I'm a strong non-theist but I do think that there might be a historical incident, an escaping of slaves on a large scale which was magnified in to miraculous events.
You are of course free to believe what you will (and to do the research to validate those beliefs), but that is far different than pointing to the fact that a tradition is long-lived as evidence of worth.
Furthermore, the long-lived character of the exodus was and is in many ways the consequence of a story being successfully promoted via a vernacular alphabet and later deemed scripture. In a very real sense it is not a long-lived tradition but a long-lived text.
And why "escaping of slaves on a large scale" rather than the Hyksos "expulsion," or an 'exodus' by a small group of Egyptian priests later relabelled as Levites, or ... ?
As for relevant evidence, the
Elephantine papyri and ostraca is intriguing. Note, for example ...
The Elephantine papyri pre-date all extant
manuscripts of the
Hebrew Bible, and thus give scholars a very important glimpse at how Judaism was practiced in Egypt during the fifth century BCE,
[10] as they seem to show evidence of the existence in c. 400 BCE of a
polytheistic sect of Jews. It is widely agreed that this Elephantine community originated in the mid-seventh or mid-sixth centuries BCE, likely as a result of Judean and Samaritan refugees fleeing into Egypt during the times of Assyrian and Babylonian invasions.
[11] They seem to have had no knowledge of a written
Torah or the narratives described therein.
[12]
Also important is the fact that the papyri document the existence of a small Jewish temple at Elephantine, which possessed altars for incense offerings and animal sacrifices, as late as 411 BCE. Such a temple would be in clear violation of
Deuteronomic law, which stipulates that no Jewish temple may be constructed outside of Jerusalem.
[10]: 31 Furthermore, the papyri show that the Jews at Elephantine sent letters to the high priest in Jerusalem asking for his support in re-building their temple, which seems to suggest that the priests of the Jerusalem Temple were not enforcing Deuteronomic law at that time. Cowley notes that their petition expressed their pride at having a temple to Ya'u, '
Yahweh ' (no other god is mentioned in the petition) and gave no suggestion that their temple could be heretical.
[12]
