Moses is at the foundation of monotheism, and so of Western culture. Here the factual and fictional events and characters in religious beliefs are studied. It traces monotheism back to the Egyptian king Akhenaten and shows how Moses's followers established truth by denouncing all others as false.

The book consists of three essays and is an extension of Freud’s work on psychoanalytic theory as a means of generating hypotheses about historical events. Freud hypothesizes that Moses was not Hebrew, but actually born into Ancient Egyptian nobility and was probably a follower of Akhenaten, an ancient Egyptian monotheist. Freud contradicts the biblical story of Moses with his own retelling of events, claiming that Moses only led his close followers into freedom during an unstable period in Egyptian history after Akhenaten (ca. 1350 BCE) and that they subsequently killed Moses in rebellion and later combined with another monotheistic tribe in Midian based on a volcanic God, Jahweh. Freud explains that years after the murder of Moses, the rebels regretted their action, thus forming the concept of the Messiah as a hope for the return of Moses as the Saviour of the Israelites. Freud said that the guilt from the murder of Moses is inherited through the generations; this guilt then drives the Jews to religion to make them feel better.

'My son, I have nothing I can give, but this chance that you may live.' With these words, a Hebrew mother places her infant son, Moses, in a basket and sets him adrift on the Nile River. From his carefree days as a prince of Egypt to his flight into the desert, nothing can fully prepare Moses for what is to come.Lynne Reid Banks, author of the best-selling novel The Indian in the Cupboard, brings the timeless story of Moses to life in this spirited retelling. Enriched with a full-color insert depicting characters and scenes from the film, this is a popular format that will enable older children to experience the movie again and again.

"Standing at the very foundation of monotheism, and so of Western culture, Moses is a figure not of history, but of memory. As such, he is the quintessential subject for the innovative historiography Jan Assmann both defines and practices in this work, the study of historical memory—a study, in this case, of the ways in which factual and fictional events and characters are stored in religious beliefs and transformed in their philosophical justification, literary reinterpretation, philological restitution (or falsification), and psychoanalytic demystification. To account for the complexities of the foundational event through which monotheism was established, Moses the Egyptian goes back to the short-lived monotheistic revolution of the Egyptian king Akhenaten (1360–1340 B.C.E.). Assmann traces the monotheism of Moses to this source, then shows how his followers denied the Egyptians any part in the origin of their beliefs and condemned them as polytheistic idolaters. Thus began the cycle in which every “counter-religion,” by establishing itself as truth, denounced all others as false. Assmann reconstructs this cycle as a pattern of historical abuse, and tracks its permutations from ancient sources, including the Bible, through Renaissance debates over the basis of religion to Sigmund Freud’s Moses and Monotheism. One of the great Egyptologists of our time, and an exceptional scholar of history and literature, Assmann is uniquely equipped for this undertaking—an exemplary case study of the vicissitudes of historical memory that is also a compelling lesson in the fluidity of cultural identity and beliefs."

In Moses the Egyptian, Herbert Broderick analyzes the iconography of Moses in the famous illuminated eleventh-century manuscript known as the Illustrated Old English Hexateuch. A translation into Old English of the first six books of the Bible, the manuscript contains over 390 images, of which 127 depict Moses with a variety of distinctive visual attributes. Broderick presents a compelling thesis that these motifs, in particular the image of the horned Moses, have a Hellenistic Egyptian origin. He argues that the visual construct of Moses in the Old English Hexateuch may have been based on a Late Antique, no longer extant, prototype influenced by works of Hellenistic Egyptian Jewish exegetes, who ascribed to Moses the characteristics of an Egyptian-Hellenistic king, military commander, priest, prophet, and scribe. These Jewish writings were utilized in turn by early Christian apologists such as Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea. Broderick’s analysis of this Moses imagery ranges widely across religious divides, art-historical religious themes, and classical and early Jewish and Christian sources. Herbert Broderick is one of the foremost historians in the field of Anglo-Saxon art, with a primary focus on Old Testament iconography. Readers with interests in the history of medieval manuscript illustration, art history, and early Jewish and Christian apologetics will find much of interest in this profusely illustrated study.

The shift from polytheism to monotheism changed the world radically. Akhenaten and Moses--a figure of history and a figure of tradition--symbolize this shift in its incipient, revolutionary stages and represent two civilizations that were brought into the closest connection as early as the Book of Exodus, where Egypt stands for the old world to be rejected and abandoned in order to enter the new one. The seven chapters of this seminal study shed light on the great transformation from different angles. Between Egypt in the first chapter and monotheism in the last, five chapters deal in various ways with the transition from one to the other, analyzing the Exodus myth, understanding the shift in terms of evolution and revolution, confronting Akhenaten and Moses in a new way, discussing Karl Jaspers' theory of the Axial Age, and dealing with the eighteenth-century view of the Egyptian mysteries as a cultural model.

A non-fictional account explaining why the author believes Moses was a prince of Thebes called Ramose. Born c.1500 BC, Prince Ramose was heir to Pharaoh Thutmose III, being his ""Great Army Commander"" - both roles ascribed to Moses by Hebrew tradition. Moreover, Ramose & Moses both led victorious military campaigns against Ethiopia (Cush), then married the king's daughter, becoming Egypt's Viceroy there. A short time later, Prince Ramose was mysteriously struck out of Egyptian records, while the Bible hints Moses was cast into exile. Exploring some of the more esoteric aspects of the prophet's life, this book finds threads firmly connecting him to Egypt's 18th Dynasty 3500 years ago... The book uncovers the Hermetic star knowledge (Astrology) which Moses gleaned from the White Brotherhood, a secretive Egyptian mystery school who met in the halls of Karnak. This knowledge was cryptically infused into the early Biblical scriptures, revealing the Israelite ancestors were once devoted Astrologers.

An investigation of how Moses was deceived and murdered by his father-in-law, Reuel • Shows how the magician Reuel staged the Burning Bush that spoke to Moses and assumed Moses’ identity after his murder • Explains how early scribes edited the Exodus story to cover Moses’ assassination and replacement and fabricated Moses’ origin story • Builds upon the Moses research of Goethe, Christopher Marlowe, and Sigmund Freud--who spent the last 40 years of his life obsessed with solving Moses’ murder The life of Moses, the greatest prophet of the Old Testament, has always been shrouded in mystery. The Bible mentions no witnesses to Moses’ death, no funeral, and no indication of his burial place, and the story of Exodus paints a very contradictory picture of this man so important to both Judaism and Christianity. At times, he is depicted as a meek, stuttering figure and at others his tyrannical commands and fits of rage terrorize the children of Israel. And, for the last years of his life, he chose to hide behind a veil. What is the explanation for these extreme shifts in character? Was Moses mentally ill? As Rand and Rose Flem-Ath reveal, the evidence points to something much more sinister: Moses was murdered and replaced by an impostor. The result of a decade-long investigation, this book continues and builds upon the research of Goethe, Christopher Marlowe, and Sigmund Freud--who spent the last 40 years of his life obsessed with solving Moses’ murder--and reaches a startling but well-evidenced conclusion that Moses was deceived and murdered by his father-in-law, Reuel. The authors show how Reuel was a skilled magician trained at Egypt’s prestigious House of Life and they reveal his motive: He was the son of Esau, from whom Jacob stole his birthright, the leadership of the Hebrew people, a role that Moses was now assuming. The authors explain how the magician Reuel used his sophisticated skills of manipulation and illusion to fake the Burning Bush that spoke to Moses as well as conceal his assumption of Moses’ identity after the murder. They reveal how the early scribes of the Old Testament inserted lags of time into the Exodus story to cover Moses’ assassination and replacement, fabricated Moses’ origin story, and changed the location of the “Mountain of God” from Edom, where Reuel was a prince, to Sinai. Unveiling the enigma of Moses’ real story--and his murder and replacement--the Flem-Aths dramatically challenge the time line and details of biblical history, exposing a cover-up at the very origins of Western religion.

"Three leading biblical scholars from the Jewish, Catholic, and Protestant faiths show how a critical approach to the Bible can complement religious readings"--Page [2] of jacket.