EGYPT

BIBLE AND THEOLOGY HISTORY

ABRAHAM, JOSEPH AND JESUS

 © Carlos Padilla – February 2024

 

In our series of Bible History, we travel to Egypt. We know that Genesis talks about Egypt and in reference to several Bible historical people who travelled to the country, like Abraham, Joseph and Jacob and all Israel. However, it is less known that a grandson of Noah, after the flood, could be, with his family, the founder of Egypt, a kingdom that was initiated by the Hyksos, and that would reach to the dynasties of the pharaohs, the name of that grandson was Mizraim (Genesis 10:6), and that name is the original that the Hebrew Text gives to Egypt. We also know that Yahshua – Jesus was in Egypt as a child, as we see in the Gospel of Matthew 2:13-23 doe to the fulfilment of the prophecy of being called from Egypt, and by cause of the killing of the martyrs of Jesus, after the order of Herod to kill all the children under two, after Jesus was born. But the angel warned Joseph to take Mary and Child Jesus to flee to Egypt and preserve His life.

Egypt, is, as well as a fascinating history, a theological concept that represents the world, the society, the culture, the religion, and all these built by man for his own glory, without counting on God. It is one of the reasons why we read in Revelation 11:8 with reference to the two witness prophets: “…and their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified,” and we know that Jesus was only crucified in Jerusalem, but the key about the city to which is referring is given to us in the same Bible Text of Revelation, in verses 1 and 2 of the same chapter 11. This is one of the theological mysteries that we shall cover for its relevance for our spiritual relationship with our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ – Yahshua, Whom we await in His coming to establish His Kingdom.

 

BIBLE HISTORY OF EGYPT

Egypt is one of the more fascinating civilizations of history, visited each year by thousands of tourists, and this year 2024 one will be able to enjoy the new Great Egyptian Museum. The history of Egypt is made of three parts: the old empire, initiated by the Hyksos, some shepherd kings, which records its beginning in Memphys and Thebes, approximately around 2.700 B.C. and 2.200 B.C. with six dynasties, being the fourth to which the construction of the great pyramids and the Guiza effigy is attributed to. The middle empire, by Semites from Asia until the XVII dynasty, and the new empire which expelled the Hyksos recovering the previous power, until the XXX dynasty in the 333 B.C. Velikovsky and Courville relate the Hyksos with the Amalekites, which would make it coincide with the Exodus of the Israelites, and these hordes of Amalekites confronted them when leaving Egypt. (Bible Dictionary Illustrated – Vila-Escuain, pg. 284). This is also supported by the Ipuwer papyrus.

Abraham went there because of the hunger in the land (Genesis 12) about 1.900 B.C. being the first time the country is mentioned in Scripture. However, as we have already mentioned, Noah’s grandson, Mizraim (Genesis 10:6) brother of Canaan, both sons of Cam, is who gives name to Egypt as a country, because that is how Egypt is known in Hebrew. The dynasties and succession lines of the pharaohs (an example is the Papyrus of the 19th dynasty from the Canon of Turin), must be considered from the point of view of how many were contemporary, how many were in power at the same time and especially to not duplicate the kingdoms of the north and the south as Manetho interpreted (an Egyptian historian of the III century B.C.), which duplicates the time of each period of the high Egypt, middle Egypt, and low Egypt, resulting with his error more dynasties than those that reigned. The reality is shorter, as historians have already accepted. The dating of mid XX century of those who pretended a date as old as possible for the history of Egypt were between 5.000 B.C. and 2.000 B.C. however, recent studies are arriving tot a date approximately between 2.480 and 2.620 B.C.

The pyramids of Giza are an interesting topic, so much for their dating, as for being part of the same architecture than ziggurats, towers made in a pyramidal shape common to all cities of the first cultures, like the Tower of Babel, Ninive, etc. There are archaeologists who argued that the pyramids are built on the mud remains of the great flood, which is something evident due to the fossils, including those from the sea which are contained within the sediments. The structures themselves and the large stones do not have signs of having suffered the effects of the flood, which did affect the geology and mountains of the planet. Also the materials used to build them, like the mortar in which obviously are organic materials dated with radiocarbon, always taking into account that it is not exact, as well as other materials used, logically show different dates because they were there already, and do show evidence of having formed part of the flood. On the other hand, we know that the great pyramid of Giza has been dated according to pharaoh Khufu, from the fourth dynasty, by the inscriptions found, but the dates that historians have concluded for the dynasties have been dated with different dates.

Creationism of the “Young Earth” dates creation around 6.000 to 4.000 B.C. and Noah’s flood around 2.350 B.C. something that opens a debate if the pyramids are from before or after the flood. The information we find in the Bible, (Genesis 7:11) indicates that in the 17th of the second month of the year 600 of Noah, he entered the ark with his wife, his three sons and their wives, and all the animals. And they did not come out of the ark until the next year, in the second month of the year 601 of Noah. His genealogy from Adam, according to the Bible, takes us also to approximate dates for the flood. The oldest date, within the secular history, thought they have already been corrected by the experts, dated the pyramids even before the date of creation proposed by the Creationism of the Young Earth. Today we find such similar dates or with only 50 years of difference, that in the case of the flood is a small difference reasonably speaking.

 

EVIDENCE OF NOAH’S FLOOD

The different stories of the event by the different cultures in the five continents, Babylonians, Sumerians, Acadians, Chinese, Nipon’s and Amerindians, and the sediment remaining of the rests of the cataclysmic event all over the planet, if they really had so much time as proposed by part of the geologists, they would have decomposed, but they have remained due to the effect of a fast, practically immediate fossilization, are evidence that in fact a planetary cataclysm occurred, the discrepancy is when. Some of the more recognized of a culture is that of Mesopotamia by Gilgamesh in a tablet that tells of an event similar than the flood of Genesis. The profs that the sediments provide of sea remaining in high mountains like the Himalaya, or the fossil layers of a vast variety of animals and plants suddenly in China, in the Biota of Chengjiang, or the layers in the Grand Canyon, show that the universal flood occurred, but part of the geologists explain it to be from the Cambrian period with a date of 45 million years where all species appear suddenly, which it self is evidence that macro-evolutive evolutionism is not possible. The information accumulated through geology by the Creationism of the Young Earth, supported by a multitude of geologist and scientists, from their part takes us to dates around 2.450 B.C. the difference is tremendous, from 4.500 years old, rounding up, to 45 million years ago, we lose many zeros between both dates.

The Lord Jesus said that in the days of Noah (Matthew 24:38-39), the flood took them all away as a judgment of God, and Jesus does not lie, but He is the Truth, and would have not spoken of that event if it would not be real and historical, and here it was not a symbolical or spiritualized event, but a real and prophetical Biblical event, and we know by the evidence that all Bible prophecies fulfil. Also, the apostles Peter (1 Peter 3:20 – 2 Peter 2:5) and Paul (Hebrews 11:7) mention the flood as a punishment of God.

The sad thing of this post flood story is that humanity continued with its own plans separated from God and said “…let us build a tower whose top is in the heavens” (Genesis 11:1-9) and they built a type of ziggurat known as the Tower of Babel. God confused their tongs so they would not understand each other and there was a universal dispersion of groups that formed the different cultures and languages. This fact has been demonstrated by remains modern humans in the five continents, remains of artifact from the same time, remains of the type of agriculture and ways of cooking, as well as genetical analysis.

A curious data to how deep the story of the flood went is the coin of Apameia with the inscription of Noah’s ark, dated in 250 B.C. found in Phrygia.

Finally we can mention that not only are the pyramids in the time we are discussing, but also the ziggurats found in other contemporary cultures, they are all of pyramidal shape, including those built by the Sumerians, prior to the Egyptians. Sumer is the land of Ur, from where Abraham emigrated, who could have shared wisdom with the Egyptians, according to Josephus.

The Egyptians where very religious and conscious of the life after death. Though they were polytheists, there was a principal god and their concepts of order and moral where quite developed. Their funerary representations show a judgment where one can see how the heart is weighed for judgment to decide if it goes to paradise or to punishment. Their language and scripture are of Semitic and Hamitic origin, initially with hieroglyphics, they formed a 24-letter alphabet, without vocal, like Hebrew and Greek, until the demotical and hieratical, being famous the black stone of Rosetta (British Museum), which tells the story of Ptolomeo (196 B.C.), and has been key to decipher Egyptian scripture, together with another inscription which tells of two Cleopatras. Until the Greek and Roman invasions, Coptic has been perpetuating, to which the Bible has also been translated to used in the liturgy.  

To close this brief section of history of Egypt, we will mention that, after the las dynasty, the attacks of Asyria in the days of Josiah, Pharaoh Necao died in the battle of Megguido (place of Armageddon). Egypt would succumb before Babylon, with Nebuchadnezzar defeating Necao in the battle of Carchemis, taking possession of all the land from the Euphrates to the Nile, and the Pharaoh never went out of his land anymore (2 Kings 24:7 – Jeremiah 46:2-12) being the Necao of Scripture the Nekau of the monuments. After that came the Persian domain, making Egypt tributary of Cirus, king of Persia. Alexander the Great to possession of Egypt, Hellenising the empire, and building Alexandria in 331 B.C. whose famous library hosted the larges collections of books of the ancient world translated to Greek, making Greek the language of the Mediterranean, even the New Testament was written in koine Greek, as well as leaving a legacy in the Septuagint, or Bible of the LXX whose Text of the Old Testament could be the oldest directly from the original Hebrew. It was succeeded by the Ptolemies (prophesized by Daniel 11). After, as we all know came the Roman Empire, and after the Saracens took it from the Byzantine empire, but the Turkish dominated until the end of the XVIII followed by the battles between British, French, and Turkish until the declaration of independence. Since 1948 it is hostile against the State of Israel.

 

ABRAHAM IN EGYPT

Abraham is a model of any person who believes in God and follows Him with faith. The reader when reading the story of Abraham is reading which should be his own, in his life. He received the following message from God which is the condition for God to talk to us: “…Get out of your country, from your family, and from your father’s house, to the land that I will show you…,” Genesis 12. The change of life that God requests from us, to go from living our own project, to live His in us. Also the covenant is with Abraham: the circumcision, which makes us be ready to circumcise our “flesh”, the mind without God, that we leave our heart open for God’s love, and that we be ready to cut our way or judging and of doing, to do according to God’s, so it not a spiritual Jew who circumcises it foreskin, but the heart in spirit. Jeremiah 4:4.

We see God the Fater in Abraham, who finds Himself in the situation of offering His Only Begotten Son in sacrifice, the Son of the promise of the Spirit. How was God going to allow that Isaac died, if he represented the descendants of the faith? However, Our Father indeed has offered His Begotten Son, Jesus Christ – Yahshua for us, who gives Himself to take His life again, once death and the evil one, are defeated, for us. Abraham is the father of the faith.

Genesis 15:18, 18:1, Matthew 3:9, Mark 12:26, Luke 16:22, John 8:39, Romans 2:29, 4:1-16, 9:7, Galatians 3:7, Colossians 2:11, James 2:21.

“…For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3 For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” Romans 4:2-3.

Read a Bible Study of Solid Food: ABRAHAM.

 

JOSEPH IN EGYPT

Joseph was the precursor of who goes to Egypt not by his own will but forced. However, although he lives with God, loves God, and seeks Him in all things, God has a plan so that inside Egypt he gives testimony of the true God. Here Joseph is the very image of the Christian in society, who finally is admired by Pharaoh who sets him to govern Egypt. Before he had to suffer great calamities and tests, like being forgotten in a prison, as a slave and servant of the prisoners, situation that God uses so that, through dreams, Pharaoh’s cupbearer received the interpretation of a dream through Joseph, and he when resituated in his position, would inform Pharaoh that Joseph can interpret a dream that God gave to Pharaoh about the 7 years of fat cows and the 7 years of sleek cows. God’s plan included saving Israel from famine, that Joseph, despite having been betrayed by his brethren, could learn to forgive them, and save His people, until after his death when they were made slaves, but later be led by Moses who would take them out of Egypt, crossing the Red Sea towards the Promised Land, the book of Exodus onwards. Genesis 37:28 – 42:3.

The 430 years that the people of Israel have relationship with Egypt are composed of two periods of 215 years each, which add up to 430. The Text in the LXX Septuagint in Greek, which is the second oldest that we have of the Hebrew Text (in its case translated to Greek) differs from the Masoretic Text which must have transmitted the interpretation of the period in stead of the 215 years. From Abraham to all Israel in Egypt 215 years. And from then until Exodus of Moses, another 215 years. As well as the Septuagint, the Samaritan Pentateuch and historian Flavius Josephus (Antiquities 2:15-2) support this interpretation of the apostle Paul in Galatians 3:16-17.

Joseph in Egypt, is, then the story of any of us who love God, who receives revelation from Him, like the dreams of Joseph, and, even if we are hated by our own brethren, or family, we will have a similar situation to this spiritual ancestor of us, who sees how his father, who represents our Heavenly Father, does not forget him and loves him, although He allows for him to go through a tough test, predecessor of a great blessing. He defeats the temptation by rejecting the wife of his master Potiphar, and unjustly blamed, she represents the soul of Potiphar, this is his attitude and character in Egypt, a symbol of the corrupted world independent from God. For being Joseph honest with God and for not following the world, he is imprisoned, but would be set free to become, not only the governor of Egypt, the right hand of Pharaoh, but the purpose was to be the vehicle of salvation of Israel. This is symbolically the spiritual people of God because the family and the brothers of Joseph are figure of our relatives, neighbours, work mates who are going to repent, because for our preaching and treat in life they will have living testimony, as the Lord says: “…My Word be that goes from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void…,” Isaiah 55:11.

Genesis 37:5 to 11, 37:12 to 28, 39:1 to 18, 39:19 to 23, Psalms 105:17, Acts 7:9, Hebrews 11:22.

“…Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. And Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, captain of the guard, an Egyptian, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him down there. 2 The Lord was with Joseph, and he was a successful man; and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian… … So the advice was good in the eyes of Pharaoh and in the eyes of all his servants. 38 And Pharaoh said to his servants, “Can we find such a one as this, a man in whom is the Spirit of God?” 39 Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Inasmuch as God has shown you all this, there is no one as discerning and wise as you. 40 You shall be over my house, and all my people shall be ruled according to your word; only in regard to the throne will I be greater than you.” Genesis 39:1 and 41:37.

 

JESUS WITH JOSEPH AND MARY IN EGYPT

“Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, “Arise, take the young Child and His mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I bring you word; for Herod will seek the young Child to destroy Him.” 14 When he arose, he took the young Child and His mother by night and departed for Egypt, 15 and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt I called My Son.” Matthew 2:15.

Jesus was taken by His parents to Egypt to escape from martyrdom due to the order of Herod, guided by the angel of the Lord that was speaking to Joseph through dreams. But there is more in this story that we must know and apply to our lives in Christ. When Jesus goes to Egypt, it is telling us that the Son of God, the Messiah, the Saviour comes to the world, and comes to save us from the slavery to the system, from sin, from ourselves, and give us eternal life, to die on the cross for us, in our place.

The depth and the implication of this action is greater than we can see at first sight, for as well as the heavenly fact that God Himself comes as a man to the word that He has created and that it does so through His Son, we must realize that it is an action of the love of God. The Father and the Son, in the bosom of the Divinity, decided before the foundation of the world, and seeing that by giving us free will we would sin, that a plans of holy justice would be needed that could only be carried out by God Himself providing His own life, to give the life for us as the greatest proof of love for His children, even though we are sinners, and that through faith we could see the immensity of His work and repent, that it would hurt us truly to live separated from Him and not taking into account His wisdom, love, counsel and proposal of His eternal Kingdom.

Thak covenant within the Divinity implicated the crucifixion of the Son of God who did not doubt to give His life for us, but it implied to leave the celestial place, in the glorious and spiritual body on the Throne of Glory to become a man and live in a specific time, in which to fulfil His plan, evangelize, fulfil prophecies, live with us, suffer, lough, live like a man, to know every temptation of the flesh, for, at the end rise and ascend again to His previous place in that glory that He had with the Father, pending the fulfilment of the times of humanity, all souls that will believe will be saved, and come to establish Hi Kingdom. And we must not forget that Moses was the first liberator of the people of God in Egypt, liberator from slavery and from tyranny to build a kingdom that was only giving glory to a man enemy of God, but Jesus is the true and prophesized Liberator of the soul for ever, who takes us out of the dependence of the world and what it offers, from sin, and over all from living without God, to take us to the promised land of a life with God, blessed and guided through Him. All this Yahshua – Jesus has fulfilled by coming to Egypt, to the world of man.

If we look to the historical part, the tryp of Joseph, Mary and Jesus to Egypt has created as a result 25 places where the Holy Family passed by which have been forging a rout of the tradition, where through the years churches were built and places of remembrance and worship, like blessed fountains by the Child Jesus, etc. that can be visited as tourists, from the Old Cairo, to Sinai. But, such a trip, even though we may not have complete certainty of its absolute veracity, it will indeed bring us close to the experience of that Family, the most special in history, who being who they were, had to emigrate, be exiled, and live with the Baby of God to preserve His life guided by angels, live surely with other Jews in Egypt and wait to return to their village of Nazareth.

 

WHAT IS EGYPT IN OUR SPIRITUAL LIFE?

If we read the description of our “Spiritual Dictionary of the Bible” which is part of the book in Spanish “The Mind of Christ. Do you know Jesus Christ?” pg. 77 we find the following description about Egypt: The world, society and its system separated from God. The people of God were slaves there, which represents what we are in our world, if we don’t ask God that He guides us, instead of following the proposal of the system, slavery to the world.

Deuteronomy 23:7, Isaiah 19:25, Matthew 2:14, Revelation 11:8.

From this brief description of what Egypt means, theologically and spiritually, I would point out the fact that making bricks for Pharaoh symbolizes what we really do when we seek our own projects in the world, without having looked first for the blessing and the guidance of God. These projects end up being only the construction of pyramids, effigies, temples, many projects influenced by the trend of the world and for the world, and on top of that in the form of slavery, a slavery to stress, to success, the American dream, to an impossible agenda, to social demands that we cannot fulfil, familiar, of traditions, of what it is supposed that we do to be well with all. Conclusively, to make bricks being under anguish seeking, first, not the Kingdom of God, but the kingdom of this world, or richness, or possessions, or temporary pleasures. All of them take us to satiety and a life with no sense.

This is one of the reasons why we read in Revelation 11:8 in reference to the two witness and prophets: “And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.” And we know that Jesus was only crucified in Jerusalem. But the key for the city to which it is referring is in the same Text in the verses 1 and 2. This is one of the theological mysteries that we cover here for its relevance for our spiritual relationship with our Lord and Saviour Yahshua – Jesus Christ, to Whom we await in His coming to establish His Kingdom. The two witnesses are Moses and Elijah who symbolize the Law and the Spirit, the Commandments, and the faith of Jesus, which begins with our repentance. Further study of the Two Olives recommended. Verses 1 and 2 talk to us about measuring the patio and the area of the Temple, which is in Jerusalem. This means that these three cities find themselves represented in Jerusalem (Sodom and Egypt) because in it each of us will se Jeus Christ coming, the same way as He was crucified and raised, will also return, being that our soul abides the spiritual relationship with God in “Jerusalem”, the religious relationship of our own creation and through traditions, heresies, and a false and adulterous spirituality with which we must battle and leave, in “Sodom”, as well as our desire to prosper in this world in our way, of finding refuge there, of taking richness from there, but from what we must also become free with the power of God in Christ, through the Holy Spirit in us to become free and cross the Red Sea towards the Promised Land of Jerusalem, stop trusting in the world “Egypt” to trust in Jesus, here and now, and in His new and eternal world, the Kingdom of God.

CONCLUSION

This time we have travelled to Egypt in our series of Bible History. We have confronted our live with the life of Abraham, Joseph and Jacob, who travelled there and learned that we should not seek our provision in the world, as Abraham did, nor faint when we are surrounded by the world, like was happened to Joseph, but wait for God to exalt us to be salt and light to others for the glory of God. That, like Jacob, we will always have a brother, in his case, his beloved son Joseph, to help us in circumstances that we may live to come out of slavery, and for what we need the Liberator, that, like Moses who led those who had faith, our Lord and Saviour is who sets us free from the slavery to sin and of trusting the world, to take us to the promised land, to a blessed and guarded life by God.

We saw that the Biblical name of Egypt is a grandson of Noah, Mizraim (Genesis 10:6), and that the age of the pyramids and of the kingdom itself could be more recent, with the scholars modifying again the dates of the dating, due to the evidences, although the Bible provides us much information.

And finally, we have seen that Revelation 11:8 contains the theological matter that the crucifixion of Christ has impacted all the order of history in all scopes: “…and their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified,” and we know that Jesus was only crucified in Jerusalem, but the key about the city according to the Bible Text of Revelation, in verses 1 and 2 of the same chapter 11 shows us that it is referring to Jerusalem, which implies that Jesus has defeated completely in the three scopes of man’s society in history: in the world in Egypt, has defeated sin in Sodom, and has defeated the religion and the false prophets in Jerusalem. To Him be the glory and we await in His coming, which will bring the eternal Kingdom of God. Amen.