Posted on 12/17/2014 10:07:42 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Six official clay seals found by an archaeological team at a small site in Israel offer evidence that supports the existence of biblical kings David and Solomon. Many modern scholars dismiss David and Solomon as mythological figures and believe no kingdom could have existed in the region at the time the Bible recounted their activities. The new finds provide evidence that some type of government activity was conducted there in that period.
A Mississippi State University team found this bulla, or ancient clay seal, on a dig site in southern Israel last summer. It offers evidence of government activity in the 10th century B.C., a time when many scholars said a kingdom could not exist in the region.
Six official clay seals found by a Mississippi State University archaeological team at a small site in Israel offer evidence that supports the existence of biblical kings David and Solomon.
Many modern scholars dismiss David and Solomon as mythological figures and believe no kingdom could have existed in the region at the time the Bible recounted their activities. The new finds provide evidence that some type of government activity was conducted there in that period.
Jimmy Hardin, associate professor in the MSU Department of Anthropology and Middle Eastern Cultures, said these clay bullae were used to seal official correspondence in much the same way wax seals were used on official documents in later periods.
Hardin, co-director of the Hesi Regional Project, has been excavating each summer at Khirbet Summeily, a site east of Gaza in southern Israel, since 2011. Hardin's findings were published in the December 2014 issue of Near Eastern Archaeology.
"Our preliminary results indicated that this site is integrated into a political entity that is typified by elite activities, suggesting that a state was already being formed....
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...
With so much of the historical artifacts of this ancient land destroyed by centuries of warfare by competing kindoms and empires, the lack of concrete evidence of small desert “kingdoms” isn’t surprising.
After all, archeologists are still finding new evidence of massive building projects in Egypt, Anatolia, ancient Persia, etc. While the Bible is of considerable significance in a religious context, the stories of the Kings and heroes of the Jews has to be seen in the light that these folks weren’t really one of the super-powers of the region.
They thought they were important and wrote down thier history—but it was sorta like the modern state of Honduras making a claim to super power status. They were fresh off the Exodus and were shepherds and nomads first and later small farmers. They knew the drill, eg. you had to have kings and princes and some kind of government over warring and competing tribes because they could look around the region and see how it was done.
The miraculous part is that they kept the faith and kept their records over centuries in constant use. Contrast that with the Hittite scrolls, the cuneiform tablets of the Tigris Euphrates region or the lost language of the Egyptian hieroglyphics up to the fortuitous discovery of the Rosetta Stone.
ping
FYI, ping!
They’ve heard of it, but their pride is such that they don’t believe they can trip or stumble, let alone fall.
It is always exciting when some artifact is found that supports the Bible in any way.
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