Thoughts on this theory about Exodus?

[Hindsight was 2020]

Richard Elliott Friedman Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Georgia in 2013 put forther this theory about the Exodus.
1) First off that it did happen
2) It was not the entire jewish people but rather the Levites who fled from Egypt
3) When the tribes of Isreal first untied togther the the Levites were given the role of being the preists so becuase of this specific role in Jeiwsh society they were able to adopt their story into the collective identity of Isreal and it's orgins
https://reformjudaism.org/exodus-not-fiction

[Statilius the Epicurean]

I find the hypothesis doubtful, since it's likely that the Levites were originally a priestly class within Israelite society and only became a separate tribe of people later: e.g. in Judges there is a "Levite" who is said to be from the tribe of Judah.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

It's possible. I tend to be of the opinion that some people group among those that ended up forming Israel had entered Canaan from Egypt at some point, possibly in the context of persecution. Doesn't mean it was the Levites necessarily.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

It's more plausible than the standard narrative, but that doesn't prove anything.

[Kingpoleon]

I have a hard time with the Literalists. In their view, from the days of Levi to the days of his daughter’s son, there went from being 12 children of Jacob to two million people. Is it any wonder the Egyptians would need to slaughter their children? And if you hold to the Talmudic claim that eight million stayed in Egypt, that means the average couple had a measly 1,000 children over the course of a few generations.