Ron Hendel

Ron Hendel: “The Exodus as Cultural Memory”

Deane Ancient Israel and Judea, Biblical Literature, Biblical Studies Topics, Cultural Memory, Exodus, Exodus, Wilderness Journey, Historical and Literary Contexts, Historicity of Ancient Israel and Judea, Israel and Judah, Methods and Approaches in Biblical Studies, Secondary, Torah, Video , ,

Professor Ron Hendel (University of California at Berkeley) delivered a lecture at the Arizona Centre for Judaic Centre on March 9, 2015, on the subject of “The Exodus as Cultural Memory”.

The Exodus is a central event in biblical and Jewish memory. But according to the archaeological and historical record, it is unclear what it is a memory of.  I propose that it is, in part, a transformed memory of the demise of the Egyptian Empire in Canaan, which facilitated the emergence of Israel as an independent people.  The story served as an engine of a distinctive cultural identity, a function that it continues to perform today.

The lecture begins at 5:30.

A version of the lecture was published in Israel’s Exodus in Transdisciplinary Perspective, edited by Thomas E. Levy, Thomas Schneider, and William H.C. Propp (Springer, 2015).