The multiplication of the Israelites in Egypt from "seventy souls" to "six hundred thousand that were men" (Genesis 12:1-20 :37)—a number which may fairly be said to imply a total of at least two millions—has been declared to be "impossible," and to stamp the whole narrative of Exodus with the character of unreality and romance. Manifestly, the soundness of this criticism depends entirely on two things—first, the length of time- during which the stay in Egypt continued; and secondly, the sense in which the original number of the children of Israel in Egypt is said to have been "seventy souls." Now, as to the first point, there are two theories—one, basing itself on the Septuagint version of Exodus 12:40, would make the duration of the Egyptian sojourn 215 years only; the other, following the clear and repeated statement of the Hebrew text (Exodus 12:40, Exodus 12:41), literally rendered in our version, would extend the time to 430 years, or exactly double it. Much may be said on both sides of this question, and the best critics are divided with respect to it. The longer period is supported' by Kalisch, Kurtz, Knobel, Winer, Ewald, Delitzsch, and Canon Cook among modems; by Koppe, Frank, Beer, Rosenmuller, Hofmann, Tiele, Reinke, Jahn, Vater, and J. D. Michaelis among earlier critics; the short period is approved by Calvin, Grotius, Buddeus, Morinus, Voss, Houbigant, Baumgarten; and among our own countrymen, by Ussher, Marsham, Geddes, and Kennicott. The point cannot be properly argued in an "exposition" like the present; but it may be remarked that both reason and authority are in favour of the simple acceptance of the words of the Hebrew text, which assign 430 years as the interval between Jacob's descent into Egypt and the deliverance under Moses.
With respect to the number of those who accompanied Jacob into Egypt, and were assigned the land of Goshen for a habitation (Genesis 47:6), it is important to bear in mind, first of all, that the "seventy souls" enumerated in Genesis 46:8-27 comprised only two females, and that "Jacob's sons' wives" are expressly mentioned as not included among them (ib. Genesis 46:26). If we add the wives of 67 males, we shall have, for the actual family of Jacob, 137 persons. Further, it is to be borne in mind that each Israelite family which went down into Egypt was accompanied by its "household" (Exodus 1:1), consisting of at least some scores of dependants. If each son of Jacob had even 50 such retainers, and if Jacob himself had a household like that of Abraham (Genesis 14:14), the entire number which "went down into Egypt" would have amounted to at least 2000 persons.
According to Malthus, population tends to double itself, if there be no artificial check restraining it, every twenty-five years. At this rate, 2000 persons would expand into 2,048,000 in 250 years, 1000 would reach the same amount in 275 years, and 500 in 300 years; so that, even supposing the "seventy souls" with their "households" to have numbered no more than 500 persons when they went down into Egypt, the people would, unless artificially checked, have exceeded two millions at the expiration of three centuries—that is to say, 130 years before the Exodus! No doubt, the artificial checks which keep down the natural tendency of population to increase began to tell upon them considerably before that time. The "land of Goshen."a broad tract of very fertile country, became tolerably thickly peopled, and the rate of increase gradually subsided. Still, as the Delta was a space of from 7000 to 8000 square miles, and the land of Goshen was probably about half of it, a population of two millions is very much what we should expect, being at the rate of from 500 to 600 persons to the square mile.
It is an interesting question whether the Egyptian remains do, or do not, contain any mention of the Hebrew sojourn; and if they do, whether any light is thereby thrown on these numbers. Now it is admitted on all hands that, about the time of the Hebrew sojourn, there was in Egypt a subject race, often employed in forced labours, called Aperu or Aperiu, and it seems impossible to deny that this word is a very fair Egyptian equivalent for the Biblical עצרים, "Hebrews." We are forced, therefore, either to suppose that there were in Egypt, at one and the same time, two subject races with names almost identical, or to admit the identification of the Aperu with the descendants of Jacob. The exact numbers of the Aperu are nowhere mentioned; but it is a calculation of Dr. Brugsch that under Rameses II; a little before the Exodus, the foreign races in Egypt, of whom the Aperu were beyond all doubt the chief, "amounted certainly to a third, and probably still more," of the whole population, which is usually reckoned at from 7,000,000 to 8,000,000, One-third of this number would be from 2,300,000 to 2,600,000.
The writer of Exodus does not, however, as yet, make anything like a definite calculation. He is merely bent on having it understood that there had been a great multiplication, and that the "family" had grown into a "nation." To emphasise his statement, he uses four nearly synonymous verbs ("were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed-mighty"), adding to the last a duplicated adverb, bim'od m'od, "much, much." Clearly, an astonishing increase is intended.