The main aim of the Habiru-peasant revolt can only be gotten from un- derstanding their socio-economic and political status. Regarding the socio-economic class of the ‘founders’ of Israel, it is more probable that they were a loose assemblage of people, holding in common only the fact that they were lower classes oppressed by the Egyptian crown. These were only gradually welded together in the cult of Yahweh in the desert
on the way to Canaan.53 Such an interpretation is hinted at by comments
in the Exodus traditions that ‘a mixed multitude also went up with them’ (Exod. 12:38) when Israel set out from Raamses to Succoth, and that ‘the riffraff that was among them’ (Num 11:4) agitated against Moses be- cause of the lack of food.
While the traditions try to distinguish between the main body of Israel- ites-the Habiru and the mixed followers, it is clear that these were one group composed of unrelated people. The attempt to separate them is an editorial one, in order to fit the perspective of the rulers later. What con- cretises our assumption is that despite the attempt by historians to sup- press the diversity these solid allusions to heterogeneity survived as au- thentic memories of the conglomerate origins of those who banded to- gether in flight from Egypt. It is clear that they did not flee as a pre- existent community but as those whose intolerable conditions of oppres-
sion drove them in the direction of a community yet-to-be.54
It is these narratives that tell us that the revolution was carried out by the common people and the few leaders, whose common experience of oppression (and nothing else) influenced their thinking. As such, the aim of such people would naturally be to seek an alternative socio-economic and political system from the previous oppressive system. Hence, it was
52
Cf. Gottwald, The Tribes of Yahweh, p. 409.
53
Cf. Gottwald, ‘Were the Early Israelites Pastoral Nomads?’, p.252; Gottwald, ‘Domain Assumptions and Societal Models’, pp. 93-94; Cf. Mendenhall, ‘The Hebrew Conquest of Palestine’, p. 74; Mendenhall, The Tenth Generation, pp. 23-25.
54
Cf. Gottwald, The Tribes of Yahweh, pp. 455-56; Hauser, ‘Israel’s Conquest of Palestine’, p.5.
upon their arrival in Canaan that by their appeal to Yahweh as a liberator god, they managed to ignite the fires of the Apiru-peasant revolution against oppression. This oppression was similar to the one they had escaped from in Egypt.
From this characterisation of the struggle in Canaan, the social reality is that the basic division, tension and the crucial conflict of interests in the ancient Near Eastern society during Israel’s appearance was between the city and the countryside. The ‘city’ and the ‘countryside’ are character-
ised as antithetical.55 Whereas the city stood for oppression and exploita-
tion, the countryside stood for salvation and liberation. While the city represented hierarchy, the countryside represented the desirable situa- tion of egalitarianism. Also, the city for them represented injustice, but the countryside represented fairness. In short, whereas the city repre- sented all that was evil and everything that needed to be demolished, the countryside stood for all the values that needed to be emulated and re- sorted to as the only viable system of life. This is the basis for the peas- ant agitation for the return to the traditional set-up of tribalisation, where the socio-economic and political spheres are administered by the tribes. This is precisely the reason why early Israel began to actively ap- propriate religion, Yahwism as an instrument to achieve this goal.
Role of Yahwism in the Habiru-Peasant Revolt
Clear consciousness resulting in concerted efforts towards fundamen- tally altering the socio-economic and political system of the Canaanite city-states is noticeable from 1350-1250 or 1225 BC. And these efforts are intimately related to the rise and contribution of Yahwism towards the agenda of radical and revolutionary changes in all spheres. From this era, early Israel began to champion fundamental changes. It challenged Egyptian imperialism; it rejected Philistine threats and radically con- fronted Canaanite city-state feudalism. The organisers of the revolution linked up the majority of the exploited peoples across the boundaries of the old city-state divisions into one broad movement agitating for revolu- tionary change. This led Gottwald to argue that, from now on we begin to observe, precisely the kind of embracing unitary culture, a common cult and religion of Yahwism, and social order in early Israel that was
55
lacking as a bond or framework for Apiru, peasants, and pastoral no-
mads a century or more earlier.56
The role of Yahwism in galvanising the diverse and variegated oppressed classes and in the process of reorganisation and transformation of the whole socio-economic and political structure should not to be underes- timated. It was the responsibility of Yahwist functionaries to provide the ideological and intellectual impetus to challenge the state of affairs as well as pointing the peasants to the intentions and goals of the revolu- tion. In other words, Yahwism became the rallying point of most of the oppressed peasants and all the other vulnerable groups, including the Apiru. With this background, it is not far from truth to regard the reli- gious cult and ideology of Yahwism as potent organisational and sym- bolic forces in establishing and reinforcing the social, economic, political and military arrangements normative for the new community. Equally, the Levitical priesthood, the founders of Yahwism, can be designated as the intellectual and organisational cadre of leadership which cuts across and penetrates the several autonomous social segments, binding them
together for actions based on common sentiment.57 Their common en-
emy as I have alluded to above, was the exploitative feudalism of the Canaanite city-states.
From the way early Israel was constituted, it is apparent that it was to- tally against feudalism. The society which it established radically trans- formed the status-quo. The new society extended its ‘outlaw’ system (as observed by the city-state rulers) over an entire region and an entire oppressed people, so that ‘outlawry’ became ‘inlawry’ as the basis of a new social order characterised by egalitarianism. The early Israelite soci- ety made it of particular importance to reintroduce tribalisation that the city-state system had summarily rejected as primitive. Therefore, Israel became an entirely counter-society; religiously, socially, economically,
politically and militarily autonomous.58
This is what Zimbabwe has failed to do at independence in 1980, which ushered in the liberation movements into power. Contrary to the war-
56
Gottwald, The Tribes of Yahweh, pp. 489-90.
57
Cf. Gottwald, The Tribes of Yahweh, p. 490; Gottwald, ‘The Hypothesis of the Revolution- ary Origins of Ancient Israel: A Response to Hauser and Thompson’, see, pp. 43-46.
58
Cf. Gottwald, The Tribes of Yahweh, p. 490; Gottwald, ‘The Hypothesis of the Revolution- ary Origins of Ancient Israel: A Response to Hauser and Thompson’, p.46.
time promises, the language, the religion and the culture that led the struggle were never given prominence in the new Zimbabwe; the politi- cal and socio-economic worldview of the underclasses was not priori- tised; the racist system of housing was never disturbed. This is generally the situation across Africa. Today, colonial languages are not only the official languages of the people of Africa, they are also the lingua franca. In Africa, we have today, African scholars, historians, journalists, reli- gious leaders and the like who are proud to be identified as “Franco- phone” or “Anglophone”. It is not an overstatement to argue that most of the people in Africa are proud to be identified with their colonial mas- ters than they are to be associated with their heroes of the liberation. Everything that is associated with the colonial era is regarded as modern and civilised while everything associated with independence is character- ised as primitive.
Be that as it may, so far, it is clear that the majority that made up early Israel were not foreign at all, but disgruntled indigenous Canaanite groups. Although it is not clearly attested or hinted in the ancient Israel- ite history, it appears, some of the Apiru, but certainly not all of the de- scendants of the Palestinian Amarna era Apiru entered into early Israel. And at the same time, it must be categorically stated that some, but surely not all of early Israel was composed of former Apiru. Important to take note of is that upon settlement, the later full formation of early Israel was an enlarged version of essentially the same process of eclectic social composition, this time in reaction to Canaanite feudalism and the remnants of Egyptian imperialism in Canaan. According to Gottwald, the rise of early Israel could be understood as a greatly expanded version of the Apiru movement. Thus, we can understand Israel as a continuity in which not merely a few people but the entire populace has become
Apiru.59