This post continues my extended review of The Exodus Decoded, picking up the program in between the second and third commercial breaks.

After leaving Beni Hasan, Jacobovici cuts to Avaris, where the voiceover and video suggest a large-scale archaeological dig occurring for the sole purpose of finding Joseph’s signet ring. Jacobovici claims that not only was Joseph’s signet ring found in precisely the time and place that Jacobovici’s hypothesis predicted, but that “Professor Manfred Bietak found no less than nine seals worn by Joseph’s court officials.” The evidence for a connection to Joseph? According to Jacobovici, “Inscribed right on them is the Hebrew name Yakov, Joseph’s father.” Then, with pictures of strong-looking Egyptians and robed men carrying guns, Jacobovici implies that Bietak would open up about a link between these seals and the biblical Jacob if not for the pressure of the Egyptian government. Here Jacobovici takes a detour into conspiracy theory, suggesting that the Egyptian government is actively and literally covering up (with dirt and plants) evidence of the biblical exodus.

Let’s leave aside Jacobovici’s conspiracy theories and focus on the seals or scarabs themselves. The name on the seals is variously transliterated as “Yaqub-hor,” “Ya’aqob-har,” and so on. According to Michael Rice, Who’s Who in Ancient Egypt (Routledge, 2001), a man named Yaqub-hor was the first of the Hyksos kings to rule Egypt, and his name has been found on seals over a wide geographic range. The name as such is not particularly remarkable, and names like Yaḫqub-el,Yaḫqub-aḫ, Yaḫqub-‘am, and so on are found in Akkadian sources from a variety of sites across a range from the 19th to the 17th centuries BCE (Abraham Malamat, History of Biblical Israel: Major Problems and Minor Issues [Brill, 2001] 12). In other words, there’s nothing special about the name “Jacob,” and it is attested for a considerable number of Bronze Age individuals who spoke one or another Semitic dialect (never mind speculations about how many “Jacobs” there might have been about whom we know nothing). Many names attested by biblical persons were also borne by non-biblical persons, and this should come as no surprise to anyone who knows at least a few dozen other human beings. Out of approximately 150 students in my Religion 101 classes this semester, there are two Jillians, two Jacquelines, two Alexanders, two Taras, two young men surnamed Coffey, and two Nichole Johnsons. Three of my colleagues on the Pepperdine Religion Division faculty are named Ron, and I also know a Ron Stevens, a Ron Hendel, and even Ronald McDonald. The mere coincidence of a name means nothing.

Jacobovici wants to interpret the “Jacob-har” seals in relation to the biblical Jacob’s son, Joseph, who is said in Genesis 37–50 to have had a cabinet-level position in charge of food rationing, to describe the job somewhat anachronistically. In The Exodus Decoded, Jacobovici does not really explain why he thinks that Joseph’s seal would have borne the name of his father, Jacob, instead of himself. The whole point of a seal of this type is to serve as a kind of signature, making it important that the person identified on the seal be the person who is actually authorizing the document. Based on this general consideration, I would expect Joseph’s signet ring to have his own name on it, or pharaoh’s, but not his father’s. Moreover, the biblical narrative is really quite explicit on this point: Joseph’s signet ring was previously on pharaoh’s hand (see Genesis 41:42), and by the chronology of Genesis 37–50, Joseph received this ring nine years before Jacob migrated to Egypt (Genesis 41:42 stands at the beginning of the seven years of plenty, and Jacob identifies himself to his brothers during the second year of the famine, according to Genesis 45:6). Again, the whole point of Joseph bearing this ring is that it enables him to act as pharaoh’s proxy, and it is impossible to imagine that pharaoh’s signet ring would be inscribed with the name of Jacob, Joseph’s father, seeing that pharaoh had just met Joseph himself and would not meet Jacob for nine years to come. Moreover, the biblical Joseph narrative implies that he carried out his official duties under the Egyptian name Zaphenath-paneah (Genesis 41:45), so it makes no sense that he would inscribe his father’s Semitic name—a name that would carry no authority—on his signet ring(s), if he had the authority to produce new ones. The only thing that makes sense in terms of the biblical Joseph story, and for that matter in terms of the operation of ancient governments, is that Joseph’s signet ring would have born the symbol or name of the authority figure that was granting him power—namely, the pharaoh.

The idea that the “Jacob-har” seals and scarabs were minted or commissioned by Joseph and inscribed with his father’s name simply has no merit and makes no sense in the context of either the Joseph novella or ancient governance. What makes perfect sense, on the other hand, is that these seals belonged to officials authorized to act in the name of the Hyksos king Yaqub-hor, who has no connection with the biblical Jacob except for sharing a relatively well-attested Bronze Age Semitic name.

Read the whole series: Part 1 | Part 2 (with addendum) | Part 3