* ^\>t^^^ ^t \U IHcotogtar j^p '*%, PRINCETON, N. J. % Shelf Division JZ) J>^ O 1 1 Section \.AC3r...d.J.4CL. Number I O^ O S A.E. Jahu-sttm EdiniurgllSiloruiDlL. THE BIBLE BY MODERN LIGHT AN ENTIRELY NEW EDITION, LARGELY RE-WRITTEN, OF 'HOURS WITH THE BIBLE' BY TcV^y\ CUNNINGHAM GEIKIE, D.D., LL.D. Edin. LATE VICAR OF ST. MARTIN AT PALACE, NORWICH MOSES TO THE JUDGES ILLUSTRATED LONDON JAMES NISBET & CO., 21 BERNERS STREET 1894 CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. The Land of Goshen 1-34 II. Egypt before the Hebrew Sojourn . . . 35- 76 III. The Oppression in Egypt 77-113 IV. Moses 114-141 V. The Plaques of Egypt 143-177 VI. The Tenth Plague and the Exodus . . . 178-214 VII. The March to Sinai 215-256 VIII. Still on the way to Sinai 257-295 IX. At Sinai 296-820 X. Still at Sinai 321-348 XI. The Wilderness 349-385 XII. The Eve of the Conquest 386-428 XIII. The Conquest of Canaan ...... 429-504 XIV. The Time of the Judges 505-525 XV. The Judges 526-555 XVI. Gideon to Samson 556-580 Index 581 . THE BIBLE BY MODERN LICxHT CHAPTER I. THE LAND OF GOSHEX. The district of Egypt ' which was to be the cradle of the Hebrew nation, lay on its north-east frontier, and was thus at once nearest Canaan, from which their fathers had come, and most isolated from the Egyptian population, to whom the presence of foreign nomadic shepherds ^ was at all times distasteful. Shepherd races allied to the Hebrews had, moreover, already largely settled in it, and were thus, virtually, a protection to the side of the Nile valley lying open towards Asia, which had no other safeguard than the fortified wall between Suez and the Mediterranean. The precise position of Goshen is not mentioned in the Bible, but it is certain, on various grounds, that it lay as above stated. Thus, Joseph^s brethren were required to halt, on entering it, till Pharaoh had been seen and had expressed his pleasure concerning them ; and there is no mention of the Nile having been passed to reach it, or of the Hebrews having re-crossed that river at the Exodus.^ They were, 1 Lengerke derives Egypt from Sanscrit. Aguptas = "The protected." Kenaan, p. 351, 2 The Co.ptic word for shepherd means also a ' ' disgrace." Dictionary of the Bible, art. " Goshen." The Copts are the descendants of the ancient Egyptians. ' Other proofs are given in Durch Gosen^ pp. 505 fE. VOL. IL-l 1 2 THE LAN'D OF GOSHEN. moreover, near the Red Sea, for a few marches brought them to it. Further, the Egyptian ''nome'' or district Qeseni — a name almost identical with Gesen or Gesem, used for Goshen in the Greek version — in the region otherwise suggested as that assigned to Jacob and his tribe, lay on the north-east of the country. According to Ebers,' the limits of this tract stretched southwards in a narrow tongue, almost to the present Cairo, on the west side of the Tanitic branch of the Nile, which formed, in fact, its western boundary to the sea. On the soutli, on the other hand, it bent north-eastwardly from Cairo to the line of the present Suez Canal, which, however, it presently crossed, reaching the Mediterranean at Pelu- sium, where the ancient fortified wall from Suez abutted on the shore. But any exact knowledge of the boundaries is perhaps, as yet, impossible, if we may judge from the con- troversy respecting them.^ The latest conclusions on this point identify the present village of Saft-el Henneh, on the south side of the railway from Cairo to Ismailia, about half way between Zagazig, once Bubastis, and Tel el Kebir, with Phacusa, the ancient capital of Goshen. The Greek Bible calls the Hebrew district ^' Gesen of Arabia, ^'' that is, of the political division of the Delta known as the '^^nome of Arabia. ^^ The Egyp- tian name of Phacusa would be ^^ Pa Kes," the "^^ temple of Kes,^^ a name twice found on the shrine of the sanctuary of Saft-el Henneh by M. E. Naville. In ^'Phacusa" the second half, '' cusa/' is believed to be identical with the first syllable of Goshen, spelt, in Greek, " Gesen, '^ which is similar to ^' Kes '' in the Egyptian " Pa Kes,^^ the native 1 Map in Durch Gosen^ p. 72. 2 Ebers, Durch Oosen, pp. 503 ff. Brugsch, History of Egypt, vol. ii. p. 339. THE LAKD OF GOSHEIT. 3^ name of Phacusa. The district first assigned to the Hebrews is believed by M. Naville, on the strong ground of the result of careful exploration of the local remains, to have been the country round Saft, within the triangle formed by the villages of Saft, Belbeis, and Tel el Kebir. The belief of Ebers and Brugsch that the village of Fakoos was Phacusa, is rejected by M. Naville from the want of correspondence between its site and the requirements of the position of the real Phacusa, as indicated by ancient notices. The name, indeed, is similar, but there are other cases in which the same name is used of two places by our- selves. The part given to Joseph's brethren was, appar- ently, only a centre from which they spread, and became equivalent to the wider tract known in the Greek Bible as the " land of Rameses." When the Hebrews settled in Egypt under the last Hyksos kings, Goshen seems, from in- cidental peculiarities of ancient lists and descriptions of the divisions of the country, to have been, as yet, uncultivated, and neither divided among Egyptians, nor regularly settled and governed : a tract of waste land, we may suppose, suffi- ciently watered to produce good pasturage, and capable, through industry, to be in the end exceptionally fertile. From its position and state it could thus be assigned to for- eigners without despoiling the native population. Phacusa, M. Naville thinks identical with the city of Rameses, but hesitates to regard this as established. ' Goshen is praised by Pharaoh, in the audience granted to Joseph,^ as ranking with the best of the land, which implies its extreme fertility ; but it must also have been well suited for pasture. Long neglect has now reduced it to a barren ' Goshen and Saft-d Hemieh, by Ed. Naville, etc., pp. 14-20. Egyptian Explora- tioa Society. a Gen. xlvli. 6, 11. 4 THE LAND OF GOSHEN. desert of sand and loose stone, powdered with a salt efflores- cence from the soil ; but the proof of its ancient richness is seen along the banks of the fresh-water canal, led by Lesseps from the Nile to the great Suez Canal. I have repeatedly travelled by the railway which runs alongside of it, and found that, alike at the stations where we stopped and throughout the whole journey, wherever water reaches, by irrigation from this, Goshen blossoms into wild beauty,^ showing that moisture alone is needed to make the whole landscape a succession of luxuriant meadows and golden cornfields. Nothing could better illustrate the force of Napoleon^s remark that, under a good government, the Nile invades the Desert, but under a bad one the Desert invades the Nile. Thus the ^ Afield of Zoan," that is, the country round about the city of Rameses-Tanis, in this region — a district an- ciently so fertile and ^^ well-watered " as to recall to the Hebrews the glories of the garden of Eden " — is now a deso- late sandy plain, covered with gigantic ruins of columns, pillars, sphinxes, and stones of buildings. By a singular good fortune, a letter of an Egyptian scribe has been pre- served, which describes it as it was in the time of the Hebrew oppression. ^'1 arrived,^'' says the writer, ^' at the city of Rameses-Tanis, and found it a very charming place, with which nothing in or around Thebes can compare. The seat of the court is here. It is pleasant to live in. Its fields are full of good things, and life passes in constant plenty and abundance. It has a daily market. Its canals are rich in fish : its lakes swarm with birds : its meadows are green with vegetables : there is no end of the lentils, and melons which taste like honey grow in its irrigated fields. Its barns are full of wheat and dhourra, and reach as 1 Durch Gosen, p. 21, ? Gen. xiii. 10, THE LAXD OF GOSHEN^. 5 high as heaven/ Onions and leeks grow in bunches in the enclosures. The vine, the almond-tree, and the fig-tree grow in the gardens. There is plenty of sweet wine, the produce of Egypt, which they mix with honey. The red fish is in the Lotus canal ; the Borian fish in the ponds ; many kinds of Bori fish, besides carp and pike, in the canal of Pu-harotha : ^ fat-fish and Kephli-pennu fish in the pools of the inundation : the Hanaz fish in the full mouth of the Nile, near Tanis. The pool of Horus furnishes salt, the Panhura lake nitre. Their ships enter the harbour ; plenty and abundance are perpetual. He rejoices who has settled here. The reedy lake is full of lilies : that of Pshensor is gay with papyrus flowers. Fruits from the nurseries : flowers from the gardens : festoons from the vineyards ; birds from the ponds, are dedicated to the feasts of King Rameses. Those who live near the sea come with fish. Feasts in honour of the heavenly bodies and of the great events of the seasons interest the whole population. The youth are perpetually clad in festive attire, with fine oil on their heads of freshly curled hair. On the day when Rameses II. — the war god Muth, on earth — came to the city, they stood at their doors with branches of flowers in their hands, and garlands (on their heads). All the people were assembled, neighbour with neighbour, to bring forward their complaints. Girls trained in the singing schools of Memphis filled the air with songs. The wine was delicious : the cider was like sugar : the sherbet, like almonds mixed with honey. There was beer from Galilee (Kati) in the 1 This expression shows that the language of the Jewish spies describing the Amorite town of Palestine as walled up to heaven, was a common Oriental hyperbole for anything very high. See Deut. i. 28. 3 One of these fish is eaid to come from the river Picharta— the Euphrates— of course salted. 6 THE LAKD OF GOSHEI?-, port (brought in ships from Palestine) : wine from the vineyards : with sweet refreshments from Lake Sagabi : and garlands from the orchards. They sat there with joy- ful hearty or walked about without ceasing. King Eameses Miamun was the god they celebrated thus.^^^ Such was one part of Goshen at the time of the Exodus ; but thirty-six centuries have seen a wonderful transforma- tion of the scene^ once so full of warm life and natural beauty. On the banks of the sweet- water canal, which now runs eastwards through the Wady Tumilat to the Suez Canal — at a spot where the vestiges of an ancient canal still remain — near Maschuta, there stands an immense block of granite, representing on its front face, in relief, a Pharaoh sitting between the gods Ea and Tum. It is no other than Rameses II., for his name occurs six times in the inscrip- tion on the back of the block. The remains of innumerable bricks made of the mud of the Mle, mixed with straw, and stamped with his cipher, lie around — the wreck of the old wall of the city of Pithom. It was reserved to our day to open the shapeless mounds which rise within, and lay bare the long buried secrets of the ancient city. Egypt, as Herodotus truly said, is ^^the gift of the Nile.'" The fertilizing mud deposited by the yearly overflow of the great river, and its quickening waters, led everywhere over the soil, have from the remotest ages created a long ribbon of the richest green along the banks ; in many places, espe- cially in Upper Egypt, not more than two miles across, and seldom more than ten, including the river, which is from 2,000 to 4,000 feet broad. A few miles north of Cairo, how- ever, the magnificent stream, after a course of over 4,000 1 Anastasi Papyrus, III. plate i. 11. Translated by C. W. Goodwin, M.A., in Records of the Past, vol, vi. pp. 11-16 ; and by Brus^sch, History of Egypt, vol. ii. pp. 9611. THE LAND OF GOSHEN. 7 miles, divides into two channels, now called the Rosetta and Damietta branches, which determine the extent of cultivable land ; fertility stretching from their banks as far as the waters of the yearly inundation spread or can be diffused. It was the belief in ancient Egypt that when Memphis was founded, as they believed, thirty centuries be- fore the time of Rameses II., all the country except near Thebes in Tipper Egypt was more or less a marsh, and that below Lake Moeris, which is much higher up the river than Cairo, the whole country was under water. As late as a hundred and fifty years after Christ, the geographer Ptol- emy does not show any land further north than about the latitude of Zoan, which is not easy to understand, since Zoan Tanis was a capital of Lower Egypt as far back as the times of the Hyksos, that is, in Joseph^s day. The natives, in fact, believed that what is now called the Delta was originally a bay of the Mediterranean, which is no doubt the fact, as it grows even now, at the rate of about a mile in sixty years. Old mouths of the river have consequently been filled up for affes, as in the case of one which ran near Ismaila, but had already been filled up in Necho's time, six hundred years before Christ, causing him to replace it by a canal. In the days of the Hebrew settlement in Egyjit, the Pelusiac branch of the river, which formed the western boundary of Goshen, parted from the main stream at a point above that at wdiich the Damietta branch leaves it, but it has for ages been choked up. Four thousand years ago, the rich landscape thus created by the mud of the Nile overflow, though of much less ex- tent than at present, must have been in many respects like the Delta ' of to-day, which shows well-nigh interminable ' Delta is the Greek letter of that name, A : used for tlie laud formed at the mouth of u river from the shape of thu two bein^ Bimilar. 8 THE LAND OF GOSHEi^. fields of maize, cotton, sugar-cane, and other produce, culti- vated by the fellahin, and irrigated by little water-wheels, through channels often small enough to be opened or closed by the foot ; wretched villages rising on the dykes, amidst clumps of palms, and marked by great dove-towers, often ruinous enough. In ancient times the whole region must have been filled with busy life and a strange civilization. The first Egyptian monarchy had its seat at Memphis ages before Jacob's day, and the kings of the Old Empire who flourished there, had left monuments of their greatness, which were old in the times of the patriarch, and still astonish the world. Huge dykes, like those of Holland, were made by them, to keep the Nile from flooding the cities, which, themselves, were built on artificial mounds raised high above the level of the annual inundations. The turquoise mines of the Sinai peninsula had been discovered and were vigorously worked. The forced labour of tens of thousands had built the gigantic masses of the pyramids, of limestone from the quarries of the neighbouring Arabian hills, cased with huge blocks of granite from Assouan, at the first cataracts, far up the river ; wonderfully polished, and cut with an exactness which modern skill still envies.' The great Sphinx, cut out of the living rock, a temple excavated between its paws, and its awful head rising a hundred feet into the air, stood then in all its majesty, for Thothmes IV. had in those days cleared away the sand by which it had in the course of centuries been in a measure overwhelmed. A vast series of tombs, hewn out of the rock, beneath 1 The causeway to bring the stone to the Great Pyramid, from the Nile, employed 100,000 men, relieved every three months, for ten years, or, in all, 4,000,000 men ; and twenty years more were spent, with the labour, in each, of 360,000 men, i-n building the pjTamid itself. Thus, in all, 7,000,000 men toiled in forced labour to rear this amazing monument. Maspero, Histoire Ancienne. THE LAXD OF GOSHEN. 9 the soil, stretched far and wide on tlie plateau of the Libyan Hills, a league west of Memphis — above the reach of the inundation — a series of subterranean palaces, which already awed the patriarch Job, as the *^ desolate places' which kings and counsellors of the earth had built for themselves/' The landscape, everywhere, had been inter- sected with canals of irrigation, and lines of dykes, along which traffic might continue to pass freely during the inun- dations. But the Ancient Empire had passed away long be- fore Jacob settled in Goshen, and dynasties had succeeded it under which Egypt steadily advanced in population, wealth, and general development ; till, in the centuries of the He- brew settlement, civilization in its highest forms, as under- stood in the valley of the Nile, surrounded the immigrants on every hand. The dead level of a river delta must always have made the landscaj^es of Goshen, in some respects, monotonous. But even a flat surface, when broken by towns and villages, and diversified by trees rising from amidst a prospect of varied fertility, may have quiet charms of its own, as we see in not a few views of town and country in Holland. The year was virtually divided into three seasons ; that in which the cities and hamlets rose like islands above the uni- versal sea of Nile waters, with the dykes and elevated roads stretching out like threads between : then, the months in which the fields and pastures were in their glory, falling in what are our winter months, which in Egypt are so delight- ful as to make life, in itself, an enjoyment. No one, indeed, can tell their delightfulness who has not been in the coun- try at this season. And finally, a time of scorching heat > Jobiii.l4. Olshausen. Ewald and Mers translate it " pyramids ; " De Wette, " funeral monumcntfl." 10 THE LAND OF GOSHEN. and hardened, stone-like ground, when the moisture of the yearly inundation had been dried up by the sun. But even at this season, Egypt has charms all its own. The morning is deliciously cool, and through the day the sun pours a flood of dazzling splendour from a cloudless sky of the deepest azure, while the transparent air brings out even distant objects with wondrous clearness, through an atmos- phere trembling as if heated over a flame. Both at morning and evening, the play of the light sheds countless tints of gold, or rose, or violet, on the clouds or on the Arabian hills. A sunset at Suez, described by Ebers, and similar to others I myself have watched, was doubtless like many gazed at with wonder by the Hebrews in the Delta. ^^The water quivered in still lovelier colours than at noon, and the finely-formed Ataka hills on the west shore, stretching away to the south till they seemed to fade into the glowing horizon, were bathed in blue and violet mists, which, after a time, gave place to a splendour of colour that I never saw elsewhere on the Mle. The mountains looked as if they were a molten mass of blended pomegranate and amethyst, and, as such, mirrored themselves in the waves which ran up to their feet — ebbing and retiring, moment by mo- ment. ^^ ' But even night in Egypt, compared with that of other lands, is a dream of beauty ; for the moon shines out with wondrous brightness, and, in her absence, unnumbered stars make the heavens white with glory. The villages and hamlets of the Delta in Jacobus day, as now, were built on mounds raised high enough to protect from the yearly inundation, the mud huts of which they 1 Durch Gosen, p. 57. Burton no less glowingly paints the colours of the atmos- phere In Egypt, at sunset and sunrise. Pilgrimage to Meccah^ p. 109. It must, indeed, strike every one who lives for any leugth of time on the Nile. THE LAN^D OF GOSHEN. 11 consisted. Canals, led from the Pelusiac branch of the Nile, and subdivided into numberless lesser channels and rivulets, covered the landscape with a vast net-work of irri- gation, and made it impossible to pass from one place to another except along the dykes ; which at once regulated the admission of the yearly flood and supplied the country with practicable roads. Creaking water-wheels, turned by buffaloes, asses, or camels, raised water night and day into the canals, from the lower bed of the Nile, even then, sunk in the dry season, beneath deep banks of the fertilizing soil it has deposited in the course of countless ages ; banks, necessarily, much deei)er and higher now. High palms marked from a distance the raised hamlets, lofty dove-cots, always near each other, serving as a second characteristic ; for the huts of to-day are indistinguishable till one ap- proaches them, and in a country so unchanging they have doubtless been always the same. Simple in the extreme, they consist of only two rooms, excejot in rare cases, and are built only of the mud dried into bricks in the hot sun — a few days sufficing to raise them from the ground to the roof. Such a landscape is inevitably monotonous, but it is relieved by the variety of the produce on every hand ; and canals, palms, water-wheels, villages, camels, flocks of birds in the waters and meadows, and the almost naked, sunburnt fellahs — poor and wretched beyond measure, amidst the infinite bounty of nature — keep awake the interest of the modern traveller. The condition of the peasantry seems always to have been miserable in Egypt, though it may have been much less so among the Hebrews in an isolated district like Goshen. But even as far back as the time of Cheops, the builder of the Great Pyramid, long before Abraham visited the Nile 12 THE LAND OF GOSHEN". valley, there had been a huge clamour of the oppressed against the oppressor, from one end of the land to the other ; a cry of anguish and bitter agony which since that time has often risen from Egypt. The will of the tyrant has always ruled, whether it ordered the building of the Great Pyramid or the making a barrage for the Nile. The land may have changed its religion, its language, and its population ; the lot of the fellah has been always the same whether a Pharaoh,' a Sultan, or a Pacha reigned. No wonder that statues of Cheops, broken and dishonoured, have been discovered in our day near the Temple of the S])hinx, in deep wells, into which they had been ignomin- iously thrown, ages ago, in popular risings against his tyranny/ In the days of Abraham it was the same as in the then long- vanished Ancient Empire. The capital had been transferred from Memphis, in the north, to Thebes, in the south, but the working classes as well as the peasants had still a very hard lot. Shrinking before the stick of the taskmaster, which was constantly over them, they had to toil from morning to night, to gain a meagre support for themselves and their households. A letter of this era, from a scribe to his son, trying to induce him to follow learning rather than a trade, paints the condition of the blacksmith, the metal-worker, the stone-cutter, and the quarry-man, the barber, the boatman, the mason, the weaver, the maker of arms, the courier, the dyer, and the shoemaker as alike to be pitied,^ and Ebers has given us a sketch of the crowd at Thebes in the time of Moses, which, in part at least, corrob- orates the scribe. " Under a wide-spreading sycamore, '' says he, " a vender of eatables, spirituous drinks, and acids 1 The name Pharaoh is now equivalent, among the Arabs, to " tyrant." Burton. 2 Mariette, Lettre a M. le Vicomte de Rouge, p. 7. 3 Maspero, p. 123. Tliis letter is there given in full. THE LAXD OF GOSHEl^-. 13 for cooling the water, had set up his stall, aud close to him a crowd of boatmen and drivers shouted and disputed as they passed the time in eager games of morra. Many sailors lay on the decks of the vessels, others on the shore : here in the thin shade of a palm-tree, there in the full blaze of the sun ; from whose burning rays they protected themselves by spreading over their faces the cotton cloths which served them for cloaks. " Between the sleepers passed bondmen and slaves, brown and black, in long files, one behind the other, bending under the weight of heavy burdens, which had to be con- veyed to their destination at the temples, for sacrifice, or to the dealers in various wares. Builders dragged blocks of stone, which had come from the quarries of Chennu and Suan, on sledges, to the site of a new temple ; labourers poured water under the runners that the heavily loaded and dried wood should not take fire. '^ All these working men were driven with sticks by their overseers, and sang at their labours ; but the voices of the leaders sounded muffled and hoarse, though, when, after their frugal meal, they enjoyed an hour of repose, they might be heard loud enough. Their parched throats refused to sing in the noontide of their labour. Thick clouds of gnats followed these tormented gangs, who with dull and spirit-broken endurance suffered alike the stings of the insects and the blows of their drivers."^ The children of the poor lived, to a great extent, on the pith of the papyrus plant, and bread made of the pounded seeds of the lotus flower,^ and radishes, onions, and garlic > Uarda, vol. i. p. 61. ' Uarda, p. 197. Diodorns says that a child did not cost its parents 20 drachmsE, about fifteen shillings, for food and clothing till it was a good size. The lotus and papyrus grew wild in vast quantities, and children ran about naked. 14 THE LAND OF GOSHEN. were the staple food of their parents/ But in Goshen, at least, the Hebrews had fish for the catching, and cucumbers, melons, and leeks,'^ which are still the food of the humbler Egyptians, though the fish now used is salt/ The Nile indeed was, and still is, wondrously rich in fish, and in no country do melons and other fruits and vegetables of the climate grow more luxuriantly. When the river shrinks back into its bed, all useful grains and plants shoot up with marvellous rapidity and vigour. Wheat, barley, spelt, maize, haricot beans, lentils, peas, flax, hemp, onions, scallions, citrons, cucumbers, melons, almost cumber the ground. The lotus, in Joseph's day, floated on the waters, and in- numerable waterfowl built their nests among the papyrus reeds along the banks. Between the river or its branch, and the far-ofl desert, lay wide fields. Near the brooks and water-wheels rose shady sycamores and groves of date-palms carefully tended. The fruitful plain, indeed, watered and manured every year by the inundation, was framed in the desert like a garden flower-bed within its gravel path. Memphis," the capital of the empire in the time of Joseph, lay on the west side of the Nile, about 12 miles south of the present Cairo, and about 20 south of the great Temple- and University-city of On or Heliopolis ; the Jerusalem of Egypt. Protected on the east, by the Nile, against attacks from Arabia, Assyria, Persia, and even Scythia, to which that frontier was always exposed, it had ^ Uarda, vol. i. p. 303. 1,000 talents = £360,000 worth, were consumed during the building of the Great Pyramid. Herod., ii. 125. Plin., N. //., xxxvi. 17. 2 Num. xi. 5. 3 Lane's Modern Egyptians, vol. i. p. 207. Burton says that garlic and onions are always speciallj^ in favour in lands liable to fevers and agues, as natural preventives. Pilgrimage to Meccah, p. 23. * Eine ^gypt. JTonigstochter, vol. i. pp. 55-57, 210, 212. Memphis was dedicated to the goddess Ptah ; the word means " The home of Ptah." Lengerke, p. 350. THE LA:N'D of GOSHEN-. 15 on the west only the feeble Libyan tribes, separated from it by a range of hills, and was thus comparatively safe. The plain on which it was built, though resting on the limestone rock, was originally a marsh ; but an embankment raised in remote antiquity by Menes, the founder of the Ancient Empire, cut off the overflow of the Nile, and the swamps were drained into neighbouring lakes, which, with the river, surrounded the city with a strong defence of water. The area of Memphis, like that of all Eastern cities, was large in j)roportion to its population, embracing a circuit of at least 15 miles,' but in this was included much open ground laid out as gardens, besides space for public build- ings, temples, and palaces, and the barracks of the garrison, in the fortress known as the White Castle. Within the wall, with its ramparts and bastions, which formed the for- tifications of the city, stood the old palace of the kings, a stately structure of brick, with courts, corridors, chambers, and halls without number ; veranda-like out-buildings of gaily painted wood ; and a magnificent pillared banqueting hall. Verdurous gardens surrounded it, and a whole host of labourers tended the flower beds and shady alleys, the shrubs and the trees ; or kept the tanks clean and fed the fish in them.^ The mound which curbed the inundations of the Nile was so essential to the very existence of the city, that even the Persians, who destroyed or neglected the other great works of the country, annually repaired it.^ The cli- mate was wonderfully healthy, and the soil beyond measure fertile, while the views from the walls were famous among both the Greeks and Eomans. Bright green meadows stretched round the city, threaded everywhere by canals thick 1 Diodorus, i. 50. 150 stadia, » Ebers, The Sisters, vol. i. p. 130. 3 Herod., ii. 99. 16 THE LAND OF GOSHEN". with beds of the lotus flower. Trees of such girth that three men could not encircle them with outstretched arms, rose in clumps ; the wide gardens supplied Eome with roses even in winter, and the gay vineyards yielded wine of which poets sang/ Its position, moreover, in the ^' narrows" of Egypt, where the Arabian and Libyan hills, hitherto girding in the narrow valley of the river, begin to diverge and form the Delta, gave Memphis the command of all the trade of the country, both up and down the stream. It may have been surpassed in the grandeur of its temples by Thebes,'' the capital of the Middle Empire, in southern Egypt, but that city had fewer of them, and it had no such public or commercial buildings. A spacious and beautiful temple in Memphis honoured the goddess Isis, while that of the sacred bull. Apis, famous for its colonnades, its oracle, and its processions, was the cathedral of Egypt, attracting countless worshippers and maintaining a numerous, rich, and learned priesthood. Apis, or Hapi — to the Egyptians, the most perfect expression of divinity in an animal form — had, moreover, a second temple, also, in the necropolis — after- wards enlarged and called the Serapeion — in which was the Nilometer, for recording the yearly rise of the inundation. But the Temple of Ptah, the Egyptian Vulcan, to whom the scarabaBus beetle was sacred, was the most ancient local shrine. Its great northern court had been erected before Joseph^s day, and Eameses the Third afterwards raised in it six colossal portrait statues, of himself, his queen, and their four sons. One of these which I saw, 45 feet high, still lies, overthrown, in an open grove of palms, among the mounds of ruin, in a pool of water left by the ^inundations, which 1 Diodor., i. 96. Pliny, xiii. 10 ; xvi. 21. Martial, vi. 80. Athenaeue, i. 30. 2 Thebes ~ No Amon = Home of Amon. Gescnius, Thes. THE LAND OF GOSHEN. 17 always, year by year, cover the spot — its back upwards and the name of Rameses on the belt — the last memorial of the great king. Spacious and magnificent eastern, western, and southern courts were added in later but still ancient times. It was at Memphis that Herodotus, nearly 1,500 years after Joseph^s death,' made his longest stay in Egypt, and thither came, from time to time, many of the sages of antiquity to learn the sciences and philosophy for which its priests were famous. The scanty remains of the city are strewn over a large space, but consist only of a few blocks of granite, broken pottery, and fragments of brick ; for successive generations have, age after age, used its ruins as a great quarry for all kinds of buildings. But the plain amid which Memphis stood is still, as of old, wide and fertile ; the level of it pleasantly varied here and there by a succession of palm groves which run out to the bank of the river, and in some cases spring from richly green surroundings. Behind these groves and the outlying plain rise the pink and yelloAV Afri- can hills, beyond which again, fourteen miles to the north- west, rise the great pyramids of Gizeh, kings of Lower Egypt; and between them and Memphis, still on the low plateau of rock west of the Nile, behind the plain stretching to the river, four other groups of smaller but still gigantic pyramids looked down, like hills, on the sacred city. But these were only sentinel towers, after all, over a population of the dead beneath the plain, immeasurably greater than that which streamed througli the busy streets of the huge Metropolis. The whole ground, a shelf of rock beneath the rich soil, is honeycombed for well-nigh forty miles with the mummy tombs of ancient Memphis, and the region about it J Joseph was taken to Egypt circa b.c. 19ia. Herodotus died circa b.c. 400. VOL. II.-2 18 THE LAND OF GOSHEN". — the vast bulk of their inmates,, numbering millions, lying embalmed in rock-cut chambers known as mummy pits, where they are huddled together in interminable rows and stacks, sometimes near the surface, but often deep down, with shaft-like entrances to their dismal resting-places. But human remains are not the only tenants of this amazing cemetery. Vast galleries are found, once filled with mum- mies of ibises, in red jars, now in many cases emptied of their contents. But the greatest wonder of the Memphis necropolis is the gallery in which stand the tombs of the sacred bulls, and these tombs themselves. How strange a light does it throw on the religious ideas of that world in which Israel lived while on the Nile, to wander through that vast avenue of the sepulchres of deified oxen ! These tombs open from, long galleries hewn out in the rock, as high and broad as huge tunnels, great side-chambers running out from their sides say every fifty yards, in high-arched vaults, under each of which reposes the most magnificent sarcophagus that can be conceived. The vaults are about twenty-six feet high, and are paved and roofed with wrought stone from the quarries of the Mokatta hills, not far off. The whole series reaches a length of three hundred and eighty yards, along which arch after arch, into which you have to descend a little from the central gallery, was once tenanted by a mummied ox-god. In twenty-four of the chambers, indeed, the huge sarcophagi still remain ; monster coffins about thirteen feet long, seven feet wide, and eleven high, and weighing not less than sixty-five tons. Many are of black or red granite, polished like glass, and cut out of one block : some are of limestone equally well finished. The galleries now open, date from about the time when the Israelites were in Egypt, THE LAND OF GOSHEN. 19 but others, still closed, are nearly four thousand years old. The mummy once laid in its place, the entrance to the chamber was walled up, but worshippers still came to en- grave their names, and prayers to the dead Apis, on the wall, or on the rock close by. Abraham had perhaps seen the l)rocessions of this strange worship, for it was already ancient in his day,' and it survived to the last periods of Egyptian history, when, Christianity having dispersed the priests, the tombs were abandoned after having been violated, and were then gradually buried beneath the sands of the desert. It was reserved to M. Mariette to bring them again to light in 1851, after an oblivion of more than 1,400 years. "^ But everything is wonderful round Memphis. You walk for miles over the high drifted sand, under which countless grand tombs, built on the rock, have for thousands of years been buried. The whole surface of the ground is strewn with fragments of pottery in countless millions : a character- istic of the sites of all ancient oriental cities and towns. The mummy pits underneath are filled for acre after acre, and mile after mile, with the shrivelled remains of innumer- able dead, but present no attractions except the ghastly horrors of a boundless charnel house. Here and there an entrance has been scooped out in the sand to built tombs, over which the drift from the desert lies deep, and some of these are of intense interest. One, rising in what was once a long street of tombs, though completely covered up on its exterior, so that it looks more like a subterranean rock-cut tomb than a building on the ancient surface of the ground, is very striking. To enter it I had to go down a slope of sand; but the whole interior has been cleared, and is in 1 It was established by the second king of the Second Dynasty. Maspero, p. 50. » Mariette, Memoire surla Mere (TApis, 185G. 20 THE LAND OF GOSHEN. perfect preservation. It is the ^^ Mastaba/^ or built tomb of one " T\," who lived about 4,500 years ago — that is, long before Abraham^s day. Nothing could exceed the beauty or truth to nature of the countless sculptures in very low relief, just standing out, in fact, and no more than that, from the stone on which they are carved. Ti himself stood before me in his wig, and false beard, and necklace, and kilt pointed in front and carefully set out in its plaits and narrow foldings : a long stalf in one hand and in the other his baton of office, for he was a dignitary of the highest rank, in his lifetime. His wife, "" the beloved of her hus- band," stands often at his side in the many repetitions of his presentation, and with them are their two sons, who were *^ princes" through the high birth of their mother, for Ti himself was of humble origin. On the various walls the whole story of Egyptian life in these remote times is told with inimitable skill in the endless figures and scenes portrayed. The killing of the ox for sacrifice or food ; the details of kitchen mysteries, fattening geese, feeding the pigeons, cranes, and other fowls of the poultry yard ; laden barges taking corn down the Nile, for sale ; the wild creatures of the eastern or western hills seen from the tomb ; a statue of Ti borne on a sledge to the place where it is to be set up, the slaves pouring water on the runners to ease the friction ; a picture of the domestic bake-house and pottery ; harvest scenes, showing every detail of agriculture from the treading in of the grain by the feet of oxen driven over the soil still wet from the overflow of the Nile, to the last incidents of the harvest ; shipbuilding scenes, from the hewing of the trees of which the vessels are to be built, to their calking, as they rest on the stocks, with all the tools used in the various stages. Carpenters, masons, sculptors, glass-blowers, chair- THE LAND OF GOSHEN". 21 makers, leather-workers, water-carriers — all have their sep- arate illustrations, as members of the great man's establish- ment, which was complete in itself, trained slaves doing all that was needed, of whatever kind. Hunting and fishing liave their minute representations, showing the pleasures of the country life of the rich to have been just the same then as now. AVe can, indeed, restore the Egypt of the patri- archs with wonderful fulness from the walls of this single tomb ; and it is necessary to keep in mind its revelations if we would bring before our eyes the country in which the Hebrews lived, and from which they broke away, under Moses. On, or Heliopolis, the City of the Sun, according to Ebers, marked the southern limit of Goshen, as Zoan or Tanis, its northern, on the west side. It was there that Joseph found his Egyptian bride, the daughter of the high priest of its great temple, and it was as the priest Osarsiph, of this sanctuary, that Moses, probably by a confusion of his name with that of Joseph, was handed down by the Egyptians in their traditions.^ That Hebrews lived in On in the times of the Oppression can hardly be doubted, for a papyrus still gives us the names of the civil and military officers charged, in the reign of Rameses III., about one hundred years after the Exodus, with the oversight of 2,083 Hebrews residing there ; de- scendants, very probably, of some who failed to make their escape with their brethren, or chose to remain behind. It was in some respects the very metropolis of Egyptian religion and ^' wisdom," for the most famous University of the land flourished in it, and the old Sun-god Ra was the local divin- ity of the Heliopolitan " nome ; " ^ the name On meaning > Jos., c. ^j3io/(, i. 26. "^ Eine jEgypt. Kdnigstochter,\o\. \. p. 223. 22 THE LAND OF GOSHEJ^-. *'the snn/^* The setting sun. Turn, was, however, also worshipped as the luminary of the Nether World, with Shu, the son of Ea, and Tafnet, his lion-headed daughter, Osiris, Isis, Hathor, and the cat-headed divinity. Bast. Nor did even these exhaust the pantheon of On. It was also the seat of the worship of the phoenix, an imaginary bird, fa- mous in Egyptian mythology, and of the sacred calf, Mnevis,^ the rival of the sacred bull Apis, of Memphis, which was said to have sprung from it. It had had its shrine at On since the long past days of the Second Dynasty. Sacred lions were also worshipped in honour of the goddess Tafnet. Worse than all, however, in Joseph's time, and till after the expulsion of the Hyksos, human sacrifices of red-haired foreign captives were offered to Typhon, the red god of evil, and to Sati.^ The temple was in its full glory in the days of Joseph, and during the centuries of the Hebrew sojourn. Great colleges of priests lived in chambers specially built for them within its holy precincts, and, besides taking charge of the sacred animals, attended to the services of the many gods honoured in its worship. In addition to these, there were numbers of learned priests connected with the medical, 1 The Greek name of the city of On— Heliopolis— means, "the City of the Sun," and it had an equivalent name in Egyptian, Ir-ha-Kheres, "the City of the Sun ; " a name on which Isaiah (xix. 18) plays by saying it shall become " the city of the destruction" of idols, Ir-ha-heres. Jeremiah calls it Beth-Shemesh, "the house of the Sun-god "— Jer. xliii. 13— and Ezekiel changes the Egyptian word On into the Hebrew word Aven, " nothingness.'" Ezek. xxx. 17. Brugsch explains On as mean- ing, " The Obelisks." History of Egypt, i. 128. 2 Merx and Pressel speak of Mnevis as black, but Ebers says it was bright- coloured, which seems to agree better with the Israelites making a " golden calf " in imitation of it, if that idol were really intended to be so. 3 Aahmes I., the conqueror of the Hyksos, abolished human sacrifice, which the Hyksos had perhaps introduced from Syria, substituting wax figures of men, of which three were offered daily. It is noteworthy, that though native Egyptian monuments do not speak of human sacrifice, the design on the " offering seal " used is a man bound, with a sword at his throat. THE LAXD OF GOSHEI^. 23 theological, and historical faculties of the temple ; the special depositaries of the science, religious and secular, for which Egypt was renowned. The observatory of the temple was famous, and it is to its priest-astronomers we are in- debted for the exact computation of the length of the year. Of the four great Temple Universities of the land — Mem- phis, Thebes, Sais, and On — that of On held the first rank. Its high-priest came next in dignity to the Pharaoh himself, and was a prince of the empire — the Piromis, ^'the noble and the good'" — and thus the marriage of Joseph to the daughter of so august a dignitary at once secured his position in the state. Prom its higher priests, moreover, no fewer than ten members of the great priestly council of Pharaoh were chosen — that is, one-third of the whole. 'No centre of Egyptian influence more powerfully or abidingly affected the Hebrews than this great centre of Egyptian thought and worship. Heliopolis, or On, lies five miles north-east of Cairo, along a well-made road which is in reality a dyke, to secure com- munication when the country is overflowed yearly by the Nile. I drove out in a European hack carriage, so fallen is the glory of old times, the horses bearing me, first through a line of Erench-looking boulevards, then between wide stretches of corn and clover, or gardens and orchards, poor enough compared with those of cooler regions. Canals from the great stream ran hither and thither, yielding, at short intervals, bright rills poured by water-wheels, from them, into lesser channels, branching off through the fields and enclosures. Clumps of fig-trees, tamarisks, and acacias varied the level monotony of the highway as I came near On, which is now a silent expanse of ploughed land, where not broken into heights by the mounds that mark ancient 24 THE LAKD OF GOSHEN". walls or buildings. Nothing of the great University city, or of its renowned schools and colleges, remains but a single obelisk, the base of which is deeply imbedded in the mud of ages of annual inundations. Long mounds rise here and there, and a line of heaped confusion along three sides of a square, far back from the obelisk, marks the site of the old city and its temple, and of the city walls. There may be wonderful secrets beneath these huge memorials of antiquity, but On has to be sought, nowadays, rather in the public and private buildings of Cairo, for which its wrought stone furnished a ready-made quarry, than within the bounds of its ancient site. The only person I saw was a poor peasant woman, in a blue slip, very dirty and wretched looking, who stood beside the obelisk, watching me with curious eyes, as I wandered over the famous spot, among clumps of prickly pear and thorny shrubs, which now spring rank where pro- cessions of priests once chanted their hymns and offered their sacrifices. No temple in antiquity could dispense with a living spring to supply the water so essential for purifications, libations, and other sacred uses. Close to On, therefore, we still find its famous '' Spring of the Sun '' — a fitting name for a foun- tain dedicated to the temple of the great Sun-god, Ea. It is now used for irrigating the neighbouring fields, by the help of a water-wheel, turned by a blindfolded ox. One stream from it waters a spot of high interest in Christian legend, the garden, beautifully kept, in which stands the gigantic sycamore under which tradition says the Virgin and Child once rested during the Flight to Egypt. Unfortunately, however, we know that the present tree was not planted till after 1672, its predecessor having died in 1055. Could we believe in the touching connection of the spot with our THE LAND OF GOSHEN". 25 Saviour's infancy, the neighbourhood would be doubly fa- mous, for it was at On that Joseph wooed and won the dark- skinned Asenath, that Moses gained his Egyptian learning, that Plato and Herodotus sought insight into its mysteries, and Dionysius the Areopagite noticed and noted the dark- ness that veiled the sky when Christ died on Calvary. In the time of the Hebrew sojourn in Egypt, a visitor having reached the artificial platform on which all Heli- oi)olis was built, and wishing to visit the great Sun-temple, passed first under the cool shade of a sacred grove, planted on the edges of the sacred lake in its grounds. A pave- ment of stone, cemented with asphalt, about a hundred feet broad and three or four times as long, now opened before him, lined on each side with huge sphinxes of yellow marble, placed at regular distances. This brought him to the great gates or pylons ; huge structures standing quite apart from all else. He then passed under the immense chief gate, adorned, like that of all Egyptian temples, with a broad winged disk of the sun. The widely opened doors were flanked on each side by a forest of lofty obelisks, intended as emblems of the solar rays, and nowhere else so numerous as here, where they fittingly adorned the entrance of the great Temple of the Sun. Huge flagstaffs, from which fluttered long red and blue streamers, contended with these in height. A great stone-flagged court, bordered to right and left with a portico resting on lines of pillars, came next — its centre, the sacred spot on which offerings were presented to the god. The whole front of the temple proper was now seen rising, fortress-like, at one side of the court ; its surface covered with brightly painted figures and inscriptions. Inside the porch was a lofty hall of approach ; then the great hall, the roof of which, sown over with thousands of golden stars. 26 THE LAlfD OF GOSHEN-. rested on four rows of gigantic pillars. The shafts and lotus-formed capitals^ the side walls and niches of this im- mense chamber, indeed all objects around, were covered with many-coloured paintings and hieroglyphics. The huge pillars, the roof immensely high and proportionally broad and long, filled the mind with awe, while the air was loaded with the odours of incense, and of the fragrant gums and spices of the laboratory of the temple. Soft music from unseen players seemed never to cease ; though broken now and then by the low of the sacred ox, or of the sacred cow of Isis, or the screech of the sparrow-hawk of Horns, which were housed in neighbouring chambers. As often as the bellowing of the ox or cow was heard, or the shrill cry of the hawk, the kneeling worshippers touched the stone pave- ment of the forecourt with their brow. Meanwhile all eyes eagerly gazed, ever and anon, into the hidden interior of the temple, where numerous priests stood in the holy of holies, no doubt like that which I saw at Esneh — a huge single stone, with a stone door, hollowed into a deep recess — the dark resting-place of the image of the god. Some of the priests wore high ostrich feathers over their bald heads, others the skins of panthers over white linen robes ; some bowed or raised themselves as they sang or murmured litanies, others swung censers or poured out pure water from golden vessels, as libations to the gods. Only the most favoured Egyptians dared enter the gigantic hall, and then, the eye, the ear, and even the breathing were sur- rounded by influences farthest from those of every-day existence, contracting the bosom and agitating the nerves. Overwhelmed and cut off from the outer world, the worship- per had to seek support outside himself, in the divinity whom the voices of the priests, the mysterious music, and 28 THE LAND OP GOSHEN. the sounds of the holy animals appeared to indicate as close at hand.' Dean Stanley^s descrij^tion of this great temple is striking. *' Over the portal, we can hardly doubt, was the figure of the Sun-god ; not in the sublime indistinctness of the natural orb, nor yet in the beautiful impersonation of the Grecian Apollo, but in the strange, grotesque form of the Hawk- headed monster. Enter, and the dark temple opens and contracts successively into its outermost, its inner, and its innermost hall ; the Osiride figures in their placid majesty support the first ; the wild and savage exploits of kings and heroes fill the second ; and in the furthest recess of all, un- derneath the carved figure of the Sun-god, and beside the solid altar, sate, in his gilded cage, the sacred hawk, or lay crouched on his purple bed the sacred black calf Mnevis, or ITrmer ; each the living, almost incarnate, representation of the deity of the temple. Thrice a day, before the deified beast, the incense was offered, and once a month the solemn sacrifice. Each on his death was duly embalmed and depos- ited in a splendid sarcophagus. One such mummy calf is still to be seen at Cairo. The sepulchres of the long succes- sion of deified calves at Ileliopolis corresponded to that of the deified bulls at Memphis." ^ 1 See Ebers, Eine ^g^jpt. Konigstochter, vol. i, p. 109. Other authorities, however, describe Egyptian temples somewhat diflEerently. Thus Schaafe writes : " Egyptian teuipleswere so constructed, as to intensify the earnestness and enthusiasm of the worshipper by chambers continually smaller and lower. The turns to be taken were all pointed out, no going in another way was allowed, and no mistake was possible. Visitors wandered full of awe between the rows of sacred beasts. The gates rose, afar, high and vast : then came another court ; the wails were closer, the courts on a smaller scale, the floor was higher. All was subordinated to one end. Going on farther, the dissipation of thought natural to the open air passed away amidst the solemnity of the building, and the holiness of the symbols and pictures with which all objects were covered. The consecrated walls closed in, ever nearer, lound the worshipper, till at last only the priestly foot could enter the lonely, echoing chamber of the god." Kunstgeschichte, vol. i. p. 394. 2 Jewish Church, vol. i. p. 88. THE LAND OF GOSHEX. 29 Strabo visited Heliopolis about the time of the birth of Christ, and found the town deserted, and the temple, though still standing, a mere desolate memorial of greatness passed away. The neighbouring canals, long neglected, had formed broad marshes before it. Priests and philosophers, canons and professors, alike were gone from the spacious mansions round the cloisters of the vast courts. Only a few lower priests and vergers lingered about, to maintain what still remained of worshijD, or to sliow strangers over the silent quadrangles and deserted cloisters ; but they still pointed out the house where Plato had lived for years, Avhen studying in their schools. Now, as I have said, the solitary obelisk still standing, and great mounds full of fragments of marble and granite, and the wreck of a sphinx, alone recall the site. The water of the Nile overflows the whole landscape each year, and rises nearly six feet up the stalk of the obelisk. The only other town of Goshen, or on its borders, to be noticed till later, was Tanis, the Zoan of the Bible, a place built only seven years after Hebron, in Palestine.' The frontier town of Goshen on the north-west, it lay far to the north of On — on the right bank of the old Tanitic mouth of the Nile. This stream overflowed the fields of the Hebrews, year by year, to the envious regret of the Egyptians, who re- garded a blessing enjoyed by foreigners as a misfortune to themselves. Mythological fables expressed this feeling, by stigmatizing these waters as those by which Typhon floated out the corpse of the murdered Osiris to the ocean ; but their real antipathy was from the channel winding through the lands of Semitic settlers. Tanis had been, apparently, founded by old Phoenician colonists, and was already a resi- • Num. xiii. 22. 30 THE LAN-D OF GOSHEi^'. dence of the Pharaohs before the invasion of the Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, with their allied Oanaanitish and Arabian tribes, who, in their turn, made it their capital, adorning it with all the architectural glories of a great Egyptian city, during their reign of five hundred years. The hour came, however, when, amidst the flames and devastations of war, they were driven out of the land, and Tanis was left for over three centuries a deserted waste of scorched and blackened ruins. Eameses the Second, the Oppressor, at last turned his eyes on it and resolved to rebuild it, and make the new Tanis, thus created, his northern metropolis. Egyptian architecture confined its highest efforts to temples and tombs, employing the arts of the sculptor, ^le draughts- man, and the painter, to add the accessories of statues, sphinxes, reliefs, and sanctuaries or resting places for the dead. Palaces have mouldered into the clay of which their materials were composed ; the houses of the general popula- tion have long ago crumbled into dust; even the remains of public structures have to be sought under the mounds which they have themselves created ; but the great ancient temples and tombs defy the ravages of time, yielding only to the violence of man and the convulsions of nature. In the Tanis of Eameses the Temple was the supreme glory. There were, no doubt, palaces, and store-houses for military and general uses, mansions and gardens, with every orna- ment of art to heighten their charms, and countless homes of the general population, but the Temple and its grounds were the chief feature of the city and occupied a large pro- portion of the space within its walls. Three-fourths of the ruins now met in these wide pre- cincts are the work of the architects, sculptors, and artists of Eameses. The sphinxes and statues still left uninjured THE LAXD OF GOSHEJf. 31 from the wreck of the former Tanis were duly appropriated, after the effacement of all inscriptions connected with their riyksos creators, but the great king also laid all the quarries of Egypt, from Assouan to the hills of Mokattam, near ]\Iemphis, under contribution, to embellish his new capital. The Temple raised for his glory was the largest and most splendid that had ever graced the Delta, destined nominally to the worship of the sun and other gods, but covered throughout with inscriptions and sculptures in his own hon- our. Countless reliefs on its walls commemorated his vic- tories, and his portrait statues of all sizes and materials rose at every point in the spacious grounds. Fragments remain of one of thfse — an ear, a toe, and part of an arm — that show the scale on which this self -homage, as to a human god, was carried out. They tell of a statue the most gigan- tic ever known. Cut out of one great block of the hard red. granite of Assouan, it stood, crowned with the double mitre of Lower and Upper Egypt, a hundred feet high ; its tre- mendous joedestal raising it fifteen or twenty feet higher. It was thus from six to twelve feet loftier than the great obelisk at Karnak, the tallest in the world, and more than fifty feet above that which excites our wonder on the Thames embankment, at London. Its weight could not have been less than twelve hundred tons. How such a huge mass of stone could have been separated "from the hill-side at Assouan, or floated hundreds of miles down the K^ile, or dragged to its position and raised when brought to the spot for it, may be asked but cannot be answered. It adds to the difficulty when we remember that it must have been laid down at Tanis, in the rough, to be duly set up when carved into the royal image, and polished till it shone like glass. The Temple itself, in which it stood, was probably not more 32 THE LAND OF GOSHEN. than fifty-six feet high, and the tallest of the glittering for- est of obelisks before the great gates was somewhat shorter, so that this mighty Colossus must have looked down on the sacred buildings and their accessories from a height of at least sixty feet ; and must have been visible, in so flat a land- scape, from a vast distance in every direction. So high, it would seem to say, is the Pharaoh above ordinary men ! In the time of Moses the banks of the Nile, at Tanis, were bordered by villas and gardens, and the stream, itself, was alive with traffic. A great flight of steps led from the water to the Temple grounds, in which the great sanctuary rose, more than half a mile from the river. As yet there was no Lake Menzeleh and no desert, but a wide plain round Tanis dotted with villages, overhung by sycamores and palms. Round the great Temple itself an endless dis- play of sphinxes, statues, and obelisks amazed the visitor by their size, number, and glittering polish. An avenue nearly four hundred feet long, bordered by columns twelve yards high, each of a single stone, led from the Temple ; the inter- val between the great pillars studded with obelisks, statues, and sphinxes in every colour of granite, and also in yellow stone ; and at its end one found himself face to face with a vast gathering of gigantic portrait statues of the great Pha- raohs, of distant centuries, brought from the temples of every part of Egypt to do honour to Rameses, who sat enthroned among the august assembly, the highest Colossus of all. The delights and beauties of the city, outside the sacred limits, have been already told us in the narrative of a contemporary of the Hebrews in this age : ' a subject of the great king, with no such bitterness of oppression in his heart to hinder his pleasure, as filled the breast of enslaved Israel. 1 See page 4. THE LAND OF GOSHEN. 33 The city had no less than seven names, connected with the gods worshipped in it, for the Egyptians gave their towns, in this way, many ; sometimes, as in the cases of Edfu and Dendera, several hnndreds. But, of the seven borne by Tanis, two are Semitic ; nor is it unworthy of notice that one is " The Field of Zoan," the exact name of the town in one of the Psalms.' Another is : ^'^ The Town of Rameses,^' for it was rebuilt and embellished, doubtless by Hebrew forced labour in part, by Rameses II. Rameses-Tanis — '' the place of departure " for Palestine — is especially important as the scene of the wonders wrought by Moses before the Exodus. It appears, next to Thebes, to have been the spot most liked by the Oppressor — the great- est of all the Pharaohs — and was chosen by him as his home both before and after his wars with the Asiatic races, who could be so easily reached from it. It continued to be a large place even so late as the days of Christ, and rose on artificial mounds round the Temi3le, though a series of gray hills of rubbish, full of fragments of bricks and pottery, are now its only memorials. From these, the houses are seen to have been built of sun-dried bricks of Nile mud, small alike in themselves and in their rooms, which, however, were often numerous. The Fresh-water canal, which fills the ancient bed of the river branch, still floats pretty large fisher-boats, which ply their trade on the neighbouring Menzeleh sea ; and it is curious to notice, that even to-day the fishermen and peasants of the district are essentially dif- ferent in their figures and features from the common Egyp- tian fellah. They are shorter in stature, and the side face is not so good, but the likeness to the profiles of the sphinxes left by the Ilyksos is unmistakable. Tanis was the local » Ps. Ixxvlil. 43, VOL. n.-3. 34 THE LAND OF GOSHEN". capital and the seat of government, to wliicli the Semitic population round had free access, while Memphis and Thebes were more or less secluded from strangers. But all around is now a barren waste, except along the canal passing through the district ; a resort of wild beasts and reptiles, dotted with swamps which breed malignant fevers. CHAPTER II. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SO.TOURX. When Joso23h was led b}^ his Islimaelite owners as a slave, to the bazaar of Memphis, for sale, fourteen dynasties had already flourished and passed away in Egypt. Of these, ten had reigned in Memphis and four at Thebes, in the south, but a fifteenth had now risen — that of the Hyksos, or Shejj- herd Kings, who had invaded and conquered Lower Egypt, and Bet themselves on the throne of the Pharaohs. Mena or Menes, *' the constant,^' the founder of Memphis and of the Egyptian nation, had obtained a site for his proposed city, by changing the course of a branch of the Nile. Build- ing a huge dyke, he turned the river from its old bed and then filled up the old channel. Temples, reared first, were followed by a large jDopulation : the wonderful necropolis was begun, and pyramids were erected. From the begin- ning, society seems to have been thoroughly organized. The Memphian high priests were great personages in the young- state : the king was already the Perao, or Pharaoh — *' the Great House" — with his queen, his harem, and his chil- dren. There were nobles and serfs, an elaborate organiza- tion of court ceremonial, and vast numbers of officials and slaves who ministered to the royal Avants or glory. There was a keeper of the royal wardrobe, a court hair-dresser and nail-trimmer, and court musicians and singers. High offi- cials took charge of the royal domains, the granaries, the 36 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOtJRK". cellars, the oil-chamber, the bakery, the butchering, and the stables. There were overseers of the public buildings, and numerous scribes, to record all public and private affairs. But amidst all this, there were taskmasters, from the first, over the wretched common people, who toiled at forced labour under the blows of the stick. The army was fully organized, but there were also men of science, to study the heavens for religious and other ends, and to measure the fields, and raise the great structures in which the king delighted. The successors of Mena followed in his steps. Arts, laws, science, and religion were zealously promoted. The worship of the bull Apis and the calf Mnevis was in- troduced, mines were opened in the peninsula of Sinai, and the earliest pyramid was built. Then came Cheops, the builder of the second, or Great, Pyramid, raised near the mysterious >Sphinx, which itself was the work of some earlier, unknown king. The third pyramid followed, and then others. Literature grew apace ; sculptures, perfect as those of the Greeks, as seen by some relics still left, showed the highest culture of genius ; gorgeous tombs were multiplied, and the mines of Sinai were worked with vigour. The name of one of the first kings of the Sixth Dynasty, Merira Pepi, is found on the oldest monuments at Tanis, and his public works can be traced all over Egypt. His campaigns ex- tended so far to the south that negroes were enlisted in his armies. Before long, ships sailed down the Red Sea to Punt or Somauli land, on the east of Africa, and returned with the products of that region. The whole country was full of activity of all kinds. The capital was now transferred to Thebes, where monu- ments of the Twelfth Dynasty still remain. Amenemha I., who reigned about three thousand years before Christ, EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 37 extended the empire still farther to the south ; and, after waging wars in all other directions, left the record of his- victories on the walls of temples built by him in every part of Egypt. Usurtasen I., his successor, founded On, and raised its great Sun Temple, with its obelisks. Gold flowed in from Nubia, and turquoises from the mines at Sinai, to which a caravan road led from the Nile. Fortresses were built far south, against the negroes, and the glory of the empire increased on all sides. The tombs of Beni Hassan, with their wonderful pictures of Egyptian every-day life and work, date from the reign of Usurtasen II., who lived about the time of Abraham. A later king constructed Lake Moeris, on the Libyan edge of the desert, as a vast reservoir of the Nile inundation, of priceless worth to the land,^ and also built the wonderful palace known as the Labyrinth, with three thousand halls and chambers, half of them above ground and the rest below it, with twelve covered courts. Herodotus and Strabo alike speak of it as an amazing work : the latter stating that it was a representation of the whole kingdom, with a palace for each of the twenty-seven nomes. Unfortunately for our knowledge of details, however, the province in which it stood worshipped the god Sebek, or Set, whose tutelary animal was the crocodile, on which ac- count both it and its inhabitants were hated and ignored, for Sebek was the Satan of Egyptian mythology. Egypt had now, more than ever, become the centre of civilization. Its schools, under the priests, were famous, and intellectual life in every form abounded. Sculpture and painting reached high perfection, and books on all sub- ' In the time of the Eleventh Dynasty the average height of the Nile inundation was nearly 7^ yards above that of our times. Brugsch, History of Egypt, vol. i. p. 167. This may in part be accounted for by the elevation of the land, since, by the Nile deposits, which form high banks on the river sides. 38 EGYPT BEFOKE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". jects were numerous ; temples, pyramids, and tombs were largely increased ; the country was everywhere improved by public works ; boundaries, public and private, were minutely fixed ; public registers kept ; industries of all kinds multi- plied ; commerce with Libya, Palestine, and other regions covered the roads with caravans, and the waters with vessels ; gold and minerals were obtained from Sinai, and the general progress attracted a great immigration of Libyans, Cushites, and Asiatic shepherd tribes. But prosperity in the case of Egypt, with a religion so debased and a people enslaved, was no security against revo- lution, when the central despotism fell into weak hands, as it did ere long. Civil wars broke out, and petty kingdoms rose, each claiming independence. Meanwhile, events on the Euphrates were destined to send a wave of invasion as far as the valley of the Nile, and substitute foreign for domestic rulers. In the obscurity of a period so remote, little definite is known beyond the fact that the nomadic races of Western Asia and Syria, perhaps driven forward by pressure from behind, or attracted by the richness of the Nile valley, united with the Phoenician colonists of the northern coast, and, having settled in ever greater numbers in the Delta, at last, taking advantage of the internal troubles of Egypt, rose against the Fourteenth native Dynasty, which then occupied Xois, its capital, in the centre of the Delta, and overthrcAV it. For a time all was misery. Fierce and uncultured, the rough shepherd warriors harried and devastated the land. Towns and tem- ples were alike pillaged, burned, or destroyed ; the inhabi- tants who escaped massacre sinking, with their wives and children, into slavery. After the taking of Memphis, how- ever, and the conquest of the whole Delta, the barbarians EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 39 fortunately elected ii king who proved able to re-establish a settled government. 'J'wo dangers were to be guarded against : the possible efforts of the Egy^jtian princes at Thebes, in the south, to organize a national resistance ; and the risk of invasion on the north by the tribes of Canaan, Syria, and Elam. But the new king was equal to the occasion. Establishing a series of fortified posts in the Nile valley, to the south, and guarding the Isthmus of Suez with a strong force, he secured himself from both perils. He further established at Avaris, or Pelusium, at the extreme north-east edge of the Delta * — on the line of the great Egyptian wall — a vast intrenched camp, in which no fewer than 240,000 soldiers could be quartered. This he and his successors permanently maintained, as at once their supreme safeguard against in- vasion at the one point from which it could threaten, and as an inexhaustible depot from which to draw soldiers to de- fend the southern borders from attack by the native princes, and to overawe the population at large. Such vigour ere long naturally resulted in the conquest of all Egypt. The Egyptians gave the name of Shous, or Shasu — the " Shepherds " — to the nomadic tribes of Syria, the Bedouins of their times ; dark, lean, sharp-nosed, and with scanty beards, as shewn in the old Egyptian wall-paintings, like the Arabs of to-day ; their king being distinguished by the Nile populations as the Hyk, or chief ; Avhence their later Greek name of Hyksos. It would appear, however, that these chiefs, thus known, were of a race distinct from the people known as the Shasu or Shepherds, whom they led to the invasion of Egypt. » See the proofs of its position in the paper of Lepsius, Mo/iatsber. der k. Akad. der Wissemchaften zu Berlin, Mai, 1866, and Ebers' JEgypien nnd die £ucher Moses, pp. 82, -211. 40 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURiN". Among the portrait heads in the pictorial record of the campaign against the Kheta or Ilittites, and the Naharaina tribes^, sculptured on the west side of the Temple at Luxor, where I examined them, two are exactly like the Avell-known Hyksos sphinxes in every detail of their face : the slight eye- brows, the sub-aquiline nose, regaining the line of the fore- head in its lower half ; the thick end of the nose ; the very peculiar slope of the underside of it ; the size and form of the lips, firm and solid, without any negroid fulness ; the angle of the beard ; the angle of the eye ; the high cheek- bones ; the breadth of the face, and the enormously bushy hair. Every one of these distinctive features is peculiarly alike in tlie Syrian and in the Ilyksos, so that it is not improbable that we have in these portraits, the type of the Hyksos in Northern Syria, who may have been pushed down towards Egypt by the Hittites in their conquering move- ments from the north. That the portraits are those of Hyk- sos no one can question who has seen the Hyksos sphinxes in the Gizeh Museum. Rulers are very often of a different race from their subjects, as we see at this day both in Europe and Asia, so that it is very probable that the strangely peculiar caste who have perpetuated their likeness in the monuments of ancient Tanis, and whose portraits still survive at Luxor, were the alien leaders of confederated shepherd tribes, as a Tartar is at this time tlie Emperor of China ; a German, of Eussia ; and a Frenchman, of Sweden and Norway. The Hyksos were known in Egypt, not only as the shep- herds, but also as " the archers," ''the thieves," and ''the robbers." Nor can we wonder at epithets which illustrate their special skill with the weapon of the age, or the ferocity which marked their invasion. How terrible their cruelty must have been in their first onslaught is implied in the fact EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURIN". 41 that the tradition of it wakes the bitter indignation of Man- etho in the recital, twenty centuries later ; and the hatred of, the conquered population vented itself at the time by fixing the vilest epithets — '^the lepers/' "the pestilence/" "the accursed" — on their masters. But the influences of the civ- ilization around soon told on them, and ere long the con- querors were vanquished, as regarded their -barbarism, by the conquered. Despite their greater political and military ability, they felt themselves inferior to their subjects in moral and intellectual culture. Their kings soon found that it was better to develop the country than to plunder it ; and, as they themselves could not manage the fiscal details of the revenue, Egyptian scribes were admitted into the depart- ments of the exchequer, and of the public service. Ere long, the advancement in civilization was striking. The court of the Pharaohs reappeared round the Shepherd Kings, with all its pomp and its crowd of functionaries, great and small. The religion of the Egyptians, without being officially adopted, was tolerated, and that of the Hyk- Bos underwent some modifications to keep it from offending, beyond endurance, the sensibilities of the worshippers of Osiris. Sutekh, the warrior god of Canaan, and the na- tional god of the conquerors, was identified with the Egyp- tian god Set. Tanis became the capital of the country, and saw its palaces and temples rebuilt and increased in number. Sphinxes sculptured at this period enable us to realize the characteristics of the race ; for the face differs widely from both the Egyptian and Semitic types. I was struck in examining those in the museum at Gizeh by their peculiar appearance. The eyes are small, the nose large and arched, while at the same time comparatively flat ; the chin is prominent, the lips thick, and the mouth depressed at the 42 EGYPT P5EF0RE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". extremities. The whole countenance is rude, and the thick hair of an enormous wig, as it would appear, hangs around the head like a mane, and appears to bury the face. The beard is worn long, in rows of small curls, but the upper lip is shaved. Such were the new conquerors, with their foreign lineaments, and their rough earnestness, who held Egypt in subjection for perhaps five hundred years, from about B.C. 210-4 to b.c. 1683. It was apparently under one of this race, whose name has come down to us, that Joseph became grand vizier — an hon- our which a foreign Shepherd King would be more willing to show to a member of a shepherd tribe than a native Pha- raoh would have been. Known as Apopi in Egypt, he was the Aphobis of the Greeks ; and as he seems to have been the restorer of Tanis, and the king under whom its rows of^ sphinxes were set up, it is not unlikely that in their striking features we may have his portrait. Of this king, a papyrus in the British Museum fortu- nately preserves a few notices.' "It came to pass,'"* says this precious document, "that the land of Egypt fell into the hands of the plague-like men, and there was no king in Upper Egypt. When Sekenen-Ra — the ruler — was king of the south land, the impure became masters of the fortress in the district of the Amu — the Semitic races of the Delta. Apopi was king in the city Avaris, and the whole land appeared before him with tribute ; doing him service and delivering to him all the fair produce of the Delta. And Apopi chose for himself the god Set as his lord, and served no other god which was in Egypt. And he built for him a temple, in noble, enduring work. And when he appeared in the temple to celebrate a festival and to offer, he wore 1 Sallier Papyrus, p. 1. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 43 garlands as men do in the tem2)lc of Ra-Hormaclmti." Determined to pick a quarrel with the Egyi:>tiun prince of Thebes, ho had demanded that, like himself, he should give up the worship of his gods and honour Anion lla alone ; but Ea-Sekenen, while yielding all else, had declined to pledge himself to this. A new message, however, was now con- trived and sent off by Apopi, on the advice of his ^^ experts'' or scribes, and delivered to the governor of Thebes, the city of the south. This dignitary, on the arrival of the mes- senger, who had hurried to him without resting day or night, asks him, "'^ Who sent thee here to the south country? Why hast thou come as a spy? '' "' Then the messenger an- swered, ' King Apopi it is who sent me to thee, and he says, " Give me up the well for cattle which is in the ... of the land. . . .'"'' Then the ruler of the south was troubled and knew not what to say to King Apopi." He nerved himself, however, and returned an answer, unfortu- nately lost, to the messenger, who then went back to Apo- pi's court. Meanwhile Ra-Sekenen *^ called together the ancients and the nobles of the south country, and the chief men and captains, and told them the message which King Apopi had sent. And, behold, they cried out with one mouth : " It is great wickedness! ' Yet they knew not what answer to send, whether good or bad. Then King Apopi sent "' — but here the document abruptly ends."^ Strange to say, we can tell some personal details respecting the hero who was thus forced to choose between war and abject submission. Ra-Sekenen, '^ the Brave," was the third of the same title, and his resistance to the demands of Apopi led to the great war of independence, which lasted, it is 1 Brugsch translates the words as referring to the stopping ofa canal. 3 Brugech, vol. i. p. 241. Ebers, JEgypten, p. 206. Recm-ds of the Past, vol. viil. p. 3. 44 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. believed^ for about a hundred and fifty years, though some think it ended in eighty, leading at the close to the expul- sion of the Hyksos dynasty, twenty-four thousand of whom, says Manetho, went to Palestine and settled there. Ra- Sekenen, who began the revolt, fell in battle, but his body was carried off by his soldiers and duly embalmed. It is nearly, if not quite, four thousand years since he died the death of a hero, and his mummy had lain as his friends had left it, though not, it may be, in the same resting place, till a few years ago, when the coffin in which it was preserved was by chance discovered. From Upper Egypt, the with- ered body of the long dead warrior was forthwith taken to Cairo, and put in the museum, which was then at Boulak. There the mummy was unrolled in 188G, and Ra-Sekenen once more lay before the eyes of men, after a burial of about four millenniums ! He had been a tall man, of six feet one inch high, and he had fought hard for his life, his face be- ing covered with wounds, and his skull cleft — showing that, as tradition reported, he had died in battle. He was a member of the family of Taa, and was known in life as Taa ni., but he was only Hak or ^' governor ^^ of Thebes — that is, under-king,^ holding his position, it may be, from Apopi, the head of the Hyksos, himself. In this glimpse of Egypt under the Hyksos we have apparently the beginning of an account of the great war of liberation, from the Egyptian side. Apopi is still all power- ful, and sends a messenger to the sub-king of the native race in the south of Egypt, dictating to him as a master to 1 It is curious to notice that when the messengers of the Hyksos king came to Ra- Sekenen at Thebes, we read in the papyrus that the prince said to them : " Who sent thee here, to the city of the south ? How hast thou come to spy out? " It is just what Joseph said to his brethren : " Whence come ye ? Ye are spies, and ye are come here to see where the land is open." ECtYPT before the HEBREW SOJOURN. 45 a dependent ; but the cliief men round him resent such hu- miliation, and a flame of national enthusiasm is thus kin- dled, which ended in expelling the Hyksos from the valley of the Nile. All the Egyptian under-kings seem, after a time, to have taken part in this national uprising, which struggled on with sullen resolution for a hundred and fifty years. In the end " The Shepherds " were driven back at every point from their fortresses in Middle Egypt, and forced to make a stand under the walls of Memphis, which was taken after a fierce and bloody struggle. Expelled from the Delta, they gathered for a final effort to regain the ground they had lost, at their great intrenched camp at Avaris, or Pelusium, on the frontier wall, at the extreme north-east of Egypt, and maintained themselves there for a long time against all the attacks of the Egyptians. Generations, indeed, passed be- fore the siege was successful, but patient determination triumphed in the end, for Aahmes I., a little man — as his mummy shows — of five feet six, but brave and vigorous withal, in the fiftieth year of his reign, when he must have been old, at last stormed the city, and drove the enemy out of Egypt into Syria. The valley of the Nile was thus finally delivered from a foreign yoke, from the Cataracts to the Mediterranean, after a subjugation of at least 500 years. ^ Strange to say, the narrative of one who took part in the closing scenes of this long struggle, and was present at the storming of Avaris and other Hyksos towns, has come down to us, and shows how unsettled the times of the Hebrew sojourn must have been throughout. Eighty years of op- pression followed the birth of Moses, and many others may have preceded it ; but before these, successive generations of the Hebrew settlers had seen the storms of war sweeping, » Maspero says " more than 600," p. 176. 46 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURl^. now here;, now there, over the land. It is quite possible, indeed, that they took sides more or less with the Shepherds, with whom they were connected by race, and perhaps this may have embittered the persecution to which they were subsequently exposed. A vigorous and warlike people, which had shown a leaning towards the hated foreigners, would be peculiarly dreaded by the new native dy]iasty, and specially obnoxious to it. The story that has come down to us from this far-off age is that of Aahmes, " the chief of the Egyptian navy," or ^^ Captain-General of Marines," and is written on the walls of his tomb on the east side of the river, above Thebes, in sight of the ancient city of El Kobs. The dead man had had a stirring and adventurous life, and wore no fewer than eight gold chains, the equivalents of our war-medals, put round his neck by the Pharaoh, for his bravery in battle. He was born in the city of Eilethya, and was the son of a naval officer, in whose good ship, The Calf, young Aahmes made his first acquaintance with the service, in the reign of Aahmes I. ; after whom, very likely, his father's loyalty had had him named. He was still only a lad, too young to be married, and was entered among the cadets. After a time, however, he took a wife, and settled ; but the old spirit came on him again, and he Avas appointed to a post on the ship called The North, to take part in the war against the Shepherd Kings. His special duty was comj)limentary to his birth and prowess, for it was to follow the king, on foot, when he went out in his chariot. The final siege of Avaris came on presently, and Aahmes fought so stoutly at it, be- fore the Pharaoh, that he was promoted to the command of the man-of-war Crowned in Memphis. In this ship he saw service on Lake Pazetku, near Avaris, and won his first EGYPT BEFOKE THE HEBREW SOJOURX. 47 golden collar of valour, by killing and cutting off the hand of an enemy in a hand-to-hand fight, mention being made of the fact to the head scribe, who reported it to Pharaoh. After that, a second battle took place in the same neighbour- hood, and in it also he fought well and cut off a hand from another enemy, which secured him a second golden collar. Then came fighting at Takem, to the south of Avaris, and he carried off a living man, after a struggle in which he had to swim with his prisoner to a distant part of the shore so as to avoid the road to Avaris. This brought him a third col- hir, for it also was made known through the head scribe to the king. At the storming of Avaris he was even more fort- unate, for he there took a grown-up man and three women, prisoners, and had them given to him as slaves by the Pha- raoh. In the sixth year came the siege of the town Sharhana, which could not resist his Holiness the 'king, after the fall of Avaris. Two women j^risoners and one hand of a slain enemy, rewarded his bravery, and these women also were given him as slaves. But now the Shepherds were finally crushed, and Aahmes found himself engaged in a war with the Phoenician population of the sea-coast of Palestine, who were ere long subdued. The eastern frontier was forthwith protected against new invasions by a line of additional fort- resses, and piping times of peace might have come, but that King Aahmes proclaimed war against the Nubians in the far south. Thither, however, we will not folloAv the storv, beyond saying that Aahmes won more slaves, and got grants of land for his valour. TTnder Kings Amenophis I., and Thothmes I., he had as warlike a career, and was at last raised by the latter to the high rank of Admiral of the Fleet, or Captain-General. Fortunately, his last campaigns brought him back to regions more interesting to us, for war broke 48 EGYPT BEFOKE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". out against Syria. There, he was fortunate enough to at- tract the notice of the king, when he was at the head of his force, by carrying off a chariot of war, with its horses and the men in it, and leading them to him ; valour which was recognized once more by the gift of his eighth collar. ' Here his interesting story ends. During the long dominion of the foreigners the temples liad fallen into decay, but now that peace was restored, and Egypt once more free, the king, to prove his gratitude, be- gan the work of restoring them in more than their original splendour. The deserted quarries in the Arabian hills were re-opened, and limestone blocks brought from them to re- build the sanctuaries of Memphis, Thebes, and other cities — a rock tablet in the quarries still showing them on their way ; each dragged on a kind of sledge by six yoke of oxen. But Egyptian temples were too vast to be quickly completed, for the inscription in that of Edfou shows that 180 years 3 months and 14 days elapsed between its foundation and its completion. The work of restoration, therefore, must have been going on as long as the Hebrews were in Egypt. Before leaving the period of the Shepherd Kings,^ a curi- ous fact in connection with their exclusive worship of the god Set deserves notice. That god had been honoured from the earliest times in Egypt, having had a temple in Mem- phis as far back as the Eifth Dynasty, while abundant traces of the reverence paid him occur in the times of the Fourth Dynasty ; that is, eight dynasties before the days of Abraham. But the name Sutekh or Set is the Egyptian word for Baal, and is represented by the same sign ; a strange fact, which supports in the most striking way, from its incidental char- 1 Brugsch, vol. i. p. 249. Page Reiionf, in Records of the Past, vol. vi, pp. 7-10. 2 Hofmann has a long article in the Studien mid Kritiken (1839, pp. 398-348), to prove that the Ilyksos were the Israelites. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". 49 acter, the statement of Genesis as to tlie common origin of the peoples of Egypt and Canaan.' ''The comparative study of the form of the Umguage of ancient Egypt," says M. de Rouge ; " the sacred traditions of a neighbouring peo- ple ; and the fact that one and the same religion was com- mon from the first to certain peoples of Syria and the Delta, all bring us back toward the primitive kindred of Mizraim and Canaan ; a kindred which various traits indicate to us as also existing between these two races and their Arabian, Libyan, and Ethiopic neighbours." "" Manetho's pictures of the wild ruin spread by the Hyksos over Egypt on their first arrival — the sacking of temples, burning of cities, and oppression of the people — have been fancied by modern students to be greatly exaggerated. It is at least certain that the Egyptians, including even the priests of the Theban god Anion, were accustomed, in the time of the Hyksos and after their expulsion, to give their children Semitic names, borrowed from the language of the Shepherd hordes, and that they voluntarily offered homage to their god. The native Egyptian princes, who had lost their throne by the invasion, naturally hated them and strove to blacken their memory, but, in the opinion of Brugsch,^ there are no traces of anything like a permanent and ineradicable abhorrence of them on the part of the nation, beyond the aversion of an exclusive and ceremonially strict race for a people counted " unclean." Tlie fall of the Shejoherds introduced the Eighteenth Dynasty, of which Aahmes, or, as he is sometimes called, Amosis, was the first king. lie reigned twenty-five years, ' Tomkins, Life and Times of Abraham, p. 14^. Brugsch, E(/ypt,\o\.\. p. 212. Eine ^gypt. Kb nig stockier, vol. i. p. 2.31. 2 De Rouge, Six Prem. Dyn., p. 9. 8 Brugsch, vol. i. pp. 25.5 ff. VOL. II.— 4 50 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURiT. and was succeeded by liis queen, as regent for their son. From her appearing in some cases in the paintings as black, it has been assumed that she was a negress/ but as she is represented in others with the usual yellow complexion of Egyptian women, it may be that the black is only introduced in her case, as it frequently is in similar ones, in allusion to her having passed to the dark regions of the grave. ^ Her son, Amenophis I., on his assuming the crown, continued his father^s policy of extending the empire. The military spirit, roused by the long war of independence, developed itself, in fact, from the times of Aahmes, into a lust of foreign conquest. Long oppressed, the Egyptians now re- solved, in their turn, to oppress. Vast numbers of the *' Shepherds,^' preferring slavery in the valley of the Nile to banishment to the desert or to other lands, had to bear the degradation which they had hitherto imposed on others — to hew the stones of the quarry and to mould the bricks of temples and cities ; toils and humiliations which the He- brews, and other races, had, sooner or later, also to undergo. Outside the empire, expansion was most easy on the north- east; the desert, and perhaps the jDoverty of the inhabitants, discouraging aggression on the south or west. To make future invasion impossible from Syria and the countries beyond, the Egyptian legions were marched into Palestine, as the high road to Asia. Henceforth, for five hundred years, the national records are little more than a roll of vic- tories and conquests, from the sources of the Blue Nile to those of the Euphrates, over all Syria and Ethiopia. The Hebrew tribes in the Delta became familiar Avith triumphal processions of generals and princes returning from the vari- ous seats of war. One day, the spoils of southern victories 1 Birch, Egypt, etc., p. 81. Maspero, p. 176. 2 Brugsch, vol. i. p. 279. EGYPT BEFOKE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". 51 were seen, in long trains of negro prisoners, giraffes led in halters, chained apes and baboons, tame j^^^^thers and leopards. On another, the barbarians of the north, as they were called, were led along in similar triumphs, with strange head-dresses, sometimes of the skins of wild beasts, the edges floating over their shoulders, and their own fair skins set off by painting or strange tattooing. A victory over the Eutenni in Syria, or the taking of some centre of the Syrian trade, on still another day, filled all mouths, or there had been a victory over the Libyans and their allies west of the Delta. The flourish of trumpets, and the rolling of drums in these grand military disj^lays became familiar ; and, doubtless, many of the sons of Israel were often among the noisy multitude that rent the air with their acclamations, drown- ing the measured chants of sacred choirs heading the regi- ments as they marched. It was a time of rapid fortunes to some, but of great suffering to the people, who had to bear the conscription for the endless wars. Aahmes, the son of a sea-captain, could hope to return a great man, though he began as a humble cadet, but in the liut of the peasant there was mourning over the strong man fallen on a distant field.' The monuments fortunately 2^1'eserve some details of these years, which further light up the period of the Hebrew sojourn, and help us to know what subjects were talked of in the cabins of the Tribes, while still on the Nile. Aahotep, the queen of Aahmes, they would hear was proclaimed a goddess before her death, as the foundress of the new Eighteenth Dynasty; and her splendour, as we may judge from the ornaments put with her into her mummy case when she passed away, must have flashed on those of » See Maspero, p. 179 ; also Uarda, passim. 52 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". the outside world who saw her in her public appearance, as something* wonderful. Her bracelets of gold, turquoise, lapis-lazuli, cornelian, and costly glass ; the rich gold chains she wore ; her necklace, a wonder of art and costliness ; her diadem, adorned with golden sphinxes, were, they would feel sure, only hints of equal splendour in all the details of her palace life, so immeasurably above that of the toiling multitude of her subjects. Her son, Amenhotep I., for the first time among Egyptian kings, had himself painted on the temples, in a wheeled chariot, drawn by horses.^ He also built a mighty temple in Thebes, and waged wars in Ethiopia and Libya, but an interval of peace marked the closing years of his reign. Then came his son, Thothmes I., ^'^ the child of the god Thoth," the holy scribe of the gods, the first king of Egypt who carried its standards to the dis- tant Euphrates. But he bore them also as far south as four degrees inside the tropic, or fully TOO miles south of the Mediterranean, where his presence is still recorded in rock tablets near Tombos. This far-reaching glory was not with- out its effects at home. The plunder of Syria and of the south was succeeded by a steady flow of their wealth in the more peaceful channels of commerce. Richly laden ships floated down the Nile from the tropics, bearing cattle and rare animals, panther skins, ebony, costly woods, balsam, sweet-smelling resins, gold, and precious stones, and negroes in vast numbers, prisoners of war, now doomed to slavery. In the mines of Wawa, in Nubia, captives and slaves dug gold-bearing quartz from the rocks of the scorching gullies ; and, after crushing it in mills, with deadly toil washed out the particles of gold, under the eyes of Egyptian soldiers. The wretchedly barren Nubian valleys paid the penalty of 1 Birch, p. 82. The horse itself is first mentioned in the reign of Aahmee. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 53 their mineral riches in the misery of their people. ' From Ethiopia the tide of war turned, next, against the north. Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria in the widest sense, felt the shock of invasions ; to be repeated for five hundred years, as a war of vengeance against these countries, to wipe out the humiliation of Egypt in the times of the Shepherd Kings. Nothing would content Thothmes till he had '^ washed his heart, ^^ that is, cooled his anger, by a victory in Mesopota- mia ; and this he gained, after advancing triumphantly through Palestine, northwards. Nor are we to think of the Kheti or Hittites, and other tribes of Canaan a,nd Syria whom he conquered, as inglorious foes, for the varied and lavish booty taken by the Egyptians from them, as recorded in the monuments, reveals a high civilization and prosperity. Chariots of Avar, blazing with gold and silver ; splendid coats of mail ; weapons of all sorts, finely made ; gold, silver, and brazen vases ; household furniture of every kind, down to tent-poles and footstools ; with countless objects, besides, which only civilization could produce, disclose an amazing development of artistic skill and social refinement in Canaan and Western Asia, centuries before the Hebrew conquest under Joshua. Even their military organization taught Egypt lessons. Chariots of war, with their pairs of horses, thenceforward took a prominent place in the Egyptian order of battle — the horse bearing on the monuments the Semitic name of Sus^ and the charioteer the Semitic name of Kasan. The very arrangement and composition of the Egyptian army were more or less moulded after Canaaniteand Syrian models.^ ' Brugbch, vol. i. p. 289. '^ The Ilittitc empire, as will be shewn more fully hereafter, at one time extended from the Euphrates to the shores of the Grecian Archipelago, at the west extremity of Asia Minor. It was thus, in its day, the greatest power in the world, so far as we know, and it only fell on the capture of its capital Carchemish, now Jerablus, on the Euphrates, by the Assyrians, ne^irly a thousand years later than the period to which the text, above, refers. 54 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. Thothmes died early, after beginning a great temple at Tliebes, which his illustrious son, Thothmes III., was to extend and beautify beyond precedent. His favourite wife, Hashop, who was also his sister, had borne him a daughter and two sons ; 'but the elder of these, Thothmes II., was cut oif before he had reigned any length of time, though not before he had waged war once more on the peoples of the far south. Meanwhile Hashop, clever and energetic, had a series of royal tombs, which I have visited, and the like of which she intended should never again be seen in Egypt, cut into the rocks near Thebes, at a height reached only by grand flights of steps, rising stage on stage ; and there her father, Amen- hotep I., and her husband-brother were laid. But, though now a widow, she had no thought of retiring from power. Throwing aside her woman^s veil, she appeared in all the splendour of Pharaoh, as a born king, in man's attire, with the crown and insignia of royalty, and seated herself on the throne as sole ruler ; putting her brother, Thothmes III., a minor, in virtual restraint. Once supreme, her first act was to efface all traces of her brother-husband from the monu- ments, replacing them by her own name and that of her father — she taking that of Ma Ka Ea, and affecting the title of king. The magnificent temples already begun were carried on vigorously, but this did not satisfy the bright in- telligence of the man- woman. She planned a voyage of dis- covery to the land of ^^ Punt.'' ' A fleet of sea-going vessels was prepared for the long and dangerous venture, which was safely accomplished, down the Eed Sea and along the hitherto unknown coast of Africa, as far as Cape Guardafui, at the extreme point where the coast turns directly south. 1 Punt or Pount seems connected with Puni or Poeni— the red men— the Phceni- cians— as originally men of Gush. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". 55 Pictures on a temple she built in the hills near Thebes still remain, describing the wonders of the enterprise ; long in- scriptions adding curious details. Though gradually fading, you can still see the terraced mountains on which incense trees grew, and the huts of the people, built on piles, a lad- der being needed to enter. Cocoa-nut palms lent a friendly shade ; strange birds showed themselves on the branches, and stately herds of cattle reposed around. Rich treasures in stones, plants, and animals rewarded the voyagers, who returned with their ships safely, one of which, especially, is minutely painted on the temple wall, bearing thirty-one incense trees in great tubs, samples of the woods of the country, heaps of incense, ebony, objects in ivory inlaid with gold, from Arabia and elsewhere ; paint for the eyes ; giraffes, leopards, bulls, hunting leopards, dog-headed apes, long-tailed monkeys, greyhounds, leopard skins, gold, cop- per, and much else, besides a number of the natives of the country with their children. A grand ceremonial attended their return, particulars of which we may be sure circulated through Goshen, as elsewhere. The treasures brought home were meauAvhile presented to the god Amon, under whose ausj)ices the voyage had been undertaken. A new festival, moreover, was instituted in his honour, the king-queen show- ing herself in her richest attire, ^^ s, spotted leopard skin with copper clasps on her shoulders, and her limbs perfumed like fresh dew." The holy bark of Amon was carried on the shoulders of priests, amidst music and song, and a long pro- cession of court officials, warriors, great people, and priests approached his temple : the priests bearing offerings ; the warriors peaceful branches ; and the vast multitude shouting for joy. Hashop's reign was splendid? , but, ere long, she had to 56 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. allow her brother, the great Thothmes III., to share the royal honours with her, which he did for twelve years. During his long reign of fifty -four years in all, Thothmes, a man of medium height, his mummy shewing that he was five feet seven, proved the Egyptian Alexander the Great, and, moreover, left behind him a world of monuments, from the grandest temples to distant rock tablets, inscribed with his name and deeds. Egypt, indeed, became the chief power of the world for a time. Its arms were carried to the verge of the then known earth, south, east, and west. Countless riches were laid up in its temples, and commerce flowed into it from all lands. Inscriptions on the grand temple halls of Karnak recorded, as Tacitus informs us, " the tributes imposed on the nations ; the weight in silver and gold, the number of weapons and horses, the presents in ivory and sweet scents, given to the temples ; how much wheat and things of all kinds each nation had to provide ; in truth not less great than at present the power of the Parthian or Roman might imj)oses.^^ This great Pharaoh had to toil through more than thirteen campaigns, during twenty years, before he had gained his ends. The tributary nations had not only refused their pay- ments during the reign of Hashop, but had leagued together against Egypt, and needed to be subjugated afresh. Town after town had to be stormed ; river after river crossed ; country after country traversed. The first efforts were directed against the kings and chiefs of Palestine, and ended in their complete overthrow at a battle on the plain of Esdraelon. The fugitives made for the fortress of Megiddo, which was presently stormed, active resistance being thus finally put down. A rich booty rewarded the victors.^ 1 Annals of Thothmes III., Records of the Past, vol. ii. p. 45. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SO JO URX. 57 Silver, gold, lapis-lazuli, turquoise, and alabaster, jars of wine, flocks for the use of the army, chariots plated with gold, an ark of gold, 924 chariots, suits of brazen armour, 200 suits of armour for the soldiery, 502 bows, 7 poles of the chief's pavilion plated with silver, 1,949 bulls, 22,500 goats, besides gems, gold dishes and vases ; a great cup, the work of Syria ; other vases for drinking, having great stands ; swords, gold and silver in rings, a silver statue with the head of gold ; seats of ivory, ebony, and cedar, inlaid with gold ; chairs, footstools, large tables of ivory and cedar, inlaid with gold and precious stones ; a sceptre inlaid with gold ; statues of the Canaanitish king, of ebony inlaid with gold, the heads being of gold ; vessels of brass : an infinite quantity of clothing ; 280,000 bushels of corn reaped from the plain of Megiddo, and a vast number of prisoners, who henceforth became slaves, are comprised in the long enumer- ation. Nor was this all. The tribute of the Rutenni, or Syrians, is given as including a king's daughter, adorned with gold — as a wife to Thothmes. It, also, comprised ornaments of silver, gold, and lapis-lazuli, slaves male and female, a hundred gold chariots, a chariot of silver inlaid with pure gold, four chariots covered with plates of gold, six chariots of copper, the chest of agate; 1,200 oxen, 104 pounds' weight of silver dishes and beaten out silver plates, a gold breastplate inlaid at the edge with lapis-lazuli, a brass suit of armour inlaid with gold, and many others of a plainer kind ; 823 large Jars of incense, 1,718 of wine and honey, much ivory, a vast quantity of the best fire-wood for the army, and a quantity of wheat so great that it could not be measured. Some of these particulars may have already been given, but this fuller list shows still more vividly the remarkably advanced civilization of Palestine 58 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURIT. and the neighbouring countries in these early ages.' The names of the towns of Aram and Syria taken by the great soldier throw further light on the development of Western Asia at this early time — about sixteen hundred years before Christ — and also on the condition in which the various countries stood towards the government on the Nile. The names of two hundred and eighteen captured towns are given, among which are many still famous in later ages. We learn, for example, that, among others, the following submitted to the conqueror : Beirut, Hamath, with Kadesh on the Orontes, and Damascus, showing that he held the country to the extreme north ; Aradus on the sea-coast, Carchemish and Pethor on the Euphrates. He boasts that he subdued the Amorites, or hill-men, of Palestine, and crushed the combined army of the Phoenicians and Hittites, while names of conquests in every part of the land prove that while Israel was in Egypt, Palestine was an Egyptian province, the strong points of which were doubtless held by Egyptian garrisons. Thothmes, it is to be remembered, lived only about two hundred years after the death of Joseph. The return of Thothmes to Egypt after his Palestine cam- paigns was a famous event in local history, and must have stirred the Hebrew community hardly less than it did their fellow-countrymen, the native Egyptians. The great tri- umphal procession at Thebes would probably be rehearsed first in Lower Egypt, which was always regarded as a sepa- rate '^^world,^^ and, if so, many an Israelite would wonder at the sight of the captive princes, their children and their subjects, following the young, hero ; the numberless horses, oxen, goats, and curious animals ; the strange productions 1 The list'is from Records of the Past, vol. ii. pp. 45 ff., and Brugsch, vol. i. pp. 327 flE. It Is engraved on the v.'alls of part of the Great Temple of Karnak. The reiga of Thothmes III. was from about b.c. 1610 to b.c. 1556. Joseph lived c. B.C. 1912. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 59 of the conquered lands, in endless variety ; the splendour and richness of the treasures of gold and silver vessels and works of art ; the precious stones, magnificent robes and furniture ; the costly woods ; the grand chariots, statues, coats of mail, and much else, which passed before him. The addition to the G-reat Temple at Karnak of the fa- mous Hall of Pillars, still standing, was ere long begun, as a royal thank-offering to Anion. Three '' feasts of victory," of five days each, at once rewarded the army and honoured Egyptian War Prisoners. the god, and the priests were made loyal by the vast offer- ings presented. Thothmes III. undertook no fewer than fourteen cam- paigns against the inhabitants of Western Asia, between the twenty-third and fortieth years of his reign ; Palestine and Syria bearing the brunt of most, but one, at least, extending to Mesopotamia ; if not, indeed, as Dr. Birch thinks pos- sible, even to India. Of all these, I have seen the exact records inscribed on the walls of the temple at Karnak, with wonderful pictures of the chief incidents, and even of the productions and animals of the different regions conquered. Water-lilies of gigantic size, plants like cactuses, all sorts of trees and shrubs, leaves, flowers, and fruits ; oxen and calves ; a strange creature with three horns ; herons, sparrow-hawks, 60 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. geese and doves, are intermingled throughout, in the great battle-j^ictures, to give an idea of the animals and vegetation of the countries in which triumphs had been won. Nor were paintings and inscriptions the only memorials of the great conqueror. Poets sang his praises and those of the god Amon, who had given him the victory : a custom familiar in Egypt for ages before Moses and the children of Israel sang their hymn in honour of Jehovah, for the destruction of Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea. ' The temples, palaces, colossal statues, obelisks, and pub- lic buildings, erected or restored by Thothmes in every part of Egypt, have mostly perished ; but the Great Temple at Karnak and some of his colossi still remain, so grand in their decay as to fill the mind with awe. What wonder if his idolatrous contemporaries already worshipped him as a divine being while alive, and transferred to him after his death the still higher honours of a god passed to heaven ! The victorious conqueror and ruler of the whole world as then known; "the beautifier of the land ;^^ ^"^ the always fortunate ; " his name was inscribed on thousands of little images and small stone scarabagi, which were used as rings ; and its invocation was held to be a charm against wicked spirits and magicians. Amenhotep II., the sou of Thothmes, was a man of remarkable powers, but his fame is obscured by his father's greatness. He, too, led the Egyptian armies to Mesopota- mia, taking Palestine by the way, and also to Nubia in the south ; filling the earth with blood as his father had done, and draining his country of its sons. Thothmes IV., the next king, was no less energetic, for his campaigns embraced twenty-two degrees of longitude, from Mesopotamia in the 1 Birch's Egypt, vol. ii. p. 87. Brugsch, vol. i. p. 370. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 61 north, to Ethiopia in the far south. The Great Sphinx — near the Pyramids of G izeh, at Cairo — a gigantic figure of a lion, at rest, witli a human head, is still one of the wonders of the world. When recently cleared for the second time in this century/ of the vast depth of sand in which a great part of it had for ages been buried, it was found to stand in a vast amphitheatre, cut in the living rock of the limestone plateau, of which the huge form of the Sphinx was itself originally a part ; the rock having been cut away round it, leaving it rising, in the midst of the immense ex- cavation, in all its majesty. Two great flights of stairs led down from the rock on which the pyramids stand, close by^, to the floor from which the wonderful creation springs. Looking up from this open area, the human head rose a hundred feet over you. The space between the paws is thirty-five feet long and ten feet wide, and was in ancient times used as a small temple, with an altar of syenite stone before it. The date of this amazing triumph of labour and genius is immensely remote, going back, apparently, to pre- historic ages, before the advent of Menes, the first king of the First Dynasty ; so that we are carried back, as we look at it, to a period before chronology began, and are face to face with the dawn of time. Till the last clearance, only the head, neck, and a small part of the back were visible above the ever drifting sand ; but the size of the head alone spoke of the vast proportions of the whole, for the ear is four and one-half feet, the nose five feet seven inches, the mouth seven feet seven inches long, while the face at its widest part is thirteen feet eight inches across. Unfortunately, the barbarous Mamelukes, destroyed in this century by Mehemet Ali, habitually used » It was cleared in 1817, by Caviglia, Englishmea finding the £450 expended. 62 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREAV SOJOURN. the grand face as a target^ so that it is now terribly battered ; but, even so late as in the Arab period of Egyptian rule, it is described as *'' very pleasing, and of a graceful and beautiful type; indeed, one might say, it smiles winningly/' This wonderful monument was buried in the remote times of Thothmes IV. almost as completely as it is now, in our own day, and was cleared by him in consequence of a dream apparently directing him to do so. The whole inci- dent is curious. Thothmes had been hunting the gazelle, and holding a spear-throwing at targets, for his pleasure, near Memphis. But as noon approached he had let his ser- vants retire for rest, and had himself gone to the temple of Sokar in the necropolis, to bring to the god Hormakhu — that is, the sphinx, worshipped as the ''Sun on the Horizon'" — and the goddess Eamni, an offering of ''the seeds of the flowers on the heights," and to pray to the great mother Isis. The sphinx, close at hand, was held to be the likeness of Keplira or Cheops, the builder of the Great Pyramid, whom the flattery of the multitude worshipped as a god, indeed, as the greatest god of these parts ; " to whom all the inhabitants of Memphis, and of all towns in its districts, raise their hands, to pray before his countenance, and to offer rich sacrifices.'^ On one of these days the prince in his wandering had stretched himself in the shade of the great god (the sphinx), when sleep overtook him, and he dreamed, exactly at noon, and it seemed as if the great god spoke to him with his own mouth, as a father speaks to his son, in these words : " Behold me, look at me, thou, my son Thothmes. I am thy father, Hormakhu (the sphinx), Kephra (Cheops), Ra (the sun), Toum (the setting sun). The kingdom shall be given to thee, and thou shah- wear the white crown and the red crown on the throne of EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 63 the earth-god Set, the youngest among the gods. Tlie earth shall be thine in its length and in its breadth, as far as the light of the eye of tlie Lord of All shines. Plenty and riches shall be thine. . . . The sand of the district in which I have my existence, lias covered me up. Promise me that thou wilt do what I in my heart wish ; then will I acknowledge that thou art my son and my helper. ^^ ^ After this, Thothmes awoke, and resolved to obey the dream, which he did forthwith, by clearing away the sand from the sphinx, setting u]), when he had done it, a great tablet of granite 14 feet high, in the temple space between the great paws, witli an account of his dream in all its details, as I have given it : a memento buried again, for the tablet is still in the position in which the old Egyptian Pharaoh had it placed, so many thousands of years ago. Such a signifi- cant dream, told of one of the kings who reigned during the Hebrew sojourn on the Xile, reminds us of those in the story of Joseph. Thothmes IV. was succeeded by Amenliotep III., a king well-nigh as great as Thothmes III., if we may judge from the number and beauty of the monuments he has left behind him, and from the contemporary records that have survived. Mesopotamia on the north, and the land of the negroes on the south, were the boundaries of his emj)ire. Strong and courageous, in his visits to Mesopotamia lie delighted in liunting, and records that he speared Avitli his own hand no fewer than two hundred and ten lions. In war, his greatest deeds were performed in Ethiopia, the California of those ages. Two colossal statues of him, which still rise seventy feet above the sand at Thebes, stood originally in front of a great temple of Anion, which he built, but which is now » Brugsch, vol. i. pp. 415-417. 04 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBEEW SOJOURN". gone. They looked wonderful in the evening light, when I saw them. The sail over the Xile, with its broad, calm stream, green banks, yellow sand islands in the shallows, purple hills behind, and the picturesque accessories of The Colossi at Thebes. Statues op Amenhotep III. creaking shadoofs raising water for irrigation from the smooth-flowing current, a broken pigeon tower, beside a mud hamlet, and graceful clumps of palms fringing the alluvial wall of the shore, was delightful, and not less so was EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". 65 the ride for three miles to the statues. They stand about twenty yards apart, and all alone on the great plain, from which they once rose amidst the homes and glories of a crowded population. Originally hewn out of a single piece of gritstone, they have for two thousand years been more or less repaired by great blocks of stone let in to fill up gaps made by time or accident. So long ago as B.C. 70, one of them fell, but, having been raised, was perfected with ma- sonry where necessary, in five layers. An earthquake alone, one would think, could overthrow such gigantic figures. The eastern statue was in antiquity the famous Memnon, from which came a metallic sound when the sun first shone into the hollow of its lap, where there seems to have been a sonorous slab, such as are known to exist, which the heat made for an instant vocal, perhaps by the expansion or vi- bration of its particles. A few peasants in blue cotton slips, with their little flocks of two or three sheeji, or goats, or a camel, or a buffalo — that is, a black, flat-horned ox — were moving jiast as I stood before the great seated forms, their children playing round, or laying vetches before their four- footed companions, for the sheep and goats at least were playmates for the little ones. Instead of this humble sur- rounding, there had gathered there, more than three thou- sand years ago, day by day, the great ones of Egypt, the pomp of priests, the illustrious from all lands, and thousands of lowlier worshippers. It was a dream of Egypt as it once was and as it is to-day. Besides these huge colossi, Amenojohis left temples, rows of sphinxes, and vast rock tombs as his magnificent memori- als. Above all, his wise sayings were treasured for ages, and he was, moreover, a great conqueror, carrying his arms far to the south, and ruling north and east to the Euphrates. VOL. II.-5 66 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURl^. After his reign of thirty-five years came his son Amenho- tep IV., ^'the long lived/' whose mother, the darling wife of his father, had l^een neither of royal blood nor even an Egyptian, as has been strikingly shewn with much detail in a series of clay tablets, eighty-one in number, very recently discovered, giving glimpses of both father and son. These documents have, besides, a special interest, since they help us to understand the old Hebrew and Western Asiatic rela- tions to the Pharaohs better than ever before. On the east bank of the Nile, between Minieh and Assi- out, a long row of mounds, now known as Tel-el- Amarna, cover the wreck of an ancient city. It was, during its short glory, the capital of Amenhotep IV., or Khu-n-Aten, ^^the Splendour of the round Sun,^^ who transferred to this spot the glory of his residence, in consequence of the trouble into which he had brought himself by adopting his mother^'s religion and discarding that of Egypt. As a ^'^ heretic,^'' he had to retire from the hatred and treason of the priests of Thebes, and, having built a new capital, transferred thither his father's archives and his own. Among other things car- ried to it was, fortunately for us, his own and his father's foreign correspondence, written in the wedge-shaped writ- ing and language of Babylonia, then the court-language of Western Asia, and naturally of Egypt, by which Western Asia was ruled, far and near. These priceless clay tablets were found in one of those treasure-houses of ancient annals, the tombs of the kings and their officers. In this case it was the grave of a royal scribe of Amenophis, or "' Amenhotep '^ III. and IV., of the Eighteenth Dynasty — kings who reigned in the sixteenth century before Christ, and thus, about 200 years before the Exodus — which had given up its records, and also a EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW S0J0ITR:N". 67 number of seals and i^apyri of great historical and artistic value. Not only do these tablets explain the historical crux men- tioned above, but they introduce us to the family life of the early kings ; they picture to us the splendours of the royal palaces ; they enable us to assist at the betrothal of the kings' daughters, and to follow the kings to their hunting grounds. Most of the tablets are letters addressed to Amen- hotep III., among the most interesting of them being some written by Tushratta, King of Mesopotamia. We know from other sources that Amenhotep was a mighty hunter, and that during the first ten years of his reign he killed 102 lions with his own hand in the plains of Mesopotamia. On the occasion of a certain expedition in search of these big game, he, like a king in a fairy tale, met and loved Ti, the daughter of Tushratta, the king of the country. In due time their nuptials were celebrated, and Ti went down into Egypt accompanied by 317 of her principal ladies. The establishment of this goodly array of Semitic beauties in Egypt led to the advent of a host of their countrymen, who, finding that the land offered a favourable sphere for their inherent business capacities, settled down in large numbers, and gradually, like the Jews in Russia at the present day, acquired jiossession of the lands and goods of their hosts. The fact of the preservation of this library of cuneiform tab- lets testifies to the influence exercised by the queen, of which we also find mention elsewhere. Under her protection her countrymen doubtless enjoyed exceptional privileges, and during the reigns of the succeeding feeble sovereigns they were probably able to hold their own. But with the advent to power of the Nineteenth Dynasty, about B.C. 14G2, a change came over their fortunes. They were set to the un- 68 EGYPT BEFOKE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". congenial tasks of making bricks and of building walls and pyramids ; and finally tlie oppression they endured ended in the outbreak which led to their triumphing gloriously over their taskmasters at the passage of the Red Sea. Among the letters translated^ the most interesting is one from Tushratta, addressed to '' the great king, the King of Egypt, my brother, my son-in-law, who loves me and whom I love,^' and begins, " I, Tushratta, the great king, thy father-in-law, who loves thee, the King of Midtanni, my brother, have peace ; to thee may there be peace, and to thy house and 'to my sister {i.e., the wife of Amenhotep III.), and to the ladies of thy establishment, to thy sons, to thy chariots, to thy horses, to the generals of thy forces, to thy country, and to thyself may peace be greatly multiplied.'^ After a multitude of such complimentary phrases, he pro- poses to his son-in-law that they should continue the ar- rangement made by their fathers for pasturing double- humped camels, and in this way he leads up to the main purport of his epistle. He says that Manie, his great- nephew, is ambitious to marry the daughter of the King of Egypt, and he pleads the young man's cause with a prayer that Manie might be allowed to go down to Egypt to woo in person. The alliance would, he considers, be a bond of union between the two countries, and, he adds, as though by an after-thought, that the gold which Amenhotep ap- pears to have asked for should be sent at once, together with " large gold jars, large gold plates, and other articles made of gold.'' After this interpolation he returns to the mar- riage question^ and proposes to act in the matter of the dowry, in the same way in which his grandfather acted, pre- sumably on a like occasion. He then enlarges on the wealth of his kingdom, where '' gold is like dust which cannot be EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 69 counted," and he adds that he sends as j^resents of peace to the king by the hand of his grandson Giliya, ^' a gold vessel inlaid (?) with laiDis-lazuli, 20 pieces of lapis-lazuli, 19 in- laid gold objects of finely chased gold, 42 objects made of some kind of precious stone, 40 gold objects inlaid with the same sort of precious stone, harness for horses, chariots, carved wooden fittings, and 30 eunuchs." Another letter is from Burraburiyash, son of Kuri-Galzu, King of Karaduniyash, the traditional Garden of Eden, to King Amenhotep IV., in which the writer acknowledges the receipt of two manas of gold, but adds that two more are absolutely necessary for the ornamentation of the house of his god and of his own palace. He promises to send in return anything that Amenhotep may Avish to have from Babylonia, and in the mean time he begs him to acce^Dt ^^ three manas of lapis-lazuli, ten sets of harness for horses, five chariots, and various woods.'' A third letter is from the King of Alashiya to x\menhotep III., and is interesting as showing the international rela- tions existing between the two countries, and the kindly offices which were exchanged between the kings. The writer mentions that a native of Alashiya had gone down to Egypt and died there, having left his wife and family in his native land. As he died possessed of property, the king requests Amenhotep to send back his goods by his ambas- sador. The writer also begs Amenhotep to accept '^'^five vessels of bronze, the like of which are not made in the land of Egypt," together with a bull which the king had asked for, and promises that the trees Amenhotep had expressed a wish to have should be sent him. In return for all these gifts he asks for only ^' two kukupu jars, and a man who understands eagles." Let us hope that he got them, and 70 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". that they afforded him some solace under the affliction of the blighting hand of the god Bazbar (the plague ?), who was slaying the people of his land. The tablets of the reign of Amenhotep IV. like those to his father^ were written by the kings and governors of Baby- lonia and Assyria, Mesopotamia, Eastern Cappadocia, Syria, and Palestine, which was then a dependency of Egypt, with Egyptian gaiTisons and Egyptian governors in its more im- portant towns. In other parts of Palestine, however, the native ^' princes '^ were allowed to hold their petty domin- ions, which often consisted of little more than single towns, with a few villages and fields round them. It is curious to read despatches about the j^olitical movements in places like Gath, Gaza, or Keilah, mentioned in Scripture ; but the chief interest of the tablets to general readers lies in the romantic story of the marriage of Amenhotep IV. to the Syrian princess, and its strange results in the fortunes of her son. Her name, it seems, was Ti, and she came from Aram Naharaim, that is, Syria of the Two Elvers, or Northern Mesopotamia. It was on the east of the Euphrates, though it sometimes gained territory west of that river also. Its ruler was the nearest Syrian prince independent of Egypt, for those as far as the western bank of the great stream were his vassals. Ti brought to her Egyptian home Semitic manners, fol- lowers, and religion; and her arrival filled the court with officials who had come to her, or with her, from Asia, and of course bore names foreign to the Nile. Like the queen, they worshipped Baal, the Sun-god, using as his symbol the figure of the Solar disk, with wings for its rays, as we see in the early monuments of Western Asia. Amenhotep IV., was. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 71 naturally, brought u-p in his mother's creed, which was also that of so many magnates and others around him in the palace. AVhen his father died he married another Syrian princess from his mother's country, and introduced still more numerously than his father had done Canaanites and Phcenicians to the high offices of state. After a time he even went the length of publicly adopting the Syrian re- ligion, slighting the worship of Amon, the great god of Thebes, and of the other Egyptian gods. Hence, though he built temples to them, he worshipped only the '^ One God of Light " — the sun — in honour of whom he even changed his name, as I have said, to Khu-n-Aten — ^' the Splendour of the round Sun.'' He further erased the name of Amon and of liis divine wife Mutli from the monuments, and proclaimed himself "a high-priest of Hormakhu," and a "friend of the round Sun.'' Nor was this all. He sought to get the new faith adopted by Egypt instead of the faith of his race, but the cry of '' The Church in danger ! " rose from the priests of the dishonoured god, and led to a rebellion, on account of which Amenhotep removed his capital from Thebes to Middle Egypt, that is, farther north. There a new city, Khu-n-Aten, the city of Aten, the sun, was forthwith built, with a grand temple to the Sun-god Aten, in a foreign style, and palaces and j^ublic buildings, nearly all of granite, labo- riously brought from Assouan or Syene. In this new me- tropolis he gathered round him a court of foreigners from Western Asia, Semitic in blood, as Edward the Confessor filled his court with his beloved Frenchmen. The Egyp- tians in attendance on him in court offices were only such as had gone over to his new creed, and hence the hatred of the priesthood grew still more intense against him. But the new city rose apace, with a grand temple to the Solar disk. 72 EGYPT BEFOKE THE HEBREW SOJOURi^. and a great palace ; represented now^ with all else in the once busy capital^ by the silent mounds of earth at Tel-el- Amarna. Though soft and feminine in his features, and of a weak, unmanly figure, Amenhotep was far from being either weak or irresolute in character. Before leaving Thebes, he had compelled the dignitaries of the empire to unite with labourers and masons in building a huge pyramid of sand- stone in honour of the " God of Light ; '' the noblest lords, including even the specially illustrious " fan-bearers,^' being required to play the humble part of overseers of the work- men who cut, shipped, and put together the stone. But he was as tender and faithful in his domestic relations as he was proud and stern towards his opj^onents, and clung zeal- ously to his new faith ; which, indeed, was much purer and loftier than the creed he had discarded. His rupture with the priests must have been the great topic of the times in Goshen and over all the land, but it did not shake his throne, for he died in peace — leaving seven daughters but no son — after a reign not without glory from the deeds of his armies abroad, and famous for his honest worth at home. The husband of the third daughter of this king succeeded him on his throne, and has had his memory preserved by a remarkable painting in the tomb of a Theban contemporary. It shows us the king on his throne receiving the homage and tribute of the nations subject to him. Richly laden ships bring the gifts and dues of the negro populations, and with them appears a negro queen, who has come on a char- iot drawn by oxen, surrounded by her slaves and officials, to visit the Pharaoh and lay rich presents at his feet, as the Queen of Sheba in a later age came to Solomon. EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. 73 The brown-skinned kings of Palestine are also painted in rich dresses, their black hair elaborately curled ; offering to Pharaoh Syrian horses, led by red-bearded men of low stat- ure ; costly and beautiful works of their country, in silver, gold, blue stone and green stone ; and all kinds of jewels ; as an expression of their wish for peace, and of their respect. But Tut-ank- Anion, as the king called liimsclf, was only an illegitimate iiretendcr, for his rpieen, through her mother, was not of the pure blood of the Pharaohs ; so that, although he returned to the old faith, and thus gained the outward support of the priests, he failed to secure their warm loyalty. Hence, when he died, after a short reign, without a legitimate successor, the throne was seized by Khu- n-Aten's former Master of the Horse — ^' the Holy Father Ai "' — who seems to have made a remarkably good king. Gossip about him must have been rife from the Mediter- ranean to Xubia — how his wife had been nurse to King Khu-n-Aten, the heretic ; how this had raised Ai, already a lord of the court and a ' * holy father '^ of the highest grade, to even higher dignities ; how he had been successively ^' fan-bearer on the right hand of the king, and superin- tendent of the whole stud of Pharaoh,^' and ^'^the royal scribe of justice." Xor had liis wife fared less generously, for rumour would justly recount how ^'the high nurse, the nourishing mother of the godlike one, the dresser of the king," increased in riches and honour, year by year. Wisely orthodox, Ai had the support of the priests, and was allowed by them to j^repare a tomb for himself amongst those of the kings at Thebes. As the Pharaoh, his armies preserved the wide limits of the empire, and even won great victories, but lie had no heirs, and the succession to the throne was once more a difficulty at his death. xVnother 74 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN. Pharaoh had to be discovered, and the good fortune fell in this case on a person who had no connection with royalty except his having married a sister of the queen of Amen- hotep III. His name, however, helped him, for it was Horemhib, or Horns, one of the great gods. An inscription records the strange steps of his elevation. In his youth he had the happiness of being presented to the Pharaoh, who named him " guardian of the kingdom." " In all his deeds and ways,^^ he tells us, '^ he followed in the path of the gods Thoth and Ptah, justice and truth, and they were his shield and his protection on earth, to all eternity.'' He was after- wards raised to the great dignity of the Aclon of the land, and held the office for many years. This was the position granted to Joseph, and hence the honours paid the son of Jacob may be gathered from those shown to Horemhib in the same office. ^' The great men at the court bowed before him, and the kings of foreign nations of the south and north came before him, and stretched out their hands at his approach, and praised his soul, as if he had been a god. His authority was greater than that of the king in the sight of mortals, and all wished him prosperity and health." His adoption as the crown prince of the land followed, and, next, his selection for the throne, after the death of "The Holy Pather." An inscription detailing the inci- dents of his coronation throws light on the relations of the priesthood to the Pharaohs and their immense influence in Egypt. "'The noble god Amon (that is, his priests, the most powerful corporation in the land) gave command to conduct the god Horns (the intended king) to Thebes . . . to deliver him his royal office and to establish it for the term of his life." Then came a grand coronation pro- cession, and " Amon Ea was moved with joy." The daugh- EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". 75 ter of the late king was forthwith given to him as queen. . . . Then went Amon (that is, liis image was carried by the priests) with his son (the new king) before him, to the hall of kings, to set his double crown on his head. There the gods (that is, the choirs of their priests) cried out : ' We will to invest him with his kingdom ; we will to bestow on him the royal attire of the Sun-god Ea ; we will to praise Amon in him. . . .' And the great name of this god- like one was settled and his title recorded." ^ ''After this festival in the southern country was finished, Amon, the king of the gods (that is, the priests bearing the image of Amon with them), went in peace to Thebes, and the king went down the river in his ship, like an image of the god Hormakhu. Thus he had taken possession of the land, as was the custom. He renewed the dwellings of the gods (the temples).^ He had all their images re-sculptured, each as it had been before. He set them up in their temple, and he had one hundred images made, one for each of them, of like form, and of all kinds of costly stones. He visited the cities of the gods, which lay as heaps of rubbish in the land, and had them restored. . . . He took care of their daily festival of sacrifice, and of all the vessels of the tem- ples, of gold and silver. He provided the temples with holy persons and singers, and with the best of the body-guards, and he presented to them arable land and cattle, and sup- plied them with all kinds of provision which they required, to sing thus, each morning, to the Sun-god Ra : ' Thou hast made the kingdom great for us in thy son, who is the con- solation of thy soul, King Horemhib. . . J" The great pyramid raised by the heretic King Khu-n-Aten was soon > Hymns in wMch the Pharaoh was adored as ihc sun-god are still extant. ^ Fap. Anastasi, II. v. 6. 76 EGYPT BEFORE THE HEBREW SOJOURN". after destroyed^ its stones being taken to raise an addition to the temple of Anion, and thus the triumph of the priests was at last complete/ AVhen the last king of the Apostate House had thus died or been dethroned, the new city was forsaken for ever, with all its magnificence of temple and palace, and the new kings returned to the worship of Anion of Thebes, and Ptah of Memphis, and guarded against the dangers of Khu-n-Aten's times by expelling the Semitic foreigners from the land, except in so far as it was thought well to retain some proportion, including the Hebrews, to serve as public or private slaves. With Horemhib expired the Eighteenth Dynasty. The Nineteenth was that under which the oppression of the Hebrews and their deliverance took place, but both were still some generations distant. » Brugscli, vol. i. pp. 462-473. CHAPTEE III. THE OPPRESSIO^^" IN" EGYPT. Of the history of the Jews in Egypt we know nothing directly except in its last period, and even of that we have only a few brief and fragmentary notices. They evidently, however, by degrees laid aside, to a large extent, their tent life as wandering shepherds, and applied themselves in some cases to agricnltnre ; digging canals from the east branch of the Kile to water their fields, or learning the varions trades and arts of Egypt ; and thns j)assed from a lower to a higher state of social development. Renben, Manasseh, and Gad, indeed, alone clung to the old shepherd life after the Exodus. No country in these early ages was so far advanced in civilization as Egypt ; none could boast so grand a history ; such far-reaching power ; such splendour of architecture ; such knowledge of arts and sciences ; such royal magnifi- cence in its government, or such accumulated wealth in its national treasury and in the hands of its nobles and priests. To use the words of Ewald, Egyjit — like Athens and Rome in later ages, in their relations to the northern races — was a magnet Avhich attracted or drove from it the less cultured peoples round — a school for wandering, conquering, or con- quered nationalities, from which none went away as they had come.' A community settled in it, as the Hebrews, when they left it, had been, for over four hundred years, must 1 Quoted in Uhlemann's Israditen und Hyksos, p. 2. 78 THE OPPRESSION IIST EGYPT. have insensibly caught more or less the modes of thought and special ideas predominant on all sides round them. Above all, they must have been largely influenced by the strange religion prevailing. Lofty and philosophical in theory or in the secret interpretation of the initiated ; splendid in its ritual and temples, and universally honoured in the land ; it had doubtless much to attract. Traces of the great primeval revelation of the One living and only God still survived/ though veiled and confused by the poly- theism which had sprung up. Thus in a hymn to the god Amon/ we find the lines : — " One only art Thou, Thou Creator of beings, And Thou only makest all that is created. He is One only, Alone, without equal, Dwelling alone in the holiest of holies.'' A few among the higher priests doubtless whispered, as a mystery trusted only to themselves, the existence of this One only God, self existent, *^His own Father and Son,"*^ ^^ the To-day, Yesterday, and To-morrow,^^ the '^ I Am that I am ; '' ^ but these glimpses of the august truth were so thickly veiled'and shaded by the countless and varied forms of the Egyptian pantheon, as to elude the recognition or comprehension of the multitude. In this very hymn indeed, Amon is said to be begotten by Ptah, the local god of Mem- phis. But to breathe even this confused vision of the truth beyond the small circle of the instructed few was an impiety, J Durch Goseii, p. 528. JJarda, vol. i. p. 45. ■2 Bulaq Papyri, p, 17. Translated by Goodwin, Trans. Soc. Bib. Arch., vol. ii. p. 250. Records of the Past, vol. ii. p. 129. It has been translated also by Grebaut and Stern. See, also, Uarda, vol. i. p. 45. 3 See this name— afterwards rightly assumed by Jehovah as due only to Him,-« quoted from the hieroglyphics, in Ebers' Durch Gosen, p. 528. THE OPPRESSIOi^ IX EGYPT. 79 to be severely punished.' To the world at large in the Xile valley, there were seven gods of the highest rank — Ra, the Sun-god, the great national divinity, and Osiris and his family. From these had emanated a second grade of twelve gods, at whose head stood the moon-god Thoth, and from these again, a third, of thirty demi-gods.^ But all these divinities took so many names and forms of both sexes, that the mind could not retain more than a few. Nor was this the worst. From the earliest ages, it had been the strange custom in Egypt to regard certain beasts, birds, fishes, and even insects as the symbols of particular gods.^ The croco- dile, the goat, the sheep, the scarabseus beetle, the ox, the dog, the dog-faced ape, the shrew-mouse, the cat, the wolf, the ichneumon, the lion, the hipj^opotamus, the ibis, some serpents, the sparrow-hawk, some fishes, and some vegeta- bles, were sacred in wider or narrower districts, and although perhaps regarded by the educated or reflecting few as only symbols, were worshipped by the multitude as in some way divine. Oiferings were presented to the sacred animals ; priesthoods maintained in their honour ; magnificent temjjles built for their reception ; grand festivals held in their praise, and public lamentations made at their death ; whilst to kill one of them was a capital crime. They were regarded as incarnations in which the particular god had veiled himself, to watch the better, from this disguise, the lives of his wor- shippers and the current of events. Clement of Alexandria aptly expresses the feeling of the outside world towards this strange religion. " The holy places of the temples,'' says he, " are hidden by great veils of cloth of gold. If you ad- vance towards the interior of the building to see the statue » Uarda, vol. i. p. 46. 2 Lepsius, ^gypten, Hcrzog, vol. i. p. 142. • J. E. Muller, in Herzog, vol. xvi. p, 49, 80 THE OPPRESSIOIi 11^ EGYPT. of the god, a priest comes to you with a grave air, chanting a hymn in the Egyptian language, and lifts a corner of the gorgeous curtain to show you the divinity. But what do you see ? A cat, a crocodile, a serpent, or some other dangerous animal. The god of the Egyptians appears ; it is a beast tumbling about on a carpet of purple/^ The multi- tude, ever incapable of refined dis- tinctions between the idol or symbol and the god who had veiled himself in its outward form, paid divine hon- ours directly to the sacred bird or l)east. Nothing more degrading than Buch a monstrous faith could be con- ceived. Thus, the people of Thebes worshipped the crocodile, which was killed as hateful farther up the Nile. A fine specimen having been caught, the priests taught it to eat from their hands, and carefully tended it. Golden ear-rings were hung in its ears and brace- lets set on its forefeet. ' Strabo gives an account of a visit to one. '^ Our host,'' says he, '''• took cakes, broiled fish, and a drink prepared with honey, and then went towards the lake ^ with us. The brute lay on the bank, whither the priests went to it. Two of them then opened its jaws, and a third put into its mouth, first the cakes, then the fish, and finally they |)oured the drink down its throat. After this, the crocodile shambled into the water and swam to the bank on the other side. Another stranger having arrived with a similar offering, the priests took it, made the circuit of the The God Thoth. The Scribe OF THE Gods. 1 Herod., ii. 69. 2 The sacred lake in the temple f^rounds, made for the divine crocodile. THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. 81 lake, and, having reached the crocodile, gave it to him in the same way."' It Avas not uncommon for rich people to spend immense sums on a splendid funeral of a sacred cat,"' dog, or ram ; ' and so zealous were the multitude in their worship, that even so late as a century and a half before Christ, a Eoman living in Alexandria, having by accident killed a cat, was seized by the crowd, on the fact being known, and put to death on the s^oot, though he was a Roman citizen, a n d though the king, who dreaded Rome and trembled for his crown, implored them to spare the unfortunate man's life.* Some of these beast-gods were only locally famous ; others were honoured by the whole country. The ram was honoured at Thebes, where the great god Anion had a ram^s head. At Mendes, in the heart of the Hebrew district, the goat was sacred to the god Binebtat, who was represented with a goat's head and legs. His worship, in keeping with his symbol, was wildly fanati- cal, and hateful for its orgies of lust and impurity.^ At Kynopolis, the dog ; at Lycopolis, the wolf, and perhaps Sevek-ra. > Strabo, xvii. 1, 3 Eine ^gypt. Kbnigst., vol. ii. pp. 51, 21^;. 3 Diodorus, i. 84. * Ibid., i. 83. See, also, another case, Hours icith the Bible, vol. 1. p. ].3. ' The Hebrews seem to have been drawn away by this idol and to have sacrificed to him. Lev. xvii. 7. Dent, xxxii. 17. In these texts the word " devils " is to be translated "goats." VOL. II.— 6 82 THE OPPRESSION" IN" EGYPT. the jackal ; at Bubastis, the cat : at Tochompso, the croco- dile was worshipped. Every household, moreover, had its sacred bird, which it fed during its life and buried with the family after its death, when it had been carefully em- balmed.' The goddess Pecht had the head of a cat, Hathor that of a cow, and Osiris was worshipped under an ob- scene symbol. The goat of Mendes was " the soul of Osiris ; " the calf Mnevis of On, ^'the soul of Ka,'^ the great Sun-god. The phoenix, a fabulous bird, was an incarnation of Osiris, as the ibis was of Thoth, and the sparrow-hawk of Horus. But the ox Apis, at Memphis, not far from Goshen, was the supreme expression of the divinity in an animal form. He was regarded as an incarnation of Osiris and Ptah together, and hence was honoured as, at once, " the second life of Ptah," and '^the soul of Osiris.''^ He had no father, but a ray of light quickened him in the womb of his cow mother which henceforth could bear no other calf.^ It was required that he be black, with a triangular white spot on his fore- head ; the figure of a vulture or eagle with outspread wings on his back, and that of a scarabaeus on his tongue. Such marks, it need hardly be said, never appeared, but the priests had symbols Avhich they accepted in their stead, as astronomers fancifully recognize the outline of a dragon, a bear, or a lyre in the positions of the stars of different con- stellations." He was not allowed, however, to live more than twenty-five years. At the end of this period he was drowned in the sacred fountain of the Sun, and his em- balmed body was then laid with great public solemnities in a magnificent tomb.^ 1 Creiizer's Symbolik, p. 158. ^ Strabo, xvii. 1. 3 Herod., iii. 28. * Mariette, Bulletin Arch, de VAthencBum, 1855, p. 54. ^ Page 19. THE OPPRESSION IX EGYPT. 83 With all this degradation, however, the Egyptian religion had the glory of maintaining the immortality of the soul as one of its most cherished doc- trines, and with this the resur- rection of the body ; though they linked the continued exist- ence of the spirit to that of the frail tenement in which it had lived on earth/ In the midst of such an idolatry the Hebrews could for themselves see its results. Cherishing for generations the lofty faith of Abraham, they must have kept very much apart while the pure creed of the patriarchs still held its ancient place in their hearts. They saw the race which honoured beast-gods sunk into degradation, and treated as slaves by their kings and the higher castes. There was no reverence for man as man, no recognition of the personal freedom of the population at large. The Pharaohs boasted of descent from the gods, and were worshipped even during their life as divine, and the whole land and all the people in it belonged to them. If a portion of the soil were left to the peasant it was an act of grace. There was, in fact, no " people " in Egypt ; only slaves. They were forced to toil, at the royal will, in raising temples, pyramids, and cities, under the eyes of remorseless ''drivers.'' Nor was any sympathy for the suffering multi- The God Amon. 1 The best account I know of Egyptian ideas of immortality is in Maspero's Egyp- tian Archaology. London, 1889. 84 THE OPPEESSIOI^ IK EGYPT. tude shown by the priests, who steadily ranged themselves on the side of power. Thus, sunk in political degradation, the multitude sought compen- sation in immorality. Gentle and patient as they were, the Egyptians were also specially impure. With such a worship, they gave the reins to the baser passions, for why should a man be better than his gods ? Un- natural vices prevailed on every side.^ Universal and open im- ])urity marked their great yearly religious festivities at Bubastis and l)endera,'at which 700,000 people sometimes were assembled. It would have been astonishing if, amidst such corrup- tion, the Hebrews had remained uncontaminated. Yet the wonder is they were not worse than they proved. Their independence and separate nationality, long respected, doubtless shielded them in part, yet they had, as a people, lapsed into a very low spiritual condition when Moses appeared. The name of the God of their fathers had been forgotten," and they had defiled themselves with the idols of Egypt,* and worshipped a calf, perhaps the symbol of the god Mnevis, under the very shadow of Sinai. They would appear also, as already said, to have sacrificed to the sacred goat Mendes,^ which was so much honoured in Egypt that the whole land mourned its death. Indeed, after the con- Anubis. 1 Herod., ii. 46. Lev. xviii. 8 ff. "After the doings of the land of Egypt wherein ye dwelt shall ye not do.'' See, especially, ver. 23. Comp. with Herod., ii. 60, 2 Ebers, Burch Gosen, p. 483. ^ Exod. iii. 13. 4 Ezek. XX. 7, 8. * Page 81, n. THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. 85 quest of Canaan they still clung to the worship of Egyp- tian gods.' Nor was idolatry the only evil learned by their long sojourn on the Nile. Ezekiel, so late as the time of the Captivity, reminds them how even their maidens had yielded to the impurities of Egypt, and had given them- selves up to shameless sin." But if;, on the one hand, the Hebrews were thus contami- nated by the religion and morals of the Nile valley, on the other hand, they gained much in their social and national development by residence there. Surrounded by the highest existing culture, they gradually became fitted for independ- ent national life. The sciences, arts, and mode of life of their neighbours re-appear more or less in their future his- tory ; in the medical knowledge of Israel, its civilization, its laws and customs, and even its knowledge of writing. Arithmetic, geometry, and acquaintance with the heavens were unknown to them before entering Egypt ; and arts, of which no trace exists in the patriarchal times, appear among them immediately after the Exodus. We find them then executing delicate work in gold, silver, wood, and stone ; skilled in weaving, embroidering, and dyeing,^ and able to cut, set, and engrave precious stones.* Nothing is told us of their history in Egypt, but an allu- sion in Chronicles ^ may refer to an unsuccessful attempt to break away from the Nile before the days of Moses. Their families grew into twelve, thirteen, or fourteen tribes,^ and 1 Josh. xxiv. 23. ' Ezek. xxiii. 8. 3 Graetz, GescJiichte, vol. i. p. 14. Uhleraann, Die Israeliten, p. 3. * Proved by the Urim and Thuramira, the stones on the high-priest's shoulderi?, and on his breastplate, etc. These were engraved with the names of the tribes. But the mention of a signet ring (Gen. xxxviii. 18) may imply the knowledge of stone engraving at an earlier period. fi 1 Chrou. vii. 21. " The number of the tribes is usually given as twelve, Ephraim and Manasseh being reckoned as two, and Levi not counted. Manasseh, however, broke up into two, 86 THE OPPEESSIOI^ IK EGYPT. these maintained a steadfast relationship through common descent and traditions. To the Eeubenites, as descendants of Jacob's eldest son, the leadership would, under ordinary circumstances, have been assigned, but the patriarch, in his dying words, virtually deposed their forefather from the rights of the first-born. '' Bubbling over like water, ^^ in his unbridled passions, he had '^ defiled his father^s couch, ^^ and '^ would have no preeminence '^ such as his birthright promised.^ The Reubenites, as has been noticed already, were and remained nomadic shej^herds, as also did the Gad- ites and the eastern half -tribe of Manasseh, with whom simi- larity of life united them ; but even among these Eeuben took no foremost place. In the same way, the next eldest tribe, Simeon, remained always subordinate, and ended by being virtually lost in that of Judah. Over them, also, for their lawless conduct at Shechem, their father^s words hung like a blight, for *" their swords had been instruments of violence. ^^'"^ *' 0 my soul, ^^ the dying patriarch had added, of both tSimeon and Levi, in this connection, ^'^come not thou into their council ; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united ; for in their anger they slew men, and in their self-will they houghed oxen.^' ^ Both, as he pre- dicted, were, literally, '' divided in Jacob and scattered in Israel." Judah, although in later times the most power- ful and noted of all the tribes, was long in taking the leadership, which in Egypt and for ages afterwards, was naturally held by that of Joseph ; including from the first its two great branches — Ephraim, long supreme as that onthe east and that on the west of the Jordan, and hence there were thirteen tribes, or, with Levi, fourteen. Graetz thinks the number of offerings in Numbers xxix. 13— thirteen— refers to thirteen tribes {Geschichte, vol. i. p. 11), but if so, the fourteen offerings that follow would include Levi, and make fourteen tribes. 1 Gesenius, Thes., 1098 b, 645 a. Miihlau und Volck, under the word Yathar. » Gesenius, Thes., 673 b. ^ Lit. translation, Gen. slix. 6. THE OPPEESSIOK IN" EGYPT. 87 the representative of its great forefather, and spoken of as " Israel ; " and Manasseh, which separated into the eastern and western branches of Machir and Gilead. The, other tribes were always subordinate : Benjamin, Issachar, and Zebulon connecting themselves in a measure with the descendants of Joseph ; Dan, Asher, and Naphtali choosing a more isolated life, comparatively apart from their brethren. The tribe of Levi held a peculiar position. Assuming the moral leadership in Egypt, it afterwards rose to be the priestly and ecclesiastical head of the nation . The tribal constitution of these various clans, in Egypt, was simple. They had no common chief, but lived under the rule of their own elders or sheiks. This simple pa- triarchal form of government they retained in common with their related nations, the tribes of Edom and those de- scended from Ishmael,' and with the Horites — or Cave-men — who lived among the Edomites, and were of Canaanitish descent.^ As the Edomites had Allufim, or ^' heads,"" the dukes of our version, the tribes of Israel had chiefs, known as princes, even before the time of Moses, for there is no mention of their having been introduced by the great law- giver. Under these "princes'"' or '^^ elders,^' were subordi- nate chiefs of greater and lesser divisions ; each tribe being apparently divided into twelve '^ Families," or clans, and each clan into twelve " Houses of the Fathers."'^ All these chiefs, no doubt, ranked among the ''^elders" of the nation ; but it is impossible to tell whether this name, the Hebrew Zaken, an elder — like the Arab Sheik, the Roman Senator, the Saxon Alderman, or the modern Signior, which mean the same, was simply a title of rank, without reference to » Gen. XXV. IG ; xxsvi. 10, 11. 2 Geu. xxxvi. 29, 30. 3 Num. 1. 2. Josh, vii. 14, 17. 88 THE OPPRESSION" 11^ EGYPT. age, or is to be literally understood. Nor is there any hint of the mode by which the heads or elders were elected in cases of vacancy in their number. ' Thus we have to think of Israel in Egypt not as a mere mob or multitude, but as a nation, or at least an organized community, of which the unit was the family, ruled by the father, with very extensive power. Separate households, moreover, grouped together into a minor clan, made a " House of the Fathers,^" and a number of these, springing from a common ancestor, formed a ^^ family,'^ or Avhat the Romans would have called a '"gens," over which, as a greater house, was also set a ^' father, ^^ or 'Miead/' or ^'^ prince. ^^ The different tribes, however, showed very dif- ferent characteristics. Eeuben, Gad, and Simeon, as has been noticed, clung to a pastoral life, while Benjamin was famous for its warlike skill and spirit. Military unions, known as "thousands,^' were common to all; meaning, it may be, 1,000 soldiers from each, or bands selected from 1,000 households.^ From the earliest times, also, the man- hood of Israel were accustomed to act together ; consulting and determining, with a noble freedom, on their common interests. Every district and division of the whole people took part in these assemblies, by representation or otherwise, and nothing was binding on them which had not been voted at such a general parliament. Thus a healthy sj^irit of free- dom, and a patriarchal government, obtained from the first ; each '''head ^^ or '^ elder, ^^ in his lesser or greater sphere, representing its members in the gathering of the tribes, at 1 Michaelis, Mosaisches Recht, vol. i. p. 'Z&i. Ewald, GeschicJite, vol. i. yt. 519. Evi^ald, Alterthiimer, pp. 321 ff. 2 Ewald thinks the number of hiojher and lower elders (including princes) was 1,728 ; i.e., 12 princes, 12 heads of families of each tribe, and 12 heads of " houses ■" (in the collective sense) of each family. THE OPPRESSION" IN EGYPT. 89 which, in later times, over 400,000 men, fit for war, in some cases, met/ There was, moreover, under Moses, and appar- ently in all after ages, a senate or council of elders, num- bering seventy or seventy-two, on whom lay a special re- sponsibility as the advisers of the nation. But notwithstanding differences so radical between the free internal organization of the Hebrews and the slavery of the Egyptian people, the stay of over 400 years on the Nile must liave left many results of which the traces are lost. Some, liowever, which are still known, and have already been named, deserve more detailed mention. Of these the knowledge and use of writing must rank among the chief. It is not men- tioned in connection with the patriarchs ; but Moses, after the Exodus, writes the commandments on two tables of stone, as he had seen done so often in Egypt ; and directions to write separate laws in a book are of frequent occurrence. Egyptian words, also, were incorporated with the Hebrew. The Jewish measures are called by Egyptian names — the log, the epliali, the hin, and the bath. ^ The local name for the Nile, JeoVy meaning at once a ditch, a canal, or a river, and used especially of the Nile, is transferred to the Bible text. So also the word Achu — the papyrus reed-beds — is the Egyptian word used in Genesis for the green edge of the Nile, from which the cattle in Pharaoh's dream ascended to the shore. ^ Gomeh — the word used for the material of the ark in which Moses floated — is pure Egyptian for the papy- rus. The month Adar bears the name of the Egyptian Athyr, and the Nablium, or ten-stringed harp, is common to both languages. Sus, the Hebrew word for horse, was adopted in Egypt. Adon, the name for the ^' Ark" of the Covenant, and Tiibah, that of the "" ark " in which Moses » Judg. XX. a. - Graetz, vol. i. p. 309. Uhleiiiaun, p. 52. ^ Qen. xli. 18. 90 THE OPPKESSIOIil^ IN" EGYPT. was preserved, are also both Egyptian. Still more curious, it appears certain that the word On — the cry of mourning for the dead — was only the perpetuation in Hebrew of the lament for " On/^ the winter retiring sun, raised yearly, to commemorate the death of Osiris, when thousands of Egyp- tian men and women beat their breasts as they walked in sad procession, uttering loud cries of grief. ^ The hierarchy of the Levites reminds us of the constitution of the Egyp- tian priesthood ; the divisions of the Tabernacle and of the Temple were similar to those of the Egyptian temples. '' How long the Hebrews enjoyed peace and independence after the death of Joseph is only conjecture. It is very probable that a great king like Thothmes III., who needed such multitudes of labourers and workmen for his vast con- structions, pressed into his service, not only Egyptians and prisoners of war, but Asiatic races like the Hebrews, living in the Delta. But it was left to Eameses II., the Sesostris of the Greeks — his Egyptian name, Rameses, meaning in the hieroglyph- ics, "•Book of the Sun-god " — the ninth king after Thothmes III., and the third monarch of the Nineteenth Dynasty, to earn for himself, especially, the evil distinction of the Op- pressor of the Hebrews. The Exodus is believed by Mas- pero^ to have taken place under Seti II., the next king but one after Rameses, but De Rouge, Chabas, Lenormant, Sayce, Lepsius, Brugsch, Ebers, and others agree in assign- ing it to the reign of Menephtah I., Rameses^ son and suc- cessor. It is hard to speak positively of dates so remote as those of the reigns of the monarchs before the Exodus, but it is safe to say that about fifteen hundred years before Christ, Ram- » Uraetz, vol. i. p. 370. '^ Ulileuiauu, p.4. « Ilistoire, etc., p. 259. THE OPPRESSION 12^ EGYPT. 91 eses was on the throne of Egypt. In any other country the only means of knowing the personal appearance of one so long dead would be from some contemporary portrait or written sketch, but in the valley of the Nile the ancient practice of embalming preserves the withered lineaments of humanity through age after age. The mummy of Eameses and that of Seti I., his father, with those of a large number of other Pharaohs, now lie as a show to all the world in the chambers of the museum at Gizeh. They were discovered in 1879 through the vigilance of Professor Maspero, then in charge of the Egyptian collections. Finding that the Arabs at Thebes were selling objects from some unknown royal tombs, he arrested the chief men and thus got the secret. In revealing it Maspero was led up the hills across the river, and shewn a cleft in the rocks, down which he was able to descend by a rope, into a deep pit, in which he found a chamber hewn out in the mountain. In this were eighteen huge mummy cases, including those containing Rameses and his father, and all were speedily lifted out and taken to the museum, where, on his mummy being unrolled, it was found that Rameses had been a man of five feet eleven inches in height. Of his features, now dried into black leather, no idea could, of course, be formed, beyond the fact that his nose was aquiline and his head rather under than over the usual size. It appeared that in the time of Rameses IX., about eleven hundred and thirty-three years before Christ, many royal tombs had been rifled, and that, to protect those still untouched, they had been removed and hidden where they have so recently been found. The first chapters of Exodus imply that the facts they re- count took place under kings who reigned in peace ; for had they had defensive wars on their hands they could not have 92 THE OPPRESSIOK" IN EGYPT. oppressed the Hebrews^ lest they should join the enemy. Such internal peace, as we shall see, marked the times of Eameses II., who, though in the earlier years of his rule en- gaged in foreign wars, passed the longer half of it in undis- turbed quiet. The Nineteenth Dynasty had been founded by Rameses I., who had been succeeded, after a brief and obscure reign, by his son Sethos or Seti I., a great king. Under him the " outer nations " on the north-east, appar- ently an alliance of the remnants of the Hyksos with other related peoples, had once more overrun the Delta, to find sustenance for themselves and their cattle in the possessions of Pharaoh. But they had been driven back, and Palestine, their nearest stronghold, and even the region of the 0 routes, had been invaded and conquered. Wars with Libya and with the nations south of Egypt had followed, but they had been succeeded by a long period of repose. New temples at Thebes, Memphis, On, and elsewhere had marked Seti's reign ; but the immense expenditure had pressed so heavily, that attention was once more given to the careful working of the gold mines of Nubia, to fill the empty treasury. The remembrance of the dangers of many former kings, from the shepherd races and their allies on the north-east, must, however, amidst all their glory, have caused both Seti and the young Rameses anxious thoughts ; for the Hebrews and other allied races formed the bulk of the popu- lation of the Delta, and were likely to join invaders con- nected with them by blood. To weaken and cripple these Asiatic communities inside the great wall, must, therefore, have long been a settled aim of Egyptian policy. Rameses^ was undisturbed by any troubles in Egypt, or 1 For sketches of Rameses, besides Uarda, Bee Brugscli, Trans, of Soc. of Mb. Arch., vol. V. p. 28. Ei/ie .^gypt. Konigstochter, vol. i. p. 229. THE OPPKESSION" IN EGYPT. 93 by any invasion, though his wars with the great Hittite empire of Western Asia lasted from the fourth to the twenty-first year of his reign, and ended in a treaty gladly made on both sides, after a struggle in which each was equally exhausted. Memorials of their campaigns still sur- vive at widely distant points. I have seen with intense interest tablets sculptured by his command, on smoothed sheets of rock at the side of the narrow military road stretching to the Dog Eiver, near Beirout, the one passage for armies north and south. The sea beats against the foot of the precipice below : the road is merely a shelf cut out in the cliffs, which rise steep from its inner side. His victories and campaigns are set forth, and he himself stands in a separate sculpture, at full length, in his royal robes ; the road being broader before these memorials than elsewhere, as if extra Avidth had been created, to give room for the high ceremonial of their religious consecration, by the priests in attendance, i have also seen, on the walls of the great buildings of Rameses, at Thebes, detailed sculp- tures of his Syrian wars. '' The forts of Tabor, in the land of the Amorites,^' of Merom, of Salem, and of the taking of the revolted city of Ascalon are set forth among other historical delineations, which cover great spaces on the Avails. The inscriptions, moreover, inform us that Rameses established a line of Egyptian fortresses as far north as Damascus : a fact to be remembered in connection with the invasion of Palestine by the Hebrews, not very much later. His wars were, however, not only carved on the great stones of his temples, but sung in lengthy verse by the court poet Pentaur. The result of so many years of wasting strife was, after all, far below what might have been expected. An offensive 94 THE OPPRESSION IK EGYPT. and defensive alliance was formed between Eameses and the Hittite rulers, each promising to come to the assistance of the other, if attacked, and agreeing to give up political offenders, criminals, or runaway slaves who had sought refuge within the boundaries of either empire.' From this time peace reigned on the Nile, and Eameses was free to carry out his policy of repression towards the Hebrews and their related fellow-settlers of the north-east of Egypt — at once to utilize their labour and to break their spirit. Such a period of quiet did not recur under his successors, who were disturbed by internal commotions, and thus, as has been said, Rameses seems marked out specially as the Pharaoh of the Oppression. That he is rightly thought so, seems further established by the fact that the incidents related in the beginning of Exodus demand the long continuance of a single reign* Not only must the successive persecutions of the Hebrews have required a number of years, but Moses, on his return to Egypt after his residence of forty years in Midian, found the same king still on the throne. No Pharaoh, however, of the Nineteenth Dynasty held the sceptre thus long but Rameses II. The son of one who was not of pure royal blood, he had been regarded as the true king, through his mother, even from his birth, and had hence, from child- hood,^ been associated on the throne with his father ; though he dates his reign only from Seti's death, when he himself was eighteen or twenty years of age. Yet he lived to wear the crown for sixty-seven years, ^ in wt)nderful accordance with the statement that " after a long time the king of 1 Bmgsch, vol. ii. p. 68. ^ Lenormant, Histoire Ancienne, vol. i. p, 404. * Brngach, vol. ii. p. 110. THE OPPRESSION IX EGYPT. 95 Egyp^. died." ' His reign, therefore, answers precisely the conditions required by the Bible narrative. The monuments of this great king still cover the soil of Egypt and Nubia in almost countless numbers, and show him to have been the greatest builder of all the Pharaohs.'* There is not, says Mariette, a ruin in Egypt or Nubia that does not bear his name. Two grand temples at Ipsamboul, hewn out of the hills, with four colossal human figures, sixty-five feet high, at the entrances, were intended to per- petuate the memory of his victories over the Soudanese of Dongola and the Syrians. At Thebes, the great temple of Amenhotep III. was finished, and adorned with two huge obelisks in granite, one of which is now in Paris. The second huge j)orcli or pylon of the great temple of Amon at Karnak was covered with tableaux, representing the wars Avith the Hittites or Kheta of the Orontes. The temple of Gournou, begun by Seti, was finished and consecrated. The Ramesseum of Thebes, another great temple, is covered with sculptures also commemorating the Hittite wars. The temple of Abydos, built in honour of Seti, shows that king sitting on the throne in the midst of the gods ; a club in one hand, in the other a sceptre. Clods sit on each side, and in rows behind him, while Rameses offers homage, in front, to his father, as to one of their number. Everywhere : at Memphis, at Bubastis, at the quarries of Silsilis, and at the mines of Sinai, similar memorials occur. The temj^le of Ptah, at Memphis, had a 2:)orch built by him at its entrance, at the sides of which were placed statues nearly fifty feet 1 Esod. ii. 23 : Lanth's translation. Allgemdne Zeitung, 1877, p. 429. So, De Wette and Augusti. Hitzig, Geschichte, p. 59, makes Joseph come to Egypt under Rameses II., and so does Bertheau (p. 2.33). Munk more justly assigns the date as during the reign of the Hyksos. Paldstina, p. 264. So. writer in Trans. Soc. Bib. Arch.., vol. V. p. 73. = Maspero, pp. 225-6. 96 THE OPPRESSIOI^- IN" EGYPT. high/ of liimself and his queen, besides the gigantic one rising more than a hundred feet high, near them, which has already been noticed. In the land of Groshen he built the vast temple of Zoan-Tanis, the city itself being, besides, rebuilt. He founded towns, dug caiials, and filled the land with colossi, sphinxes, statues, and other creations. Of the thirty-two obelisks which yet exist in Egypt or elsewhere, twenty-one were either in whole or in part due to him ; and of the eight temples which still remain in the ruins of Thebes, there is only one which he did not complete or build entirely.'' He also erected a chain of fortifications along the entire north-east frontier of Egypt, for 160 miles, to defend it from the invasions of the Syrians and Arabs. Cities which were endangered by the yearly inundations he protected by huge earthen dykes, and he intersected the entire region between Memphis and the sea with channels of irrigation so wide and so numerous, that it became hence- forth impracticable for cavalry or war chariots, for which it had before been especially adapted. Herodotus further tells us, that he marked off the land thus reclaimed in square blocks, and distributed them among his Egyptian favour- ites, treating the Delta as a new jorovince, now, for the first time, incorporated with the rest of the kingdom. But with what an expenditure of human misery must all this have been attended ! It fills the mind with horror to think of the thousands of prisoners of war, or forced la- bourers and workmen, who must have died under the blows of the drivers, or under the weight of privations and toil too great for human endurance, in raising these innumerable creations. When slaves could not be had in sufficient num- 1 Herod., ii. 110. Diod., i. 57. Thej-^ were thirty cubits high. 2 Notes on Obelisks, by J. Bonomi. Trans. Royal Soc. Lit., vol. 1. p. 158. THE OPPRESSION" IX EGYPT. 97 bers, after the close of the Syrian wars, great slave-hunting razzias to Ethiopia were organized, to harry the far south and drag off thousands of victims, in chains, to toil in the brickfield, the quarry, or the temple precincts. All the for- eign tribes of Semitic origin who had settled in the Delta were oppressed by forced labour. Even the native popula- tion had to suffer. A letter of the period is still extant, which tells how ''the tax-collector arrives (in his barge) at the wharf of the district, to receive the government share of the crops. Ilis men, armed with clubs, are Avith him, and his negroes, with batons of palm-wood, cry out, 'Where's your wheat?' and there is no way of checking their exac- tions. If they are not satisfied, they seize the poor wretch, throw him on the ground, bind him, drag him off to the canal at hand, and throw him in, head first ; the neighbours running off, to take care of their own grain, and leaving the poor creature to his fate. His wife is bound, and she and his children carried off.'' ' The numbers of prisoners taken in wars were, indeed, far too small to meet the de- mand for labour on such vast and countless works as Rameses undertook, for in the records of each campaign the returns, carefully given, are singularly insignificant ; men preferring death to the horrors of slavery.^ He could only procure the toil required for works more numerous than those of all the other kings of Egypt for 2,000 years, by driving off to them, as forced labourers, all the population he could ven- ture to enslave, the Hebrews among them.^ 1 Maspero, Z>« Genre Ejnstolairechezles Anciens ^gyptiena. Lenormant, 3/flnMe/ de r inst. Ancienne de r Orient, vol. i. p. 423. The priests told Diodorus that no native Egj'ptian had had to work on these vast constructions, but they knew well that this was not the truth. 2 Even four, ten, or fifteen prisoners are carefully noted. The highest number taken in any one series of campaigns is given on the monuments as 2,400. 3 Homer, in the Odyssei/, xiv. 272, xvii. 441, makes Ulysses speak of the Egyptians as killing some of his crew and driving oflf the rest to slave labour. VOL. II.-7 98 THE OPPRESSION IK EGYPT. The tasks to wliicli they were set included all that the plans of Rameses demanded. They were doubtless marched in gangs to the quarries to hew out huge blocks of granite and limestone, and then set to drag them to their respective destinations, or to ship them on rafts and pilot them down the Nile. They would be employed in digging canals ; in making bricks and mixing mortar for the countless erections always in progress ; in painfully raising the Nile waters into the canals for irrigation, and their circulation over the land, as we still see it along the banks of the river, where the peasants, naked under the burning sun, work through the day, like j)ieces of machinery, drawing up the buckets of water from the stream, to the fields above. ''All manner of service in the field," in short, Avould be exacted from them, '^ besides all their (other) labour, which they put upon them with rigour." ^ '"It is very hard to make the smooth road on which the colossus is to slide along," says an inscription of the j)eriod ; ''but how unspeakably harder to drag the huge mass like beasts of burden." There was no machinery then ; little mechanical help ; the strain lay almost wholly on human thews and sinews. " The arms of the workman," continues the inscription, "are utterly worn out. His food is a mix- ture of all things vile ; he can wash himself only once in a season. But that which above all is wretched is when he has to drag for a month together, over the soft yielding soil of the gardens of a mansion, a huge block of ten cubits by six. " ^ Egypt in all ages has been so marked by the oppres- 1 Exod. i. 14. 2 About 17 feet by 10, Papyrns SalUer, ii. 6, 1. Chabas, Fecherches st<7' la XIX^ Dyjiastie^X). 144. 120,000 men died in digging out a canal to unite the Nile and the Red Sea, in the reign of Pharaoh Necho, and, after all, the scheme was aban- doned on account of an adverse oracle. See also vol. i. pp. 438-9. THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. 99 sion of its toiling thousands, that one of the crimes from which an Egyptian had to clear himself before the judge of the soul, was cruelty to them. Thirty thousand men died in this very century in digging out the Mahmoudieh Canal with their hands, without picks, or spades, or wheelbarrows — falling worn out with toil exacted from them by the blows of their pitiless taskmasters ; and the monuments show sim- ilar misery to have been inflicted from the remotest ages. Doubtless the Hebrews suffered in the same way, and their groans and murmurs may well have taken the shape of those of the wretched fellahs of our own day, whose songs have such refrains as, '' The chief of the village, may the dogs tear him, tear him, tear him:''' ^^They starve us, they starve us :'' '' They beat us, they beat us :'' — '•' But there's some one above who will punish them well, who will punish them well.'" ^ The records strangely surviving from remote ages, on l)otslierds used by those too poor to buy proper material for writing, on papyri, or from relics found in ancient ruins themselves, confirm the fact that the poorer classes have always been much oppressed in Egypt, and the Hebrews must have shared their hardships to the full. The social condition of the ancient fellah was mainly that of serfdom. He formed part of the rich landowner's estate ; and if the estate were sold, he went with the soil which his ancestors had tilled for immemorial generations. Yet he was not a slave. He was under the direct protection and supervision of the law. He was bound, for instance, to present himself at stated periods before the government scribes, who entered his name, age, and special employment in the official rolls, together with a description of his person, and a note as to 1 Nassau Senior's Journal in Egrjpl, 185G. Stephens' Jfwidents, vol. i. p. 22. 100 THE OPPRESSIOK IIS" EGYPT. his good or bad conduct during the year. This is a scene frequently represented in the tomb-paintings. If sent by his master from one part of the country to another, the serf was required to carry a written permit or passport. If he ran away, he could be pursued only by the police, and judged only by the magistrate. His owner, though wielding a paternal right of corporal punishment, was evidently no irresponsible proprietor of a human chattel. The stick might be laid freely enough across the back of an idle labourer ; the bastinado might be applied to the soles of his feet; but the master could not, in old Egyptian phrase, ^'^give breath." In other words, he exercised no power of life and death. In the case of runaway serfs, the law was supreme : not even a royal prince being free to act for him- self. The right of petitioning Pharaoh was open to the meanest of his subjects, even those who, being too poor to buy a bit of papyrus, had to write their lowly supplication to the monarch on a worthless potsherd. The craftsmen of the town were often serfs like the peasants, and it is hard to say which had the harder lot. In the old papyrus, already quoted, we have a glimpse of peasant life. ^' Behold,'^ it says, '*^the humble farm labourer. His whole life is con- sumed amid the beasts of the fields. His strength is spent in tending the vines and the hogs. He seeks his food in the fields. If he is well, he is well among the cattle ; if he is sick, he lies on the bare ground in the midst of the herds. ^^ Such was the condition of the mere labourer. The small cultivator — also a serf, but standing a grade higher in the social scale — was no better off. The terrible picture quoted on a former page, of the tyranny exercised on the fellah, to get his crop for the government, dates from the time of Rameses II., but this of the farm labourer is more than fif- THE OPPRESSIOJ^" IN" EGYPT. 101 teen hundred years older, so that the same tale of misery- had marked the peasant in all ages. But deplorable as was the lot of the fellah, the condi- tion of the workman would seem to have been even more wretched. In the country, his position somewhat resembled that which is occupied in India by the artisan dependents of the native nobles. He lived on his master's premises, and plied his craft in workshops superintended by his master's overseers. For, as in India now, every landed proprietor numbered among his hereditary bondsmen a staff of masons, joiners, painters, carvers, weavers, glass-blowers, metal- workers, and the like, whose labour belonged to their owner, and whose lives were consumed in toiling for his pleasure. I have already quoted some illustrations of their condition from an old papyrus dating from the Twelfth Dynasty, in which the sufferings of the workingman are sketched in the gloomiest colours that the writer's palette contains. The metal-worker, he says, not only toils all day, but works at night by torchlight ; the mason, exposed to every bitter wind, is a j)rey to sickness ; the dyer's eyes are worn with sleeplessness, and his hand never rests ; the blacksmith's fingers are rough as crocodile-skin, and the back of the stone-cutter is well-nigh broken. The weaver, imprisoned inside the house, is more helpless than a woman. He sits crouching, his knees higher than his heart. He tastes not the free air. If for a single day he fail to weave the prescribed length of stuff, he is bound with cords, like a bundle of the marsh lotus. It is only by brib- ing the storekeeper with gifts of bread that he gets out to look on the light of day. The painted tombs of Thebes and Beni Hassan show that this picture is not exaggerated. All these craftsmen are to be seen at their work, and there is 102 THE 0PPKESSI0:N- TN^ EGYPT. always an overseer, stick in hand, with them. How cruel the tyranny of this petty tyrant, may also be seen in frequent pictures of the bastinado inflicted at his orders on men, women, and even young children. A few craftsmen, like a few of the peasants, were independ- ent, working for wages, on their own account, but living, even in good times, after all their toil, only from hand to mouth. The great majority of town workmen, however, like the peasantry as a rule, were serfs. At Thebes, where the right bank looking down the stream was the city of the living, while the left bank was that of the dead, the work- men were mostly slaves of the Church. Half, at least, of the inhabited city consisted of temples, sacred colleges, sacred enclosures, and ecclesiastic domains, while the whole of the city of the dead on the other side of the river belonged to the priests. On the right, the living side, the sacred buildings and grounds were all hemmed in by humble dwell- ings, the ruins of which may still be traced. On the left — • the dead side — all the miles of cemetery up the stony valley and in the cliffs — slopes and cliffs being everywhere pierced with tier on tier of rock-tombs — were skirted by countless workshops, and by the multitudinous hovels of quarry- men, masons, coffin-makers, painters, gilders, carvers, and embalmers, who formed the population of the great city of tombs. The wages of these widely different and yet related trades were paid in bread, for coined money had not yet been invented, commerce being carried on by barter, metal rings, coils, and bars being only used in payment of tribute or in large transactions. The circulating medium needed in daily life, and the current cash in Ancient Egypt was corn, which took the place of money from the earliest date of which we THE OPPRESSION" IX EGYPT. 103 liave records. I'he state granaries were the public banks, and an order for so many measures of corn was equivalent to a draft on tlie treasury. Taxes were paid in corn. The soldier, the civil functionary, the crown pensioner were all paid in corn. Loans were effected in corn ; and, long after minted money had come, under the Ptolemies, into general circula- tion, corn continued to be the popular factor in matters of sale and purchase. As with the soldiers^ pay, so with the wages of the workmen. Corn for long payments, bread for short jiayments, was everywhere the rule. For a workman, two loaves, for a soldier, three, were the daily allowance ; a measure of oil being sometimes added to the workman's allowance where his task was specially laborious, as in the case of dragging heavy stones. Respecting this kind of work, for example, a papyrus order is sent by the superintend- ent : " As soon as thou shalt receive this written communi- cation, hasten to push forward the work in the abode of Rameses Mer-Amen (to whom be life, health, and strength !). Let there be no negligence, no laziness. Note that the men be divided into three gangs, each gang under its captain ; six hundred men, making for each gang two hundred. Make them drag the three great blocks which are [lying] before the gate of the temple of Muth, and not for one single day be it omitted to give out their rations of corn and oil. . . . Also, let oil be given to each driver of a pair of oxen.'' Workmen, in many cases, were paid by the month, and as they were proverbially improvident, the corn that should have served till next payment was often squandered long before it came. Hence rose grievous troubles. A note- book of a superintendent of the great Theban necropolis, for example, written apparently in the reign of Rameses III., informs us how the book-keeper and certain priests of the 104 THE OPPllESSIOK 11^ EGYPT. necropolis were met on the first day of Tybi (December 27) by a deputation from the workmen's quarter. ^' Behold/''' said the spokesman, "' we are brought face to face with star- vation. AVe have neither food, oil, nor clothing ; we have no fish ; we have no vegetables. Already have we sent up a petition to our sovereign lord the Pharaoh, praying that he will give us these things, and we are going to appeal to the governor that we may have wherewithal to live/^ It was the first of the month, when the general distribution of corn was evidently due, and we are not told why that distribution did not take place. Perhaps the clerk of the stores was absent from his ]30st, or jierhaps the men had already drawn some of their wages on account. Be this as it may, their need Avas urgent, and the priests through compassion, or to keep the affair from the ears of the governor of the necropolis, granted them one day^s rations. How they fared after this we know not ; but a few weeks later they are in open revolt. Thrice they break out of their own quarter, which is sur- rounded by walls and closed by gates, like the Roman Ghetto of old. '' We will not go back," replies one to the police officers who are sent after them. ^' Go tell your captain what we say : it is famine that speaks through our mouths ! " To parley with them is vain. ^' There was much commo- tion,'" writes the superintendent in his note-book, " I gave them the most serious answer I could devise, but their words were true from the heart.'" Pacified by a dole of half rations, they at length return to work, but in ten days they are on strike again. Khons, the ringleader, urges his mates to help themselves. " Let us go down," he says, ^' to the store-house on the quay, and let the governor's men tell him what we have done." The advice is acted upon as soon as given. They force their way, not into the strong store- THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. 105 house, but iuto the enclosure. The storekeeper remonstrates, gives them something, and induces them to return to their quarters. Again, after eleven days, the riot breaks out afresh. The commandant of Thebes passes by, and finds the men sitting on the ground behind the temple of Seti, at the northern extremity of the necropolis. They cry '* Famine ! " and the great man gives them an order for fifty measures of corn, in the name of Pharaoh, "^ who has sworn an oath,^' he says, '^ that you shall be fed.^^ The Pharaoh, in all probability, has never heard of those petty local mutinies or received the petition which the poor fellows drew up a month or two before. But of this they have no suspicion. Pharaoh to them represents an all-seeing and all-knowing Providence, and they go on their way rejoicing. Thus closes our notice of the earliest strike on record, lighting up for us the social condition of the poorer classes on the Nile in the days before the Exodus, and bringing the lot of Israel in those times vividly before us. Very wretched in any case, it must have been almost intolerable with great numbers, yet with such glimpses of lentils, fish, garlic, and cucumbers, in rare happy moments, as waked bitter recollec- tions of the contrast when they found themselves in the bare waste of the desert. AVhen on the Nile, I, myself, indeed, saw a strange spectacle which seemed to bring back these long-dead ages. A vast crowd of labourers had been col- lected to scoop out the soil, so as to form the channel of a wide and deep new canal. AVages they got none : they were driven to the spot to give forced labour. Swarms, thick and quick-moving as ants, hurried hither and thither in bewil- dering confusion : filling baskets with their hands and then marching off with them on their heads. The labourers at the sugar factories fared still worse, for they were hurried 106 THE OPPRESSION IN" EGYPT. along at a trot by taskmasters with great whips in their hands, freely used where fatigue made the toiler slow. A lash over the bare back quickened even the faintest ; and if any one fell in a faint, for the day was very hot, a bucket of cold water was thrown over him, and there he lay, to die or get better, as might be. At night they lay on the ground, without any covering, though the nights were cold. Cough- ing rose on all sides in the darkness, for the exposure brings on disease of the lungs, from which many die. The Bible statement, that the Hebrews " built for Pha- raoh the store cities Pithom and Eaamses,"' is strangely corroborated in the case of the latter by contemporary docu- ments, which mention the Israelites under the name of Aperiu or Aberiu, the Egyptian pronunciation of their own way of naming themselves, as the '' Iberim,""^ or, as we say, Hebrews. In the first, a scribe called Kaonisar writes to his superior, the scribe Bekenptah, thus : " For your satisfac- tion I have obeyed the command you gave me, saying. De- liver their food to the soldiers, and also to the Aperiu who transport the stone for the great Bekhennu — depots and fortified magazines — of the king Eameses, the lover of Amon, which are under the charge of Ameneman, the chief of the Mazai. I give them rations each month according to your excellent instructions.'' ^ The second document is from 1 By " store cities " are meant depots for all kinds of provisions, war material, etc., perhaps like Woolwich— great magazines for the public service, in short. Durch Gose/h P- 521. 2 The Egyptian plural ended in u, instead of the m of the Hebrew. 3 Papyr. Hier. of Leyden, i. 348. lEhera, Durch Gosen, p. 502. Chabas, Melanges, 1st series, p. 44 ; 3d series, vol. ii. p. 222. This papyrus was found in the tombs at Memphis. It shows that while corn was the staple of payment, the workmen ex- changed it at the dealers', for other articles as desired. Possibly, also, the rations in a few cases were varied, as in this papyrus, but it must have been a rare exception. Wheat, meat, fish, fresh or salted, and vegetables, were provided by government for labourers, but the quantity was at times so insufficient that the works had to be sus- pended from the weakness of the starved men. Chabas, Deux Pap. Hier., p. 24. THE OPPRESSIOiq' 11^ EGYPT. 107 another scribe to his superior, Hiu, a high official of Eam- eses II. " I have obe3^ed/' says he, " your command to give provision to the Egyptian soldiers, and also to the Hebrews wlio transport the stones^'' — great blocks dragged from the other side of the river — ''for the Sun-temple of Rameses-Miamun, on the southern part of Memphis.^'' Mazai, or gendarmerie, a corps of foreign mercenaries drawn from Libya, and thus in no danger of sympathy with the oppressed, filled the hateful office of the under taskmasters who punished the wretched gangs.' An interesting contemporary account of Rameses-Tanis, the Rameses especially mentioned in Exodus, has already been given, but a second, also, has fortunately been pre- served. '' His majesty, Rameses 11.,^^ writes a scribe to his friend, "has built for himself a town, Rameses. It lies between Palestine and Egypt, and abounds in delicious food. It is a second Hermouthis (a suburb of Thebes), and will endure as long as Memphis. The sun rises and sets in it. Every one leaves his town to settle in its district. The fish- ermen of the sea bring it eels and fish, and the tribute of their lake. The citizens wear festal robes each day, with perfumed oil on their heads, and new wigs : they stand at their doors, bouquets in hand — green branches from the town of Pa Hathor — garlands from the town of Pahour, on the day of Pharaoh^s coming. Joy reigns and spreads with- out bounds. Rameses-Miamun, life, health, strength to him ; he is the god Muth ^ of the two Egypts in his speech : the sun of kings as ruler : the glory of Egypt, the friend of Tum, as geneml. All the earth comes to him. The great king of the Kheta — the Ilittites^ — sends his messenger to 1 Durcli Gosen, p. 75. - One of the three gods of Thebes. 3 By the way, it is curious to find that Rameses used blood-hounds to hunt down his foes, in the Hittite war. Trans. Bib. Arch.^ vol. ii. p. 180. 108 THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. his fellow-prince of Kadesh (on the Orontes)^ saying, 'If thou be ready, let us set out for Egypt, for the words of the god Rameses 11, are fulfilling themselves. Let us pay our court to him at Tanis, for he gives breath to him whom he loves, and by him all the people live/ " ' The excavations recently made at Tel-el-Maskhut^i — the name given to large mounds near Tel-el-Kebir, so well known in the late Egyptian war — a place about thirty-five miles north-east of Cairo, near the railway to Ismailia, have settled the position of Pithom, and the fact that it was built by order of Rameses II. M. Naville found inscrip- tions which not only shoAV that these mounds cover an an- cient city whose religious name was Pithom, while its civil name was Succoth, but also that the founder was Rameses II. In Greek times — long after the Exodus — its name was Heroopolis, or Ero, from the Egyptian word ara, "a store- house,''' reminding us that both Pithom and Rameses, built by the Israelites, for the Pharaoh, were '^ treasure^' or '^ store " cities. M. Kaville even discovered the store cham- bers themselves. They are very strongly constructed, and divided by brick partitions from 8 to 10 feet thick, the bricks being sun-baked, and made, some with and some without straw. In these bricks without straw we have a commentary on the words of Scripture : '' Thus saith the Pharaoh, I will not give you straw. ^' The treasure cham- bers occupy almost the Avhole area of the old city, the walls of which are about G50 feet square and 22 feet thick. Its name was in Egyptian " The City of the Setting Sun,^^ or ''^Tum,'^and we now see that the Hebrews finally set out from it — that is, from the very place where they were at 1 Maspero, Bu Genre Epistolaire, etc., p. 102. Chabas, Melanges Egyptologiqiies, 2d series, p. 151. For the divinity of the Pharaoh, see also Maspero, Histoire Anc, p. 9. Records of the Past, vol. i. pp. 6, 8. THE OPPRESSIOIT IN EGYPT. 109 work — for ^^ Succoth/" its civil name, is given as the point from which they started.' The square area, which contains about 55,000 square yards, shows the ruins of a temple and various monu- ments, from which the inscriptions have been erased. The store chambers or granaries were intended to provide food for the armies sent out at any time to the north-east, over the desert, and the town was itself a fort of defence on that frontier. Its names. Pi Tum, " The City of the Setting Sun," and Succoth, were repeatedly found on other inscrip- tions. M. Naville's words about the bricks are : '^ Many of them are made with straw, or with fragments of reeds, of which traces are still to be seen ; and some are of Nile mud, without any straw at all.'' In the lowest course the bricks are well made, in the middle ones there is rough straw or reeds in them, but in the higher courses there is neither straw nor reeds. ^ Eameses or '^ Tanis,'' named after the king, as Alexandria was after Alexander, or Constantinople after Constantine, ranked next to Thebes in the preference of its second founder. He could easily march from it against the Asiatic peoples, and it was near the frontier, to welcome him back from his wars. Hence it became his special residence. Connected with the sea by the Tanitic branch of the Nile, then broad and navigable, it also commanded the entrance of the great fortified road to Palestine, and thus was, in the fullest sense, the key of Egypt. It was doubtless for this > Exod. xiii. 20. 2 Near the ruins of Pithom there are still some pools mentioned in an ancient papyrus, in connection with a request made to Menephtah, the king of the Exodus, from some Bedouins of Idumea, to be allowed to pasture their herds in the neigh- bourhood. The word used for the pools is Barkabnta, which implies tha residence of Semitic lierdsmen around, for it is evidently coimected with the Hebrew word for a pool, Beraichah, pi. Beraichoth. 110 THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. reason that Eameses restored it from its ruins and trans- ferred his court thitlier ; making it in fact a temple city of the great gods of Egy2)t, and of Baal Sutekh, the god of the Hyksos/ In its glory, as Moses saw it, with its countless statues, obelisks, sphinxes, and other monuments, and its great temples and majestic royal palace, it must have been imposing in its magnificence ; especially in the eyes of the Hebrew population, in whose midst it had risen like a city of enchantment, thougli at a fearful cost of suffering to themselves. An old writing on the back of a papyrus, apparently of the date of Seti, the founder of the Nineteenth Dynasty, brings vividly before us a picture of the brickmaking, which was part of the labours of the Hebrews. ^' Twelve masons," says the Avriter, 'M^esides men who are brick moulders in their towns, have been brought here to work at house building. Let them make their numher of tricks each day. They are not to relax their tasks at the new house. It is thus I obey the command given me by my master.'^ ""^ These twelve masons and these brickmakers, thus taken from their own towns to build this house, at a fixed rate of task work daily, may not have been Hebrews, but their case illustrates exactly the details of Hebrew slavery given in Exodus. Nor is it, in the opinion of so calm a mind as that of Ebers, too much to believe that the bricks of Pithom were moulded by Jewish hands. ^ Indeed, even the details of brickmaking like theirs are supplied by the monuments. In a tomb on the hill Abd-el-Qurnah, a picture of the time of Thothmes III. has been preserved, in which prisoners of war, set to build the temple of Anion, are seen toiling at the 1 Brugsch, vol. ii. p. 95. ^ Dxircli Gosen^ p. 75. 2 Papyrus Anastasi, back of ul. 3. Cliabas, Melanges Egypt., 2ci series, p. 133. THE OPPRESSION IN EGYPT. Ill bitter labours of the ])riokfield. Some carry water in jugs from the tank hard ])y ; others knead and cut up the loamy earth ; others, again, make bricks in earthen moulds^, or J c3 Slaves in the Egyptian Brickfields. From Tomb of Abd-el Qurnah. place them carefully in long rows, to dry ; and some are building walls. An accompanying inscription states that these are captives whom Thothmes III. had carried away, to 112 THE OPPRESSIOK IK EGYPT. build the house of his father, the god Amon. The '^ baking of the bricks "' is for a new provision house of the god. Nor is there wanting a taskmaster ; for the overseer watches the workers ; the words, " Don't idle, the stick is in my hand," being painted as if coming from his lips. ' The monuments often, indeed, speak of brickmaking by forced labour, and in the various paintings which represent this, or any other kind of "task work," the overseer with his stick is rarely absent. Thus, among the pictures at Beni Hassan, workmen are represented being beaten severely with short sticks, which differed from the long rods of office, and were used solely to bastinado the unfortunate labourers. Some of these are seen thrown naked on the ground, two men holding the arms and another the feet, while the taskmaster showers blows on the exposed body. There are even pictures at Beni Hassan of women and children being thus bastinadoed. The task- masters in Exodus— literally Chiefs of the Tribute — were dig- nified officials, apparently over large divisions of the corvee. Inferior officers were placed over sections of these, and the zekanim, or elders, and the shoterim, or scribes, of the Hebrews themselves, seem to have been responsible for the work to be done by the men of their respective localities. The Hebrew word for the straw used by the unhappy toilers is Teben — straw broken into pieces by the teeth of the threshing sledges, and by the feet of the oxen used to draw them.^ It is kept in pits to be always dry. One sees great stacks of it also, in the straw merchants' yards, in Cairo. The Hebrews, not being supplied with this, as was usual in brickmaking, would have to lose time gathering the 1 Bunsen's Urkunden, vol. i. p. 114. Brugsch, La Sortie ties Hebreux d^Egypte, pp. 14, 15. Brugsch, Histoire, vol. i. p. 376. 2 See Hours, vol. iv. pp. 371, 381. THE OPPRESSIOX IX EGYPT. 113 straw left on the fields from the previous harvest, or the reeds from the banks of the canals or of the Nile, and yet liad to finish a given number of bricks a day. Sun-dried bricks, like those made by the Hebrews, are now made, in Palestine, and also in Egypt, by leading water, or pouring it, into ditches dug in the clay. Teben is next mixed with the soft mass, which is then lifted in wooden bowls, and packed into wooden frames of about ten inches length, and of proportionate breadth and depth ; and these, when thus filled, are left in the sun, till the bricks are dried. They are made, in Palestine, in spring. VOL. II.-8 CHAPTER IV. MOSES. How long the policy of 023pression had been in force against the Hebrews before the Exodus, can only be con- jectured. As far back as the days of the great Thothmes III. we have seen Asiatic prisoners of war toiling in the brickfields, ' as the Israelites had to do under Eameses. The hostility towards all the Semitic races, as the special enemies of Egypt for ages, and as, for centuries, its masters, in the dark days of the Hyksos, would, indeed, naturally direct itself against the Hebrews, their brethren in race. Whether the distrust and hatred had been deej)ened by the jmrt taken by the Asiatic population of the Delta during the long war of liberation, cannot now be ascertained ; but, even if they had been neutral, any favour shown them would have seemed an encouragement to the common enemy, within Egypt itself. It would almost appear, moreover, as if a clause in the treaty of Rameses II. with the Kheta or Hittites, alluding to fugitive subjects who were to be sent back from Palestine, hints at a restlessness in the Semitic races still in Lower Egypt, which needed to be vigorously repressed.^ Nor is it clear that the Hebrews, a people full of young life and energy, and rapidly increasing in numbers, had not been for generations j)lotting their escape from the banks of the Nile ; for the flight of bands sufficient to lead i Page 110. , 2 Biugsch, Ilistoire, vol. ii. p. 74. MOSES. 115 to a provision for their extradition, in the Hittite treaty, must have rejoresented a state of feeling far from settled. That they were fierce and warlike, even while in Egyj^t, and that they often made forays into Canaan, is hinted at in various passages of the Old Testament. Thus, as has before been noticed, the sons of Ephraim are said to have made an inroad, during their father's life, as far at least as Gath, to drive off the cattle of the Philistines.^ Sherah, a daughter of Ephraim, moreover, is said to have built the upper and lower villages of Beth-horon, the ''' Hollow way,'''' the one at the head, the other at the bottom, of the wild steep pass of the border hills of Ephraim and Benjamin;" and, also, Uzzen Sherah — Sherah's inheritance — another village pre- sumably in the same district.^ The grandchildren of Judah, moreover, Avere not only famous in after ages for the fine linen which they had learned to weave, doubtless in Egypt, but also for having held ^'^the dominion in Moab." * No wonder that the Pharaohs should have been alarmed lest such a race should multiply still more, and, joining their enemies, fight against Egypt in case of war, and "get them up out of the land," ^ where slaves so hardy and enduring were essential for the public works. But while the mighty kings of the Nile valley were bent on weakening the Hebrews by every form of tyranny and ' Chron. vii. 21. 2 Furrer's Palasdna, p. 14. "Beth-horon," in Richm. 3 1 Chron. vii. 24. * 1 Chron. iv. 22. The word Jashubi-lehem is understood by Berthean, Kurzge- fass. Ilandbuch. as the name of one of the sons of Sherah. It means " returning to the bread," perhaps an abbreviation of Beth-lehem, ''returning to Bethlehem," as Ruth did. By some scholars the words " held the dominion," are translated " be- came citizens of." So Septuagint, Vulgate, Schlottmann. But Gesenius, Bertheau, Keil, and Hitzig retain the meaning in our version. Hitzig translates the name Jashubi-lehem by " and requited them." Evvald makes it " brought them home wives : " fanciful enough, both ! * Exod. i. 10. 116 MOSES. oppression, they were themselves, in the providence of God, to be made the agents in preparing one of the hated race to become in due time its deliverer. Jewish tradition touch- ingly describes the condition of these ancestors of the nation. Joseph, it tells us, had been almost universally loved by the Egyptians ; but, after his death, though the Hebrews turned so much towards Egyptian ways, as even in many cases to neglect the circumcision of their children, popular dislike increased against them. Taxes and forced labour were exacted, instead of their being left free, as hith- erto. Fields, vineyards, and other possessions, given them by Joseph, were taken from them, and they were formally enslaved. They had, moreover, to build fortresses, store cities, and pyramids ; to lead off the Nile waters into canals, surround towns with dams, to keep off the yearly inunda- tions ; to learn all kinds of trades that they might work at them for their masters, and even the women had to toil in many ways. ^ But help was now slowly preparing. Among the Hebrew tribes in Egypt that of Levi appears from the first to have specially given itself to the higher culture which jire vailed around, and to have held the fore- most place, as in some degree a priestly caste. ^ Other tribes doubtless gave themselves, more or less, to the arts and sciences which flourished in the valley of the Nile — the paint- ing, the sculpture, the weaving, the dyeing, the working in precious stones and in metals ; but to Levi the whole were indebted for the adoption of writing from the Egyptians,^ ^ Beer's Leben Mods, p. 9. The Rabbis, in their desire to glorify the Hebrew matrons, gravely say that six. twelve, or even sixty children were borri at a birth, all strong and well formed ! Ibid., p. 12. The allusion to the neglect of circumcision as copied from the Egyptians, is, of course, an error on the part of the tradition, as also is the reference to the building of pyramids. 3 1 Sam. ii. 27, 28. These verses are to be read, not interrogatively, but as statements of facts. Graetz, p. 14. 3 Graetz, vol. i. p. 14. :>iosES. 117 and the higher '^ wisdom" was apparently left to their study. Among their number Avas Amram — the ^^ Kindred of the Lofty One " — and Jochebed — she " whose glory is Jehovah '' —his aunt,' both of the tribe of Levi/ and of the family of Kohath, the second of Levies sons. From the marriage of these two sprang the great leaders, Miriam, Aaron, and Moses, the first about twelve years older than her second illustrious brother, who was also younger than Aaron by about three years. ^ Their mother's name, alone, proves that her family had remained true to the hereditary faith of their race, and still clung to the worship of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; keeping far from Egyptian idolatry and corruption. Her children must have grown up in an at- mosphere of saintly morals and godliness, to have developed the character they afterwards showed. But to the inspired Avriters the most exalted human being was only dust and ashes in the sight of the Almighty, and details are studi- ously shunned which could by any possibility lead to a hero worship incompatible with the absolute and undivided hon- our due only to God. Hence we know very little of the personal history of the illustrious household. Moses appears to have been born about eighty years before the Exodus, for that was his age when he returned to Egypt from Midian. Thus, his youth runs side by side with that of Rameses II., the future oppressor of the Hebrews, but the national hero of the Egyptians, and the great Sesostris of the outside world ; whose glory, as, like all the Pharaohs, in the belief of all their subjects, a god in human form, was the special theme of Egyptian poetry and legend. Exodus tells 1 Exod. vi. 20. 2 Sept. and Heb. Exod. ii. 1, '• Son" in our version = to '• descendant." 1 Chron. vi.2. 3 '• Moses," in Riehm. 118 MOSES. US, that at the time of the birth of Moses, an edict to put to death all uew-born Hebrew male children was in its early vigorous force, so that Jochebed could save her infant during the first three months of its life only by hiding it. At that time his birth became known to Pharaoh's police, and nothing remained but to let him be put to death, or to trust him to the care of Providence in a way of which she may very likely have heard, in a legend brought by her ancestors, from their ancient home in Ohaldsea. There, a great king, Sargon I., had caused a most romantic story of his own birth to be recorded on the clay tablets of the royal library, in remote times. ^' I am Sargon, the great king, the king of Agada,'' said he. *'' My mother was of the masters of the land, but I never knew my father. I was born secretly in the city of Atzupirani, on the banks of the Euphrates. My mother put me in an ark of bulrushes lined With bitumen, and laid me in the river, which did not enter the ark. It bore me to the dwelling of Akki, the water-carrier,^ and he, in the goodness of his heart, lifted me from the water, and brought me up as his own son. After this he established me as a gardener, and (the goddess) Ishtar caused me to prosper, and, after years, I came to be king."^ Acting either on the hint of this strange legend, or led in a like case to a similar course, Jochebed prepared a little ark of papyrus, and after coating it with bitumen, to prevent the water from reaching 1 A labourer of the lowest and meanest class. See Josh. ix. 21,23, 27. Here, it means, strictly, one who works a shadoof, to raise water from the river, for irrigation. 2 Smith's Chaldcean Genesis., p. 299. Fox Talbot, in Trans, of Soc. of Bib. Arch.,yo\. i. p. 271, and in Records of the Past, vol. v. p. 1. Lenormant, Les Premieres Civilizations, vol. ii. p. 104. Mr. Talbot translates the last two lines thus : " He placed me with a tribe of Foresters and they made me king." He supposes that he became captain of this baud of rude people and from this rose to power. Ishtar was the Assyrian Venus. MOSES. 119 tlie child, put liim in it ; doubtless with many a prayei*. She then laid it among the papyrus reeds on the edge of one of the broad canals at Tanis, or Rameses, where she lived, and set the infanta's sister, a girl of about twelve, to watch his fate from a distance. An inscrijition found by Ebers, if he translate it aright, seems to point to Tanis, ** the field of Zoan,^' and the scene of his future ^•' wonders, ^^ as the birth- place of the destined law- giver. In this case his ex- posure took place, not on the broad stream of the Nile at Memphis, as one tradi- tion has asserted, but far to the north, among the He- brew population of the Delta, on one of the flowing canals of irrigation which spread in a network over the land. Rameses, it would appear from the curious docu- ment in question, was living at Tanis exactly eighty years before the date ^ fixed by Lepsius ^ as that of the Exodus — B.C. 1314,^ though this is not accepted by other weighty authorities, who assign it to the year B.C. 1460. From the vast numbers of the Hebrews who left Egypt, when Moses was eighty years of age, it is not likely that the command The Papyrus. » Durch Gosen, p. 82. 3 Chronologie der yEffijpter, vol. i. p. 314. s Exod. vii. 7. Diestcl thinks the date of the Exodus, r..c. 1401. Schonkel gives B.C. 1460. 120 MOSES. to destroy the male infants remained long in force, but it could only have been given under the influence of immedi- ate contact with the evil against which it was directed ; that is, while Rameses was in residence at his northern Delta capital — Tanis. According to the custom of the court, his family doubtless attended him, and thus the presence of the princess by whom Moses was rescued is explained. In those days the papyrus, now found only at the fountain of Arethusa and the Blue River, at Syracuse, in Sicily, and in the far southern White Nile, must have grown thickly in the broad canals of Lower Egypt. In its pleasant screen the little ark would be pro- tected from the sun ; while the privacy secured would attract the ladies of the court to a spot so suited for the frequent bathing demanded alike from the heat of the climate, and as a religious requirement. The slow current, and limited surface, moreover, would prevent any danger of the ark being swept out of sight, as it might well have been on the broad bosom of the Nile.^ If the dates on which Ebers relies be correct, Seti I. must have been still reigning when Moses was born, and with him his young child Rameses, thus associated with him as joint king ; for, as already said, he was thus honoured from his infancy, on account of his pure royal descent through his mother. The daughter of Pharaoh by whom the baby was saved ^ must, therefore, have been a sister of Rameses. Seti, however, in accordance with Egyptian custom, had made over to Rameses in his early youth, as his wives, a number of ladies from the royal harem, and among these, it is more than likely, the rescuer of Moses; for, as we have already 1 See Speaker''s Comment., vol. i. p. 255. 2 The gorgeous dress of a daughter of Pharaoh is described in Ebers' Uarda, vol. i. pp. 63, 64, 297, and in his ^gypt. Konigstochter, vol. ii. p. 247. MOSES. 121 seen, a marriage of brother and sister was thought in Egypt, as in Ancient Persia, the best possible for a prince ; to guarantee the purity of the divine blood of the royal house. The practice, indeed, prevailed on the Nile as late as the times of the Ptolemies.' Though not given in the Bible, the name of the " daughter of Pharaoh " has been handed down by tra- dition as Thermouthis,' and also as Merris,^ both which occur in the inscriptions. Thus, Thermouthis is the name of an Egyptian town, in a fragment of Stephen of Byzance,* and, in a list of princesses, the monuments name one as Meri, which is evidently identical with Merris ; ^ while they give Thermouthis, the very name in Josephus, as that of one of the wives of Eameses.^ He had also a favour- ite daughter. Bent Anat — the heroine of Ebers^ charm- ing story Uarda — and married her, as he had done his sister Thermouthis. So low was the morality of the Nile valley, even round the throne of the greatest of all its kings. A curious fact, which, however, is of questionable value, is mentioned by Brugsch. An inscription dating from about a hundred years after the death of Rameses II., the great Sesostris, speaks of a place in Middle Egypt which seems to refer to the Hebrew Lawgiver. It is called T-en Moshe — ''the island,'^ or ^^the river bank of Moses." It 1 ^Egypt. Konigstochter, vol. iii. pp. 122 291. That, in spite of prohibition bj' the law (Lev. xviii. 9, 11), marriages of brothers and sisters were not unknown in Israel, is seen from 2 Sam. xiii. 13. 2 Jos., Ant.^ II. ix. 5, 3 Euseb., PrcKp. Evang., ix. 27. * A Greek geographer of the sixth century, who wrote a great geographical dictionary, fragments of which only are extant. ^ Brugsch, vol. ii. p. 112. ® Lenormant, Histoire Ancienne^ vol. i. p. 423. Maspero, L' Inscripiion Dedicatoire du Temple d'Abydos, p. 29. Ebers, Durch Gosen, p. 525. Thermouthis means '•Beloved by the goddess Muth." 122 MOSES. lay on the eastern side of the river, near the city of the heretic King Khn-n-Aten.' But, unfortunately, the locality does not suit that of the exposure of the infant destined to he so illustrious. The meaning of the name Moses is given in Exodus as '^^ drawn out^' (from the water) ; and this is supported hy the fact that the words mo and slii, respectively, mean still, in Coptic, the modern representation of ancient Egyptian, '^ water, ^^ and "to take/"* That it is a Hebraized form of an Egyptian name appears certain, but the original form is believed by modern scholars to have been Mesu, which often appears in Egyptian writings, and was written "Mosis^^ by the Greeks.^ Josephus^ derives it from the Egyptian words, mo, water, and uses, " the saved one ;" and this was evidently the opinion also, before his day, of the Alex- andrian translators of the Bible, who give the name as Mouses. Keil and Delitzsch, by a slight change in the form of the derivatives, trace it to two Coptic words, w?o, "water,^' and udsclie, "to be saved from," believing that the combination of these two was softened in Mosche, the Hebrew way of writing the great prophet^s name. But here, as elsewhere, the zeal of modern science has presented a new aspect of things. A Babylonian text lately discovered in Upper Egypt, dating from the old times of the Tel Amarna tablets, shows that the name of one of the Mesopotamian gods, known also as Uras, " the god of light," and Baru, "the Creator," was more commonly Masu, "the hero," but, also, "a leader," a "writer," and used, besides, as the name of the " Sun-god who rises from the divine day." Masu, however, is, letter for letter, the same as the Hebrew Mosheh, 1 Brugsch, vol. ii. p. 112. 2 Lepsius, Chronologies vol. i. p. 336, Ebers, Durch Gosen, p. 586. 3 Ant, II. ix. 6. MOSES. 123 our '^ Moses." Ebers always speaks of liim, when wishing to use the Egyptian form, as Mesu. Handed over to the care of his mother during his tender years — thanks to the quick wit of his sister Miriam — Moses became a permanent inmate of the palace in his early boy- hood. Once there, he was adopted by Thermouthis, and received the care and training of a king's son ; Rameses the Opj)ressor becoming unconsciously his Protector I Ebers has given us an idea of the splendour amidst which the wondering child must thus have grown up. The palace of Rameses, at Tanis, he tells us/ was more like a little town than a house. The part of it used by the royal family com- manded a view of the Nile, from which it offered to the passing vessels a pleasing prospect, for it stood, amidst its surrounding gardens, in picturesque buildings of various outline, not as a huge and solitary mass. On each side of a large structure Avhich contained the state rooms and ban- queting hall, three rows of pavilions of different sizes extended in symmetrical order. These were connected with each other by colonnades, or by little bridges, under which flowed canals that watered the gardens, and gave the palace the aspect of a town upon islands. The principal part of the palace was built of light Nile- mud bricks and elegantly carved woodwork, but the exten- sive walls which surrounded it were ornamented and forti- fied with towers, in front of which heavily armed soldiers stood on guard. The walls and pillars, the galleries and colonnades, and even the roofs, blazed with many colours, and at every gate rose tall masts, from which red and blue flags streamed * Uarda, vol. i. p. 288. The palace described was at Thebes, bnt it none the less helps us to realize the splendours that surrounded the childhood, youth, and man- hood of Moses, till he was forty. 124 MOSES. when the king was in residence. Tall brass spikes at their top were intended at once to add to the splendour and to act as lightning conductors. On the right of the principal building, and entirely surrounded with thick plantations of trees, stood the houses of the ro3^al ladies ; some mirrored in the lake, round which they stood at a greater or less dis- tance. In this part of the grounds were the king^s store houses, in long rows ; while behind the central building, in which the Pharaoh resided, stood the treasuries, and the barracks of the body-guard. The left wing was occupied by tne officers of the household, and the innumerable servants, and by the royal horses and chariots. Two rooms of this palace, in the ladies^ quarter, are also described by Ebers, from the monuments, and help us to realize the associations that must have been familiar to the early life of Moses. Passing through the gardens in which a hundred gardeners watered the turf, the flower-beds, the shrubs, and the trees, and crossing the quadrangles in which companies of guards came and went, and where horses were being trained and broken, the j^rincess and her maidens, on returning from the river, would be received, as her litter entered the gates, by a lord in waiting, and then led by the chamberlain to her rooms, amidst low bows. One of her chambers commanded the river, to enjoy the beauty of which a doorway, closed with light curtains, opened on a long balcony with a finely worked balustrade, to which clung a climbing rose with pink flowers. The carpets in the room itself were of sky-blue and silver brocade from Damas- cus ; the coverings of the seats and couches had been richly embroidered with feathers by Ethiopian women, and looked like the breasts of birds. The images of the goddess Hathor, which stood on the house altar, were of an imita- MOSES. 125 tion of emerald called Mafkat, and other little figures were of lapis-lazuli, malachite, agate, and bronze overlaid with gold. On the toilet table stood a collection of unguent boxes, and cups of ebony and ivory finely carved — every- thing being arranged with the utmost taste. The other room was also worthy of such a kingly house. It was high and airy, and its furniture consisted of costly but simple necessaries. The lower j^art of the wall was lined with cool tiles of white and violet earthenware, on each of which was joictured a star. Above these, the walls were covered with a dark green ma- terial brought from Sais, which also covered the long divans skirting them. Chairs a n d stools, made of cane, stood round a very long table in the middle of the room, out of which several others opened ; all handsome, comfortable, and harmonious in aspect. Rare and magnificent plants, artis- tically arranged on stands, stood in the corners of many of the rooms. In others were tall obelisks of ebony, bearing saucers for incense, which all the Egyptians loved, at once for its perfume and as a disinfectant.' The garden stretching below the windows was as wonder- ful as all else. A famous artist had laid it out in the time of Queen Hatasu, and the picture which he had in his mind J Uarda, vol. i. pp. 285, 288. Egyptian Chair. 126 MOSES. when he sowed the seeds and planted the young shoots, was now realized, many decades after his death. He intended it to form a carpet on which the palace should seem to stand. Tiny streams, in bends and curves, formed the out- line of the design, and the shapes they enclosed were filled with j)lants of every size, form, and colour. Beautiful plats of fresh green turf everywhere represented the groundwork of the pattern, and flower beds and clumps of shrubs stood out from them in har- monious mixture of colours ; while tall and rare trees, which Hatasu's ships had brought from Arabia, gave dignity and impressiveness to the whole.* A few more extracts from the same wonderful restora- tion of Egyptian life at the time of Moses, bring before us other aspects of the scene amidst which his early life was passed. A grand tempo- rary banqueting hall erected at Avaris or Pelusium, on the frontier wall towards Pales- tine, when Eameses came back from his wars with the Kheta of Syria, is thus described, in strict accordance with details gathered from the monuments. " It was of unusual height, and had a vaulted ceiling, painted blue and sprinkled with stars, to represent the night heavens. This rested on pillars j some carved in the form of date palms ; some, like 1 Uarda, p. 292. Egyptiak Chair. MOSES. 127 cedars of Lebanon. The leaves and twigs consisted of art- fully fastened and coloured tissue : elegant festoons of bluish gauze were stretched from pillar to j^illar across the hall, and were attached in the centre of the eastern wall to a large shell-shaped canopy over the throne of the king, deco- rated with pieces of green and blue glass, mother-of-pearl, shining plates of mica, and other sparkling objects. '^ The throne itself had the shape of a buckler, guarded by two lions, which rested on each side of it, and formed the arms ; and it was sui)ported on the backs of four Asiatic captives who crouched beneath the weight. Thick carpets, which seem to have transported the seashore to the dry land — for their pale blue w^as strewn with a variety of shells, fishes, and water-plants — covered the floor of the banqueting hall, in which three hundred seats were placed beside the tables, for the nobles of the kingdom and the officers of the troops. Above all this splendour hung a thousand lamps shaped like tulips and lilies, and in the entrance stood a huge basket of roses, to be strewn before tlie king" when he should arrive. '^Even the bedrooms for the king and his suite were splendidly decorated. Finely embroidered purple stuffs covered the walls, a light cloud of 2)ale blue gauze hung across the ceiling, and giraffe skins were laid, instead of car- pets, on the floors. A separate pavilion, gilt and Avreathed with flowers, was erected to receive the horses which the king had used in the battle, and which he had dedicated to the Sun-god. " Crowds of men and women from all parts,"" of whom Moses may have been one, ^Miad thronged to Pelusium, to welcome the conqueror and his victorious army on their return, and every great temple college had sent a deputation 128 MOSES. to meet him. A few only of these wore the modest white robe of the simple priest : most were adorned with the pan- ther skin worn by the prophets. Each bore a staff decorated with roses, lilies, and green branches, and many carried censers in the form of a golden arm, with incense in the hol- low of the hand, to be burnt before the king. Among the deputies from the priesthood of Thebes were several women of high rank, who served in the worship of Amon. . . . '' Ere long, the flags were hoisted on the standards beside the triumphal arches, clouds of dust rolled up the farther shore of the Nile, and the blare of trumpets was heard. First came the horses which had carried Rameses through the fight, with the king himself, who drove them. His eyes sparkled witli joyful triumph, as the vast multitude on the other side of the bridge hailed him with wild enthusiasm and tears of emotion, strewing in his path the spoils of their gardens — flowers, garlands, and palm branches." . . , The scene at the banquet, at which Moses may have been a guest, was in keeping with all this pomp. ^'Hundreds of slaves hurried to and fro loaded with costly dishes. Large vessels of richly wrought gold and silver were brought into the hall on wheels, and set on the side-boards. Children, perched in the shells and lotus-flowers that hung from the painted rafters and from between the pillars hung with cloudy, transparent tissues, threw roses and violets down on the company.* The sound of harps and songs issued from concealed rooms, and from an altar ten feet high, in the middle of the room, clouds of incense were wafted into space. " - No details of the early life of Moses are furnished by the > In the story of Sineha the Pharaoh is described as having " a pavilion of pure gold." Becords of the Past, vol. vi. p. 147. « TJarda, vol. ii. pp. 236-252. MOSES. 120 Bible, and the Avant can only be supplied by the fanciful inventions of tradition. Thus Josephus tells us that he was wonderfully tall when only three years old, and so beautiful that even the common people stopped to look at him as they went by. St. Stejohen, indeed, corroborates the statement as to his comeliness, which he describes as uncommon.' A short extract from Manetho has likewise been preserved by the Jewish historian, stating that Moses was born at On, and that his name was originally Osarsiph, from Osiris, the god of On, but that he changed it into Closes, '^ and that he was a priest of Osiris in the great Sun-temj^le of his native city, but was turned out of the priesthood for leprosy.^ Josephus adds that he was appointed general of an Egyptian army, which marched under liim against the Ethiopians and won great victories ; but all this rests on no authority beyond un- trustworthy legend."' His training in ^' all the wisdom of the Egyptians,^' must have followed as a necessary conse- quence from his adoption by Thermouthis, which itself in- corporated him into the royal family and into the priestly caste. Tradition assigns the great Temple of the Sun at On^ the chief university of Egypt, as the scene of his education, and if so his experience of Egyptian life in many striking aspects must have been wide, for the population of the tem- ple and its dependencies was Avell-nigh that of a small town. Shady cloisters opened into lecture-rooms for the students, and quiet houses for the professors and priests, in their many grades and offices ; there being room for all in the cor- ridors of the huge pile. Outside these, but still within the 1 Acts vii. 20. See al^o, Ileb. xi. 23. 2 Co>i(ra Ajnon, i. 2li-28. ^ Ibid. ■> The legend of Mo.ses having led an army to Ethiopia may have risen from the title of a Son of Pharaoh having always been Messi, or Massui— Prince of Ethiopia. A high official is also called so on a rock tablet at Assouan. Ebers, Diirch Gosen, l>. 526. Brugsch, vol. ii. p. 530. Lepsius, Kdnigsbuch, J. 35, No. 469. VOL. II.-9 130 MOSES. precincts, were the cottages of tlie temple servants, keep- ers of the beasts, gate-keepers, litter-bearers, water-carriers, washermen, washerwomen, and cooks ; and the rooms of the pastophoroi who prepared the incense and perfumes. The library and writing chambers had their host of scribes, who all lived in the temple buildings, and there were besides, also as members of this huge population, the officials of the counting-house, troops of singers, and, last of all, the noisy multitude of the great temple school — the Eton or Harrow of the time — from which Moses would pass upwards to the lectures of the various faculties of the university/ Clement of Alexandria has fortunately preserved an ac- count of one of the many religious processions, a counter- part to which Moses must often have watched issuing from the gates of this vast sanctuary. It was in honour of Isis. The singers came first, their voices accompanied by instru- ments. Then followed, carrying a palm branch and his time-measurer, the horoscoper, who predicted the future from the stars ; then the holy scribes, with ink, pens, and a book. The first was required to know by heart thirty-six of the forty-two books of Hermes, with the hymns to the gods, and the rules for the king ; the second, those of the books of Hermes which treated of astrology ; the third, to be an adept at hieroglyphics, geography, the structure of the earth, the phenomena of the Nile, and the details of meas- ures and offerings. After these came the dressers of the god, carrying " the rod of righteousness,^^ and a vessel for the drink-offering. The chief of these was required to be skilled in all that related to the honouring of the idol. Next came the prophets, the foremost bearing a sacred vessel ; others, the holy bread. The chief prophet was the 1 Ebers, I'he Sisters, vol. ii. pp. 32-34. MOSES. 131 president of the temple, and had committed to memory the ten books of the priests. The pastophoroi ^ or sacred phy- sicians followed, clad in their robes like the rest, and hon- oured as having by heart the six books of medicine ; and these were followed by others, with endless display.^ In what the '^'^ wisdom '' in which Moses was trained con- sisted is not easy to learn, for the priestly scribes in their written allusions to it which are still extant, speak so meta- phorically, and hide their meaning so studiously, that it is always more or less uncertain. They held it, indeed, as their exclusive treasure ; to be communicated to none out- side their circle.^ The belief in one supreme God seems, however, as is shown in the Book of the Dead, to have been the kernel of these secret doctrines ; but the " wisdom " must have included much besides that was lofty and attrac- tive, since the wisest of the Greeks — Lycurgus, Solon, Thales, Pythagoras, Democritus, Plato, and others — borrowed from it many of their principles in politics, geometry, astronomy, and physics. It included, also, moral and even medical precepts, and to these Moses doubtless owed much." Por it is striking to notice that the forty-two mortal sins from which the soul had to clear itself before the forty-two judges of the dead, in the next world, as a condition of a happy immortality, embrace nearly the Avhole Mosaic moral law ; presenting, in fact, the quintessence of that universal hu- man morality which in all ages has made mankind justly responsible for their conduct, as the ^Haw written in their hearts," making them " by nature '' a '' law unto them- selves." ^ The ibis-headed god Thoth — the scribe of the ' See p. 130. - Clemens Alex., Strmn., vi. 4. ' Uarda, vol. i. p. 28. * Uhlemann, p. 59. c Rom. ii. 14, 1.5. See Fine ^gypt. KQnigstochter, vol. ii. p. 254 ; vol. iii. p. 271. Lopsius, Todtenbuch^ p. 125. 132 MOSES. gods, known to the Greeks as Hermes Trismegistos, Ilermes the thrice greatest — was given out by the priests as having written six books on medicine, which embraced anatomy, pathology, therapeutics, and treatment of diseases of the eye, so common on the Nile. These books, composed by learned priests, would be of great value to a mind of such comprehensive genius as that of Moses. Nor must we for- get that it is to Hermes or Thoth that the sublime definition of God is ascribed, as being a circle Avhose centre is every- where and the circumference nowhere. The library of the Kamesseum at Thebes — over the gate of which was seen the inscription, " For the healing of the soul " — contained 20,000 books ; nor is it without significance, as indicating a period of great intellectual activity, that the structure thus consecrated to knowledge was built by Rameses II. Statues of Thoth, the god of wisdom, and of Safekh, the goddess of history, adorned the entrance, and we sttll possess some priestly papyrus rolls dated from it. The library is, indeed, often mentioned in Egyptian book-rolls, and the graves of two of its librarians under Rameses II. are yet to be seen at Thebes. The two, it seems, were father and son, and in their life enjoyed the title of ^' Chief of the Books." ^ Nor was this the only library in the times of Moses. That of Osiris Seb is mentioned in a copy of the Book of the Dead, and there was one belonging to the temple of Ptah at Memphis, in which medical books were included. Another, also, existed later, in the Serapeion at Alexandria. The temples, like our own monasteries in the middle ages, were, in fact, the libra- ries of the times, and often had valuable collections of books. ^ It is not probable that Moses permanently maintained » Lepsius, Chronologie-Eirdeitung, p. 39. 2 Eine JEgypt. Kd?iiff stockier, vol. iii. pp. 273-4. MOSES. 133 associations with the royal family, after lie had grown to manhood. His absence while at the University of On, if he studied there ; the removal of the court to distant Thebes, wliich took 2)hxce periodically ; and, above all, his sympathy with his own race, must have practically separatqd him, after a time, from the splendours of the palace. The lowly home of his parents would have more attractions than the halls of his princely benefactress, grateful as he might be to her. That his feelings were intensely national is seen by the one incident recorded, in Exodus, of his Egj^jotian life. In a sudden access of just indignation at the sight of a native overseer cruelly ill-using an Israelite, he fell on the oppressor and slew him, and as death was the inevitable punishment should the homicide be discovered, he could save his life only by a hasty flight from the country.' His guilt, indeed, was exceptionally great, for he had hidden the body and thus hindered embalmment, without which the soul of the slain man would never enter into the Egyptian heaven. The direction he took was, in all probability, straight for Pelusium or some other town on the line of the great frontier wall, offering escape into the desert beyond. He would breathe freely only when he had left Egypt behind, and even then, no course was open for him but to turn south, and seek refuge in the mountainous peninsula of Sinai. He could not, like Sinelia," hundreds of years before, flee to Southern Palestine, for the Hittite treaty of Rameses 1 Besides the short rods for the bastinado, the " taskmasters " had long, lieavy scourges made of a pliant wood imported from Syria. Chabas, Voyage d'ltn Egyp- iien, pp. 119, 136. Old Egyptian proverbs tell of the fearful cruelty of these " drivers." Thus, " the child grows up and his bones are broken like the bones of an ass." " The back of a lad is made that he may hearken to him that beats liim." Chabas, Voyage, p. 136 n. Papymis Anast., V. viii. G. 2 Chabas, Les Papyruit Hiemtiques de Berlin, pp. 36-51. Maspero, p. 109. Itecords of the Past, vol. vi. p. 13o. 134: MOSES. had^ as we have seen^ an extradition clause^ by whicli lie would at once have been sent back to the Nile. But we can well fancy that^ like liim^ he suffered not a little on his far longer and more painful journey. '' I went on foot/' says that fugitive of the age before Abraham, ^^ until I came to the fortress which the king had made to keep off the Eastern foreigners, and an old man, an herbseller, sheltered me. But I was alarmed at the sight of the watchers on the wall, who were changed daily. When the night was passed, however, and the dawn came, I went on from place to place, and arrived at the station of Kamur. But thirst overtook me on my journey, and my throat was so parched that I said, ' This is the taste of death,' till, hearing the pleasant voice of cat- tle, I lifted up my heart, and braced my limbs. Presently I saw a Bedouin, who asked me whither I journeyed, addressing me as from Egypt. He then gave me water, and poured out milk for me, and I went with him to his tribe, and they brought me on from place to j)lace till I arrived at Atuna.'' Moses betook himself, with a wise foresight, to the south- ern part of the Peninsula of Sinai, a mountainous triangle of more than 120 miles, north and south, from the line of Suez. The north of the peninsula was held by the Amalek- ites, but the southern portion was the district of a part of the great tribe of Midian, known as the Kenites,' and as such descended from Abraham through Keturah. The bond of common race would thus secure the fugitive a hearty reception, and it laid the ground, moreover, for a possible alliance against Egypt, when the Hebrews should make an effort for deliverance. Eeaching the headquarters of this people, which were, as usual, near the local well, he 1 Judg. i. 16 ; iv. 11. MOSES. 135 received, at once, a friendly welcome from the chief, to whose daughters he had shown a kindly courtesy. The simple manners among which he now found himself breathe of the early patriarchal age. His host was both the sheik and the emir of the tribe — its civil and religious head, bear- ing as tlie former the name of Jethro — '' the head man '' — and as the latter, Raguel — '^ the friend of God." Marriage to Zipporah — "• the little bird" — one of Jethro's daughters, of whom there were seven, soon followed. But the name of the first son of the wanderer shewed that his heart was still on the banks of the Nile, among his oppressed people, for he called him Gershom, in his deep and abiding feeling that he himself was only ^' a stranger there." The region in which Moses Avas to sj^end many years — that of the Sinai ^fountains — was singularly fitted at once to shelter him by its seclusion from the outer world, and to train him by its influences, for the high duties which lay before him. The white limestone of Palestine and of the Wilderness of the Till stretches into its northern portion. Beyond this, towards the south, come hills of sandstone, usually of only moderate height, but of wonderful variety and splendour of colour, and grotesqueness of shaj^e. These, however, ere long, give way to tlie mountains of Sinai, which till up the lower end of the Peninsula — vast masses of primi- tive rock, rising in their highest summit 9,000 feet above the sea. Memorials of the earliest age of creation, their crystalline masses have remained the same as they are to- day through all the modifications of the surface of the world. ''Their granite, porphyry, mica schist, and greenstone shafts, pinnacles, and buttresses have towered from the beginning over the ocean, undisturbed by the change from the Silurian age to the Devonian, from the Carboniferous to the Liassic ; 13G MOSES. from the Oolite to the Chalk." ^ No vegetation covers the bareness of the vast walls of rock, but their colours are so varied and so sharply defined that they seem, notwithstand- ing, to be veiled in a rich and varied world of plant life. The light-effects, moreover, in the dry pure air and under the deep blue of the sky, have an indescribable power and beauty, in their varying tints, from blinding white to deep violet. To one coming from the rich fields of the Egyptian Delta all this splendour of rock and sky cannot, however, have made up for what he had left behind, and must have seemed desolation. Yet in the days of Moses the whole region was much less barren than now. The destruction of trees age after age, for the use of the miners of ancient Egypt, and for the manufacture of charcoal, which is still carried on, has not only destroyed the forests, but has in- tensified the sterility of the soil by diminishing the fall of i-ain. Mimy a valley which now shows only a few stunted bushes may well have been shaded by woods 3,000 years ago. So late as a.d. 400 an eyewitness tells us that there Avas great plenty of wood and broom over the whole region — the wood not failing in any part of it.'' Even to-day there are oases in at least five of the Sinai wadys, and no valley, in the very heart of the mountains, is entirely bare of vegetation. Acacias and tamarisks grow in Wadys Sheik and Gharandel in great numbers, and the palm groves of Wadys Feiran, Kid, Dahab, Noweyba, and Tor yield a rich harvest of fine dates. Broom bushes and other thorny growths, and a great variety of strong-scented plants, espe- cially thyme, nestle in the cracks of the steepest precipices. The broad-leaved colocynth grows in the sandy plains on the border of the wilderness of the Tib, and the bright green 1 Fraas, Aus clem Orient, p. T. ^ j)urch Gosen, p, 35i. MOSES. 137 of the caper plant makes a striking contrast to the dark leaves of the swallow-wort or asclepia, on many a wall of rock. Tliousands of goats and sheep find sufficient pasture iluring the whole year, and many chamois and mountain badgers frequent the almost inaccessible gorges of the heights. Panthers also are met with in these upland valleys. Singing birds enliven the copses by the clear cool springs of the mica schist, and, occasionally, huge flocks of quails, wearied by their long flight from the west, over the Red Sea, settle for the time on tlie rocky slopes and open plains. Wild ducks, moreover, abound in the small lakes of one or two of the wadys. Nor is the land, alone, thus, in a measure, astir witli life. The dugong seal is still, at times, caught in the bays on each side of the peninsula ; its thick hide being much prized for sandals to protect the feet from the many acacia thorns in every path. Even with the rude appliances of the Arabs, moreover, the take of fish and moUusks from the neighbouring Red Sea is very large.' Snakes, both poisonous and harmless, are numerous in some parts. But, as a whole, the Sinai Mountains rank among the wildest regions. From a distance they rise, red and gray, in huge masses and peaks of porphyry and granite. On all sides lie heaps of dark ashes of burnt-out volcanic fires, or of fragments of porphyry, red as wax. AValls of rock, with a green shimmer, rise naked and threatening ; uncouth, wild crags tower steeply above mounds of black and brown stones, which look as if they had been broken by the ham • mers of giants. The horizon takes new forms with every short advance, as one closed-in valley rises above another ; the sublimity of the landscape increasing with the ascent. 1 Furrer, Sinai, in Schcnkel, vol. v. p. 327. 138 MOSES. As each new level is reached^ the mountains rise in huge heights around, but as the journey leads on to the next plateau they seem to shrink into tameness before the new giants that encircle the way.' ^^ Were I a painter/^ says Ebers, " and could I illustrate Dante's Inferno, I would have pitched my camp-stool here, and have filled my sketch-book, for there could never be wanting to the limner of the dark abyss of the Pit, landscapes savage, terribly, immeasurably sad, unutterably wild, unapproachably grand and awful." ^ The influence of such a district on a mind like that of Moses must have been great. No region more favourable to the attainment of a lofty conception of the Almighty could have been found. Nature, by the want of water and the poverty of vegetation, is intensely simple, presenting no variety to dissipate and confuse the mind. The grand, sub- limely silent mountain world around, with its bold, abrupt masses of granite, greenstone, and porphyry, fills the spirit with a solemn earnestness which the wide horizon from most peaks and the wonderful purity of the air tend to heighten. The wanderer looks down, for example, from the top of Jebel Miisa, the Mount of Moses, with a shuddering horror, into the abyss below — and round, on the countless pinna- cles and peaks, cliffs and precipices, of many-coloured rocks ; white and gray, sulphurous yellow, blood red, and ominous black ; entirely bare of vegetation. To the north, the desert of the Tih stretches out beyond the mountains in end- less perspective. On the east and west the reflection of the blue sea shimmers up from the depths ; beyond it, towards sunrising, are seen the pale sands of Arabia ; while towards sunset the mountains of Egypt rise half veiled in the blue of distance. Such a place was far more fitted than the » Durch Gosen, p. 131. 2 ma., p. 132. MOSES. 139 narrowly liemmed-in valley of the Nile, or than Palestine, to call forth great thoughts.' In such a desert region we take refuge in our own reflections from the monotony around ; the senses are at rest. Undisturbed and uninfluenced from without, the View prom the Summit op Sinai. By Permission. From Prof. Palmer's Desert of tJie Exodus. mind follows out every train of thought to the end, and examines and exhausts every feeling to its finest shades. In a city there is no solitude : each is part of a great whole on which he acts, and by which he is himself affected. But the lonely wanderer in a district like Sinai is absolutely isolated from his fellows, and must fill up ' Fiirrer. Die Bedeutung der Bib. Geographie fur der Bib. Uxegese, p. 5. Ritter, Erukundt, vol. xiv. pp. 3, C44, 54S, 584. 140 MOSES. the void by liis own identity. The present retires into the background;, and the spirit, waked to intensity of life, finds no limits to its thoughts. In a lofty spiritual nature like that of Moses, the solemn stillness of the mountains and the boundless sweep of the daily and nightly heavens would efface the thought of man, and fill the soul with the majesty of God. As he meditated on the possible deliver- ance of his people, the lonely vastness would raise liim above anxious contrasts of their weakness compared with the power of Egypt, which might have paralyzed resolution and bidden hope despair. What was man, whose days Avere a hand- breadth, and whose foundation was in the dust, before the mighty Creator of Heaven and Earth — the Eock of Israel ? ' Even less lofty spirits than his had, indeed, been kindled, age after age, to a nearer sense of the presence of God, amidst these magnificent and awful solitudes ; for Serbal had been from the earliest times sacred to the worship of I^aal, and, even still, the wandering Bedouin sacrifices lambs within stone circles raised on it, as thank-offerings for any special blessing received." So, Horeb already bore the name of "' the Mount of God" when Moses came to live near it,^ and the Avliole group of mountains, like Ararat or the Himalaya, were holy among the tribes around." In this sanctuary of the hills, awaiting the time when the advancing purposes of God had ripened Israel for the great movement of its deliverance, and, meanwhile, unconsciously preparing for the mighty task before him, Moses spent, as St. Stephen informs us, no fewer than forty years. ^ His wanderings would make him acquainted with every valley, 1 (Jeikie's Life and Words of Christ, vol. i. p. 382. 2 Sepp, Jerusalem xi. das Heilige Land, vol. ii. p. 776. 3 Exod. iv. 27. ^ Ewald's Geschichte, vol. ii. p. 63. 6 Acts vii. 30. MOSES. 141 plain, gorge, hill, and monntain of the whole region ; with its population, whether native, or that of the Egyj)tiau mines ; with every spring and well, and with all the re- sources of every kind offered by any spot : an education of supreme importance towards fitting him to guide his race, when rescued from Egypt, to the safe shelter and holy sanctuaries of this predestined scene of their long encamp- ment. Still more, in those calm years every problem to be solved in the organization of a people would rise successively in his mind and find its solution ; and above all, his own soul must have been disciplined and purified, by isolation from the world and closer and more continual communion with God.^ 1 Bertheau thinks that Moses in Midian would come in contact with a form of the faith of Abraham, preserved in Jethro's tribes, purer than survived among the Jews in Egypt. Geschichte, p. 242. CHAPTER V. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. The long interval dnring which Moses lived in Midian as a humble shepherd, must have been one of ripening progress towards future deliverance on the part of the Hebrews on the Nile. Parents whose home training had resulted in a family like Miriam, Aaron, and Moses — true to the God of their fathers, and, as such, filled with an intense aversion to the religion of Egypt — could not have been the only instances of a hereditary loyalty to the faith and aspi- rations of Israel. Doubtless Amram and Jochebed bore in their names ^ the proud assertion of a creed cherished by not a few of their race besides, even in these dark times. There had been, it may well be believed, too much indifference to the memories of Bethel and Beersheba ; but trouble had quickened the religious feelings of the nation, and given a value, which had not latterly been assigned them, to the promises made by Jehovah to Abraham and his descend- ants.''' This great spiritual revolution was brought about, so far as can now be seen, through the agency of the tribe of Levi, to which the parents of Moses belonged, and their children lived to be its chief promoters. But Amram and Jochebed doubtless received from others of a former gener- ation, the Puritan impulse which their family was destined to spread so widely and to conduct to such triumphant 1 Gesenius, 8th ed. See ante, p. 117. ^ Exoil. ii. 23. 142 THE PLAGIJES OF EGYPT. 143 results. That their tribe should hereafter be honoured with the national priesthood was, therefore, its natural inheri- tance. It was through it, in Eg}7)t, that its brethren turned again 'to Jehovah, and it was by the efforts of its sons, Aaron and Moses, that they became a people. Pio- neers, in Egypt, of national revival, religious and political, perliaps for generations, the tribe of Levi was designated from the first, alike by its past services and its special fitness, for the dignity ultimately assigned to it. Aaron was doubtless the chief agent in this great work, but he would have the assistance of the ^"^ elders^' of the people ; that is, of the heads or '^ princes " of tribes, of clans, of sub-clans, and of households, in spreading his influence through the whole population. To do so, how- ever, with any aid, would be no easy task ; for the masses are slow to rouse to spiritual ideas, especially when crushed by a hard life. Yet it was essential they should be thus quickened. To free them in a merely physical sense would have left them unfitted for their high destiny as the People of God. The foundation of a permanent and earnest rec- ognition of Jehovah as their national God, demanded that the contrast between the true and the false should be brought home to them and burnt into their hearts, while they were still surrounded by Egyptian idolatry, and aglow with enthusiasm against its votaries, as their oppressors. Kor is it without significance that the Greek Bible speaks of God as gradually *''' becoming known to them.^'^ The Hebrew overseers in charge of each gang of their brethren, under the Egyptian taskmasters, doubtless shewed them a sympathy which extended beyond their physical sufferings ; 1 The words, ch. ii. 25, " God had respect unto them,"" are, in the Septnagint, "Grod became known unto them." 144 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. for these overseers or ' ^ officers " ' are elsewhere identified with the "elders," who were in close commnnicjition with Aaron. ^ The heads of each clan or sub-clan were evidently made responsible for the behaviour of those connected with them, and tribal communication was thus intimately main- tained. That Aaron should have gone to Sinai to meet his brother Moses speaks, moreover, of his work being at last ripe for great results, and of a correspondence having been maintained between the two through the years of their sep- aration ; if only by messages carried by traders passing through Jethro^s district. The preparation of Moses for his great task must, like that for all high aims and spheres, have been gradual and slow. To feel one's self summoned to play the part of a prophet of God implies an elevation, an enthusiasm, and a concentration of soul only attained by degrees. The out- ward duties of such an office must indeed be the spontane- ous expression of profound personal conviction, rising above all doubt and question where others hesitate most, and this is necessarily slowly reached. Every utterance of the pro- phetic impulse ultimately exhibited by Moses, implies that the existence and continual presence of God, as the supreme directing and controlling force in all human affairs, must have been realized by him with an overpowering vividness, carrying with it his whole nature. It may be that his flight, 1 Exod. V. 6, 14, 19. The word is shoterim. Even the seventy elders are so called, Num. xi. 16. So are, afterwards, the heads of the different sections of the tribes, in the march through the wilderness. Dent. xx. 9 ; xxix. 9 ; xxxi. 28. Josh. i. 10 ; iii. 2 ; viii. 33 ; xxiii. 2 ; xxiv. 1. The municipal dignitaries of the towns of Israel also bore, in after days, tliis name. Deut. xvi. 18. 1 Chron. xxiii. 4 ; xxvi. 29. The shoterim seem to have had charge of the genealogical records of the tribes. " Exod. iv. 29. It is noteworthy that Pharaoli complains of the people " listening to lying talk," about going off to sacrifice in the wilderness. This shows that their leaders had access to them, and we may feel sure that they had long used this privilege to quicken them to worthy thoughts. See Exod. v. 9. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 145 after killing tlic Egyptian taskmaster, was the first step towards this lofty inspiration, by breaking off every tie with Egypt, and committing him unreservedly to the cause of his people. For, though his heart had always been theirs, even amidst the learned seclusion of the temple cloisters at On, or the splendours of the palace at Tanis — and though he had often stolen away to mingle with those whom he loved as *^ his brethren," and to sympathize with them in their ' "■ burdens " — his flight must have first set him free from an embarrassing position, and left him wholly at their service. The prophet, in the true meaning of the word, is tlic mouth of God among men, whether in respect to the present or the future. Prediction is only one form of the Divine communications he announces. To proclaim the present purposes and will of God is his main commission. But to rise to a condition of mind in which he thus becomes the articulate voice of the Eternal to his fellow-men must come by a natural advance. Before the S23irit can thus be filled with the Divine, like a lamp with light, it must have been long concentrated on it to a degree unknown to other men. Earth must well-nigh have disappeared, before the heavens thus open as the familiar home of the thoughts. Th'j Unseen must have become the great reality, before which tlie visible and temporal rank as infinitely subordinate. In this sense Moses was, at once, the first and the greatest of the prophets, for no one before Christ has spoken in the name of God with such commanding majesty, or shed such a flood of light on the Divine nature and laws. All future prophets draw their light from his central splendour, for he estab- lished in the hearts of his race the great truths which his successors had but to press home on their contemporaries. VOL. II.-IO 146 THE PLAGUES OE EGYPT. Tlio burning bnsli of Iloreb was, indeed, only a symbol of tbe sacred fire which glowed through his being, and kindled in the world, unextinguishably, the light of the true relig- ion. But what long wrestlings of soul ; what ponderings over the mysteries of nature as seen around and above him ; what mental struggles with the teachings of his Egyptian masters ; what contrasts of the gods of the Nile valley in all their higher and lower aspects, with the traditional faith in the One living and true God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, must have passed through his soul, before Jehovah stood out alone, supreme, universal, as the holy Lord God of heaven and earth ! To think one^s way, even with all supernatural aids, to such a stupendous conclusion, in the clearness and intensity with which it rose before him, sets him apart among men ; for the God of Moses, though also the God of Abraham, is revealed with infinitely fuller circumstance, in His relations to mankind and in the disclosures of His own Being. Revelation doubtless poured into his soul the light by which it realized such truths, but his whole nature must have strained towards that light with a grand earnestness, to have been fitted for such communications. In spiritual things, it is ever to those only who have, that more can be given. Apart from this concentrated Divine enthusiasm, how- ever, raising him slowly, through years, to the conviction that he was called to be a prophet to his people, and to speak to them, as such, for God ; the vast task before Moses demanded the intellect of a statesman, a legislator, and an organizer on a grand scale, and it was the union of these with his supreme authority as the recognized mouth- piece of God, that qualified him supremely for his great work. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 147 It was in the wilderness of Sinai, the Bible tells us, amidst the mountains of Horeb — *^^the dry," a name for the vast heights of the Sinai group as a whole — while he was feeding the flocks of his father-in-laAv, that Moses was first honoured with the Divine communication which trans- formed him, henceforth, in his whole nature, by bringing to a crisis the inarticulate dreams and spiritual aspirations of the past. Tradition has fixed the spot, since the sixth century, in the deep seclusion to which he afterwards led the children of Israel, and the convent of Justinian is built over what is held to have been the very spot where he was commanded to put the sandals from off his feet. But whether this "valley of Jethro," or the plain at Mount Serbal, was the scene of the event, the circumstances around were equally fitting. The awful majesty of the hills, which, as Josephus tells us,^ had already invested them with a spe- cial sacredness in the eyes of the Arab tribes as "the Moun- tains of God," looked down on the wanderer from every side. He had followed his flocks of sheep and goats as they sought the aromatic shrubs on the ledges of the rock, or in the folds of the narrow valleys, or by the side of chance springs ; little thinking to what they were leading him. The wild acacia, the seneh of the Hebrew Bible — a gnarled and thorny tree, not unlike our solitary hawthorn in its growth "^ — dotted the bare slopes and the burning soil of the ravines. But now, suddenly, a glow of flame, like that Avhich was consuming Israel in the furnace of affliction, shines forth amidst the dry branches of one of these before him, and yet, as he gazes, "the bush," though "it burned with fire," was not consumed. Drawing near to "see this great sight," a voice which he instinctively recognizes as » Ant., II. xii. 1. 2 Tristram, Nat. Hist, of Bible, p. 391. 148 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. Divine sounds from its miclst^ commanding liim to remove his sandals, as on holy ground ; ' revealing new and closer relations of God to His chosen people, and imposing on the awed shepherd a unique commission as His prophet. Ha had been known to their forefathers, and was known to themselves, by names more or less used by related peoples, in speaking of their gods— the names El, or Elohim, or Shaddai — " the mighty One.'^ The worship of Jehovah, indeed, was generally diffused through Assyrian and West- ern Asia at an early date; for, as far back as B.C. 822, the names of Assyrian officials are in part made up, like so many Jewish names, by incorporating part of it. Even in B.C. 887, the name Abijah occurs on the Euphrates as an Assyrian name, and in the time of Sargon, the destroyer of Samaria in B.C. 721, lanhida was king of Hamath, on the Orontes ; Joram was king of Edom ; Zedekm/^, king of Ascalon, and Pad^/^, king of Ekron. There is, moreover, a Joel in a Pha3nician text from Malta. The name Jehovah was, indeed, common, at least as early as the tenth century before Christ, to all Semitic peoples of Western Asia as far east as Nineveh. The Hebrews themselves had, in fact, also used the name, as we see in that of Jochebed, the mother of Moses, but its wide import had never been fully revealed to them.^ Henceforth, the gulf between the true God and the idols of Egypt and of the nations, should be marked by the adoption of the name Jehovah in its full significance, as expressive of the One only Living God — the true '^ I am WHOM I AM," the mysterious Fountain of all Being. ^Hlo 1 " Our habit of respect is to take ofE the hat : theirs, to take oflE their shoes. Con- sequently, they never enter their places of worship, or generally their own rooms, without taking them off and leaving them at the doors." Mill's Samaritans, pp. 107, 225. 2 Oehler, in Herzog, vol. vi. p. 460. THK PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 149 to your brethren^ the children of Israel," continued the Divine voice, ''and say to them, 'Jehovah, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you. This shall be My name for ever : so shall you call Me for ever and ever.'" ' All other gods were mere Elilim^ — "nothings" — had no existence, but were only inventions of man. He alone, by the very name Jehovah, proclaimed Himself as the One Liv- ing God. Moses was to tell his brethren that this mighty Being — mindful of His covenant with Abraham — was about to deliver them from oppression, and gather them beneath the mountains where the Voice then spoke, that He might give them their future laws as His people, and afterwards lead them to the good land which He had promised to their fathers. Instinctively shrinking from an office at once so lofty and so difficult, Moses naturally craves special assurances of God's presence with him, before he can face the majesty of Pharaoh, or hope to rouse the apathy of a down-trodden race. But these, alsa, are given him. Overpowered with the vision, and yet divinely exalted in soul ; shrinking in hu- mility as he thinks of himself, but strong in a holy trust as he remembers Jehovah, he turns back to his flocks another man. Henceforth, he is in the fullest sense inspired, and rises to the height of the great enterprise committed to him. If he be slow of speech, has not Jehovah said that i\aron would speak for him to Pharaoh and to the people ; he him- 1 Gesenius, Lex., 8th edition, art. "Ziicher/'p. 239. It is striking how this supreme name of God had its echoes in other nations than Israel— perhaps from the first age of innocence. laO was at times the name assigned by the Greeks to the highest God (Macrob., Saturn., i. 18). The Chalda3ans spoke of lao, and the Ichthyophagi are said to have used the name laO Sabaoth, as a charm or spell in their fishing. See Knobel's Exodus, p. 29. Perhaps these nations borrowed the name from the Hebrews. 2 p^. xcvi. 5. 150 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. self actings through him, as the representative of Grod ? It would thus be his to indicate : Aaron would put his instruc- tions in fitting words. To himself it was vouchsafed to stand to the people in the place of G-od ; to Aaron he would be as God is to a prophet whom he inspires. ^ Did he wish a symbol of his high office ? Had not the shepherd^s rod in his hand been already made the instrument of Divine power ? His task was to be performed by no mere human aid. Had he been required to front the majesty of Egypt by raising an insurrection and trusting to military success, he might well have despaired ; for how could the multitudes of an enslaved population win the day against disciplined armies ? But the peaceful symbol he bore — the staif with which he had guided his kinsman's flocks — spoke, as the wonders he had already seen wrought by it showed, of an invisible Power before whom the might of the Pharaohs availed nothing. In the modest humility of such an emblem he could go forward, assured that Jehovah who had sent him would also fight the battle for Israel.^ For, had not this simple rod, at the 1 KnobePs Prophetismvs, vol. i. p. 104. Ewald's Geschichte, vol. ii. p. 86. 2 The incident of the circumcision of Gers^hom, the son of Moses, at the caravan- serai, on the way to Egj'pt, is striking. Moses had neglected to perform the rite and was suddenly struck by severe illness, which he traced to this oversight of his duty. Zipporah, learning the fact, forthwith circumcises the child, and Moses presently recovers ; on which Zipporah tells him that .she has won him again for her bride- groom by the child's blood ; that his life is spared on account of it. and she has him as it were, given to her anew— now this duty is fulfilled. Exod. iv. 24-27. That the " sons " of Moses should be set on an ass, implies that they were of tender years, so that his marriage must have taken place long after his going to Midian, or the birth of his children must have been long delayed. Herodotus says that the Arabs were wont to confirm covenants by cutting their middle finger with a sharp stone (iii. 8). In the case of Moses it was fitting that the covenant made with Abraham, and now virtually renewed with himself, should be solemnized by the sign divinely appointed at its first institution. But it marks strikingly the extent to which the patriarchal faith had passed from the common Hebrew mind, that even Moses should have neglected to circumcise his children. Gesenius quotes with approval the statement of some Jewish expositors, that a mother called her son " spouse " when he was circumcised. Thesaurus, p. 539. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 151 bidding of God, turned to an angry serpent, the symbol of death, and had not the hand that held it been alternately withered and restored by the same Voice ? Had not the vision of the burning bush shown that though thorns could not of themselves resist the shining flames, but were, rather, the very thing that would most easily fall a prey to them, a Power was at hand who protected even what was so frail ? Israel might be unable in itself to oppose Egypt, but its Eedeemer was mighty. As God was in the flame of the bush and hindered its consuming that in which it glowed, so He was with His people in their trials, and would keep them from being destroyed. They would be saved, not by the skill or intellect of any leader, but only by the power and loving-kindness of Jehovah Himself. Their deliverance should be so clearly His work alone, that they would in all future ages see in it a pledge of His having divinely chosen them for His own, and of His tender love and pity towards them.^ The meeting of Aaron with his brother must have filled both hearts with joy and confidence in God, for if Moses had to speak of heavenly encouragement in their great enter23rise, so had Aaron. He had to report, besides, that the Hebrews, their brethren, were at last, after long years, roused once more to an enthusiasm for the religion of their fathers, which insured their co-operation in any j^lan for speedy deliverance from the burden of Egyptian slavery, and the hated presence of Egyptian idolatry. Nor was it necessary to wait any length of time for the proof of this. All the elders of Israel being summoned and told of the approach- ing crisis, the tidings soon spread through every division of the tribes, and were received with universal joy. The elders i Ivolilcr's Lekrbuck der Bib.-Gcschichle, vol. i. p. 174. 152 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. indeed could report that ^^tlie people believed, and rejoiced that Jehovah had visited them^^ through His chosen mes- sengers, and that they had bowed their heads and wor- shipped/ The struggle which had now come to a head between Israel and Egypt, Avas at once a revolt of slaves against their mastei-s and the conflict of one religion with another. The Pharaoh had aimed at destroying the nationality of the Hebrews and incorporating them with the general popu- lation, but this involved their accepting Egyptian idolatry. Israel had, however, clung with a desperate tenacity to the faith of their race, and craved leave to perform the sacrifices it demanded. But these required the slaughter of rams and oxen — the former sacred to Amon ; the latter the symbol of Osiris and Isis — and to kill animals thus sacred, would have roused the whole nation to exterminate a people guilty of such impiety. It was inevitable that if these sacrifices were to be offered at all, the Hebrews must be allowed to go out- side the bounds of the kingdom. Demanding an audience, therefore, from Pharaoh, Moses and Aaron requested that their brethren should be permitted to go a three-days' journey to the wilderness, and there hold a solemn religious festival to their (lod.^ The refusal of a proposal so fair and moderate w^ould at once justify their obtaining for themselves this natural right, and with it their personal freedom, by any worthy means that offered. The Pharaoh who now reigned was Menephtah II., the thirteenth son of Kameses II., who had died after reign- ing well-nigh seventy years, leaving many survivors of his 1 Exod. iv. 31. Septuagint and Knobel. ' The Egj'ptians had their own religious pilgrimages and sacrificial festivals, at Bubastis,Busiris, Sais, Heliopolis, Boutos, and Papremis. Herod., ii. 59. See also Vaihinger, Studien u. Kj'itiken, 1872, p. 374. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 153 immense family of 170 children.' Meneplitah was already a man of about sixty when he ascended the throne, and he held his court habitually in Lower Egypt ; at Memphis, On, and Tanis or Zoan,'^ where monuments bearing his name still exist, thus corroborating the statement of the Bible, that it was at Zoan Moses encountered him.' The date of his accession is said to have been n.c. 1325, but it is hard to reconcile this with the accepted dates of earlier and subse- quent events. From the time of Seti I., the grandfather of Menephtah, the people of Libya had threatened the western frontier of Egypt, but the vigour of Rameses II. had driven them back, and held them in check while he lived. After his death, however, things changed. A great alliance was formed by tlie Libyans with the G-reeks — of whom this is the first historical mention known — the Sicilians, the Etruscans, the Sardinians, and the Lycians ; and Egypt was invaded from the north, by sea and land. In such a time the persecution of the Hebrews must have been suspended, for it would have been madness to have tempted them, by ill-treatment, to join the invaders, who were finally driven off after '' days and months,'' leaving the unusual number of 9,376 prisoners in the hands of Menephtah.'' Mounds of hands and dis- membered limbs laid at his feet attested the ferocity of the Egyptian troops, especially the cavalry, of whom Menephtah particularly boasts. But besides these, there were more 1 Lenormant's Manuel, vol. i. p. 423. Birch's Ancient Egypt froni the Monuments, p. 133. Ebers, in Riehm, p. 333. Maspero, p. 258. De Rouge, Examen. Critique de V Oavrage de M. le Chevalier de Bunsen, 2d partie, p. 74. 2 Chabas, Recherches svr la XIX' Dynastie, pp. 79, 80. Chabas, Melanges JEgyp- tologiqiies, 3d series, vol. ii. pp. 117, 161. 3 Ps. Isxviii. 12, 43. 4 Inscription at Karnak translated in liecords of the Pafit, vol. iv. 37-48 ; also by De Ronge in the Revue Archceologiqne, 1867, p. 167: and bj- Chabas, Etudes de V Anti- quit e Hlstojique, Paris, 1870-73. Ebers, ^^gypten und die Biicher Moses\ p. 154, 154 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. valuable spoils : multitudes of horses and oxen, over 9,000 copper swords, 1,308 bulls, many goats, 54 gold vases, a number of silver drinking cups, and more than 3,000 of other materials ; coats of mail, skin tents, and much else. Peace once more established, the oppression of the He- brews recommenced with additional severity ; perhaps from the doubtful attitude taken by them during the invasion ; but, it may be, only from the natural fear that a people so numerous, so vigorous, so distinct from the Egyptians, and so fiercely opposed to the national religion, should hereafter give trouble if fresh complications arose. Among other pre- cautions, Menephtah, like his father, took up his residence, usually, at Memphis or at Tanis-Zoan, whence he could most easily dominate the alien populations of the Delta, and stand, as it were, on guard, at the entrance of Egypt, against invasion from Syria or Arabia. An allusion occurs, in the inscription which records the great Libyan inroad, to the condition of these parts after peace had been restored, and also in the old Hyksos days. On ^ or Heliopolis and Mem- phis were additionally fortified ; other places which had been ruined were rebuilt, and lines of defence were thrown up at weak points ; perhaps in part as measures of repression towards the Hebrews. Then follows a glance at the condi- tion of the Delta and Lower Egypt, generally, in the old Hyksos times, and since. '^ Never was the like devastation seen as in the invasion of the Libyans and their allies — not even in the times of the kings of Lower Egypt, when the land lay in the hand of the enemy, and misery reigned — in the times when the kings of Upper Egypt could not drive the invaders out. (In the Libyan invasion) the open lands ^ The Septnagint udds the name of On to those of Pithoni and Rameses, as a city on which the Hebrews performed forced labour. THE PLArTUJ:s of egypt. 155 were left untilled, as pasture for cattle, because of the bar- barians. These parts had been infested from the times of our ancestors, when the kings of Upper Egypt lay in their tombs, and when those of Lower Egypt, in the midst of their towns, were surrounded by dwellings of corruption.^ Their troops had not auxiliaries enough to enable them to act efficiently.^''* The Delta was still, as in the past, the weak point of Egypt, from the large foreign element in its population, holding close relations to the inexhaustible hos- tile regions outside. The whole position of affairs, after the expulsion of the Libyans and their European and Asiatic allies, might naturally suggest the sternest measures towards the already dangerously numerous Hebrews. Tanis, the scene of the plagues by which Pharaoh was at last compelled to yield to the demands of Moses, has been already described.^ Fortunately, we have on one of the walls of the great temple of Karnak, a plan of its ruins made in the time of Seti I., grandfather of ^lenephtah, before it had been rebuilt and beautified by Rameses 11. The Tanis branch of the Xile flows through the town and its suburbs, and is crossed by a bridge. In the water are crocodiles and aquatic plants. The sea, not far off, is also represented, with its fish ; * for in the Hyksos days the ships of Palestine and other countries could sail up to the wharves of Tanis, as they again were in the time of Eameses II., though the canal Avhicli now represents the river is only navigable for the fisher-boats from Lake Menzaleh, which did not then exist. 1 An alien population. 2 Becords of the Past, vol. iv. p. 41. Ebers, ^gypten, p. 207. Vigouroux, vol. ii. p. 248. Chabas, Recherches, p. 94. 3 Page 29. < Bnigscli, Inscript. Gcog.^ I. pi. 48. La Swtic des Htbrmx d'Egypte, Conference, Alexandrie, 1874, p. 20. 156 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. Menephtali was about twenty years younger than Moses^ and had doubtless heard of his early life in the palace, and of his subsequent flight and its cause. Time, however, had long effaced these recollections, for even the flight had hap- pened forty years before. But to make any impression on a Pharaoh, in favour of despised slaves, needed more than words, however reasonable or weighty. Menej^htah had been taught to regard his lightest fancy as the law which all must obey. That he should be required to do the least trifle against his pleasure was inconceivable. Court laureates had addressed him in odes, one of which, still preserved, is doubtless a sample of many. He was, they told him, '^ the lover of truth," "' the sun in the great heaven, enlightening the earth with his goodness, and chasing the darkness from Egypt." " Thou art, as it were, the image of thy father, the Sun Who rises in heaven. ... No place is without thy goodness. Thy sayings are the law of every land. . . . Bright is thy eye above the stars of heaven : able to gaze at The sun. Whatever is spoken, even in secret, ascends to Thine ears. Whatever is done in secret, thy eye sees it, O ! Baeura Meriamen,* merciful Lord, creator of breath ! '' - The first approaches of Moses and Aaron to this man-god, on behalf of their people, the despised beings by whose la- bour he was executing the public works of the district, only drew down on the sufferers a heavier lot. Hitherto they had been allowed tebben, the broken straw of the thresh- 1 A name of Menephtah II. The expression of belief that he was the tnie living representative of Deity on earth was doubtless sincere, for all men in Eg5'pt, as has l)een already said, worshipped the Pharaoh as the incarnate Sun-god. Proofs ol this are met with constantly. 2 Papyrus Anasfasi, translated by Chabas, Melanges Egijptologiques, 1870, p. 117, and by Mr. Goodwin, Trans. Soc. Bib. Arch., vol. ii. p. 353. Eecords of the Past, vol. vi. p. 101. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 157 ing floor, to use in binding the clay tliqy had to make into bricks ; but now they were to get it where they could, from the fields far and near ; the same number of bricks as before being still demanded from them.' It must have been some time about the end of April ; for the wheat harvest is then just over in Egypt and leaves the plains of the Delta covered with standing straw — soon to be gathered and torn or trampled to pieces for fodder : the reapers in Ancient as in Modern Egypt cutting off the grain close to the ear. The Xile would be at its lowest, and the hot sand wind from the Sahara would have begun to blow, as it does for fifty days together at that season, making the heat almost unen- durable. But the Hebrews had to face it, and waste their strength and lives on their impossible task.^ The burden had become intolerable, but deliverance was at hand. The signs and plagues by which Menephtah was in the end compelled to let the Hebrews go, began, we are told, with a repetition of the wonder that had already been wrought at Horeb — the turning a rod into a serpent : a miracle imitated, however, by the '^ magicians of Egypt."' ^ The great lesson of all these manifestations — the superiority of Jehovah to the idols of Egypt — was in none, however, more vividly shown than in this, by " Aaron's rod swallow- ing up" all the others.* The jugglers and magicians of the East have in every age exhibited feats of skill, or of unholy powers, which startle the senses and seem to defy explanation. Egypt especially was the land of "the black art,"' which indeed got that name from the dark colour of the soil of the Nile valley.'' 1 Exod. V. 15 ff. 3 Osburn, Israel in Egypt, p. 252. 3 Exod. vii. 11. * All official E<,'yprians carried rods in their hands, a? indications of their rank, etc. * Alchemy means *' pretended science," and is derived from Kemia = black— the native name of Egypt. Hence it was •' the black art." 158 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. Exodus supplies us Avitli the names of some classes of its wonder-workers — the Hakamim^ or wise men^, who specially dealt in secret arts ; the Mekashphim, who muttered magic spells and adjurations for driving away spirits^ or the more tangible dangers of crocodiles, asps, snakes, and the like ; ' and the Ilartummim, who were, as Brugsch tells us, the high priests, presiding at the different religious services in the very city of Zoan-Tanis, where Moses and Aaron wrought their miracles. Their name means, we are told, '' the warriors," in allusion to the myths of conflicts of the gods, so common in Egypt. ^ This class were perhaps, equiv- alent to " the sacred scribes," ^ and appear to have been at once the literary men of their temples, and skilled in utter- ing spells by the use of sacred names and words." In this relation they were ,the " scribes of occult writings," and formed, with the other classes named, the council of the Pha- raoh, to consult the magic books for him, when summoned. The names of the two chief opponents of Moses and Aaron, Jannes and Jambres, have been preserved by St. Paul,^ and are both Egyptian ; An or Annu, which is identical with ^' scribe," being frequently found in writings of the date of Moses, while Jambres is the name of a sacred book, and may mean '' Scribe of the South."" Buxtorif gives some of the traditions of the later Jews respecting them, under the names of Jochanna and Mamre. They were said to have been sons of Balaam, and to have perished with Pharaoh in the Eed Sea, but it is idle to repeat such inventions at any length.' 1 See references in the Book of the Dead. 2 Brugsch, The Exodus and the EgijiMan Ifonnments, Trans. Oiient. Cotigress, London, 1874, p. 273. Dillmann (Exodus, p. 68) rejects this etymology. 3 Ebers, jEgypten, etc., p. 34L ■* SpeaJcer''s Comment., vol. i. p. 279. 5 2 Tim. iii. 8. « Speaker's Comment., vol. i. p. 279. ■^ Buxtorff's Lex. Ch. et Tal., pp. 948-9. Rosenmiiller, Das Alte u. Neue Morgen- land, vol. i. p. 275. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 159 Like all the other " signs " and plagues, that of the rod turned into a serpent was a direct challenge from Jehovah to the idols of Egypt ; for serpents were Avorshipped in vari- ous parts of the country/ and the living symbol of the god of Pithom, in the Hebrew district, was one of these creat- ures, dignified with the name of *'the Magnificent/^ and ^' the Splendid." ^ The asp was also the symbol of the god Knepli — the creator and sustainer of the world/ and Serajns was frequently represented with a serpent^'s body/ To dis- credit this reptile, therefore, at once dishonoured a multi- tude of Egyptian gods, for their utter impotence as com- pared with Jehovah could have had no more signal illustra- tion, than the vanishing of all the rods of the magicians before that of Aaron. How the feats narrated of these wonder-workers were per- formed it is impossible to tell, but it is certain that, in both ancient and modern times, conjurers in the East have boasted of amazing power over serpents. An African race, the Psylli, were believed to be proof against their bites, handling them recklessly, in reliance on the protection of spells and incantations. Throwing them into a helpless lethargy, they then played with them as mock rods or staves.^ Even at this day Egyptian jugglers are accus- tomed to catch a serpent by the head, and by some strange • Ilerod., ii. 74. Eusebius speaks of two serpents worshipped at Thebes, as the greatest of all the gods. '^ Bnigsch, The Exodus and the Egyptian Momiments, p. 269. 3 Creuzer's SymboliJc, p. 166. 4 Winer, Schlange. Lane, in his Modem Eqyptians, states that each quarter of Cairo has a special guardian genius, in the form of a serpent. This is no doubt a relic of ancient serpent worship. Every visitor to this wonderful city must have seen the serpent charmers, who have their performing cobras, carried about by them in baskets, and taken out for the amusement of the foreigners at the hotels, to go through their dancing motions on the pavement. s See authorities in Knobei's Exodus., p. Gl. Dillraauu, p. G9. 160 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. power make it stiff and motionless, as if changed into a rod/ The second " sign " and first " plague " — the turning the waters of Egypt into blood — was a blow at the whole relig- ion of Egypt, than which none could have been more im- pressive, wdiether to the Egyptians or Hebrews. The Nile was, in the strictest sense, regarded as divine, and was wor- shipj^ed under a variety of names. A hymn as old as the days of Moses, still j^reserved, shows how deeply this rever- ence had taken hold of the Egyptian mind." " Hail to thee, 0 Nile! Thou who hast revealed thyself to this land. Coming in peace, to give life to Egypt ! Hidden god ! who bringest what is dark to light, As is always thy delight ! Thou who waterest the fields created by the Sun-god; To give life to all the world of living things. Thou it is who coverest all the land with water. Thy path, as thou comest, is from heaven ! Thou art the god Set, the friend of bread ! Thou art the god Nepra, the giver of grain ! Thou art the god Ptah, who lightenest every dwelling! Lord of Fishes, when thou risest over the flooded lands Thou protectest the fields from the birds. Creator of wheat : Producer of barley ; Thou sustainest the temples. When the hands of millions of the wretched are idle, he grieves. If he do not rise, the gods in heaven fall on their faces, and men die. ' Champollion-Figeac, Egypten, p. 26. On serpent charming in Egypt, see Eine jEgypt. Koniqstochter, vol. i. p. 236. In the Desa^iption de VEgypte, vol. xxiv. p. 82, it is said, " They can turn the Kaje (a serpent) iiHo a stick and make it appear dead. They then revive it, when they choose, holding it by the tail and rolling it briskly between their hands." See also, for extraordinary feats performed, with poisonous snakes, Drummond Hay's Western Barbary^ p. 64. Tristram's Nat. Hist, of Bible, p. 272. - Papyrus Saltier, I. 11-13. Anastasi, VII. It is translated by Canon Cook, Bec- ords of the Past, pp. 4, 105. Dumichen, Gesch. des Alten. ^gyptens, p. 11. Maspero, Histoire Ancienne, p. 11. Tlic two latter translations are wonderfully alike, but both differ considerably from that of Canon Cook. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 161 He makes the whole land open before the plough of the oxen, And great and.small rejoice. Men invoke him when he delays his coming, And then he appears as the life-giving god Khnonm. When he rises the land is filled with gladness, Every mouth rejoices : all living things have nourishment: all teeth their food. Bringer of Food! Creator of all good things! Lord of all things choice and delightful, If there be offerings, it is thanks to thee ! He maketh grass to grow for the oxen ; He prepares sacrifices for every god, The choice incense is that which he supplies! He cannot be brought into the sanctuaries, His abode is not known ; There is no house that can contain liim! There is no one who is his counsellor! He wipes away tears from all eyes ! ^e ***** * 0 Nile, hymns are sung to thee on the harp ; Offerings are made to thee: oxen are slain to thee; Great festivals are kept for thee: fowis are sacrificed to thee: Incense ascends unto heaven : Oxen, bulls, fowls, are burned ! Mortals, extol him! and ye cycle of gods! His Son (the Pharaoh) is made Lord of all, To enlighten all Egypt. Shine forth, shine forth, 0 Nile, shine forth!" As the bountiful Osiris/ and under many other divine names, the Nile was the beneficent god of Egypt — the repre- sentative of all that was good. Evil, however, had also its god, the deadly enemy of Osiris — the hated Typhon — the source of all that was cruel, violent, and wicked. With this abhorred being the touch or sight of blood was associated. lie himself was represented as blood-red ; red oxen and even red-haired men were sacrificed to liim, and blood, as his 1 Crcuzer, Si/nifjolik, p. 89. VOL. II. — 11 162 THE PLAUUES OF EGYPT. symbol, rendered all unclean who came near it. To tnrn the Nile waters into blood was thus to defile the sacred river — to make Typhon triumph over Osiris — and to dishonour the religion of the land in one of its supremest exjores- sions. The law of Divine government by which, even when miraculous results are to be i:)roduced, natural phenomena are utilized as far as they go, has led to many attempts to ex2)lain the change effected on the waters of Egypt, as caused by a special employment of ordinary means. Thus it is known that the Nile at a certain stage of its yearly rise assumes a red colour. '^^The sun,^' says Mr. Osburn, ^'^was just rising over the Arabian hills, and I was surprised to see that the moment its beams struck the water a deep red reflection was caused. The intensity of the red grew with the increase of the light, so that even before the disk of the sun had risen completely above the hills the Nile offered the appearance of a river of blood. Suspecting some illusion, I rose quickly, and leaning over the side of the boat, found my first impression confirmed. The entire mass of the water was opaque, and of a dark red, more like blood than anything else to which I could compare it. At the same time, I saw that the river had risen some inches during the night, and the Arabs came to tell me it was tlie Bed Nile." ' It is fatal, however, to the belief that such a familiar phenomenon explains the wonder of Exodus, since '' the ^vater is never more healthy, more delicious, or more refresh- ing/^ than when thus discoloured.' The phenomenon has been traced by Ehrenberg to the presence and inconceivably rapid growth of infusoria and 1 Osburn's Monumental History of Egypt, vol. i. p. 10. 2 Rosenraiiller, DasAlte u. Neue Morgenland^ has varied information on this sub- ject, vol. i. p. 276. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 163 minute cryptogamous jilants of a red colour/ Many cases of such appearances are recorded. Ehrenberg himself, in 1823, saw the whole bay of the Eed Sea, at 8inai., turned into the colour of blood by the presence of such plants.''^ Similarly, the Elbe ran with what seemed blood, for several days, in the beginning of this century. The Nile, also, has been known to have the same look, and to remain blood-like and fetid for months. In Silliman's Journal there is an account of a fountain of blood in a cave in South America. It grew solid and burst bottles in Avhicli it Avas put, and dogs ate it greedily. Before the potato rot in 1840 small red spots appeared on linen laid out to bleach, and in 1848, Eckhardt, of Berlin, saw the same on potatoes, in the house of a cholera patient ; the sj)ots in this last case proving to be caused by one of the algae — Palmella i^rodigiosa. In 1852 a similar appearance on food, both animal and vegetable, was noticed in France, by M. Montague. In 1825, Lake Morat became like blood in different parts. In the steppes of Siberia, also, lakes have been noticed thus strangely dis- coloured. In the time of the Keformation, M. Merle d'Au- bigne tells us, blood seemed in some parts of Switzerland to flow from the earth, from walls, and other sources, and tlie same thing has been noticed on bread, at Tours, in a.d. 503 ; at Spires, in 1103 ; at Eochelle, in 1163 ; at Namur, in 1193 ; and elsewhere at various times. The cause of these wonders is a minute alga which grows so rapidly that it act- ually flows, and is so small that there are from 46,656,000,- 000,000, to 884,736,000,000,000 plants in a cubic inch.' 1 Cryptogamous plants arc those in which the fructification is concealed. Such as ferns, mosses, licliens, algic, and fungi, or mushrooms. 2 Lengerke's Kenaan, p. 40(i. 8 Macmillau. Infusoria, fungi, and volcanic dust arc also, perhaps, occasional causes. 164 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. AVe are told that this appalling visitation was inflicted at the moment of Pharaoh's going to the river ; ^ apparently at the head of a religions procession ; on the formal visit usually made ea(ih day at sunrise, when the inundation was begin- ning, to note the height of the waters, and to pay religious homage to the river. ^ The daily increase of the river was carefully registered under the personal superintendence of the king, who announced the god to be worshipped that day : for a different god presided over every new phase of the waters. But not only was the Nile affected : the miracle showed itself also, at once, in all its branches ; in the " rivers, '^ or rather canals, which covered the whole land with a network of broad streams or silver threads ; in the '^'' ponds/' including the few natural springs, and all the cisterns and tanks of the towns and villages ; and in all the ^'^ pools/' or reservoirs, some of which were of enormous extent.^ Nor did even the water in the stone or wooden jars of households, escape. To add to all, a great mortality followed among the fish of the river — on which the popula- tion largely depended for food. Yet, though thus broadly stated, it is clear that some of the water must have been left unchanged, for we read that the magicians did the same by their ^^enchantments;" which would have been impossible if there had been no water left for them to manipulate. Marcos, the leader of a heretical sect in tlie ancient Church, seems to have had 1 Exod. vii. 15. - Irwin saw a troop of maidens go out, at midnight, dancing and singing, to the banlcs of the Nile, then beginning to rise. After bathing in the holy waters, they sang the praises of the stream. Irwin's Incidents, etc., p. 229. =* The words used prove the sacred writer's intimate knowledge of Egypt, for they include all the water sources of tlie land ; the arms of the Nile, the canals of irriga- tion, the ponds left by the Nile, and the artificial reservoirs. Hengstenberg. See also Spt:aker''s Convnient., vol. i. p. 277. Dillraann, p, 71. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 165 the knowledge of chemical secrets on which the Egyptian priests, also, may have acted. Having filled wine cups of transparent glass with colourless wine, he began to pray, and the fluid, as he did so, became in one of the cups hlood- red, in another, purple, and in a third, an azure blue/ That the Almighty could, if he chose, turn water into blood as easily as His divine Son turned it into wine, can be questioned by no one, but it deserves notice that equally exact language is used elsewhere in Scripture when only a similarity in appearance is meant. Thus it is said in Joel ^ that '^the moon shall be turned into blood." It is strik- ing, moreover, that in the announcement of the threatened infliction, it is not said that the Egyptians would be quite unable to drink the water, but that they '^ should weary themselves '' ^ in their efforts to do so, and be forced to dig "round about the river "for supplies. That they ob- tained enough by this means is certain, else all the popula- tion would have died ; but the mere filtration of the river water through the soil would not have made it drinkable had it been changed into actual blood. Moreover, in the climate of Egypt, the smell of corrupting blood would have killed every living creature, both man and beast, long be- fore the seven days had ended. The Second Plague, of frogs, like all the others, directly assailed Egyptian idolatry, for Heki — ^^the driver away of frogs " — a female deity, had the head of a frog, as also had the god Ptah, worshipped in southern Egypt, as the Avife of Khaoum, the god of the cataracts of the Nile.' The frog, moreover, as a symbol of renewed life after death, was con- 1 Epiphau., Contra Hceren., vol. i. p. 24. 2 Chap. ii. 31. Acts ii. 20. 3 Exod. vii, 18. Knobel. * Brugsch, Geoff., p. 224. Jlier. Wdrterbuch, p. 478. Grammaire Hiet., p. 105. Plutarch says that the frog was- an emblem of the euu. 166 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. nected with the most ancient forms of nature worship in the country at hirge/ It was embalmed and honoured with burial at Thebes. When the Nile and its canals are full, in the height of the inundation, the abounding moistiu'e quickens inconceivable myriads of frogs and toads, which swarm everywhere even in ordinary years, and now did so to an extent never before known. But Hepi was so utterly powerless to deliver her worshippers from them, that even the houses and the very kneading-troughs were polluted by their presence ; a trouble very serious to a people so ceremo- nially strict in their ideas of purity. The magicians, with their muttered spells, could only add to the evil by appear- ing to bring up more frogs from the marshes ; when the land had to be cleared of them, Pharaoh needed to ask the aid of Moses and Aaron. ^ That he sought their help was the first sign of his yielding ; but his relenting humour soon passed away. The Third Plague was not preceded by any such warning as had been given before the two former. The soil of Egypt was as sacred as everything else in the valley of the Nile, for it was worshipped as Seb — the father of the gods.^ But now it was to be defiled, by its very dust seeming to turn into noisome pests. At the stroke of Aaron^s rod '' there arose gnats on man and beast, ^^ or, as our version renders it, ''^lice." In this instance, also, the natural phenomena of the season were utilized, as far as they went, to carry out the judgment. When the inundation lias risen above the level of the canals and channels and is rapidly flowing over 1 Diimicheii, jEgypt. Zeitschrift, 1869, p. 6. 2 The words of Moses, " glory over me, etc." (Exod. viii. 9), are equal to " Thine be the honour to appoint the time when I shall entreat for thee and thy servants, etc." He would show that he could remove the plague at any time on Pharaoh's yielding. " Have this honour over me, of saying when I shall, etc." 3 Brugsch, Zeitschrift, 1868, p. 123. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 167 the entire surface, the fine dust or powder into which the mud of last year's overflow is triturated in the paths, and even the stone-like fields, present a very extraordinary phe- nomenon. Immediately on its being moistened with the waters, gnats and flies innumerable burst from their pupa3, and spring into perfect existence. The eggs that produce them were laid in the retiring waters of the former flood. They have matured in the interval, and vivify instantane- ously on the soil absorbing moisture enough to discolour it. As the flood advances slowly onwards, a black line of living insects on its extreme verge moves with it. The sight of them, and of the birds and fishes that prey on them, is a very singular one.^ The word used in Exodus ^ apparently includes various poisonous flies and insects. Origen traces the plague to swarms of mosquitoes.^ The Greek Bible, translated by Jew^s, who, like Origen, lived in Egypt, uses a word * which includes not only harmless insects, but winged pests, which were fatal even to horses and cattle.^ Brugsch thinks the word used in the Hebrew Bible ° the same as the Egyptian word for the mosquito, and saj'S that it has still this meaning in the Coptic, which is the representative of the Ancient Egyptian language. Sir Samuel Baker, how- ever, speaks of a plague of vermin in Africa in terms so like those of the English version as to suggest that mosquitoes were not the only form of the visitation. There is a kind of tick, he tells us, which lives in hot sand and dust, and is '^the greatest enemy to man and beast. From the size of a grain of sand, in its natural state, it swells to the size of a 1 Osbum, I^^rad in Egypt, p. 265. " Exod. viii. 13, 17. 3 Homil. IV. in Exod. Mi.<,'ne, Patrol. Gr., xii. 323. * Skniphes. The insects that destroyed the horses of Sapor's army at the siege of Nisibis are thus named. Theodoret, II. E., ii. 30. 5 Knobel, Exod., p. 71. Liddell and Scott : " Knips." Dilhnann, p. 78. " Kinnim. 168 THE PLA.GUES OF EGYPT. liazel-iiut after luiviug preyed for some days upon the blood of an animal.'^ '^At one place it seemed/^ lie says, ^'as though the very dust were turned into lice.'^' Dr. Tris- tram ^ thinks mosquitoes cannot be meant, as they rise from the waters, not from the dust, and he supposes lice are intended ; but Baker remarks that '^'^lice^^ would shrivel at once in the hot dust of Africa, and therefore contends for the terrible ticks he names. To a scrupulously clean people like the Egyptians, and especially to their priests, '^Hice^^ or ^^ ticks'*^ would be a terrible visitation ; while the inability of the magicians to remove the pest, if it were that of mos- quitoes, was a direct confession of impotence on the part of the gods to whom was intrusted the preservation of the country from such visitations. "^ Fly-gods ^'' were character- istic of all hot countries, in antiquity — as, for example, Zeus Apomyius, "the driver away of flies, ^^ who was worshipped at Olympia, in Greece ; and Myiagros, ^^ the protector against flies, ^^ invoked at the festival of Athena. Apollo Parnopius was the averter of locusts ; the god Acchor the '' protector from flies " at Gyrene. It was believed that no flies or dogs would approach the temple of Hercules Myiagros at Eome ; and at Ekron, in the Philistine country, the god Beelzebub — "the Lord of Flies ^^ — was the recognized guardian of the land from insect plagues. All that could be pretended was that the evil gods of their land were fighting against the good ; that it was the work of Set, the Sutekh or Typhon of later mythology — the Egyptian Satan. The Fourth Plague was another visitation of insects, of a different kind, but equally terrible. The Hebrew word used,' appears to include winged pests of all kinds," as 1 Baker's Nile Tributaries, p. 84. 2 jf^di^ History of the Bible, p. 304. 3 Arob. * So the Jewish expositors understand it, and also Aquila and Jerome. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 169 might be expected in a country in which, as in Egypt, flies swarm in clouds of which inhabitants of northern countries have no idea. Their countless myriads fill the air in October and November, after the season of frogs is over. One eats them, drinks them, and breathes them.^ I remember seeing the eyes of an infant at Thebes fringed with a row of them which the little creature never tried to drive away, being so used to them. The cockroach, cricket, and beetles generally seem also implied in the Hebrew word,^ and, if this be so, the most sacred symbol of the Egyptian religion, the scara- bfeus ' or common dung beetle of the country, must have been jiart of the plague. This insect, which I have often seen busy at its task, was believed to be of no sex, but to be produced directly from the balls of ox dung in which it lays its eggs, and which it afterwards buries in the ground ; and hence, as the Egyptians did not suspect the presence of these eggs, it was chosen as the emblem of the creative principle. Other fanciful analogies made it be regarded also as the emblem of the sun, which was at times symbolized by an idol with the form or head of a scarabeeus ; of consecration to the gods ; and of the abiding life of the soul, notwith- standing any change of body in future stages of its existence. It was sculptured on every monument, painted on every tomb, and on every mummy chest ; engraved on gems, Avorn round the neck as an amulet, and honoured in ten thousand images of every size and of all materials.* That it, among > Wood's Bible Animals, p. 633. 2 Rosenmuller, Das Alte it. Nem Morgenland, vol . i, p. 286. Gesenius, 9th edition, p. 661. 5 Prof. Drake, in SmWCs Bible Diet., translates " swarms of flies," by " swarms of beetles ; " .so Kalisch and others. Hug, quoted by Winer, thinks that the fly, under the form of which Beelzebub was represented, was the scarabaeus. * Creuzer's Symbolik, p. 162. There was a god— Cheperu— with the head of a beetle. 170 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. other insects, should be multiplied into a plague, was a blow at idolatry that would come home to all. But stinging flies wei'e added to the visitation : vast swarms of them, perhaps, being blown northwards to Lower Egypt, from the great marshes of the Upper Nile, by the south wind, as sometimes happens still/ Among these the cattle-fly, which is far worse in its bite than the mosquito, is perhaps especially meant. Coming in immense clouds, it covers all objects with its black and loathsome masses, and causes severe in- flammation by its bites. Indeed, in Abyssinia, it is still so much dreaded, that at its approach in the rainy season, the inhabitants move off with their herds ; man and beast being alike unable to endure them.'^ But the trouble caused in Egypt even by the common fly is almost indescribable. AVhen the country is mostly under water, during the height of the inundation, they increase to a fearful extent. No curtains, or other precautions can exclude them. Their food being diminished by the great amount of land under water, they seem literally mad with hunger, and light in countless numbers upon whatever promises to satisfy it. Every drinking vessel is filled with them, and they cover every article of food in a moment. If, however, it be thus in some years even now, what must it have been when they came in such millions, that Egypt seemed turned into a region as much to be loathed as it was formerly loved." The Fifth Plague touched the honour of the Egyptian religion in one of its tenderest points — the worship of Isis and Osiris, to whom the cow and the ox were sacred, and of the great god Anion, of whom the ram was the living sym- 1 Fliegen, in ScheukePs Lex., and in Rlehm. 2 One is reminded of the tsetse fly of the Zambesi. 8 Esod. viii. 24. " The laud was corrupted, etc." THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 171 bol. The sacred cow, the ox Apis, and the calf Mnevis, were in fact their greatest deities. It is the custom to strew the surface of tlie inundation waters with seed of lentils, vetches, and other plants,' and trample them into the soil to prevent their being washed away, by driving cattle of all kinds, back and forward, through the soft mud. In this process, how- ever, the herds suffer so greatly that numbers of sick beasts, tended by skilful herdsmen, are rej^resented in almost all the pictures of it in the tombs. Perhaps this common passage in Egyptian agricultural life was the starting point of the terrible calamity now sent on the land. It may have been, however, at the close of the inundation, when the water is very foul ; for murrain has been noticed to occur at that season.^ In any case, a wide mortality broke out suddenly, not only among the sheep and oxen, but even among the camels, horses, and asses, and threatened to destroy them utterly.^ Murrain is even yet not uncommon in Egypt, and sometimes is very fatal. Thus, in 1842 the rinderpest swept off great j)art of the cattle of all kinds,* and in 178G they were almost exterminated by a similar disease.^ But the plague brought on them by Aaron could not be confounded with such natural visitations, for, like that of the flies, it was limited to the strictly Egyptian districts, and did not enter Goshen, while it also came and ceased with equal suddenness at the word of Moses. ^ Eccles. xi. 1. 8 Knobel, Exodus, p. 77. It breaks out almost yearly after the subsidence of the inundation. Chabas, Melanges Eoyptologiques, 1st ser. p. 39. Dillmann, p. 83. 3 Exod. ix. 6, says " all the cattle of Egypt died," but in verse 19, and in chap. xi. 5, it is seen that this is not to be understood as it reads. The poverty of the Hebrew language is, in fact, the cause, in this and many other cases, of universality being stated when it is not really designed. There were no words to express limitations. * Lepsius' Biiefe aus Egypten^ p. 14. ^ In 1863 the murrain began in November and was at its height in December. Thia Is Us usual time. Speaker's Comment. 172 THE PLAGUES OE EGYPT. In the Sixth Plague the hand of God pressed still more heavily on the Egyptians, for now they themselves were smitten. Nor was the lesson taught by the new visitation less striking than the others in its religions aspect. Hand- fuls of ashes from the " furnaces/^ it may be the smelting furnaces for iron' — the special emblems in Scripture of the bitter slavery of the Hebrews — were sprinkled towards heaven in the sight of Pharaoh ; an act familiar to those who may have seen it done, though the import could not for the moment be realized. In various Egyptian towns sacred to Set or Typhon, the god of Evil — Ileliopolis and Busiris, in the Delta, among them— red-haired and light-complex- ioned men, and, as such, foreigners, perhaps often Hebrews,^ were yearly offered in sacrifice to this hideous idol. After being burnt alive on a high altar, their ashes were scattered in the air by the priests, in the belief that they would avert evil from all parts whither they were blown. ^ But, now, the ashes thrown into the air by Moses, instead of carrying bless- ing with them, fell everywhere in a rain of blains and boils on the people, and even on the cattle which the murrain had spared, (frievous to every class, this plague, which some have thought the leprosy,'' must have fallen with special > The imtage of a furnace for smelting iron is often used in this connection. Thus, " I have brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt." Deut. iv. 20. "I have brought them forth from Egypt, from the iron furnace." Jer. xi. 4, "I have chosen thee out of the furnace of affliction." Isa. xlviii. 10, "Out of Egypt, from the midst of the furnace of iron." 1 Kings viii. 51. 2 Thus David was " ruddy." 1 Sam. xvi. 13 ; xvii. 42. " My beloved," says Canti- cles, " is white and ruddy," i.e., " dazzling white and red." Delitzsch, Das Hohelied., v. 10. 3 "In India, when magicians pronounce an imprecation on an individual, a village, or a country, they take the ashes of cow dung from a common fire, and throw them into the air, saying to the objects of their displeasure. Such a sickness, or such a curse shall surely come on you." Roberts' Oriental Illustrations. 4 It is perhaps in vague reference to this that Tacitus says : "Many authors agree that a plague which made the body hideous having broken out in Egypt, the king, Bocchoris, on the counsel of the oracie of Ammon, from which he had asked what THE PLAGUES OF EaYPT. 173 severity on the priests, by rendering them unclean and thus incapacitating them for their duties. No attempt could be made to imitate such a judgment. The " interpreters of secret signs " could not even stand before Moses. Six plagues had now failed to make Pharaoh own defeat and grant the Hebrews permission to leave the country. To lose a whole nation of slaves was hardly worse than to admit that the gods of the land had been humbled by Jehovah. A Seventh Plague was therefore sent. It was now about tlie month of March, for the barley was in car and the flax in blossom, but wheat, rye, and spelt were yet only green. ^ A terrible storm of thunder and lightning, accompanied by liail, presently devastated all the land except Goshen, which it did not affect. Such a phenomenon w^as unheard of, for though thunder and hail are not unknown in Egypt in spring, they are rarely severe. AVittman, indeed, encoun- tered a great thunder-storm with lightning, in November, and Lepsius notices another in December, accompanied with hail,'^ but even these were very unusual occurrences. How must it have shocked a nation so devout towards its gods, to find that the waters, the earth, and the air, the growth of the fields, the cattle, and even their own persons, all under the care of a host of divinities, were yet, in succession, smitten by a power against which these protectors were impotent ! But the lesson was sinking into the hearts of he should do, wat< ordered to purge the kingdom of those thus afflicted, and to send tliem away to other countries, as hateful to the gods." Hist., v. 3. Contagious dis- eases are said, in an old Egyptian document, to have been frequent in December. I'ap. Sail., iv. 1 Exod. ix. 31, 32. Bark-y and flax arc generally ripe in Egypt in March ; wheat and spelt in April. In Palestine, except the Jordan valley, these crops are from a month to six weeks later. The flax crops were very important, from the wide use of linen in Egypt, for priests and others. 2 Knobcl's Exoiltis, p. 81 . One at Beni-Hassan, in February. " of extreme severity," is mentioned in the Speaker's Vomtnent., vol. i. p. 3«."). Uillnuunf s Kxodus, p. 87. 174 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. the Hebrews, if not of tlie Egyptians, that '' the earth is Jehovah's, ^^ and that idols were vanity. The Eighth Plague took the dreaded form of a miraculons visitation of locusts, than which nothing more terrible could follow the devastation of the hail.^ The invasions of these insects are one of the heaviest calamities to the regions they afflict. In the Old AVorld, the vast sweep from the Cape of Good Hope to Norway, and from China to the West Coast of Africa ; but especially from Arabia to India^ and from the Nile and the Eed Sea to Greece and the north of Asia Minor, is exposed to their ravages. Their legions have been known to cross the Black Sea and alight on the fields of Poland, and to pass over the Mediterranean and fall on the green plains of Lombardy. Always advancing in a straight line and leaving behind them the countless germs of future swarms, they devour everything green that comes in their way. Their numbers exceed computation : the Hebrews called them ^' the countless/^ and the Arabs know them as " the darkeners of the sun.^^ Unable to guide their own flight, though capable of crossing large spaces, they are at the mercy of the wind, which bears them as blind instru- ments of Providence," to the doomed region given over to them for the time. Innumerable as the drops of water or the sands of the sea-shore, their flight obscures the sun and casts a thick shadow on the earth. It seems, indeed, as if a great aerial mountain, many miles in breadth, were advanc- ing with a slow unresting progress. A¥oe to the countries beneath them, if the wind fall and let them alight ! They 1 Locusts seem to visit Egypt, when they do come, from March to May. The Egyptians were passionately fond of trees. There are many notices of the importa- tion of foreign ones to beautify the land. 2 " The pest of the anger of the gods," is the name Pliny gives them. Hist. Nat.., ii. 35. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 175 descend unnumbered as flakes of snow, and hide the ground. It maybe '''like the garden of Eden before them, but behind them it is a desolate wilderness. At their approach the peoples are in anguish; all faces lose their colour."'' No walls can stop them in their winged stage : no ditches arrest them : fires kindled in their path are forthwith extinguished by the myriads of their dead, and the countless armies march on. If a door or a window be open, they enter aiid destroy everything of wood in the house. Every terrace, court, and inner chamber is filled with them in a moment. Such an awful invasion now swept over Egyj^t, consuming before it everything green, and stripping the trees, till the land was bared of all signs of vegetation. Nor did they cease their ravages till Pharaoh had called Moses and se- cured his intercession for the land by a promise to let Israel go. Then, at the ^''entreaty ^" of His servant, Jehovah sent a strong north-west wind from the Mediterranean which swept the locusts into the Red Sea.^ Once more, for the moment, Pharaoh was humbled. But this visitation failed to influence him long. It is, after all, only a' natural event, whispered the priests, and so Israel was still kept in bonds. There had, indeed, been a show of concession before the locusts came, but Moses had justly refused it. The men might go, by themselves, Pharaoh had said, to hold a religious feast to Jehovah, but the rest must stay. " Jehovah will certainly be with you,^^ he had added, with a sneer, ^'^ when I let you and your little ones go together ! You intend evil. The men may go and serve Jehovah : you wanted that/' — and he drove Moses and 1 Joel ii. 0 (literallj' translated). 2 The removal of locusts is generally brought about by the wind. " Being carried off by the wind." says Pliny, " they fall into seas or lakes."' Hist. XaL, si. 35. The putrefaction of the masse? of locusts thus drowned sometimes causes a pestilence. 176 THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. Aaron out of his presence.' But now tliat a plague so awful had come, he was willing that only the flocks and herds should be left behind, as a pledge for the return of the Hebrews. He had, however, refused the first request for only three days' journey away from Egypt,'' to a spot where sacrifices of creatures sacred among the Egyptians could be offered without infuriating the population ; and now the demand was indefinitely increased — even the cattle, to the last hoof, must go with them. Nor was anything more said of a merely temporary journey.^ Meanwhile, before it had come to this, the Ninth Plague fell upon the land. The sun was the supreme god of Egypt, and he, too, was at last to veil himself before Jehovah. From whatever cause, natural or miraculous, an intense darkness was brought over all Egypt, except Goshen, for three ' days, during which men could not see each other, and all move- ment was stopped. A physical phenomenon, frequent in Egypt, though of less intensity, may possibly illustrate the agency divinely used to produce this result. A hot wind, known as the Chamsin, blows from the equator, in Africa, towards the north, in April or between March and May. The name means " fifty, "" from the Chamsin prevailing in- termittently for sometimes two, three, or four days together, during that number of days, with a calm between the storms, of it may be a month. In the desert it raises vast whirlwinds of sand, which sometimes bury entire caravans. Indeed, they once overwhelmed the whole army of Camby- > Exod. X. 9-11. 2 The Egj'ptians seem to have had religious pilgrimages to points outside their own country. There are still stone monuments with inscriptions by the Pharaohs, at Surabit el Khadim, which seem to mark it as a place to which such pilgrimages were made. The request of Moses would not, therefore, be anything strange. Kobinson's Palestine, vol. i. p. 128. Lengerke's Kenaan, p. 403. 3 Exod. X. 9-11, 24. THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT. 177 ses, sent agaiust Anion, so completely, that it disappeared as if swallowed up by the waves of the sea." It is always attended with a thickness of the air, through which the sun sheds at best only a dim yellow light ; even this passing in many cases into complete darkness. On these occasions the people in the towns and villages shut themselves up in their houses, in the innermost apartments, or in underground cellars, if there be any, and those in the desert dig holes in the earth, or hide themselves in caves or pits, and await the end of the storm. Artificial light at such times is of little use, for it cannot pierce the opaque air. The streets are perfectly empty, and a deep silence, like that of night, reigns everywhere. An Arab chronicler, about the end of the eleventh century, records a great storm accompanied by darkness so intense that it was thought the end of the world was at hand.^ Startled by the awful intensity of the dark- ness in the present case, Pharaoh once more seemed about to yield. ]^ut the demand of Moses, that the Hebrews should take with them the Avhole of their flocks and herds, again roused his stubbornness, and the interview ended amidst angry threats of the king that the audacious in- truder on his peace should die if he came to him again. His cup, however, was nearly full, and Moses, knowing the future, could repeat the words with an awful significance — that he would indeed see his face no more.^ The Exodus was at hand. > Herod., iii. 26. Kalisch, Exod., p. 120. 2 Rosenmuller's Alterthumskunde, vol. iii. p. 23J. Denon's Travels, vol. i. p. 285. The words "darkncs? that may be felt," in our version, are translated l)y Kalisch, •'so that they may grope in darkness." Znnz translates them, "The darkness will continue." Iltrsch and Do Wette agree with our version. 3 The "rage and fury "of Nebuchadnezzar at the thwarting of his lea-^t whim (Dan. iii. 13), may help us to picture the interview between Moses and Menephtah. Exod. ix. 31 explains what is said elsewhere of G )d hardening the heart of Pharaoh, for it distinctly tells us that Pharaoh hardened his own heart. See Studien vnd Kntiken, 1814, p. 404. VOL. II.-12 CHAPTER VL THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. No great national crisis is of sudden growth. More than a generation had passed since Moses, in a sudden heat of irrepressible indignation, had smitten down the Egyptian overseer for his cruelty to a Hebrew ; a first outbreak against the enslavement of his people which he, in all likelihood, hoped would prove the signal for their general uprising, to strike for freedom under his leadership. In his secret thoughts he had doubtless long dreamed of their possible emancipation, and it might well seem that, now he had committed himself to them, they might rally round him, and break away, as free men, into the desert which was so near„ But the iron had entered into their souls, and his daring patriotism, far from finding support, seemed likely to end only in his death, through the evidence given by Hebrews themselves against him. From that time, in the depths of Midian, the one thought had still engrossed him. But he had had to endure the pain of hope deferred for many years, while, in his absence, Aaron was gradually educating his brethren, through their tribal organization, to higher thoughts, and to a sense of religious and national unity, in opposition to the Egyptians. At last the time seemed ripe, and Aaron, divinely prompted, could go to Midian, to com- mune with his brother, and prepare for the future. THE TENTH PLAGUE Ai^D THE EXODUS. 179 But the religious development of the Hebrew community, was still imperfect, for centuries of residence among the idols of Egypt, and of the Asiatic tribes of the Delta, had sadly lowered the spiritual sensibilities of most, and had created almost imperceptibly a leaning towards the corrupt worship around them. It was necessary, therefore, before they broke away from the Nile valley, that they should be constituted, formally, a distinct community, chosen by Jehovah for Himself, and recognizing Him, only, as their God. To secure their adoption of a divinity almost new to them — for they had well-nigh forgotten the faith of their patriarch forefathers — it was imperative that they should feel His sujoreme greatness, as contrasted with the false gods they were required to abandon for His sake ; and this tlie successive plagues effected. Egyptian idolatry had been utterly dishonoured and discredited by Him whom they were henceforth, alone, to worship. To this great Being, moreover, they were 2:)ermitted to look, henceforth, as their Protector and Heavenly King, and as the God of their fathers. To be His '^'^ first-born sons" ' by this separation to His service, was to be impressed on them as their greatest glory, and the imperishable pledge of their future. One act more remained of the sublime drama, by whicli these mighty revelations should be brought home to the hearts of all Israel. The Pharaoh, still obdurate, was to be humbled to the dust by a judgment so terrible that he would gladly resign the contest with Jehovah, and let tlie race whom so awful a Power thus championed, ^^go, alto- gether;" thankful to be rid of them, and even "thrusting them out'' ' from the Nile valley. But, thus to abase the Pharaoh was to degrade the national idolatry in his person 1 Exod. iv, 22. a Exod. xi, 1. 180 THE TEKTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. — for he was, himself^ the incarnation of the great Sun-god Ra. It was necessary^ however, that the Hebrews should be prepared for their sudden departure, and for entering on a tent-life in the desert, like that of their forefathers. Their training in the arts and occupations of Egypt secured them the elements of a higher civilization than that of mere shep- herds, and fitted them for their destined part as a settled community in Palestine. But their humble position, as a whole, in Goshen and throughout Egypt, especially for the long period of their slavery, left them unprovided with adequate means for their religious or social wants as a community. While some may have gained wealth, the multitude must have been very poor, for the Egyptians, for generations, had forced them to labour for them without wages. They were now about to set out on a great religious pilgrimage to KSinai, a holy region to the tribes around, related to them, and then to enter on an independent life as a nation ; and this demanded, among much else, due pro- vision of robes, ornaments and vessels, for religious festivi- ties. They and the bulk of the Egyptian people had lived on friendly terms, for the native population, like the poor Mussulmans in Turkey, were hardly less oppressed than the Hebrews themselves. Even among the wealthy, moreover, who had supported the tyranny of the Pharaohs, and in the court itself, the events of the last months had made all feel the necessity of deprecating further plagues from God. When, therefore, the word went forth from Moses to Israel, to ask ' from all around them, likely to have such things, 1 Not to borrow. Exod. iii. 22 ; xi. 2, The Hebrew word simpl}'^ means " to make a request." The wealth so obtained was doubtless regarded by the Hebrews as only a just return for long service and cruel wrongs. Knobel and Kalisch both reject the idea of "lending.'" In India, even the poorest are seen at religious festivals well THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 181 the dresses/ and ornaments, and vessels which tlie wilder- ness could not yield, the appeal was widely successful. And now, as the first step towards an independent national organization under Jehovah, their invisible king ; as the formal inauguration of His worship as the national God, and in recognition of their emancipation being due to Him alone, a sacrificial feast — the Passover — was instituted. But, first of all, the date from which their year began was changed ; for it was fitting that the deliverance of the nation should open a new era. It was the time of wheat coming into ear — almost our April — and, henceforth, the month, known from this, as Abib — the ' new ear ' — should be the first of the ecclesiastical year. Hitherto they had contented themselves with the Egyptian calendar, which began about the time of the summer solstice,^ when the Nile was rising, and harvest is over in Palestine.^ From this time, however, all connection with Egypt was to be broken ott', and the commencement of the sacred year was to com- memorate the time when Jehovah led them forth to liberty and independence. It would seem as if the Hebrews, like other ancient races, had held yearly festivals at the different seasons, even while in Egypt. Spring, when the green ears shoot out, was in all nations of antiquity marked by religious festivities, the great characteristic of which, however differently expressed, was a desire to avert evil from the community by propitiat- ing the higher powers. It Avas doubtless on the existence of such a custom among his own people that Moses based his adorned with jewels which they have borrowed for the occasion from their richer neighbours. Roberts. » Exod. xii. 35. 2 Lepsius, Chron. der ^gypter, vol. i. p. 148. 3 Lev. xxiii. 16. 183 THE TEN-TH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. demand, so many times repeated, that they shonld be al- lowed to go outside Egypt, to hold a great sacred feast, with their national rites/ Availing himself of this established usage, he at the same time changed it, from a mere vague expression of religious feeling, to a distinctly historical and theocratic institution. Israel was henceforth to base its religion on the assurance that it was the chosen people of Jehovah, standing in a special relation to Him, as a royal and priestly race : the great deliverance from Egypt by which He separated them to Himself, consecrating them as such. The old feast of spring was therefore, from this time, changed to a yearly celebration of a unique and transcend- ent event. On the tenth day of Abib each head of a family was to set apart a kid or a lamb ; which must be a male, without blemish, in its first year. If a household were too small to consume the whole, ^ members of another were to join. Eour days later, in the minutes between the sunset and the appearance of the stars, the whole ^^ congregation^^ were to kill the victims thus selected ; each family sprin- kling its blood on their doorposts and lintels, as the parts most readily seen, and holding the feast in their own dwelling. The lamb or kid was to be roasted entire, with head, legs, and entrails — of course after being cleansed — the bones unbroken ; and any part of it left was to be burned next morning. The directions for the meal were also striking. They were to stand, their sandals on their feet, their staif in their hands, their girdle bound round them, as in prepara- tion for a journey, and they were to eat '^in haste. ^^ No 1 Exofl. V. 1, 3, 17 ; vii. 16 ; viii. 1, 20, 25 fE. ; ix. 1, 13 ; x. 9. The name of the month, Abib, is given in chap, xiii, 4. It was called Nisan by the later Hebrews— from the Assyrian Nisannu. The early Syrians called it Nisan. De Vogtie, Syrie Centrale, p. 5. 2 The later Targums say, that ten were required at each Passover circle. THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 183 one was to leave the house that night. No foreigner could join in the festival, and the flesh must not be carried out- side the house. Every care was to be taken that no part of it should be applied to profane uses, or shared by any but the chosen i^eoplc. It was ^^holy to Jehovah/^ and a memorial of His relations with Israel alone. The Hebrew population were, meanwhile, to be ready at a moment's notice, to set out on their flight for liberty, wlien summoned, before morning, to do so.^ The awful signifi- cance of the blood sprinkled on the door-posts and lintels of their houses was moreover impressed on them by the an- nouncement, that God was to pass through the land of Egypt that night, to smite all the first-born, both of man and beast, and thus to execute judgment against all the gods of the land y but would ''^pass over'^ every house on which the blood was seen, leaving its inmates unharmed."^ Every detail, indeed, was significant. The sprinkled blood marked the rite as a sacrifice, for it redeemed them from the death let loose on Egypt.* As that of a sinless victim, the household might, as it were, hide behind it and escape the just punishment of their sins.* That the lamb was given them as a feast was, moreover, a sign of Jehovah's favour, and brought Him, as it were, to be their guest. There being as yet no common sanctuary, each house had its own sacrifice ; in the absence of a public altar to Jehovah, the blood was to be sprinkled on the door-posts and lintels ; » Exod. xii. 30. 3 Exod. xii. 12. This doubtless implies that the sacred animals were smitten. In every temple the god lay dead. 3 Exod. xii. 23. * It is a curious illustration of the vitality of religious jrites, that the Mohamme- dans even to this day, at the great feast of Bairam, yearly, sacrifice sheep and sprinkle the blood on the door-posts of their houses. Strauss, Sinai and Golgotha., p. 63, 6 Kohler, vol. i. p. 11)5. 184 THE TENTH PLAGUE AlN'D THE EXODUS. no priests having as yet been consecrated, these dnties were fulfilled by each household father. Coupled with this, a second feast ^ was to be observed — that of unleavened bread, with the same object of keeping permanently alive the remembrance of their being "^ thrust out from Egypt/'^ so suddenly that they had to take with them "their dough before it was leavened, and bind up their kneading-troughs in their clothes upon their shoul- ders.^^ ^ The Passover lamb was eaten with such unleavened bread, to remind them of this, and with bitter herbs as a memento of the affliction they had undergone ; and only unleavened bread was to be used for seven days after the Passover, to impress on them that for many days after their escape from Pharaoh, the hot haste of flight left no time to prepare any other kind. ISlor was the yearly recurrence of these festivals thought enough to stamp on the heart of the nation, age after age, the memory of its wondrous birth. The first-born of man and beast were demanded for Jehovah, to be bought back only by a ransom, in impressive acknowl- edgment that when the first-born of Egypt perished, that of Israel, though spared, had been justly exposed to the same doom, but for the propitiating sacrifice." 1 The word for feast is Haj— the word for a religions pilgrimage among the Mohammedans now. 2 Exod. xii. 34. 3 The characteristics of the original observance of the Passover may in some measure be preserved in the rites with which it is kept bj' the modern Samaritans. The following is the account of these given by the Rev. John Mills in his Modern Samaritans, pp. 2.50-256 :— "The tents, ten in number, were arranged in a kind of circle, to face the highest point of the mountain, where rose their ancient temple, now lying in ruins. Within a radius of a few hundred yards from the place where I stood, clustered all the spots which make Gerizim to them the most sacred mountain, the house of God. Under my feet was the ruined wall of their famous temple ; a little on my left, to the south, were the seven steps of Adam out of Paradise ; still a little further southward was the place of the oft'ering of Isaac ; close by it, westward, was the rock of the Holy Place ; and just by the wall on which I stood, northwestward, were the celebrated THE TEXTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 185 The curse now broke over the doomed land. ^* It came to pass, that at midnight Jehovah smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh, that eat on his tlirone (that is, who reigned with him), unto the Joshua stones. A few hundred j'ards westward was their encampment, in front of which was the phitform for the celebration of their holy feast. '• About half-i)ast ten, the officials kindled the fire to roast the lambs. For this purpose, a circular pit had been sunk in the earth, about six feet deep and three feet in diameter, and built round with loose stones. In this a fire, made of dry heather, and briers, etc., was kindled, the minister of the synagogue meanwhile standing on a large stone, and offering up a prayer suited to the occasion. Another fire was then kindled in a kind of sunken trough, close to the platform where the service was to be performed. Over this, two caldrons lull of water were placed, and a .short prayer offered. We then returned to the priest's tent, for a short time, to regale ourselves with lemonade, till, about half an hour before mid-day, the whole male pop- ulation assembled to commence the regular service. There were forty-eight adults, besides women and children ; the women and the little ones remaining in the tents. The congregation were in their ordinary dress, with the exception of the two officers, and two or three of the elders, who were dressed in their white robes, as in the syna- gogue. A carpet was laid on the ground, near the boiling caldrons, where Yacub, the minister of the sj'nagogue, stood, on the stone, with his face to the people, and chanted the service, assisted by some of the elders— all turning their faces towards the site of the temple. Six lambs driven by five young men, dressed in blue cotton, their loins girded, now made their appearance. At mid-day, the service had reached the place where the accoinit of the Paschal sacrifice is introduced ; • And the whole assembl}' of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening ' (Exod. xii. 6) ; when, in an instant, the lambs, one after another, were thrown on their backs by the blue-clad young men, and in a moment lay dying under the flashing knife of one of their number. The young men now dipped their fingers in the blood, and marked a spot on the foreheads and noses of the children and some of the females ; but on none of the male adults. The whole male congregation then came up close to the reader ; embracing and kissing one another, because the lambs of their redemption had been slain. Next came the fleecing— not skinning— while the service still con- tinued. It was done by pouring boiling water from the caldrons, the effect of which was to scald off the wool so that it could be easily removed. Each lamb was then lifted up, with its head downwards, to drain off the remaining blood. The right fore legs, which belonged to the priest, were next removed, and, together with the entrails and some salt, placed on the wood, already laid, and then burnt ; but the liver was carefully replaced. The inside being sprinkled with salt, and the ham- strings carefully removed, the spitting began. For this purpose they had a long pole, which was thrust through from head to tail, a transverse peg near the end pre- venting the body from slipping off. The lambs wers no'v carried to the oven, which was by this time well-heated, and were lowered into it carefully, so that the sacrifice might not be defiled by coming in contact with the oven itself. This accomplished, a hurdle was placed over the mouth of the oven, and well-covered with moistened earth, to prevent any of the heat escaping. By this time it was about two o'clock, and this part of the service was ended. 186 THE TEKTH PLAGUE AXD THE EXODUS. lirst-born of the captive that was in the dungeon ; and all the first-born of the cattle. And Pharaoh rose up in the night, he, and all his servants, and all the Egyptians ; and there was a great cry in Egypt ; for there was not a house where there was not one dead.^ And he called for Moses and Aaron by night, and said. Rise up, and get you forth from among my people, both ye and the children of Israel ; " At sunset the service was recommenced. All the male population, with, the lads, assembled round the oven. A large copper dish, filled with unleavened cakes and bitter herbs, rolled up together, was held by the nephew of the priest, and its con- tents distributed amongst the congregation. The hurdle was then removed, and the lambs drawn up one by one ; but unfortunately one fell off the spit, and was taken up with difficulty. Their appearance was anything but inviting, for they were burnt as black as ebony. Carpets having been spread to receive them, they were removed to the platform where the service was read. The congregation stood in two files, the lambs, strewn with bitter herbs, being laid in a line between them. Most of the adults had now a kind of rope round the waist, and staves in their hands, and all had their shoes on, in exact compliance with the words, ' Thus shall yc eat it ; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, your staff in your hand ' (Exod. xii. 11). The chanting was now continued by the priest for about fifteen minutes, ending with the blessing ; after which the congregation at once stooped,* and, as if in haste and hunger, tore up the blackened masses piecemeal with their fingers, eating them at once, and carrying portions to the females and little ones in the tents. In less than ten minutes the whole, with the exception of a few fragments, had disappeared. These were gathered and placed on the hurdle, and the area carefully examined, every crumb picked up, together with the bones, and all burnt over a fire, kindled for the purpose in the trough where the water had been boiled. ' And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning ; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire ' (Exod. xii. 10). Whilst the flames were burning, and consuming the remnant of the paschal lambs, the people returned cheerfully to their tents." 1 In the Egyptian accounts this destruction was ascribed to a battle with the haled "Shepherds." Jos., c, Ap. i. 27. The Psalmist ascribes it to a sudden and terrible visitation of the plague. "He spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over unto the pestilence." Ps. Ixxviii. 51. The plague is noticed as often following the Chamsin or pitchy-dark storm wind. Its mortality is sometimes awful. In 1580, 50,000 men died of it in Cairo in eight months. In 1696, as many as 10,000 men in one day ! In Constantinople in 1714 it was reckoned that 300,000 died of it. Even in Palestine it made awful ravages, for in 2 Sam. xxiv. we read that 70,000 died of it in three days. Uhlemann strikingly reminds us that all the plagues are connected with the natural peculiarities and phenomena of Egypt, and that they show the narrator's intimate knowledge of the country. " The Almighty hand of God," he continues* " shows itself, hence, not so much in the wonders themselves, as in their wide reach, their intensity, and the swift succession in which they came, at the Divine command —for, individually, they are specially characteristic of Egypt, in a certain degree, at all times." * When Dean Stanley saw the ceremony they all sat to gat. THE TEXTH PLAGUE AT^D THE EXODUS. 187 and go, serve Jehovah, as ye have said. Also take your flocks and your herds, as ye have said, and be gone ; and bless me also.''^ These last words seem to gleam through the tears of the humbled king, as he lamented his son snatched from him by so sudden a death, and trembled with a sense of the helplessness which his proud soul at last felt, when the avenging hand of God had visited even his palace. Striking to say, a monument confirms the fact that Me- nephtah during his lifetime lost his eldest son, who bore the same name as himself. This prince, associated with him on the throne, is commemorated on a colossal statue of his father now in the museum at Berlin. He is ^^ the Uraeus snake on the front of the royal crown ; the son whom Me- nephtah loves, who draws towards him his fa therms heart ; tlie royal scribe ; the singer ; the chief of the archers ; the Prince Menephtah,"" and is represented as adoring Sutekh, ''^the great god, the lord of heaven;''^ and as ^"'the justi- fied,''' or, as we should say, ''^the glorified one,^^ and ^' the blessed,^'' that is, the departed/ To this it had all come at last. In the jyimic fear of the moment things might go as they liked. The policy of generations had given way. No matter, now, if the masses in the Delta, sprung from the foreign prisoners of reign after reign ; the various shepherd tribes admitted from time to time to its bounds ; and the vast throngs of Hebrews, the most useful and the cheapest labour power of the country — were to be lost in one sweep ! Menephtah's reign, mostly peaceful, had seemed more secure from danger than that of the kings before him, for he was in close friendship with the warlike nations of Palestine ; his eastern boundary was 1 Lauth, Aus Alt-^gyptiscJier Zeit. Pharao, Moses und Exodus. Allg. Zeitung, 25th July, 1875. 188 THE TEiq^TH PLAGUE AKD THE EXODUS. strongly fortified ; and there were no enemies with whom the Hebrews and other foreign races in Egypt conld ally them- selves. Treaties^ moreover, bound the Canaanite kingdoms to give up any fugitives, and those kingdoms, on the edge of whose rich territories the nomades of the Egyptian fron- tier, the Hebrew slaves, and the other alien population of the Delta, hung like a war cloud — as the Arabs threaten the French province of Algiers — were too highly civilized not to dread their escape from the Nile valley, as much as the Egyptians themselves. Yet all had now happened which had seemed impossible ! Every effort had been made to pre- vent these masses gathering to a centre. They could be kept under so long as they acted only in isolated bands, but, if they succeeded in rallying to one point, the small brooks which, singly, could be easily dammed, would swell to a tor- rent that might perhaps rush, wasting and destroying, on the rich provinces west of Egypt, or turn to the east against Palestine. But even in this case how many thousand pri- vate Egyptian interests must suffer, where the alliance was so close as with these countries, and how certain was a new war of resentment ! That Menephtah under such circumstances should have done his utmost to keep the Hebrews scattered over the land, in harmless fractions, was natural. For at least a year, therefore, he had tenaciously maintained an unequal strug- gle for this end : a struggle of the mightiest on earth against the surely self-accomplishing will of Heaven. He had striven hard to break through the net, but it only drew round him the more closely after each attempt to escape from it. Distracted between granting a demand which undermined his throne, and the breach of promises, each violation of which filled him with dread of new chastise- THE TENTH PLAarE AND THE EXODUS. 189 ments from Heaven, liis resistance had finally given way when the awful darkness covered the land with a gloom like that of his own spirit. He had then yielded so far as to grant that the Hebrews might go off into the wilderness, if they left behind them, as a pledge of their return, the herds in which their wealth consisted, from which they derived their nourishment, and without which they were helpless. But Moses had rejected such a conditional favour, and had filled the cup of Menephtah's alarm with the bitter threat of the death of the first-born of all Egypt, and the prediction that he and his courtiers would presently throw themselves at his feet, beseeching him to leave the stricken land. And all this had come to pass ! ' The terrors of the plagues must have sunk more deeply into the Pharaoh's soul than they otherwise would have done, from the fact that his dynasty — the Nineteenth — es- pecially honoured the Canaanitish god Sutekh or Set, who had, it was thought, greatly aided Rameses II. in his wars in Palestine and Syria. He would readily confound this foreign god, whose favour his house had received in the past, and whose anger was therefore the more to be dreaded, with the God of Moses — in his eyes a Canaanite by descent — and fancy that the very power in which he had trusted was turned against him.' The number of the Hebrews in Egypt may be approxi- mately gathered from the repeated statement that there were among them 600,000 men able to bear arms — that is, between twenty and sixty years of age.^ This would imply a total of at least 2,000,000 of men, women, and children ; * an aggregate so great as to have led many to fancy an error » Burch Gosen, pp. 81-88. a Diestel, in Riehm, p. 1022. 3 Exod. xii. 37 ; xxxviii. 26. Num. i. 4.5, 46. * Bertheau calculates 3,000,000. 190 THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. in the text. In apparent confirmation of this supposition, the number of the first-born males, at Sinai, is given ^ as 22,- 273, which allows only 1 to every 30 men. But the first-born of purely Hebrew families may, alone, have been reckoned in this case, while the foreign multitude, and the slaves who went out with the Hebrews, may be counted among the men fit for war.^ Nor is it possible to argue from the present condition of the Sinai Peninsula and the regions immedi- ately south of Palestine, as to the population able to live there for a lengthened period, over 3,000 years ago, by mov- ing from place to place, as the Hebrews did.^ Everything had been prepared for the final moment, and now the Egyptians, filled with terror, urged the instant de- parture of the Hebrews. Nor did the long-enslaved multi- tudes delay. Summoned in the midst of their Passover feast, before the dawn of the 15th of the month thenceforth called Abib, every father hurried, by the light of the full April moon, with his wife and children, to the rendezvous already appointed — to put himself under the leaders of his tribal division ; his little ones and the sick in the j^anniers of asses, his cattle driven before him, the unbaked bread, in the family kneading-trough, wrapped up in his abba on his shoulder.'' As the avalanche grows in its onward rolling, so 1 Num. iii. 43. 2 Joseph's marriage with an Egyptian was no doubt widely imitated, so that many of the Hebrews would be of mixed blood, and many Egyptian women would leave Egypt with them. This intermarriage may in part explain the great increase of the Hebrews. It is to be remembered that even Moses married a Cushite wife. Many slaves and retainers, moreover, had come to Egypt with Jacob, and had most prob- ably been merged into the Hebrew tribes before the time of the Exodus. See Uhle- mann, Israeliten n. Ilyksos, p. 51. Also Lev. xxiv. 10. 3 Bertheau, Geschidite der Israeliten^ p. 256. Ebers and some others think there is an error In the numbers, but Bertheau, an acute and independent critic, accepts them, as does alsoEwald. The Rev. S. Clark, in the Speake?'''s Comment., vol. i. p. 299, thinks the numbers do not exceed a reasonable estimate of the increase of the Israelites, including their numerous dependents. * "Each Arab wears round his shoulders a sheepskin, which serves the double THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 191 swelled the march of the Hebrews as they touched town after town, and were joined not only by fresh crowds of their own race, but by throngs of Semitic prisoners of war, by kindred bands, like themselves, sorely oppressed, and by multitudes of slaves ; bringing with them additional herds and flocks. From Tanis, on the west, they poured south to Fakusa, and thence to Pithom. From Avaris, on the east, on the far north coast, at the fortified wall, past Migdol, *' the tower," ' with its castle and garrison, they pressed south-west to Tanis. From On, in the south, and all the country between, they streamed northwards, to join the great contingent from the north, at Pithom, where the great canal, running to the Crocodile Sea, branched oil from an arm of the Nile. Bubastis, to the east of that town, sent its hosts, and the united multitudes, meeting near Pithom, struck due east to Eameses, on the canal from Bubastis, where all the tribes assembled to follow their great leader. Swift-footed messengers, who are never wanting in the east,'^ had carried the command to start at once for that city. Three or four days after the morning of the 15th would find all gathered at the common centre ; separated roughly into their respective tribes, with Avhat arms they could muster, and arrayed for the march, if Ewald be right, in five divisions ; the van, centre, two -vvings, and rear-guard.^ l)urpose of a cloak and a baking board. Spread on the ground, fleece downward, the dough is kneaded on it in thin round cakes. They also carry small wooden bowls or troughs to make the dough. Their mill on a journey 1^? simply two stones. Kindling a hot fire of dry camels' dung, they heat the ground well, then bnisli oflfthe fire, lay down the cake, cover it with the ashes, and -in ten minutes it is baked." SLewart's Tent and the Khan. • '• From Migdol to Syene," was in Egypt equal to " from one end of the country to the other," like " from Dan to Beersheba," in Palestine. 2 Mehemet AH rode 85 miles in 11 hours on a dromedary— from Suez to Cairo— and one of his slaves ran alongside all the way, holding on by a cord. 3 Ewald's Geschichte, vol. ii. p. 89. See Exod. xiii. 18 ; '" harnessed " may mean " armed," " in battle array," "girt for the journey," or, as the margin of our Bibles reads it, '• by fives in a rank." 192 THE TEKTH PLAGUE A:N'D THE EXODUS. They had gained their freedom without bloodshed ; the first people who had valued liberty so highly ; * the nnconscious champions, for all future ages, of the inalienable rights and dignity of man. One vast host presently started from Tanis, — under Moses, the earliest proclaimer of the essential equality of all races and ranks. lie was virtually king, but he disdained the ambition of the name. His office brought with it im- measurable difficulties. These tens of thousands of freshly emancipated slaves, only a few of whom understood the mighty work that had been done for them, followed their leader, glad to escape from the lash of the drivers ; but only to murmur at their first difficulty on the morrow. Such a people, migrating in mass, he liad to lead through the des- ert to the Land of Promise, caring for them and training their minds and hearts ! Out of a horde he had to form a nation ; conquering a home for it, giving it social and relig- ious laws, and making it fit for a noble national life. Nor could he reckon on much helj) in this gigantic task. The tribe of Levi, to which he belonged, was the only one on whose intelligent aid he could rely." The scene must have been strange. Leaving behind them the shining forest of granite obelisks before the great temple of Amon Ra, glancing back perhaps at the gilt copper roof of the palace, at the soft flowing river, with its multitudinous sails, at the long streets, the avenue of sphinxes and gigantic statues, with tliat of Rameses towering over all to a hundred feet in height, all of one stone, and at the great clumps of palms overshadowing the wide plain on which Tanis lay, they streamed out towards Pithom ; a crowd seemingly endless and boundless ; some of them men who had amassed large 1 Graetz, vol. i. p. 20. 3 Graetz, p. 30. THE TENTH PLAGUE AXD THE EXODUS. 193 property and had great herds and flocks, but tlie vast ma- jority poor creatures whose lives had been passed in clay hovels which a kick would bring down about them. The Egyptians were for a moment unable to check the flight. The men with their heads shaved, in universal mourning for the death of their first-born ; the Avomen with ashes strewn on their foreheads in grief at the terrible calamity in every household, could only wail and curse, or content themselves by a massacre of such of the hated race as from age or sick- ness or accident failed to escape with the rest. It was a night never to be forgotten by that or any future generation. Yet, at first, all went well. Grrateful wonder at the good- ness of Jehovah, intense anxiety to escape from the hated oppressor, joyful trust in their leader, and bright hopes of the future, had roused the long-enslaved masses to a won- drous energy, and the sight of the thousands on every side must have awakened a new sense of power. No dread of future sulferings or dangers yet threw its shadow over them. They had still fresh water and rich fodder for their cattle, and the way was still open before them. The one thought in every bosom was Canaan — the land '' flowing with milk and honey " — theirs by the promise of God ; and their one tacit demand, that they should be led thither at once. This wish seemed to be granted, when, after a brief rest, the vast host entered on the direct road to Palestine, and at the close of a march north-east, of about fifteen miles, apparently in the line of the fresh-water canal to the Bitter Sea, encamped by Pithom, the HebrcAV name of which was Succoth, '^^the tents.'" AVater had been within reach all the way, but many of the women must already have fallen behind ; children must have been exhausted and ill, and the cattle must have been jaded. Amidst all this, moreover, faint-heartedness VOL. IL— 13 194 THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. crept over the men as they thought of the great fortified wall before them^ and that they would presently contend with the swords of well-trained soldiers, whose very sticks had hitherto made them tremble. Pithom^ the city of the great god Tum, had been built by their brethren, who were eagerly awaiting their approach to join their vast encamp- . ment when at last they rested on the broad level outside the town. The vast store-houses built by them for Pharaoh, and filled with every kind of provision for the army, may, very probably, have been stormed and plundered by the mob, for the few Egyptian soldiers guarding them could easily be overpowered, at such a time of distraction, by the rush of numbers ; and from those vast victualling places, tens of thousands of measures of wheat and barley, rye and dourah, lentils, dates, and onions could easily be taken, for sustenance hereafter. Sacks, pitchers, skins, kneading- troughs, jars, cloths of all kinds would serve to let down the treasures from the opening on the roofs, by which access was obtained to them, cords or ladders helping the plun- derers to get them safely to the ground. Thousands of lanterns would be gleaming everywhere that night to light the revolting Hebrews to their eager labours ; but, after all, they were only a vast horde of peasants and labourers, well- nigh unarmed. There would be no lack of axes, staves, sickles, and brazen pikes, or of heavy poles, or slings, familiar to them as the weapon of shepherds against the wild beasts of the desert ; but of bows and arrows, the musketry of those ages, they had none. No wonder, there- fore, that their excitement was mingled Avith alarm. Fort- resses guarded all the eastern frontier, before them, from the days of Abraham, and these were skilfully provided with scarp and counterscarp, ditch and glacis, and manned by THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 195 the best troops of Egypt, with sentinels pacing the ramparts along their whole length day and night. Nor was the prospect beyond this terrible barrier cheerful, for the whole Philistine plain was very probably held, at this time, by Egyptian garrisons, since we have a representation of the siege of Ascalon by Rameses II., and know, incidentally, that Palestine had been, for ages, virtually an Egyptian province. Khetam, or, as the Hebrews wrote the word, Etham, was the Egyptian name of a range of strongholds defending the gates and weak places of Shur, tlie great frontier wall ; and the nearest and largest of these was within a few hours of Pithom-Succoth. There is on the walls of the Temple of Karnak a picture of Seti I., father of Rameses II., returning victorious from Syria, and welcomed with wild rejoicings at one of the great castle-like gates of this fortified barrier. It is the one which protected a canal, cut, perhaps, as early as B.C. 4000, through the Isthmus of Suez, and thus anticipat- ing the triumph of Lesseps by nearly sixty centuries. When the present canal was being dug, a fresh-water canal, to sup- ply the wants of the countless labourers, was excavated from the Nile to the line of the projected works ; and this, as it advanced, struck into the bed of the ancient Egyptian Canal, which, in some parts, may still be seen as a deep hollow, near the site of Pithom-Succoth. AVhat the country was in these old days may again, as I have said, be imagined from the results of this modern introduction of water to it, for the Wady Tumilat, through which it passes, has been transformed from the awful desolation in which it had lain for perhaps thousands of years, into a fruitful tract of gar- dens and fields. Moses had apparently intended to launch the vast multi- tudes behind him on the nearest fort, trusting that the sud- 196 THE TEN^TH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. denness and impetuosity of the attack might sweep away the garrison and permit the Hebrews to pass out to the direct road towards the Promised Land. The sufferings of the march from Tanis had, however, damped the spirits of most, and it was clear that to lead the assault against the fortress while this gloom prevailed could only lead to a fruitless butchery of thousands. All this Moses and the other leaders felt still more deeply, when, on the next day, the vast throng moved nearer the fortilied wall. From afar they could see the great fort ris- ing gaunt and bare from the stony soil, Avith no relief of even a single palm or shrub to soften its outline ; its wooden stockade, its ramparts, its scarped walls, its watch-tower look- ing westward, the broad, flat roof swarming with soldiers. Out from the scarped walls, moreover, a platform projected to hinder the use of scaling ladders, and along this were ranged armed men, at close intervals, for the garrison no doubt had already heard of the revolt of the Hebrews, and w^ere on the watch to prevent their escape. Every man would be at his post, and on the roof the gong-men would be placed ready to give the alarm with their heavy wooden mallets on the huge gongs, if an attack were begun. It was clearly impossible to force the gate thus watchfully and strongly defended. Among the Hebrews, at the sight of such an insurmountable barrier in their way,^ fear grew louder, and though they were still on Egyptian soil, voices were heard regretting that they had not remained slaves rather than follow Moses, to die in the desert.'^ Their great leader, however, knew not only the character of his countrymen, but also the relations of Egypt with the 1 Joshi/a, by Georg Ebers, gives vivid pictures of the Exodus. 2 Esod. xiv. 12. THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 107 kings of Palestine, and had foreseen what had now hap- pened. He knew that he would be attacked, not only by tlie garrisons of the frontier Egyptian fortresses, but, ere long, even if these were overpowered, by the princes of southern Canaan, Avho, whether allied with the Pharaoh or not, would assuredly fall upon a vast migration of escaped slaves and shepherds, seeking a new home. He was, in- deed, virtually between two armies, even were he to succeed in breaking through the frontier wall, for the Egyptian chariot soldiery could soon overtake him. He would then have them and the forces of Palestine on his front and rear, and must be destroyed ; since, however numerous the crowds that followed him, they were not an army, but a people cum- bered with Avomen and children. He knew the disciplined array he would have to face, and the want of training, the insubordination, and the over-confident rashness of those he had to lead. Even thus soon, they had revealed their ob- stinacy, selfishness, and conceit ; their want of discipline and of moral strength. In the comparatively small limits of an ordinary caravan the strictest order must be maintained at the pitching or striking of the tents. The presence of women and children may, indeed, elicit the best characteris- tics of some ; but, on the other hand, perverseness, selfish- ness, coarseness, and vice show themselves grossly. The tent-pins will not hold in every soil ; a tent cannot be raised without a neighbour's help ; where water for large numbers is to be had only from one spring, strict order must be kept, and the thirsty willingly abide their turn, if quarrels are to be avoided ; when pasture is insufficient for the herds, every shepherd seeks to get a good strip for his cattle, if necessarv, by force ; and the property of all is exposed before or in the tents. If everything be not ready at the right hour when 198 THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. the tents are struck, either all are delayed, or those who lin- ger behind must be abandoned. But if this be the case with a small body, how much worse would it be with 3,000,000 of people ? The camps at Succoth and Etham, in apito of all tribal separation and sub-division, must have been a cha- otic confusion of men, women, children, and cattle, which no leader could reduce to order.' No wonder, therefore, that the mingled evil of the mass broke out in murmurs and unmanly regrets. It was partly on this account, no doubt, that they were led, not " through the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near ; for God said, ' Lest, peradventure the j^eople repent when they see war, and re- turn to Egypt ; ^ but made to turn (from before the Wall) towards the way of the wilderness of the Weedy (Red) Sea ; though they went up in battle array from the land of Egypt." They had, indeed, set out full of hope that they would soon reach and, if necessary, conquer the Promised Land, and had struck into the well-known road to Palestine, with no foreboding of the weary years they would have to spend in the wilderness, or of the graves awaiting nearly all of them there, or of the difficulties through which their chil- dren were to reach the longed-for goal. Moses could give them n.o hint of his plans, for had they known them they would assuredly have returned to the Nile valley. He had led them to the frontier fortresses, and now that they storm- ily clamoured for their old life of slavery, rather than face the death that threatened them, he could cheer them by the intimation that they would not have to fight ; as God had another, less dangerous road for them, towards the Red Sea. He had first to lead them out of Egypt with as little loss as 1 Durch Qosen, pp. 94-96. - ExoJ. xiii. 17 (literally). THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 199 possible, and then to train them to discipline, order, and worthy aims in life. This point reached, they could receive intelligently the full revelations destined for them, and be led victoriously to Palestine. Escape from Egypt lay near at hand, but their education as a people could only be at- tained by the long work of years, after they liad received the laws they were to ol^ey. Turning therefore * to the south, at some miles distance from the frontier wall, the multitude hastened on, in fear of the Egyptian troops ; and, in hope of speedy escape from them, pressed forward without taking more rest than was needed to refresh them. At last they reached a spot — Pi- hahiroth — " the place where the reeds grow,^'""^ in sight of Baal-zephon, as the grand limestone mountains of the Ataka range behind Suez were called by the Phoenician sailors.^ There they could pitch their tents, and take much- needed rest, amidst springs of fresh water and abundant pastures. They had turned the great frontier wall with its line of forts, and were safe for the time. For the moment tliey had escaped any conflict with disciplined troops. Their advance to the fortress wall, and their subsequent api^arent retreat, and disappearance in the wilderness, had had the additional result of deceiving the Egyptians, and leading them to suppose that Moses had lost his way, or had given up his design of breaking through to the east, and was now wandering in the desert. The garrisons of all the fron- tier forts must have been informed of the approach of vast masses of people, and would be on the watch ; doubtless preparing themselves for an expected attack, and very pos- sibly filling the TIcl)rows with terror by the l)lare of their » Exod. xiv. 2. 2 Ge!*eniii9, 9th ed., p. U84. But see meaning in Brugscli, p. 194. 3 Ebers, Durch Oosen, p. 98. 200 THE TENTH PLAGUE Al^D THE EXODUS. trumpets, resounding afar over the silent desert. Uncertain where tlie attempt to break out would be made, they would remain under arms, vainly awaiting assault, and would send off posts to Pharaoh, at Tanis, begging for reinforcements, and telling him that the advancing hordes had disappeared in the desert, to the south-west. It was natural, therefore, that he should believe that they had become entangled and lost in the wilderness. ' The messages brought him must have shown Menephtali at once that Moses had now altogether different intentions from merely going off into the desert to sacrifice ; and the loss of such a vast multitude of slaves came back on him in all its force. ^^Why have we done this, ^^ said he, '^ that we have let Israel go from serving us ? '' ' He had permitted a pilgrimage to the wilderness to hold a religious feast, with the utmost reluctance, when he could not help it ; but now that the Hebrews were evidently bent on flight, they must be hindered by all the means in his power. They had had a lengthened start of him, but his cavalry could soon overtake them. Ordering his own war chariots, therefore, and 600 selected chariots besides, as his immediate escort ; supported by all the chariot-force of Lower Egypt, with fighting men in each, and his " horsemen,^^ ^ he started in hot haste after the Hebrews. Under Menephtali, the chariot force of the army had been more assiduously encouraged than under any other of the Pharaohs. The name of one of his " Heads of the Horse'' is still preserved ; a ''chief prophet" of Set, and general of 1 Exod. xiv. 3. 2 Exod. xiv. 5. 3 From " horsemen " being mentioned separately it would seem that, though not named on the monuments, there were cavalry, in our sense, in the Egyptian army. Diodorus Siculus says that Rameses II. had 24,000 horse soldiers besides his chariot regiments. THE TENTH PLAGUE AKD THE EXODUS. 201 the gendarmerie, who lived at Tanis, the city from which Menephtah now set out. The Delta — that is, the former Hebrew district — was in fact the breeding place of the chariot horses, for which its open flatness and its pastures especially suited it. Menephtah's chariot squadrons were his glory, and are constantly mentioned, for their deeds iu 202 THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. the field, in the long inscription at Karnak which commem- orates his victory over the Libyans and their allies. ' Some time, during which he remained inactive, must, however, have intervened between the departure of the Hebrews and the pursuit. The piety of the Egyptians to the dead was so great that the weightiest political affairs would ]iecessarily be neglected while the king paid the last honours to his dead son. Besides, in this case, the families of the officers and soldiery had also been universally be- reaved. Seventy to seventy-two days were required for public lamentation,^ and during this time all else would be forgotten by the Pharaoh. It was not till ten weeks after death that the mummy was put in its resting place, with the needful rites detailed in the Book of the Dead. Till then all was at a standstill. Loud wailing rose in the public streets at the moment of death ; the forehead was covered with dust or mud, and the head smitten by the hands as a sign of deepest sorrow. When the corpse was opened at the embalming house, the relatives wore required to be present. The embalmers then went to their doleful work, not later than the third day, and the family, meanwhile, shut them- selves up in strict seclusion till the process was completed, over two months later. ^ But if Menephtah was thus forced to giv^e the Hebrews a lengthened breathing time, during which they in a measure organized themselves, while resting in the comparatively rich tract round Pi-hahiroth, his pursuit was now so much the hotter. Launching his magnificent squadrons after the 1 Lepsius' DenTcmaler, vol. iii. p. 199. Diimichen, Historische Inschrifien, Taf. i.-v. Chabas, Etudes, etc. Thus it ^ays, "He sent his cavalry in all directions." "His Majesty with his cavalry attacked them." " He sent the ctvalry after them," and so on. 2 Herod., ii. 8.5. Diod., i. 7^2, 90. Gen. 1. 3. 3 Uarda., vol. i. p. 37. ^gijpt. Konigstochter., vol. iii. p. 275. THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 2U3 prey; ^' the horses," to use the words of an old papyrus/ "swift as jackals ; their eyes like fire ; their fury like that of a hurricane wheu it bursts ; " the doom of the Hebrews seemed fixed. The fugitives had at last broken up their encampment and were marching slowly towards the Red Sea, which they designed to reach in the afternoon, at the ebb tide." The murmur of the waves on the beach was already heard when the clouds of dust on the horizon behind told them they were pursued. Terror seized the host once more at the sight, and fierce accusations of Moses were mingled with loud despair of escape. But the great leader, ever calm in the presence of danger, kept the alarm from degenerating into ruinous panic. ^^ Jehovah will fight for you,^^ said he to the terrified crowds, '"and ye shall be still ; '" words which shone out on the desj^airing multitudes, to use the fine figure of Ebers, '^ike the sun rising in calm majesty on the lost and almost spent traveller.^' ^ The van of the pursuers was already in sight from the shore. The danger was great, but Jehovah had heard the cry of Moses, and ordered the vast host to go forward, though the waters apparently barred their way ; promising that, at the uplifted rod of His servant, the waves would be divided and offer a broad j)athway on dry ground.* The exact locality at which the Hebrews crossed the Eed Sea appears to be more nearly pointed out than in the past, by the results of recent investigation. Pi-hahiroth may be a place called Pikaheret in an inscription found near Tel-el- Maskhuta, on the railway line to Suez from Cairo, and also ^ Anast.^ 1. - Lurch Gosen, p. 101. 3 Di/rch Gosen, p. 101. No taunt could be more bitter thau that used, "Because there are no graves in Eg}'pt hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderne.ss ? " Exod. xiv. 11. Egypt was the land of graves, and especially round Memphis the cemeteries were of immense extent. * Exod. xiv. ^u. 204 THE TENTH PLAGUE AN"D THE EXODUS. close to the fresh-water canal, which runs near the line a great part of the way. It is near the canal which in anti- quity led from the Nile to the Keel Sea, over nearly the same track as the present fresh-water one, but Ebers places Pi-ha- hiroth much nearer the Eed Sea. The Hebrews, according to the latest study of the question, appear to have marched, after turning from the great wall, towards the waters, then much broader than now, which are called Lake Timsah, or " Lake of Crocodiles, ^^ a small spot of water, two or three miles across, and seven or eight miles long, about forty-five miles in a straight line from Suez, and now used as part of the channel of the Suez Canal. North of this a few miles, just beyond the town of Ismailia, is the highest point on the isthmus, which has always been dry land, connecting Africa with Asia. Over this lay the road from Tanis to Philistia, and also to the Gulf of Akaba ; in fact, to the east generally. The first march of the Hebrews seems to have been towards this high road to the lands beyond, above the present Lake Timsah ; but the sight and thought of the fortress on the wall alarmed the multitude, and they turned to the south, past the present Bitter Lakes, which, also, are utilized for the Suez Canal. Here they were beyond the great wall with its castles, for the waters were now a sufficient defence of the Nile valley. But they found themselves still in a sore strait, for the range of the Ataka mountains rose to the south, on the African side of their march, while before them and at their side were the waters of the Bitter Lakes, then part of the Red Sea, and behind them were to be, very soon, the chariots of Pharaoh. What was to be done ? " To the north of the Grulf of Suez, and extending ten statute miles to the Bitter Lakes, there exists at the present day a neck of land, across which the Israelitish host might THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 205 have marched into the wilderness of Etham, on their way to Mount Sinai, and over which the army of Pharaoh, with its chariots, would probably have been unable to follow. . . . Ever since the Pliocene period, down to very recent times, the land has been gaining on the sea, over this area. At the Pliocene period the whole of Lower Egypt and the borders of the Mediterranean were submerged to a depth of at least 200 feet below the present sea-level, and since then the land has been slowly rising. It is not too much to assume that 4,000 years ago the process of elevation had not been completed to its present extent; and that, in conse- quence, the waters of the Gulf of Suez stretched northward into the Bitter Lakes, forming a channel, perhaps of no great depth, but requiring the exercise of Almighty power to convert it into a causeway of dry land, in order to rescue the chosen people from their impending peril. The levels taken for the Suez Canal show that a depression of about 25 feet would suffice to bring the waters of the Gulf of Suez into the Bitter Lakes, and this submergence Avould still leave the neck to the north of the Bitter Lakes in the position in Avhich we know it to have been in the times of the Pharaohs, when the road between Egypt and the East ran over it.^^ ' This geological fact seems to point to the shallow head of the ancient Ked Sea, now occupied in part by the Bitter Lakes, as most probably the j>lace at which the Hebrews crossed, for Suez in the days of Moses would be under a very deep body of water. I have, myself, been both at Lake Timsah and Suez, and feel assured that the ascertained elevation of the mud during the ages since the Exodus shows that the Bitter Lakes or their vicinity must have witnessed the amazing scene of the Hebrew crossing. 1 Hull's Mount Seir, p. 176. 20G THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. " Professor IIiill,'^ says Sir John Coode, the eminent engineer, " shows that the beds of sand and gravel con- taining shells, corals, and other marine forms now existing in the waters of the Gulf of Suez (which beds are found on either side of that gulf up to at least 200 feet above the present sea-level), form complete evidence of the elevation of the whole land area of that particular region, but that this elevation must have taken place at a time long an- tecedent to that of the Exodus. He points out, what is true, that if at the time of the Exodus an elevation of not more than from 25 to 30 feet had remained to be effected, the land now forming the southern part of the Isthmus of Suez would have been submerged by the waters of the Red Sea, and he regards it as in the highest degree probable that as far back as the time when the Exodus took place the waters of the Red Sea extended northwards up the valley at least as far as the Bitter Lakes, producing a channel 20 to oO feet in depth, and perhaps a mile in breadth — a terrible barrier to the Israelites, and sufficient to induce a cry of despair from the whole multitude. '' Having quite recently traversed the whole isthmus, making a special examination of the portion between Is- mailia and Suez^ the following incident, which then oc- curred, appears to me to be worthy of notice, inasmuch as it is eminently corroborative of Dr. Hull's view. '' Whilst engaged with other members of the Inter- national Commission upon the investigation of various matters connected with the question of improving the Suez Canal, some of our party landed from time to time, and on one occasion at a point between what is now the north end of the Gulf of Suez and the south of the Bitter Lakes — not, in fact, very far to the north of the bridge of THE TENTH PLAGUE AXD THE EXODUS. 207 boats by which the pilgrims to and from Mecca cross the canal. ^' Desiring to test for myself the character and hardness of the unbroken ground at this point, and at a height of about 12 or 15 feet above sea-level, the first stroke of a pick turned up, from three inches below the surface, a thick cake of a dull white substance which at the moment appeared to be gypsum ; and, whilst stooping to pick it up, I remarked that accordingly, but simultaneously, a colleague who was stand- ing at my side, exclaimed * salt.' On asking him how it came to pass that he so instantly arrived at this conclusion, he replied that the whole district thereabouts was full of such salt. ^' When it is explained that this gentleman had the engineering charge of a considerable length of this part of the Suez Canal at the time the work was in course of construction, and consequently had thus acquired an in- timate knowledge of this district, and also that on testing the ground at other points thereabouts I found salt existing below a thin covering of sand, at heights coi>siderably above the sea-level, there is ample warrant for saying, as I have done, that the extensive existence of salt in this form and at such a height cannot be regarded otherwise than as a proof that the waters of the Red Sea did at one time extend as far north as the Bitter Lakes. A specimen nearly an inch thick is l)efore me as I write. '^ Further evidence that, at some period antecedent to the formation of the Suez Canal, the sea extended as far up the isthmus as the Bitter Lakes is found in a remarkable sample of salt, which was cut from the bottom of the Bitter Lakes by the engineers of the Suez Canal Company, before the sea was let in to effect the completion of the water communi- 208 THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. cation between the northern and sonthern sections of the work. This block of salt, to which my attention was directed by M. de Lesseps, is preserved in the courtyard attached to the offices of the canal company at Ismailia ; it is fully seven feet in height, and, according to M. Voisin Bey, who, at the time it was taken out, acted as the com- pany's chief engineer in Egypt, salt certainly existed to a still greater depth, but to what precise extent is not known. '^I may here mention that whilst passing over the 1,500 miles from the Strait of Bab-el- Mandeb to Suez, the water of the Red Sea is so far changed by evaporation, that samples taken from the surface at Suez have been proved to be nearly two parts in 1,000 Salter than those at Bab-el- Mandeb. It should be borne in mind, moreover, that an exceptionally great amount of evaporation would necessarily take place within such a comparatively shallow inland basin as that of the Bitter Lakes, having its surface swept by the hot, dry air of the Arabian desert, and shut in from the Mediterranean by the high land at Serapeum immediately to the north, or, at any rate, by the still higher ridge of country at El-Gruin. These conditions Avould obviously contribute to the formation of such a remarkable deposit of salt as is found in the specimen above described. '^'^A peculiar feature in this specimen is the presence of an occasional thin layer of sand, most probably caused during the prevalence of violent southerly winds which from time to time raise the sea-level at Suez nearly three feet above that of an ordinary spring tide in calm weather. The strong current to the northward on such occasions would be certain to carry a considerable quantity of sand into the Bitter Lakes, sufficient, it may be assumed, to account for the lay- ers of sand in question. THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 209 " The facts to wliioli I luive here called attention appear to me unquestionably to confirm the view entertained by Professor Hull. I feel, with him, that, according to this view, the physical conditions at the time of the Exodus will be brought into harmony with the Bible narrative, and that the difficulty which has hitherto surrounded the subject of the passage of the Israelites through the Red Sea will thus have been to a great degree removed.'^ * If the present Bay of Suez was thus so deeply submerged in the time of Moses, and the Red Sea extended to near Ismaila, we need no longer trouble ourselves about the instances recorded of individuals having succeeded, under special circumstances, in crossing Suez. It is not now what it was then, but has been raised pro^Dortionately as much as the rest of the Isthmus. Had the position of land and sea been the same as at this time, it would have been possible for Israel to have crossed into Arabia Petra9a without the interposition of Grod : many miles, then sea, being now dry. It is pleasant to read in so acute a writer as Niebuhr : "''It would be a great mistake to imagine that the passage of such a great caravan (as the Israelites) could have been effected by purely natural means. No caravans go this way nowa- days, at least from Cairo to Sinai, though it would be a great saving of distance if they could. But it was even less possible for the children of Israel to cross thus thousands of years ago, for the water was then apparently much broader, and, besides reaching farther to the north, was far deeper. The water seems not only to have retreated since, but the bottom of this shallow point appears to have been raised by the sand blown in for ages from the desert.'' The night set in dark and stormy, with a violent north- 1 Sir John Coode, Letter to the Times. ^ Beschreibung von A?'abia^ p. -HI. VOL. II.-14 210 THE TEN"TH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. east gale/ wliicli blew all night, and drove back the waters till the sandy and shallow bottom was laid bare. The storm, prolonging the ebb, delayed the flow of the tide, and thus before morning, the whole of the Hebrews — here, going round pools, there, kept back by the tempest, and by the slow progress of the cattle — were able to reach the east shore ; after a long struggle, aggravated by the terrors of the night. What these must have been may be imagined from the description in one of the Psalms, ages after : " The clouds poured out water : The skies sent out a sound : Thine arrows (the lightnings) also went abroad. The voice of Thy thunder rolled along the heavens, ^ The lightnings lightened the world : The earth trembled and shook." ^ The pursuing Egyi:)tians reached the strand when most of the Hebrews, with their cattle, had crossed in safety. It was a question whether they should at once dash after them, or seek to overtake them by the circuit of the shore. Man and horse were tired out by the forced marches of the last few days, and the night was impenetrably dark. Since their advance to the great wall with its fortresses, Jehovah had vouchsafed to guide His people by a cloud through the day and fire by night," as Eastern armies still follow, in many cases, signals of fire and smoke seen at the front of the march. ^ This light, Avhich the Pharaoh perhaps fancied 1 It is to be remembered that the Hebrews gave names only to the four winds from the four cardinal points, so that north-east and south-east, the winds employed by Jehovah iu this case, would be regarded as east winds. 2 Gesenius says, " was in the whirlwind.'" 3 Ps. Ixxvii. 17, 18. * Exod. xiii. 21. 6 Alexander the Great had a huge cresset set up on a tall pole over his tent as a signal for departure, seen far ofl: by all, by its light in darkness and its smoke by day. Curtius, v, 2. On the march the holy fire was always carried before the army on silver altars. Curtius, iii. 2. Seetzen quotes from an old Arab MS. the fact that THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 211 such a signal, now moved from before the HebreAvs and came to their rear/ at once quickening and guiding lag- gards and stragglers, and misleading the Egyptians as to the progress made by the host. Thinking that the storm would keep back the waters, and seeing their prey so near, passion overcame prudence in the pursuers. Their squadrons, there- fore, rushed to the edge of the channel, rank pressing on rank after those who claimed to know the way, towards the light which they might well fancy marked the leader^s place, at the front. Meanwhile, according to Josephus,*^ a terrible storm of rain, with dreadful thunder and lightning, broke out, and helped, with the loud and fierce wind, to be- wilder the charioteers ; who, it may be, were led still more astray by different signal fires of the sections of the He- brews, kindled as a flaming banner, to guide their divisions in the wild blackness. But, now, when the host of the Egyptians were floundering in the dangerous sands to the ford, the wind suddenly veered round, and blew towards the north instead of from it ; driving before it the foaming waters of the rising tide. Advance was henceforth hopeless, but so, also, was retreat, for the narrow wheels of the chari- ots sank in the water-soaked bottom, and bent or snapped the axles,'' hurling the charioteers headlong from their places, to use the metaphor in the sacred text, like stones from a sling. the caliphs used fire to send news swiftly— the brightness serving this end bj' night and the smoke by day. The vast pilgrim caravans to Mecca, guide themselves in a similar way. An Egyptian general, in an ancient inscription, is compared to a flame streaming in advance of an army, and this is repealed in an old papyrus. Chabas, F. E., p. 54. Pap. Anast., i. 1 Exod. xiv. 19, 20. The Peshito reads, " And there were clouds and darkness all the night, but there was light to the children of Israel all the night." The Sep- tuagint reads, " There arose clouds and darkness, and the night passed," etc. 2 Jos., Ant., II. xvi. 3. 3 The Septuagint reads that the wheels were " bound " or "clogged " by the sand. 212 THE TENTH PLAGL'E AND THE EXODUS. Mortal terror now seized the pursuers ; for the God of the Hebrews was ^' looking out on them/^ and once more fight- ing against them from that fiery cloud/ But escape was impossible. The south-west wind blowing wildly from the clefts and gorges of the Ataka hills — the wind most dreaded, in our own day^ by the boatmen of Suez — drove the waters before it, and ere long the chariots and the heavily mailed soldiery of Pharaoh, held in the remorseless grip of the yielding sands, were overwhelmed, and miserably perished. Next morning all was over, and the triumphant Hebrews saw the corpses washed up, in heaps, along the sea-shore. Such a deliverance filled all minds with awe, for they felt that Jehovah alone had inflicted this great defeat upon their enemies. Now, as never before, they feared and believed in Him, and in his servant Moses.'^ A document translated by M. Chabas may perhaps refer to the escape of the Hebrews. It, runs thus: "Notice! when my letter reaches you, bring the Madjai at once, who were over the foreign Safkhi who have escaped. Do not bring all the men I have named in my list. Give attention 1 Exod. siv. 24. Translate " troubled " as " threw into confusion." 2 Exod. xiv. 30, 31. The name of the Red Sen, really, the Weedy Sea, Yam Suph, is supposed by Stickel {Studien u. Kritiken, 18.50, p. 330) to be derived from the woolly tuft of the ripe shore reed, which grows very thickly on the edge of the sea. It was called in Egypt the Reedy Sea. On the other hand, I have lately met the fol- lowing proposed derivation : " As we emerged from the mouth of a small defile the waters of this sacred gulf (the Red Sea) burst upon our view ; the surface marked with annular, crescent-shaped, and irregular blotches of a purplish red, extending as far as the eye could reach. . . . This red colour I ascertained to be caused by the subjacent red sandstone and reddish coral reefs. A similar phenomenon is observed in the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, and also near Suez, particularly when the rays of the sun fall on the water at a small angle.'" The late Captain Newbold, in Journ. of Royal Asiatic Soc, No. XIH. p. 78. The Hebrews divided the night into three watches : the first from sunset to ten ; the second from ten to two ; the third from two to sunrise. The passage of the sea was in April, when the sun rose about six A.M. Rosenmiiller, Alte u. Neue Morgenland, vol. ii. p. 18. Munk thinks the passage was effected at some part of the Bitter Lakes, not far from Ismailia. Palds- Una, 269. THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. 213 to this. Bring them to me to Takhii, and I will admit them and yon." Takliu was a fortress which defended the eastern frontier of tlic Delta, and this letter may well be an order to recall the gendarmerie who had watched the wall when the Hebrews were advancing to it.' It is, of conrse, idle to expect that Egypt would record a disaster so terrible as that of the Red Sea. but a papyrus of the next period strangely confirms its magnitude, by show- ing the virtual breaking up of the kingdom of the Pharaohs from that date. The events of the later period of Meneph- tah's reign r.re passed over in perfect silence ' by the monu- ments. After him. the empire which Seti I. and Rameses II. had established at so great a cost of war and energy, went ignominiously to pieces, and his successors, Seti II. and ^Eenephtah II., could not prevent even single counties of the Delta from breaking loose from their rule, declaring them- selves independent, and setting up dynasties of their own. The great Harris Papyrus says of this time : ^' The popula- tion of Egypt had broken away over the borders, and among those who remained there was no commanding voice, for jnany years. Hence Egypt fell under dynasties which ruled the towns. One killed the other in wild and fatal enter- prises. Other disasters succeeded, in the shape of years of famine. Then Aarsu, a Syrian, rose among them, as prince, and the whole land did him homage. One leagued with the other and plundered the magazines, and the very gods acted as men did '' — that is, they seemed to waste the earth by their judgments. in Menephtah's eighth regnal year a rejjort was sent to him saying that " the ^Dassage of tribes of the Sliasu (or Bedouins) from the land of Edom had been effected through » Pap. Anagt., V. 18, G, pi. 19. 2. - Brugsch. vol. ii. p. 130. 214 THE TENTH PLAGUE AND THE EXODUS. the fortress of Khetam (Etham) which is situated in (the district of) Succoth (Thuku) to the lakes of the city of Pi- thom, which are in the land of Succoth, in order that they might feed themselves and their herds on the possessions of Pharaoh/' But this must refer to an inroad, from the desert without, on the fertile pastures of the Delta round Pithom : not to an exodus of any kind. The mummies of Seti, Rameses, and other kings of the dynasty have been found, but no mummy of Menephtah ! CHAPTER VII. THE MARCH TO SIXAI. How long the Hebrews remained in Egypt has been much disputed. It is stated by St. Paul that from the date of the covenant with Abraham, to the proclamation of the Mosaic law on Sinai, was 430 years/ and this is stated also in Exo- dus.' In Genesis^ the Egyptians are predicted as destined to afflict the Hebrews 400 years, and this is repeated by St. Stephen in his defence." Respecting these two numbers, 430 and 400 years, there is little difficulty, as the one is only a round number, whilst the other is a precise statement. But in Genesis ^ it is said that the return to Canaan was to be in the fourth generation from the time of God's covenant with Abraham ; so that an average of over 100 years is thus presumed for each. Jewish interpreters, however, assuming the length of a generation as only about 50 years, have di- vided the longer period into two ; allotting 215 years to the interval between the descent of Abraham to Egypt and that of Jacob, and the same time to the residence there of his posterity. But tliis is not necessary, if we remember the length of life assigned in the Bible to the patriarchs, for Abraham himself died at the age of 175,^ Isaac at that of 180,' Jacob at that of 147/ Joseph at that of 110, and 1 Gal. iii. 17. '^ E.Kod. xii. 40, 41. « Geu. xv. 13. * Acts vii. 6. ^ Gen. xv. 16. « Gen. xxv. 7. ^ Gen. XXXV. 28. " Uict. of Bible, art. " Jacob." Sclieukers Lex. makes him 170. 216 THE MARCH TO SIN^AI. Moses at that of 120/ It is hardly to be expected that evi- dence in corroboration of such matters should be accessible from outside sources, but on many Egyptian inscriptions we still meet with tlie prayer which very few would think of offering now^ that the writer may reach the perfect age of 110 years ; and in a papyrus, preserved in Paris, of the date of the Twelfth Dynasty," that is, at least as old as Abraham, one Patah-hotep, who describes himself as 110 years old, speaks of his father, the reigning king, as still alive, and, indeed, addresses him ; so that ho must have been about 130 years old/ Their miraculous escape had raised the excitable spirit of the vast host to a delirium of joy. From the extremity of peril they had passed, in a night, to safety. An almost heljjless multitude, cumbered with women, children, and cattle, with the sea before them and the terrible chariots of Egypt behind — they had seen a way made for them through the waters, and the chivalry of the greatest empire in the world overwhelmed wdien pressing after them. They had been simply spectators of the great deliverance wrought for them by the invisible God, whom Moses had proclaimed as their Leader, and whom their fathers had worshipped. There was no room for pride : they could only look with grateful eyes to the heavens, from which alone their rescue had come. Jehovah was assuredly a God above all gods, and He had proclaimed them His chosen people, by redeem- ing them thus with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Such an event, which distant ages would remem- ber with lasting awe. demanded a corresponding recogni- 1 Deut. xxxiv. 7. " Maspero, p. 85. Brugsch, vol. i. p. 92. 3 Facsimile d^uii Papyrus Egyptien. Par M. Trisse d'Avennes. PI. 19, lines 7 and 8. THE MARCH TO SINAI. 217 tion from those who had witnessed it. The emotion that filled all hearts could find adequate utterance only in song and public rejoicing, in honour of their divine Protector. The sacred dance was a part of most ancient religions. Even now the young women of Egypt thus greet the rising of the Nile — a relic of the old sacred festival of the river. The Indians, in antiquity, danced before the rising sun, in his honour, and sacred dances were in use among the Romans. Indeed, the Greek Church stills retains at Easter some traces of this antique form of worship, and the danc- ing dervishes of Turkey and Central Asia are well known. It seemed, in fact, to the ancient world as fitting to express their joy thus as by singing, to which it appeared the nat- ural adjunct, expressive of the gladness of the worshipper's whole being.' It is not surprising, therefore, that the He- brew word for a religious festival means, literally, a circling dance/ or that when Moses asked Pharaoh to let the peo- ple go, to hold a feast to Jehovah in the wilderness, the word refers to this chief characteristic of such festivities.^ The deliverance of the nation, by the direct intervention of Jehovah in its behalf, was hence naturally celebrated by a solemn festival in His honour, in which sacred dances took a prominent part. But the dance was always an accompani- ment to song, and this was provided in the grand lyric known as the Song of Moses — the oldest and noblest tri- umphal ode we possess. It ran thus : * 1 Exod. xxxii. G. There are still, at fixed times, sacred dances in the Cathedral of Seville, as part of the public worship. 2 Hag, in Gesenius, 9th edition, p. 252. 3 Exod. V. 1. It is the same in Lev. xxiii. 41. " Ye shall keep a-feadf (or ' dance ') unto Jehovah seven days in the year." In Ps. xlii. 4, " The multitude that kept holy day," is literally, " that celebrated religious dances.'" * See translations of Koster iStudien u. Kritiken, l&il, p. 09), Knobel, Ewald, Herder, Buusen, and Kalisch. 218 THE MARCH TO SIJTAI. I will sing to Jehovah, for He hath triumphed gloriously ; * The horse and its rider hath He hurled ^ into the sea. Jehovah is my Victory and Song: He is my deliverer; He is my God, I will praise Him ; The God of my fathers, I will exalt Him ! Jehovah is a hero of war: Jehovah is His name! The chariots of Pharaoh and his Might He cast into the sea: His chosen captains ^ were drowned in the Weedy Sea. The depths covered them ; They sank to the bottom like a stone.* Thy right hand, 0 Jehovah, glorious in power, Thy right hand, 0 Jehovah, broke in pieces the foe. In the greatness of Thy excellency Thou hast overthrown them that opposed Thee, Thou didst let loose Thy fiery indignation, and it consumed them like stubble.^ Before the breath of Thy nostrils ^ the waters piled themselves up ; The floods stood up like a dam — The waves were congealed in the midst of the sea. The foe said: "I will pursue: I will overtake : I will divide the prey; I will glut my revenge on them, I will draw out my sword, and destroy them." Then thou breathedst with Thy wind; the sea covered them: They whirled down, like lead, in the rushing waters. Who is like unto Thee, among the gods, 0 Jehovah! Who is like unto Thee ; so great in Thy majesty ! So fearful in glory; doing such wondrous deeds! J Literall}', He is gloriously glorious. ^ ^s from a sling. 3 Officers of the highest rank especially attending the Pharaoh. * The weight of their armour would make them helpless to escape. The corselets of the officers were of bronze, with sleeves reaching nearly to the elbow, and cover- ing the whole body, and the thighs nearly to the knees. The chariot warriors also are always represented with heavy coats of mail. Wilkinson, vol. i. p. 366. ^ The word for stubble in the Hebrew text is Egyptian. 8 A poetical expression for the natural agency of the stormy wind. All natural phenomena are thus ascribed by the Hebrews to the direct act of God—" God thun- ders,"—"God gives rain,"—" God giveth snow," etc. THE MARCH TO SIJ^AI. 219 Thou stretchedst out Thy right hand, Then the earth swallowed them up. Thou leddest by Thy grace the people whom Thou didst redeem, Thou leddest them by Thy strength to Thy holy habitation.^ The peoples shall hear it and be afraid. Trembling shall seize the inhabitants of Philistia.- The princes of the tribes of Edom are in terror ; The mighty men ^ of Moab, trembling seizes them ; The inhabitants of Canaan melt for fear ! Fear and dread fall on them. At the greatness of Thine arm they stiffen, in terror, like stone, Till Thy people, 0 Jehovah, have passed over ; "* Till Thy people, whom thou hast made Thine own, have passed over, Till Thou hast brought them in, and planted them on the mount of Thine inheritance.* The place, 0 Jehovah, which Thou hast made Thy dwelling; The Sanctuary, 0 Jehovah, which Thy hands have prepared! Jehovah is king for ever and ever ! For Pharaoh's horse, and his chariots, and his riders, went into the Sea, And Jehovah brought back over them the waters ; But the children of Israel went on, dry, through the depths. 1 Palestine. 2 The first who would expect an invasion. Pelasheth, the country of the Philis- tines, is, as has been said, the original of the name Palestine. 3 Literally, " the rams," a metaphor for strength, etc. See Jer. xlviii. 29, 41. The men of Moab were famous for their strength and size. The metaphor applies aptly to them as great " sheep-masters." * The Jordan. *> Palestine, a country of hills, was holy to Jehovah, and is probably meant, as a whole, but the allusion may be to Mount Moriah, at Jerusalem ; though it was not used for sacred purposes till after David bought the threshing-floor of Araunah, on it, and Solomon crowned it with his temple. In Isa. Ixv. 9, Canaan is called by Je- hovah, " My mountains." It is also called " that goodly mountain," Deut. iii. 25, and " this mountain," in Ps. Ixxviii. 54. It is also called m that verse, " His Sanctu- ary." as in the Song of Moses, though the words may be translated, ''His holy border." 220 THE MARCH TO SIKAI. The burden of this magnificent ode sank into the hearts of the Hebrew race, and fired the genius of inspired poets, century after century, reappearing again and again in psalm and prophecy. ' As here, the strain of all these allusions to the great deliverance is, that " not unto us, not unto us, 0 Lord, but unto Thy name give glory, for Thy mercy and for Thy truth's sake/' ^ Xor did its echoes die away with the Jewish dispensation. As a triumphant celebration of God's victory over His enemies, it is even transferred in the Apoca- lypse to those who stand on the sea of glass mingled with fire, having the harjos of God, and singing ^' the song of Moses the servant of God, and of the Lamb." Uttered first, in all probability, by a single voice, from some point which lifted the reciter above the vast multitude, its refrain was caught up by the women and maidens of Israel, and sung by them as they danced for joy, their tam- bourines held over their head, and struck in unison as they moved. Miriam,^ the sister of Aaron and Moses, noblest as well as first of the daughters of the people, led the way, the whole chorus of sisters following, their right hands beat- ing in time the skin disk of their simple instrument, round which rows of shells, or pieces of metal added to the joyful noise. Then would strike in the deep, solemn chorus of the men, every voice expressing, in its loudest chant, enthusi- asm and gratitude for the wondrous deliverance vouchsafed. In one of the Psalms we have a glimpse of a scene in some respects similar : the rejoicings at the consecration of the Tabernacle erected by David. Then, '' Singers went before ; » See Ps. Ixxvii. 12-20 ; Ixxviii.; cv.; cvi.; cxiv. 2 pg, cxv. 1. 3 Miriam is called a " prophetess,'" but this often means in Scripture only one who says or makes known the doings of God, or His praises, whether with or without musical instruments. Thns the singers appointed by David are called " prophets," and are said "to prophesy with harps," etc., and "to give thanks and to praise the Lord." 1 Chron. xxv. 1-3. THE MARCH TO SIXAI. 221 players on stringed instruments followed iifter, and, be- tween, came damsels playing on timbrels.' In full choir, the sons and daughters of the Fountain of Israel praised God, even Jehovah ;^'' "David and all the House of Israel playing before Jehovah with all their might and with sing- ing,^ even on harps, and on psalteries, and on castanets,* and on cymbals." Traditions of an event so striking as the escape of the Israelites, lingered for ages among the neighbouring peoples. The tribes on the east of the Red Sea, says Diodorus of Sicily, who was in Egypt shortly before the birth of Christ, ** have a tradition which has been handed down among them from age to age, that the whole bay at the head of the sea was once laid bare by ebb tides, the water heaping itself on the other side, so that the bottom was seen.^' Artapanus, a Greek who lived some time before Christ, and wrote a book on the Jews, of which some fragments have been preserved by Eusebius, records that "the priests of Memphis were wont to say that Moses had narrowly studied the time of ebb and flow of the Red Sea, and led his people through it when the sand was bare. But the priests of Hieropolis tell this story otherwise. They say that when the king of Egypt pursued the Jews, Moses struck the waters with his rod and the waters forthwith turned back, so that the Israelites passed over dryshod. But the Egyptians having ventured on the same dangerous path, were blinded by fire from heaven, and the sea having rushed back to its bed, they all perished, partly by the thunderbolts, partly in the waters." ^ A theory advanced by Brugsch, with respect to tlie > The tambourine is still used universally in the East by women when they dance or sinfj. Niebuhr, in Rosenmiiller's Scholia, vol. i. p. 495. 3 Ps. Ixviii. 25, 26. Ewald. 3 2 Sam. vi. 5. Septuagint and most recent critics. ♦ Literally. See also Pe. cl. 3-5. * Prceparat., is.. 27, 436. 222 THE MARCH TO SINAI. scene of the destruction of Pharaoh^s host, has excited some attention. This eminent scholar, differing from all others, supposes that the Israelites, instead of turning southward towards Suez, marched to the north-east, in the direction of Pelusium.' Baal-zephon, he thinks, was a temple on Mount Oasios, outside the Egyptian boundary wall, in the direction of Canaan, while, instead of the " Ked,'' he rightly thinks we ought to read the ^' Weedy Sea \'' a name given not only to the lied Sea but to the wide and terrible abysses known as the Sirbonian Lakes, between Pelusium and Goshen, near the Mediterranean coast. Between these lakes and the Med- iterranean there still runs a narrow bar of coast, forming a possible line of communication between Egypt and Pales- tine, but covered in great storms by the foaming waters of the outside ocean. Along this pathway, he supposes, the Israelites were led in safety, while Pharaoh's army, attempt- ing it, were met by a blinding storm, which submerged the narrow coast line, and threw them into such confusion that they lost their way, and were swallowed up in the bottom- less lakes at its southern edge. We cannot adopt this hy- pothesis, but the great reputation of M. Brugsch claims a statement of it in his own interesting words. *^^ According to monumental indications, '^ he says, '^'in accordance with what the classic traditions tell us of it, the Egyptian route led from Migdol to the Mediterranean, up to the wall of Gerrhon (the fortified wall of Egypt), at the extremity of the Lake of Sirbonis." " Separated from the Mediterranean by a tongue of land which offered in ancient times the only Egyptian way into Palestine, this lake, or rather lagoon, covered with a rich vegetation of rushes and papyri, but in our day almost dried 1 Pelusium = Mud-town {Bib. Lex., art. " Sin *'). THE MARCH TO SIN^AI. 223 up, hid the unforeseen danger whicli hirked in the nature of its borders, and in tlie presence of its fatal gulfs, of which an ancient author has left us the following description : '^ ' On the side of the Levant, Egypt is protected, partly by the Nile, partly by the desert, and by the swampy plains called by the name of Barathra, gulfs. There is in Ocele- Syria and in Egypt, a lake which is not very large, of a prodigious depth, and in length about 200 stadia.' It is called Sirbonis, and is very dangerous to the traveller ap- proaching it unawares, for its basin being very narrow, like a ribbon, and its swampy borders very wide, it often hapj^ens that these are covered with a mass of sand, brought by the continual south winds. This sand hides from sight the sheet of water which intermingles with the soil. Througli this, whole armies have been swallowed up, in ignorance of the place, and from having mistaken their way.^ The sand slightly trodden on, leaves at first only the trace of the steps, and thus deceives those who have ventured on it, until, sus- j)ecting their danger, they seek to save themselves at the moment when there remains no means of escape. For a man thus engulfed in the mud can neither move nor extricate himself, the action of the body being hindered : neither can he get out of it ; having no solid support by which to raise himself up. This intimate mixture of the water and the sand, constitutes a kind of substance on which it is imj^os- sible to Avalk, and through which one cannot swim. Thus, those who find themselves caught there, are dragged away to the bottom of the abyss, since the banks of sand sink with 1 About twenty-five miles. 2 Compare Milton, Pa7'. Lost, II. 592 :— " A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casios old, Where armies whole have sunk." 224 THE MARCH TO SIXAI. tliem. Such is the nature of these plains, to which the name Barathra — gulfs — perfectly suits.'' *' The Hebrews, on approaching this tongue of land in the north-east direction, found themselves thus confronted by these gulfs : or, according to the Egyptian texts^, opposite Khirst — the ancient nanie^, which answers exactly to the gulfs in the Lake of Sea Weed — near the place Gerrhon. Thus will be perfectly understood the Biblical expression Pi-hahiroth, a word which literally designates ' the entrance to the bogs,' and agrees with the geographical situation. This indication is finally pointed out by another ; — for Baal- zephon— ' the Master of the North ' — was, as Baal Zaponni — the Egyptian god Anion, of Thebes, the great falconer, who crossed the lagoons ; the master of the northern countries, and, above all, of the marshes, to whom the inscriptions give the name of the Master of Khirst, that is to say, "^gulf ^ of the papyrus lagoons. To the (Ireeks he became Zeus Oasios, and had a sanctuary at the point of the extreme Egyptian frontier on the eastern side. ^' After the Hebrews crossed on foot the shallows which extend between the Mediterranean and the Lake of Sir- bonis, a high tide overtook the Egyptian horsemen and the captains of the chariots of war who fiercely pursued them. Baffled in their movements by the presence of their frightened horsemen, and thrown into disorder by their chariots of war, there happened to these soldiers and char- ioteers, that which in the course of history has sometimes occurred, not only to simple travellers, but also to whole armies. . . "When, in the first century of our era, the geogra- pher Strabo, a wise man and great observer, was travel- 1 Diodonis. i. 30. THE MARCH TO SINAI. 225 ling in Egypt, he entered in his journal the following notice : '' ' At the time of my sojourn in Alexandria, there was a high tide at the town of Pelusium, and near to Mount Casios. The waters inundated the country, so that the mountains appeared to be islands, and the road near them, leading towards Pelusium, became practicable for ships/ ^''Another fact of the same nature is related by an ancient historian. Diodorus, in describing a campaign of King Artaxerxes, against Egypt, mentions a catastrophe wdiich happened to his army at the same place : "' ' When the Persian king,^ says he, ' had united all his troops, he made them advance toward Egypt. Having arrived at the Great Lake, where they found places named '' gulfs," he lost part of his army, because he was ignorant of the character of this region.^ " ' This theory, which seems so plausible, has not, however, As has been said, commended itself to scholars, and has been rudely shaken by recent investigations of the locality. In- stead of a connected road along the shore, it has been found that there is a long interval which is bare only at ebb tide, making it almost imjDossible to pass by this way to Palestine.^ The coast line may certainly have changed in three thousand years, but, even if so, the fact that this route would have brought the Hebrews face to face with the Egyptian army at Pelusium seems conclusive that it could not be the one followed by Moses. The Egyptian account of the escape of the Hebrews from the Nile valley is necessarily very different from that of the Bible, but its very contrast is interesting, while some details * Transaction^! of OrientaUftt Congress, 1874, pp. 277-279. 2 Pal. Fmul Reports, laSO, p. 148. VOL. II.— 15 226 THE MAKCH TO SINAI. seem to throw light on particulars not otherwise known. Manetho^ the Egyptian historian, paraphrased, and in part quoted verbatim by Josephus, thus describes it : ^ ^^'Amenophis (a corrupted form of Menophthis or Me- nephtah) had a desire to see the gods, as Horns/ one of his predecessors, had done, and had told this to another Ameno- phis, the son of one of the priests of Apis — the Sacred Ox — who had the reputation of being inspired, from his wisdom, and because he could foretell things future. This man had said to him that he would see the gods when he had cleansed the country of all lepers ^ and other polluted persons. The king, rejoiced at this, gathered every one who had a bodily uncleanness, from every part of Egypt, to the number of 80,000, and sent the whole to the quarries on the east side of the Nile, to work in them, and be wholly separated from the other Egyptians. Among them, Manetho says, were some priests of note who were polluted by leprosy. The wise, prophetic man, Amenophis, now dreaded the wrath of the gods on himself and the king, when he saw how these men (the lepers, etc.) were treated, and in the end he predicted that certain people would come to their help, and would rule over Egypt thirteen years. Yet he did not venture to say this to the king, but he committed it to writing for him, and then killed himself. The king, at all this, was in great trouble. Then," says Josephus, " Manetho continues, ^ When these people had lived miserably in the quarries for 1 Jos., Contra Apion, i. 15, 26, 29. I use the version of Bunsen, founded on tbe best text of Josephus. Urkundeii, vol. i. p. 134. 2 The last king of the Eighteenth Dynasty, ^ The leprosy was regarded by the ancients as a disease peculiar to Egypt. Pliny Cxxvi. 1) calls it so, as also does Diodorus (i. 80). Lucretius says expressly, " Leprosy is a disease born in Egypt, along the waters of the Nile, and nowhere else.'' So that the Hebrews brought it with them from their Egyptian slavery. Quoted in Uhle- manu, p. 60. THE MARCH TO SINAI. 227 a good while, the king was asked to appoint them as a colony and guard, in the city Avaris, then lying desolate, through the departure of the Shepherds (the Hyksos). This town from the first had belonged to the god Seth or Typhon (the evil one). When, now, they had gone to this town, and had thus reached a point from which they could readily break out of the country, they made a certain priest of Heliopolis, by name Osarsiph — ^^ the consecrated to Osiris " — their leader, and swore a solemn covenant that they would obey him. He gave them first, as a law, that they should not bow down before any of the gods, and that they should not refrain from eating the holy animals most revered in Egypt, but should kill and use them all for food, and they were further to associate with none but members of their league. After he had given them these laws, and others similarly opposed in the highest degree to Egyptian customs, he commanded them to strengthen the walls of Avaris to the utmost, and prepare for war against Ameno- phis, the king. Moreover, he gathered round him some of the other priests and polluted ones, and sent ambassadors to the town called Jerusalem, to the Shepherds whom Thoth- mes had driven out. He told them his position and that of his fellow-outcasts, and besought them to invade Egypt along with him. He promised to lead them first to Avaris, the city of their fathers, and to 23rovide them richly with all necessities, if required, and to subdue the country to them without difficulty. They, greatly pleased, forthwith came to Avaris with 200,000 men. When, now, Amenophis, the king of Egypt, learned of the invasion of these j^eople, he was in great fear, had the holy animals which were held in the highest honour, and kept in the temples, brought to his capital, and commanded the priests to conceal all the images S28 THE MARCH TO SIKAI. of the gods as securely as possible, and sent his son Sethos — who was five years old^ and was called, also, Rameses^ after Rameses, the father of Amenophis — to his friend the king of the Ethiopians. Tie himself crossed the west arm of the Nile with his army, which consisted of about 300,000 soldiers of the greatest prowess. Yet when he reached the enemy, he fought no battle, but taking the fancy that he was fighting against the gods, he fled and came back to Memphis. There he took the Apis and the other holy animals which he had collected round him, and marched off with them, and with his whole army, and a multitude of Egyptians, to Ethiopia, the king of which — at once his friend and tributary — received him, and pro- vided all his train with everything the land offered for food, besides granting them sufficient cities and villages, for the thirteen years during which he believed the sovereignty of Egypt was to be taken from him. In addition, the king of Ethiopia set an army on the watch on the borders of Egypt, along with those whom King Amenophis had left behind him there. This happened in Ethiopia. But the Jeru- salemites who had invaded the land, along with those polluted ones of Egyptian origin, bore themselves so cruelly that the dominion of the Shepherd Kings seemed a golden age to those who saw the present wickedness. For not only did they destroy the towns : they even burned down the temples, and mutilated the carved images, and habitually used the holy of holies of the venerated sacred animals for kitchens, and forced the priests and prophets of the holy animals to kill them (for food), after which these venerable men were themselves killed, and their bodies thrown out, naked, on the streets. It is said that the man Osarsiph of Heliopolis, who founded their state and THE MAltCH TO SIXAI. 229 made their laws, when he went over to these people, changed his name and was called Moses/ "^I pass over," says Josephus, ''for brevity, other partic- ulars which the Egyptians relate of the Jews. Manetho, however, tells further, that Amenophis afterwards returned from Ethiopia with a great army, and with his son Rameses, who also led an army : that they fought with the polluted ones, overcame them, killed many, and drove the rest to the boundaries of Syria." The confusion of events and times is evident in this strange story ; but there seems to glimmer through it a proof that the Exodus was preceded by fierce religious dis- putes between the Hebrews and the Eg3rptians, and by terri- ble persecutions, extending even to the better classes. The reproach of leprosy, indeed, was only an ordinary expression of religious hatred, embodying the idea of religious rather than physical impurity; for all '^'unclean" persons were habitually denounced in this way. Leprosy has always been more or less prevalent in the Nile valley. Indeed, it was regarded by the ancients as a disease peculiar to it, but it is now known that it was common and much dreaded in Meso- potamia, from which the Jews came. The hero Gis-dubar in the Deluge tablet has to go to the spirit-land to be cured of it, as no man could cure it. His body, we are told, was full of leprosy, his skin consumed by it. He could only be healed by bathing in some water of the other world, and, having done so, his skin returned to health and shone like snow, so completely was he cleansed. Till then he had been banished from his city, but now he could go back to it. The purifica- tion lasted six days and seven nights. So sorely had he been stricken that his body had been covered with ulcers. It is easy from this to see that the Egyptians had good grounds, 230 THE MARCH TO SIITAI. in sj)eaking of Western Asiatics, and among them the He- brews, as leprous. The first camping place of the Hebrews, after their leav- ing the farther side of the Red Sea, appears to have been the spot known still as Ayun Musa — the Springs of Moses. To reach it they would need to advance round what is now the Gulf of Suez, to a little oasis in the desert sands, some miles southwards from the present town of Suez and some distance back from the Red Sea waters. I went to it by boat, across the Gulf, and then by riding, Egyptian fashion, on a donkey, over the unspeakably barren tract between it and the shore, once itself under the waters which it now borders. Crystals of salt sparkle on the surface of the hard sand, roughened only by stone, or stray plants that can stand such a soil. Channels of winter torrents seam it into low hollows, here and there, but on all sides, one sees only vari- eties of forbidding waste. Ayun Mtisa has several springs, but the largest, known as that of ^' the Three Palms, ^^ is the richest in vegetation. As you ajoproach, over reaches of loose sand like that of any beach, above high water, some palms, half invisible from the sandy dust on their fronds, are seen struggling through the yellow moving sand waves. The highest are poor stunted things, and between these and others, barely rising off the sand, are some of all low heights. There is sand round them, sand on them, sand everywhere. The large pond — of the Three Palms — I found to be fifty steps round. In fact, it is about the size of a horse pond and of no depth. Nor is there any strength in the spring, for the outlet is so shallow and narrow that a single stone of no great size is enough to fill up its channel. What w^ater flows out, is led to the wretched palms at hand, but it can do little indeed for them, in such surroundings. As to gar- THE MARCH TO SIXAI. 231 dens, it is out of the rjuestion to speak of them. Among the dwai'f palms, a few wretchedly poor Arabs had made a shelter of some palm fronds, in which no one in England would have housed an animal, and this was their home. The place could only be noticed at all, from the hideous sandy desert in which it is found. The whole so-called oasis is about five furlongs in circumference. There are several springs, some of them warm — that is, from seventy to eighty-four degrees Fahrenheit, but the water is, in some cases, very salt and bitter, though in others quite drinkable, and only slightly brackish. I was too disgusted with the squalor of everything round the large spring, to go to the others, but, at the best, the Hebrews must have been sorely pressed to think much of them. As to a supply for any number of people such as the Hebrews, in themselves, and their followers, things must have been very different to have yielded it. The huge Hebrew camp broke up at last from this spot, after we know not how long a stay, and the host moved on, following its leader, to the south. On their right, across the narrow ribbon of blue sea, rose the wild peaks of the Ataka mountains, almost the last glimpse they were to have of Africa ; on their left, Asia was shut out from them by the hills of El Raha ; the western edge of the upland wilder- ness of the Till. The track still used for caravans from Sinai, to Suez or Cairo, must have been followed ; leading them Avcarily, at some distance from the sea, amidst the glowing heat of skies without a cloud, scorching even as early as March, over a desert hard to the feet, and strewn with sharp flints. Wadys, mostly dry, but occasionally trickling with salt-tasting water, had to be crossed, but no drinkable springs invited the vast host to refresh them- 232 THE MARCH TO SIKAI. selves and their lierds. Everything was dreary and barren. Nothing living met their eye, except, perhaps, a raven, a beetle, or a lizard. High sand-hills shut out the sea on their ria'ht ; the Raha hills frowned down on them on the other side of the march, and the road, whitened with the bleaching bones of camels Avhich had fallen by the way," in the past, grew more rolling and hilly as they advanced. It was the wilderness of Shur, that is, of '^ the great frontier wall,^' known also, as that of ^^ Etham,'" the wall "forts. ^^^ For three days the vast multitude toiled along, relying on the waterskins they had brought with them ; but these were at last exhausted, and the agonies of thirst began to tell on all. It was a dismal beginning of their new history, and contrasted keenly with the expectations they must have formed after their triumphal deliverance from Pharaoh. The coast of the Eed Sea along which the Hebrews marched continues the same as to Ayun Mtisa — a raised beach with long intervals of hard gravel, roughened by hillocks and waves of sand, in low terraces and knolls, where the surface has, in past ages, been sawn through by torrents, or stretched out by the sea. Many torrent beds, dry except after storms, but sometimes deep and dangerous with sudden floods, dur- ing the rainy season, break the level, at times indenting the shore for the breadth of a mile. Fierce hurricanes, filling the air with sand, are not infrequent at some times of the year, and occasionally overpower both man and beast. It is to be hoped the Hebrews had neither floods nor sandstorms on their weary, burning route. At last, however, they reached Huwarah, then known as Marah, and found water, but it was too salt and bitter to drink. ^ Their moral training had already begun. Jehovah had saved them at the Red Sea, > Exod. XV. 33. Num. xxxiii. 8. * " Marah," in Riehm, p. 953. THE MARCH TO SIIn^AI. 233 and would have them learn to trust Him for the future. But it was a hard lesson^, and the camp once more broke out in loud murmurs against Moses. It was^, indeed, an awful test of their reliance on their unseen Guide and Protector. At dawn, in these regions, it is mild and balmy as an Italian cpring, and inconceivably lovely in the colours it sheds on earth, air, and sky. But presently the sun bursts up from the sea, a fierce enemy that will force every one to crouch Ijefore him. For two hours his rays are endurable, but after that they become a fiery ordeal. The morning beams op- press you with a feeling of sickness, their steady glow blinds your eyes, blisters your skin, and parches your mouth, till you have only one thought — when evening is to come. At noon the heat, reverberated by the glowing hills, is like the blast of a limekiln. The wind sleeps on the reeking shore. The sky is a dead white. Men are not so much sleeping as half senseless. They feel as if a few more degrees of heat would be death.' The shores of the Red Sea and the neigh- bouring regions, east and Avest, are, indeed, the hottest por- tion of the world, as may be judged from the thermometer sometimes rising above the heat of boiling water at vSuakim. Under such circumstances the want of water is an indescrib- able calamity, and the excitement and confusion when some is found, or is supposed to be found, are terrible. "The crowd of thirsty men," says Buckingham, describing such a scene, '^ plunged at once into the stream in the darkness of the night, ignorant of its depths, which drowned some of the horses. The cries of the animals, the shouting and quarrelling of the people, and the sense of danger on every hand was awful." ^ No wonder that in the wondrous open- ing passage of Mendelssohn's " Elijah," genius, trying to 1 Burton's Meccah., 3d ed., p. 145. ' Buckini^ham's Mesopotamia, vol. ii. p. 8. 234 THE MARCH TO STN-AI. represent the despair of n whole people perishing from thirst — after giving it vent at first in sullen, restless mur- murings, pictures it as gathering at length a terrible cumu- lative strength, and bursting forth almost appallingly, in cries of heart-rending and importunate agony. Yet help was near at hand, could they but have believed in the God to whom they had vowed themselves so recently. '^ And Moses cried unto Jehovah : and Jehovah showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the water, the waters were made sweet/' and the thirst of all relieved. A gra- cious promise was, besides, vouchsafed, that, if they faith- fully obeyed the Divine commands and followed Jehovah loyally, they would have no such diseases sent among them as had been inflicted on the Egyptians. Huwarah is from fifteen to seventeen hours of the slow tread of camels from Ayun Musa, and thus suits the posi- tion of Marah, as " three days " distant from that place. On a sand-hill on the caravan road to Sinai, surrounded by a few straggling palms and thorn bushes, there is still a shallow spring, from which Ebers, attempting to drink, was warned oif by his guide with the cry, ^^ Morra, Morra,^' the Arab for Marah, '' bitter.^' Indeed, even after his adding brandy, it was found bitterly salt.' The Arabs and their camels only drink it when in the extremity of thirst, and even then some will not taste it.^ The small quantity of 1 Ebers, p. 117. This is caused by the action of sesquicarbonate of soda, with which tlie soil of the whole neighbourhood is impregnated. 2 Burckhardt, in Knobel's JSxodu.f, p. 160. Robinson and Seetzen, liowever, say their camels drank readily of it. Robinson's Palest., vol. i. p. 106. Its taste seems to depend on the time of the year. Kneucker supports the opinion that the Hebrews crossed the Red Sea above Suez, at the " Bitter Sea," the water tlien, he thinks, reaching thither. He consequently fancies Marah much farther to the north than Huwarah. Bibel- Lexicon, vol. iv. p. 111. There is certainly at the place he indicates, Ain Nuba, three hours south of Suez, a very bitter spring, of much larger volume than that at Huwarah. Brugsch and Hitzig also think this was Marah, THE MARCn TO SIXAI. 235 water now fomul has been urged as a ground for fjuostioning the correctness of its identification with the Marah of Exo- dus ; hut the sand may have choked up the spring in thou- sands of years, besides affecting the supply otherwise, and, moreover, tlierc are traces of its much greater abundance in some years tlian in others. It is the first water found in any quantity after leaving Ayun Musa, and suits the re- quirements of the sacred narrative both as to distance, and from the fact that there are no other bitter springs in the neighbourhood.' Travellers, with one exception hitherto, have failed to dis- cover any tree or plant in the district which has any effect in sweetening the spring. Lesseps, however, tells us, that Arab sheiks assured him they were accustomed to 2:)ut a kind of barberry which grows in the desert into such l)itter water, to make it palatable;- and the remark of Palmer is worthy of notice, that the Bedouins use the word " tree '^ for every- thing with any medicinal properties.^ There are, besides, in other countries, plants and trees with the very qualities ascribed by Exodus to the tree of Marah. Thus a tree which grows on the coast of Coromandel — the Xellimaram — sweet- ens bitter water. The missionary, Kiernander, tells us that a spring in the Mission garden, having become bitter from want of rain, was made palataljle by throwing into it a branch of this tree, and this is confirmed by another mis- sionary, Sattler. The bottoms of newly dug wells are, in- deed, floored with the Xellimaram, by the Tamulese, for the very purpose of keeping the water sweet. In Peru, also, 8uppopin;2; that the crossing took place at the Bitter Sea. It is indeed impossible to speak with confidence on matters of which so many details are unknown. 1 Bnrckhardt and Wellsted, quoted by Knobel, p. 160. Seetzen's lidsen, vol. iii. p. 117. 8 Ebers' J>urck Oosen, p. 117. ^ Desert of the Exodus, vol. i. p. 83. 236 THE MARCH TO SINAI. there is a plant called Yerva by the Spaniards, which has the power of purifying any water, however salt or bad, and making it drinkable. The people carry it with them when- ever they travel any distance, to correct the unwholesome- ness of the water on the road.'^^ Breaking up ^ from Marah, the next station, two hours ^^^ farther on, was Elim — ^'^the trees ^^ — so called from "sev- enty palms " which marked the presence of no fewer than twelve sj)rings. This spot, so inviting to the Hebrews, is identified by most with the AVady Gharandel, only two and a half hours south of Huwarah or Marah. It is a broad hollow running north-east to south-west, from near the hill chain of El Eaha to the sea, a distance of about twelve miles. It is, after that of the AVady Feiran, farther on, the largest oasis of the Sinai Peninsula, and is still famous among the Arabs for the abundance of its waters, though their estimate in such matters is that of Orientals, rather than one from AYestern or Northern standards. Even so early as March, only shrunken threads of water, hardly deep enough to float a boy's paper boat, are visible ; but, as we may see, one need only have wandered in the desert for a few days to appreciate the worth and charm of even such a spot. When it has not rained for a length of time, the water does not reach the sea ; but the Arabs say that it does so after wet weather. It tastes somewhat salt, but is drink- able. A few palms, mostly low and bushy, with some tama- risks and acacias, ornament the valley, and strips of grass J Rosenmiiller's Morgenland, vol. ii. p. 29. 2 The rapidity with which a large Eastern encampment breaks up is wonderful. In quarter of the time which it would take a poor family in England to get the furni- ture of a single room ready for removal, the tents of a large encampment will be struck, and, together with all the movables and provisions, packed away on the backs of camels, mules, or asses, and the whole party will be on its way, leaving not a rag or a halter behind them. Pictorial Hible, vol. i. p. 87. THE MARCH TO SINAI. 237 and herbage offer pasture for the camels of passing Arabs or travellers. At different times, in fact, the wady presents very dif- ferent appearances. Niebuhr says that, after rain, a jiow- erful stream rushes through it. Burckhardt says that the spring from which the water flows is copious, but that the stream from it is only a small one, though the water is the best between it and Cairo. Robinson thinks that, though salt, it is not so disagreeable as that of Huwarah ; and finally. Harper, on two occasions found a delightful small stream of good water running through the wady. There were bushes in plenty and clumps of the stunted palms of the desert. There were even pools in some parts, but they were only like those of a Scotch '' burn." Forget-me-nots and maiden-hair ferns hung on the banks, and birds shewed themselves. There is, also, some j^asture of the Eastern type, which is very poor, in some parts of the wady.' But vegetation seems to have been much more abundant in former times, for old travellers speak of it in glowing terms, dwelling on the many trees and the small copses it boasted, and especially noting the palms and numerous tamarisks ; though the destruction of trees by the Arabs for ages has no doubt lessened the general richness which greeted the Hebrews. The soil and the limestone hills which bound the valley are, on the whole, however, now very bare. On the other side of the sea, dark, shattered, and verdureless, rise the boundary hills of Upper Egypt, while the Eaha chain shuts in the view on the east. But, if even now, the valley be hailed by the Arabs as almost a Paradise, in comparison with the desert in which it lies, what must ' Harper, The Bible and Modern Discoveries, p. 118. Niebuhr's lieisebesch., vol. 1. p. 227 ; BurckJiardt's Syria, p. 778. Ebers' Durch Gosen, p. 120. 238 THE MAKCH TO SIKAI. it have been 3,500 years ago to tlie weary and thirsty Hebrews ? iiiiiif Ritter's Erdkiinde^ vol. xiv. p. T69. 2 Ebers says there is only a small spring of bad water. Burch Gosen, p. 124. Who will reconcile the«e contradictions ? I presume the month of a traveller's visit and the drought or ruin before it, account for the very opposite appearances of the same place described. ^ Ebers' Durch Gosen, p. 121. 240 THE MARCH TO SINAI. of plains shut in by naked white-yellow hills and rocky walls of sandstone, many of which in the distance seem like the work of man. Closing on all sides like an amphitheatre, they so surround the traveller, that he looks in vain for an exit ; hut, as he advances, the way opens of itself after a long, weary ascent. The road winds on thus from one plain to anotlier, every short advance bringing a new view exactly similar to that just left. Th.e shapes of the hills, indeed, vary, but as long as the sun is up the colours remain the same — yellow, gray, brown, and black ; the only tints, as it appears, that nature has had to spare for this desert region. There is little verdure, and even the creatures which make these parts their dwelling, the camel, the hyena, and the antelope, have the colour of the wilderness in which they are bred, in illustration of the fact that the creatures of any region are always found coloured so as to secure them the greatest safety, or to help them most in the struggle for life in that region. Mount Taijibeh, however, varies the land- scape, rising in sloping beds of different colours ; gold-yel- low bearing on it great bands of red, then a broad belt of black, and this is crowned, finally, by a summit of yellow. Here, on the edge of the Red Sea, amidst the sound of its Avaters, the tents of the Hebrews were once more pitched.' Why they were led thus to the shore again we caji only con- jecture. Was it for the springs of fresh water for the host ? Or to take advantage of the landing port from Egypt for the Sinai mining region, which might secure them many commodities, of which they would hereafter stand in need ? Or was it to get food for the muHitude, from the magazines, and from vessels in the harbour ? "^ 1 Num. xxxiii. 10. / 2 Ebers thinks that the number of men fit for war— 600,000— given as that of the Hebrews at the Exodus, must be a corruption of the text, copied from one transcriber THE MARCH TO SINAI. 241 The road from the seashore encampment led for some dis- tance along the coast. Leaving the high chalky cliffs of Wady Taijibeh, with tlieir blinding glare, the Hebrews would enter on the plain of El Markha, called in Exodus the wilderness of Sin, which runs along the strand — a deso- late expanse of flints, gravel, and sand, nearly destitute of vegetation, broken from time to time by equally desolate wadys opening on it from the interior. There is hardly any more dismal tract in the whole peninsula. Even in winter the heat is indescribable during the day, and it was now to the other. la explanation of his opinion he says : " In Goshen two millions of people— the gross number which tJOO,000 men j)re.supposes — not including the Egyp- tians who lived among them, would have made a denser population than that of the kingdom of Saxonj" : in other words, it would not have been an agricultural, far less a ])aptoral people, but a manufacturing. The whole area of Sinai," he continues, "is about 2,000 square miles (English), so that if the Israelites had ever been equally dis- tributed over it, which is not said, and naturally could not have been the case— leav- ing out of the reckoning the resident tribes of Midianites, Amalekites, etc. — the population to the square mile would have been 10 per cent, denser than in the Grand Duchy of W'eimar." * "The water supply is another difficulty. Assuming that the Prussian military allowance of two Prussian quarts daily— equal to half a gallon— was required for each person, a quantity rather too small than too great m such a climate, l.OOO.UOO gallons would be required each day, or 18,.5]S hogsheads. But all the cattle, which were very numerous, had, besides, to be supplied. Allowing only 10 hours a day for water- drawing, a time so shorX as to l)e wholly unequal to the requirements, a spring would liave needed to yield -28 gallons a second to supply the human wants, without reckon- ing those of the cattle. At the present time the Bedouins of the district are in serious trcjuble if a caravan of oven a few hundred men draw water, in passing, from even their largest springs ; lest they should exhaust it. for the time." The water-supply of London is at present 1. "54.000,000 gallons a day— for, say .5,000,000 persons. On this scale, supposing the Hebrews, with the mixed multitude that went out with them, numbered in all, as many think, about 3,000,000, this would require a daily supply of about 88,000,000 gallons, supposing this quantity to maintain the cattle and flocks as well. But even if we lowered the required amount to 60,000,000 gallons a day it means no less than 2ti7,8.o7 tons weight of water every day. But the populousness, in ancient time.s, of neighbouring districts, now well-nigh as barren as Sinai, disturbs all these calculations. * At. 11, .500 square miles, the area of the peninsula given by the Ordnance Survey 2,000,000 would give 174 to the square mile over the whole surface, counting the mountains as level ground. Palmer's S'uiai, p. 4. The 2,000 square miles of Sinai must refer only to the triangle of the Sinai mountains. VOL. IL-16 242 THE MARCH TO SINAI. approaching the middle of the year. " From about nine till eleven in the morning of a bright day/' says Palmer, " when the sun's power is not yet tempered by a cooling sea breeze, travel is almost intolerable, especially to the new-comer. Heat is everywhere present, seen as well as felt. The waters of the gulf, beautiful in colour — deep azure far out from land ; slowly fading, as they near the shore, to the most del- icate blue, are mirror-like — almost motionless — breaking on the beach only in a sluggish, quiet ripple. The sky, also beautifully blue, is clear, hot, and without a cloud ; the soil of the desert is baked and glowing. The camel-men, usu- ally talkative and noisily quarrelsome, grow pensive and silent — their fiercest wrangles hushed in the heat of a fiercer sun. The camels grunt and sigh, yet toil along under their burdens, in a resolute plodding way which one can scarcely understand. Even the Bedouins, usually indifferent to the sun's rays, draw their thalebs, or white linen tunics, over their heads and shoulders, and tramp along under the lee of their camels ; glad to avail themselves of the niggard scraps of shadow, which, though the sun is now approaching the meridian, the tall forms of these animals afford. When, at last, the sea breeze comes, one breathes a little more freely : the heat, though still great, feels less oppressive : clouds di- versify the sky : the sea breaks into life and motion, and all the conditions of the march improve. " Evening brings with it, however, the pleasantest part of the day, but the halt is followed by a scene of uproar and confusion which almost baffles description. The baggage camels, in nine cases out of ten, stoutly refuse, at first, to sit down to be unloaded, and each animal's refusal is the sig- nal for a savage onslaught from its master, aided by every available ally he can summon to the fray. The struggle THE MARCH TO SIN^AI. 243 that follows is desperate and noisy : the camels resist with a hideous series of unearthly snarling roars : the Bedouins swell the din by yells and screams, and curse everything they can think of ; especially, of course, the camel, who, perverse as he is, gives in at last/^ ' If, instead of a cara- van, we imagine a countless host, this vivid picture, no doubt, answers, in the main, in the unchanging East, to the scene, as the Hebrews toiled wearily on, with their wives, children, multitudinous herds, and vast aggregate of baggage. To add to the general distress, the stores of wheat, flour, and food of various kinds, brought from Egypt, which must have been enormous to have lasted so long, began to fail, in spite of any additions which may have been procured at their last station ; for it was now six weeks since they had crossed the Red Sea. Water had failed them before, and the intolerable agonies of thirst had raised murmurs against Moses. Famine now threatened, and in the presence of this new fear, the miracles of the past were forgotten. Fierce cries rose against both Moses and Aaron, and bitter regrets were heard on all sides that they had not stayed in slavery on the Xile, where they had had " flesh pots, and bread to the full." ^ It is hard for even the best of men to trust calmly in the Providence of God when all human resources are failing, and it must have been harder still for a mixed host like that of the Hebrews, to whom their very religion was new, to do so. They had not realized that since they were under the care of Jehovah Himself, they could never want. But flesh and bread were about to be supplied from sources they little imagined, for the evening saw a great flight of quails alight amidst the encampment, and on the next morning manna covered the ground far and near. » Palmcr'a Explorations, p. 20. 2 Exod. xvi. 3. 244 THE MARCH TO SIN"AI. No great flocks of birds of any kind are found in the Sinai Peninsula, though one meets single birds, and among them larks and our common starling. Quails, however, not unfrequently pass over it in great migratory swarms, on their way from the interior of Africa, in the late spring, when the Hebrews encountered them, and they necessarily alight for rest. They fly, as a rule, in the evening,' and al- ways before the wind," keeping near the ground ^ — birds of the earth rather than of the air, as Pliny remarks." Ex- hausted with their journey, they are easily killed with sticks, or caught in nets, or even by the hand." The Egyp- tian monuments show such scenes, and the quails being snared by bird-catchers with nets and traps. They were eaten, in many cases, merely dried in the sun and salted, without being cooked — the monuments furnishing pictures of the process." So plentiful, indeed, were these birds at times, that a colony of wretched Egyptian offenders, muti- lated by having the nose cut oif, and banished to the mouth of AVady el Arish, on the coast between Egypt and Pales- tine, are recorded to have lived on them, by setting up nets made of split reeds, along the shore, to entangle them as they came, in clouds, tired and heavy, over the sea.' These swarms are in fact familiar in many parts of the East. In 1 Exod. xvi. 13. 2 Ps. Ixsviii. 26. Read " S. E. wind," for " E."' 3 Our version, in Num. xi. 31, reads as if the quails were two cubits thick on the ground, one over the other. It should be " flying about two cubits above the ground." See Knobel, Num., p. 56. Also, Vulgate. The Targnm of Onkelos rightly says, " The wind bore them upon the camp at the breadth of a day's journey here, and a day's journey there, round about the camp, and as at a height of two cubits over the face of the ground."' Dean Stanley suggests that instead of quails we should read storks, from the height above the ground, but the true sense shows the fancifulness of this explanation. The stork, also, is uneatable. ^ Pliny, Nat. Hist., x. ;i3. & Purrer, in Bibel Lex., vol. v. p. 626. 6 Ebers' Durch Gosen, p. 563. Rawlinson's Herod.., ii. 110. 7 Diodorua, i. 60. THE MARCH TO SIJ^^AI. 245 Palestine, and on the Euphrates, they are very common after the spring rains, and immense numbers of birds are caught for food and sale — their flesh being greatly prized.' Their flight being weak, they instinctively select the shortest sea passages in their migrations, and avail themselves of any island as a resting place. Hence, in spring and autumn, on their way from Africa, and on their return to it, they are slaughtered in great numbers in Malta and the Greek islands, where they remain, each time, only a day or two. It was natural, therefore, that the Israelites should meet them in the desert of Sin, for they would follow the land in Africa till the Ked Sea was narrowed by the projecting Sinai Peninsula, and take advantage of it to cross to Asia. In- deed, vast flocks are known to visit the Sinai deserts, even now, at the time of migration. Tristram tells us that in Algeria, also, he has found the ground covered with them, over many acres, at daybreak, where, on the preceding after- noon, there had not been one. They were so fatigued, he adds, that they scarcely moved till almost trodden upon. He noticed the same phenomenon in Palestine, on a smaller scale — catching one with his hands, in the Jordan valley, while another was actually crushed by his horse^s feet.'^ The supply of manna"* has been variously explained ; but though natural phenomena may indicate the direction in which miraculous aid was vouchsafed, they are inadequate, in their ordinary exhibition, to account for the whole facts recorded. One theory, which has met with favour from many, is that manna was simply the sugary exudation from 1 Hammer, Gesch. d. Osmanisoheit JReiches, 2te Auf. vol. i. p. 724. a Tristram, y^at. Hist, of the Bible, p. 231. 3 The word manna seems to mean, prynarily, " a gift " (from God), but that in no way excludes the play on it by the Hebrews, as was usual with them, by making it also mean "What is it?" which its form permits. Man-hu was also an Egyptian word for the manna of the tamarisk tree. 246 THE MARCH TO SINAI. the twigs of the tamarisk tree, which from the earliest ages has been called ''man/' or ''manna/' by the Arabs. The twigs, not the feathery leaves, distil a sweet, syrupy, honey- like substance, which falls in heavy drops, and is gathered by the Bedouins and put into leather bags, to be used, in part as a relish with their thin flat bread ; partly for sale at Cairo, and to the monks of St. Catherine's convent at Sinai. The tamarisk is richer in sap than almost any other growth of the Peninsula, retaining its greenness when every- thing else is withered by the fierce summer heat. Its "manna" exudes from punctures made by an insect in the tender skin of the twigs in spring. It flows most freely after heavy rain, but needs to be cleansed and prepared be- fore being flt for food. "White manna" is mentioned on the Egyptian monu- ments as a kind of vegetable food,' and was used both in offerings, and in the laboratory as a medicine ; so that the substance has been known from the earliest times. The Bed- ouins still speak of it as " raining from heaven," because it falls from the trees with the dew. Like the true manna, it also lies on the ground like hoar-frost in the earliest morning. That there was dew when it fell, in the case of the Hebrews is, by the way, a proof that their camp was not in the arid wilderness, but where water and pasture existed. The ap- pearance of ' ' worms " in what was gathered, if kept too long, has been explained by that of the larvae of the fly that produces the tamarisk manna, which erelong show themselves, if it be not cleansed by passing through a coarse cloth. Like that of the Bible, this manna looks like coriander seeds ; tastes like honey, and melts in the sun.'* To the objection that the tamarisk manna is found only 1 Durch Gosen, p. 236. " Ritter, Erdkmide, vol. viii. Absch. i. pp. 680 ff. THE MARCH TO SI1^"AI. 247 for a month or two in si)ring, Ritter answers that it is not said in the Bible to have fallen every day of the year, but was only an addition to the food of the Hebrews, who had, besides, dates, ^ and flocks and herds, for milk and flesh, '^ and doubtless bought food from the Amalekites, Midianites, and Ishmaelites who lived in the district, as they wished after- wards to do Avith the Edomites/ As to the smallness of the quantity now obtained, Ritter says, very justly, that the produce of the few trees at present existing, cannot be taken as a measure of that which a prob- ably much greater number yielded in the days of Moses. It is certain, indeed, that Sinai, in ancient times, was much more fertile than it has since become. There are still, in- deed, traces of ancient lakes, in the now arid valleys of Sinai, which have only gradually risen to their present elevation from a submergence in later geological ages of at least two hundred feet under the waters of the Red Sea, raised beaches being found with shells, corals, and crinoids of species still living in the adjoining waters. The climatic changes of Palestine from a land of abundant rain to its present com- parative want of moisture must have affected the condition of a district so near it. There is no doubt, indeed, that the vegetation of the wadys has greatly decreased, in part as the inevitable effect of the winter torrents. The trunks of palm trees washed up on the shore of the Dead Sea, from which the living tree has now for many centuries disaj^- peared, shoAV what may have been the devastation produced among those mountains, when the floods, especially in earlier times, must have been violent to a degree unknown in Palestine ; whilst the peculiar cause — the impregnation of salt — which has preserved the vestiges of the older » Exod. XV. 27. 2 Exod. xii. 38 ; xvii. 3. 3 Deut. ii. 6. 248 THE MARCH TO SIKAI. vegetation there, has, of course, no existence here, in Sinai/ " Long before the children of Israel marched through the wilderness," says the Rev. F. W. Holland,^ " the mines were worked by the Egyptians., and the destruction of trees was probably going on. It is hardly likely that the Israel- ites themselves would have passed a year in an enemy's country, knowing that they were to march onwards, with- out adding largely to this destruction. Their need of fuel mnst have been great, and they would not hesitate to cut down the trees, and lay waste the gardens ; and thus, before they journeyed onwards from Mount Sinai, they may have caused a complete change in the face of the surrounding disti-ict. *' It is a well-known fact that the rainfall of a country dejoends in a great measure upon the abundance of its trees. The destruction of the trees in Sinai has, no doubt, diminished the rainfall, which has also gradually been less- ened by the advance of the desert, and decrease of cul- tivation on the north and north-west ; whereby a large rain-making area has been gradually removed. " In consequence, too, of the mountainous character of the Peninsula of Sinai, the destruction of the trees would have a much more serious effect than would be the case in most countries. Formerly, when the mountain-sides were terraced, when garden-walls extended across the wadys, and the roots of trees retained the moisture, and broke the force of the water, the terrible floods that now occur, and sweep everything before them, would be impossible. *' In the winter of 1867 I witnessed one of the greatest floods that has ever been known in the Peninsula. I was 1 Sinai and Palestine^ p. 26. '^ Recomry of Jerusalem^ p. 513. THE MARCH TO SINAI. 249 encamped in Wacly Feirdn, near the base of Jebel Serbal, when a tremendous thunder-storm burst on us. After little more than an hour's rain, the water rose so rapidly in the previously dry wady, that I had to run for my life, and with great difficulty succeeded in saving my tents and my goods ; my boots, which I had not time to pick up, were washed away. In less than two hours a dry desert wady, upwards of 300 yards broad, was turned into a foaming torrent, eight to ten feet deep, roaring and tearing down, and bearing everything before it — tangled masses of tamarisks, hundreds of beautiful palm trees, scores of sheep and goats, camels and donkeys, and even men, women, and children ; for a whole encampment of Arabs was washed away a few miles above me. The storm commenced at five o'clock in the evening ; at half-j^ast nine the waters were rapidly subsid- ing, and it was evident that the flood had spent its force. In the morning only a gently flowing stream, a few yards broad, and a few inches deep, remained. But the whole bed of the valley was changed. Here, heaps of boulders were piled up, where hollows had been the day before ; there, holes had taken the j)lace of banks covered with trees. Two miles of tamarisk wood, situated above the palm groves, had been completely washed away, and upwards of 1,000 palm trees swept down to the sea. '^ The fact is that, in consequence of the barrenness of the mountains, the water, when a heavy storm of rain falls, runs down from their rocky sides just as it does, in Britain, from the roofs of our houses. There is nothing in the valleys to check it, and so it gathers force almost instantaneously, and sweeps everything before it. The monks used formerly to build walls across the gullies leading down from the moun- tains ; they planted the wadys with fruit trees, and made 250 THE MARCH TO SIlfAI. terraces for their gardens, and these checked the drainage and let it down by degrees, so that the storms in those days must have been comparatively harmless. The Amalekites and former inhabitants of the Peninsula, adopted probably the same means for increasing the fertility of their coun- try.- Fire, also, has played its part in making Sinai the desert it, in great part, now is ; for a spark from the pipe of a Bedouin may destroy all the trees of a valley. Charcoal for local mining purposes must, moreover, have been required from the earliest ages, and have caused a terrible destruction of trees. Even now, indeed, that made from the acacia may be said to be the only traffic of the Peninsula.' Camels loaded with it are constantly met on the way between Cairo and Suez. Hence, in the valleys from which the acacia wood was readily procured by the Hebrews, for the building of the Ark and many other sacred uses, the tree is now utterly unknown. The greater number of trees, formerly, would, moreover, not only increase the rainfall ; the fertility of the region, thus caused, would attract a denser population that can now exist in these regions, and their care and labour would in- crease the vegetable richness of the district. Nor are indica- tions wanting, both in the Sinai Peninsula and in the desert regions south of Palestine, of the presence of a far larger population than the present. The Egyptian mines created extensive intercourse with the Nile ; and in Edom, and the southern wilderness of the Tih, remains of cities still prove that a traffic and bustle of human life, almost inconceivable at this day, once animated these now silent landscapes. Yet, with every allowance for greater fertility over the 1 Sinai and Palestine, p. 27, THE MARCH TO SIXAI. 351 Peninsula and the desert north of it in the time of Moses, we fear that the explanation of the supjoly of manna as hav- ing come from the tamarisk tree is Avholly inadeqnate. Another idea has, however, been advanced — that of its having been derived from the manna rains known in various countries. There is an edible lichen which sometimes falls in showers several inches deep, the wind having blown it from the spots where it grew, and carried it onwards. In 1824 and in 1828, it fell in Persia and Asiatic Turkey in great quantities. In 1829, during the war between Persia and Russia, there was a great famine at Oroomiah, south- west of the Caspian Sea. One day, during a violent wind, the surface of the country was covered with what the people called ^' bread from heaven,"^ which fell in thick showers. tSheep fed on it greedily, and the people, who had never seen it before, induced by this, gathered it, and having re- duced it to flour, made bread of it, which they found palata- ble and nourishing. In some places it lay on the ground five or six inches deej). In the spring of 1841, an amazing quantity of this substance fell in the same region, covering the ground, here and there, to the dej)th of from three to four inches. Many of the particles were as large as hail- stones. It was gray, and sweet to the taste, and made ex- cellent bread. In 1846, a great manna rain, which occurred at Jenischehr, during a famine, attracted great notice. It lasted several days, and pieces as large as a hazel-nut fell in quantities. AVhen ground and baked it made as good bread, in the opinion of the people, as that from grain. In 1846, another rain of manna occurred in the government of Wilna, and formed a layer upon the ground, three or four inches deep. It was of a grayish white colour, rather hard, irregular in form, without smell, and insipid. Pallas, the 252 THE MAKCH TO SINAI. Eussiau naturalist, observed it on the arid mountains and limestone tracts of the Great Desert of Tartary. In 1828, Parrott brought some from Mount Ararat, and it proved to be a lichen known as ParmGlia Esculcnta, which grows on chalky and stony soil, like that of the Kirghese Steppes of Central Asia. Eversmann described several kinds of it, last century, as found east of the Caspian, and widely spread over Persia and Middle Asia. It is round, and at times as large as a walnut, varying from that to the size of a pin's head, and does not fix itself in the soil in which it grows, but lies free and loose, drinking in nourishment from the surface, and easily carried off by the wind, which sweeps it away in vast quantities in the storms of spring, and thus causes the "manna rains 'Mn the districts over which the wind travels.' It has been acutely remarked ' that the description of manna in Exodus seems to imply that there were two kinds of it, since the same substance could not ^^be ground in mills or beaten in mortars'^ and yet ^^ melt in the sun.'' There would then be room for supposing that both the tree and the lichen manna may have played a part in the supply of the Hebrews ; but, in any case, there were special features which imply miraculous agency. The quantity of manna now gathered in the Peninsula in the best season is not more than 600 or 700 pounds weight a year, and generally not more than a third of this quantity, so that no probable estimate of the greater fertility of the district in ancient times could suppose the production equal to the wants of the vast host of Israel. That which they enjoyed was nutri- 1 Ritter, Erdkunde, vol. viii. A.bsch. i. pp. G80 ff. Macmillan's Footnotes from the Page of Nature, p. 104. 2 Kalisch, Exodus, p. 214. Robinson's Palestine., vol. i. p. 170. Laborde's Exodus and Numbers, p. 97. THE MARCH TO SIKAI. 253 tious and satisfying, whereas the tree manna is rather a con- diment than a food, and was rightly classed by tlie Ancient Egyptians, for its effects on the body, as a drug, and kept, as such, in the medical storerooms found in all temples. That a double quantity fell on the sixth day, and none on the seventh, points,' moreover, to direct providential arrangements, and it certainly looks as if the tree manna, which has always been well known, could not have been so great a wonder to the Hebrews, as to have required a sample to be preserved to future generations. The explanations of earlier writers have, at times, been very curious. Manna was supposed, for instance, to have been the dust of trees blown off by the air, or sweet vapours rising from them, and falling, when condensed by the dew, in a thick honey -like substance. Air manna was the name given to this fanciful creation." '' The intense heat in Arabia," says Oedman, '^ draws a number of sweet juices from the trees and shrubs growing there, and the odours of these rise in the air and float so long as they are lighter than the atmosphere, but thicken as the evening cools, and fall with the dew in a sticky, honey -like form/' This theory is supported by authorities which are at least curious, however scientifically incorrect. Avicenna,"* in his great book on medicine, describes manna as '^a dew which falls on stones or plants, has a sweet taste, is of the thickness of honey, and hardens into a grain-like form." In another place he speaks of a kind of manna which is the vapour of trees and plants, 1 The words " abide ye every man in lu>' place on tlie seventh day," were held by one Jewish sect a« a command that no one should move at all during the whole Sabbath from the spot and position in which its commencement found him. Routh, On Hegesippits, li. *?., vol. i. p. 225. 2 See a long list of authorities in Rosenmiiller's Das Alte u. Neite MorgerUand, vol. ii. p. 34. 3 Born near Bokhara, a.d. 976. Died at Ecbatana, in Persia, a.d. 1036. 254 THE MARCH TO SIKAI. undergoing a certain preparation in tlie air and falling like honey, at nighty on trees and stones. In the same way Aris- totle says, "' Honey falls from the air, especially at the ascent of the larger stars, and when the rainbow is seen, but not before the rising of the Pleiades.'^ Pliny, agreeing with this, writes, " From the rising of the Pleiades honey falls from the air, about daybreak. At that time the leaves of the trees are found bedewed with honey, and any one early afoot has his clothes as it were anointed, and his hair ropy/' Shaw, in strange keeping with these fancies, tells us that when travelling in Palestine, his bridle and saddle were one night covered with sticky dew. The monks at Sinai also speak of manna falling on the roof of their cloister, but this may be the manna of the tamarisk, carried by the air. A number of trees, in fact, yield more or less of a sweet substance known as manna. Two kinds of ash in Sicily and Italy produce it; the camers-thorn of India, Egypt, Arabia, Northern Persia, and Syria, is equally famous over these widely separate regions ; the plant called gharb, which grows in the valley of the Jordan, yields what is called the Beiruk honey ; and several kinds of oak, in different coun- tries, have also a saccharine exudation, due to the punctures of the leaves by insects. All these sorts, which, however, are rather a form of sugar than any more substantial food, are gathered for use ; but they throw little light, after all, on the manna of the Hebrews. The edible lichen seems in all respects most similar to the famous '' heavenly bread " of Sinai and the wilderness,' but there is no record of its hav- 1 Furrer thinks the tamarisk manna that of Exodus. Bibel Lex., vol. iv. p. 109. So also does the author of the art. "Manna," in Riehm's Handiv&r-terbuch. Ebers' JDurch Goserh pp. 223-247, Winer, Realwdrterbiich, art. "Manna." Ritter, Erd- Jcvncle, vol. xiv. pp. 665 ff. Miihlau and Volck, Gesenins' Lex., 8te Auf. p. 478. Knobel, Exodus, p. 173. Captain Palmer thinks the quantity too small to have ever THE MARCH TO SI]^AI. 255 ing been observed in the Peninsula of Sinai. Dean Stanley forcibly sums up the improbability of the tamarisk manna being that of Exodus : "An exudation like honey, produced by insects ; used only for medicinal purposes ; falling on the ground only from accident or neglect, and at present pro- duced in sufficient quantities only to support one man for six months, has obviously but few points of similarity with the * small round thing, small as the hoar-frost on the ground ; like coriander seed, white ; its taste like wafers made with honey ; gathered and ground in mills, and beat in a mortar, baked in pans and made into cakes, and its taste as the taste of fresh oil/^^ In his opinion the manna of Kurdistan and Persia — the edible lichen, "far more nearly corresponds to the Mosaic account.'' * Vaihinger thinks that the tamarisk manna, even if miraculously in- creased, would not satisfy the requirements of the sacred narrative. His closing remarks deserve quotation on various grounds. " All recent travellers," says he, " inform us that the whole peninsula has not at this time over 6,000 inhabi- taj^ts, and maintain that its barren soil could not support many more. But as in the time of the Exodus there were Midianites in the south of it, and Amalekites in no small number lived in its northern parts, it seems hardly conceiv- able how a nation of 2,000,000 persons could find room in addition, and secure food. Yet this estimate of the Israel- ites is confirmed by two different reckonings.'* An increase of fertility to the extent of five hundred-fold must therefore be assumed during forty years, to explain the support of the Israelites; and, moreover, the tamarisk manna cannot be made into bread. been of any moment, while, besides, it is only found in May and June. Recent Explorationti, p. 24. 1 Sinai and Palestine, vol. i. p. 28. ^ Exod. xii. 37. Num. i. 40 ; ii. 33 ; xxvi. 51. 256 THE MAECII TO SIKAI. ^' If, besides, the number of Israelites at the Exodus is right, and we have no reason for doubting it : if the forty years' wandering in the wiklerness be a historical fact : nothing remains but to regard the manna as a miraculous gift for the support of the Chosen People." ' 1 Vaihinger, in Herzog, vol. viii. p. 795, CHAPTER VIII. STILL ON" THE WAY TO STXAI. Trayellixg is at best very slow among Orientals, a short distance of ten miles being regarded as a special effort by an Arab encampment, while the ordinary progress made is no more than six. A vast multitude like the Hebrews would be even slower in its movement than the population of a few tents, and hence it would require a long time before the host reached the tangled and difficult passes of the Sinai Mountains. The course was necessarily determined by the facility for obtaining water, and it is thus more or less easy to conjecture ; the springs and wells of the possible routes being known to us. To lead them must have been a most formidable task, for the breaking up of a vast encampment, the moving and the pitching of the tents, the securing cattle, baggage, the feeding and watering them, and a thousand things besides, in the evening would create a world of confusion and uproar in an excitable multitude of so immense a size. What each morning on which they woke up brought with it, may be in some degree realized by Burton^s description of the daily scene at the starting on its successive marches, of the great pilgrimage to Mecca. " At half -past ten that evening," says he, '^ we heard the signal for departure ; and, as the moon was still young, we prepared for a hard night's work over rough ground covered with thicket. Darkness fell upon us like a pall ; the camels VOL. n.-i7 257 258 STILL ON" THE WAY TO SIIS'AI. tripped and stumbled, tossing their litters like cock-boats in a short sea. It was a strange, wild scene ; the black basaltic field was dotted with the huge and doubtful forms of spongy- footed camels, with silent tread looming like phantoms in the midnight air, the hot wind moaned, and whirled from the torches sheets of flame and fiery smoke, whilst ever and anon a swift-travelling native carriage, drawn by mules and surrounded by runners, bearing gigantic blazing cressets, threw a passing glow of red light upon the dark road and the dusky multitude." At last, however, the Hebrews had reached the more diffi- cult portion of their journey. Leaving the barren sweep of the Desert of Sin, which stretches along the seashore to the very south of the Peninsula, the mountain system of Sinai was close before the Hebrews in all its grandeur. Huge precipices and peaks of every form, in bands and masses of gray, red, brown, green, chalk-white, and raven-black, rose on every side. It seemed as if '^ legions of evil spirits had united their strength and hostility to life, in piling up the hard, naked, desolate, barren cliffs, pinnacles, peaks, and perpendicular walls; to be alone amidst which would be to despair." Yet the spirit of gain had led men even here, for ages before Moses. It was the beginning of the mining district of the Ancient Egyptians. The route lay through Wady Maghara, past Wady Sidr, to Wady Mo- katteb. Mighty walls of rock on both sides appeared to block up the way with masses hewn by Titans and heaped up one on the other. Eed and black stones^ broken as small as if by the hand of man, lay in great heaps, or strewed the path, which led imperceptibly upwards, through passes dis- closing fresh landscapes, at the sight of which the pulses throbbed and a shudder ran through the frame. Countless STILL OX THE WAY TO SIXAI. 259 pinnacles and i:)eaks, cliffs and precipices, of every colour — white and gray, sulphurous yellow, blood-red and ominous black, rose anew in wild confusion and to vast heights.' Wady Maghara, a wide valley, closed in by two high and rocky mountains — the Ta Mafka of the Egyptians and the Dophkah ^ of the Hebrews, now opened before the host : its steep and lofty southern cliffs of dark granite ; its northern, of red sandstone varied by a light brown. Here, for well- nigh a thousand years before the days of Closes, the Egyp- tians had worked their treasured mines of copper and tur- quoise, a stone to which, even now, the Arabs ascribe the power, when worn, of warding off misfortune, strengthening the eyesight, gaining the favour of princes, securing victory over enemies, and driving away bad dreams.^ In the midst of the valley rose a hill, surrounded by a wall, and crowned with small stone houses for the guard, tlie officers and the overseers ; their only roofs a slight covering of palm branches brought from the Oasis of the Amalekites, which was near." On tlie highest peak of the hill, where it was most exposed to the wind, were the smelting furnaces, and a manufactory where a j^eculiar green glass was prepared, in imitation of emerald ; that stone itself being found only more to the south, on the western shore of the Red Sea. Inscriptions and rude sculptures, which still remain, show the extreme antiquity of these mines ; the very oldest of which we have any record ; dating further back than four thousand years before Christ. One group shews three figures bearing the royal crown ; the third holding fast, with his left hand, an enemy wearing a feather head- dress, who kneels at his feet — the representative of the * Ebei-s' Uarda, vol. ii. p. 160. 2 Xiira. xxxiii, VZ 3 Durch Gosen, p. 137. « Uarda, vol. ii. p. 162. 260 STILL 0^ THE WAY TO SINAI. wliole local population ; the right hand being raised to strike the suppliant a deadly blow with an uplifted war- club. The Pharaoh thus portrayed^ is Senefru, the last king of the ancient Third Dynasty ; beside him is Cheops, the builder of the Great Pyramid. The inscriptions range from the reign of Senefru, four thousand years before Christ, to tliat of Thothmes III., sixteen hundred years before the birth of our Saviour, and even to that of Rameses II., the Oppressor. After leaving Egypt the Hebrews had advanced leisurely, Avith abundant time for stragglers to regain the main body at each change of the encampment. They had rested and refreshed themselves at well -chosen spots, where the cattle could be watered, fed, and cared for, and the flesh of slaugh- tered animals divided and cooked. How long the stay at each halting place had been is not told, but it must always have been more than one day, as it would have been impos- sible for the whole multitude to break up, and encamp afresh, daily. But, in spite of all the care of Moses, the region through which he was leading hi« people sadly dis- pirited them. The terrible Wilderness of Sin had been suc- ceeded by landscapes of such almost unequalled desolation and wildness that even the Ilomans, in after ages, were appalled by their savage horrors, as of huge Alps, bared to their stony skeletons, with no display of verdure on their gloomy sides. Tlirough such scenes the host had advanced ; surrounded and pressed together by narroAV defiles ; the hanging rocks overhead apparently ready to topple down on them ; stumbling over loose stones and wearily climbing up rocky paths, offering no green blade towards which the thirsty tongue of the cattle might stretch out ; the herds of camels and cattle, and the flocks of sheep, blocking up the STILL 0^ THE WAY TO SIITAI. 261 narrow gorges, and hindering the march of the men, women, and children. The road they had thus passed had been ter- rible, but that which now opened before them must have looked like the valley of death. They would have been more than human if they had been able to endure, without a murmur, experiences so different from those which they had fancied liberty would bring them. Why should ]\Ioses have led them so terrible a road ? The question can be answered only when Ave know whom, and what, the great leader expected to find at Dophkah. Inscriptions still remaining show that the mines in this gloomy region were in full operation during the reign of Rameses II., the Oppressor, but none have been found of that of his successor, the Pharaoh of the Exodus ; a fact which, together with the evident richness of the abandoned workings, seems to point to some external cause having led to their sudden stoppage. Copper was very early known not only in Western Asia and Egypt, but also in Palestine. ' Homer speaks of Sidon as ^'^ricli in copper," and the metal is mentioned no less than forty times in the Pentateuch, while iron is mentioned only twice, if we except the notices in Deuteronomy. In the book of Job we are told, *' There is a vein for the silver, And a place for gold, which they refine : Iron is taken out of the earth, And they melt stone into copper. Man sinketh a shaft far from a sojourner ; - There the forgotten live, away from the feet of passers by : Away from man, they hover ^ on the rocks." • Mover's Phonizier, vol. ii. p. 6