犹太人分享：现代犹太人如何看待犹太祖先“出埃及”的真实性？其现实意义何在？
How do you accept the Exodus from Egypt?
译文简介
埃及会觉得有大量的奴隶脱逃很是尴尬，所以很有可能不会花功夫去铭记此事。在过去，他们曾经试图“遗忘”那些不受欢迎的法老
正文翻译
（图解：以色列人大规模“出埃及”）
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As a secular jew this isn't really an issue for me. It's pretty clear the exodus couldn't have happened (at least not nearly to the scale that's described in the Torah). And there's plenty of evidence that supports the notion that the Israelites came from the Canaanites, which opposes the exodus and Joshua's conquest narrative.
作为一个世俗犹太人，这个问题对我来说其实是不成立的。出埃及这种事是不可能发生的（至少不可能达到《摩西五经》所描述的那种规模），这太明显了。而且有大量证据支持以色列人起源于迦南人的说法，这就与出埃及记以及约书亚征服迦南地的叙说相悖了。
While the historicity isn't the point, it tends to be accepted that the Israelites began as southern Canaanites and/or local nomads. There are extensive historical records of Egypt taking slaves from these groups and of slaves escaping. Then you have Yahweh popping up in Canaanite mythology as a rival storm daddy god to El. Eventually Yahweh and El are syncretized, and then the religion becomes first henotheistic, then monotheistic--aka Judaism--but none of this answers the question of where the locals picked up Yahweh to begin with. Meanwhile, the historical documentation for the surrounding desert is incredibly poor, leading some historians to posit that Yahweh may have begun as a god from a nomadic desert tribe that was picked up by Canaanites/other locals passing through the desert and transplanted into the Canaanite pantheon. So the story of the Exodus may not be word-for-word true, but I personally believe that it may be a way of mythologizing, condensing, and glamorizing real historical trends from the period that very much led to the creation of Judaism as we know it.
虽然其史实性并不是重点，但人们倾向于接受以色列人的源头是南部的迦南人和/或当地的游牧民族。有海量的历史记录表明，埃及曾经从这些族群中把人抓去当奴隶，也有奴隶逃亡的记载。然后，你会在迦南神话中发现“耶和华”的存在，其为伊勒（EL）的对手暴风父神。最终，耶和华和伊勒合二为一，然后这种宗教先是变成了一神论，然后变成了一神教，即犹太教，但这些全都没有回答这个问题：当地人到底是从哪里开始接受耶和华的。同时，从周边沙漠地区出土的历史文献极为贫乏，导致一部分历史学家断定一开始耶和华可能是一个沙漠游牧部落的神，被经过这片沙漠的迦南人/其他当地人接受，传播范围超出了这片沙漠，并被移入到了迦南人的众神之中。因此，出埃及的故事也许不是每一个字都属实，但我个人相信，它可能是对这段历史时期真实历史动态的一种神话化、浓缩化和美化的方式，也在很大程度上导致了我们所知的犹太教的产生。
（回）是的，我的解读是，这就和我看待诺亚和大洪水的方式是一模一样的。一个影响了我们这个族群心灵的重大历史事件经过神化的版本。
The fundamental principle that Torah is not a history book, basically.
基本原则就是：从根本上说，摩西五经并不是史书。
拉什在评论《摩西五经》时，一开头就援引了伊扎克导师的说法，后者认为《摩西五经》的起点本该是“你们要以本月为正月”，这样就跳过了整部《创世纪》和《出埃及记》的前三分之一，涵盖了原本的《出埃及记》，这个例子就说明了历史元素相对不重要。
（译注：拉什为中世纪的一名法国拉比；伊扎克（Yitzhak Yosef）是以色列塞法迪犹太人的首席拉比）
I don't see the contradiction here, Torah is full of Midrash and is, ultimately, not meant to be viewed as 100% historically accurate but existent to convey theological principles. That's why Chazal said Torah isn't a book of history, even if it has history in it.
The Exodus happened, but did it happen exactly as a plain reading of the Torah states? Not necessarily.
我没看出哪里有矛盾，《摩西五经》充满了米德拉什（即注释），从根本上不是为了被看成百分之百准确的史实的，其存在是为了传达神学原则。这就是为什么他说《摩西五经》不是史书，尽管其中含有历史内容。
《出埃及记》是发生过的，但具体经过是否和《摩西五经》字面陈述的一模一样？那可不一定。
Like much of the Torah, I think a good part of it is sacred myth. It's an origin story of the nation of Israel, it is central to our identity and to our history, and it doesn't have to be 100% word for word exact history for it to be important to us or to be worthy of retelling and learning.
就像《摩西五经》的大部分内容一样，我认为其中很大的一部分是神圣的神话。它是以色列民族的起源故事，对我们的身份认同和历史至关重要，而且它不一定非得要100%合乎史实，才能为我们所重视乃至值得传扬和学习。
我真的不知道这个故事是否在现实中发生过，但这对我来说并不重要。这是一个已经被我们认定对破解“我们是谁”至关重要的故事，几千年来我们一直是高度尊重它的。这套传统及其遗产对我来说已经足够好了。
（回）视角很有趣！我确实听说过有很多犹太人对其真实性不会想太多，因为他们觉得这并不重要。
The lesson, for me (and for my students, when I teach) isn't "how do we know that all of this happened?" it's "What does this all mean for and to me?"
在我看来（那些听我上课的学生也是如此），这一课并不是“我们怎么才能确定这一切都发生过？”，而是“这一切对我来说意味着什么？”
Many great stories can be ruined by some shmuck in the back yelling “No actually thats not historically what happened “.... its like watching jurassic park with a paleontologist , just ruins the whole thing.
有很多伟大的故事都会被一些蠢材毁掉，他们会在背后大喊，“不，根据历史，这事儿其实并没有发生过”…这就像是和一个古生物学家一起观看电影《侏罗纪公园》，他们把一切毁了个彻底。
Historians who make outright claims that the Exodus did not happen are usually taking the Bible more literally than even traditional Jewish commentators.
通常，那些直截了当地声称出埃及记没有发生过的历史学家，他们从字面上理解圣经的倾向，甚至都超过了传统的犹太人评论家。
他们会说“有一百万人在此地露营却没有留下某种痕迹是不可能的”，好嘛， 就算这是真的，谁规定一百万这个数字要按字面意思去理解呢？那个时期的文明，在使用数字时是取其象征意义的。《摩西五经》也是如此。
Archeology suggests that the ancient Hebrews separated themselves out of the Canaanites. There is evidence that Canaan/Israel was in fact Ruled by Egypt, or at least it was a vassal state. While there may have been small migrations of people from Egypt to Canaan, it was nothing on the scale of the Exodus account in the Torah. However sacred scxture wasn’t written as natural history today is written. The Torah/Tanakh was written to convey hope, identity, boundaries, and kinship in the face of a brutal Bronze Age world, and it worked. In fact it worked so well that even now in the Information Age, the Exodus story still brings people hope.
考古学研究表明，古希伯来人让自己从迦南人中分离了出来。有证据表明，迦南/以色列实际上是由埃及统治的，至少也是个附庸国。虽然可能有小部分人从埃及迁徙到了迦南，但和《摩西五经》中《出埃及记》的规模相比，根本不算什么。但是，神圣的经文并不是像今天的自然史那样写就的。写作《摩西五经》/《塔纳赫》是为了在面对青铜时代的残酷世界时，传达希望、身份认同、界限和血缘关系的，而且它奏效了。事实上，它成效卓著，甚至到了现在的信息时代，《出埃及记》的故事仍能给人以希望。
A) It's been thousands of years. Records get lost
B) Egypt would find a mass slave break embarrassing so would likely not make an effort to remember it. They have tried to 'forget' unpopular pharaohs before
C) Many arcæologists/researchers aren't neutral and actively want the story to be fake
D) The entire Sinai hasn't been dug up or explored
E) We know labor disputes happened, odds are Exodus is one of them that just got super exaggerated
A) 已经过去了几千年。记录会佚失
B) 埃及会觉得有大量的奴隶脱逃很是尴尬，所以很有可能不会花功夫去铭记此事。在过去，他们曾经试图“遗忘”那些不受欢迎的法老
C) 很多考古学家和研究人员并不中立，他们采取了积极的行动，希望把这个故事变成假的
D) 整个西奈半岛还没有被挖掘或探索过
E) 我们知道发生过劳动纠纷，《出埃及记》有可能就是其中的一例，只是被无限夸大了。
I love history.
我爱历史。
有一个故事，说的是二战时有一架轰炸机在北非坠毁。这架轰炸机几十年来都没有被找到，因为那个地区，沙子转移物体的速度太快了。那是一架非常结实的金属飞机，有三辆公交车那么大，几十年来都没有人发现它！
而现在，你却告诉我，你惊讶于我们找不到几千年前青铜时代的一群人穿越同一地区的证据？比如什么证据呢？一个你拇指大小的箭头？纸张或书面文件在那种环境下不出几天就会被彻底毁掉，更不用说几百年了。
在我看来，其他民族的历史在没有被证伪之前都是可信的，而犹太人的历史在找到证据之前却被认为是在撒谎。没有人要求美国人拿出实物证据来证明华盛顿横渡过特拉华河。在出现能推翻它的证据之前，人们都会相信。但犹太人在沙漠中游荡？给我看证据，不然它就没有发生过！你又能找到些什么呢？当时99%的东西都是由生物可降解材料制成的。也许你会发现少量的金属，但你没有能力追查到它是属于谁的。请记住，犹太人的工具和武器是从埃及人那里拿过来的，所以有大量的证据看起来都像是埃及旅行者留下的，而非犹太人。
（译注：图为《华盛顿横渡特拉华河》（Washington Crossing the Delaware），系德国艺术家埃玛纽埃尔·洛伊茨于1851年创作的一副油画，描绘了美国独立战争转折点特伦敦战役期间，华盛顿于1776年12月25日横渡特拉华河的场景）
原创翻译：龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处
I think a lot of these comments and historians miss a key part. Let's say it's mythology. So our founding mythology is steeped in slavery and casting it off. That's fairly unique. Are there other founding mythologies where they're all like, we were slaves and literally "short on spirit," a broken people for 400 years and came back from that and still here today? I'm not a historian but I cannot think of any other origin story like that. As others have pointed out, other heros are descendants of wolves, bears, gods, amazing things. Not us.. That's what's interesting to me.
我认为有很多评论和历史学家都忽略了一个关键部分。让我们假设它是神话。因此，我们的立国神话是沉浸于奴隶制以及摆脱奴隶制的。这可就相当独特了。是否还有其他的立国神话会是这个模样：我们是奴隶，而且确实“欠缺精神力”，是一个破碎的族群，这种四分五裂持续了四百年，然后获得了重生，到今天仍然屹立在这里。我不是历史学家，但我想不到有什么其他的起源故事是这样的。正如其他人指出的，其他民族的英雄都是狼、熊、神以及各种神妙存在的后裔。而我们不是。这才是我感兴趣的点。
The story has certainly happened, whether the details are true or not, it is true at its core.
毫无疑问这个故事发生过，不管各种细节是真是假，故事的核心是真实的。
Is there another nation that emphasizes slavery and suffering as a significant part of its heritage? Usually, the typical heritage of a nation goes as follows: "We were brave nomadic tribes, we conquered many countries and began to prosper."
Therefore, slavery and the Exodus couldn't be invented out of the blue.
恐怕没有第二个国家会去强调奴隶制和苦难是其遗产的重要组成部分吧？通常情况下，比较有代表性的民族传统会这么说，“我们是勇敢的游牧部落，我们征服了很多国家并开始走向昌荣”。
因此，奴隶制和出埃及记不可能是凭空发明出来的。