun to pose a serious logistical problem for
the new dynastic ruler.
The combination of extensive pyramid building and
abundance of foreign immigrants in Egypt is a perfect mix for the testimony of
Josephus that the Israelite slaves built the pyramids, as well as walls for
cities (Antiquities, ch. 9):
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/ant-2.html
And having in length of time forgotten the benefits they
had received from Joseph; particularly the crown being now come into another
family; they became very abusive to the Israelites; and contrived many ways of
afflicting them: for they enjoyned them to cut a great number of channels for
the river, and to build walls for their cities, and ramparts, that they might
restrain the river, and hinder its waters from stagnating, upon its running
over its own banks: they set them also to build pyramids: … and by all
this wore them out, and forced them to learn all sorts of mechanical arts, and
to accustom themselves to hard labour. ….
That is not to say that the Israelites were the only
peoples enslaved by Twelfth Dynasty Egypt,
but just the people of vital interest to the biblical scribe(s).
King Solomon (Book of Wisdom), recalling the attitude of
the ancient Sodomites, will slate the Egyptians for their wretched ingratitude
and inhospitality to Israel:
file:///C:/Users/lib_pubaccess.INTERNAL/Downloads/Wisdom_of_Solomon_and_Biblical_Interpret.pdf
…. The
Sodomites guilty of inhospitality In Wis 19:13–17
… Solomon describes the Egyptians as
particularly inhospitable, ungrateful hosts to the Israelites: they received
the Israelites only to turn right around and enslave them. He then adds a
curious statement in v. 14: “Others had refused to receive strangers when they
came to them.” Who were these “others”?
We find
out in v. 17, where we read that the Egyptians were punished for their
treatment of the Israelites by “loss of sight—just as were those at the door of
the righteous man.” In this passage, we see another example of … Solomon’s
linking two seemingly unconnected events: this “loss of sight” is an allusion
to the ninth plague (Exod 10:22–23); and “those at the door of the righteous
man” are those who came to the house of Lot (the “righteous”) demanding he hand
his guests over to them and whom the angels struck blind (Gen 19:11). It is
worth noting that … Solomon adduces the story of Sodom’s destruction to
buttress his condemnation of Egypt’s inhospitality. He is free to do so
because, at least on one level, he understands the sin of Sodom as not
specifically sexual misconduct, but rather as the Sodomites’ refusal “to
receive strangers”—that is, their inhospitality. … Solomon is not alone in this
view, and there may even be some scriptural support for such a notion. Ezekiel
16:49–50 condemns the inhabitants of Sodom, saying Sodom “had pride, excess of
food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy.” What seems to
be in view here is the Sodomites’ mistreatment of other people rather than
their sexual misconduct (although the latter is certainly not excluded).
Moreover, Josephus’ Jewish Antiquities 1.194 also regards the sin of the
Sodomites as inhospitality, dislike of foreigners, and arrogance. ….
Cf. Book of Wisdom (19:13-17):
On the sinners, however, punishments rained down not
without violent thunder as early warning; and they suffered what their own
crimes had justly deserved since they had shown such bitter hatred to
foreigners.
Others, indeed, had failed to welcome
strangers who came to them, but the Egyptians had enslaved their own guests and
benefactors.
The sinners, moreover, will certainly be
punished for it, since they gave the foreigners a hostile welcome; but
the latter, having given a festive reception to people who already shared the
same rights as themselves, later overwhelmed them with terrible labours.
Hence they were struck with blindness,
like the sinners at the gate of the upright, when, yawning darkness all around
them, each had to grope his way through his own door.
The Cretans and Therans were most prominent trading
partners with Twelfth Dynasty Egypt.
Magnificent palaces were being erected throughout the region at the time.
For abundant information on the trade interaction between
Twelfth Dynasty Egypt and Crete, one
could read Gavin Menzies (The
Lost Empire of Atlantis: History's Greatest
Mystery Revealed (HarperCollins, 2011),
whilst making allowance for his adherence to inflated conventional dates and
basic historical construction. Menzies, writing of the “highly prized”,
distinctive Cretan pottery (pp. 41-44), will tell of how Egyptian chronology is
the yardstick for dating Cretan pottery:
The
pottery told us loud and clearly that the Minoans [sic] had traded much more
than foodstuffs and olive oil. The Kamares designs are dramatic, a
modern-looking black and red, and the pottery was first excavated here [Kamares
cave] in the early 1900’s.
I’d
learned by now it had been highly prized across the entire Mediterranean. It
has been found across the Levant and Mesopotamia, from Hazor and Ashkelon in
Israel to Beirut and Byblos in Lebanon and the ancient Canaanite city of
Ugarit, near what is now the sea-town of Ras-Shamra in modern-day Syria.
Judging
by the finds in Egyptian tombs and elsewhere across the region, the Minoan
skill in art seems to have given the Minoans of ancient Crete a free pass to
the glamour, science and civilisation of the two most advanced cultures of the
Early Bronze Age, Mesopotamia and Egypt.
In
the 14th century B.C., said Professor [Stylianos] Alexiou, the
bounty of Crete – its skilled metal-work, olive oil, pottery, saffron and so on
– was exchanged as gifts between Mediterranean rulers. In return, the Egyptians
sent exotica: gold, ivory, cloth and stone vessels containing perfumes.
The
wealth of pottery, sculpture and jewellery that has been found in Crete was so
old that no one could accurately date it, according to Professor Alexiou. So
many Minoan artefacts are in Egypt that experts are best able to date Cretan
finds by comparing them to Egyptian ones, whose chronology is better
understood. ….
Whilst
the following quote from professor Alexiou will show how the successive
palatial periods of Cretan history are to be aligned with Egypt, on the basis
of pottery finds, the problem is that Egyptian dynastic history itself has not
been properly dated, meaning that, for instance, Cretan pottery synchronous
with the era of pharaoh Thutmose [Thutmosis] III of 18th dynasty
Egypt, i.e., Neo-Palatial Cretan, will be dated about 500 years earlier than it
should be. Menzies continues:
According
to Professor [Stylianos] Alexiou:
The
absolute date in years of the various Minoan periods is based on synchronisms
with ancient Egypt, where the chronology is adequately known [sic] thanks to
the survival of inscriptions. Thus the [Cretan] Proto Palatial Period
[2000-1700 BC] is thought to be roughly contemporary with the [Egyptian] XIIth
dynasty [1991-1783 BC] because fragments of [Cretan] Kamares pottery attributed
to Middle Minoan II [c. 1800 BC] have been found at Kahun in Egypt in the
habitation refuses of a settlement found in the occasion of the erection of the
royal pyramids of this [XIIth: 1991-1783 BC] dynasty.
One
Kamares vase was also found in a contemporary tomb at Abydos [Egypt - Valley of
the Kings].
The
beginning of the Neo Palatial period [Crete -1700 BC] must coincide with the
Hyksos epoch [1640-1550] since the lid of a stone vessel bearing the cartouche
of the Hyksos Pharaoh Khyan was discovered in Middle Minoan III [c. 1700-1600
BC] levels at Knossos [Crete].
Equally
the subsequent Neo-Palatial Cretan period [1700-1400 BC] falls within the
chronological limits of the new kingdom with particular reference to the
Egyptian] XVIIIth dynasty [1550-1307 BC]: an alabaster amphora with the
cartouche of Tuthmosis III [1479-1425 BC] was found in the final palatial
period at Katsaba [Crete]. ….
“New King” of Exodus 1:8
He was the first king of Egypt’s so-called Twelfth Dynasty, namely, Amenemhet I – but now to be considered
with a whole host of Old and ‘Middle’ Kingdom alter egos, including Snofru: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sneferu
“Reused building materials found at the pyramid complex of
Amenemhat I that are thought originally to have been a depiction of the Sed festival for Sneferu”.
“Reused”, or is it that Snofru is to be identified as
Amenemhet I as I have already suggested?
Eduard Meyer, the father of the “Sothic” theory mangling,
was one (amongst many) who would deny the very existence of Moses and his
work.
We read this information in the Preface to Martin Buber’s
book, Moses (1946): “In
the year 1906 Eduard Meyer, a well-known historian, expressed the view that
Moses was not a historical personality. He further remarked”:
After all,
with the exception of those who accept tradition bag and baggage as historical
truth, not one of those who treat [Moses] as a historical reality has hitherto
been able to fill him with any kind of content whatever, to depict him as a
concrete historical figure, or to produce anything which he could have created
or which could be his historical work.
One
could reply to this that, thanks to Berlin School Meyer’s own confusing rearrangement of
Egyptian chronology, an artificial ‘Berlin Wall’ has been raised preventing
scholars from making the crossing between the text book Egyptology and a
genuine biblical history and archaeology.
Admittedly Moses - not a native Egyptian, but a Hebrew
fully educated in Egyptian wisdom (Acts 7:22): “Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was
powerful in speech and action” - has been most difficult for historians to
identify in the Egyptian records. Impossible for conventional historians
(thanks to the likes of Eduard Meyer), who will always be searching in the
wrong historico-archaeological period, but also difficult for revisionists.
According
to John D. Keyser (http://www.hope-of-israel.org/dynastyo.html):
Some say
the Israelites labored in Egypt during the 6th Dynasty; while others claim the
dynasty of the oppression was the 19th.
Still
others proclaim the 18th to be the one -- or the period of the Hyksos rulers of
Egypt!” Keyser then concludes: “By turning to the Bible and examining the works
of early historians, the dynasty of the oppression becomes very apparent to
those who are seeking the TRUTH with an open mind!
Keyser’s
theory here is sound.
However,
it turns out to be much more difficult to realise in practice.
About sixty-four (64) years are estimated to have elapsed
from the death of Joseph at age 110 to the birth of Moses.
That phase of time would help to explain why it is said
of the Pharaoh of the Oppression (Exodus 1:8): “Now
there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph”.
The great Imhotep
(Joseph) – surely this “new” pharaoh ‘knew’ of him!
The Hebrew (לֹא-יָדַע) here, translated as “did not know”, can also mean something
along the lines of ‘did not take notice of’, which is not surprising if more
than half a century had elapsed.
Moreover, as we have
already learned from the testimony of Josephus, the crown of Egypt had at this
stage passed into ‘a new family’.
Now, if I have been
correct in setting Joseph to a revised Third (Old) and Eleventh
(Middle) Egyptian phase, then the “new king” of Exodus 1:8, presumably a
dynastic founder, would likely be the first ruler of the Fourth (Old)
and the first ruler of the Twelfth (Middle) kingdom[s].
Beginning with the Fourth
Dynasty, the “new king” would be none other than Khufu (Cheops), best-known
pharaoh because of his Great Pyramid at Giza (Gizeh).
Yet, for all this, he is
surprisingly, little known.
In fact, we have only
one tiny statuette representation of pharaoh Khufu.
“Although the Great pyramid has such fame,
little is actually known about its builder, Khufu. Ironically, only a
very small statue of 9 cm has been found depicting this historic ruler.
This statue … was not found in Giza near the pyramid, but was found to the
south at the Temple of Osiris at Abydos, the ancient necropolis”. http://www.guardians.net/egypt/khufu.htm
Thus Khufu, like the
seemingly great, yet poorly known, Zoser, at the time of Joseph, is crying out
for an alter ego.
And that we get, quite
abundantly, I believe, in the person of Amenemhet [Amenemes] I, the founder of
the mighty Twelfth Dynasty, Moses’s
dynasty.
John
D. Keyser has, with this useful piece of research, arrived at the same
conclusion as mine, that Amenemhet I was the Book of Exodus’s “new king” (op.
cit.):
In the
works of Flavius Josephus (1st-century A.D. Jewish historian) we read the
following:
Now it
happened that the Egyptians grew delicate and lazy, as to painstaking; and gave
themselves up to other pleasures, and in particular to the love of gain. They
also became VERY ILL AFFECTED TOWARDS THE HEBREWS, as touched with envy at
their prosperity; for when they saw how the nation of the Israelites
flourished, and were become eminent already in plenty of wealth, which they had
acquired by their virtue and natural love of labour, they thought their
increase was to their own detriment; and having, in length of time, forgotten
the benefits they had received from Joseph, PARTICULARLY THE CROWN BEING NOW
COME INTO ANOTHER FAMILY, they became very abusive to the Israelites, and
contrived many ways of afflicting them;
FOR THEY
ENJOINED THEM TO CUT A GREAT NUMBER OF CHANNELS [CANALS] FOR THE RIVER [NILE],
AND TO BUILD WALLS FOR THEIR CITIES AND RAMPARTS, THAT THEY MIGHT RESTRAIN THE
RIVER, AND HINDER ITS WATERS FROM STAGNATING, UPON ITS RUNNING OVER ITS OWN
BANKS: THEY SET THEM ALSO TO BUILD PYRAMIDS, and by all this wore them out; and
forced them to learn all sorts of mechanical arts, and to accustom themselves
to hard labour. And FOUR HUNDRED YEARS [sic] did they spend under these
afflictions.... (Antiquities of the Jews, chap. IX, section 1).
Within
this passage from Josephus lie several CLUES that will help us to determine the
dynasty of the oppression of the Israelites.
The
Change of Rulership
Josephus
mentions that one of the reasons the Egyptians started to mistreat the
Israelites was because “THE CROWN [HAD] ... NOW COME INTO ANOTHER FAMILY.” Does
Egyptian history reveal a time when the crown of Egypt passed into the hands of
a totally unrelated family? Indeed it does!
In the
Leningrad museum lies a papyrus of the 12th DYNASTY, composed during the reign
of its FIRST KING AMENEMHET I. The papyrus is in the form of a PROPHECY
attributed to the sage Nefer-rehu of the time of King Snefru; and in it an
amazing prediction is made:
A king
shall come from the south, called AMUNY [shortened form of the name Amenemhet],
the son of a woman of Nubia, and born in Upper Egypt ....
He shall
receive the White Crown, he shall wear the Red Crown [will become ruler over
ALL Egypt]....the people of his time shall rejoice, THE SON OF SOMEONE shall
make his name for ever and ever....The Asiatics shall fall before his carnage,
and the Libyans shall fall before his flame....There shall be built the ‘WALL
OF THE PRINCE [RULER],’ and the Asiatics shall not (again) be suffered to go
down into Egypt.
Here the
NON-ROYAL DESCENT of Amenemhet I. is clearly indicated, for the phrase “son of
Someone” was a common way of designating a man of good, though not princely or
royal, birth. According to George Rawlinson: “There is NO INDICATION OF ANY
RELATIONSHIP between the kings of the twelfth and those of the eleventh
dynasty; and it is a conjecture not altogether improbable, that the Amen-em-hat
who was the FOUNDER OF THE TWELFTH DYNASTY was descended from THE FUNCTIONARY
OF THE SAME NAME, who under Mentuhotep II. [of the previous dynasty] executed
commissions of importance. At any rate, he makes NO PRETENSION TO ROYAL ORIGIN,
and the probability would seem to be that he attained the throne NOT THROUGH
ANY CLAIM OF RIGHT, but by his own personal merits. (History of Ancient
Egypt. Dodd, Mead and Co., N.Y. 1882, pp.146-147).
“His own
personal merits” probably included conspiracy: “We have to suppose that at a
given moment he CONSPIRED AGAINST HIS ROYAL MASTER [last king of the 11th
Dynasty], and perhaps after some years of confusion mounted the throne IN HIS
PLACE. A recent discovery lends colour to this hypothesis.
A Dyn.
XVIII inscription extracted from the third pylon at Karnak names after
Nebhepetre and Sankhkare a ‘GOD’S FATHER’ SENWOSRE who from his title can only
have been the NON-ROYAL PARENT of Ammenemes I [Greek form of Amenemhet].” (Egypt
of the Pharaohs, by Sir Alan Gardiner. Oxford University Press,
England. 1961, p.125).
The
inscriptions on the monuments make it clear that his elevation to the throne of
Egypt was no peaceful hereditary succession, but a STRUGGLE for the crown and
scepter that continued for some time. He fought his way to the throne, and was
accepted as king only because he triumphed over his rivals. After the fight was
ended and the towns of Egypt subdued, the new pharaoh began to extend the
borders of Egypt.
The fact
that the 12th Dynasty was a “maverick” dynasty -- one that did not conform to
the royal blood line of the pharaohs -- was well known in the 18th Dynasty.
According to information provided by the family pedigrees in several tombs of
the 18th Dynasty, and by texts engraved or painted on certain objects of a
sepulchral nature, the ANCESTOR of the royal family of this dynasty was
worshiped in the person of the old Pharaoh MENTUHOTEP OF THE 11th DYNASTY, the
57th king of the great Table of Abydos. The royal family of the 18th Dynasty
considered the dynasty of Amenemhet I. to be an aberration!
According
to Henry Brugsch: “The transmission of the PURE BLOOD of Mentuhotep to the king
Amosis (Aahmes) of the EIGHTEENTH DYNASTY was made by the hereditary princess
Aahmes-Nofertari (‘the beautiful consort of Aahmes’), who married the said
king, and whose issue was regarded as the LEGITIMATE RACE of the Pharaohs of
the house of Mentuhotep.” (A History of Egypt Under the Pharaohs.
Second edition. John Murray, London. 1881, p. 314). Thus, with the ascension of
Amenemhet I. of the 12th Dynasty, the crown had “NOW COME INTO ANOTHER FAMILY”.
….
The
implications of this choice for the “new king”, though, would likely mean that
Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty needs to be
shortened, as I have long realised.
We
also need to fill it out - as in the case of Joseph - with its Old Kingdom
‘other face’.
I
have mentioned Khufu of the Fourth
Dynasty, and shall return to him soon.
But
I find a more ready and striking alter ego for Amenemhet I in the
founder of the Sixth Dynasty, Teti.
As I have written previously:
Starting
at the beginning of the 6th dynasty, with pharaoh Teti, we have
found that he has such striking likenesses to the founder of the 12th
dynasty, Amenemhet (Amenemes) I, that I have had no hesitation in identifying
‘them’ as one. Thus I wrote in another article:
Pharaoh
Teti Reflects Amenemes I
…. These
characters may have, it seems, been dupli/triplicated due to the messy
arrangement of conventional Egyptian history.
Further
most likely links with the 6th dynasty are the likenesses between the latter’s
founder, Teti, and Amenemes I, as pointed out by historians. Despite the little
that these admit to knowing of pharaoh Teti - and the fact that they would have
him (c. 2300 BC) well pre-dating the early 12th dynasty (c. 1990 BC) -
historians have noted that pharaoh Teti shared some common features with
Amenemes I, including the same throne name, Sehetibre, the same Horus
name, Sehetep-tawy (“He who pacifies the Two Lands”), and the likelihood
that death came in similarly through assassination.
This
triplicity appears to me to be another link between the ‘Old’ and ‘Middle’
kingdoms!”
But
Amenemhet I combined with Teti - shaping up remarkably well as the “new king”
of Exodus 1:8 - may need further yet to include the alter ego of the
Fourth Dynasty’s Khufu. Though, as noted earlier, “we have only one tiny statuette
representation of pharaoh Khufu”, that one depiction of him finds a virtual
‘identical twin’ in a statue of Teti I have viewed on the Internet (presuming
that this statue has rightly been labelled as Teti’s).
….
From the 4th dynasty, we gain certain elements that are relevant to the
early career of Moses. Firstly we have a strong founder-king, Cheops (Egyptian
Khufu), builder of the great pyramid at Giza, who would be an excellent
candidate for the “new king” during the infancy of Moses who set the Israelite
slaves to work with crushing labour (Exodus 1:8). This would support the
testimony of Josephus that the Israelites built pyramids for the pharaohs, and
it would explain from whence came the abundance of manpower for pyramid
building.
Cheap
slave labour.
The
widespread presence of ‘Asiatics’ in Egypt at the time would help to explain
the large number of Israelites said to be in the land. Egypt’s ruler would have
used as slaves other Syro-Palestinians, too, plus Libyans and Nubians.
As
precious little, though, is known of Cheops, despite his being powerful enough
to have built one of the Seven Wonders of the World, we shall need to fill him
out with his 12th dynasty alter ego.
In Cheops’
daughter, Mer-es-ankh, we presumably have the Merris of tradition who
retrieved the baby Moses from the water. The name Mer-es-ankh consists
basically of two elements, Meres and ankh, the latter being the ‘life’ symbol
for Egypt worn by people even today.
Mer-es-ankh
married Chephren (Egyptian, Khafre), builder of the second Giza pyramid
and probably, of the Great Sphinx.
He would
thus have become Moses’s foster/father-in-law.
Moses, now
a thorough-going ‘Egyptian’ (cf. Exodus 2:19), must have been his loyal
subject. “Now Moses was taught all the wisdom of the Egyptians and became a man
of power both in his speech and in his actions”. (Acts 7:22) Tradition has
Moses leading armies for Chenephres as far as Ethiopia. Whilst this may seem a
bit strained in a 4th dynasty context, we shall find that it is perfectly
appropriate in a 12th dynasty one, when we uncover Chephren’s alter ego.
From the 12th
dynasty, we gain certain further elements that are relevant to the early
era of Moses. Once again we have a strong founder-king, Amenemhet I, who will
enable us to fill out the virtually unknown Cheops as the “new king” of Exodus
1:8. The reign of Amenemhet I was, deliberately, an abrupt break with the past.
The beginning of the 12th dynasty marks not only a new dynasty, but an entirely
new order.
Amenemhet
I celebrated his accession by adopting the Horus name: Wehem-Meswt (“He
who repeats births”), thought to indicate that he was “the first of a new
line”, that he was “thereby consciously identifying himself as the inaugurator
of a renaissance, or new era in his country’s history”.
Amenemhet
I is thought actually to have been a commoner, originally from southern Egypt.
I have
thought to connect him to pharaoh Khufu via the nobleman from Abydos, Khui.
“The
Prophecy of Neferti”, relating to the time of Amenemhet I, shows the same
concern in Egypt for the growing presence of Asiatics in the eastern Delta as
was said to occupy the mind of the new pharaoh of Exodus, seeing the Israelites
as a political threat (1:9): “‘Look’, [pharaoh] said to his people, ‘the
Israelites have become far too numerous for us’.”
Israel had become “too
numerous”
That
‘Asiatics’ were particularly abundant in Egypt at the time is apparent from
this information from the Cambridge Ancient History: “The Asiatic
inhabitants of the country at this period [of the Twelfth Dynasty] must have been many times more numerous than has
been generally supposed ...”. Dr David Down gives the account of Sir Flinders
Petrie who, working in the Fayyûm in 1899, made the important discovery of the
town of Illahûn [Kahun], which Petrie described as “an unaltered town of the
twelfth dynasty”.
Of the
‘Asiatic’ presence in this pyramid builders’ town, Rosalie David (Emeritus
Professor of the Egyptian branch of the Manchester Museum) has written:
It is
apparent that the Asiatics were present in the town in some numbers, and this
may have reflected the situation elsewhere in Egypt.
It can be
stated that these people were loosely classed by Egyptians as ‘Asiatics’,
although their exact home-land in Syria or Palestine cannot be determined ....
The reason for their presence in Egypt remains unclear.
Undoubtedly,
these ‘Asiatics’ were dwelling in Illahûn largely to raise pyramids for the
glory of the Egypt’s rulers.
Is there any
documentary evidence that ‘Asiatics’ in Egypt acted as slaves or servants to
the Egyptians?
“Evidence is
not lacking to indicate that these Asiatics became slaves”, Dr. Down has
written with reference to the Brooklyn Papyrus. Egyptian households at this
time were filled with Asiatic slaves, some of whom bore biblical names. Of the seventy-seven legible names of the servants of an
Egyptian woman called Senebtisi recorded on the verso of this document,
forty-eight are (like the Hebrews) NW Semitic.
In fact, the
name “Shiphrah” is identical to that borne by one of the Hebrew midwives whom
Pharaoh had commanded to kill the male babies (Exodus 1:15).
“Asian
slaves, whether merchandise or prisoners of war, became plentiful in wealthy
Egyptian households [prior to the New Kingdom]”, we read in the Encyclopaedia
Britannica.
Amenemhet I
was represented in “The Prophecy of Neferti” - as with the “new king” of Exodus
1:8 - as being the one who would set about rectifying the problem. To this end
he completely reorganised the administration of Egypt, transferring the capital
from Thebes in the south to Ithtowe in the north, just below the Nile Delta.
He allowed
those nomarchs who supported his cause to retain their power. He built on a
grand scale. Egypt was employing massive slave labour, not only in the Giza
area, but also in the eastern Delta region where the Israelites were said to
have settled at the time of Joseph.
Professor J.
Breasted provided ample evidence to show that the powerful Twelfth Dynasty pharaohs
carried out an enormous building program whose centre was in the Delta region.
More
specifically, this building occurred in the eastern Delta region which included
the very area that comprised the land of Goshen where the Israelites first
settled.
“... in the
eastern part [of the Delta], especially at Tanis and Bubastis ... massive
remains still show the interest which the Twelfth Dynasty manifested in the
Delta cities”.
Today,
archaeologists recognise the extant remains of the construction under these
kings as representing a mere fraction of the original; the major part having
been destroyed by the vandalism of the New Kingdom pharaohs (such as Ramses
II).
The Biblical
account states that: “... they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in
mortar and in brick”. (Exodus 1:14).
John
Keyser, again, has written very interestingly, in a compatibly revised context,
of the oppressive Egyptian labour demands upon the Israelite slaves, he now
incorporating Amenemhet III into the mix. Thus Keyser has written (op. cit.):
Josephus’
description of the type of labor the Israelites were forced to endure under the
new pharaoh is REMARKABLY SIMILAR to the observations of DIODORUS SICULUS, the
first-century B.C. Greek historian: Moeris ... dug a lake of remarkable
usefulness, though at a cost of INCREDIBLE TOIL. Its circumference, they say,
is 3,600 stades, its depth at most points fifty fathoms. Who, then, on
estimating the greatness of the construction, would not reasonably ask HOW MANY
TENS OF THOUSANDS OF MEN MUST HAVE BEEN EMPLOYED [?], AND HOW MANY YEARS THEY
TOOK TO FINISH THEIR WORK? No one can adequately commend the king’s design,
which brings such usefulness and advantage to all the dwellers in Egypt.
Since the
Nile kept NO DEFINITE BOUNDS in its rising, and the fruitfulness of the country
depended upon the river’s regularity, THE KING DUG THE LAKE TO ACCOMMODATE THE
SUPERFLUOUS WATER, SO THAT THE RIVER SHOULD NEITHER, WITH ITS STRONG CURRENT,
FLOOD THE LAND UNSEASONABLY AND FORM SWAMPS AND FENS, nor, by rising less than
was advantageous, damage the crops by lack of water. BETWEEN THE RIVER AND THE
LAKE HE CONSTRUCTED A CANAL 80 STADES IN LENGTH AND 300 FEET IN BREADTH.
Through this canal, at times he admitted the water of the river, at other times
he excluded it, thus providing the farmers with water at fitting times by
opening the inlet and again closing it scientifically and at great expense. — The
Pyramids of Egypt, by I.E.S. Edwards. Viking Press, London. 1986, pp.
234-235.
These
engineering marvels are noted by author J. P. Lepre: “Amenemhat III is also
credited with the mighty engineering feat of constructing the irrigation canal
now known as the Bahr Yusif, and of using this canal to REGULATE THE FLOW OF
WATER FROM THE NILE to Lake Fayum during the flood season.
This water
was held there by sluices, and later let out again, at will, back to the
section of the Nile from Assyout down to the Mediterranean Sea, REGULATING THE
HEIGHT OF THE RIVER in that area during the dry season. This irrigation system
was the PROTOTYPE for the modern High Aswan Dam.”
Although
Amenemhat III was involved in several great engineering works, the Bahr Yusif
endeavor is of special note. For here, two 20-mile long dykes -- one straight
and the other semicircular -- were constructed so as to aid in the ADJUSTMENT
OF THE WATER LEVEL through the use of sluices, and to reclaim 20,000 acres of
farmland by enriching the soil." (The Egyptian Pyramids.
McFarland and Company, Inc. Jefferson, N.C. 1990, pp. 217-218).
Obviously,
both Josephus and Diodorus Siculus are talking about THE SAME construction
project carried out during the reign of AMENEMHET III. OF THE 12TH DYNASTY!
Emptied of all meaning
As earlier
observed: The “new king” of Exodus 1:8 would have seen all
around him evidence of the massive infrastructural project that Joseph had
enjoined upon the Egyptians to construct in anticipation of a Famine yet years
away: large, temporary dams, waterways and canals, and vast enclosures for
grain storage. And he would learn from much of it.
In many ways, the régime of the New King of Egypt has parallels with our
own times.
Technologically, he would improve on Joseph’s infrastructure to an
extent that even the dreamer, Joseph, would not have envisaged.
It helped that he had a veritable army of enslaved workers, unlimited
manpower.
Joseph, too,
had governed Egypt with a firm hand.
But what he
built at least had a vital purpose and meaning.
It was
Joseph, as Imhotep, who had built the first pyramid, the fabulous Step Pyramid
at Saqqara.
But this marvellous
structure was not raised as a boost to his, or to Pharaoh’s, ego.
No, it had
Divine significance. Had not Joseph’s father, Jacob, had a dream-vision of a
Staircase to Heaven (Genesis 28:12)!
“The Old
Kingdom pharaohs believed that death was the beginning
of eternal
life. To help them on their way they built pyramids;
huge ramps or
stairways … leading directly to the sky”.
Joyce A. Tyldesley
The New King
saw this – how could he miss it? – and decided to ‘improve’ upon it to satisfy
his megalomaniacal spirit.
He also
introduced some incredible technological advancements to Joseph’s waterways, to
the Bahr Yusef (Joseph’s Canal), quite forgetting the reason as to why
these had been developed in the first place. For he had no need of Israel’s
God.
In like
fashion do our technological experts raise hideous monuments of egotism
reaching to the skies, devoid of any spiritual association. Even the heavens
are emptied of their meaning, being replaced with mathematics and the so-called
Laws of Nature.
Building “Pithom and Ramses”
Mention
of a store city named “Rameses” in Exodus 1:11 has led to the prevailing
opinion today that Ramses II ‘the Great’ belonged to the era of Moses.
But
this name is quite an anachronism, being added later by an editor who must have
lived when the name of the city had been changed by Ramses II to “Rameses”.
John
Keyser continues:
Historians
in pursuit of the Era of Oppression of the Israelites have spent much time and
consideration pondering the crucial geographical information as provided in
Exodus 1:11: “So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced
labour, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh”.
Lacking
here, but no doubt crucial, is the extra piece of information supplied by the
Septuagint version of this verse, that the Israelites also built On
(Heliopolis): “And he set over them task-masters, who should afflict them in
their works; and they built strong cities for Pharao, both Pitho, and Ramesses,
and On, which is Heliopolis”.
Apart
from the Era of Moses involving the Fourth,
Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth Egyptian
dynasties, we also need to add the Thirteenth,
based on some known correspondences of its officials with the Twelfth
Dynasty.
Dr. Donovan Courville has provided these useful, when
writing of the Turin list which gives the names of the Thirteenth Dynasty
officials (“On the Survival of Veliovsky’s Thesis in ‘Ages in Chaos”, pp.
67-68):
The thirteenth name [Turin list] (Ran-sen-eb) was a known
courtier in the time of Sesostris III …”.
“The fourteenth name (Autuabra) was found inside a jar
sealed with the seal of Amenemhat III …. How could this be, except with this
Autuabra … becoming a contemporary of Amenemhat III? The explanations employed
to evade such contemporaneity are pitiful compared with the obvious acceptance
of the matter”.
“The sixteenth name (RaSo-khemkhutaui) leaves a long list
of named slaves, some Semitic-male, some Semitic-female.
One of these has the name Shiphra, the same name as the
mid-wife who served at the time of Moses’ birth …. [Exodus 1:15].
RaSo-khemkhutaui … lived at the time of Amenemhat III.
This
Amenemhet (Amenemes) so-called III, as we pick up from reading about him in N.
Grimal’s book (A History of Ancient Egypt, 1994), was a particularly
strong ruler, renowned for massive projects involving water storage and
channelling on a gargantuan scale. He is credited with diverting much of the
Nile flow into the Fayuum depression to create what became known as lake Moeris
(the lake Nasser project of his time).
The grim-faced depictions of the 12th dynasty kings,
Amenemhet III and Sesostris III, have been commented upon by conventional and
revisionist scholars alike.
Cambridge Ancient History has noted
with regard to the former …: “The numerous portraits of [Amenemhet] III include
a group of statues and sphinxes from Tanis and the Faiyûm, which, from their
curiously brutal style and strange accessories, were once thought to be
monuments of the Hyksos kings.”
For revisionists, these pharaohs can - and rightly so -
represent the cruel taskmasters who forced the Israelites to build using bricks
mixed with straw (Exodus 5:7, 8).
In fact, this very combination of materials can clearly
be seen, for example, in Amenemhet III’s Dahshur pyramid.
Amenemhet III, according to Grimal …:
… was respected and honoured from Kerma to Byblos and
during his reign numerous eastern workers, from peasants to soldiers and
craftsmen came to Egypt. This influx of foreign workers resulted both from the
growth in Egyptian influence abroad and from the need for extra workmen to help
exploit the valuable resources of Egypt itself. For forty-five years
[Amenemhet] III ruled a country that had reached a peak of prosperity … and the
exploitation of the Faiyûm went hand in hand with the development of irrigation
and an enormous growth in mining and quarrying activities.
The Faiyûm was a huge oasis, about 80 km S.W. of Memphis,
which offered the prospect of a completely new area of cultivable land. Exodus
1:14 tells of the Israelite slaves doing “all kinds of work in the fields.”
Mining and quarrying also, apparently, would have been
part of the immense slave-labour effort. Grimal continues …:
In the Sinai region the exploitation of the turquoise and
copper mines reached unprecedented heights: between the ninth and forty-fifth
years of [Amenemhet III’s] reign no less than forty-nine texts were inscribed
at Serabit el-Khadim ….
The seasonal encampments of the miners were transformed
into virtually permanent settlements, with houses, fortifications, wells or
cisterns, and even cemeteries.
The temple of Hathor at Serabit el-Khadim was enlarged ….
The expeditions to quarries elsewhere in Egypt also proliferated ….
Amenemhet III was, it seems, a complete dictator … (my
emphasis):
The economic activity formed the basis for the numerous
building works that make the reign of [Amenemhet] III one of the summits of
state absolutism.
Excavations at Biahmu revealed two colossal granite
statues of the seated figure of [Amenemes] III …. Above all, he built himself
two [sic] pyramids, one at Dahshur and the other at Hawara…. Beside the Hawara
pyramid were found the remains of his mortuary temple, which Strabo described
as the Labyrinth. ….
From
the birth of Moses to the Exodus 80 years later, the Twelfth Dynasty rulers sorely oppressed Israel, beginning with an
infanticide that King Herod in Jerusalem would later emulate.
King
Solomon tells - in what could also be a wake-up call for our own times - how
Egypt paid for this cruel “decree of infanticide” (Wisdom 11:5-16, emphasis
added):
Thus, what had served to punish their enemies became a
benefit for them in their difficulties.
Whereas their enemies had only the ever-flowing source of
a river fouled with mingled blood and mud, to punish them for
their decree of infanticide, you gave your people, against all hope, water in
abundance, once you had shown by the thirst that they were
experiencing how severely you were punishing their enemies.
From their own ordeals, which were only loving
correction, they realised how an angry sentence was tormenting the godless; for you had tested your own as a father admonishes, but the others
you had punished as a pitiless king condemns, and, whether far
or near, they were equally afflicted.
For a double sorrow seized on them, and a groaning at the
memory of the past; when they learned that the punishments they were receiving
were beneficial to the others, they realised it was the Lord, while for the man
whom long before they had exposed and later mockingly rebuffed, they felt only
admiration when all was done, having suffered a thirst so different from that
of the upright.
For their foolish and wicked notions which led them
astray into worshipping mindless reptiles and contemptible beetles, you sent a
horde of mindless animals to punish them and to teach them that the agent of
sin is the agent of punishment”.
Conclusion
Finally,
applying our configuration to the Twelfth Dynasty, and using the
semi-mythological Sinuhe as (a garbled later version of) Moses, we lack
here only a “Merris”:
1. Amenemhet
(I-IV) as Founder; 2. Sinuhe as Moses, escaping Egypt from a wrathful 3.
Sesostris (I-III) Neferkare (“Chenephres”); the dynasty concluding with
4. the female pharaoh, Sobeknefrure.
