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The Exodus (from Greek ἔξοδος ''exodos'', "going out") is the founding, or etiological, myth of Israel; its message is that the Israelites were delivered from slavery by Yahweh and therefore belong to him through the Mosaic covenant.〔"Charter (i.e., foundation) myths tell the story of a society's origins, and, in doing so, provide the ideological foundations for the culture and its institutions." ((Sparks (2010), p.73 )〕 It tells of the enslavement of the Israelites in Egypt following the death of Joseph, their departure under the leadership of Moses, the revelations at Sinai (including the ten commandments), and their wanderings in the wilderness up to the borders of Canaan. The exodus story is told in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, and their overall intent was to demonstrate God's actions in history, to recall Israel's bondage and salvation, and to demonstrate the fulfillment of Israel's covenant. The historicity of the exodus continues to attract popular attention, but most histories of ancient Israel no longer consider information about it recoverable or even relevant to the story of Israel's emergence. The archeological evidence does not support the story told in the Book of Exodus and most archaeologists have therefore abandoned the investigation of Moses and the Exodus as "a fruitless pursuit". The opinion of the overwhelming majority of modern biblical scholars is that the exodus story was shaped into its final present form in the post-Exilic period, although the traditions behind it are older and can be traced in the writings of the 8th century BCE prophets. How far beyond that the tradition might stretch cannot be told: "Presumably an original Exodus story lies hidden somewhere inside all the later revisions and alterations, but centuries of transmission have long obscured its presence, and its substance, accuracy and date are now difficult to determine." The Exodus has been central to Judaism: it served to orient Jews towards the celebration of God's actions in history, in contrast to polytheistic celebrations of the gods' actions in nature, and even today it is recounted daily in Jewish prayers and celebrated in the festival of Pesach. In secular history the exodus has served as inspiration and model for many groups, from early Protestant settlers fleeing persecution in Europe to 19th and 20th century African-Americans striving for freedom and civil rights. ==Origins== The opinion of the overwhelming majority of modern biblical scholars is that the Torah (the series of five books which consist of the book of Genesis plus the books in which the Exodus story is told) was shaped in the post-Exilic period. There are currently two important hypotheses explaining the background to this: the first is Persian Imperial authorisation, the idea that the post-Exilic community needed a legal basis on which to function within the Persian Imperial system; the second relates to the community of citizens organised around the Temple, with the Pentateuch providing the criteria for who would belong to it (the narratives and genealogies in Genesis) and establishing the power structures and relative positions of its various groups. In either case, the Book of Exodus forms a "charter myth" for Israel: Israel was delivered from slavery by Yahweh and therefore belongs to him through the covenant. The final form of the Pentateuch was based on earlier traditions. These have left traces in over 150 references throughout the Bible. The earliest are in the prophets Amos (possibly) and Hosea (certainly), both active in 8th century BCE Israel; in contrast Proto-Isaiah and Micah, both active in Judah at much the same time, never do; it thus seems reasonable to conclude the Exodus tradition was important in the northern kingdom in the 8th century BCE, but not in Judah. In a recent work, Stephen C. Russell traces the 8th century BCE prophetic tradition to three originally separate variants, in the northern kingdom of Israel, in Trans-Jordan, and in the southern kingdom of Judah. Russell proposes different hypothetical historical backgrounds to each tradition: the tradition from Israel, which involves a journey from Egypt to the region of Bethel, he suggests is a memory of herders who could move to and from Egypt in times of crisis; for the Trans-Jordanian tradition, which focuses on deliverance from Egypt without a journey, he suggests a memory of the withdrawal of Egyptian control at the end of the Late Bronze Age; and for Judah, whose tradition is preserved in the Song of the Sea, he suggests the celebration of a military victory over Egypt, although it is impossible to suggest what this victory may have been. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Exodus」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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