The Hyksos, Kings of Egypt and the land of Edom

Much more space is given to the origins of the Edomites in the book of Genesis than to any other non-Israelite nation. There must be a reason for this. Ishmael's descendants for instance, are dismissed in just seven verses (Gen.25:l2-l8); all the nations of the Canaanites, so familiar to the Israelites, are disposed of in only six verses (Gen.10:15-20); but a whole chapter of no less than forty-three verses is devoted entirely to the origins of Edom (Gen. 36)

We naturally ask, why? Moses, whom we believe was the author or compiler constrained to turn from his main subject, and to give quite a lengthy, though most compact digression, covering the details of Esau's descendents, to tell of the people they intermingled with and overwhelmed, to catalog the early sheiks of this nation, and to list the first eight kings. This is a most striking fact, in an author who otherwise wrote right to the point, and who does not diverge from his main theme.

The obvious reason for this lengthy digression is that Esau's descendents, the Edomites, were looked upon at that time and in that time as of great national or international importance, a people not to be passed over lightly, the subject was something not to quickly missed and forgotten, but needed to be recorded and preserved for future reference. The statement is repeatedly made in Genesis 36, "Esau is Edom." Edom was therefore an important name in the day when the book of Genesis was written. It is pointedly stressed that this Esau, the brother of Jacob, was the progenitor of this important nation, Edom. Edom is thus accorded a very unusual place of distinction and significance.

If we are right in the theory that we are going to be put forth, then the origin of the Edomites would indeed call for more than usual attention at the hands of the ancient historian.

Now our theory is, in short, that the Hyksos kings were the Edomites. Preposterous? We think not. We seriously suggest that the Hyksos Empire was an early expansion of the Edomite Kingdom, assisted by associated and related peoples. An empire which bloomed and blossomed early, but as quickly faded, withered and perished from sight.

We feel there is much attractive suggestion and circumstantial evidence to support the theory, so much so that it becomes mentally difficult for us to reject this conclusion. It also seems to explain and shed light upon otherwise inexplicable passages of Scripture which indicate that Edom was looked upon as a strong nation at one time.

We will thus set forth this theory, explaining and listing the large array of points in its favor, and leave you, the reader to judge.

We will begin with the man Esau himself, tracing his story just as it has been handed down to us in the Bible.

Esau's Parentage
Esau is said to be the founder of the nation Edom. He was twin brother of Jacob, the son of the Patriarch Isaac, and grandson of Abraham "the Hebrew" (Gen.14: 13). All of these men were "shepherds" Racially Esau was an "Hebrew," a Semitic person.

Esau's mother was Rebekah. She was an industrious woman, who in her youth, without hesitation single handedly undertook the watering of a camel caravan, and camels can be quite thirsty! She readily forsook her father's home in the city of Nahor in Northern Mesopotamia (Gen 24:10) to marry a man she had never seen, but whom she knew to be a worshipper of one God and the one and only God, to the entire exclusion of all other gods. He was the inheritor of certain peculiar promises and covenants of that God; whose name was (translated in the Authorized Version of the English Bible) "Jehovah." Her father was Bethuel, the "Syrian" (Gen24:l5; 28:5), son of Nahor, the brother of Abraham. Bethuel lived in or near the city of Haran (Gen 29:4) where also Abraham himself had resided for a number of years after leaving the city of Ur (Gen.11: 27-32) . (10)

It appears to us to be a major error to imagine that the Semitic Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were mere wandering nomads of little or no significance in the world of their day. Such views are sometimes expressed. In the Biblical account they are definitely pictured as men of high social standing and as men of influence, importance and of considerable wealth and power. They are set forth more in the nature of princes who had renounced their former national connections with the great, powerful cities of Ur and Haran; and who consequently had no country or people to which they any longer owed allegiance. Forsaking city life they deliberately chose a nomadic way of living, "looking for" a future city" which God would give them.

Abraham's brother Nahor appears to be the progenitor of a people occupying the general region around Haran. This name, Nahor actually appears upon ancient cuneiform tablets referring to this district. Egyptian monuments not many generations after the times of the Patriarchs refer to the "Naharain" in the region of Northern Mesopotamia.

Again, Laban, Jacob's uncle, seems to be a man of wealth and of power. Indications are he was of unusual importance, as his name seems to be remembered throughout a wide area in Syria. It seems to be preserved in the name of the mountain range and nation name of "Lebanon." Unimportant people do not usually have the distinction of having districts and mountains, etc., named after them.

The peoples of Mesopotamia had their own written records and their traditions regarding their ancestors. Had these early Hebrew stories regarding their ancestors in Mesopotamia been pure fiction, or had they no genuine relationship to the men of Nahor and to Laban, surely the Hebrew accounts would have been "laughed out of court" by the men of those days. The fact that the Biblical accounts survived as sober history seems to indicate that these accounts were accepted then and received no serious challenge. The claims of the Hebrews must have conformed to common knowledge at the time. Thus, we seem confronted by evidence that the families from which the Hebrews of the Bible originated were prominent and of no mean standing. It follows that Abraham would be well educated and not an insignificant nomad.

Those who hold that the names in the Biblical record such as "Terah" and "Nahor" refer only to tribes or clans of those names, (11) and not to genuine personalities, still must in fairness to that record, concede that such tribes or clans must have been very important and powerful, because their names stand out on clay tablets, and became attached to places, mountains, etc. Thus, even if we were to view these Hebrew stories as personifying tribes and clans, we still are forced to much the same conclusions. The Hebrews originated from persons (or tribes) of importance and power.

Now look at Abraham himself. His retinue and followers, when he first came into the Land of Canaan, constituted an element of such military significance that the Amorites of Mamre (a place later called Hebron) found it to their advantage to become his confederates (Gen. l4:13-14). Abraham called them to the war against Chedorlaomer, a mighty king of Elam. No little nomad would undertake such a war.

Melchizedek, King of Salem, highly honored Abraham (Gen. 14:18-19). We have to notice, too, that Lot, Abraham's nephew, very quickly rose to a seat of authority and recognition in the city of Sodom, a prize of such wealth and prosperity that Chedorlaomer traveled many, many miles with his army to secure. The very early advance Philistine settlement at Gerar (the great Philistine immigration came generations later), feared the military strength of both Abraham and Isaac (Gen. 21:22-32; 26:16, 23-33). To the Hittites, Abraham was a prince. (Gen. 23.6). All this points to a man of distinction and power. Of such an illustrious, Semitic family came Esau, the father of the Edomites.

Esau's Great Mistake
Early in life Esau manifested a materialistic tendency. He showed a low esteem of the spiritual values wrapped up in that covenant which God had made with his grandfather Abraham; a covenant involving blessing to the whole earth through a promised "Seed" (the Lord Jesus Christ), as well a numerous "seed" or posterity, and ultimate possession of all the Land of Canaan. Esau was more concerned with the immediate and the present, not with promises which were "afar off" and on which Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, and Rebekah set so much store (Heb.11:13). This trait of character came up in the famous "mess of pottage" incident. Esau despised his birthright by selling it to his twin brother Jacob for food when he was hungry and famished. The food was material and the birthright was "spiritual."

God held Esau to his foolish bargain. Later God permitted the wily Jacob, by a lie, to steal the prophetic blessing also which the aged and blind Isaac still purposed to give to his favorite son Esau, despite his knowledge that the "elder shall serve the younger." For this theft Jacob indeed paid dear in later life, reaping a terrible harvest in his sons who, in turn, lied to and deceived him for a number of years concerning his favorite son Joseph. How well the sons learned of their father!

Esau was terrifically angry at the loss of his father's blessing, as it included certain promises of material gain such as he craved. However, he found no way of repentance (Heb.12:16-17), and became thereafter an everlasting example of the tragedy of a fatal, wrong choice which cannot be remedied.

He typifies, in the Book of Hebrews those who despise the gain of Heaven through Jesus Christ, and choose instead "the mess of pottage" of this present world.

So extreme was Esau's anger that he began to plot the murder of his twin brother. Jacob, thereupon fled, and for twenty years was absent from the Land of Canaan, becoming a stranger living at Haran in Mesopotamia.

During this twenty year period, Esau and Jacob each amassed additional great wealth in cattle and lesser livestock. Then Jacob returned to Palestine. When the brothers met, Esau was pacified; the two were happily reconciled, and the old hatred was put away. Hereafter we hear of no further trouble between them.

Esau's Marriages
At the age of forty, before Jacob stole the blessing, Esau had married two wives, both Hitties, be it noted, of the Canaanite nations. This was a direct flouting of the family's sacred traditions. It was another clear demonstration of a basic despising of the religion of his father and grandfather, which religion forbade such ties with the Canaanites. Isaac especially loved Esau, but Esau cared not for his father's wishes; he did not as fully return that love. Esau was obviously seeking immediate material and social advantages for himself alone by thus joining affinity with prominent Hittite families. As we shall see later, he was quite successful in gaining such material and social advantage, but the price was the utter and final loss of the spiritual birthright, for thereafter it is written by God over his life, "Esau have I hated" (Romans 9:13; Mal 1:2)

Some people are sorely puzzled over the account of Esau's wives and have even questioned the accuracy of the text. The follow paragraphs, besides helping our study, may clear up the seeming contradictions of many of our readers.

Esau's First Wife, Judith-Abolibamah
Esau's first wife was Judith. She was the daughter of Beeri, a Hittite. In Genesis 36: 2 this woman is called also "Aholibamah." It was very common in those days for persons to bear more than one name. Almost endless examples could be cited, such as Abram = Abraham; Sarai = Sarah; Jacob = Israel; Esau = Edom; Ben-oni = Benjamin; Zaphnath paneah = Joseph; and so on. So also this woman is known by two names, Judith = Aholibamah. For the sake of our study, we will use the first name, Judith.

Judith's mother was Anah, and Anah was the daughter of Zibeon, a Hivite (Gen.36:2). This woman Anah is not to be confused with a man named Anah, of whom we shall speak later. Thus Judith, while Hittite on her father's side (Gen.26:34), was Hivite on her mother's. By marrying her, Esau smartly obtained family connections with both the Hittites (the children of Heth) and the Hivites, two prominent Canaanite nations.

From Esau's point of view, looking for material and social advantage, he had made a brilliant move, but not so in God's sight. It was Esau's fall. God turned from him, and from then on God's hand was directed toward Jacob in protection, guidance, and discipline, to make him the grand character he became in later life.

From this marriage three children were born in the Land of Canaan, named, Jeush, Jaelam, and Korah. All three became sheiks in the later Edomite government (Gen.36:5, 18), but they do not appear to rank as high or to have been as prominent as the children of Esau's other wives. In fact, in listing the sheiks derived from Esau in Genesis 36:15-19, this wife, and her children are given last place, as being in honor of a lower rank than the others.

Esau's Second Wife, Bashemath-Adah
Esau's second wife, (though he appears to have married both women at about the same time, Gen.26:34) was Bashemath or Adah. (Another instance of dual names.) She was the daughter of Elon, a Hittite. In Genesis 36: 10 this woman is named first in rank, and so evidently became Esau's chief wife.

Her only named son is Eliphaz. He is called Esau's "firstborn" Gen. 36:16), so was evidently older than Esau's other children. This name "Eliphaz" should be kept in mind, as we will speak of this son in a later chapter
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This marriage also linked Esau with the Hittites of Canaan.

Esau's Third Wife, Mahalath-Bathshemath
Esau's third wife was taken much later than the other two. After Jacob had fled to Haran, Esau came to better realize how really displeasing to his father and mother were his Canaanitish wives, and that his marriages, made for personal advantage, lay largely at the bottom of the loss of that blessing he now coveted. In a desperate effort to remedy an already hopeless and lost case, he went true to form, and again resorted to scheming a marriage to get what he wanted.

Did ever any man so debase the ideal of marriage as Esau! So he planned his third marriage, this time to a Semitic woman not of the Canaanites.

The Canaanites lay under the curse of utter destruction, in the religion of his family (Gen.16:l6). Therefore, Esau now sought a woman linked racially and religiously with his father's people. Evidently he hoped that both he and the children from such a marriage could yet inherit the blessing of Abraham. He may have thought that he could force God to let him inherit it, if he could but succeed in his plan to murder Jacob. Jacob was unmarried as yet. If Jacob died childless, the blessing would have to revert to himself. Esau foresaw, however, that even with Jacob dead and out or the way, he would still have trouble because or his Hittite wives, whose children could not come into this distinctively Hebrew blessing. To overcome the obstacle he negotiated this third marriage, taking this time a Hebrew wife. He would create a Hebraic line of descent which could inherit the blessing of Abraham.

So it was he went eastward into the Arabian Desert to the young, growing tribe of Ishmael, Abraham's eldest son, and married Mahalath or Bathshemath, Ishmael's daughter (Gen. 28:6-9). She was, in fact, his step-cousin.

However, Bathshemath, this third wire, although a Hebrewess, was not pure Hebrew. It is true, she had no Canaanite blood in her, but in actuality she was three-quarter Egyptian, since both her mother and her grandmother Hagar were Egyptian women (Gen. 21:21). The important point to Esau was her Hebrew connections, and that she was not Canaanite.

This woman had but one son, named Ruel (Gen. 36:4, 10). We will refer to Ruel again.

The Racial Mixture of the Edomites
From the foregoing we can see that in their origin the Edomites, the descendents of Esau, were a mixture of Hebrew, Hittite, Hivite, Ishmaelite (that is, Arabian) and Egyptian stock. But that is not all! As we shall see later, the Edomites intermingled with the Horites at an early date. The Horites were a settled people of the north east part of the Sinai Peninsula, lying easterly from Lower Egypt.

Now, turning back to the Egyptian references to the Hyksos people we find an astonishing parallel and similarity between the Hyksos and the Edomites.

1. Both are Semites (Semitic language and names).
2. Both have Hebrew characteristics.
3. Both have Hittite traits.
4. Both appear to have been Shepherds (after Manetho).
5. Both are Arabians. (Ishmael = Northern Arabia.)
6. Both lived easterly from Lower Egypt.

The resemblance is close if not exact, and certainly is most remarkable. Where else can we find so complete a similarity? None of the strictly Canaanite entities seem to fit points 2 and 5. The Moabites and the Ammonites do not, as far as we know, fit with points 3 and 5. Arabian tribes beyond Edom do not seem to fit point 3.

Only Edom seems to fit at all points with what we know of the Hyksos.

One wonders how two separate peoples could be so racially and linguistically alike! The thought can scarcely be resisted that instead of two peoples, we are viewing one entity, whose description has come down to us through two separate channels and under different names. One channel is the Egyptian sources, under the name "Hyksos" the other channel is the Biblical or Hebrew sources, under the name "Edom."

But as yet we still do not have proof; only the suggestion, the thought, the possibility. Do we have anything stronger? Yes, we do. Most striking as the foregoing similarity surely is, we have next to set forth the indications of the tremendous growth of the Edomite Kingdom and point out how it appears to dovetail into the Hyksos story.

End of Chapter Two