How Long Were the Children of Israel in Egypt?
by Farrell Till
Because the Exodus-6 genealogy lists only four generations from Levi to Aaron and Moses, this presents several problems for inerrantists. First, Exodus 12:40 states that the Israelites sojourned in Egypt 430 years. Since Levi was one of Jacob's sons who accompanied him into Egypt (Gen. 46:11) and since Levi's sons Gershon, Kohath, and Merari had already been born at this time and also were in the group that went with Jacob into Egypt (Gen. 46:11), it is inconceivable that in the space of over 400 years just two more generations would have been born in the Levitical branch that Aaron and Moses were born into, yet Exodus 6:18-20requires this unlikely conclusion.
Exodus 6:18 The sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel, and the length of Kohath's life was one hundred thirty-three years. 19 The sons of Merari: Mahli and Mushi. These are the families of the Levites according to their genealogies. 20 Amram married Jochebed his father's sister and she bore him Aaron and Moses, and the length of Amram's life was one hundred thirty-seven years.
Notice that Kohath lived to be 133 (v:18) and that his son Amram (the father of Aaron and Moses) lived to be 137. If we assume that Kohath was just an infant in his mother's arms when the Jacobites went into Egypt and if we assume that in the final year of his life, he sired Amram, and then if we assume that Amram sired Moses the last year of his life, this genealogy would allow for an Egyptian sojourn of only 350 years. This number is arrived at by adding 133 (the maximum period of time that Kohath could have spent in Egypt) to 137 (the length of his son Amram's life) to 80, the age of Moses at the time of the exodus: "And Moses was eighty years old and Aaron 83 years old when they spoke to Pharaoh" ( Ex.7:7).
To circumvent this problem, inerrantists will argue that the genealogy of Exodus 6 is not complete, that the writer skipped some generations. Thus, Moses and Aaron weren't necessarily the sons of Amram but could have been his grandsons or even his great-grandsons. They argue this despite the fact that Exodus 6:20 clearly says that "Amram married Jochebed his father's sister and she bore him Aaron and Moses." The father/son relationship of Amram and Aaron and Moses was also claimed in Numbers 26:59, "The name of Amram's wife was Jochebed daughter of Levi, who was born to Levi in Egypt; and she bore to Amram: Aaron, Moses, and their sister Miriam." So two separate biblical passages clearly state that Amram's wife Jochebed bore to him Aaron and Moses, but when inerrantists are in trouble they never let plain language bother them. In this case, they will still insist that the language of these passages was not intended to be understood literally but that Aaron and Moses were merely descendants of Amram who were listed as "sons" in a genealogy that had skipped generations. They have to resort to this quibble in order to keep from admitting that the Bible made chronological errors.
To rebut this "skipped-generations" explanation of the Exodus-6 problem, I intend to establish that both biblical and extrabiblical writers understood that the relationships expressed in Exodus 6 were literal family relationships. Thus, to this writer, Levi was literally the father of Kohath, Kohath was literally the father of Amram, and Amram was literally the father of Aaron and Moses. To establish this, I will be focusing on one of the least prominent names in the genealogy quoted above. Exodus 6:18 states that the sons of Kohath were "Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel." Now if this genealogy was a literal, generation-by-generation genealogy, that would mean that the person named Uzziel in verse 18, who was listed with Amram, Izhar, and Hebron as "sons of Kohath," would have been the uncle of Aaron. That would be necessarily true if Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel were the brothers of Amram, for if all four of these were literally the sons of Kohath, then Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel would have been uncles to any children that Amram produced.
In this article, my intention will be to establish that biblical and extrabiblical writers did understand that Uzziel was the uncle of Aaron. Once that I have established this, it will be hard for inerrantists to argue that generations were skipped in the Exodus-6 genealogy. I will warn readers in advance that establishing Uzziel's relationship to Aaron will require some rather tedious genealogical analysis, which will in turn require careful reading to understand. Some people skip over all of the "begats" when they come to genealogies in the Bible, but I find them to be a storehouse of useful information that often spells big trouble for the Biblical inerrancy doctrine.
Let's look now at the relevant parts of the Exodus-6 genealogy. I won't get to Uzziel's relationship to Aaron and Moses until much later in this article, but my initial analyses of the genealogy will provide a useful background to build on when Uzziel finally becomes my primary focus. We need to consider first the entire genealogy and not just the part that speaks of Aaron's and Moses' descent from Levi.
These are the heads of their fathers' houses. The sons of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel [Jacob]: Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron, and Carmi; these are the families of Reuben. And the sons of Simeon: Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jachin, Zohar, and Shaul, the son of a Canaanite woman; these are the families of Simeon. And these are the names of the sons of Levi according to their generations: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari; and the years of the life of Levi were a hundred and thirty and seven years. The sons of Gershon: Lebni and Shimei, according to their families. And the sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhar, and Hebron, and Uzziel, and the years of the life of Kohath were a hundred thirty and three years. And the sons of Merari: Mahli and Mushi. These are the families of the Levites according to their generations" (verses 14-19).
I will interrupt the text at this point to note some reasons why readers should think that the writer of this passage was giving what he understood to be a literal father/son genealogy. The evidence that this was his intenion is overwhelming. Let's notice first that this genealogy is in perfect agreement with the listings in Genesis 46:8-11, where the sons and grandchildren of Jacob, through Levi's children, are listed. Verse 8 says that the sons of Reuben (who is also identified here as "Jacob's firstborn) were Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron, and Carmi. Compare this to the beginning of the genealogy quoted above, and you will see that the same names are listed as the "sons" of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel [Jacob]. Were the writers of these two passages being literal in their usage of sons and firstborn? Other biblical information indicates that they were.
In telling the story of Jacob's marriage to the daughters of Laban (Leah and Rachel), Genesis 29:31-32 says, "And Yahweh saw that Leah was hated, and he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren. And Leah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Reuben, for she said, Because Yahweh has looked upon my affliction, for now my husband will love me." That should be convincing enough for inerrantists to agree that the writers of these genealogies were speaking literally at least when they said that Reuben was the "firstborn of Jacob" [Israel].
But were the genealogists being literal in their usage of the word sons when they said that the "sons" of Reuben were Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron, etc. Let's notice what Josephus said in Antiquities of the Jews, Book 2, Chapter 7, Section 4 when he listed the members of Jacob's family that went into Egypt. This section in Josephus is parallel to the listings in Genesis 46.
Now Jacob had twelve sons; of these Joseph was come thither before [meaning that Joseph had already come into Egypt]. We will therefore set down the names of Jacob's children and grandchildren."
I will pause at this point to notice how specific Josephus was. He said that Jacob had twelve "sons," and I assume that inerrantists will not deny that Jacob literally had 12 sons. (The story of Jacob as related in Genesis makes that too clear to deny.) Furthermore, in the text quoted above, Josephus wrote not in terms of Jacob's "sons," as did the biblical genealogists, but he wrote in terms of Jacob's "children" and "grandchildren."
Now let's resume reading in Josephus.
Reuben had four sons--Anolch, Phallu, Assaron, Charmi [the spellings vary because Josephus wrote in Greek, but anyone can see that they are the same names as the biblical genealogies used]; Simeon had six--Jamuel, Jamin, Avod, Jachin, Soar, Saul; Levi had three sons--Gersom, Caath, Merari...."
Now since Josephus introduced his list with a very specific announcement (we will therefore set down the names of Jacob's children and grandchildre), we must understand that he meant for his readers to interpret sons literally in the above text. Hence, Josephus obviously thought that Gershon [Gersom], Kohath [Caath], and Merari were literally the sons of Levi. We can make this determination even more obvious by continuing our reading in Josephus's listing of Jacob's children and grandchildren.
Judas [Judah] had three sons--Sala [Shelah], Pharez [Perez], Zerah; and by Phares [Perez] two grandchildren--Esron [Hezron] and Amar [Hamul]....
So when Josephus came to names on the list that he understood were not literal children or sons of Jacob, he referred to them with the specific term "grandchildren."
Everything in the biblical text and in Jewish writings points to the obvious fact that Gershon, Kohath, and Merari were understood to be the literal sons of Levi, who was obviously the literal son of Jacob (Gen. 29:31). Everything points to the obvious fact that the writer of the Exodus-6 genealogy intended for his readers to understand that he was speaking literally when he used the word sons. A genealogy from Levi through Aaron and Moses is in 1 Chronicles 6:1-3, and it reads exactly as the listings in Exodus 6 and Genesis 46. A genealogy of Levi through his grandsons is listed in Numbers 3:17-20, and it reads exactlyas the listings in Exodus 6 and Genesis 46. Every time the Bible lists the descendants of Levi, the listings are exactly as they appear in Exodus 6, Genesis 46, and the work of Josephus.
The evidence that biblical and extrabiblical writers considered the Exodus-6 genealogy to be a literal father-son listing extends beyond the verses I have so far analyzed in this passage, so let's look at evidence that indicates that the writer continued his literal listings through the rest of the genealogy.
Verse 21 And the sons of Izhar: Korah, Nepheg and Zichri....
This is an important verse, because verse 18 said that the sons of Kohath were Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel. (I will remind readers that they should watch Uzziel closely, because something very interesting is going to happen with him later in this article.) Now if verse 18 is a literal father/son listing, as I believe the evidence presented so far has clearly established, Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel were all brothers, who were the sons of Kohath. This is important because most inerrantists who want to claim that generations were skipped in this genealogy will point to this verse as a likely place where generations were skipped. Many inerrantists, for example, will take the position that Amram wasn't necessarily the literal father of Aaron and Moses but only a direct ancestor. This argument, which flies right in the face of the "face-value" language of the text, claims that Amram's wife Jochebed could have borne Aaron and Moses only in the sense that she was an ancestral grandmother of Aaron and Moses, which, of course, would have made Amram only their ancestor and not their immediate father. In "The Inerrancy Doctrine Is Found to Be Impregnable" and "Plugging Holes in the Two-Amrams Theory," published in the first two issues of The Skeptical Review, biblical inerrantist Jerry Moffitt took the position that the Amram of verse 18 (listed as a son of Kohath and brother of Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel) was not the same Amram of verse 20 listed as the father of Aaron and Moses. He argued that generations were skipped between these two Amrams. Since inerrantists will resort to all sorts of linguistic gymnastics to try to deny that this genealogy means what it clearly says, it is very important to establish that biblical writers understood that Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel were brothers and that the Amram who was Kohath's son was the same Amram who was the father of Aaron and Moses, so we need to look at textual information that shoots this quibble full of holes.
I will begin the shooting by reminding readers that the sons of Kohath were Amram, Izhar,Hebron, and Uzziel (verse 18) and that Izhar had sons named Korah, Nepheg, and Zichri (v:21). Numbers 16 records a rebellion against the leadership of Moses that was led by a man named Korah, so obviously biblical writers thought that there was a man named Korahliving at the time of Moses. But was this Korah the same person who was listed in Exodus 6:21 as the son of Izhar, who was listed in verse 18 as the son of Kohath and brother of Amram? Unfortunately for proponents of the "skipped-generations" quibble, there is a clear indication that the Korah of Numbers 16 was considered the same Korah. That is shown in the opening verse of Numbers 16.
Now Korah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, with Dathan and Abiram... took men and they rose up before Moses...."
The chapter goes on to describe the rebellion that Korah led, which angered Yahweh so much that he caused the ground to open and swallow the rebels alive, but the important point about this story is the agreement that we have between this verse and the Exodus-6 genealogy.
Exodus 6:16 These are the names of the sons of Levi according to their generations: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari....
Exodus 6:18 And the sons of Kohath [were] Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel....
Exodus 6:21 And the sons of Izhar [were] Korah, Nepheg, and Zichri....
Numbers 16:1 Now Korah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi....
At face value, the Bible says that Levi had a son named Kohath, who had a son named Amram,who had a brother named Izhar, who had a son named Korah, and the Bible, at face value, says that a rebellion against the leadership of Moses was led by a man named Korah,who was the son of Izhar, who was the son of Kohath, who was the son of Levi. Earlier in this article, I presented both biblical and extrabiblical evidence to show to any reasonable person that both Jewish and biblical writers understood that Levi was the literal father of Kohath, who was the literal father of Amram, who was the literal father of Aaron and Moses. Now the information just presented above shows very clearly that biblical writers understood that the Amram, who was the son of Kohath, had a brother named Izhar, who had a son named Korah, who led a rebellion against Moses in the wilderness, so the evidence that the genealogy in Exodus 6 was a literal father/son listing continues to mount.
So far I have analyzed the Exodus-6 genealogy through verse 21 to show that all of the evidence, both biblical and nonbiblical, indicates that the writer obviously understood that he was giving a literal father/son genealogy. More needs to be said about the relationship of Amram and Jochebed to Aaron and Moses, so I will now back up to take another look at verse 20.
And Amram [listed in verse 18 as one of the "sons" of Kohath] took him Jochebed his father's sister to wife, and she bore him Aaron and Moses; and the years of the life of Amram were a hundred and thirty and seven years."
Now if this is a literal father/son genealogy, Amram would have been a literal son of Kohath, and the woman he married (Jochebed) would have been Kohath's literal sister. If Jochebed was Kohath's literal sister, then she would have been a literal daughter of Levi. Is there any evidence to indicate that biblical writers understood that Jochebed was Levi's literal daughter?
Numbers 26:59 says, "And the name of Amram's wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi,who was born to him in Egypt; and she bore to Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister." A widely recognized principle of both hermeneutics and literary interpretation states that language is to be interpreted literally unless there are compelling reasons to assign it figurative meaning. The only reason why anyone would want to assign figurative meaning to the expression "daughter of Levi" is to avoid a chronological discrepancy between the Exodus-6 genealogy and the claim that the Israelites sojourned in Egypt 430 years (Ex. 12:40). The avoidance of discrepancy, however, is not a compelling reason to interpret a passage figuratively when the face-value meaning implies literalism, because that becomes an attempt to prove inerrancy by assuming inerrancy. Inerrantists, nevertheless, will most certainly want to avoid discrepancy, so I am never surprised to see them arguing that Jochebed was a daughter of Levi only in the sense that she was a descendant of Levi. The evidence, however, will not support this quibble.
To so argue, inerrantists will have to ignore a mountain of evidence. In an apocryphal work called Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, each of the sons of Jacob gave their testaments. In Levi's, he said this in the 11th and 12th chapters.
I was twenty-eight when I took a wife; her name was Melcha. She conceived and gave birth to a son, and I gave him the name Gersom, because we were sojourners in the land. And I saw that, as concerns him, he would not be in the first rank. And Kohath was born in the thirty-fifth year of my life, before sunrise. And in a vision I saw him standing in the heights, in the midst of the congregation. That is why I called him Kohath, that is the Ruler of Majesty and Reconciliation. And she bore me a third son, Merari, in the fortieth year of my life, and since his mother bore him with great pain, I called him Merari; that is bitterness. Jochebed was born in Egypt in the sixty-fourth year of my life, for by that time I had a great reputation in the midst of my brothers.
And Gersom took a wife who bore him Lomni and Semei. The sons of Kohath were Amram, Isaachar, Hebron, Ozeel. And the sons of Merari were Mooli and Moses. And in my ninety-fourth year Amram took Jochebed my daughter, as his wife, because he and my daughter had been born on the same day... (quoted from The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, editor James H. Charlesworth, vol. 1, Doubleday, p. 792).
So in this pseudepigraphic work, we see clear evidence that the writer of Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs (which I will from now on abbreviate as T12P) understood that both the Exodus-6 genealogy and Numbers 26 expressed actual family relationships. The writer of this work, claiming to be Levi, said that Kohath was his son, whom his wife had given birth to, that Amram was Kohath's son, and that Amram married his daughter Jochebed. Hence, this extrabiblical text supports a literal interpretation of Numbers 26:59, which says that Jochebed was Levi's daughter who had been born to him in Egypt, and Exodus 6:20, which says that Jochebed was the sister of Amram's father. This is certainly compelling evidence that "Hebrew culture" understood that Levi was Kohath's actual father and that Jochebed was Kohath's actual daughter.
Philo Judaeus said this about Amram's wife.
"For there was," says the same historian, "a man of the tribe of Levi, named Amram, who took to wife one of the daughters of Levi, and had her, and she conceived and brought forth a male child; and seeing that he was a goodly child they concealed him for three months." This is Moses..." (The Works of Philo,Hendrickson Publishers, 1993, p. 316).
Philo didn't identify Amram's wife by name but only referred to her as a "daughter of Levi," so inerrantists may quibble that this leaves room for her to be a daughter of Levi only in the sense that she was a "descendant" of Levi. However, I have already given sufficient evidence that the writer of Exodus 6 was speaking literally in his usage of the word sons, so if Amram was a son of Kohath (who was Levi's son), and if Amram married "his father's sister," then Amram married his grandfather Levi's daughter. And that is exactly what the writer of Numbers 26:59 said: "The name of Amram's wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, who was born to him in Egypt." And that is exactly what Levi's testament in T12P says: "And Jochebed was born in my sixty-fourth year in Egypt."
In Antiquities of the Jews, however, Josephus was more specific and said that Jochebed was Amram's wife (2:9.4, verse 217) and went on to describe how she and Amram built an ark of bulrushes in order to thwart pharaoh's decree to kill all Hebrew male children. This, of course, is a familiar story about Moses that is known even to people whose biblical studies never went beyond Sunday school. Hence, the evidence, both biblical and nonbiblical, supports my argument that the writer of Exodus 6 was using literal language to describe the relationships of the people listed in the genealogy.
Further extrabiblical evidence to support the generation-by-generation view of the genealogy can be found in Philo and Josephus. Before we look at it, let's notice first that the Bible clearly teaches that Abraham begot Isaac, Isaac begot Jacob, and Jacob begot Levi, and I don't think that any inerrantist would seriously try to dispute that there were just four generations from Abraham to Levi. Therefore, if Levi literally begot Kohath, and Kohath literally begot Amram, and Amram literally begot Aaron and Moses, there would have been just seven generations from Abraham to Aaron and Moses. These would be (1) Abraham, (2) Isaac, (3) Jacob, (4) Levi, (5) Kohath, (6) Amram, and (7) Aaron and Moses. In his account of the birth of Moses, Josephus said, "(F)or Abraham was his [Moses'] ancestor of the seventh generation, for Moses was the son of Amram, who was the son of Caath [Kohath], whose father, Levi, was the son of Jacob, who was the son of Isaac, who was the son of Abraham" ( Antiquities, 2:9.6, verse 229). The fact that Josephus said that Abraham was Moses' ancestor of the "seventh" generation clearly shows that he was using the word son in its strictest sense as he went on to say who was the son of whom in these seven generations.
On the subject of Moses' descent from Abraham, Philo said, "(A)nd Moses is the seventhgeneration in succession from the original settler [Abraham] in the country who was the founder of the whole race of the Jews: ("On the Life of Moses," The Works of Philo,Hendrickson Publishers, 1993, section II, verse 7, p. 459).
So two major Jewish writers both understood that there had been only seven generations from Abraham to Moses, and Philo even specified that these were seven generations "in succession." Seven generations in succession would not allow for any "skipped generations" in the Exodus-6 genealogy. Josephus even listed all seven names after saying that Abraham was Moses' ancestor "of the seventh generation." When trying to explain biblical discrepancies, some inerrantists will talk a great deal about the need to understand Hebrew culture. It will be interesting, then, to see what these Hebrew-culture advocates will resort to in order to dance around the obvious fact that two well known Jewish writers, who were about 2,000 years closer to the time of the exodus than they are, understood that Moses was the seventh generation in succession from Abraham. Surely, they will not claim that Philo and Josephus just didn't understand Hebrew culture.
So far, I have examined the Exodus-6 genealogy, compared it to other biblical genealogies and extrabiblical texts, and established to the satisfaction of any reasonable person that both biblical and nonbiblical writers understood that Levi was the literal father of Kohath, that Kohath was the literal father of Amram, and that Amram was the literal father of Aaron and Moses. Along the way, I have established that Amram (the father of Aaron and Moses) had a brother named Izhar, who had a son named Korah, who led a rebellion against the leadership of Moses. Such information as this (confirmed by more evidence than any reasonable person could demand) makes it irrational for anyone to claim that the writer in Exodus 6 skipped generations in his listings in this genealogy. Certainly, the information makes it unreasonable to argue that generations were skipped between Kohath and Moses. To so argue, one must claim that generations were skipped between Izhar and Moses, yet somehow Izhar's son Korah was living in the time of Moses and was young enough to lead a rebellion against Moses.
There are, however, still more nails to drive into the coffin of this "skipped-generations" quibble, which makes the unreasonable claim that the word sons in Exodus 6 meant only descendants. The next nail that I will be driving finally brings us to the relationship of Uzzielto Aaron. To introduce this argument, let's notice that Exodus 6:18 says, "And the sons of Kohath [were] Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel." Now if I am right in claiming that Exodus 6 is a literal father/son genealogy, it is obvious that Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel were brothers. Furthermore, if they were brothers and if the Amram in this verse was the literal father of Aaron, then Uzziel would have been Aaron's uncle. That conclusion is so obvious that nothing further needs to be said about it.
Let's notice again that verse 20 says, "And Amram took him Jochebed his father's sister to wife, and she bore him Aaron and Moses," so certainly the "face-value" meaning of the text gives us every reason to conclude that a man named Amram was the literal father of Aaron. Therefore, if this Amram is the same Amram of verse 18, then by necessity, Uzziel was Aaron's uncle.
With that in mind, let's now look at verse 22: "And the sons of Uzziel [were] Mishael, Elzaphan, and Sithri." That seems clear enough, doesn't it? Uzziel--and who could this be but the Uzziel of verse 18, who was listed as a brother of a man named Amram?--had sons who were named Mishael and Elzaphan.
Now let's compare this passage to Leviticus 10:1-4, where we are told the strange story of Aaron's sons Nadab and Abihu (both of them priests like Aaron), who offered "strange fire" to Yahweh, and so Yahweh did what any self-respecting tribal deity of that time would have done. He sent forth fire to devour them, "and they died before Yahweh" (v:2). So after Yahweh had had his petty vengeance for a petty offense, Moses, the top man on the Hebrew totem pole... well, let's look at exactly what the inspired, inerrant word of God says.
And Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan, the sons of Uzziel, the uncle of Aaron, and said unto them, "Draw near and carry your brethren from before the sanctuary out of the camp" (v:4).
Please notice that these two men, Mishael and Elzaphan, whom Moses called before him at this time were said to be "the sons of Uzziel." Now keep in mind that the Exodus-6 genealogy said that Amram and Uzziel were the "sons of Kohath" (v: 18) and that verse 22 said that Uzziel had sons who were named Mishael and Elzaphan. It kind of sounds as if the Uzziel of Exodus 6 and the Uzziel of Leviticus 10:4 were the same person, doesn't it? Now bear in mind that if these two were the same person and if Exodus 6 is a literal father/son genealogy, then Uzziel of Exodus 6 would have been Aaron's uncle.
So notice what Leviticus 10:4 says in identifying who Mishael and Elzaphan were. It clearly says that they were "the sons of Uzziel, the uncle of Aaron." Now I know from previous exchanges with inerrantists on this subject that some will argue that the word uncle simply meant a "relative." I intend to do follow-up articles on this issue in which I will reply to the various attempts that inerrantists have made to resolve the chronological problem in Exodus 6, so at that time, I will show that the uncle=relative quibble just won't work.
The evidence that I have presented so far shows that both biblical and extrabiblical writers understood that Jacob's son Levi was the literal father of Kohath, who was in turn the literal father of Amram, who was the literal father of Aaron and Moses. The astounding thing about this genealogy is the mountain of evidence, both biblical and nonbiblical, that makes it so easy to establish that Jewish writers, both biblical and nonbiblical, understood the relationships in this lineage exactly as they are presented above. Yet despite this overwhelming evidence, bibliolaters will resort to all kinds of verbal gymnastics to keep from admitting that the face-value meaning of the language in this genealogy makes Moses and Aaron the great-grandsons of Levi, Jacob's son from whom the Levitical priesthood in Judaism descended.
Why are bibliolaters so intent on denying the face-value meaning of Exodus 6? The reason is that they must put more generations between Levi and Moses and Aaron than are listed in the genealogy in order to keep the Exodus-6 genealogy from contradicting the claim in Exodus 12:40 that the Israelites had spent 430 years in Egypt by the time of the exodus. However, if Aaron and Moses were only the great-grandsons of Levi, a glaring chronological discrepancy results when the ages of Levi, Kohath, Amram, and Aaron and Moses (at the time of the exodus) are added. First, let's notice again that Kohath, the grandfather of Aaron and Moses, was born before Jacob took his family into Egypt. This determination is made from Genesis 46:11, where Kohath was listed as one of the 70 "souls" who went with Jacob into Egypt.
This text does not state Kohath's age at this time, but if we assume that he was just a nursing infant in his mother's arms when the trip to Egypt was made, he would have spent 133 years in Egypt. That is determined from Exodus 6:18, where it says, "And the years of the life of Kohath were a hundred and thirty-three years." It is unlikely that Kohath was just a nursing infant at the time of the descent into Egypt, because Genesis 46:11 lists him as the second of three sons that Levi had at the time. Since this chapter names Jacob's sons in the order that they were born to their respective mothers, a determination we can make from Genesis 29-32, which tells all about Jacob's escapades with his two wives and two concubines, we have reason to suspect that Jacob's grandsons were also listed in the order of their birth. If that is so, Kohath had a younger brother named Merari, and that would mean that Kohath was not an infant at the time of the descent into Egypt (unless, of course, Kohath and Merari were twins). However, in order to give biblicists every benefit of the doubt, we will assume that Kohath was actually the youngest of the three sons and that he was just an infant when he went into Egypt. This would allow him to have lived 133 years in Egypt.
Kohath, as we have already noted, had four sons: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel. For reasons just noted, Amram was probably the oldest of the four brothers, but again, to give inerrantists every advantage, I am going to assume that Amram was really the youngest of the four. Furthermore, I am going to assume that Kohath's last act before he drew his final breath was to sire Amram. It is ridiculous to think that this could have happened, but I am trying to give inerrantists every break possible. Since Amram lived to be 137 (v:20), the maximum number of years that could have passed from Kohath's entry into Egypt until the death of his son Amram would have been 270 years (133 + 137). To give inerrantists further benefit of the doubt, I am going to assume that Amram's last act on earth (like his father's) was the siring of a son, in this case Moses, who was obviously younger than both Aaron and his sister Miriam (Exodus 7:7; 2:1-8). Since Moses was 80 years old at the time of the exodus (Exodus 7:7), this would mean that no more than 350 years could have passed from the time of the Israelite descent into Egypt to the time of the exodus. This figure is arrived at by adding Kohath's total age (133 years) and Amram's total age (137 years) to Moses' age at the time of the exodus (80). Any reasonable person would, of course, recognize that the Exodus-6 genealogy won't even allow a span of 350 years from Kohath's descent into Egypt to the exodus, because it is completely unreasonable to believe that Kohath and Amram could have sired sons at the ages of 133 and 137 respectively.
So this is exactly why inerrantists bend over backwards to make the Exodus-6 genealogy not mean what it obviously does say. If they admit that Exodus 6 contains a literal father/son genealogy, as it obviously does, then that results in a contradiction between Exodus 6 and Exodus 12:40. I believe that the evidence I have presented sustains my claim that there is indeed a discrepancy in the two texts, so it is now the responsibility of biblical inerrantists to show us that I have incorrectly divided "the word of truth."
This pretty well summarizes the chronological problem that this genealogy causes the biblical inerrancy doctrine, but the bad news for inerrantists is that there is even more evidence that biblical writers thought that the generation-by-generation descent from Levi to Aaron and Moses was exactly as it is shown in the Exodus-6 genealogy. That evidence is in the few remaining verses of the genealogy that I have not yet analyzed. The genealogy shifted its focus to Aaron at verse 23, at which time the writer further indicated that he was presenting a generation-by-generation genealogy.
And Aaron took him Elisheba, the daughter of Amminadab, the sister of Nahshon,to wife, and she bore him Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar.
This verse strengthens my claim that the writer of Exodus 6 used family relationships in their literal senses in this genealogy. To show why, let's notice another genealogical statement in Ruth 4:18-20.
Now these are the generations of Perez: Perez begot Hezron, and Hezron begot Ram, and Ram begot Amminadab, and Amminadab begot Nahshon....
Perez was the son of Judah, who was born illegitimately as a result of Judah's escapade with his daughter-in-law Tamar (Gen. 38:12-30), so Perez was born before the Israelite descent into Egypt. Furthermore, Perez's son Hezron was also born before the descent into Egypt, because he was listed in Genesis 46:12 with Jacob's children and grandchildren who had descended through Jacob's son Judah. (Everyone should remember that Josephus used the specific word "grandchildren" in his listing of those who were descendants of Jacob but not his immediate sons, Antiquities, 2.7.4.) So the chronological problem in this genealogy again becomes very obvious. If Judah begot Perez and Perez begot Hezron and if both Perez and Hezron had been born before the descent into Egypt, how reasonable is it to believe that only three generations (Ram, Amminadab, and Nahshon) would have been born during the 430-year sojourn in Egypt (Exodus 12:40)? That's not very likely, yet the genealogy clearly says that Aaron married Elisheba, the daughter of Amminadab, the sister of Nahshon, so she would represent only the third Israelite generation born in Egypt, according to the "face-value" meaning of the genealogy in Ruth 4:19-20, which reads exactly as Matthew's genealogy (1:3-4) and the genealogy of Judah in 1 Chronicles 2:5-10. There is no genealogy anywhere in the Bible that adds any generations to the genealogy of Perez through Nahshon.
Obviously, inerrantists can't accept the "face-value" meaning of these genealogies, so that is why they will insist that some generations were skipped between Hezron, who was born before the descent into Egypt, and Nahshon, who was obviously a contemporary of Aaron and Moses, because he is mentioned several times during the wilderness wanderings as a leader in the tribe of Judah.
Numbers 1:4 A man from each tribe shall be with you, each man the head of his ancestral house. 5 These are the names of the men who shall assist you: From Reuben, Elizur son of Shedeur. 6 From Simeon, Shelumiel son of Zurishaddai. 7 From Judah, Nahshon son of Amminadab.
Numbers 2:3 Those to camp on the east side toward the sunrise shall be of the regimental encampment of Judah by companies. The leader of the people of Judah shall be Nahshon son of Amminadab, 4 with a company as enrolled of seventy-four thousand six hundred.
Numbers 7:11 Yahweh said to Moses: They shall present their offerings, one leader each day, for the dedication of the altar. 12 The one who presented his offering the first day was Nahshon son of Amminadab, of the tribe of Judah....
Numbers 10:13 They set out for the first time at the command of Yahweh by Moses. 14 The standard of the camp of Judah set out first, company by company, and over the whole company was Nahshon son of Amminadab.
Interestingly enough, whenever Nahshon was mentioned, he was always identified as "the son of Amminadab." Yes, inerrantists will argue, he was the "son of Amminadab, but soncould mean just descendant, so that doesn't necessarily mean that Nahshon was the literal "son" of Amminadab. Well, if he wasn't the literal son of a man named Amminadab, why was he always called the "son of Amminadab"? As many times as he was mentioned, why didn't a biblical writer at least one time refer to him as the son of whoever was his actual father?
A dodge that some inerrantists try to use when confronted with genealogical problems like the one in Exodus 6 is to argue that the names in genealogies represented "ages" or "eras" and not the specific people named in them. Thus, the name Abraham in the genealogy of Jesus meant not Abraham but the "age" or "era" of Abraham. Very well, if that is true, why did the biblical writers consistently say that Nahshon was the "son of Amminadab"? Who was this Amminadab anyway? We really don't know, because outside of the many times that he is listed in genealogies as the "son" of Ram and the father of Nahshon, he was never mentioned. So why would biblical writers have chosen such an obscure person to represent an "age" or an "era" in the various genealogies that listed Amminadab? He was famous for nothing except that he had a "son" who was an important leader in the tribe of Judah during the wilderness experiences of the Israelites. If this age-or-era-of argument has any merit, why wouldn't the writers of biblical genealogies have gone directly from Hezron to Nahshon, because he was the only descendant after Hezron who was prominent enough to have an age or era named after him? Ram and Amminadab weren't.
For these reasons, it is entirely logical to understand that the writer of the Exodus-6 genealogy meant for his readers to understand that he thought that Aaron's wife Elisheba was the literal sister of the Israelite leader Nahshon and that this Nahshon was the literal son of a man named Amminadab, just as Aaron's wife was the literal daughter of Amminadab. I have already established to the satisfaction of anyone who doesn't have an inerrancy axe to grind that the writer of this genealogy was using the word sons literally throughout the genealogy as he listed the "sons" of Reuben and Simeon and Levi and Kohath, etc. So if Nahshon was not the literal son of Amminadab, then the genealogist suddenly switched the meaning of the word son when he said that Nahshon was the "son of Amminadab," and that would be a writing error known as equivocation. I have said many times in discussing biblical discrepancies that an error is an error. It doesn't have to be a "biggie" in order to be an error, and if there is even a "little" error in the Bible, it is not inerrant.
Two more generations after Aaron were listed in the Exodus-6 genealogy, and they provide further evidence that this was a generation-by-generation listing that skipped no generations. We have already noted above that verse 23 says that Aaron married Elisheba, the sister of Nahson, who bore him Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar. If Elisheba bore these four to Aaron, then they would have been Aaron's actual sons just as Aaron and Moses would have been the actual sons of Amram, whose wife Jochebed bore him Aaron and Moses. The genealogy goes on to say that one of Aaron's sons, Eleazar, married Putiel whom bore him Phinehas.
Exodus 6:25 Aaron's son Eleazar married one of the daughters of Putiel, and she bore him Phinehas.
I would waste time if I cited all of the passages where Eleazar was identified as the son of Aaron and Phinehas was identified as the son of Eleazar. Those who want verification of these relationships can check Exodus 28:1; Leviticus 10:6; Numbers 3:2-4; Numbers 3:32; and Numbers 4:16, which are just a few of the many passages that identify Eleazar as the son of Aaron, and Numbers 25:7, 11; Numbers 31:6; Joshua 22:13, 30-32; Joshua 24:13; and Judges 20:28, which clearly identify Phinehas as the son of Eleazar. From the beginning to the end of this genealogy, then, the text indicates that the writer understood that he was listing all generations and skipping none. The "sons" in this genealogy were clearly sons and not more distant descendants.
The writer of the Exodus-6 genealogy obviously thought that only three or four generations of Israelites were born between the descent of Jacob's family into Egypt and the exodus. He presented the genealogy of Aaron in a way that revealed that he thought that only four generations of Israelites at the most had actually grown up in Egypt (Kohath, Amram, Aaron, and Eleazar) and that Aaron had married a woman who was only the third generation of her family to be born in Egypt (Ram, Amminadab, and Nahshon and Elisheba). It isn't possible to find 430 years in this genealogy, so we can only conclude that a chronological discrepancy exists in Exodus 6:18-25 and Exodus 12:40, which says that the Israelites sojourned in Egypt for 430 years. And an error is an error. This is the exact kind of error that we would expect to find in a "book" that is actually a collage put together by different writers and editors. The left hand didn't remember what the right hand had done.
There is, however, no such thing as a discrepancy that biblical inerrantists won't try to explain, so I will post follow-up articles in which I discuss the different attempts that biblicists have made to show that the genealogy in Exodus 6 is consistent with the 430-year claim in 12:40.