For more than four decades, biblical experts have tried to place the story of Exodus into historical context--without success. What could explain the Nile turning to blood, insects swarming the land, and the sky falling to darkness? Integrating biblical accounts with substantive archaeological evidence, "The Parting of the Sea" looks at how natural phenomena shaped the stories of Exodus, the Sojourn in the Wilderness, and the Israelite conquest of Canaan. Barbara Sivertsen demonstrates that the Exodus was in fact two separate exoduses both triggered by volcanic eruptions--and provides scientific explanations for the ten plagues and the parting of the Red Sea. Over time, Israelite oral tradition combined these events into the Exodus narrative known today.

Skillfully unifying textual and archaeological records with details of ancient geological events, Sivertsen shows how the first exodus followed a 1628 B.C.E Minoan eruption that produced all but one of the first nine plagues. The second exodus followed an eruption of a volcano off the Aegean island of Yali almost two centuries later, creating the tenth plague of darkness and a series of tsunamis that "parted the sea" and drowned the pursuing Egyptian army. Sivertsen's brilliant account explains inconsistencies in the biblical story, fits chronologically with the conquest of Jericho, and confirms that the Israelites were in Canaan before the end of the sixteenth century B.C.E.

In examining oral traditions and how these practices absorb and process geological details through storytelling, "The Parting of the Sea" reveals how powerful historical narratives are transformed into myth.

Cushetunk was the Indian name given to the Upper Delaware River valley which stretches for about five miles in each direction from the present town of Cochecton, New York. The Nathan Skinner Manuscript is a detailed source of genealogical, historical, and anecdotal information about the pioneer and Revolutionary War days from 1754 to 1783 in Cochecton/Cushetunk. In 1850, James Eldridge Quinlan, a junior editor for The Republican Watchman in Monticello, New York, began writing a series of columns on the history of the Cochecton region, using for his main resource the memory and written lore of seventy-three-year-old Nathan Skinner. Skinner also owned a collection of early land deeds, passed down to him from his father. In 1873, Quinlan wrote his History of Sullivan County, using copies of the manuscript and Skinner's deeds. Subsequent histories have quoted largely from the Nathan Skinner Manuscript, but this is the first time it has been arranged in chronological order and updated with contemporary factual materials to support, challenge, and enhance it. The editors utilized the archives of Pennsylvania and New York, the published papers of Sir William Johnson, George Clinton, and the Susquehannah Company, the unpublished Draper and Haldimand Manuscripts and many others. A map of Cochecton/Cushetunk and a full-name index add to the value of this work.

Written as a chronological narrative of Mohawk history and genealogy, the text is enhanced by detailed reference footnotes and about fifty Mohawk lineage charts. Excerpts from letters and memoirs add character to the history. Appendices contain transcript