These posts are in reverse chronological order, with newest first.
Three thousand years ago, Semitic tribes shifted from an agricultural calendar based on the flood and ebb of the Nile in Egypt to periods of rain and intense heat in the Land of Israel. How did they all manage to get on the same page of the calendar? And did the change help them stick together over the millennia?
Calendars and Culture Read More »
The unforgiving desert of Saudi Arabia has had periods of lushness. Did the Israelites flee Pharaoh just as the wilderness was greening? Do we still remember the Exodus because of an extraordinary series of lucky breaks? And how will we remember the extraordinary events we are living through today?
Little is known about how people sang, played, and danced to music at the time of the Exodus. So what’s a writer who needs a Spotify playlist to do? The answer: search for and find one of the best world musics you’ve never heard of. It’s called Gnawa.
The Music of Exodus Read More »
Being a teen is rough these days. But it was undoubtedly rougher for Israelites about to become a slave to Pharaoh in Egypt.
The Brink of Slavery Read More »
Fun fact: No camels were used during the Exodus. The “ships of the desert” only came into wide use centuries later. But what was it really like for Israelites to live as slaves in ancient Egypt, and what skills did they need to survive once they’d escaped? The modern nomads of the Levant, the Bedouin, provide some clues.
How to Escape from Pharaoh Read More »
Aboriginal oral histories in Australia may be accurate to 13,000 years ago, say researchers. So does that mean the most boring parts of the Hebrew Bible, the endless genealogical lists or “begats,” are the most historically accurate?
Generations, centuries, millennia Read More »
There are three versions of the Ten Commandments in the Hebrew Bible, and the two variants in the book of Exodus have almost nothing in common. This makes the bedrock of belief in one god a flagrant example of the Bible’s internal contradictions. But there’s a deeper lesson here, and it’s not about how theft and murder are bad. It’s about the origins, and the actual age, of the Bible text itself.
Conditional Commandments Read More »
A toxic algae bloom in a primary water source causes a mass die-off of amphibians, attracting insects that become vectors of disease. Changes in weather patterns bring on freak storms and an explosion of vermin, wiping out crops and livestock. The government responds to criticism with crackdowns, worsening the overall disaster. And finally, a deadly food-borne illness turns a joyful holiday into a national calamity.
All of this could be in our future. But could it also be what happened almost five thousand years ago, when the Book of Exodus tells us the plagues came to Egypt?
Was the Mountain of God a volcano? The description in the Hebrew Bible is consistent with one: There’s billowing smoke, an earthquake, and trumpet blasts followed by silence. Consensus is building among scholars that Mt. Sina’i erupted.
The Mountain of God Read More »
Hi, I’m Bonnie J. Gordon, and this is my Google Earth flyover for the route the Israelites might have taken as they fled from Pharaoh in Egypt in the biblical stories of the Exodus.
Narration for Exodus Route Flyover Read More »