My guess is that the majority of Hebrew bible scholars today would be open to at least part of what became Israel escaping from Egyptian slavery in the thirteenth-century BCE, with a sizeable minority arguing that the exodus account is more or less wholly fictive, and a very small minority insisting on an exodus much like that described in the book of Exodus occurring in the fifteenth-century. With this in mind, I recently read Gary Rendsburg's argument that even the thirteenth-century is too early for the exodus, and that rather we should date it to the twelfth-century (Rendsburg initially presented this argument in a 1992 paper in Vetus Testamentum, and conveniently presented it again just this year for a popular audience in Five Views on the Exodus). More specifically, he argues that the exodus occurred under Ramesses III, who reigned from c. 1186 through to 1155 BCE. A twelfth-century exodus faces a real, quite significant empirical challenge, however, as we have something called the Merneptah stele which 1) refers to Israel, 2) alongside Canaan, 3) in approximately 1207 BCE. On the basis of this stele, probably the majority of biblical scholars (perhaps even most) would suppose that an entity known as Israel, and which in some fashion is related to the biblical Israel, existed in the southern Levant before the twelfth century. On Rendsburg's dating for the exodus, Israel did not enter the land until after the Merneptah stele was composed. How does he deal with this?
Before I address Rendsburg's handling of the Merneptah stele, I would like to note that apart from this there is much to commend a twelfth-century date for the exodus. Rendsburg's argument begins by paying close attention to the biblical text. Famously, 1 Kings 6:1 states that the exodus occurred 480 years before Solomon ordered work to begin on the temple in Jerusalem. This is the primary evidence cited by those who argue for a fifteenth-century BCE exodus: the work on Solomon's temple can be dated to c. 966, and since 1446 is 480 years earlier ultra-literalists date the exodus to exactly 1446. This is problematic on multiple levels. For instance, is a nice, round number such as 480 years meant to be the exact number of years? I might well say that the First World War was a hundred years ago, but of course that's not exactly the case—"a hundred" is simply a quick short-hand to give a sense of how long ago the war was. And as Rendsburg notes, there are yet further problems. For instance, Ruth 4:18–22 provides a genealogy from Perez, son of Judah, to David. This genealogy indicates that David's great-great-great-grandfather is one Nahshon, son of Amminidab. Now, Nahshon, son of Amminidab is named in Numbers 1:7 as a leader of the tribe of Judah. Presumably, this is meant to be the same man, and as such Numbers presents him as a member of the "wilderness" generation, i.e. the generation after that of the exodus. His father, Amminidab, is likewise presented as active around the time of the exodus, as his daughter marries Aaron, Moses' brother (cf. Exodus 6:23). Now, David is Solomon's father, and thus Ruth presents Solomon as six generations removed from Nahshon. As Nahshon is a member of the wilderness generation and his father active at or around the time of the exodus, Solomon would be about seven generations removed from the exodus. Unless each of the men in this genealogy fathered the next at around seventy years of age, we are probably looking at less than 480 years between the time of the exodus and the founding of the temple. Similarly, Aaron's grandson, Phinehas, appears as a character in Judges 20:28—and also appears in Numbers 25:7, 11 and 31:6. This would seem to suggest that the biblical authors understood that there were yet members of the wilderness generation—the forty years after the exodus—alive at the time of the judges (and this despite the fact that Judges 11:26 indicates that Israel had already been in the land of Canaan for three centuries). The reality is that although 1 Kings 6:1 states that the exodus occurred 480 years before the founding of Solomon's temple, once one gets into the weeds and really, carefully reads the biblical texts it seems that the temporal distance was considerably shorter. The strength of Rendsburg's hypothesis lies in such careful attention to the biblical texts.
Rendsburg's twelfth-century exodus would certainly be closer to seven generations before the founding of the temple than is a fifteenth-century exodus. It would probably be closer than a thirteenth-century exodus, insofar as a thirteen-century exodus is usually placed in the earlier half of that century (and thus upwards of three centuries before the temple was founded; generations of perhaps forty to fifty years are more plausible than generations of eighty years, but still seem on the high side). Still, a thirteenth-century exodus would on the data generated by David's genealogy remain viable. Nonetheless, there are other advantages to Rendsburg's date. A notable one is the absence of interaction with Egyptian forces in either Joshua or Judges. The Egyptians dominated Canaan through the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries. With either a fifteenth or a thirteenth century exodus, Israel would presumably have been in regular contact with either Egyptian forces and rulers or Egyptian client states. Yet, there is no hint of this in our texts. Rendsburg's hypothesis readily accounts for this, as by the time of Ramesses III (r. 1186–1155)—the pharaoh of the exodus, according to Rendsburg—Egypt had abandoned Canaan. Rendsburg thus elegantly explains why Israel does not have to deal with Egyptian suzerainty over Canaan: by the time of the exodus, there was no Egyptian suzerainty over Canaan. Further, the general decline of the Egyptian empire in the twelfth-century—part of the broader phenomena known as the Late Bronze Age Collapse—seems an ideal time for a large group of slaves to leave Egypt and to successfully enter a Canaan whose city-states were themselves receding in power. Thus far, Rendsburg makes a very strong case.
But the Merneptah stele. What to do about that? Again, on Rendsburg's hypothesis, it refers to Israel alongside Canaan before Israel entered Canaan. He offers two possible explanations, neither of which seem overly compelling. The first is that the Merneptah stele actually refers to Israel while they are still enslaved in Egypt, and that Israel is mentioned next to Canaan because Egyptians knew the Israelites to have come from in or around Canaan. There is admittedly an attraction to this. The stele says that "Israel has been laid waste and his seed is not." This reminds one tantalizingly of pharaoh's order to kill newly born Israelite males in Exodus 1:15–16. Nonetheless, all the other enemies mentioned in the stele—and there are many—seem to be enemies external to the land of Egypt. It seems a bit odd that Israel would be an exception here. Rendsburg alternatively suggests that only part of the entity known as Israel was enslaved in Egypt, and that another part remained in Canaan—and it is to this that the Merneptah stele refers. Although Rendsburg does not prefer this explanation, it actually seems the stronger of the two. It fits well with hypotheses which hold that the "exodus group" which came up from Egypt only constituted part of what became Israel. This allows for the possibility that something called Israel existed in Canaan c. 1207 BCE, and only later was joined by those who escaped from Egypt in the exodus. Nonetheless, the biblical texts suggest that all Israel was enslaved in Egypt, which is something of a problem given the extent to which Rendsburg presents his argument as the one most congruent with the biblical data. At the very least, one would have to admit that like most hypotheses that seek to bring together the various biblical and extra-biblical data, this one cannot fully account for every single relevant datum. (A third alternative—which Rendsburg does not consider but is worth mentioning—is that the Merneptah stele refers not to Israel at all. This is mentioned because some have argued that it refers rather to Jezreel. This reading of the stele however seems to be rejected by the overwhelming majority of Egyptologists).
Jens Schröter has said with specific reference to historical Jesus studies that "[t]he sources themselves do not yield history; they have, however, a 'power of veto' with respect to interpretations that are not possible" (From Jesus to the New Testament, p. 19). Perhaps the Merneptah stele's great strength is precisely such a veto. The stele itself tells us little more than the fact that by c. 1207 BCE Egypt knew of something most likely called Israel, and moreover knew to associate it closely with Canaan. It does not otherwise establish the history of this Israel. It does however limit the interpretations that might be built on the basis of other material. And as attractive as Rendsburg's twelfth-century exodus might otherwise be, it feels as if the Merneptah stele might very well be exercising its veto power here.
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