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8-year-old Israeli boy stumbles across ancient relic
Israel 21c ^ | December 1, 2015

Posted on 12/01/2015 2:55:39 AM PST by beaversmom

Essential Question: How should one be rewarded for doing the right thing?

The worldwide press is calling him “the young Indiana Jones," but eight-year-old Itai Halperin of the central Israeli town of Pardesiya* was not intentionally digging for relics when he came across the ancient head of a fertility goddess figurine. He was simply out for a November nature walk with his family near Tel Beit Shemesh*.

Because Itai did the right thing and turned over his find to archaeologist Alexander Glick of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), he and his class will now have the privilege of participating in a real dig and touring the IAA archive. He also got a certificate of honor for good citizenship.

Itai told Glick that he had recently watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, the first in the Indiana Jones film series about a swashbuckling archeologist seeking ancient Israelite treasures, and that he hopes to be an archeologist when he grows up.

Alon de Groot, an IAA expert on the Iron Age, identified the find and dated it to the Iron Age, roughly corresponding to the First Temple period in ancient Israel, from the 10th to sixth centuries BCE.

"Figurines of this kind, depicting naked women symbolizing fertility, were common in the homes of residents of the kingdom of Judah from the eighth century BCE until the destruction of the kingdom by the Babylonians in the days of Zedekiah (586 BCE)," he said.

The ceramic statuette head helps the IAA determine the borders of the area controlled by the kingdom of Judah, de Groot added.

During the Iron Age, Tel Beit Shemesh was a large thriving Judean city and a major industrial center, said IAA archeologist Anna Eirich. It was attacked by the Assyrian army in 701 BCE and was later destroyed by the Babylonians the same year they demolished the First Temple in Jerusalem about 20 kilometers to the east.

Tel Beit Shemesh has been excavated extensively, starting in 1911. From 1990 to 2000, excavations were held every summer by a team from Tel Aviv University headed by archeologists Zvi Lederman and Prof. Shlomo Bunimovitz. But the fertility goddess head was overlooked until this November, when young Itai found it poking out from the ground in front of his feet.

*Pardesiya - is a small town close to Netanya.

*Tel Beit Shemesh - was an important Biblical city during the Israelite and Caananite periods. You can learn more about this important site here.


TOPICS: History
KEYWORDS: godsgravesglyphs; israel; jerusalem; letshavejerusalem; netanya; pardesiya; telbeitshemesh
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To: beaversmom

Didn’t this happen in the movie The Omen? I hoped they found the steely knives too.


21 posted on 12/01/2015 5:03:00 AM PST by King Moonracer (Bad lighting and cheap fabric, that's how you sell clothing.....)
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To: Balding_Eagle

A problem is that the reference to BC and AD are built on the false history that the Messiah was born in year 1. It can be conclusively established that He was born no later than 4 BC(E).

And, isn’t EVERY year His year anyway (i.e. AD)?


22 posted on 12/01/2015 5:03:18 AM PST by Tzfat
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To: GreenHornet

The common dating method for Jews is ‘since creation’ - the BCE used here is for a common dating system, since historians know that Jesus was not born in year 1.


23 posted on 12/01/2015 5:06:55 AM PST by Tzfat
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To: knarf

BC and AD replaced “The Year of our Lord”, so you were already using the scaled down more secular version.


24 posted on 12/01/2015 5:11:34 AM PST by TexasFreeper2009 (You can't spell Hillary without using the letters L, I, A, & R)
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To: GreenHornet
I think the secular progressives started using "BCE" to replace "BC" a number of years ago, with the acronym meaning "Before Common Era."

Truly a progressive idea, no real meaning. Common to what?

25 posted on 12/01/2015 5:15:41 AM PST by LoneRangerMassachusetts (behind enemy lines)
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To: Flag_This

I smiled at the irony of the statement. “Until” God used people from modern day Iraq to punish the nation for idolatry and child sacrifice. For those of you reading...God then judged them and their city no longer exists.


26 posted on 12/01/2015 5:17:24 AM PST by huldah1776
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To: TexasFreeper2009
I think BC and AD preceded ITYOOL, and the words were adopted to give providential authority to documents

My 1948 birth certificate says "In The Year Of Our Lord"

But it no longer matters ... WE are the watchmen on the tower ... just as we have bullied them into calming down about the "Happy Holidays" BS ... we are the ones to teach our children ... otherwise, all THEY have to do is wait a few more years to spring it on a dumbed down populace

27 posted on 12/01/2015 5:47:44 AM PST by knarf (I say things that are true .... I have no proof ... but they're true.)
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To: Balding_Eagle

This is a quote from someone in the Isreal Antiquities Authority. I would guess that he is Jewish, so as far as he is concerned, we are still in the time Before Christ.


28 posted on 12/01/2015 5:53:06 AM PST by oincobx
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To: beaversmom
For those of you who might be interested in history and archaeology in Israel, James Mitchener wrote a wonderful novel called "The Source." Quoting a book review.....
"The historical events in The Source are put into contemporary perspective by a frame story that is set in 1964. In the frame story, a team of three archaeologists is excavating a Tell, or mound, at the site of the fictional crossroads of the ancient world called Makor, or the Source, because of its spring. The narratives correspond with the unearthing of each successive level of human habitation, beginning with the earliest level. At the end of each chapter, in a flash forward, the archaeologists evaluate the finds that correspond to the events that have previously been related.

The chapter titled "The Bee Eater" begins in 9831 b.c.e. and introduces Ur, the progenitor of the Family of Ur that appears in the following four chapters. Ur is primarily a hunter, but his son's experiments with planting presage a new way of life for Ur's descendants. When his son-in-law is killed by a wild boar, Ur begins probing the mysteries of life and death by asking himself questions such as "Why do I live?" By the year 2202 b.c.e., the people of Makor have attempted to answer those questions by creating gods, in "Of Death and Life." When the time comes for Urbaal to sacrifice his first-born son to the Canaanite god of Death, he does so willingly in spite of the protests of his wife.

Next the story introduces the Haibiru, who are the forerunners of the Hebrews. After arriving in Makor, the Haibiru diplomatically respect the local gods but cling to the belief that El Shaddai is the most powerful god.

The third historical chapter, takes place during the reign of David. By this time, El Shaddai has been replaced by Yaweh, who controls the heavens and the hearts of humanity.

And so the story goes all the way up to modern times. It's a very interesting read!
29 posted on 12/01/2015 5:58:42 AM PST by Apple Pan Dowdy (... as American as Apple Pie)
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To: csvset
Not to belittle the boy's find, but it's always a fertility goddess , isn't it ?

Heh, I wondered as well.

"Figurines of this kind, depicting naked women symbolizing fertility,

It's just the head! Who knows what the rest was wearing or not!

30 posted on 12/01/2015 6:03:03 AM PST by Moltke
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To: Fresh Wind

To be fair, Indiana Jones is pretty close to what a “real” archaeologist was for the time his movies are set in, car chases, mook fights, and booby traps notwithstanding.


31 posted on 12/01/2015 6:04:08 AM PST by Little Pig
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To: GreenHornet
I think the secular progressives started using "BCE" to replace "BC" a number of years ago, with the acronym meaning "Before Common Era."

I had to deal with it from a "Religion" professor in college back in the mid-1990s. I did ask the question "and what is it, exactly, that before common era, and common era (the new term for AD) centered on?" He didn't much care for that.

32 posted on 12/01/2015 6:12:32 AM PST by IYAS9YAS (I got nothin'.)
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To: beaversmom

So to recap recent events. Israeli youth finds ancient artifact, turns it over to authorities for preservation and study. Meanwhile ISIS/Muslim youth are busy blowing up or otherwise destroying even larger and more significant artifacts across Iraq and Syria. Check.


33 posted on 12/01/2015 6:50:06 AM PST by ThunderSleeps (Stop obarma now! Stop the hussein - insane agenda!)
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To: Little Pig

In other words, they were grave robbers.

Maybe they still are.


34 posted on 12/01/2015 6:56:34 AM PST by Fresh Wind (Falcon 105)
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To: Tzfat
The New Testament evidence is insufficient to allow us to determine for sure the year that Jesus was born.

Anyone who deals with Greek history has to deal with backwards counting. It would have been easier if Jerome or someone had selected some earlier date like the birth of Abraham or the Flood and counted forward from that. Plus if you want to calculate the interval since a date B.C. you have to remember there was no year zero--so the 2500th anniversary of the battle of Marathon was 2011, not 2010.

People who don't like "B.C." because it means "Before Christ" could just read it as "Backwards Counting." Then "A.D." becomes "After Dat."

35 posted on 12/01/2015 7:24:09 AM PST by Verginius Rufus
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To: Verginius Rufus

People who don’t like CE could just think of it as “Christian Era.”

We have s a legitimate concern about bias against religious dating in the secular world. However, BCE, and CE also have a valid basis in that BC and AD refer to an event that did not take place at year 1.

Here is my proposal for those who are stuck in BC/AD: change the current date to match. Since Jesus was born most likely in 4 BCE, subtract 5 years from the current Gregorian year: If this was 2010 AD, it actually would be accurate. Since it is 2015, it is not accurate to say “AD” after it.


36 posted on 12/01/2015 7:43:53 AM PST by Tzfat
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To: Apple Pan Dowdy

A book we were required to read in high school in the 70s.


37 posted on 12/01/2015 11:02:22 AM PST by dmz
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To: Tzfat
Possibly Jesus was born in 4 B.C., but it isn't certain.

The Roman consuls for the year 1 (A.D.) were Gaius Caesar (grandson and adopted son of Augustus--not the future emperor Gaius) and Lucius Aemilius Paullus. So the Christian era could be called the Caesaro-Paulline era after their names. Neither man was all that important (Augustus's grandson died as a young man) but the Roman political traditions derived from the Caesars and the Christian ideas found in the writings of St. Paul have been extremely influential over the centuries, so we could ignore the fact that "Caesaro-Paulline" actually referred to other individuals.

The current era could be abbreviated CPE and the years before A.D. 1 would be "years before the consulate of Caesar and Paullus" (annos ante consulatum Caesaris Paullique) or ACCP.

38 posted on 12/01/2015 11:09:34 AM PST by Verginius Rufus
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To: Tzfat
Possibly Jesus was born in 4 B.C., but it isn't certain.

The Roman consuls for the year 1 (A.D.) were Gaius Caesar (grandson and adopted son of Augustus--not the future emperor Gaius) and Lucius Aemilius Paullus. So the Christian era could be called the Caesaro-Paulline era after their names. Neither man was all that important (Augustus's grandson died as a young man) but the Roman political traditions derived from the Caesars and the Christian ideas found in the writings of St. Paul have been extremely influential over the centuries, so we could ignore the fact that "Caesaro-Paulline" actually referred to other individuals.

The current era could be abbreviated CPE and the years before A.D. 1 would be "years before the consulate of Caesar and Paullus" (annos ante consulatum Caesaris Paullique) or ACCP.

39 posted on 12/01/2015 11:09:35 AM PST by Verginius Rufus
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To: Pollster1; StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; decimon; 1010RD; 21twelve; 24Karet; ...
Thanks Pollster1.

40 posted on 12/01/2015 11:43:41 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Here's to the day the forensics people scrape what's left of Putin off the ceiling of his limo.)
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