How many people are there in Egypt?

How many Israelis left Egypt? -Another point of view

1。 In the first chapter of Numbers, verses 4-46 say: ". . The descendants of the sons of Reuben, Israel's firstborn, were numbered by their families, families and names, all those from twenty years old and over who were able to go out to war were 46,500. . . . . . . So the number of the Israelites by their families, from twenty years old and over, who were able to go out to war was 603,550. 」

From twenty years old and over, men from twelve tribes were able to go out to war.

Diarrhea: 45,600 people

Simon: 59,300 people

Total population: 45,650.

Judah: 74,600 people

Ithaca: 54,400 people

Zebulon: 57,400 people

Ephraim: 40,500 people

Manasseh: 32,200 people

Benjamin: 35,400 people

But: 62,700 people

Asher: 4 1 1,500 people

Naphtali: 53,400 people

Total: 603,550 (excluding Levites)

2。 Many biblical scholars think that the number of 600,000 is amazing for three reasons:

Answer: This figure seems incongruous in Numbers. Numbers 3: 43 says that the Israelites are one month old, and the firstborn males are 22,273. If there are 603,550 men over the age of 20, it means that the number of men over one month can reach one million. That is to say, the ratio of the total number of males to the eldest son is1100,000 to 2273, which is about 50: 1. It is incredible that a mother needs 100 children (50 boys and 50 girls) to have this ratio.

B even with manna, quail and water from the sky, it is hard for us to imagine that 2 million people can live on these things in the wilderness for 40 years.

C. In other parts of the Old Testament, it is said that Israel is the smallest of all nations (Deuteronomy 7: 7), and God will not expel the Canaanites until their numbers increase. (for example. 23: 30) If two million people came out of Egypt, they could easily occupy the whole land of Canaan. About fifty years ago, before the Israelis immigrated to Palestine, the population here was only about one million.

3。 Therefore, biblical scholars such as John Winham and Colin J. Humphries agree that it is inconceivable that 2 million people left Egypt. They think that the number of "thousand" and the original "‘LP'" (without vowels) can have three meanings:

Answer: Lp or' eleph (with vowels), for the word "thousand", such as Chuang 20: 16, Min 3: 50.

B Lp or' alluph' (with vowels) is interpreted as "patriarch", such as A9: 7,12: 5,6, Gen 36: 15.

C. Lp or' eleph (with vowels) can be used as "family" and "clan", such as Liu Shi: 15, Sam 10: 19, or as a small group in the army with a leader.

Different English versions sometimes make different translations of this Hebrew word, such as 1 Sam 23: 23. AV and RSV are translated as "all the troubles of Judah", but NIV is interpreted as "all the clans of Judah".

4。 Colin J. Humphries put forward a mathematical model to calculate the population of Egypt. He interpreted' LP' as a' group' and got about 20,000 people instead of 2 million. The following is his mathematical model:

"The firstborn male among the Israelites is 273 more than the Levites." (Minutes. 3: 46) This is a fact recognized by everyone, and there is no need to argue. So,

I(f) - L = 273 - ( 1)

Among them, I(f) is the number of firstborn Israeli men, and L is the number of Levi men, both calculated from one month away.

From the formula (1) alone, we can't calculate the values of I(f) and L because there are two unknowns.

Assume that the total number of Israeli males/the total number of levi males = I/L.

Since there are twelve tribes in Israel, it should not be too far if we assume that the total number of men in eleven tribes in Israel is about eleven times that of the Levites.

Therefore, I = 1 1L-(2)

We also need to estimate the total number of Israeli men over 20/the total number of Israeli men = I (20)/I.

According to statistics, in countries with high fertility rate, the population over 20 years old accounts for about half of the total population.

Therefore, I = 2 I (20)-.

We still need to estimate the last number, which is

Total number of Israeli men/number of first births of Israeli men = I/I (f) = n-(4)

(where n is the number of men over one year old in Israeli households)

From formulas (1) and (2):11i (f)-i =1x 273 = 3003.

According to formula (4): I (11-n) = 3003n-(5).

From formula (3): I (20) (11-n) =1501.5n-(6)

By formulas (2) and (5): l (11-n) = 273n-(7).

According to formulas (6) and (7), we can get the following results (Table 1):

n 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I (20)150 334 563 8581251802 26314004 675715015.

l 27 6 1 102 156 228 328 478 728 1228 2730

(Table 1)

Table 1 lists how many Israeli men over 20 years old (I(20)) and how many Levi men (L) will be in different N (where N is the number of men over one year old in Israeli family units). According to this table, n can't exceed 10, otherwise I(20) in formula (6) will become negative.

Table 2 below shows the number of Israeli men aged over 20 in each tribe at the time of the first census (population 1: 1-46). The table shows how many people are there when' LP' is interpreted as' thousand'; When' LP' is interpreted as' army combat unit' (army), how many people are there?

The number of people when the lp of the tribe is interpreted as "thousand" and the number of people when lp is interpreted as "the combat unit of the army"

How many "combat units" and how many people are there? Number of people in a combat unit (n)

Diarrhea 46500 46500 1 1

Simon Corp.

gade 45 650 45 650 14

Judah 74 600

Ithacar 54 400

Zebulon

Ephraim 40,500

Manasi

Benjamin 35400 35400 1 1

But 62700 62700 1 1

Yashe 41.500 41.50012

Naphtali

Total 603,550,598,5550 9.3

(Table 2)

According to table 1, if the number of Israeli men over 20 years old is 5550, n (the number of men in an ordinary family unit) should be 8.7 (according to Formula 6). Is it possible? We know that when Jacob was in Egypt, his twelve children had 57 sons (for example. 1: 5), which is roughly a family unit with five men. Exodus 1: 17-20 implies that there are many children in Israel, so it is not surprising that it was later increased to nine. From Table 2, we get that the average number of people in a combat unit (N) is 9.3. If 50% of the population is under the age of 20, it means that each combat unit (unit) is composed of two male families over the age of 20. This is a fairly reasonable calculation.

If' LP' is interpreted as a combat unit (army), can the number of Levites be correctly calculated from the male number of 8.7 people in an ordinary family unit obtained from the table 1?

Substituting n = 8.7 into formula (7), we get:

Total number of men in levi (L) = (273x8.7)/(11-8.7) =1041-(8).

From the following Table 3, if "‘LP'" is interpreted as "team", then the total number of Levi men is 1000, which is not far from the figure obtained by Formula (8).

The number of Levites when lp is interpreted as "thousand" and the number of Levites when lp is interpreted as "team"

How many "units" and how many people are there? The number of people in a unit.

Geshun 7500 7500 7 1

Kohan

Li 6200 6 200 33

Total 22,000,265,438+0,654,38+0000,48

(Table 3)

Now we can go back and see if the assumptions we made before are true.

Formula (3) assumes that the population over the age of 20 is about half of the total population. As can be seen from Table 2, there are 5,550 combatants over the age of 20. If the hypothesis is established, the total population of Israel in one month (excluding the Levites) should be I = 2i (20) = 2x5550 =1100.

Formula (2) assumes that the total number of men in eleven tribes in Israel is about eleven times that of the Levites. So,

Number of Levites (L) = I/111100/1=1009.

This is very close to the number of Levites in Table 3, that is, 65,438+0,000.

Therefore, all our assumptions can be established.

However, Levi's "team" has reached as many as 48 in Table 3, far higher than Israel's "combat units". This is acceptable, because the service unit (priest unit) is not a combat unit (military unit), and the number of people is bound to be different. For example, on 26th, the number of gatekeepers recorded in 1- 12 was 93.

Table 4 below shows the number of Israeli men over the age of 20 (26) in each tribe at the time of the second census. The table shows how many people are there when' LP' is interpreted as' thousand'; When' LP' is interpreted as' army combat unit' (army), how many people are there?

The number of people when the lp of the tribe is interpreted as "thousand" and the number of people when lp is interpreted as "the combat unit of the army"

How many "combat units" and how many people are there? Number of people in a combat unit (n)

Diarrhea 43730 43730 16

Western Myanmar

Gade 40，500 40，500 12

Judah 76 500

Isakar 5

Zebulon

Ephraim 32500 32500 15

Manasi

Benjamin 45600 45600 13

But 64400, 64400 6

Yashe 53, 400 yuan 8

Naphtali

Total 60 1, 730 596 5730 9.6

(Table 4)

Comparing Table 2 and Table 4, the number of Israeli soldiers (5550, 5730) is very similar to that of a combat unit (9.3 and 9.6).

5。 Summary:

According to Colin J. Humphries,

The number of men over one year old in Israeli families is 8.7. For an Israeli family with many children, this figure is acceptable.

According to two censuses, the number of men over the age of 20 in the combat units of the Israeli army is 9.3-9.6. This is also an acceptable figure. This is equivalent to saying that each combat unit (unit) is composed of two male families over the age of 20.

Min Yi: 2 1 The number of people who said they had diarrhea was 46,500. From Table 2, he thinks there should be 500 men in 46 'lp (combat unit), which means there are 500 men over 20 in Ruben tribe. People 1: 46 said that there are 603,550 people over the age of 20 in Israel. He believes that the original text should be 598 'lp (combat unit) and 5 'lp (thousand people) and 550 people. The original readers interpreted these figures as 598 combat units and 5550 people. Later, the original meaning was lost, and the scholars combined 598 and 5' lp to become 603 "money", and the total became 603,550.

If 5,550 Israeli men over the age of 20 leave Egypt, that means there are about 10000 men over the age of one, and the total number should be around 20,000. Adding male Levites over one year old and about 1000 women, we can infer that the number of Israelis in Egypt is about

Twenty thousand people.

Do you think Colin J. Humphries' calculation method is reasonable?