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When Judaism Meets Science
Posts Tagged ‘Israel Finkelstein’
Lessons from Wall Fragments and a Scroll
Wall Fragments in the Jordan Valley
Most of us have no idea of what treasures might rest under our feet. And then, perhaps, the wind blows, some rain falls, a shovel turns, and you see what no human has seen in years, maybe thousands of years.
So it was just fifty-seven years ago at a site known as Deir Alla, 13 miles east of the Jordan River and 27 miles northwest of the current Jordanian capital of Amman. There and then, an Arab foreman working with a group of archaeologists led by Prof. Henk J. Franken of the University of Leiden discovered fragments of a story that had been written many centuries earlier in red and black paint on a plaster wall. Recovery, preservation, restoration, and reassembly of the plaster fragments was a multi-year effort which led first to framed reconstructions being sent to the Amman Archaeological Museum and, subsequently, the publication of a book.
What could have caused the wall to collapse and shatter? And could that cause help us understand when the wall might have fallen? The answers came from a convergence of investigations at different sites in modern Israel and Jordan, sometimes utilizing different approaches. The sites ranged from Hazor in the north of Israel to Ein Hatseva in the south. The Jordanian site of Deir Alla lies midway between the two. What these sites have in common, and in common with other sites like Gezer, Lachish, and Tell ej-Judeidah (Tel Goded), is that they all sustained damage consistent with earthquake debris in areas stratigraphically contained to the middle of the Eighth Century BCE. In 2021, the Israel Antiquities Authority (“IAA”) announced evidence in Jerusalem, as well, of a powerful ancient earthquake around that time.
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The Battle for Jerusalem and the Origin of Fake News — 2700 Years Ago
Sennacherib Prism,
Oriental Institute, U. of Chicago
How can you tell what is true and what is not in the Hebrew Bible (the “Tanakh”)? How can you separate fact from fiction and fable? In some instances, science can help. For instance, both geological and archaeological records confirm that the whole earth was not submerged in flood waters during the last six thousand years, and evolutionary biology demonstrates that all land animals and birds do not owe their existence to creatures that were on a vessel floating on those mythical waters. Similarly, we know that the Sun did not stop in the sky for twenty-four hours during a battle at Gibeon, for that would have meant that the Earth ceased to rotate during that period of time, which, in turn, would have caused cataclysmic consequences neither reported in the story nor elsewhere. (See Gen. 7:6-8; Josh. 10:12-14.)
From a modern perspective, then, it is reasonably easy to identify some biblical stories that are not factually accurate. They may well contain worthy moral or other lessons, but as factual recitations of actual occurrences, they fail.
At the same time, there are other stories in the Tanakh that seem quite plausible, even contemporary in their nature. How can we tell if they are historically true or historical fiction or simply imagined? One such story concerns the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrian king Sennacherib (pronounced Seh-NACK-er ib) during the reign of the Judahite king Hezekiah about 2700 years ago. read more
What if Cyrus Had Not Freed the Jews?
Over twenty-five centuries ago, Cyrus II, founder and ruler of the Persian Empire, freed the Jews who had been transported forcibly to Babylon and facilitated the reconstruction of their Temple in Jerusalem. Without the intervention of Cyrus, the Jewish People and Judaism as we know it (if that is not redundant) would not exist today. In short, no Cyrus, no Jews. So who was Cyrus, and why aren’t we celebrating his actions?
Cyrus was born into the royal family of the small state of Anshan, located in what is now southwest Iran. Not long after becoming king of Anshan around 559 BCE, Cyrus first conquered nearby Media (550 BCE) and then turned west to capture Lydia (546 BCE) in what is now western Turkey. Next, he shocked the world by toppling the previously dominant empire of Babylonia (539 BCE). Whether his victory after a multi-year siege of the capital Babylon was more the result of brilliant tactics, Babylonian palace treason or some other factor can be debated, but it is crystal clear that Cyrus emerged from Babylon triumphant. And with this victory, Cyrus became ruler of, among other lands, the territory bordering and east of the Mediterranean Sea to and surrounding the Jordan River. read more
The Camel’s Nose and the Torah’s Tent
The time is out of joint – O cursed spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!
Nay, come, let’s go together.
Shakespeare, Hamlet, I, 5
For those who hold that the Bible, and particularly the Torah, is the Word of God, without flaw and inerrant, the last few hundred years have been very frustrating. The development of the Documentary Hypothesis, the idea that the Torah was a compilation of works from several discrete sources, was and, despite scholarly challenge, remains a formidable obstacle to the claim of unitary and divine authorship. But the Documentary Hypothesis is, for all its power and value, just that, a hypothesis. Similarly, the notion that much of the Torah text is pretext, i.e., a series of allegories designed to enhance the image of one or more Kings of Judah, is another provocative and persuasive concept, but again, just that, a concept.
Yet while some would dismiss such broad theories as too sweeping, and not definitive, small, stubborn little problems with the text cannot be so easily refuted and disregarded. One sign that the Torah is not the work of a single writer, much less a divine one, is the presence of anachronisms in the text. read more