Moses

Judaism was founded on the belief that there is only one God. (Somewhat uncoincidentally, the same one of the Christians and Muslims.)

In the times of the Jewish temple, before its destruction by the Romans in AD 60, Jews used to sacrifice animals and burn incense, as well as say certain prayers, such as the Shema, the Aleinu, and the Amidah

However, since its destruction, Jews have worshiped by reading prayers from a prayerbook (as sacrifices can no longer be performed) and an extra prayer - the Musaf - is added on the Sabbath to represent the extra sacrifice customary at that time.

There are also readings from the Torah and tuneful songs sung. The entire service is done in Hebrew, and certain of the older prayers are said in Aramaic.

There is a misconception that worship in synagogues or in the home began only after the destruction. That is not the case. People outside of Jerusalem prayed in synagogues and in houses of study just as we do today. In Jerusalem itself there were tens of synagogues while the Temple still stood. This is why in 1 Kings ch.8, as he is dedicating the First Temple, King Solomon mentions both praying in the Temple (verse 33) and praying far away from it (verse 47), because God who dwells in the Temple also dwells in the heavens (again, both mentioned in the above chapter) and hears prayers everywhere. I might also point out that in addition to the sacrifices, prayers were said in the Temple (Mishna, tractate Tamid).

However, the view of biblical scholars now is that Moses did not write, and could not have written, Exodus.

Exodus was compiled over a period of centuries, before it reached a more or less identifiable form, and was then redacted into substantially the form we know today. So, the answer to this question depends on the level of the book's evolution at which you would finally consider it to be 'Exodus'. Arguably, that would be somewhere around 500 to 600 BCE.

The book is based on input from several sources. Because we do not know the actual names of those sources, we generally call the major contributors: J, E, D and P.

Based on the archaic Hebrew and other evidence, J and E appear to be from around 800 to 1000 BCE. D (the Deuteronomist) lived a little before 600 BCE. P (the Priestly source) probably lived during the Babylonian exile.

It has been argued further that Moses was not only the author of Exodus, but also of the entire Pentateuch (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy). That is fully supportive of the first of the two dates provided in the first answer to this question.

However, the Sources Theory, which states that the Pentateuch had several authors, is widely accepted by modern scholars and some Christians. After all, a late date for Exodus does not undermine the message of the Bible. It is also important to note that nowhere in Exodus, or the Pentateuch, does it claim to have been written by Moses so we must analyse the text to determine who probably wrote it. Just one citation is "Testament: the Bible and History", by John Romer (1996). However, some Christian organizations and their websites present a different view.

In order to provide balanced support for a late date of the authorship of the Pentateuch, I have added some additional reasoning, taken from examples in the Bible. The reader should make his or her own decision as to which date to accept (eg circa 1400 BCE or circa 500-600BCE).

Deuteronomy chapter 34 describes the death of Moses.and says that "not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses..." This could not have been written by Moses or even by any author prior to the establishment of a nation called Israel. If we explain this by saying that this chapter was added after the death of Moses, we leave open the question as to what else was added after the death of Moses.

The Ten Commandments in Exodus 20 have a slightly different wording to the same commandments in Deuteronomy 5. Exodus 20:11 says that the Sabbath is in honor of the 7 days of creation; Deuteronomy 5:15 says that the Sabbath is in honor of the flight from Egypt. While these issues have no important theological consequences, it is not possible that the man who personally carved the commandments onto tablets would not even remember what he wrote. And if, as the author of the Pentateuch, he was not sure, he could have looked in the ark and read the tablets again.

· The J (Yahwist) source always used 'YHVH' as the name for God and presents tradition from the point of view of the southern kingdom, Judah, using archaic Hebrew. J was a gifted storyteller who was especially interested in the human side of things and had his own characteristic vocabulary. J referred to Moses' father-in-law as Reuel or Hobab.

· The E (Elohist) source always used 'Elohim' as the name for God and presents tradition from the point of view of the northern kingdom, Israel, using archaic Hebrew. E referred to Moses' father-in-law as Jethro, an apparent error that Moses himself could not have made.

· At some time around 650 BCE., J and E were combined by Judaean editors, known to us as JE.

· The D (Deuteronomist) source emphasises centralisation of worship and governance in Jerusalem, as would be expected from political events that followed the defeat of Israel. It uses a more modern form of Hebrew.

· The P (Priestly) source uses both Elohim and El Shaddai as names of God and focusses on the formal relations between God and society. He also uses a late form of Hebrew, with a rather turgid style.

There are also many 'doublets' where each author provided his own, separate version of the same event. We can be sure that had Moses had been the author, he would have chosen a preferred version and stuck with that one.

Exodus 17:14

Exodus 20:22 - 23:33

Exodus 34:10 -26

Moses was certainly in a position to write the Pentateuch. Moses would have had access to the Hebrew patriarchal records. Moses had the time during the 40 years in the wilderness. Moses was personally familiar with the geographical features of the area. Moses as the leader and founder of the nation wanted them to have the laws which would facilitate their function as a nation. At this time, even Egyptian slaves were inscribing records on tunnel walls. On the other hand a man like Moses must certainly have written about one of the most significant epochs in history.

Note that the gospel passages include a number which indicate Jesus himself believed the Law was written by Moses.

So the Exodus would have been written by Moses between 1441 and 1401 BC.

Exodus 9:3: "Behold, the hand of the LORD is upon thy cattle which is in the field, upon the horses, upon the asses, upon the camels, upon the oxen, and upon the sheep: there shall be a very grievous murrain."

Clearly, the author was not aware that camels had not yet been domesticated during the times of Abraham and Moses. This fact alone is sufficient to prove that the Pentateuch was not written before the eighth century BCE, or the tenth century at the very earliest. Technology and lifestyles changed so slowly that the biblical author believed that the lifestyle he experienced had always been so.

To broaden this research to the Pentateuch as a whole: in Genesis, the story of Jacob includes the gift from Jacob to his twin brother Esau of thirty milch camels with their colts. This could not have written in the time of Jacob nor the time of Moses. It must have been written in the first millennium BCE.

A date in the first millennium BCE is consistent with the Sources Theory, providing an independent proof of late dating for Exodus.

Even looking at just the Exodus, with a date sometimes given as just prior to 1220 BCE, does not make sense for references to Philistines. Whoever wrote these accounts lived after 1100 BCE and probably in the first millennium BCE.

First of all, literary analysis is not about handwriting, it is largely about content.

Secondly, are we saying that Moses gave his scribes such latitude in what they wrote that it reflected their personal biases more than anything that Moses dictated to them? Whenever scholars identify the style associated with the Yahwist (J), the text reflects the Judahite perspective; whenever scholars identify the style associated with the Elohist (E), the text reflects the Israelite (northern) perspective. Also many doublets differ too much in content to have originated from the same source.

D and P also had their own style. But why did they use a much later form of Hebrew than the others? A form that is associated with the middle of the first millennium BCE?

Moses's wife is named Tzippora (or Zipporah).

Additionally

Moses' first son was Gershom, as mentioned in Exodus 2:22. He had two sons as mentioned in Acts 7:29.

Acts 7:29 When Moses heard this, he fled to Midian, where he settled as a foreigner and had two sons.

According to traditional chronology, the Exodus was in 1312 BCE. Non-traditional chronology places it earlier. However, it does not state explicitly that the route of the Exodus involved crossing the Nile. See also:

More about the Exodus

More about Moses

Moses' father, whose name was Amram, was of the Tribe of Levi. He was the son of Kehath (often misspelled "Kohath") and grandson of Levi (Exodus ch.6). See also:

Information about Moses

In the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament), Moses is the Law-Giver. He is also the great leader of the Israelites, who led them out of Egypt, from slavery into freedom. Moses had a special relationship with God, yet was referred to as "the most humble man on earth." Moses was the one to whom God spoke; he was given the Ten Commandments, the rules of ethics that instructed the people in how God wanted them to live. So, Moses' job was to communicate with God and then transmit that teaching and instruction to the Israelites.

Although Christians believe in the New Testament, they also revere Moses, and Jesus too revered him. You can read about Moses in four of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible-- he is in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. In fact, although he is not really a part of Genesis, the first five books of the Bible are often called the Five Books of Moses, because it is believed he wrote them. (It should be noted that he probably did not write them himself, even with Divine inspiration; but despite a lack of scientific or archaeological proof, many people to this day believe he did.)

It should also be mentioned that Moses taught not only the written laws of God, but the Oral Torah as well. The Oral Torah is details and commentary that have been handed down by the sages of the Talmud but not written in the Torah itself.

A:

Based on the account in the Book of Exodus, with the loss of 600,000 healthy adult male slaves, the Hebrew women, and much wealth, Egypt should have gone into serious economic decline. However, there is no evidence of any such decline occurring at any time during the Late Bronze Age. The copious documents were now have show that economic activity continued as before, with contracts written and honoured, etc. In fact there is no evidence outside the Bible that the Israelites were ever in Egypt or that there was any Exodus from Egypt as described in the Bible. The clear majority of scholars now say that this event never really occurred.