A few years ago, Rabbi David Wolpe of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles created a certain degree of commotion by giving a series of sermons questioning the historicity of the Exodus. He cited archaeological evidence that deems it extremely unlikely that 600,000 Hebrews (plus women and children) left Egypt en masse and wandered for forty years in the desert.

Given the importance of yetziat mitzrayim as our formational story, where do you stand on the question: "Did the Exodus really happen?" Further, how important, in your estimation, is the answer to this question?

Rabbi Michael Zedek (Emanuel)

One of the things I love about our tradition is its embrace of the notion conveyed in the phrase D'var Achar (“another interpretation”). So for me that means there is not one exclusive approach, not one and only correct way of understanding.

As to the matter at hand, in some ways not only do I not know if there was an Exodus (albeit I think so) but also I do not consider it the essential matter. The stories of our people are important not because they happened a long time ago. Rather, the essence is that these stories are capable of providing both history and a personal or spiritual autobiographical perspective. Such perspective continues to enrich the story that was conveyed to me (us) and the opportunity to wrestle with the life that awaits us.

Rabbi Asher Lopatin (Anshe Sholom B’nai Israel)

Yes, the Exodus from Egypt happened. There are, of course, many interpretations of how it happened, from the text of the Torah through the midrashim all the way to modern day commentators.  As Rabbi David Hartman says, Judaism is an interpretive tradition.  We accept the Torah as truth, but the exciting and meaningful part comes from the way the Jewish people interpret that truth in every generation, each generation based on the philosophy, science and vision of its own era.

The Exodus from Egypt is a basic part of our identity: It tells us that God cares, that human beings are not condemned to just pass through history at the mercy of vicious tyrants, that the Jewish people is responsible to declare freedom throughout the land, and that we understand what it is to suffer and cannot tolerate such a situation. What could be more contemporary than this message?  What could be more true?

I applaud all the work that archeologists do: Their job is not to interpret our tradition, but to investigate the world and its history from a scientific point of view. Their findings always remain theory, conjecture and hypothesis - what is more likely or less likely. Only the world of G-d is truth, and we human beings will spend an eternity trying to find out what that truth is.

So most importantly, go learn! Look again at the passages in the Torah that talk about the Exodus - the opening 15 chapters of the Book of Exodus are among the most exciting in the Torah. Then add your own interpretation to the thousands of years of study, and you will be part of the process of the living Torah, this great adventure in celebrating the word of G-d given to the Jewish people.


 

Rabbi Larry Edwards (Congregation Or Chadash)

One of the most interesting of the current scholarly theories is that the Exodus never happened at all, and certainly not the way it is described in the Book of Exodus. Rather, Israel emerged gradually from among the "indigenous" (was anyone really indigenous to anywhere?) tribes in the Land of Canaan. What separated us was our developing theology of a single, invisible God.

But why, then, would we develop a national "myth" that traces our descent from nomadic foreigners and fugitive slaves? I ask this not to argue that the Exodus narrative must be true (for why would anyone make up such a story about themselves?), but in order to seek the inner truth of our story. The philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, of blessed memory, wrote, "The traumatic experience of my slavery in Egypt constitutes my very humanity, a fact that immediately allies me to the workers, the wretched, and the persecuted people of the world."

The story of the Exodus is my story (and I’m stickin’ to it!). But even if we, through some act of brilliant imagination, concocted the whole thing, it is that story that makes us who we are. It is because of that story that the Torah insists on what I take to be its most central teaching:

"When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not wrong him. The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I the Lord am your God" (Lev. 19:33-34, and almost anywhere else you look in the Torah).

Ten Plagues? Maybe, maybe not. That we must remember also the suffering of the Egyptians? I have been taught this since I was very young. It is a profoundly Jewish teaching.

What actually happened we can never know with certainty. What we can know is that our story is not just a story – it lays upon us infinite obligations.

Rabbi Daniel Burg (Anshe Emet Synagogue)

The problem with the question (which, admittedly, I posed in the first place) is that archaeology is far from an exact science.  Essentially, archaeology is the science of excavating people's centuries-old (or millennia) garbage. Sometimes this garbage survives to be discovered by modern-day scientists.  Often, it does not. There are many who claim that the Exodus didn't happen simply because of a lack of physical evidence. The truth is that there is some limited evidence that the story of yetziat Mitzrayim is rooted in history. This evidence includes a 13th Century BCE tablet called the Mernephtah Stele which refers to "Israel" and the Tel El Amarna letters which refer to the Apiru or Habiru (these terms could indicate "Hebrews").

However, just as there is archaeological evidence to support certain historical claims in the bible, there are other data which negate the historicity of our sacred documents.  For example, to my knowledge, we have not discovered a destruction layer at Jericho from the time of Joshua. Does this mean that the walls did not "come tumbling down?" The factual answer to this may very well be "yes." 

The larger question, to which some of my colleagues have already alluded, is whether the Bible is intended to be a historical document. Or, as others have put it, does something have to be factual in order to be true? I happen to believe that there was an Exodus and that God's presence was revealed at Sinai. However, I for one am not willing to pin my faith on some archaeologist unearthing the Ark of the Covenant (anyway, we all know that it's in a warehouse somewhere in Washington, DC)! 

I would commend Y.H.Yerushalmi's Zachor, in which the author challenges us to reframe our understanding of Judaism in terms of memory, not just history. Scholars would indicate (if any cared to check) that I was sitting around a table with my family this Pesach.  But I remember gathering my meager possessions, baking some barely adequate bread and setting off with my brethren toward the Promised Land. Don't you remember that too?