Cris Rogers is a vicar in East London (at All Hallows, Bow), and a friend online. He has recently been posting interesting material on the archaeological background to the Bible. So I asked him what he was doing and why—and he gave some very interesting answers!
IP: You have recently been in the habit of posting really interesting links on social media to archaeological finds. What first sparked your interest in archaeology and the insights it offers to interpreting the Bible and Christian faith?
CR: I have always been interested not only in the words of the Bible, but in the world those words came from. Scripture never dropped from the sky in abstraction; it was written in real places, by real people, under real political, social, and economic pressures. Archaeology helps me hold those two things together—part of that interest began quite early. Like many people of my generation, I grew up watching films such as Raiders of the Lost Ark. While they are obviously fictional, they sparked an imagination for buried worlds and lost histories. Around the same time, I remember watching a long documentary about the Shroud of Turin. Whether one is convinced by it or not, the idea that physical objects could still speak across centuries fascinated me.
That curiosity deepened during my theological training in Bristol. One of the PhD students there was researching the archaeology connected with Abraham and his journey. Beki and I later travelled to Florida to see some of that research first-hand and to hear him speak about his findings. That was a key moment, seeing how serious academic work, archaeology, and biblical theology could sit together.
Since then, archaeology has become part of how I inhabit the biblical story. I have visited the Holy Land a number of times and have also led teaching trips. Standing in those places does something that books alone cannot do. You begin to sense scale, distance, terrain, and proximity. You realise why certain metaphors were chosen and why particular events unfolded as they did. In that sense, archaeology has become, for me, something like a fifth gospel. Not because it adds to Scripture or competes with it, but because it helps us see the world in which the gospel lived. It does not speak louder than the text, but it speaks into it.
IP: What are your—let’s say three favourite archaeological insights into the Bible? What difference do they make, and why are they important?
CR: At its simplest, archaeology is the act of uncovering what was hidden, sometimes that means digging in the dirt, sometimes it means exploring caves and sometimes it involves fragments kept in libraries and museums. What matters is not the drama of the discovery, but what those discoveries help us understand.
One personal favourite is the Rylands Library Papyrus P52, now housed in Manchester. It is a tiny fragment of John’s Gospel, but its significance is enormous. It gives us one of the earliest physical witnesses to the New Testament text. For many people, the Bible can feel distant, as though it emerged fully formed centuries later. Holding or even seeing an image of such an early fragment collapses that distance. It reminds us that these texts were copied, shared, and treasured very close to the events they describe.
Another important find is the Tel Dan Inscription, discovered in the early 1990s. This stone inscription refers to the “House of David”. For a long time, some scholars argued that King David was little more than a legendary figure, perhaps a literary invention. This inscription does not tell us everything about David, but it does confirm that he was understood historically as the founder of a dynasty. That matters because it grounds Israel’s story, and the messianic hopes that flow from it, in real history rather than myth.
A third favourite is Hezekiah’s Tunnel in Jerusalem, which leads to the Pool of Siloam. You can still walk through this ancient water system today. In the Gospels, Jesus heals a blind man by sending him to wash in that very pool. Suddenly, the miracle is not happening in an abstract “Bible land”, but at the end of an extraordinary feat of engineering, built under threat and pressure centuries earlier. Archaeology here does not explain away the miracle, it situates it, allowing us to see how layers of Israel’s story converge in a single moment.
IP: Why do we need these insights to help us read Scripture well? Can’t we just pick the Bible up and read it?
CR: Of course we can pick the Bible up and read it, and we should. Scripture stands on its own authority and nothing in archaeology challenges that, nor should it ever be used to. But reading well has always involved understanding context. When we read a letter today, we instinctively ask who wrote it, to whom, and why. Archaeology helps us do the same with Scripture. It helps us imagine the physical, political, and religious environment in which God’s word was first heard.
These discoveries also give credibility to the biblical narrative. The Bible consistently names places, rulers, customs, and buildings that can be identified and, in many cases, still visited. When the text refers to a pool, a city gate, or a road, and we can stand in those locations today, it reinforces the sense that Scripture is rooted in reality. Archaeology does not prove faith, and it does not replace faith. But it does help remove unnecessary obstacles, especially for those who assume the Bible is detached from history. It shows that the God we meet in Scripture speaks into real human life, not into myth or abstraction.
IP: Some people argue that studying these things leads to intellectual elitism, or a ‘them and us’ divide between those who know the Bible’s background and those who do not. Is that a fair accusation?
CR: It can be, if handled badly. Any knowledge can become a tool for exclusion if it is used to impress rather than to serve. At its best, though, archaeology should do the opposite. It should build confidence, not create hierarchies. When discoveries confirm or illuminate Scripture, they are not for specialists alone, they are gifts to the whole Church. There will always be people who know more about the historical world of the Bible than others. That has always been true. The question is what we do with that knowledge. When it is shared humbly, it equips preachers, teachers, and ordinary readers to trust the Scriptures more deeply and to read them more attentively.
The problem is not expertise, it is pride. When archaeology is offered as a servant of Scripture rather than a rival to it, it becomes a means of encouragement rather than division.
IP: If these things are important, how can we make them accessible in the local church and for ordinary readers of the Bible?
CR: This has been a driving motivation behind my writing and teaching. When I wrote The Bible Book by Book, part of the aim was to bring context into the hands of ordinary readers without overwhelming them. I want people to feel resourced, not intimidated. Sharing archaeological insights does not require specialist language. Often it is as simple as explaining why a city mattered, what a particular object was used for, or how geography shaped a story. Social media has also become a surprisingly effective way of sharing these things. A single image or short explanation can open up a whole passage for someone.
The Church does not need more hidden information, locked away in academic books or buried in the ground. It needs accessible resources that help ordinary Christians become confident disciples. If understanding the world of Scripture helps people trust it more, read it more, and live it out more faithfully, then it is unquestionably a good thing. It can also encourage engagement beyond the church walls, whether that is visiting museums that hold biblical artefacts or, for some, travelling to the Holy Land. These experiences can deepen faith rather than distract from it.
Next time you visit a museum that houses object from the past, it’s worth googling first, is there anything in this museum that helps us understand the Bible further? Or going to the welcome desk and ask them if they have any guides that would help them find Christian related objects. You never know what you might find. We have far more in our own UK museums than most people realise.
IP: Does this shape the way you preach and teach? How do you incorporate these insights without sermons turning into lectures?
CR: It shapes my preaching deeply, but always in service of the text rather than alongside it. I am currently preaching through Revelation, and the archaeology of the seven cities is immensely helpful. Understanding places like Ephesus, with its artisan culture and economic life, sharpens our hearing of Jesus’ words to that church. Another example is Philadelphia and the 3 remaining pillars, or Laodicea and its ancient lukewarm water pools, all help us unlock some of the picture language Jesus gives us of Revelation 3.
I often use images to stimulate people’s imaginations. Seeing a city layout, a temple ruin, or an inscription can help people step into the biblical world. I also sometimes bring physical replicas, such as copies of Dead Sea Scroll fragments, for people to hold. There is something powerful about engaging the senses. The key is restraint and purpose, because Archaeology should illuminate the message, not replace it. A boring teacher can make archaeology dull very quickly. An engaged and enthusiastic teacher who knows why a detail matters can use it to bring Scripture alive.
Ultimately, the goal is not information, but formation. I want people to move from a flat, two-dimensional reading of the Bible into a rich, three-dimensional encounter with the story God is telling.
IP: In our own reading of Scripture, how can we read with both head and heart, keeping our minds engaged and our lives responsive?
CR: However much background we bring to the text, Scripture must always be allowed to speak personally. Knowledge is never the endpoint. Every reading of Scripture, whether aided by archaeology or not, needs to end with a simple but demanding question: “What changes for me today because I have read this passage?” Archaeology may help us understand what a passage meant then, but the Spirit helps us discern what it means now.
When head and heart are held together, Scripture becomes both trustworthy and transformative. We learn to see the world of the Bible more clearly, and in doing so, we find our own world being reshaped by the God who still speaks through it.
IP: Thank you Cris for these fascinating insights!
Revd Dr Cris Rogers is Vicar at All Hallows, Bow, in the east of London.
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Archaeology is the nearest we are going to get to a time machine to visit the Holy Land. That in conjunction with the scriptures, viewed as (historical) truth.
For me, Joel Kramer has done a lot in showing how the archaeology invariably proves consistent with the scriptures, in his YouTube channel Expedition Bible. He is a professionally trained archaeologist and evangelical Christian, son of a US oil executive brought up in the Middle East and familiar with the region and its cultures. There are too many anti-intellectual fundamentalists who think you can just turn up and read the Bible and look at the landscape and point to where it happened, and too many secular archaeologists who disbelieve the accuracy of the Bible and take unjustifiable liberties with the timing. Particular highlights are the identification of the Pharaoh of the Exodus and the discovery that his son is buried in the same tomb and that his mummy/body is covered in boils; and the dating of the Old Testament based on cross-correlating Assyrian and Old Testament accounts, a solar eclipse mentioned in unearthed Assyrian accounts whose date we can work out (763BC), and 1 Kings 6:1. I wish he’d do Mt Sinai, because I’ve read several plausible candidates, but I suspect he can’t get into Saudi for this purpose.
I also like the work of biblical archaeologist Paul Lawrence, whose book “The Books of Moses Revisited” gives a robust defence of the Pentateuch as written roughly in real time.
I took have been really helped and inspired by Joel Kramer’s videos on YouTube! Brilliant. I recommend them as a resource to guests on our Alpha courses.
And of course I’m really looking forward to our trip with Ian and Maggie to Turkey to visit the sites of the seven churches of Revelation!
I think one of the challenges of archaeological discovery… Including recent discoveries such as the medallion of Isaiah… Is the ‘ ordinariness’ of the world they portray. I think many Christians. ‘ imagine’ the events of the Bible to have taken place in a wide screen technicolour format with soaring strings and choirs of angels… Whereas, in most cases, it was apparently ordinary people living in fairly ordinary environments and speaking with human voices to people who were caught up, as they are today, with ordinary daily concerns. As far as we know, nobody saw the angels at the birth of Jesus apart from the Shepherds.
For some, having to just their imaginations as to what biblical people and events were really like could potentially pose a threat to their faith. For others, it is an invitation to reconsider how God really operates in this world….in the small things, the obscure things, marginalised people, and the ‘still small voice’.
I agree, very interesting interview; thank you both.
Today, on Premier radio, there was a talk by Jill Briscoe mostly on Joshua passages. I heard part of the talk. She had visited and looked down on the ruins of Jericho but didn’t really go into “standing in his shoes” in time and history without bringing in the Scriptural dimension of the battle, God’s intervention.
Is that not a danger in visiting sites- that it remains grounded in the ground? Rather than the astonishment of faith in God.
The problem is the huge discoveries of the ANE worldview that have come through in a great many publications in recent years can be a challenge to some Confessional positions – and some are not happy about the whole concept – as you can see from John Piper’s body language in this short video.
https://youtu.be/U5ZQ_ZtPT4I?si=Nfer6U805kyo8Wjz
Thanks for the encouragement. I was studying Classics at the time I committed my life to Christ as an undergraduate and immediately the archaeology in the Bible became part of what was illuminated to me by the Holy Spirit. I travelled to Athens, Corinth and Rome, later to Israel and am now looking forward very much to Ian’s 7 Churches tour later this year!
And we are looking forward to your joining us!
A very useful and balanced interview here. Reading through Ruth recently, I reflectec that appreciating the story is a lot easier when you can correctly imagine the size of ANE towns and the significance of walls and the town gate, as well as unfenced fields with boundary stones, note to mentionthe landscapeof Moab. And I’m sure our host would have something to say about four-roomed houses! Because of the differences between then and now (and the danger of introjecting false ideas from medieval art), I think preachers and teachers should make good visual use of the findings of archaelogy when retelling the Bible’s story.
And every visitor to the British Museum should seek out the Assyrian reliefs, the relief of the diege of Lachish and the Cyrus cylinder.
Yes indeed. I enjoyed the “Life in the Roman army” exhibition a couple of years ago and the Silk Roads exhibition one year ago, and can’t wait for the Bayeux Tapestry from October.
I remember visiting Machakos, in Kenya, which was the main town in the area of the Wa’Kamba tribe. The Kamba and the Kikuyu are “brother tribes” with languages close enough to be often understood by one another – but the Kikuyu are numerically and economically dominant – and their area gets more rainfall – so the Kamba may feel like “younger brothers.” It gave me a moment of emotional insight, imagining how Ruth the Moabitess might feel migrating to a more “successful” society than her own.
Does this shape the way you preach and teach? How do you incorporate these insights without sermons turning into lectures? … However much background we bring to the text, Scripture must always be allowed to speak personally. Knowledge is never the endpoint. Every reading of Scripture, whether aided by archaeology or not, needs to end with a simple but demanding question: “What changes for me today because I have read this passage?”
What’s wrong with ‘lectures’? Why can’t knowledge be the endpoint? I’ve listened to many lectures in my time, and some have been fascinating, even thrilling – including some that required paying close attention. Where in the Bible does it say that every Sunday there has to be a sermon/homily? On what biblical grounds do we assent to the idea that “We mustn’t go too deep into a subject. We mustn’t be ‘heavy’. We mustn’t use the sermon slot to impart ‘mere’ knowledge”? Where in Scripture does it say that Scripture must always be allowed to ‘speak personally’? Where does it present us with a view of human nature such that if a talk does not end with an explicit moral ‘application’, or does not touch the heartstrings, then it will leave the listener unaffected?
If we take this anti-intellectual approach, if ‘every reading of Scripture must end with the question “how does this change me personally?”, preachers will end up with congregations that only read about 5% of the Bible. It is certainly not my experience that something changes for me every time I read Scripture, and I don’t think it’s edifying when someone implies I should feel guilty that it doesn’t – that I am lop-sidedly cerebral, unfeeling and subhuman.
“What changes for me today” is not a question I can often answer. It is the Spirit of God who does the changing (where spiritual change is going on). He works in ways that are often mysterious, ways I’m not always aware of, indeed usually not. And often it’s not ‘today’ that I am affected, but far down the road – as I reflect; as something from Scripture quite unexpectedly throws some light on something; as I grow old.
And often it’s not about ‘change’ at all. But about being encouraged, or reminded. A matter – as one practises the discipline of daily reading – of hearing the Master’s familiar voice and keeping in touch.
‘Emek Shaveh is an Israeli NGO working to defend cultural heritage rights and to protect ancient sites as public assets that belong to members of all communities, faiths and peoples. We object to the fact that the ruins of the past have become a political tool in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and work to challenge those who use archaeological sites to dispossess disenfranchised communities. We view heritage sites as resources for building bridges and strengthening bonds between peoples and cultures and believe that archaeological sites cannot constitute proof of precedence or ownership by any one nation, ethnic group or religion over a given place.’
(Emek Shaveh, “About Us.”) https://emekshaveh.org/en/about-us/
As regards the Old Testament, there are two major issues: (1) has Egypt’s history been correctly dated, and (2) is carbon dating (as calibrated to tree-ring sequences) an accurate system? The answers to both questions is unfortunately No.
The correct dating of Egyptian history matters because it is the backbone of Ancient Near East chronology. Apart from Israel, Egypt is the only country before the 6th century BC with historical records that can potentially be dated in the BC system. All other ANE countries derive their chronology through links with Egypt (chiefly through Egyptian imports buried in their respective archaeological strata). Whether C14 dating is accurate matters because, without historical dates, archaeologists use that to date what they find.
We know they can’t both be right because they don’t agree with each other. But it’s possible that neither is right.
Joel Kramer’s videos are mostly sound (and much to be commended) because his arguments don’t often depend on the chronology. But they do err when it comes, e.g., to identifying the pharaoh of the Exodus, or discussing the Baal-Berith temple at Shechem. That’s because he uncritically accepts the standard chronology based on the dynasties of Egypt.
As things stand, one would have to say there is no historical/archaeological support for the Exodus, because Egypt’s and Israel’s history are misaligned – misaligned because Israel’s chronology is unique in not being based on Egyptian artefacts, but rather based on its direct historical records. Worse, Israel’s biblical history is misaligned with its own archaeological record, which chronologically is tied with Egyptian and C14 chronology.
Take the recent discovery of the Siloam Pool’s monumental water dam in Jerusalem, for example. Everybody assumed that it was the work of Hezekiah. Now, because of C14 dating, archaeologists have had to conclude that it was built 100 years earlier. There are many such discrepancies.
Anyone seriously interested in the historical validity of the biblical record needs to face up to these issues. Either the biblical record is faulty and sometimes downright fictitious, or there is something seriously awry with the two other chronological systems: the dating of Egypt’s dynasties and the C14 system. As things stand, (trying) to argue that the extra-biblical record agrees with the Bible, and the Bible therefore confirmed, is unscholarly and misleading.
It is easy enough to demonstrate just where Egyptian chronology goes astray; also to identify just where the tree-ring calibration of the C14 system falls down. Those interested can read more at:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/345122141_Bronze_and_Iron_Age_chronology_recalibrated
I wrote the paper a few years ago. Subsequent discoveries (such as the Siloam Dam) have served only to confirm the arguments made.
Joel Kramer’s videos are mostly sound (and much to be commended) because his arguments don’t often depend on the chronology. But they do err when it comes, e.g., to identifying the pharaoh of the Exodus… because he uncritically accepts the standard chronology based on the dynasties of Egypt.
No he doesn’t! Kramer dates the Exodus by cross-correlating Assyrian and Old Testament accounts, including a solar eclipse mentioned in unearthed Assyrian accounts whose date we can work out (763BC), and 1 Kings 6:1. Having got a year for the Exodus he then looks for a Pharaoh whose father reigned for many decades, as follows from the Book of Exodus. In the window covering the two rival dating systems for Egypt, only one Pharaoh fits, Amenhotep II. Furthermore his son was buried with him, meaning he predeceased him, consistent with the plague on the firstborn, and above all Amenhotep II’s body – his mummy – is covered in boils. What more do you want? Of course this identification favours one dating system for Egypt over the other, but that is peripheral to Kramer’s concern. Where EXACTLY do you think is the error in his reasoning?
No, he doesn’t. Yes he does, except that, in order to make Amenhotep II fit the biblical date for the Exodus (1446 BC), he has to go for an Egyptian chronological scheme – the ‘high chronology’ – that is now largely superseded. That scheme, which has Amenhotep II reign 1450-23, does not work for a variety of other reasons. The ‘low chronology’ favoured by most Egyptologists dates the king to 1427-1401 or thereabouts (Ancient Egyptian Chronology ed Hornung et al 2006 puts him at 1425-1400).
Almost certainly the Pharaoh of the Exodus perished in the Red Sea (Ex 14:28, Ps 136:15), in which case his reign would have ended in 1446.
Nothing calamitous happened in the middle or at the end of Amenhotep’s reign, corresponding to the wrath of God – the crippling of Egypt’s economy, the death of the nation’s firstborn, the destruction of its standing army and judgement upon the nation’s gods.
The question of where the Exodus is to be placed in Egyptian history involves more, and more critical, issues than just identifying a pharaoh who was succeeded by someone other than his firstborn son. Also, it does not follow from Acts 7:30 that the pharaoh’s predecessor must have reigned at least 40 years, as Kramer asserts. Even if one were to follow such reasoning and assume (i) that God told Moses to return to Egypt as soon as Amenhotep’s predecessor had died and (ii) that that predecessor was the one from whom Moses fled 40 years earlier, this would mean that the Exodus took place at the beginning of Amenhotep’s reign. This is because ‘after 40 years had passed’ would make Moses 80 years old at the time, which would be 1446 BC, since Moses would live for another 40 years, dying at the age of 120 at the end of the wilderness period in 1406 BC.
It is also regrettable that Kramer does not, in his video, inform the viewer that there is more than one chronological scheme for the New Kingdom and that his argument depends entirely on opting for a scheme which is generally not favoured in the light of current knowledge. Many viewers lacking in-depth independent knowledge of the subject may watch and come away convinced – but be none the wiser.
It is also regrettable that Kramer does not, in his video, inform the viewer that there is more than one chronological scheme for the New Kingdom
He does, as I shall detail. Have you actually seen Kramer’s video, or perhaps seen a different one in which he does not give full details? If you go to this list of his videos
https://www.youtube.com/@ExpeditionBible/videos
then you will need two videos, titled “Tomb of the Exodus Pharaoh” (26:12 mins, uploaded 22nd March 2025) and “How we know the dates for the Old Testament” (27:11 mins, uploaded 1st June 2024).
In the 2025 video, Kramer quotes 1 Kings 6:1 which states that King Solomon began to build the Temple in Jerusalem in the fourth year of his reign and 480 years after the Israelites came out of Egypt. He asserts that Solomon began building the Temple in 966BC, so that the Exodus took place in 1446BC.
I’ll come back to the implications for Egypt of that date for the Exodus, but we first need to know how Kramer got that date for the Temple. Look at his 2024 video, which finds a total eclipse of the sun recorded at Nineveh sometime in roughly the 8th century BC. Astronomy tells us that this must be the eclipse of 15th June 763BC. The Assyrian accounts, which run year by year, also imply that Sennacherib invaded ancient Israel 62 years later, i.e. in 701BC. This event is recorded in 2 Kings 18:13 as being the 14th year of King Hezekiah’s reign. Now count back in the Old Testament records, which give the line of kings and the lengths of their reigns, and you find Solomon acceding in 970BC. Invoke 1 Kings 6:1 and you reach 966BC for the start of Temple-building in Solomon’s fourth year and, 480 years earlier, 1446BC for the Exodus.
What does this date mean for Egypt? Whether you accept the High Chronology or the Low Chronology, the difference is not so great as to throw into question the Dynasty that experienced the Exodus: the 18th dynasty. Kramer speaks of these rival chronologies for Egypt from 19:55 in the 2025 video, contrary to your assertion that “Kramer does not, in his video, inform the viewer that there is more than one chronological scheme for the New Kingdom”.
Acts 7 is explicit that Moses spent 40 years in Midian, beginning when he fled from the Pharaoh (Exodus 2:15). Exodus 2:23 states that “During this long period, Pharaoh died”. The phrase clearly implies that the Pharaoh who tried to kill Moses died a long time after Moses fled. (Neither Exodus 14:23-28 nor Psalm 136:15 states that Pharaoh himself drowned at the Red Sea, which would surely be mentioned if it happened – he presumably directed his army and watched.) The only plausible candidate for this Pharaoh – Kramer consulted Aidan Dodson and Dyan Hilton’s 2004 reference book ‘The Complete Royal Families of Ancient Egypt’ – is Thutmose II, who reigned for 54 years. So his son, Amenhotep II, is likely the Pharaoh of the Exodus. And, consistent with the death of Pharaoh’s son in the plague on the firstborn (Exodus 12:29) and the plague of boils (Exodus 9:10), Amenhotep II was entombed with his son Webensenu (who would have had his own tomb had he acceded) and Amenhotep II’s mummy is covered in boils, unlike any other mummy recovered from the Valley of the Kings.
You rubbish all of this on the grounds of your preferred chronology for Egypt. It is not necessary to disputer that with you; suffice it to say that scholars are divided, and the very strong argument above is not Egyptological. That is prefers a chronology for Egypt that you disagree with is of no consequence to me; take that up with Egyptologists, and take the argument above up with me. Where is Kramer’s error?
I don’t know why you persist in making a point about how Kramer got to 1446 BC, which I do not dispute. This is the accepted date among those who follow the Thiele chronology of Israel’s kings and the springboard of I Kings 6:1. In suggesting that it is new to Kramer you show yourself to be not conversant with the ins and outs of the subject.
Ex 2:23 says nothing more than what it says – it does not imply what you say it does. It refers to ‘those many days’ because Israel was suffering and there appeared to be no respite. They were still suffering despite the death of the king who was drowning their babies. Contrast Ex 14:23ff and Ps 136:15 which ‘imply’ (but do not explicitly state) that Pharaoh himself died. To quote the ABR website:
I said ‘almost certainly’, acknowledging some slight room for doubt, but to reverse your argument, if Pharaoh did not drown in the Red Sea when his army did, the text would surely have said so (if one way or the other the author knew for sure – he may not have done). Ps 136 implies that the army and the Pharaoh suffered the same fate, which is what any reader of Ex 14 would naturally assume, especially as the Pharaoah was the one who had refused to let Israel go and was therefore the one responsible for God’s wrath.
I don’t rubbish anything. I criticise your/Kramer’s argument, because it is weak, on the grounds stated (which you do not address) – not because I prefer another chronology. I spent a year researching the matter (drawing on knowledge previously acquired over decades) precisely because I felt the status quo to be unsatisfactory. To suggest the reverse, that I had an a priori chronology in despite of the arguments for a New Kingdom Exodus, is merely ad hominem and unworthy of you. There is nothing to take up with Egyptologists in this context, as the consensus among them is that there was no Exodus, and it certainly did not happen at the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of Amenhotep’s reign.
The video I watched was at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JusQxiTXnE from two years ago.
You are entitled to your opinion. You don’t have to get upset if someone disagrees.
We’re probably both being rather snarky, but please don’t say I am being and you aren’t.
I never claimed that Kramer originated the 1446BC Exodus date, not least because I am well aware that he didn’t. He needed and summarised it, rather well. I am also aware of the difficulties in reconciling the accounts of the timing of the reigns of the Hebrew kings in the Old Testament, having read Leslie McFall’s thesis on the subject. Before his death 11 years ago he probably knew more than anyone else on the subject, and he too concluded that Solomon began to reign in 970BC.
You have to be very wedded indeed to a pet theory to ignore the boils on the skin of a Pharaoh entombed with his son in the correct window of time.