Joseph entered Egypt as a slave. It is interesting to note that slavery was not a very old concept in Egypt. It had not existed earlier in the Old Kingdom, the period when the great pyramids were being built. Those structures were not, as is sometimes stated, built by slave labor. They were constructed by drafted peasant labor. The Middle Kingdom is the first major period in Egyptian history where slavery was well known. In the 1950s AD, the American Egyptologist William C. Hayes published a famous papyrus document from the Middle Kingdom which had a list of slaves on one side and a discussion of Egyptian prisons on the other (Hayes 1972). In the next issue of Bible and Spade, we will examine the information this valuable papyrus provides for us regarding the story of Joseph. Click here.

 http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/ted_hildebrandt/otesources/01-genesis/text/articles-books/Aling-JosephPt1.pdf


Bible and Spade 15.1 (2002) 21-23 [text only] Copyright © 2002 by Bible and Spade. Cited with permission. Joseph in Egypt First of Six Parts by Charles Aling No portion of the Old Testament has a richer Egyptian coloring than the story of Joseph. Egyptian names, titles, places, and customs all appear in Genesis 37-50. In the last one hundred years or so, historical and archaeological research has made the study of the Egyptian elements in the Joseph story more fruitful than ever before. In order to examine the Egyptological information, it is necessary to establish the period in Egyptian history when Joseph was in Egypt. Mainline contemporary scholarship and the Bible's own chronology are in accord in dating Joseph sometime between 2000 and 1600 BC. This time frame includes two important periods of Egypt's history, the Middle Kingdom (2000-1786 B.C.) and the Second Intermediate Period (1786-1570 B.C.). However, before narrowing down our dates for Joseph any more, let us first survey these two periods. The Middle Kingdom was one of Egypt's three greatest ages (Hayes, 1964) (Aling, 1981). The country was unified and prosperous, and was in the process of conquering Nubia, located in what is today the Sudan. In the Bible, this area is called Ethiopia. The eight Pharaohs of this period comprise Egypt's 12th Dynasty: The founder was the great Amenemhat I (1991- 1962 BC). He died by assassination, but not before he had associated his son Sesostris I with him on the throne as coregent. Sesostris in his long reign (1971-1928 BC) campaigned with success in northern Nubia and built at no less than 35 sites in Egypt. Under his immediate successors, fighting in Nubia subsided and trade received the main royal attentions. Since Babylon had not yet emerged as a great power under page 21


  Also, when Joseph is given a wife by the king as a reward for his interpretation of the dream, the woman is said to be the daughter of Potiphera, Priest of On. On was the center of solar worship in ancient Egypt. The chief god worshiped there was Re or Ra, the northern manifestation of Amon-Re, the supreme deity of both the Middle Kingdom and New Kingdom periods of Egyptian history. The Hyksos, while they did not persecute the worshipers of Re, did not give that deity the number one position. Their favorite deity was Set, a delta god sometimes regarded by the Egyptians as nearly a devil-like figure. The Hyksos identified Set with the Palestinian god Baal, a god from their Canaanite homeland who was very familiar to them. Now if Joseph was being rewarded by a Hyksos king, it stands to reason that his new wife would not have been the daughter of a priest of Re, but rather the daughter of a priest of Set. Once again, the Middle Kingdom seems a better choice for dating Joseph than the Second Intermediate Period. Thus, relying on the Biblical chronology and the historical material, we will place Joseph in the Middle Kingdom Period, under two great rulers, Sesostris II (1897-1878 BC)and Sesostris III (1878-1843 BC). Joseph entered Egypt as a slave. It is interesting to note that slavery was not a very old concept in Egypt. It had not existed earlier in the Old Kingdom, the period when the great pyramids were being built. Those structures were not, as is sometimes stated, built by slave labor. They were constructed by drafted peasant labor. The Middle Kingdom is the first major period in Egyptian history where slavery was well known. In the 1950s AD, the American Egyptologist William C. Hayes published a famous papyrus document from the Middle Kingdom which had a list of slaves on one side and a discussion of Egyptian prisons on the other (Hayes 1972). In the next issue of Bible and Spade, we will examine the information this valuable papyrus provides for us regarding the story of Joseph.


 Bibliography Aling, C. F. 1981 Egypt and Bible History. Grand Rapids: Baker. Hayes, W. C. 1964 The Middle Kingdom of Egypt. New York: Cambridge University. 34ff. Hayes, W. C., ed. 1972 A papyrus of the Late Middle Kingdom in the Brooklyn Museum. Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum Reprint. page 23c Associates for Biblical Research P.O. Box 144 Akron PA 17501 http://www.christiananswers.net/abr/bible-and-spade.html Please report any errors to Ted Hildebrandt at: thildebrandt@gordon.edu

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