Exodus (Gr. departure), a book of the Bible, the second of the Pentateuch. It derives its name from the principal event recorded in it, the departure of the Hebrews from Egypt, and contains the history of that people from the death of Joseph until the building of the tabernacle. The researches of modern Egyptologists have thrown much light on the Biblical narrative. The land of Goshen, where the Hebrews had been permitted to settle, was east of the delta of the Nile, on the borders of Syria, and the places mentioned in connection with the exodus have been identified as follows: Barneses as the town Nashuta, in the E. part of the wady Tumilat; Succoth, the Thaubasium of the Ro-mans. X. E. of Lake Timsah; Etham, the fortified wall on the Syrian frontier; Pi-hahiroth, the modern Kalat Agrud, N. W. of Suez; Migdol, the place formerly called Kambysu, where the Persian monument stands; and Baal-zephon as the Atakah mountains. The hieroglyphic inscriptions render it probable that the oppressors of the Hebrews were Seti I. and his son Rameses II., and that Merneptah was the Pharaoh of the exodus. (See Egypt, vol. vi., pp. 461-'2.) They show also that the He-brews had been employed to build temples, fortresses, and granaries; and several monuments depict them at work making bricks, with overseers standing by and sometimes beating them with rods.

This does not ne-cessarily lead to the conclusion that the Pharaohs of the period were reckless tyrants. They were severe military rulers, who foresaw that the Hebrews would make common cause with their kindred in Syria in case of an invasion. They strengthened accordingly the fortified wall on the borders, which the Pharaohs of the 12th dynasty had erected, and built new fortresses in Goshen, partly for protection against invasion and partly for keeping watch over the Hebrews. According to the monuments, the troops stationed here were chiefly Libyans, who were not likely to sympathize with the Hebrews. A treaty made by Rameses II. with the chief of the Khitas in Syria, found on a stele in the temple district of Karnak, provides for the extradition of fugitives escaping over the border. Mer-neptah's policy was to prevent the Hebrews from gathering into bodies too large to be controlled, which he effected by compelling them to labor in small detachments on the public works. His refusal to allow them to assemble for the purpose of worshipping their God in the wilderness was prompted by fear of some hostile movement on their part, and nothing but the dread of greater disasters than those which would naturally follow their departure induced him to permit Moses to lead them away.

Nor are monumental indications wanting for establishing the historical character of Moses. His interview with Merneptah is supposed to have taken place at Tanis, the temporary residence of the last three Pharaohs.

He and his people marched first to Takusa, a city south of Tanis, and thence to Shekh Musa, in the neighborhood of Pithom. The route touched the most important Hebrew towns and enabled their inhabitants to join the emigrants. Moses marched them in an easterly direction through the wady Tumilat, which Hebrew labor had supplied with a canal. The Hebrew population was especially dense in • this fertile oasis. The Hebrews rendezvoused at Rameses, a central point in Goshen. A journey northeastward of about 150 m. would have taken them to the borders of Canaan, but would have brought them into conflict with the warlike Philistines. Moses led them in almost the contrary direction; For God said, Lest peradventure the people repent when they see , war, and they return to Egypt." The general route of the exodus is now fairly established. The Hebrews marched S. E. for three days, then turned S. W., and finally E., their fourth encampment being at Pi-hahiroth, a few miles S. of the present Suez, near a point where the gulf of Suez suddenly narrows to a quarter of its former width. They were on a narrow triangular plain bounded N. by a range of cliffs and S. E. by the expansion of the sea.

The Egyptian king had meanwhile gathered a considerable force, especially of chariots, the cavalry of the time, and was following hard upon the fugitives, who, hemmed in between the cliffs and the water, had no apparent way of escape. At the point here assumed as that of the passage there is still a shallow, stretching from shore to shore, almost fordable at low tide. "The Lord caused the sea to go by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided." That is, the east (or more strictly easterly) wind piled up the waters toward the head of the gulf, leaving the shallow dry. The idea which painters have popularized, that the waters stood up as a solid wall on each side, is wholly without warrant in the sacred text; all that is implied is that there was deep water on each side of the passage. The crossing was apparently made during the day. At nightfall the Egyptians came up, and seeing the passage still dry attempted to follow. It is apparently implied in the text, though not directly stated, that the wind now shifted; for an easterly wind would have carried the bodies of the Egyptians to the west side, whereas the Hebrews beheld them thrown on the eastern shore, upon which they were.

All the implications of the narrative are that the reflux of the waters was gradual; for we are told that "the Lord took off or rather clogged up their chariot wheels, and made them go heavily;" that is, probably, the returning waters slowly filtered into the sand, making it difficult for the chariots to move. The Egyptians, seeing the waters rising, endeavored to retreat; but in the darkness, their returning van encountering their advancing rear, they could go neither way, and were swallowed up by the rising tide. That this passage was really miraculous is everywhere asserted or implied by all the sacred writers who speak of it. Their route at first lay parallel with the eastern shore of the gulf of Suez, which they apparently touched at one point, the halting places being specified, and several of them are identified with reasonable certainty. At one of these, Rephidim, they were attacked by a body of Amalekites, who were defeated by the Israelites under the command of Joshua. After three months they reached the region of Sinai, in the heart of the Arabian peninsula, where they remained until 14 months after their departure from Egypt, and then set off upon their long wanderings toward the promised land.

During this interval the law was given, and those religious and civil institutions were framed which in the course of a generation transformed the Hebrews into a military people, able to cope with the enemies whom they were about to encounter. The history, as related in the book of Exodus, properly closes with the encampment around Sinai, and is continued in the book of Numbers. (See Sinai.) -The best works on the historical narrative are Ebers's Aegypten unci die Backer Mose's (Leip-sic, 1868 et seq.) and Durch Gosen zum Sinai (Leipsic, 1872), and Palmer's The Desert of the Exodus (London, 1872).