5 Most Popular

Biblical Archaeology Articles

From The Ancient Near East Today

A Publication of
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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Table of
Contents
Introduction

Chapter 1: Godnapping in the

Ancient Near East

Chapter 2: The So-Called Jehoash In-

scription: A Post Mortem

Chapter 3: New Light on the Priestly

Blessing from Ancient Judah

Chapter 4: The Role of Biblical Archae-

ology in Exegesis: An interview with
Professor Israel Finkelstein, Part 1

Chapter 5: Does the Bible Claim That

the Sun and Moon Stopped in Their
Tracks?
 Editors Introduction
By: Alex Joffe

One of the most remarkable things about Biblical archaeology in the 21st century is that it exists all.
Thirty years ago, many scholars and laypeople were confidently predicting Biblical archaeologys
demise but today it is still going strong.

This latest ASOR e-book proves the point. The Ancient Near East Today will be starting its 5th volume
in 2017, and every month reaches 12,000 subscribers directly and many more through social media.
Public interest in Biblical archaeology and the ancient Near East as a whole remains high.

The top five Biblical archaeology articles from The Ancient Near East Today also tell us something
important about the shape of public interest. The most popular articles cover topics including Biblical
era inscriptions, Biblical passages and their ancient Near Eastern background, ancient Near Eastern
practices related to religion and politics, and an interview with a leading Biblical archaeologist.

The relationship between inscriptions and the Biblical text, the broader ancient Near Eastern cultural
contexts, and the practice (and people) of Biblical archaeology itself are among the key interests for
The Ancient Near East Todays readers. Each of these deserves some comment.

The problem of inscriptions and the Biblical text dates back to the 19th century beginning of
archaeology in the Near East. The recovery of Mesopotamian artifacts from Assyria and the decipher-
ment of cuneiform in 1850 were front-page news that electrified the public. For some, discoveries
like the story of Gilgamesh and the flood narrative complemented the Bible. For others, these newly
translated texts complicated or even compromised the Biblical narrative.

Today, the study of inscriptions has gone high tech. Scholars are as likely to be using multi-spectral
imaging as they are grammar books. The study of inscriptions also involves a good deal of skepticism
since separating forgeries from real texts has become a serious problem. The Ancient Near East
Todays readers appear keen to keep up with this especially challenging area.

The broader ancient Near East has also been a perennial interest. To 19th and 20th century public,
the ancient cultures of Mesopotamia, Egypt, Iran and beyond were different but never unreachable.
Museums and popular accounts shortened the distance to these times and places. Today, thanks to
these sources as well as multimedia and archaeo-tourism, these distances seem shorter than ever.
The desire to find ones place in the world - and to simply derive aesthetic satisfaction - through an
appreciation of the past remains strong.

Finally, there is the practice and people of Biblical archaeology. The practice of Biblical archaeology
today is a far cry from that of decades past. Its scientific underpinnings are such that hardly a day
goes by without a new specialist report, from analyses of trace elements in bones to databases con-
taining pottery profiles. The amount of technical data is challenging even for specialists. Translating
these finds into understandable prose, and situating them in historical and cultural terms, is an import-
ant goal of The Ancient Near East Today.

As for the people of archaeology, the desire to experience archaeology firsthand is greater than ever.
The growing number of individuals who volunteer on excavations in the Middle East shows how eager
so many are to learn about archaeology and the past in the most direct, strenuous and rewarding way
possible.

The Ancient Near East Today cant quite compare with the experience of being on a dig but, short of
that, it will continue to give all readers the most interesting and accessible experience possible.
 1
CHAPTER ONE

Godnapping in the
Ancient Near East
 The Ancient Near East Today
September 2016: Vol. IV, No. 9

By: Shana Zaia

I captured the cities of Tarbau and Yaballu. I carried off 30,000 people, together with their
possessions, their property, their goods, and their gods. I destroyed those cities, together
with cities in their environs, making them like the tells after the Deluge. Assyrian King Ti-
glath-pileser III (745-727 BCE)

When Mesopotamian polities went to war, the successful party gained more than just territory. Trium-
phant kings boast in their inscriptions that they carried off royal family members,
deportees, and precious goods and treasures. Often nested in these lists is a more unusual type of
loot: the gods of the losing king or polity were also moved into the victorious kings homeland. This
particular removal of gods, called godnapping by modern scholars, is
attested over a long period of Mesopotamian history, from the start of the 2nd millennium through the
5th century BCE. But how can a mortal carry off a divine being against its will?

Ancient Near Eastern gods were represented on earth by cult images. Often
anthropomorphic, the images were made from a wooden core with precious metals and stones as
decoration. These statues would have stood in temples, locations that were thought of as the houses
of the gods, and received offerings there. Because of the perishable nature of the core material, none
of the original cult images have survived until today, but there are texts that describe the creation of
these statues and the rituals that imbued them with the divine spirit. Reliefs also depict these divine
images, as seen in an example from the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser IIIs palace reliefs in Nimrud,
which features Assyrian soldiers carrying off an enemys gods. Most of the evidence for godnapping,
however, comes from texts, including royal inscriptions, chronicles, and letters.
 Warka mask from Uruk, made of white Wall Relief from Tiglath-pileser IIIs Palace in Nimrud,
marble for attachment to a wooden Iraq (British Museum 118931)
core and dated approximately 3100 BCE
(Baghdad Museum).

Godnapping is not religious warfare in todays sense; these gods were not removed to promote
other religious systems, nor were conquered areas converted to a new religion. It is extremely rare
that kings recorded the destruction of cult statues, as this seemed to cross broadly accepted
boundaries of what kinds of aggression were permitted against the gods. The descriptions of
godnapping suggest that cult images were treated with respect and were sometimes set up in
temples for safekeeping, even if the gods were considered foreign to the conquering kings pantheon.
There is also evidence that the cults of the abducted gods were not suspended in their homelands
during the statues absence, and alternative symbols could be used until such time as the cult statue
was returned or a new one could be fashioned, both actions that were dependent upon the will of the
gods. The Neo-Babylonian Sun-God Tablet from Sippar, for instance, shows the divine symbol of the
solar disc, which had served as a substitute for the missing cult image in the temple, being lifted away
before the new statue of ama, the sun god and patron of the city.
 Assyrian and Babylonian inscriptions reveal differences
in the conceptualization of godnapping. Assyrian kings
describe this practice in a straightforward way, simply
stating that the gods were taken after a successful
conquest. The names of individual gods are only
mentioned infrequently, as the texts generally identify
the gods on the basis of their city of origin or by the king
to whom they belonged. Notably, the Assyrian royal
inscriptions only record the acts of deportation that they
committed, never mentioning if their own gods were
ever taken by any other polity, a practice that is consis-
tent with the Assyrian tendency to omit any mention of
defeat or misfortune in war.

Babylonian inscriptions, on the other hand, include the

The Sun-God Tablet from Sippar, modern Tell
Abu Habba, Iraq (British Museum 91000)
loss of Babylonian gods, but the forcible nature of god-
napping is retold as the gods leaving their city of their
own volition. The reason given for the gods departure is
anger with the behavior of the inhabitants, and the gods

return only after they are appeased. This rewriting makes the gods responsible for their own depar-
ture, essentially editing godnappers out of the narrative and denying mortals the ability to deport
gods. In turn, this flight is usually the cue for invading forces to come in and wreak havoc on the new-
ly-abandoned city, the next step in the gods punishment of their own cities. Earlier parallels to this
include Sumerian city laments, a literary genre in which a deity leaves his or her patron city, which
subsequently falls into ruin.

As the texts that record godnapping do not explain any specific philosophy or reasoning behind the
act, several theories have been advanced. First and foremost, gods were seen as protectors of the
city in which they lived, and their departure meant that the city was left vulnerable to invasion and
conquest. By removing the cultic statues, conquering kings were symbolically stripping the city of its
divine protection, thus placing the city instead under their new hegemony or facilitating its destruction.
Assyrian royal inscriptions also describe individual enemy kings who face defeat as being abandoned
by their gods.
Some have suggested that godnapping was a tactic of humiliation, emblematic of total defeat, as the
public spectacle of ones own gods being carried away as booty would be devastating both emotion-
ally and psychologically. Another feature of godnapping is that kings would take a conquered citys
gods away so that they could bring them back; like with hostage-taking, deported gods would be
held until negotiations were made or certain behavioral conditions were met. Generally, this strategy
meant that gods would be returned when a polity or its leader swore allegiance to the conquering
king. The return of deported gods is mentioned with some frequency in royal inscriptions and chroni-
cles, described as taking place with great joy and celebration.

Despite the claim in 2 Kings 19: 17-18 that the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their
lands, and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of mens hands,
wood and stone; therefore they have destroyed them, iconoclasm was not the stated motivation for
godnapping. In fact, only two episodes are known in which Assyrian kings admitted to the destruction
of cult images: king Sennacherib describes smashing the Babylonian gods after his conquest and
sack of Babylon, and his grandson Ashurbanipal later records turning the Elamite gods into ghosts.
Both cases are extreme examples perpetrated against major opponents, however, and Sennach-
eribs successor, Esarhaddon, even takes great lengths to undo the theological and political damage
caused by his fathers actions.

In contrast, when ancient Near Eastern divine images are mentioned in the Bible, it is almost exclu-
sively in the context of iconoclasm. Figures such as the prophet Daniel (as in the apocryphal story
Bel and the Dragon) and King Josiah (2 Kings 23: 4-6) advocated for the destruction of cult statues,
criticizing them as mere idols and underscoring their man-made nature. The Assyrians and Babylo-
nians would not have shared this attitude towards the destruction of cult images, particularly the idea
that such iconoclasm could occur without serious divine repercussions.
 Daniel and Cyrus Before the Idol Bel. Rembrandt van Rijn, 1633.

Overall, godnapping was apparently a temporary situation for the victimized gods, who were carried
off intact and stored safely until they were returned to their homes amidst great fanfare. In general,
the ability of gods to leave their earthly dwellings, whether it was considered voluntary or not, ex-
plained how cities could be vulnerable to outside invasion and destruction despite the belief that they
were divinely protected by their patron gods.

Shana Zaia is a Ph.D. candidate in Assyriology at Yale University.

 2
CHAPTER TWO

The So-Called
Jehoash Inscription:
A Post Mortem
 The Ancient Near East Today
February 2016: Vol. IV, No. 2

By: Ed Greenstein
At the turn of 2003 the Israeli press published a front-page
article, announcing the authentification by the Geological
Survey of Israel of what appeared to be a royal inscription
of King Jehoash of Judah (circa 800 BCE). If genuine, the
inscription reports on a refurbishing of the Jerusalem Temple
(the Temple of Solomon) in close conformity with the account
that is presented in 2 Kings 12. If genuine, the inscription
would be proof positive that there actually was a great temple
in Jerusalem in the monarchic period, a fact that has been
challenged in recent scholarship.

But the inscribed stone, roughly the size of a tablet computer,

Jehoash tablet
was not discovered in a controlled archaeological excavation.
Instead, it came to light through an antiquities collector, who claimed it was from the environs of the
Temple Mount in Jerusalem but had no documentation to support that assertion.

A full geological analysis of the stone tablet was published in December 2012, arguing that it and the
lengthy, fifteen-line inscription it bore were genuinely ancient. The authors allowed for the possibility
that the mineral coating of the inscription, its patina, including imbedded gold globules and signs of
burning, could have been produced artificially. Carbon 14 testing showed the tablet to be hundreds of
years later than the period of King Jehoash.
 Closeup showing part of the right side of the central fissure of the tablet (now a full break) cutting through the
engraved letters. The patina covers the letters as well as the fissure.

The geologists, who represent their work to be hard science, and therefore unbiased, disparaged
other scholarly methods of determining authenticityanalysis of the language (philology), spelling
(orthography), and writing (paleography) of the inscription. It is clear why: almost all the competent
studies of the language, spelling, and writing of the inscription, which began appearing in academic
journals and the press, as well as the committee of scholars appointed by the Israel Antiquities Au-
thority to determine the authenticity of the inscription, concluded that the text was inauthenticit was
a forgery.

Well-respected geologists challenged the conclusions of the colleagues who pressed for authentica-
tion. They explained how the patina could have been faked. Moreover, they made another important
point: if the stone tablet were once in the Temple and after some destruction were buried in the ad-
joining soil, there would have been local mineral elements in the patina that are not present.

Recently, Howard R. Feldman, a geologist who worked with the Israeli authenticators, has claimed
that the numerous scholars of ancient Hebrew language, literature, and writing who have determined
the inscription was forged have been motivated by minimalism, the position that virtually all the Is-
raelite history recounted in the Bible is a later fiction unless it can be supported by indisputable evi-
dence. Im afraid that the opposite is the case: the geologists promoting the authenticity of the text are
the ones exhibiting some need to prove it is genuine. The scholars, Israeli and Western, who have
challenged the authenticity of the inscription on the basis of philology and paleography are for the
most part relatively traditional in their historical views and far from the minimalist school. We just dont
care for fakes and fakerythey are the very antithesis of the academic values we hold dear.

I am, among other things, a Semitic philologist. The moment I saw a photograph of the so-called
Jehoash inscription in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz in mid-January 2013 my curiosity was piqued.
Yes, it seemed too good to be true. The text was very clean and legible. I copied the inscription and
studied it. In less than two hours I found several anomaliesspellings and linguistic usages that did
not jibe with what we know of ancient Hebrew writing and language.

Jehoash tablet transcription and transliteration

Convinced the text was forged, and worried that the Israel Museum or some other institution might
pay good money for it, I phoned the paper, and the next day a few of my examples, together with
doubts expressed by a leading Israeli historian of the Biblical period, Nadav Naaman, were reported
in Haaretz, in both the Hebrew and English editions. Subsequently other anomalies were discerned,
well over a dozen. Here are just a few.

In Biblical Hebrew the term bedeq means a crack. Accordingly, in the Biblical account of King
Josiahs temple repairs, the cracks were tightened or reinforced. In later Hebrew the term
bedeq comes to mean repairs, an elliptical (omitting the verb) derivation of the Biblical usage.
The inscription says I made the bedeq, which is the opposite of what was intended. The author
of this text was thinking in later Hebrew, not ancient Hebrew.
 The inscription closes by invoking a divine blessing for the people. This is quite odd. Moreover,
the Hebrew has May YHWH command his people with a blessing. How does one command
someone with a blessing? The proper Biblical expression (see Leviticus 25:21; Deuteronomy
28:8; Psalm 133:3) is to command (or ordain) the blessing to the people. Again, the author of
this text was thinking in modern Hebrew, where the phrase with blessing is widely used.
An expert in ancient scripts, Christopher Rollston, has indicated a subtle anomaly that, to me, is
far stronger than any geological analysis. When West Semitic scribes of the Biblical period would
write the sequence of letters kaph-samekh, as in the word for silver, keseph, the top of the kaph
is always notably higher than that of the samekh. But not in the so-called Jehoash tablet. This
is a forgers mistake. A forger can copy letter forms from charts and trace them from existing
inscriptions. But only a sophisticated scholar will (until now!) pay proper attention to the relative
height of the letters. This is an insight that was not yet in the handbooks.
At least three-quarters of the inscription is composed of (sometimes misread and
misinterpreted) phrases from the Biblean extraordinary number, which gives the impression of
cobbling together, not original writing.

Several months after the publication of the tablet and after several scholars had declared the text a
fake, the State of Israel put the owner, Oded Golan, and other individuals on trial in Jerusalem dis-
trict court, for this fraud and for other infractions. After seven and a half years of periodically hearing
testimony from 130 witnesses, in March 2012, the judge delivered a 500-page opinion explaining the
complexity of the case, in which experts contradicted experts. The judge did not find the Jehoash
inscription to be authentic but felt there was enough doubt to acquit the defendant of the major crimi-
nal charges. In October 2013 the court ordered the Israel Antiquities Authority to return the tablet to its
owner. The tablet was returned the following May.

Oded Golan with the James ossuary

The judge, overwhelmed by the diverse testimony, was inconclusive. However, the judgment of schol-
ars who read ancient texts and analyze their language and writing is clear: no textbook of ancient
Hebrew inscriptions will ever include the so-called Jehoash text; no historian of ancient Israel will ever
count the inscription as a source; no grammarian or lexicographer of ancient Hebrew will ever include
words, phrases, or forms found in the inscription as genuine data.

Forgeries such as this, and there are others, play into the hands of the radical skeptics. Perhaps, they
say, other inscriptions that were not discovered in professional excavations are phony. Perhaps even
some that were are fake. The work of philologists and paleographers is difficult enough without the
complications produced by frauds. It would be great to find more genuine inscriptions from ancient
Israelbut unless they are found in controlled digs, they will be under suspicion until authenticated.

Ed Greenstein is Professor of Biblical Studies and Meiser Chair in Bible at Bar-Ilan

University, Israel.
 3
CHAPTER THREE

New Light on the

Priestly Blessing
from Ancient Judah
 The Ancient Near East Today
August 2016: Vol. IV, No. 8

By: Jeremy D. Smoak

The most meaningful prayers are not simply recited but lived. And some of the best known have sur-
prising backgrounds.

Numbers 6:2227 instructs the sons of Aaron to recite the following blessing to the Israelites:

24May Yahweh bless you and guard you;

25May Yahweh make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you;
26May Yahweh lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.

Since this text associates this blessing with the Israelite priesthood, both Jewish and Christian tradi-
tions refer to it as the priestly blessing. Jewish and Christian literature shows that the blessing came
to hold a central place in the liturgies of both communities over the course of the past two thousand
years. The blessing itself is structured as a rising crescendo. The first line, which requests the Israel-
ite god to bless and keep/guard, consists of three words in the Hebrew, whereas the second and third
lines consist of five and seven words in Hebrew, respectively. Importantly, the last two lines of the
blessing invoke references to Yahwehs face as part of the blessings request for divine favor.

Until recently our knowledge of the background and early function of this blessing outside of the Book
of Numbers was rather limited. This was largely due to the paucity of evidence for the blessing in an-
cient Judah dating to the Iron Age (ca. 1200586 BCE). The discovery of several Iron Age inscriptions
from the regions of Syria and Palestine, however, has begun to shed new light on the early function of
the blessing.
 Gabriel Barkay at Ketef Hinnom Ketef Hinnom

Most notably, in 1979 Gabriel Barkay and Judith Hadley discovered two tiny silver amulets at the mor-
tuary site of Ketef Hinnom just outside of the Old City of Jerusalem. The amulets were made of thin
sheets of silver, which were rolled up like small scrolls and suspended around the neck as jewelry.
When a team of specialists unrolled the amulets, they discovered that each amulet contained several
lines of Hebrew inscriptions on their surfaces. The small size of the amulets required that microscopic
photography to read the inscriptions. When the inscriptions on the amulets were photographed and
read, the team discovered that both contained versions of a blessing with striking similarities to the
priestly blessing of Numbers 6:2426.

Reconstructed burial cave

Ketef Hinnom Amulet 2
For instance, Amulet 1 contains the following inscription:

1 . . .]YHW . . . 3the grea[t . . . who keeps] 4the covenant and 5[G]raciousness toward those
who love [him] and (alt: those who love [hi]m;) 6those who keep [his commandments . . . 7 . . .
]. 8the Eternal [. . .] 9[the?] blessing more than any 10[sna]re and more than Evil. 11For re-
demption is in him. 12For YHWH 13is our restorer [and] 14rock. May YHWH bles[s] 15you and
16[may he] guard you. 17[May] YHWH make 18[his face] shine . . .

In addition to the blessing, the inscriptions on the amulets also contained phrases reminiscent of
several other biblical passages (Deuteronomy 7:9, Nehemiah 1:5, and Daniel 9:4). The discovery of
the blessings on the amulets was significant for several reasons. Most notably, they showed that a
blessing with very close parallels to the priestly blessing functioned in the poorly understood personal
realm as a protective incantation written and worn upon the body. The discovery of the amulets in a
tomb indicates that the blessing may have also been concerned about the status of the dead in the
afterlife.

But the amulets also contain references to the Judean god Yahweh as the Rebuker/Exorciser of Evil
and describe Yahwehs blessing as stronger than Evil/the Evil (One). In this way, the amulets draw
much-needed attention to the subject of the even less understood demonic realm in ancient Judah.
The amulets join thousands of other amulets discovered in Iron Age Israelite and Judean contexts
attesting to a widespread concern over protection against demons, Evil, and other malevolent forces.
This evidence might be used to suggest that a better translation of the first line of the blessing might
be bless and guard rather than bless and keep. What evils and which demons, however, remain
unknown.

The location of the blessings on the amulets invites new questions about the association that the
Book of Numbers draws between the priestly blessing and the Tabernacle. The Book of Numbers
cites the blessing as part of the instructions that Yahweh delivered to Moses at Mount Sinai. The con-
text in which these instructions appear in the book connects the blessing with the duties of the priest-
hood and the Tabernacle. The instructions appear between the law of the Nazarite (6:121) and the
description of the dedicatory offerings given by the tribal leaders of Israel during the dedication of the
altar (7:188). In this way, Numbers connects the priestly blessing to a strikingly different context than
the amulets by associating it with the giving of votive and dedicatory offerings at a temple.
Past studies have argued that the instructions for the blessing in Numbers reflected its use in the lit-
urgy of the First Temple. While there is no reason to doubt this, several inscriptions discovered with-
in other Iron Age temple complexes shed light on the association that Numbers draws between the
priestly blessing and the Tabernacle. One such inscription was discovered at the site of Ekron on the
Philistine inner coastal plain about thirty-five kilometers west of Jerusalem.

Excavators discovered the inscription in a temple complex dating to the seventh century. The in-
scription was written on a block of limestone, which originally had been set in and displayed on the
western wall of the building. The inscription was a royal dedicatory offering that the king of the city of
Ekron had donated to the temple. It contains a standard dedicatory formula, requesting the goddess
of the city to bless the king and his land. But toward the end of the inscription appears the following
blessing formula: May she bless him, and guard him, and prolong his days, and bless his land. This
blessing formula exhibits very close lexical and syntactic similarities to the priestly blessing of Num-
bers 6:2426 and the blessing on the Ketef Hinnom amulets.

Plan of Ekron Temple Ekron inscription

Beyond such similarities, the Ekron inscription is also important because it sheds light on the contexts
in which inscribed blessings functioned in the Iron Age Levant. The inscription at Ekron, like the
blessings on the Ketef Hinnom amulets, draws attention to the importance of the written-ness, that
is, the tangibility, of the blessing in the Book of Numbers. In other words, the fact that the blessing
inscription at Ekron was displayed in a temple complex might suggest that the writing of the priestly
blessing in Numbers 6:2426 was an appropriation and adaptation of the practice of inscribing bless-
ings in temple space. That is, the appearance of the blessing in Numbers not only reflected its func-
tion as an oral formula, but also the significance of its written-ness or textuality in temple spaces in
the Iron Age.
The placement of the blessing in the text of Numbers may thus be seen as a re-locating of the ritual
function of blessings from temple to text. By associating the priestly blessing with the tabernacle and
the description of Israelites bringing dedicatory and votive offerings to the altar, the text of Numbers
reflected the physical connection that existed between temple dedications and inscribed blessings in
Iron Age temples. In this way, the citation of the blessing in the text of Numbers also paved the way
for the continued use of the blessing in later Jewish and Christian liturgy and practice.

Jeremy D. Smoak is Lecturer, Hebrew Bible and Ancient Near East at the University of Califor-
nia, Los Angeles. He is the author of The Priestly Blessing in Inscription and Scripture, The
Early History of Numbers 6:24-26 (2015).
 4
CHAPTER FOUR

The Role of Biblical

Archaeology in Exegesis:
An interview with Professor
Israel Finkelstein
 The Ancient Near East Today
April 2016: Vol. IV, No. 4

By: Louis C. de Figueiredo

If the historical faith of Israel is not founded in history, such a faith is erroneous, and therefore, our
faith is also. So wrote Father Roland de Vaux, the French Dominican archaeologist who excavated
Qumran and the first editor-in-chief of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Many, but not all, excavations demonstrate that text and spade point in different directions. If, there-
fore, archaeology is allowed to tell its own story some parts of biblical history will require rethinking. It
does not signify the end of faith. It can only mean that mature faith will be needed.

This is the approach of Professor Israel Finkelstein, of Tel Aviv University, prominent Israeli archaeolo-
gist, and co-author of The Bible Unearthed: Archeologys New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origins
of its Sacred Texts.

Israel Finkelstein The Bible Unearthed: Archaeologys New Vision of

Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts
Following are excerpts of an interview with him:

You have said that radiocarbon dates of organic material found in excavations will give a ver-
dict on archaeology. Do you rely mostly on carbon dating?

My chronology relies mostly on radiocarbon dating because it is the only method which provides an
external system independent of textual materials, the historicity of which may be debated.

You are also on record saying that we have to sort history from non-history. It is also true that
every text is biased, as you also stated. So is it archaeology that can help decide what is his-
torically accurate and what is non-history, making a clear distinction between fact and myth?

For the proto-historical period, history is constructed solely through archaeology. For historical peri-
ods, archaeology can help in a significant way, but I dont think it can give a final verdict. Archaeology
also has its problems, including methodological issues. So, if we take biblical history as an example
archaeology can help tremendously because, unlike the texts, which in certain cases describe events
that ostensibly took place centuries before the actual compilation, it provides real-time evidence.

What made the Israelites emerge as a distinct group in Canaan? Was it monotheism?

No, because monotheism came later. We cannot speak about monotheism even in the year 586 BCE,
the time of the destruction of Jerusalem. The religion of Judah at that time can be described as mono-
latrism, which means that there was a deity who was more important than the others, so the exis-
tence of other deities was not denied. Monotheism, in the way we understand it, is the product of the
Persian, and more so, the Hellenistic, period.

But the New Testament tells us that even during the time of Jesus, people were worshipping
other gods. He accused some Israelites of worshipping Baal.

I think monotheism came relatively late. In the beginning the Israelites were part of the mosaic of peo-
ple in the Levant, with their demographic and cultural roots in ancient Canaan. Then, gradually, they
began to develop differently, because of territorial and political reasons. This includes religion and
cult. I suppose that we can speak about full-fledged monotheism in the Hasmonean era.
You have written that the only disadvantage of the Low Chronology at least for some is
that it pulls the carpet from under the biblical image of a great Solomonic United Monarchy
and puts the spotlight on the Northern Kingdom of the Omride Dynasty as the first real pros-
perous state of early Israel. Here is the dilemma: How can one diminish the structure of the
good guys and let the bad guys prevail?

Was Omri the bad guy because he is said to have promoted Baal worship, referred to in 1
Kings: 23-25 as the worthless idols? Verses 11-7 of the same book also tell us that Solo-
mon built a high place for the Chemosh the detestable idol of Moab, on the mountain which is
east of Jerusalem, and for Molech the detestable idol of the sons of Ammon. According to the
Bible, both Solomon and Omri did evil. To take the point further, studies have demonstrated
that Solomons Temple was built after the model of the Syro-Hittite Ain Dara temple, dated to
1300 BC, and dedicated to Ishtar or Baal.

You are right. People read the biblical text selectively, without paying attention to the many layers
found in it. David had many faults and Solomon led a sinful lifestyle, according to chapter 11 of 1
Kings. Yet, they ruled over a sort of Golden Age, an age of territorial expansion and economic and
cultural prosperity. This includes the construction of the Temple. Omri and Ahab are described as
villains, and they were kings of the Northern Kingdom, despised and rejected by the author of Kings.
Hence it was easier for many to affiliate with the founders of the Davidic Dynasty, ignore the an-
ti-North sentiment in the text and fail to see the Northern Kingdom as described by contemporary
monarchs one of the two most important powers in the Levant of their time.

The Merneptah Stele was the most important find of Sir William
Matthew Flinders Petrie, and that was in 1896, and it continues
to be very important, in fact it is a bone of contention in biblical
archaeology till today. The stele provides little information about
the Israel it refers to. What is your point of view?

The Merneptah Stele refers to a group of people named Israel, who

lived in Canaan in the very late 13th century, that is, close to the year
1200 BCE. Yet, it does not provide us with real information about the
size of this group and its location. Some scholars have placed it in
Transjordan and others have located it in the highlands west of the
Jordan. The big question is how this group developed later and gave its name to the kingdom of Isra-
el, meaning the Northern Kingdom, which emerged in the late 10th century, that is, ca. 250 years after
the Merneptah campaign. With no relevant texts for the two and half centuries between Merneptahs
campaign and the rise of the Northern Kingdom, this can be answered only by archaeology, in the
sense that the Merneptah Israel should be sought among the groups that settled in the highlands
west and east of the Jordan starting in the late 13th century. These groups later created the territorial
kingdoms of the Iron Age, among them Israel.

What can you now say about Khirbet Qeiyafa, another archaeological site that has raised
controversy? Together with Dr. Alexander Fantalkin you had correctly pointed out that a
finding can reverse the course of research and save the literal reading of the biblical text from
critical scrutiny, an approach that was then traced to Professor William F. Albrights assault on
Wellhausens documentary hypothesis.

Yes, conservative interpretation of the finds at Khirbet Qeiyafa is a revival of Albrights approach,
according to which archaeology can prove critical research to be wrong and support a literal reading
of the biblical text. Khirbet Qeifaya is a highly interesting site, and unique in many ways. But many
interpretations of the finds are possible. The layout of the site indicates a highland origin of the inhab-
itants, however it does not necessarily point to the expansion of early Judah to the Shephelah. Many
of the finds hint at a north highlands link to the site. In other words, I think that the finds there shed
light on early, 10th century BCE north Israelite territorial formation, rather than Judah in the days of
the formation of the Davidic Dynasty.

Why has so much importance been

given to the ostracon found at the site
when ostraca cannot be compared to
monumental inscriptions and papyri?
Another problem is that the text is
incomplete and there are no
preceding or succeeding verses. Father
mile Puech, the co-editor-in-chief of
the Dead Sea Scrolls, who is also an
expert in some ancient Near Eastern
languages, not only published his
Professors Yossi Garfinkel and William Dever at Khirbet
Qeiyafa, 2011. Photo by Alex Joffe
translation in the journal Revue Biblique but also interpreted the verses as referring to the
establishment of an Israelite monarchy. Both of you are world-class experts in your respective
fields, he in epigraphy, you in archaeology. What can you say as an archaeologist?

The majority of scholars cannot read a clear text in this inscription, and I am one of them. As far as
I can judge, this inscription should be evaluated as one of a group of Proto-Canaanite inscriptions
known from the Shepelah and the southern coastal plain of that time.

Find part 2 of this interview on the ASOR Blog by following this link.

Louis C. de Figueiredo is a journalist, reviewer, and researcher on the Bible and theology.
 5
CHAPTER FIVE

Does the Bible Claim

That the Sun and Moon
Stopped in Their Tracks?
 The Ancient Near East Today
May 2016: Vol. IV, No. 5

By: Mark Chavalas

The sun and moon have been in the news lately; Pastor John Hagee has claimed that recent blood
moons (a popular phrase for a total lunar eclipse) have biblical significance of cataclysmic proportions
concerning modern day Israel. A discussion of what the Bible actually says of the movement of heav-
enly bodies is therefore in order.

The passage in Joshua 10:12-15 ap-

pears to claim that the sun stopped
in Gibeon, and the moon in the valley
of Aijalon. Ancient Jewish and Chris-
tian scholars interpreted it literally;
they also argued that the purpose of
the miracle was to allow the Israelites
more daytime to defeat their enemies.
If taken literally, one would think this
miracle would have significant cosmic
consequences, to say the least! How-
ever, one must first interpret the Bible
in its ancient context.

According to Joshua 10, the Israelite

leader, Joshua, made a mad dash
Blood moon.
to get to Gibeon to protect that town
against a coalition of Amorite kings. Like any good military leader in antiquity, Joshua inquired of God
about his chances in battle; God guaranteed victory, which was all Joshua needed to know.
 Joseph-Marie Vien, Joshua Commanding the Sun to John, Martin, Joshua Commanding the Sun to
Stand Still, 1742-1743 Stand Still upon Gibeon, 1816

The lyric poetry of Joshua 10:12 states that the sun halted in Gibeon, and the moon in Aijalon. This
signifies that the sun was in the east, and the moon in the west, meaning it was morning, not evening.
Thus, Joshua was certainly not asking for more sunlight (after all, the day had just begun). Further-
more, the event was considered unique, not because of any astronomical abnormalities, but because
God listened to the voice of a man and fought for Israel (v. 14).

So, what on earth was Joshua asking for? Though I am not an astronomy geek, I am a Mesopotamia
geek. The phraseology in Joshua 10:12-13 sounds suspiciously like the vocabulary used in Mesopo-
tamian celestial omen texts (something first observed by John Walton of Wheaton College). In fact,
it is clear that the relative position of the sun and moon played a role in determining military move-
ments. Kings consulted omen priests who told them whether a particular solar/lunar juxtaposition was
propitious for victory.
For example, one Neo-Assyrian omen from Nineveh states, When the
moon and sun are seen with one another on the 14th {14th day since
the last full moon}, the land will be satisfied. This was a good omen.
However, another Neo-Assyrian tablet notes that when the moon and
sun are seen with each other on the 15th day, a powerful enemy will
raise his weapons against the land, clearly a bad omen.

Many of the technical phrases in these omens concern the stop-

Neo-Assyrian omen tablet from
Nineveh, British Museum, K 00795.
ping and waiting of the heavenly bodies. From the standpoint of the
viewer on earth, the sun and moon stopped and waited for each other
(that is, they were seen together, a bad omen for the 15th day after a
full moon).
The phraseology is not unlike Matthew 2:9,
which states that the Christmas Star stood
over Bethlehem (this makes sense from the
standpoint of the traveler, of course).

Celestial omen observation was not just

prevalent in Mesopotamia but northwest in
Syria at the sites of Ugarit, Mari, and Emar
(all in regions with significant Amorite con-
nections). The Biblical text and Joshuas
poetic statement about Gods favoring Israel
with the motion of the sun and the moon
were part of a broader ancient Near East-
ern tradition of asking for divine help on the
battlefield.

Neo-Assyrian omen tablet from Nineveh,

But this context also helps answer an easily British Museum, Rm 200
anticipated question: why would a follower of
the God of Israel ask for an omen, a practice that was considered divination and regarded as a capital
crime? The answer is that the Bible recasts the omen. Joshua was not asking for a celestial phenom-
enon for himself, or even for Israel, but probably for the enemy; he must have known what it meant
for them to have the sun and moon aligned on the 15th day, presumably the day of battle. If they
received a bad omen, it would have significantly lowered their expectations of victory, to say the least!

Jews and Christians believe that God can do whatever He pleases, including violating natural laws
(e.g., causing the sun and moon to stop in their tracks). But one does not have to manufacture a mir-
acle where the biblical text does not call for it. To be correctly understood, the Bible must be read in
its historical and literary context; only then can we mortals respond in awe.

Mark W. Chavalas is Professor of History at University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse.

ARTICLES CURATED AND EDITED BY
ALEX JOFFE
@DrAlexJoffe theancientneareasttoday@gmail.com

Alex Joffe is the editor of the Ancient Near East

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ranging from the state of biblical archaeology to
archaeology after the Arab Spring.

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