New reading of Mesha Stele could have far-reaching consequences for biblical history

Photography of Mesha Stele. Credit: Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository

The biblical King Balak may have been a historical figure, according to a new reading of the Mesha Stele, an inscribed stone dating from the second half of the 9th century BCE.

A name in Line 31 of the stele, previously thought to read 'House of David', could instead read 'Balak', a king of Moab mentioned in the biblical story of Balaam (Numbers 22-24), say archaeologist Prof. Israel Finkelstein and historians and biblical scholars Prof. Nadav Na'aman and Prof. Thomas Römer, in an article published in Tel Aviv: The Journal of the Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University.

The Mesha Stele was found in the 19th century in the ruins of the biblical town of Dibon in Moab (present day Jordan), and is now in the Louvre. The stone's inscription tells the story of the territorial expansion and construction endeavours of King Mesha of Moab, who is mentioned in the Bible. The stele was cracked in the 19th century and parts of it are missing, but portions of the missing parts are preserved in a reverse copy of the inscription, known as a 'squeeze', made before the stele cracked.

The authors studied new high-resolution photographs of the squeeze, and of the stele itself. These new images made it clear that there are three consonants in the name of the monarch mentioned in Line 31, and that the first is the Hebrew letter beth (a 'b' sound).

While the other letters are eroded, the most likely candidate for the monarch's name is 'Balak', the authors say. The seat of the king referred to in Line 31 was at Horonaim, a place mentioned four times in the Bible in relation to the Moabite territory south of the Arnon River. "Thus, Balak may be a historical personality like Balaam, who, before the discovery of the Deir Alla inscription, was considered to be an 'invented' figure," they suggest.

"The new photographs of the Mesha Stele and the squeeze indicate that the reading, 'House of David' - accepted by many scholars for more than two decades—is no longer an option," the authors conclude. "With due caution we suggest the name of the Moabite king Balak, who, according to the Balaam story of Numbers 22-24, sought to bring a divine curse on the people of Israel.

"This story was written down later than the time of the Moabite king referred to in the Mesha Stele. Yet, to give a sense of authenticity to his story, its author must have integrated into the plot certain elements borrowed from the ancient reality, including two personal names: Balaam and Balak."

A comparison of the Hebrew signs of the Samaritan ostraca with the Hebrew characters of the Mesha stele shows a definite change in the writing of single letters. The same characteristics found in the Samaritan letters reappear in the Shiloah inscription of King Hezekiah, dating from close to -700. "How to explain that the characters of the ostraca, a quarter of a century older than the stele of Mesha, are more directly related to the later characters of the Shiloah inscription?"(6) This compelled the researchers to advance the hypothesis that the Hebrew letters passed through a retrograde stage of development before resuming their progress, or that in Moab the development was slower than in Samaria.

In subsequent excavations at Samaria ivories with Hebrew letters were unearthed. These letters were found to be of the same type as those on the stele of Mesha and to have therefore originated in the ninth century. They are of a more archaic type than the characters of the ostraca of Samaria.

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Abibaal, another king of Byblos, ordered a statue of Shoshenk Hedjkheperre to be carved and inscribed in his name;(7) for this reason Abibaal was placed in the tenth century as a contemporary of that king. Placing Elibaal and Abibaal in the tenth and and early ninth centuries respectively created problems for epigraphists concerned with the history of the Hebrew script. The inscriptions on the sculptures are in Hebrew characters, and were the subject of much discussion in connection with the development of the Hebrew alphabet. The epigraphists, who must take directives from the archaeologists, tried to reconcile the dates derived from these inscriptions with the characters on the stele of Mesha, the king of Moab, who in the middle of the ninth century revolted against Ahab, king of Israel, and with the ivories from Samaria belonging to the same period -- and were rather puzzled. The inscriptions of Elibaal and Abibaal are written in a script that appears to bear the closest resemblance to the eighth-century ostraka from Samaria; yet the conventional historians have them precede the stele of Mesha. Evidently, the order of the Libyan kings on the throne of Egypt is not properly put together, and Elibaal and Abibaal belong to the eighth century, just as do Osorkon I and Shoshenk Hedjkheperre, their contemporaries in Egypt.

The Assyrian Conquest: The Libyans in Egypt | Immanuel Velikovsky

The rebellion of Mesha, a vassal king of Moab, against Ahab, the king of Samaria, and the intrusion of desert tribes from across the Jordan toward Jerusalem in the days of Jehoshaphat resulted from this disruptive policy, with the king of Damascus changing more than once his political orientation.

The Assyrian Conquest: Revolutions in Egypt and Israel | Immanuel Velikovsky

...because of certain characteristics in their form, the earliest Cadmeian letters bear the best resemblance to the Hebrew-Phoenician letters of the ninth century -- as exemplified by the Mesha stele.

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92. As the alphabetic writing of Hebrew in cuneiform of Ras Shamra is contemporaneous with the stela of Mesha written in Hebrew alphabetic characters, the alphabet most probably did not originate in Phoenicia but in Palestine.
115. Mesha, King of Moab, is often mentioned in the Letters by his name (Mesh). The omission of the name of the rebel king by the translators of the Letters is not warranted.
124. Ahab was faithful to the Egyptian protectorate. Ben Hadad, supported by Shalmanassar, inspired Mesha to revolt.
130. The insurrection of Mesha took place during the life-time of Ahab, after the defeat at Ramoth in Gilead.
131. The K-r-k-h (the capital) of the Mesha Stela means Samaria. The Moabites succeeded in entering Samaria. The Ophel of K-r-k-h is the Ophel of Samaria. The fall of Samaria signified the "everlasting humiliation" and the "great indignation" in the Scriptures and the Stela.
132. By "cuttings" of K-r-k-h, the ivory work of the palace of Samaria is meant.

Theses for the Reconstruction of Ancient History | Immanuel Velikovsky | 1945

“I still don’t understand the far reaching consequences of this. What am I missing?”

I’m guessing that some Palestian group will claim to be Moabites, and want their land back from Isrial!

Yeah - I don’t know. Other than to support the idea that the names in the Bible aren’t just mythical. For a long time the idea of a King David being the ruler of a large and rich kingdom in this part of the world was regarded as impossible for that day and age (not enough resources, people, etc.) But then they find archaelogical evidence that their were large cities, etc.

I always thought the oral tradition was also room for error. I think there is a difference between oral tradition, and oral transmission.

When a culture only has words (and stories) to keep their facts and their history, they developed ways to keep the facts intact. With the Hebrews they (the Rabbis I suppose, but probably in families as well) would tell the story, until someone called them on a mistake. Then that person would continue the story until they made a mistake.

So it isn’t like telephone where just one person knows the phrase. Lots of people knew the “phrase”, and no doubt there was competition to be the top dog in story-telling, with everyone working hard to get the facts straight.

I suppose some folks had special areas of expertise.

“Okay, okay - I’ll sit down!! You know I always get a little confused after we crossed the Red Sea!”

Because of the tribute Shoshenk received from Hoshea, king of Samaria, the Ten Tribes of Israel were doomed to lose their homeland. Shalmaneser V besieged Samaria, but Shoshenk did not send any military expedition to relieve the siege of Samaria by the Assyrians: there is no mention of it in the books of Kings or Chronicles, nor in the extant Egyptian documents... In the decades that followed the Scythians descended from the steppes of Russia and moved along the Caspican coast. The Scythians at that time worshipped Mars, and a sword as his sign, for a while leaving their ancient worship of Saturn in abeyance -- they were called Umman-Manda, or People of Saturn, in the Akkadian and so-called "Hittite" literary texts. The Scythians in their migration displaced the nomadic Cimmerians, pushing them towards the south and west. The Assyrian defenses withstood the Cimmerian onslaught, but at a heavy cost, which included the death of Sargon in battle in -702.

The Assyrian Conquest: The End of Samaria | Immanuel Velikovsky

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