Шишак: Египетский фараон и библейские завоевания

Egyptian pharaoh mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, identified with Shoshenq I

Shishak, also spelled Shishaq or Susac (שִׁישַׁק, Tiberian: , Σουσακίμ), was, according to the Hebrew Bible, an Egyptian pharaoh who sacked Jerusalem in the 10th century BC. He is usually identified with the pharaoh Shoshenq I. He supported Jeroboam against king Rehoboam of Judah, and led a successful campaign through that country with a large army. Shishak did not destroy Jerusalem but took the treasures of Solomon's Temple and the king's house. His campaign records, found in the Bubastite Portal at Karnak and a relief at el Hibeh, list several conquered towns but fail to mention Jerusalem. The omission has sparked various theories, with some scholars questioning the historical accuracy of the Biblical account and others suggesting possible explanations for the omission. Shishak has also appeared in popular culture, notably in the film Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The spelling and pronunciation of Shishak's name is not consistent throughout the Hebrew Bible. It occurs three times as Šīšaq (שִׁישַׁק), three times as Šīšāq (שִׁישָׁק), and once as Šūšaq (שׁוּשַׁק).

In the very early years after the decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs, on chronological, historical, and linguistic grounds, nearly all Egyptologists identified Shishak with Shoshenq I of the 22nd dynasty, who invaded Canaan following the Battle of Bitter Lakes. This position has been maintained by most scholars ever since, and remains the majority position today.

Shoshenq I left behind "explicit records of a campaign into Canaan (scenes; a long list of Canaanite place names from the Negev to Galilee; stelae), including a stela [found] at Megiddo" which supports the traditional interpretation. The Bubastite Portal, a relief discovered at Karnak, in Upper Egypt, and similar reliefs on the walls of a small temple of Amun at el Hibeh, shows Pharaoh Shoshenq I holding in his hand a bound group of prisoners. The names of captured towns are located primarily in the territory of the kingdom of Israel (including Megiddo), with a few listed in the Negeb, and perhaps Philistia. However, the inscription makes no mention of Jerusalem itself, nor of Rehoboam or Jeroboam. Various explanations of this omission of Jerusalem have been proposed: its name may have been erased, the list may have been copied from an older pharaoh's list of conquests, or Rehoboam's ransoming the city (as described in the Second Book of Chronicles) would have saved it from being listed.

It has been claimed that the numbers of Egyptian soldiers given in Chronicles can be "safely ignored as impossible" on Egyptological grounds; similarly, the numbers of chariots reported in 2 Chronicles is likely exaggerated by a factor of ten—leading 60,000 horses through the Sinai and Negev would have been logistically impossible, and no evidence of Egyptian cavalry exists from before the 27th Dynasty. Some authors, such as Israel Finkelstein, deem the treasures taken by Shishak as unlikely, alleging the material culture of 10th century Jerusalem and surroundings to have been too primitive to allow for any treasure that an Egyptian pharaoh would have been interested in. Finkelstein concludes that the looting narrative "should probably be seen as a theological construct rather than as historical references". By contrast, Krystal V. L. Pierce has pointed that a relief from Karnak records Sheshonq I presenting the tribute from his Levantine campaign to Amun Re, and that the Pharaoh used the tribute to finance the construction of several monumental structures across Egypt. More recently, David Rohl's New Chronology identified him with Ramesses II of the 19th dynasty, and Peter James has identified him with Ramesses III of the 20th dynasty.

Shishak is mentioned in Steven Spielberg's action adventure film Raiders of the Lost Ark as the pharaoh who seized the Ark of the Covenant from the Temple of Solomon during his raids on Jerusalem and hid it in the Well of Souls in Tanis.