‘It’s a fact that the Jews invented monotheism,’ he said.
‘Not quite, the Pharaoh Akhenaton was the first great historical figure to have adopted monotheism, and certain believe that Hebrews who lived in Egypt at that time became monotheists. But if we remember the story of the Exodus this doesn’t quite fit in, because we have seen how the Exodus is very probably a legend. It was possible the Hyksos who carried the idea with them when they were forced out of Egypt.’
‘The Hyksos did not have a god of their own?’
‘At the beginning, but they had become Egyptians.’
‘And before that?’
‘Little is known of the Hyksos or Sea Peoples, but in ancient times Semitic tribes were polytheists. However, it was the tradition of each of these tribes to enter into a covenant with one particular god and in doing so the tribe was assured of that god’s exclusive protection, in turn for which the tribe offered their exclusive obedience and loyalty.’
‘Ah, so that’s where the covenant comes from!’
‘Yes. In the case of the Hebrews led by legendary figure of Abraham who inherited such a covenant, though in the beginning there were most certainly polytheists. Then as the tribe grew in importance the covenant with Yahweh replaced all others.’
‘Yahweh?’
‘Yahweh comes from a Hebrew tetragram of consonants, Yhwh, which roughly translated means Lord.’
‘Oh…,’ she mumbled wondering what a tetragram was.
‘So as the tribe grew into a nation, the nation was symbolised by this covenant, representing the direct relationship between God and the Nation of Israel. In this way it replaced all the older covenants of the various tribes that formed the nation. So you see this form of belief was in fact derived from the social patterns of nomadic tribal life in ancient Palestine.’
‘So that explains Abraham’s tent and the movable tabernacle in the bible.’
‘Right.’
‘So Abraham could have existed?’
‘So far the findings from intensive archaeological surveys in Israel do not confirm the biblical portrayal of Abraham as the founder of Israel. Data does not support the biblical origins as portrayed in Genesis through to Joshua. Today most humanist scholars agree there never was an Exodus as portrayed in the Pentateuch, nor was there a military conquest of the Promised Land by Joshua.’
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King David
The Legacy of Solomon Page 62
