BIBLICAL CONTROVERSY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 81845, 12 September 1906, Page 4

BIBLICAL CONTROVERSY.

Professer Currelly, who has been assisting in the exploration of Gos chen and the Sinaitic Peninsula, on behalf of the Egyptian Exploration Fund, has (says a London conespon dent) thrown a bombshell into the camp of the orthodox, who believe in the exactness of theßiblical accoun of the exodus. Professor Currelly docs not doubt the exodus, but instead of the number of Israelites capable of bearing arms being. 60,000, he considers that it was 'only; 600. He draw s that Conclusion, like some other authorities, from a new rendering of the original figures, and he argues that not many more than 6000 could have possibly found room in the rocky, waterless valey under the Mt. of God. He considers, as the result of seeing a similar phenomenon, that in the passage of the so called Red Sea (Bitter Lakes), the water was held back by the wind and tide; and he believes the pillar of fire to have been a camp fire, intended to let the scattered tribes know where was the centre of the camp. Pithom, largely built by the Israelites, was, he states, probably built without straw. He considers it the most ill built place in all Egypt.