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Legendary figure of Ancient Egypt who has been equated with Moses
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Osarseph/ˈoʊzərˌsɛf/ or Osarsiph/ˈoʊzərˌsɪf/ (Koinē Greek: Ὀσαρσίφ) is a legendary figure of Ancient Egypt who has been equated with Moses. His story was recounted by the Ptolemaic Egyptian historian Manetho in his Aegyptiaca (first half of the 3rd century BC); Manetho's work is lost, but the 1st century AD Jewish historian Josephus quotes extensively from it.
The story depicts Osarseph as a renegade Egyptian priest who leads an army of lepers and other unclean people against a pharaoh named Amenophis, who was the son of Ramses and the father of Ramses, whose original name was Sethos (Seti).[1] The pharaoh is driven out of the country and the leper-army, in alliance with the Hyksos (whose story is also told by Manetho) ravage Egypt, committing many sacrileges against the gods, before Amenophis returns and expels them. Towards the end of the story Osarseph changes his name to Moses.[2]
Much debated is the question of what, if any, historical reality might lie behind the Osarseph story. An influential study by Egyptologist Jan Assmann has suggested that no single historical incident or person lies behind the legend, and that it represents instead a conflation of several historical traumas, notably the religious reforms of Akhenaten (Amenophis IV).[3]
^Against Apion 1:26
^Safrai, Shmuel (1974). The Jewish People in the First Century: Historical Geography, Political History, Social, Cultural and Religious Life and Institutions. Uitgeverij Van Gorcum. p. 1113. ISBN 978-90-232-1436-6.
^Assmann, Jan (2003). The Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of the Pharaohs. Harvard University Press. p. 227. ISBN 978-0-674-01211-0.
Osarseph /ˈoʊzərˌsɛf/ or Osarsiph /ˈoʊzərˌsɪf/ (Koinē Greek: Ὀσαρσίφ) is a legendary figure of Ancient Egypt who has been equated with Moses. His story...
historian Manetho is quoted writing of a treasonous ancient Egyptian priest, Osarseph, who renamed himself Moses and led a successful coup against the presiding...
borders of Syria, where Osarseph gives the lepers a law-code and changes his name to Moses, although the identification of Osarseph with Moses in the second...
Joseph is saved from the well and sold to Egypt, he adopts a new name, Osarseph, replacing the Yo- element with a reference to Osiris to indicate that...
the borders of Syria, where Osarseph gives the lepers a law code and changes his name to Moses. The identification of Osarseph with Moses in Manetho's account...
period with the Hyksos invasion, with Osarseph likely standing in for Akhenaten. The final mention of Osarseph, in which he changes his name to Moses...
Manetho, who claimed that a certain Egyptian priest from Heliopolis called Osarseph led leprous Asiatics out of Egypt, in an Exodus later reportedly that of...
of their 2009 album, Those Whom the Gods Detest. Pharaoh of the Exodus Osarseph Cohen & Westbrook 2002, p. 6. Rogers 1912, p. 252. Britannica.com 2012...
Israel, the most terrible religious crime was idolatry. In this respect Osarseph alias Akhenaten, the iconoclast, and the Golden Calf, the paragon of idolatry...
originals, and constructed a polemic against Manetho without them. Avaris and Osarseph are both mentioned twice (1.78, 86–87; 238, 250). Apion 1.95–97 is merely...
Play. 1st ed. 1961 Athens. ISBN 960-7327-66-7 Joseph and His Brothers Osarseph Dodson (2016), p. 204. Assmann (2004), p. 180. Ridley 2019. Darnell, J...
history that Moses was not a Jew, but an Egyptian renegade priest called Osarseph, and portrays the Exodus as the expulsion of a leper colony. Josephus argues...
story can be found in Manetho's Aegyptiaca, which speaks of a leader named Osarseph who had overthrown the legitimate Pharaoh of Egypt leading a group of lepers...
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