by
Damien F. Mackey
“As
someone who studies ancient inscriptions in the original, I have a
responsibility to warn the lay audience that the new fad (revisionism)
represented
by Philip Davies and his ilk is merely a circle of dilettantes”.
Professor Anson F. Rainey
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THEBIBLEHISTORYAND ARCHEOLOGY
Part 2
If Moses did not really lead God’s people out of
Egypt, as described in the book of Numbers, then the Law of Moses is a man-made
tradition.
If David was not the anointed ruler of Israel, then
Jesus, the Son of David, was a pretender to a false legacy.
If the stories of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph are
just the creation of imaginative and pious Jews in the second century BC, then
Paul’s statement in Romans 4:16,17 concerning Abraham, “He is the father of us all. As it is written: I have made you a father of
many nations.” becomes meaningless. John Oakes
Damien Mackey comments: For a more satisfactory historico-archaeological
setting for Abram (Abraham), see e.g. my multi-part series, beginning with:
For Moses as an historical figure, see e.g. my
article:
For
a revised David and Solomon, see e.g. my article:
Solomon and Sheba
TheBibleasHistory article continues:
Let
us say it very clearly, if the events recorded in the Old Testament are just
religious stories with little or no basis in fact, then both the Old and the
New Testament lose nearly all their meaning, and Christianity becomes a
man-made religion.
Do
not be deceived. This is the view of a vast number of the intellectual elite,
and believe it or not, even of many supposed Christian theologians today.
HISTORICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVIDENCE by John Oakes
On the Hebrew Passover
in 2001“Rabbi” David Wolpe of
Los Angeles stated that "the way the Bible describes the
Exodus is not the way it happened, if it happened at all."
Wolpe made his
declaration before 2,000 worshippers at the Conservative Sinai Temple, and the
speech was reported on the front page of the Los Angeles Times. The article
entitled, "Doubting the Story of Exodus," asserts that archaeology
disproves the validity of the Biblical account.
Michael
Lemonick (majored in Journalism) wrote for TIME magazine : "... much of what is recorded in the Bible is at best distorted, and
some characters and events are probably totally
fictional. Most
scholars suspect that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob ...
never existed“.
In a similar vein,
professor Gunnar Heinsohn (Masters Sociology) of the University of Bremen has written
“Mainstream scholars are in the process of deleting Ancient
Israel from the history books. The entire period from Abraham the Patriarch in
the -21st century (fundamentalist date) to the flowering of the Divided Kingdom
in the -9th century (fundamentalist date) is found missing in the
archaeological record.
Minimalists and Maximalists
- Minimalists do not believe that the Bible is historical. Most believe that most of the Old Testament was created during the Persian Empire. Maximalists however believe the Bible is historical but is not inspired.
MINIMALIST OR REVISIONIST
ISRAEL FINKLESTEIN
WILLIAM DEVER
THOMAS THOMPSON
PHILIP DAVIES
To the right are some
popular minimalists (sometimes called Revisionists). However, one has changed
his mind based on extensive evidence.
William Dever
Dever, who once did not believe the Bible was historical, now
believes much of it is. Although Dever is not a minimalist or a maximalist, he
seems to be more objective when he sees the evidence. He also points out how
his former peers are not being objective with the evidence. He has now written
a book on the Historical Israel
Prof. Israel Finkelstein is another famous minimalist who has written books
on the history of Israel. He believes that the history of Israel (including the
Old Testament) is just a fabrication of stories created in the Persian Empire.
One forward of his book reads:
“A
revolution is happening in Biblical Archeology. Biblical Archeology is
critically examining the Bible against the archeological record and is turning
everything we thought we knew upside down. It may disturb many that hold strong
political or highly conservative religious beliefs. This will be true of
Christians, Muslims and Jews who interpret the Bible literally.
It
will disturb many secular Zionists who justify modern Israel's existence and
the proposed annexation of "Judah and Sumaria" based on the Biblical
Texts. You can choose to believe this research or not. But it has profound
implications for the Israeli Palestinian conflict. This article will review the
theories of one of the foremost of these revolutionary Biblical archeologists -Israel Finkelstein. “
“Finkelstein has had an impact on radically revising the history of Israel
in the 10th and 9th centuries BCE. He has transformed the study of history and
archaeology in Israeli universities, moving from a "monumental" to a
"systemic" study of the archaeological evidence.”
Yet, says William Dever, Ph.D. (a fellow revisionist) this new dating
system "is not supported in print by a single other ranking
archaeologist."
Prof. Israel Finkelstein, a revisionist, theorized a different dating
system that places the construction of the gates 100 years after the time of
Solomon.
Dovid Lichtman
Revisionists stubbornly
dismiss as fictitious most historical aspects of the Bible. To them, the
patriarchal period (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) is all imagination, the story of
Joseph and the sojourn in Egypt is fabricated, as are the Exodus and the desert
wanderings. The conquest, settlement and united monarchy (Saul, David and Solomon)
are mere "propaganda" to quote Philip
Davies.
Marit Skjeggestad, a Scandinavian revisionist, said that on
biblical history, "the archaeological record is
silent."
"In fact,"
asserts Dever, "the archaeological record is not at all silent. It's only that some
historians are deaf."
Revisionists evasive
maneuvers are also too much for Dever. He said that this "is an example of the lengths to
which scholars will go to avoid the obvious when it does not suit them."
Dever states:
None
of the revisionists can or will write a history of any “Israel” in the Iron
Age.
Davies denies the existence of either a “biblical” or a “historical” Israel, both being in his view post-modernism’s “social constructs”; and his
putative “historical” Israel cannot be illustrated because he completely
ignores the archaeological data, now our primary source. (He dismisses Mazar’s handbook in a single footnote as
“irrelevant,” because it does not extend to his “Persian
period Israel”; 1991:24, n. 4).
Dever continues: “Thompson
attempted a 450-page History of the Israelite Peoples (sic) in 1992, which however he now repudiates as it is “after all hardly
history, critically speaking, but rather just another rationalistic paraphrase
for biblical Israel” (1997:178, 179). His 1999 400-page book The Mythic Past, despite its subtitle Archaeology and the Myth of Israel, has
nothing whatsoever to do with modern archaeology. And the few pages devoted to Iron Age Israel (1999:158-168; 179-190 [23
pages]) scarcely even mention “Israel” by name, speaking rather of “southern
Syria’s marginal fringe” or “the (Assyrian) province of Samarina.”
Dever sums up the attitude of objective scholars:
"In
my view, most of the revisionists are no longer honest scholars, weighing all
the evidence, attempting to be objective and fair-minded historians, seeking
the truth. Determined to unmask the ideology of others, they have become
ideologues themselves. The revisionist and the postmoderns are dangerous
because they have created a kind of relativism -- an anything goes attitude --
that makes serious, critical inquiry difficult if not impossible."
In the words of Anson
Rainey:
"As
someone who studies ancient inscriptions in the original, I have a
responsibility to warn the lay audience that the new fad (revisionism)
represented by Philip Davies and his ilk is merely a circle of dilettantes. Their view that nothing in
the biblical tradition is earlier than the Persian period, especially their
denial of the existence of the united monarchy, is a figment of their vain
imagination. The name 'House of David' in the
Tel Dan and Mesha inscriptions
sounds the death knell to their specious conceit. Biblical scholarship and
instruction should completely ignore the (revisionist) school. They have
nothing to teach us."
Most archaeologists are
not minimalists like Israel Finkelstein.
The
California Institute of Ancient Studies along with most Archeologists and Historians disagree with such skeptics. The few minimalist Dever-Finkelstein
followers (one who authored "The Bible
Unearthed") have been proven wrong simply because they have used the
outdated Sothic Chronology.
Even
on an ABC special, the archeologists did have some embarrassing moments such as
when the founder of the famous Tel Dan inscription referring to the "House
of David" showed that actual inscription to the cameras and laughed at
the early attempts by the archaeologists to explain it away. David himself was
grudgingly accorded a real existence, based largely on the Tel Dan evidence.
THE HOUSE OF DAVID
by
Damien Mackey
by
Damien Mackey
Gate at Tel Dan
In
fact, the program's presenter himself came to be convinced that a massive altar
on Mount Ebal in Samaria was the one that Joshua had built there (Joshua 8:30).
Indeed it was made of "unhewn stones" (v.31), and the archaeological
data discovered around this altar seemed to fit very well that this was indeed
an ancient Israelite site of sacrifice.
THE HOUSE OF DAVID
by
Damien Mackey
by
Damien Mackey
Damien
Mackey comments: “The House of David”
article has since been up-dated.
TheBibleasHistory article continues:
Even
a statement made by a true scholar on the subject, Prof. Adam Zartal, chairman of the Dept. of Archaeology at the University
of Haifa who
had this to say about history, archaeology and the Bible:
"After
years of research, I believe it is impossible to explore Israel's origins
without the Bible. At the same time, the research should be as objective as
possible. The Bible should be used cautiously and critically. But again and
again we have seen the historical value of the Bible.
Again and again we have seen that an accurate memory has been preserved in its transmuted narratives, waiting to be unearthed and exposed by archaeological fieldwork and critical mind work."
Again and again we have seen that an accurate memory has been preserved in its transmuted narratives, waiting to be unearthed and exposed by archaeological fieldwork and critical mind work."
“Dr. and Professor Eilat Mazar is a third-generation
Israeli archaeologist, specializing in Jerusalem and Phoenician
archaeology. She has worked on the Temple Mount
excavations, as well as excavations at Achzib and Bethlehem, and is a visiting
scholar with the Institute of Archaeology AND the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.”
Dr. Eilat Mazar: Israeli Archaeologist / Discovered the King David's Palace in February 2005.
Alongside her laptop on
a paper-strewn desk sits the most telling object: a heavily marked Bible.
Like her grandfather and father before her, Mazar is a believer in the Bible’s
historical reliability.
“One
of the many things I learned from my grandfather was how to relate to the
biblical text,” she
says. “Pore
over it again and again, for it contains within it descriptions of genuine
historical reality.” She adds, “I
work with the Bible in one hand and the tools of excavation in the other.
That’s what biblical archaeologists do. The Bible is the most important
historical source and therefore deserves special attention.”
Damien Mackey comments: For a different perspective on the archaeology of
Jerusalem, though, see e.g. my multi-part series, beginning with:
Massive Challenge to Standard Geography of
Jerusalem-Temple.
TheBibleasHistory article continues:
This approach led Mazar
to the site she now believes is the northern edge of King David’s palace in an
area known as the City of David. When she set out on her quest in search of the
palace in 1997, she turned to her Bible. She looked in……
Second
Book of Samuel chapter
five, verse 17. “When the Philistines came to fight, the
Bible says David went down from his palace to the
fortress,” Mazar says. “I wondered down from where? It’s very
reasonable to assume that when the Bible describes David going down he
came from a higher place. The only higher place is from the north.”
It was a crucial
observation. Mazar reasoned the only direction where the topography is higher
would be just north of the City of David, outside the walls of the Old City.
She began excavating in February of 2005. The finds came quickly. Surprisingly
intact, just two yards beneath ground level, were Byzantine-era
artifacts, including a fully-preserved room with mosaic floors
dating to the 4th to 6th centuries C.E. When Mazar peeled back the room, she uncovered water cisterns, pools and
a mikvah from the Second Temple period.
But it was what was under
these that would prove to be the most startling. The Second Temple remains were
directly on top of thick foundation walls that protruded in all directions—and
even beyond—the length and width of her 30-by-10 meter excavation site.
The pottery found under
the building—that is, from before the building’s construction—dated
back to the 12th to 11th centuries B.C.E.—just before David conquered
Jerusalem.
But inside one of the
rooms, Mazar’s team found pottery from the 10th to 9th century B.C.E., indicating
that the building was in use during the period of David’s reign in Jerusalem. In addition, Mazar found a seal impression, called a bulla, of a late
7th-century royal official named Jehucal, son of Shelemiah, son of Shevi,
who is mentioned twice in the Book of Jeremiah (37:3 and 38:1). “The bulla find—it’s an amazing find,” she says, adding that it proves
“that the site was an important center in the ancient Israelite monarchy for
four centuries.”
Jeremiah
37: 3
And Zedekiah the king
sent Jehucal the son of Shelemiah, and
Zephaniah the son of Maaseiah, the priest, to the prophet Jeremiah, saying,
Pray now unto Jehovah our God for us.
Jeremiah
38: 1
- 1 And Shephatiah the son of Mattan, and Gedaliah the son of Pashhur, and Jucal the son of Shelemiah, and Pashhur the son of Malchijah, heard the words that Jeremiah spake unto all the people, saying,
- 2 Thus saith Jehovah, He that abideth in this city shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence; but he that goeth forth to the Chaldeans shall live, and his life shall be unto him for a prey, and he shall live.
Prof.
Yigael Yadin, Dean of Archeology in the University of
Jerusalem, has also further
confirmed the Bible’s records in other areas of Solomon’s accomplishments. He
was asked if archeology is was confirming the Biblical accounts. He
replied:
“I
would say, generally speaking, that this is very definitely so. I would say
that the historical portions of the Bible are thus far being proved true by
archeologists. I would go one step further, and say that a biblical diary has
actually helped us archeologists find our way and understand the data.
The Bible tells us, for
example, that King Solomon built three strategic cities. One is Megiddo, and one is Gezer, near Jerusalem. And we excavated Hazor, the third Solomonic city.
“Were
it not for the passage in the Bible which tells us that Solomon built these
three cities we would not have been able to identify them. The actual discovery
of these gates proved that this example of a verse in the Bible was correct.
Now this is only one example. Wherever we go in this land of the Bible we
illuminate our finds with the Bible, and the finds, I would say, are
illuminating the Bible.”
HAZOR
GEZER
MEGIDDO
Dr.
David Rohl
"I
consider the Bible a historical document just like the writings of Herodotus or
a text of Rameses II," says Rohl. "It's ridiculous to throw it in the
dustbin just because it's a religious text. If so strong a tradition evolves
out of the past, it is likely to have a genuine geographical setting."
