Bible Myths and their Parallels in other Religions Part 13

The author of "The Spirit History of Man," says:

"The Hebrews came out of Egypt and settled among the Canaanites. _They need not be traced beyond the Exodus. That is their historical beginning._ It was very easy to cover up this remote event by the recital of mythical traditions, and to prefix to it an account of their origin in which the G.o.ds (Patriarchs), should figure as their ancestors."[54:2]

Professor Goldzhier says:

"The residence of the Hebrews in Egypt, and their exodus thence under the guidance and training of an enthusiast for the freedom of his tribe, form a series of strictly historical facts, which find confirmation even in the doc.u.ments of ancient Egypt (which we have just shown). But the traditional narratives of these events (were) _elaborated by the Hebrew people_."[54:3]

Count de Volney also observes that:

"What Exodus says of their (the Israelites) servitude under the king of Heliopolis, and of the oppression of their hosts, the Egyptians, is extremely probable. _It is here their history begins. All that precedes . . . is nothing but mythology and cosmogony._"[54:4]

In speaking of the sojourn of the Israelites in Egypt, Dr. Knappert says:

"According to the tradition preserved in Genesis, it was the promotion of Jacob's son, Joseph, to be viceroy of Egypt, that brought about the migration of the sons of Israel from Canaan to Goshen. The story goes that this Joseph was sold as a slave by his brothers, and after many changes of fortune received the vice-regal office at Pharaoh's hands through his skill in interpreting dreams. Famine drives his brothers--and afterwards his father--to him, and the Egyptian prince gives them the land of Goshen to live in. _It is by imagining all this that the legend tries to account for the fact that Israel pa.s.sed some time in Egypt._ But we must look for the real explanation in a migration of certain tribes which could not establish or maintain themselves in Canaan, and were forced to move further on.

"We find a pa.s.sage in Flavius Josephus, from which it appears that in Egypt, too, a recollection survived of the sojourn of some foreign tribes in the north-eastern district of the country. For this writer gives us two fragments out of a lost work by Manetho, a priest, who lived about 250 B. C. In one of these we have a statement that pretty nearly agrees with the Israelitish tradition about a sojourn in Goshen. _But the Israelites were looked down on by the Egyptians as foreigners, and they are represented as lepers and unclean._ Moses himself is mentioned by name, and we are told that he was a priest and joined himself to these _lepers_ and gave them laws."[55:1]

To return now to the story of the Red Sea being divided to let Moses and his followers pa.s.s through--of which we have already seen one counterpart in the legend related of Bacchus and his army pa.s.sing through the same sea dry-shod--there is another similar story concerning Alexander the Great.

The histories of Alexander relate that the Pamphylian Sea was divided to let him and his army pa.s.s through. Josephus, after speaking of the Red Sea being divided for the pa.s.sage of the Israelites, says:

"For the sake of those who accompanied Alexander, king of Macedonia, who yet lived comparatively but a little while ago, the Pamphylian Sea retired and offered them a pa.s.sage through itself, when they had no other way to go . . . _and this is confessed to be true by all who have written about the actions of Alexander_."[55:2]

He seems to consider both legends of the same authority, quoting the latter to substantiate the former.

"Callisthenes, who himself accompanied Alexander in the expedition,"

"wrote, how the Pamphylian Sea did not only open a pa.s.sage for Alexander, but, rising and elevating its waters, did pay him homage as its king."[55:3]

It is related in Egyptian mythology that Isis was at one time on a journey with the eldest child of the king of Byblos, when coming to the river Phdrus, which was in a "rough air," and wishing to cross, she commanded the stream to be _dried up_. This being done she crossed without trouble.[56:1]

There is a _Hindoo_ fable to the effect that when the infant Crishna was being sought by the reigning tyrant of Madura (King Kansa)[56:2] his foster-father took him and departed out of the country. Coming to the river Yumna, and wishing to cross, it was divided for them by the Lord, and they pa.s.sed through.

The story is related by Thomas Maurice, in his "History of Hindostan,"

who has taken it from the _Bhagavat Pooraun_. It is as follows:

"Yasodha took the child Crishna, and carried him off (from where he was born), but, coming to the river Yumna, directly opposite to Gokul, Crishna's father perceiving the current to be very strong, it being in the midst of the rainy season, and not knowing which way to pa.s.s it, Crishna commanded the water to give way on both sides to his father, _who accordingly pa.s.sed dry-footed, across the river_."[56:3]

This incident is ill.u.s.trated in Plate 58 of Moore's "Hindu Pantheon."

There is another Hindoo legend, recorded in the _Rig Veda_, and quoted by Viscount Amberly, from whose work we take it,[56:4] to the effect that an Indian sage called Visvimati, having arrived at a river which he wished to cross, that holy man said to it: "Listen to the Bard who has come to you from afar with wagon and chariot. Sink down, become fordable, and reach not up to our chariot axles." The river answers: "I will bow down to thee like a woman with full breast (suckling her child), as a maid to a man, will I throw myself open to thee."

This is accordingly done, and the sage pa.s.ses through.

We have also an Indian legend which relates that a courtesan named Bindumati, _turned back the streams of the river Ganges_.[56:5]

We see then, that the idea of seas and rivers being divided for the purpose of letting some chosen one of G.o.d pa.s.s through is an old one peculiar to other peoples beside the Hebrews, and the probability is that many nations had legends of this kind.

That Pharaoh and his host should have been drowned in the Red Sea, and the fact not mentioned by any historian, is simply impossible, especially when they have, as we have seen, noticed the fact of the Israelites being driven out of Egypt.[56:6] Dr. Inman, speaking of this, says:

"We seek in vain amongst the Egyptian hieroglyphs for scenes which recall such cruelties as those we read of in the Hebrew records; and in the writings which have hitherto been translated, we find nothing resembling the wholesale destructions described and applauded by the Jewish historians, as perpetrated by their own people."[57:1]

That Pharaoh should have pursued a tribe of diseased slaves, _whom he had driven out of his country_, is altogether improbable. In the words of Dr. Knappert, we may conclude, by saying that:

"_This story, which was not written until more than five hundred years after the exodus itself, can lay no claim to be considered historical_."[57:2]

FOOTNOTES:

[48:1] Exodus i. 14.

[48:2] Exodus ii. 24, 25.

[48:3] See chapter x.

[48:4] Exodus ii. 12.

[48:5] The Egyptian name for G.o.d was "_Nuk-Pa-Nuk_," or "I AM THAT I AM." (Bonwick: Egyptian Belief, p. 395.) This name was found on a temple in Egypt. (Higgins' Anacalypsis, vol. ii. p. 17.) "'I AM' was a Divine name understood by all the initiated among the Egyptians." "The 'I AM'

of the Hebrews, and the 'I AM' of the Egyptians are identical." (Bunsen: Keys of St. Peter, p. 38.) The name "_Jehovah_," which was adopted by the Hebrews, was a name esteemed sacred among the Egyptians. They called it Y-HA-HO, or Y-AH-WEH. (See the Religion of Israel, pp. 42, 43; and Anacalypsis, vol. i. p. 329, and vol. ii. p. 17.) "None dare to enter the temple of Serapis, who did not bear on his breast or forehead the name of JAO, or J-HA-HO, a name almost equivalent in sound to that of the Hebrew _Jehovah_, and probably of identical import; and no name was uttered in Egypt with more reverence than this IAO." (Trans. from the Ger. of Schiller, in Monthly Repos., vol. xx.; and Voltaire: _Commentary on Exodus_; Higgins' Anac., vol. i. p. 329; vol. ii. p. 17.) "That this divine name was well-known to the _Heathen_ there can be no doubt."

(Parkhurst: Hebrew Lex. in Anac., i. 327.) So also with the name _El Shaddai_. "The extremely common Egyptian expression _Nutar Nutra_ exactly corresponds in sense to the Hebrew _El Shaddai_, the very t.i.tle by which G.o.d tells Moses he was known to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob."

(Prof. Renouf: Relig. of Anc't Egypt, p. 99.)

[48:6] Exodus iii. 1, 14.

[49:1] Exodus iii. 15-18.

[49:2] Exodus iii. 19-22. Here is a command from the Lord to _deceive_, and _lie_, and _steal_, which, according to the narrative, was carried out to the letter (Ex. xii. 35, 36); and yet we are told that this _same Lord_ said: "_Thou shalt not steal._" (Ex. xx. 15.) Again he says: "_That shalt not defraud thy neighbor, neither rob him._" (Leviticus xix. 18.) Surely this is inconsistency.

[49:3] Exodus iv. 19, 20.

[49:4] Exodus iv. 10.

[49:5] Exodus iv. 16.

[49:6] Exodus v. 3.

[50:1] Exodus vii. 35-37. Bishop Colenso shows, in his Pentateuch Examined, how ridiculous this statement is.

[50:2] Exodus xiii. 20, 21.

[50:3] "The sea over which Moses stretches out his hand with the staff, and which he divides, so that the waters stand up on either side like walls while he pa.s.ses through, must surely have been originally the Sea of Clouds. . . . A German story presents a perfectly similar feature.

The conception of the cloud as sea, rock and wall, recurs very frequently in mythology." (Prof. Steinthal: The Legend of Samson, p.

429.)

[51:1] Exodus xiv. 5-13.

[51:2] Orpheus is said to have been the earliest poet of Greece, where he first introduced the rites of Bacchus, which he brought from Egypt.

(See Roman Antiquities, p. 134.)