Jerusalem has appeared in the Pharaonic records many times. In the Tel-Amarna letters, which were correspondences between Egypt Pharaoh and local rulers of Jerusalem around 1350 BC, Abdu-Heba, the ruler of Jerusalem or Urushamem at the time, pleads for military aid from the Pharaoh to face the tribes of Hapiru, who frequently attacked the city.. The Pharaoh sent help and actually ruled the area across different historical eras..[1]
Eventually, around 1200 BC, plagued by internal political and social problems, the Pharaoh’s ruling class was unable to protect the city, and the Israelites left Egypt and entered the holy land..
The Exodus of the Children of Israel
Around 1200 BC, Israelites left Egypt under the leadership of Prophet Moses to escape the persecution of the Pharaoh (Merenptah). They crossed the Sinai Desert, and according to the Judeo-Christian and Islamic scriptures, only entered the city after 40 years.[2]
It was not until Joshua[3] took over that the Israelites could enter Palestine. According to the Bible, the Israelites destroyed many of the towns and killed tens of thousands of the original Canaanite Arab inhabitants.[4] Recent archeological records deny that such mass destruction ever took place..[5] The Bible also mentions the Jebusite king of Jerusalem Adoni-Zedek who conducted a pact with four Canaanite kings to fight the people of Jabon who surrendered to the army of Joshua.[6]
According to Joshua 63:15 upon entrance into the holy land, Joshua divided Palestine between the Twelve tribes of Israel and gave Jerusalem to Judah and Benjamin.[7] However, the Israelites were unable to enter Jerusalem for two hundred years up until the era of David.[8] The city remained Arab and kept its Jebusite name until the hebrew king and prophet David ruled over it and it was called the city of David. Even under the rule of David however, and for centuries following it, the city’s original Canaanite inhabitants remained in their city.[9] The Bible refers to the non-Jewish origins of the city in Ezekiel 16:3[10] and mentions that when David wanted to build the temple he bought the land for it from the Jebusite Arnan.[11]
The City of David and the Temple of Solomon
The twelve tribes of Israel were ruled by the judges[12]. The israelites and their neighboring Phillistines, who lived in the south and along the coast until 1000 BC, fought frequently, ,[13] until David was able to occupy Jerusalem after besieging the water channel that connected the city with spring Jihon.[14] The city was called the City of David because, according to the Bible, David united the twelve tribes of Israel under his kingdom. David, who ruled the city for 33 years,[15] planned to build the temple in Jerusalem but died before implementing his plan.[16]
After the death of David, his son Solomon was named a king of Jerusalem. The bible claims that Solomon, who ruled the city for 40 years, finished building the temple and expanded the Hebrew kingdom from the Nile to the Euphrates in present-day Iraq.[17]
Division of the Kingdom
Upon his death, Solomon’s kingdom was divided into two kingdoms: the kingdom of Judah in the south, formed by the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, capital of which was Jerusalem and which was ruled by Solomon’s son Rehoboam and the kingdom of Israel in the north, where the other 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel lived, the capital of which was Samaria and was ruled by Yeroboam.[18] The two kingdoms waged war among themselves and with their neighboring nations in a trail to take over the kingdom and extend its borders. Jerusalem was invaded by many nations who took advantage of the status quo between the two Israelite kingdoms and was destroyed, burned and looted by many nations but mainly Pharaonic Egyptians..[19]
The End of the Two Kingdoms
The two Israelite kingdoms, Judah and Israel were exhausted by the continuous wars and internal and external problems which made them susceptible to their enemies..
In 733 BC, the Assyrians invaded the kingdom of Israel and 721 BC and it completely fell apart. The kingdom of Judah was raided by Philistines, Syrians, Babylonians, and Egyptians and the jewish residents paid tribute to both Babylon and Egypt until it was finally attacked and destroyed in 587 BC. Babylonians, under Nebuchadnezzar, attacked Jerusalem, destroyed it, and carried the Israelites into captivity at Babylon. This marked the end of the kingdom of Judah.[20]
[1]Aref Al-Aref, History of Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Al Andalus Library, 1999 fifth edition), 31
[2]Al-Aref, History of Jerusalem, 34 and Riad Yassin and Amjad Al-Fa’ouri, the Political and Cultural History of Jerusalem (Jordan: Dar Wael, 2012), 16 and Henry Cattan, Jerusalem (London: Saqi Books, 2000), 20-21
[3] Joshua is the assistant of Moses and the leader of the Israelite tribes after Moses’s death. he holds a central position in the Hebrew bible “Joshua Book”
[14]Yaseen and Fa’ouri, the Political and Cultural History, 16 and Al-Aref, History of Jerusalem, 38 and Joseph Millis, Jerusalem: the Illustrated History of the Holy City (London: Andre Deutsch, 2012), 10-13 and Teddy Kollek and Moshe Pearlman, Jerusalem: a History of Forty Centuries (New York: Random House, 1968), 27
[15]Yaseen and Fa’ouri, the Political and Cultural History, 16 and illustrated p 10-13 and Kollek and Pearlman, a History of Forty Centuries, 27
[16]Al-Aref, History of Jerusalem,39 and Millis, Jerusalem, 10-13
[17]Yaseen and Fa’ouri, the Political and Cultural History, 17 and Al-Aref, History of Jerusalem, 39 and Millis, Jerusalem, 16-17
[18]Al-Aref, History of Jerusalem, 41 and Cattan, Jerusalem, 22 and Millis, Jerusalem, 16-17 and Kollek and Pearlman, a History of Forty Centuries, 55
Jerusalem has appeared in the Pharaonic records many times. In the Tel-Amarna letters, which were correspondences between Egypt Pharaoh and local rulers of Jerusalem around 1350 BC, Abdu-Heba, the ruler of Jerusalem or Urushamem at the time, pleads for military aid from the Pharaoh to face the tribes of Hapiru, who frequently attacked the city.. The Pharaoh sent help and actually ruled the area across different historical eras..[1]
