Abstract
The received exodus narrative is an exilic or post-exilic Priestly redaction in which earlier JE traditions were deliberately rewritten so as to elevate the exodus “event” to mythic status, thereby glorifying both Yahweh and Israel. P portrayed the exodus as a continuation of the primordial battle between the creator and primeval Sea, a principal form of the ancient Near Eastern chaos monster. Pharaoh (Egypt) is depicted as the chaos monster—“the great dragon,” to borrow the language of Ezekiel regarding Pharaoh. P manipulated the wilderness itinerary so as to have Pharaoh perish in yam sûp, geographically identifiable with our Red Sea but understood literally as “the Sea of End,” a boundless expanse of ocean fraught with mythical overtones of non-creation, or chaos. Pharaoh is thus merged with primeval Sea and is defeated along with it. P employed Combat Myth motifs also to imply that the exodus was a second phase of creation whereby Israel, Yahweh’s newest creation, emerged through the deity’s splitting—or defeat—of the Sea.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
See Propp (2006: 735–756) on the complex issues concerning historicity. S. C. Russell 2009 argues the attempt to find a single historical core for the exodus is misguided; close analysis of biblical traditions concerning Egypt and the exodus reveals considerable regional variation: Cisjordan-Israelite, Transjordan-Israelite, or Judahite. Oblath (2004: 194–195) concludes that the exodus narrative describes” a movement of people within and out of the region between the Negeb and the Gulf of Elath. … Egypt, no matter that it is a ‘character’ in the play, played no role in the events themselves.”
- 2.
Propp (2006: 752) observes, “there is little doubt that in Exod 23:31; Num 14:25; 21:4; Deut 1:40; 2:1; Judg 11:16[?]; 1 Kgs 9:26; Jer 49:21, the Suph Sea is the Gulf of Aqaba. In Exod 10:19; 13:18; Num 33:10–11, however, the Suph Sea appears to be the Gulf of Suez. In short, the Suph Sea is the Red Sea and its two northern arms.”
- 3.
In the LXX yam sûp is consistently rendered as Erythra Thalassa except in two places: Judg 11:16 (Thasassa Siph, evidently [mis]reading sîp instead of sûp) and 1 Kgs 9:26 (“king Solomon built a ship in Gasion Gaber near Elath on the shore of the last sea [tēs eschatēs thalassēs] in the land of Edom.” The latter was intended evidently as a literal rendering of yam sûp/sôp. Oblath (2004: 58–61) argues that the LXX translator being situated in Egypt, was intent on distinguishing the more distant (from Egypt) Gulf of Elath, which other Greek sources call the Aelanite Gulf, from the nearer and better known Red Sea/Gulf of Suez; but if such were the intention of the translator, why would other obvious references to the same Elath/Aelanite Gulf (Exod 23:31; Num 14:25; 21:4; Deut 1:40; 2:1; Jer 49:21) be rendered inconsistently in the LXX as Erythra Thalassa?
- 4.
J. Fitzmyer (1971: 153–154): “According to M. Copisarow (1962) the term “Red Sea” originated with mariners of ancient Greece, independently of Egyptian or Hebrew influence; it designated the sea between Asia and Africa and was gradually extended from the Gulf of Suez to the Persian Gulf including the Indian Ocean.”
- 5.
In discussion, James Hoffmeir noted that without vowel points sôp and sûp look the same, making possible in late texts a beautiful word play that enabled the mythic overtones posited herein. Aren Maeir questioned my contention that ancient Israelites attributed mythological attributes to yam sûp/Red Sea, noting that Iron Age and Persian period sailors navigated the Indian Ocean for spice trade with Arabia and India and so would not have considered it mythical. This ignores the fact that ancient mariners usually navigated close to known shorelines and that the Indian Ocean extends southward far beyond India (and Africa); and also that to the ordinary ancient Near Eastern mind oceans remained frightening entities fraught with mythic overtones, as attested in numerous texts.
- 6.
In previous publications I assumed that the latter was the case but now consider either case possible. I also opt for the integrity of Numbers 33 as an older and independent textual witness to the wilderness wanderings of the Israelites.
- 7.
Kloos (1986: 205) argues that the theme of the Israelites crossing a dried up sea was present already in the Song of the Sea.
- 8.
P is derived from Number 33 and not the other way round, as Numbers 33 would have no reason to add a second camping station at yam sûp, in addition to the one at the sea of crossing, had both seas not been already present in the tradition inherited by Numbers 33. The same cannot be said of P, against Propp (2006: 749–753).
- 9.
For additional biblical examples of Combat Myth themes applied to historical events, see Batto (1992: 146–150).
- 10.
Conrad Schmid (oral comment) agreed that P makes creation and exodus parallel. Propp (1999: 560–561) finds that the Combat Myth pervades Exodus 14–15, in effect turning “the entire Torah” into “a Creation Myth”; but strangely, Propp does not find the Combat Myth “in Genesis 1–3, the Creation story proper.”
- 11.
With some inconsistency Propp (1999: 34 and 560–561) similarly finds the Canaanite myth of the storm god Baʿlu as a prototype of the exodus tradition, but claims that the Sea is no longer the cosmic ocean but a specific body of water.
- 12.
Behemoth perhaps should be included here (Day 1985: 75–87; Batto 1995). In ancient Near Eastern literature and iconography the chaos figure(s) was (were) depicted in various forms: aquatic, bird-like, serpentine, draconic, seven-headed, or fully anthropomorphic; moreover, the monster may even exhibit multiformism, appearing in more than one shape within the same context (Batto 2013a: 244, Pitard 2007: 82–83, Wiggermann 1997: 37–39).
- 13.
The verb bqʿ is used in the Ugaritic Baʿlu Cycle for Anat’s slaying of Mot “Death,” another chaos figure (KTU 1.6 ii 32).
- 14.
Kloos (1986: 212) argues “that the Reed Sea story is a transformation of the [Canaanite] myth of the battle with the Sea”; also pp. 149–152. Dozeman (1996: 408–411) also recognizes that in Exod 15:5 the primary function of yam sûp is mythological, to reinforce “the power of Yahweh over sea,” though elsewhere the phrase has greater geographical specificity. Cross (1973: 131–132) argued that the sea is only a passive instrument in Yahweh’s control for defeating the Egyptian force, a historical enemy; similarly Forsyth 1987: 93–98. S. Russell (2009: 127–158) finds historical connections tenuous at best; the Song reflects a Judahite provenance, according to which the first half depicts victory over the Egyptians and the second half describes in language rooted in the mythological tradition of ancient Near Eastern kingship a victory tour by God’s people.
- 15.
- 16.
Perhaps read with some MSS hattannîn haggādôl; so BHS.
- 17.
Gary Rendsburg (orally) identified Ezekiel’s “great dragon” with the crocodile; while appropriate for Egypt specifically, Ezekiel’s purview likely included a larger ancient Near Eastern mythic tradition; see Lewis (1996: 28–47).
- 18.
See also Hab 3:8–10, 15, above.
- 19.
This motif of paradisiacal plenty is attested in both biblical and Ugaritic literature (e.g., Job 29:6; KTU 1.6 iii 6–7).
References
Batto, Bernard F. 1983. The Reed Sea: Requiescat in Pace. Journal of Biblical Literature 102: 27–35. Reprinted, with a postscript, in Batto 2013a: 158–174.
Batto, Bernard F. 1987. The Sleeping God: An Ancient Near Eastern Motif of Divine Sovereignty. Biblica 68: 153–157. Reprinted in Batto 2013a: 139–157.
Batto, Bernard F. 1992. Slaying the Dragon: Mythmaking in the Biblical tradition. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox.
Batto, Bernard F. 1995. Behemoth. Cols. 316–322. In Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible [DDD], 2nd ed, ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Peter Horst. Leiden: Brill.
Batto, Bernard F. 2004. The Divine Sovereign: The Image of God in the Priestly Creation Account. In David and Zion: Biblical Studies in Honor of J. J. M. Roberts, 2nd ed, ed. Bernard F. Batto, Kathryn L. Roberts, and Peter Horst, 143–186. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Reprinted in Batto 2013a: 96–138.
Batto, Bernard F. 2013a. In the Beginning: Essays on Creation Motifs in the Ancient Near East and the Bible. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
Batto, Bernard F. 2013b. The Ancient Near Eastern context of the Hebrew ideas of creation, 7–53. In Batto 2013a.
Batto, Bernard F. 2013c. The Combat Myth in Israelite Tradition Revisited. In Creation and Chaos: A Reconsideration of Herman Gunkel’s Chaoskampf Hypothesis, ed. JoAnn Scurlock and Richard H. Beal, 217–236. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
Childs, Brevard S. 1974. The Book of Exodus: A critical, Theological Commentary. Old Testament Library. Philadelphia, PA: Westminster.
Copisarow, Maurice. 1962. The Ancient Egyptian, Greek and Hebrew Concept of the Red Sea. Vetus Testamentum 12: 1–13.
Cross Jr., Frank Moore. 1973. Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University.
Day, John. 1985. God’s Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea: Echoes of a Canaanite Myth in the Old Testament. Cambridge: Cambridge University. University of Cambridge Oriental Publications 35.
Dozeman, Thomas B. 1996. The yam-sûp in the Exodus and the Crossing of the Jordan River. The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 58: 407–416.
Dozeman, Thomas B. 2009. Exodus. Eerdmans Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.
Fitzmyer, Joseph A. 1971. The Genesis Apocryphon of Qumran Cave I: A Commentary, 2nd ed. Rome: Biblical Institute Press. Biblica et Orientalia 18A.
Forsyth, Neil. 1987. The Old Enemy: Satan and the Combat Myth. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University.
Hurowitz, Victor (Avigdor). 1992. I have Built You an Exalted House: Temple Building in the Bible in Light of Mesopotamian and Northwest Semitic Writings. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. JSOTSup 115; JSOT/ASOR Monographs 5.
Kloos, Corola. 1986. Yhwh’s Combat with the Sea: A Canaanite Tradition in the Religion of Ancient Israel. Amsterdam/Leiden: van Oorschot/Brill.
Levenson, Jon D. 1988. Creation and the Persistence of Evil: The Jewish Drama of Divine Omnipotence. San Francisco: Harper & Row.
Lewis, Theodore J. 1996. CT 13.33-34 and Ezekiel 32: Lion Dragon Myths. Journal of the American Oriental Society 116: 28–47.
Montgomery, James A. 1938. Hebrew (2) yam sûp (‘The Red Sea’) = Ultimum Mare? Journal of the American Oriental Society 58: 132–133.
Noth, Martin. 1962. Exodus: A Commentary. Old Testament Library. Philadelphia: Westminster. [Trans. J. S. Bowden, from German Das zweite Buch Mose, Exodus [ATD 5], Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1959.]
Oblath, Michael D. 2004. The Exodus Itinerary Sites. New York, NY: Lang.
Pitard, Wayne T. 2007. Just How Many Monsters Did Anat Fight (KTU 1.3 III 38-47)? In Ugarit at Seventy-Five, ed. K. Lawson Younger Jr., 75–88. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
Propp, William H.C. 1999. Exodus 1-18, Anchor Bible 2.1. New York, NY: Doubleday.
Propp, William H.C. 2006. Exodus 19-40, Anchor Bible 2.2. New York, NY: Doubleday.
Russell, Brian D. 2007. The Song of the Sea: The Date of Composition and Influence of Exodus 15:1-21. New York, NY: Lang.
Russell, Stephen C. 2009. Images of Egypt in Early Biblical Literature. Berlin: de Gruyter. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die altestamentliche Wissenschaft 403.
Sasson, Jack M. 1981. Literary Criticism, Folklore Scholarship, and Ugaritic Literature. In Ugarit in Retrospect, ed. G.D. Young, 81–98. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
Snaith, Norman. 1965. ים־סוף: The Sea of Reeds: The Red Sea. Vetus Testamentum 15: 395–398.
Stolz, Fritz. 1995. Sea. Cols. 1390–1401. In Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible [DDD], 2nd ed, ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Peter Horst. Leiden: Brill.
Wiggermann, Frans A.M. 1997. Transtigridian Snake Gods. In Sumerian Gods and Their Representations, ed. Irving L. Finkel and Markham J. Geller, 33–55. Groningen: Styx. Cuneiform Monographs 7.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2015 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Batto, B.F. (2015). Mythic Dimensions of the Exodus Tradition. In: Levy, T., Schneider, T., Propp, W. (eds) Israel's Exodus in Transdisciplinary Perspective. Quantitative Methods in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-04768-3_14
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-04768-3_14
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-04767-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-04768-3
eBook Packages: Mathematics and StatisticsMathematics and Statistics (R0)