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Lesson 42 Hope of Israel Ministries BIBLE Correspondence Course 9




Dynasty. Amenemhet took great trouble to study the revered one, the Sole Companion, Butler and
the level of the Nile and carried out a great many Overseer of the slaughterers of the House of
irrigation works. He greatly enlarged the Khuu in its entirety, who says: I was the priest
capacity of Lake Moeris in the Fayum that had for slaughtering and offering in two temples on
previously been constructed under the guidance behalf of THE ruler. I OFFERED FOR THIR-
of the patriarch Joseph. Attached to the lake was TEEN RULERS without a mishap ever befalling
a canal called the BAHR YUSUF by the Egyp- me....I buried the dead and nourished the living,
tians to this day. The meaning of BAHR YUSUF wherever I went IN THIS DROUGHT WHICH
IS “THE CANAL OF JOSEPH” -- of course it is, HAD OCCURRED. I closed off all their fields
for JOSEPH supervised the construction of it and mounds in town and countryside, not letting
during the First Intermediate Period! Seven their water inundate for someone else, as does a
years of terrible famine were soon to arrive! worthy citizen so that his family may survive.
But what about the record of a FAMINE When it happened that Upper Egypt barley was
for 7 long years? There are numerous inscrip- given to the town, I transported it many times. I
tions of the First Intermediate Period that tell of gave a heap of white Upper Egyptian barley and
the terrible famine of Joseph's time. One in parti- a heap of hmi-barley, and MEASURED OUT
cular (the stela of the Butler Merer of Edfu) con- FOR EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS
tains an important CLUE for dating the inscrip- WISH....” (Ancient Egyptian Literature, p. 87).
Another stela of the First
Intermediate Period, that
of the Treasurer Iti of
Imyotru, deals with the
SAME FAMINE and
relates how he supplied his
town during the famine
and also helped the towns
of Hefat and Iuni, while
not attempting to help the
hungry citizens of Thebes.
The similarities in style
and content make it certain
that this stela is CON-
TEMPORARY with that
of Merer. It reads, in part:
“An offering which the
king gives (and) Anubis,
who is upon his mountain
and in the place of
Map of the Fayum showing the canal (Bahr Yusif) built by Joseph while
in Egypt. embalming, the lord of the
necropolis: an offering for
the revered one, the Royal
tion and the famine. Notice:
“An offering which the king gives (and) Seal-bearer, Sole Companion, Seal-bearer of the
Anubis, who is upon his mountain and in the God, Iti, who says: I was a worthy citizen who
place of embalming, the lord of the necropolis, acted with his arm. I was a great pillar in the
in all his good and pure places: an offering for Theban nome, a man of standing in the
Southland. I NOURISHED IMYOTRU IN THE



Archaeology and the Bible
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