Neil Steinberg/Sun-Times
The Bible is not the gateway to history that some wish it to be.
The Passover story? Enslaved Jews making bricks, Moses, plagues, escape from Egypt? None of it supported by a shred of historical evidence.
Oh, the ancient Egyptians were
there. The mummy of the pharaoh in Exodus, Ramses II, is on display in Cairo. As are the pyramids.
Somebody built them. But the Egyptians who, like the Germans, were sticklers for documentation, are tellingly mum on this topic. The Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago is jammed with hieroglyphics recording everything from tax receipts to recipes for beer. But nothing about a certain people being let go through means miraculous or mundane.