Merneptah Stele - Significance

Significance

While alternatives to the reading "Israel" have been put forward since the stele's discovery - the two candidates being "Jezreel", a city and valley in northern Canaan, and a Libyan tribe - most scholars accept that Merneptah refers to "Israel". It is not clear, however, just who this Israel was or where they were located. For the "who", if the battle reliefs of Karnak show the Israelites, then they are depicted in Canaanite costume and Merneptah's Israelites are therefore Canaanites; if, on the other hand, the Karnak reliefs do not show Merneptah's campaigns, then the stele's Israelites may be "Shasu", a term used by the Egyptians to refer to nomads and marauderers. Similarly, if Merneptah's claim to have destroyed Israel's "seed" means that he destroyed its grain supply, then Israel can be taken to be a settled, crop-growing people; if, however, it means he killed Israel's progeny, then Israel can be taken to be pastoralists, i.e., Shasu.

For the "where", most scholars believe that Merneptah's Israel must have been in the hill country of central Palestine, but some think it was across the Jordan, others that it was a coalition of Canaanite settlements in the lowlands of the Jezreel valley (the potential Israelites on the walls of Karnak are driving chariots, a weapon of the lowlands rather than the highlands), and others that the inscription gives very little useful information at all.