Early Israelites: Two Peoples, One History: Rediscovery of the Origins of Ancient Israel

by Igor P Lipovsky

Overview

What does the Bible hide and to what extent can we trust the Holy Scriptures? The “archaeology” of biblical texts yielded many interesting and surprising discoveries. As it turned out, the Israelites (Northern Hebrew tribes) and Judahites (Southerners) had completely different ancestors, who arrived in Canaan and then left the Nile Delta at different times. The Northerners and the Southerners made their Exodus from Egypt at different centuries as well, and conquered their places in Canaan independently. So what – or who – is responsible for the contradictions between facts mentioned in the Old Testament and archeological findings of the last decades?

The biblical writers merged the family trees and narratives of both peoples to create a common genealogy and history. But where the archaeologists look for the history of Early Israel, are in fact the hidden and different pasts of two West Semitic peoples.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780578536309
Publisher:	American Academy Press
Publication date:	08/20/2019
Edition description:	Second Revised ed.
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.63(d)

About the Author

Professor Igor P. Lipovsky is a distinguished scholar of Near Eastern History. He is the author of nine books written in English and Russian, and has published more than a hundred articles in American, British, German and Russian journals. He taught at universities in Russia, Israel, and the United States. He was born March 7, 1950, in Moscow, Russia; now, he is a United States citizen and lives in Washington D.C.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Where did the ancient Semites come from?

Chapter One: The beginning of Jewish history

1. The origins of biblical patriarchs
2. Family or tribal group?
3. Adoption of the cult of El
4. The family tree of Hebrews and their relatives

Chapter Two: The Southerners and the Northerners

1. Jacob and Israel: the two forefathers of the Hebrew tribes
2. When was the story of Abraham-Isaac-Jacob written?
3. Who were the biblical Hittites?
4. Creation of common genealogy and history

Chapter Three: In the Egypt of the Hyksos

1. What does the Bible hide?
2. West Semitic nomads settle the Nile Delta
3. Who were the Hyksos?
4. Hyksos’ connections with Canaan
5. What did the Egyptian pharaohs conceal?
6. The Amorites: the new rulers of the Nile country
7. The ‘house of Joseph’ and ‘house of Jacob’ in Egypt
8. The fall of the Hyksos and first exodus of the Western Semites

Chapter Four: The ‘house of Joseph’ in Canaan, 15^th-13^th centuries B.C.E.

1. The Amarna letters on Habiru and Sutu
2. Egyptian rule and Hurrian presence in Canaan
3. The emergence of Israel

Chapter Five: The second exodus of the Western Semites from Egypt

1. Ramesses II: the oppressor pharaoh
2. When did the biblical Exodus happen?
3. Moses’s mission

Chapter Six: On the path to the old homeland

1. The birth of monotheism
2. Religious and tribal conflicts
3. Alliance with the Midianites and confrontation with the Amalekites
4. The strengthening of Egypt and split of Moses’ tribes

Chapter Seven: The peoples of pre-Israelite Canaan

1. The West Semitic population
2. The primordial pre-Semitic peoples
3. Indo-Europeans
4. Hurrians

Chapter Eight: The re-conquest of Canaan

1. Moses’ people join the Israelite tribal league
   
   1. Return to the rite of circumcision
   
   
   
   
2. The re-conquest of Canaan in the light of biblical and archaeological data
3. The struggle for Canaan: three time periods
4. Israelites and Canaanites: peaceful co-existence and intermarriage
5. The Northerners and the Southerners – their separate conquests in Canaan
6. The fate of the tribe of Reuben
7. Settlement on the land

Chapter Nine: In the days when there was no king in Israel

1. The judges and their gods
2. The disintegration of the Israelite tribal confederation
3. The tribe of Dan: West Semitic or Indo-European?
4. The Philistine threat

Selected Bibliography

Index

Editorial Reviews

"This book is a true breakthrough in biblical studies." --- Los Angeles Times

"The author offers the most interesting and attractive vision of biblical history published in the last decades." --- The New York Times Book Review

"This book sheds new light on the origins of ancient Israel." --- The Boston Globe

From the Publisher