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In Israel, diggers unearth the Bible's bad guys
Charlotte observer ^ | 7-8-11

Posted on 07/08/2011 5:19:43 AM PDT by SJackson

TEL EL-SAFI, Israel At the remains of an ancient metropolis in southern Israel, archaeologists are piecing together the history of a people remembered chiefly as the bad guys of the Hebrew Bible.

The city of Gath, where the annual digging season began this week, is helping scholars paint a more nuanced portrait of the Philistines, who appear in the biblical story as the perennial enemies of the Israelites.

Close to three millennia ago, Gath was on the frontier between the Philistines, who occupied the Mediterranean coastal plain, and the Israelites, who controlled the inland hills. The city's most famous resident, according to the Book of Samuel, was Goliath - the giant warrior improbably felled by the young shepherd David and his sling.

The Philistines "are the ultimate other, almost, in the biblical story," said Aren Maeir of Bar-Ilan University, the archaeologist in charge of the excavation.

(Excerpt) Read more at charlotteobserver.com ...


TOPICS: Israel; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: canaan; canaanites; catastrophism; gath; ggg; godsgravesglyphs; letshavejerusalem; philistia; philistine; philistines; tellessafi
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To: Red Badger; Cronos; wildbill; StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; 1010RD; 21twelve; 24Karet; ...

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Thanks Red Badger, Cronos, and wildbill for the pings, and, uh, oh-oh, I think I owe thanks to SJackson for posting the topic. Closed the tab already, too lazy and tired to hunt it.

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

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61 posted on 07/08/2011 7:59:31 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Yes, as a matter of fact, it is that time again -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: SunkenCiv

Lots of opinions to the contrary if you google the subject.


62 posted on 07/08/2011 8:10:29 PM PDT by wildbill (You're just jealous because the Voices talk only to me.)
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To: wildbill

The dating of the Trojan War is indeed usually given as circa 1200 BC (or a little earlier, sometimes as far back as 1300 BC), and I’m not going to argue that the 1200 BC date isn’t out there — it’s just that it is dead wrong.

As an aside, I find it particularly odd that a siege that, 140 years ago, was practically universally held to be a fiction, has a fixed date. :’) Bravo for Heinrich Schliemann.


63 posted on 07/08/2011 8:27:50 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Yes, as a matter of fact, it is that time again -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: wildbill

BTW, I like your idea...
Fearless Leader

64 posted on 07/08/2011 8:31:30 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Yes, as a matter of fact, it is that time again -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: decimon

You’re only saying that because I’ve got five of ‘em, and it’s a five for five shot in the dark. ;’)


65 posted on 07/08/2011 8:32:02 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Yes, as a matter of fact, it is that time again -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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David Rohl suggests (pp 164, 168, and 224) that the king of Gath, a Philistine city, had a Hurrian/Carian name, which is not that farfetched, but the idea that King David ruled in Jerusalem at the same time is incorrect. The Gath reference Rohl cites is found in the Amarna diplomatic correspondence, a time in which Gath was no longer Philistine, the Philistines themselves no longer a going concern and David was long dead. In the conventional timeline, the Hurrians were no longer extant at the time, and the Amarna letters were buried and forgotten.
Philistines: Giving Goliath His Due
Marco Polo Monographs, No. 7.


by Neal Bierling
foreword by Joe E. Seger

old edition on Amazon

Giving Goliath His Due:
New Archaeological Light on the Philistines

by Neal Bierling
foreword by Paul L. Maier
The name Goliath, like Achish, is not Semitic, but rather Anatolian (McCarter 1980, 291, Mitchell 1967, 415; Wainwright 1959, 79). Not all agree though; the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (2:524) proposes that Goliath may have been a remnant of one of the aboriginal groups of giants of Palestine who now were in the employ of the Philistines. [1. Naveh (1985, 9, 13 n. 14) states that Ikausu, the name of the king of Ekron in the seventh century b.c., is a non-Semitic name that can be associated with that of the Achish of Gath in David's time. The name in the seventh century has a shin ending that is non-West Semitic.]

66 posted on 07/08/2011 8:37:34 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Yes, as a matter of fact, it is that time again -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: SunkenCiv
I only know of one to trash peruse. I think I left the last post there.
67 posted on 07/08/2011 8:48:29 PM PDT by decimon
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To: SunkenCiv

I think we’re too quick to dismiss myth as pure fiction. These things have a root somewhere.


68 posted on 07/09/2011 3:31:23 AM PDT by Cronos ( W Szczebrzeszynie chrzaszcz brzmi w trzcinie I Szczebrzeszyn z tego slynie.)
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To: Cronos

After Schliemann, there was an apparently organized campaign to undermine the whole idea of the veracity of surviving ancient texts. The most notorious example (besides the construction of the Egyptian pseudochronology, which is mostly earlier in date) may be the jokers who claimed that there was never any flowing water, no cracks in the ground etc inside the Temple of the Delphic Oracle.

After more than a century of generations just believing that concoction, a geologist finally surveyed the site and found not only one fault line, but two — intersecting at the point where the oracle used to sit. Another researcher who had been brought up to reject the texts got talked into taking a look (the geologist basically told him, you haven’t been there, and you don’t know what you’re talking about), and then got permission to take some samples. A hallucinogenic gas (that’s one of its characeristics anyway) used to bubble out with the water (y’know, the water that someone claimed wasn’t there; the spring dried up in ancient times), and that’s what made the pythoness babble.


69 posted on 07/09/2011 6:50:41 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (Yes, as a matter of fact, it is that time again -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: Quis Custodiet

I’ve often wondered how the stone could penetrate Goliath’s skull if he was wearing his helmet, but then I supposed that Goliath, as another way of insulting David, took off his helmet and gave it to his shield bearer, shouting out “I won’t need this!.”


70 posted on 07/09/2011 8:12:29 AM PDT by COBOL2Java (Obama is the least qualified guy in whatever room he walks into.)
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To: SJackson

Very interesting article, but I hoped it might be about Sihon and Og... :-)


71 posted on 07/09/2011 8:21:36 AM PDT by COBOL2Java (Obama is the least qualified guy in whatever room he walks into.)
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To: Westbrook

What? Suddenly your ‘courage’ leaves you?

What would you say?


72 posted on 07/09/2011 8:28:41 AM PDT by Balding_Eagle
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To: SJackson

The Philistines are, alas, alive and well in their recent incarnation as Philistinians (Palestinians).


73 posted on 07/09/2011 10:56:31 AM PDT by ZULU (Lindsey Graham is a nanometrical pustule of pusillanimous putrescence)
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To: Varda

CCD?

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine???


74 posted on 07/09/2011 10:11:20 PM PDT by Immerito (Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days)
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To: Westbrook

It’s regrettable that, by and large, journalists abandoned the respectable code of intellectual honesty and journalistic integrity.


75 posted on 07/09/2011 10:14:58 PM PDT by Immerito (Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days)
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To: Balding_Eagle

> What? Suddenly your ‘courage’ leaves you?
>
> What would you say?

You seem to be the only one that doesn’t get it.


76 posted on 07/09/2011 11:28:23 PM PDT by Westbrook (Having children does not divide your love, it multiplies it.)
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To: Westbrook

Oh I get it. You’re afriad to put the concept into your own words, as they will sound just like the words you are criticizing.


77 posted on 07/10/2011 8:30:38 AM PDT by Balding_Eagle
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To: Balding_Eagle

Oh, Please.

I already gave a demosntration of how to correctly report a piece.

Do your own bloody homework.

Reporting, by REAL journalists, which I don’t even pretend to be, even though I’ve take a course, does not have the reporter’s opinion in it. That’s for the goons in the editorial room, not the trench warriors on the street with a note pad and pen.

I’m not going to rewrite the stupid piece to show you how it’s correctly done.

If you don’t get it, that’s your problem.


78 posted on 07/10/2011 9:27:30 AM PDT by Westbrook (Having children does not divide your love, it multiplies it.)
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To: Westbrook
I’m not going to rewrite the stupid piece to show you how it’s correctly done.

Chuckle

You sure are going to a lot of effort and twisting yourself into pretzels just to avoid your iteration of the two words 'improbably felled'.

That's because they accurately describe the incident. You can't think of any other words to simply describe such an improbability, so you have to come up with hundreds of words to try and divert attention from your lack of ability.

79 posted on 07/10/2011 10:47:53 AM PDT by Balding_Eagle
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To: Balding_Eagle

> ‘improbably felled’

OK, since you seem to be too dense to get it.

“allegedly felled”
“felled according to the account”
“the author records that he was felled ...”

Please.

If you don’t have any imagination and skill, don’t accuse me of “twisting myself into pretzels”.

No go away and play with people your own mental age.


80 posted on 07/10/2011 5:05:14 PM PDT by Westbrook (Having children does not divide your love, it multiplies it.)
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