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The Birth & Death of Biblical Minimalism
Biblical Archaeology Review ^ | BAR 37:03, May/Jun 2011 | Yosef Garfinkel

Posted on 05/09/2011 7:18:22 PM PDT by SunkenCiv

Hardly had the minimalist argument been developed than it was profoundly undermined by an archaeological discovery. In 1993 and 1994, several fragments of an Aramaic stela were found at the long-running excavation of Tel Dan led by Avraham Biran of Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem. The historical references in the inscription and the paleography of the writing make it clear that it dates to the ninth century B.C.E. Moreover, the text specifically mentions a king of Israel and a king of the "House of David" (Hebrew, bytdwd ), that is, a king of the dynasty of David.

This discovery led to a reexamination of the well-known Mesha Stela, a contemporaneous Moabite inscription discovered more than a century ago. André Lemaire, a senior paleographer at the Sorbonne, identified in that text an additional reference to the House of David.b This was subsequently confirmed by another senior paleographer, Émile Puech of the École Biblique et Archéologique Française in Jerusalem.

Thus, there is at least one, and possibly two, clear references to the dynasty of David in the ninth century B.C.E., only 100-120 years after his reign. This is clear evidence that David was indeed a historical figure and the founding father of a dynasty.

This led to the collapse of the minimalist paradigm in which David was little more than a myth. There was a David. He was a king. And he founded a dynasty.

The minimalists reacted in panic, leading to a number of suggestions that now seem ridiculous...

(Excerpt) Read more at bib-arch.org ...


TOPICS: History; Religion; Science; Travel
KEYWORDS: archaeology; bible; biblical; catastrophism; david; godsgravesglyphs; kingdavid; meshastela; minimalism; minimalist; teldan; telhatzor; velikovsky
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Did Joshua Destroy Canaanite Hatzor?
by Clarence H. Wagner, Jr.
September 1997

original, dead link
Hatzor is the largest archaeological tel in Israel. The discovery of several cuneiform tablets at the 800-dunam (200-acre) site over the years points to the likelihood that Hatzor will produce the first ancient archive, other than the Dead Sea Scrolls, ever to be found in the country... Ben-Tor... hoped there might be two archives -- one in each of the two palaces identified on the acropolis atop the tel. The late Prof. Yigael Yadin had been the first to identify a palace during his landmark dig at Hatzor in the 1950s, dating it to the 18th century BC or Middle Bronze (MB) period. That fitted perfectly with the date of the royal archive in Mari, Syria, in which cuneiform messages relating to MB Hatzor were found - the first hint of a possible archive at Hatzor. However, when Ben-Tor began his excavations in 1990 he came upon a palace near Yadin's which he dated, by means of its ceramics, to a few hundred years later -- that is, to the last half of the second millennium or Late Bronze (LB) period. The generally accepted dating of the biblical destruction of Hatzor by Joshua roughly coincides with the date of this LB palace's destruction, the 14th or 13th centuries BCE. This summer, as he probed the area of the palaces, Ben-Tor began to have an uneasy feeling that Yadin, his former teacher, had made a wrong dating and that there was in fact only one palace -- his own LB structure... Even if he is a palace short, however, the one that Ben-Tor is left with is proving enormous... The basalt stones had been distorted by a terrible fire which likewise echoes the biblical description of Joshua's destruction. It was clear for anyone to see that the basalt stones had been fractured by a hot fire. Geologists report that the fire had to be over 1200 degrees to cause this kind of damage to basalt.
The Burning Of Hazor
by Abraham Rabinovich and Neil Asher Silberman
The Egyptians could be responsible. Pharaoh Seti I, in an inscription describing his military campaign against Canaan ca. 1300 B.C., claimed to have destroyed Hazor. Another possibility is that Ramses II could have conquered the city, either on his way northward to Syria before the Battle of Kadesh in 1275 B.C. or on his return to Egypt afterward. Yet Ben-Tor believes that the intentional smashing of statues at Hazor, particularly those of the Egyptian kings, makes these possibilities unlikely. He also dismisses the likelihood of destruction at the hands of a rival Canaanite city-state because of the apparent absence of nearby cities powerful enough to attack Hazor. As for the Sea Peoples, Ben-Tor notes that not a single sherd of their distinctive decorated pottery has been found in the city, which is much further inland than the sites they are known to have conquered. That leaves the Israelites. The discovery of an archive at Hazor might pinpoint the date of the city's destruction, or provide information about the historical situation in Canaan in the years immediately preceding the Israelite settlement.

1 posted on 05/09/2011 7:18:31 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
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To: SunkenCiv

I love Biblical Archaeology Review. Good article, too.


2 posted on 05/09/2011 7:21:43 PM PDT by far sider
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The Assault Against Old Testament History has been Beached
on the Rocky Shores of Archaeology
The Ignorant Fishermen | 5/7/2011 | Mark Musser
Posted on 05/07/2011 9:20:41 AM PDT by Olympiad Fisherman
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2716581/posts


3 posted on 05/09/2011 7:27:52 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab
Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab
Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab
Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab Opens in new window or tab

4 posted on 05/09/2011 7:27:55 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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To: far sider

The only bad part of BAR is, it’s not monthly any longer.


5 posted on 05/09/2011 7:29:16 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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To: 75thOVI; agrace; aimhigh; Alice in Wonderland; AndrewC; aragorn; aristotleman; Avoiding_Sulla; ...

One of *those* topics.
 
Catastrophism
 
· join · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post new topic · subscribe ·
 

6 posted on 05/09/2011 7:33:13 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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(last part of Sec II only)
Section II
Theses for the Reconstruction of Ancient History

From the End of the Middle Kingdom in Egypt
to the Advent of Alexander the Great

by Immanuel Velikovsky

New York, June 10, 1945
28. The "Amalekite city" which was captured by Saul was Auaris.
29. As the result of his victory at Auaris, Saul freed Egypt and the entire Near East.
30. In the siege of Auaris, Saul was assisted by Kamose and Ahmose, the vassal princes of Thebes.
31. Manetho's story about the Hyksos leaving Auaris by agreement reflects the scriptural incident concerning the Kenites leaving the besieged Amalekite fortress.
32. The invasion of southern Palestine by the escaping remnants of the Hyksos is reflected in I Samuel 30; and their further destruction at Sheruhen, in the Talmudic story of Joab's war against the capital of the Amalekites.
33. This last bastion of the Amalekites was probably on one of the rocks of Petra.
34. Manetho confused Sheruhen with Jerusalem, and the Israelites, the redeemers of Egypt, with the Hyksos.
35. This confusion spread in the Ptolemaic time and became the cause of the rise of anti-Semitism which, fed from different channels, survived until today.
36. The period of the Wanderings in the Desert, of Joshua, and of the Judges, corresponds to the time of Hyksos domination in Egypt and the Near East. The period of the Hyksos lasted for more than four hundred years. The archaeological findings of the Hyksos period in Palestine appertain to the time of the Conquest and the Judges.
37. Two kingdoms rose on the ruins of the Hyksos Empire: the kingdom of Israel under David, and the New Kingdom of Egypt under the Eighteenth Dynasty. The beginnings of these two dynasties are not separated by six centuries; they started simultaneously.

7 posted on 05/09/2011 7:33:15 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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To: StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; 1010RD; 21twelve; 24Karet; 2ndDivisionVet; 31R1O; ...

· GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother, and Ernest_at_the_Beach ·
· join list or digest · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post a topic · subscribe ·

 
 Antiquity Journal
 & archive
 Archaeologica
 Archaeology
 Archaeology Channel
 BAR
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 Discover
 Dogpile
 Eurekalert
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 Mirabilis.ca
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 Excerpt, or Link only?
 


To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.
 

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8 posted on 05/09/2011 7:33:20 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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To: SunkenCiv
I hate to bring this up, but...

did you ever consider the very devil of a time later historians are going to have sifting out the claims of Obaama's birth and administration?

Cheers!

9 posted on 05/09/2011 7:38:12 PM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
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To: SunkenCiv

IN SEARCH OF AMALEK

http://creation.com/images/pdfs/tj/j11_1/j11_1_111-123.pdf

excerpt:

‘There was a king of ours, whose name was Timaus.
Under him it came to pass, I know not how, that God
was averse to us; and there came, after a surprising
manner, men of ignoble birth out of the eastern parts,
and had boldness enough to make an expedition into
our country, and with ease subdued it by force, yet
112
without our hazarding a battle with them. So when
they had gotten those that governed us under their
power, they afterwards burnt down our cities, and
demolished the temples of the gods, and used all the
inhabitants after a most barbarous manner; nay, some
they slew, and led their children and their wives into
slavery. At length they made one of themselves king,
whose name was Salatis . . . . . He chiefly aimed to
secure the eastern parts, . . . . and ... he found . . . a
city very proper for his purpose. . . called Avaris, this
he rebuilt, and made very strong by the walls he built
about it, and by a most numerous garrison of two
hundred and forty thousand armed men whom he put
into it to keep it ... . This whole nation was styled
HYCSOS — that is, shepherd-kings.... But some say
that these people were Arabians . . . . These people,
whom we have before named kings and called shepherds
also, and their descendants kept possession of Egypt
five hundred and eleven years.’


10 posted on 05/09/2011 7:40:37 PM PDT by Fred Nerks (FAIR DINKUM!)
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To: Fred Nerks

Not surprising that the “Sea Peoples” pottery wasn’t found in the Hazor dig. :’)


11 posted on 05/09/2011 7:43:42 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Thanks Cincinna for this link -- http://www.friendsofitamar.org)
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To: SunkenCiv

“In my view Velikovsky was probably correct in several of his major identifications in his books ‘Ages in Chaos’ and ‘Ramses II and His Time’; but he was definitely correct in his argument in ‘Peoples of the Sea’ that Ramses III lived in the fourth century BCE and was the Egyptian king Nectanebo I who defended Egypt from invasion by Persians and Greek mercenaries. Also Velikovsky was correct in ‘Peoples of the Sea’ that the 21st Dynasty Maunier Stela is an Egyptian record of Alexander the Great’s visit to Egypt in 331 BCE (this monument has been misdated about 800 years too early, and mainstream Egyptology does not recognize it for what it is). In my view the evidence for these two identifications is conclusive and they should be taken as anchor points for developing a revised chronology.”

http://persians-not-philistines.org/persians_not_philistines_012.htm


12 posted on 05/09/2011 8:06:39 PM PDT by Fred Nerks (FAIR DINKUM!)
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To: SunkenCiv
Personally, I am sick and tired of the Anti Christianity demonstrated by BCE and ACE. The “common” era is the birth of Christ. Therefor there is no need for BCE, just BC and no need for ACE as AD does quite well. I believe the ACE and BCE scribes are the same people who hug trees. So save a tree over the millenia, to say nothing of the ink used by the unneeded letters.
13 posted on 05/09/2011 8:15:05 PM PDT by Tuketu (Democrats should be known as the National Democrat Party - NDP CASE CLOSED)
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To: SunkenCiv

Bookmarked.


14 posted on 05/09/2011 8:17:46 PM PDT by Inyo-Mono (My greatest fear is that when I'm gone my wife will sell my guns for what I told her I paid for them)
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To: SunkenCiv

The extreme Biblical minimalists seem almost to be justifying the Islamic Claim that Ancient Israel and Judah never existed, but were created by the Persian Empire.


15 posted on 05/09/2011 8:21:06 PM PDT by Lucius Cornelius Sulla (Liberty and Union, Now and Forever, One and Inseparable -- Daniel Webster)
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Comment #16 Removed by Moderator

To: SunkenCiv

Great Article!


17 posted on 05/10/2011 3:12:47 AM PDT by Jan_Sobieski (Prov 30)
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To: Tuketu

You’re right. My response is to simply say Before the Christian Era and After the Christian Era. Thus defeating their designs.

It’s a simple way to save the day. ;-]


18 posted on 05/10/2011 3:46:12 AM PDT by 1010RD (First, Do No Harm)
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To: grey_whiskers; SunkenCiv

You love bringing it up. And thank you! ;-)


19 posted on 05/10/2011 5:35:01 AM PDT by TheOldLady
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To: Tuketu; SunkenCiv
Personally, I am sick and tired of the Anti Christianity demonstrated by BCE and ACE. The “common” era is the birth of Christ. Therefor there is no need for BCE, just BC and no need for ACE as AD does quite well.

If you were familiar with YHvH's Word,
you would know that AD or Anno Domini
is blasphemous.
It states that the year of the LORD
(YHvH) did not always exist.

It states that the creator of the universe
did not exist before the year zero.

Seek the face of YHvH in His WORD.

shalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach
20 posted on 05/10/2011 7:56:19 AM PDT by Uri’el-2012 (Psalm 119:174 I long for Your salvation, YHvH, Your law is my delight.)
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