​3 days until Christmas and we are down to our last 3 discoveries. Today’s archaeological discovery is the Tel Dan Stele.
 
The Tel Dan Stele was discovered in the 1993 at the site of Tel Dan during Avraham Biran’s excavation. It was written in Aramaic and in an ancient Phoenician Script closely related to an early Hebrew.
 
The stele dates to the 9th Century BCE and is said to be authored by Hazael of Aram-Damascus. He discuses how he took the city of Dan and killed the Northern Kingdom of Israel’s kings Joram and later Ahaziah from the Omride Dynasty. However, in this stele, it does not designate these kings as the Omride dynasty, instead he says they were kings from the “House of David.”

​This is a quite significant discovery considering that before this event, scholarship had not yet found any real historical confirmation of the biblical King David. It was assumed that he was a legendary figure like King Arthur. However, when this stele was discovered it changed everything we knew about the history of Israel.
 
It is interesting that that the king of Aram, from outside of Israel, mentions by name the House of David and designates it to the Northern Kingdom which separated itself from the Southern Kingdom of Judah after the reign of King Solomon. This shows that there was, at the very least, a tradition of both kingdoms once being united and the kingship was called the “House of David.” Also, kingdoms would call nations typically by the name of their ruler or most powerful ruler when they refer to them in monumental inscriptions.
 
This stele shows there is some historicity to the human figure of King David. It was obviously debated as to its authenticity after its initial discovery but now there is not too much debate on the subject. The Tel Dan Stele remains one of the most important archaeological discovery in the realm of biblical scholarship.
 
Tune in tomorrow as we will be two days away from Christmas!
 
-Tal

​Number four are the Ketef Hinnom amulets. Found near Jerusalem, these miniatures, silver scrolls were found in a series of burial chambers. They were excavated by Gabriel Barkay in 1979.
 
Much can be said about these scrolls but for an attempt to be brief I will give a summary of the debate regarding these scrolls.  The assumption among biblical scholars is these texts from the priestly source (labeled P) are typically dated, to the 4th Century BCE, after the Judean Exile and during or after the Persian occupation.
 
This assumption was challenged after the discovery of these scrolls because, after analysis of the Hebrew writing on the silver, it was revealed to be inscribed with Numbers 6:24-26 which is known as the “Priestly Blessing.”
 
Num. 6:24      The LORD bless you and keep you;
Num. 6:25      the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you;
Num. 6:26      the LORD lift up his countenance3 upon you and give you peace.

​This passage which is usually considered a P source, dating to the 4th Century BCE was found in a burial context from the 7th Century BCE. This shows that at the very least, the Priestly Blessing, and the tradition of this blessing dates much early rather than the assumed later date from Source Critics of the Bible
 
This is another perfect example of how archaeology is constantly changing the way we think and know things concerning the Bible.
 
Tune in tomorrow as we are only 3 days away from Christmas!

At this point in the list any of these objects can be anyone’s favorite discovery which connect archaeology and the Bible. However, I am ranking this list by what I think is most significant for biblical studies.
 
Next in our countdown is the Mesha Stele or also known as the Moabite Stone. It is a stone monument authored by a Moabite king by the name of Mesha. The inscription is written an ancient Phoenician alphabet which scholars believe to be an Old Hebrew Script. Discovered in 1868 by Fredrick Augustus Klein, in the ancient Moabite city of Dibon, located in modern day Jordan.

It is the longest Iron Age inscription ever found and contains 34 lines of text. It describes how king Mesha falls back into the grace of his god Chemosh, the god of Moabites. It mentions their subjugation under the nation of Israel and how he, Mesha restored the land of Moab and dates to the context of the 9th Century BCE Iron Age Transjordan.
 
The reason it is significant is because it mentions an event that takes place in 2 Kings 3:4-8 which is a significant for Israel and Judah against the Moabites. The inscription is one of the earliest epigraphical evidences for “Israel,” “House of Omri,” the Divine Name (YHWH), and perhaps the name “House of David.”

Tune in tomorrow for Day 4!
 
 Rollston, Chris A. (2010). Writing and Literacy in the World of Ancient Israel: Epigraphic Evidence from the Iron Age. Society of Biblical Lit. p. 54.

The next archaeological discovery goes hand in hand with the our number 7 from yesterday. In fact the object in question concerns the very same king who battled Ahab at Qarqar. Found in the ancient city of Nimrud, the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III is another monument describing the Assyrian king’s reign in the Ancient Near East. It contains four registers which each scene continues around the object, 360 degrees. The contain scenes of hunts, wild and exotic animals, and two foreign kings bringing tribute to the Shalmaneser III in his throne room.

This object is important for biblical studies because it is the only pictorial representation of an Israelite king, Jehu. In my last post I mentioned how the Kurhk Monoliths show the conflict between the West Semitic kings and Shalmaneser III in Assyria. Jehu, formed a coup d'etat against the house of Ahab and had his queen, Jezebel killed. The very next event is not mentioned in the Bible but it assumed to have happened, in that Jehu pledges allegiance to Shalmaneser III, the very king in which Ahab was at war with during his reign. ​

Jehu is in the second register in which he is shown, surrounded by Assyrian officials and bowing down to Shalmaneser III. Below this scene is written in Akkadian, “Jehu of the House of Omri.” It is interesting that in the identification of King Jehu of Israel, he is not in fact from the Omride Dynasty. This is most likely an example of foreign empires addressing the nation according to its most powerful or famous dynasty.

Further along the second register going 360 degrees also shows what appear to be other Israelites forming a procession and carrying tributes to the king. This was a common practice in the ANE where a smaller kingdom would pay tribute or taxes to a major empire in hopes of reaping the benefits of said empire. In this case the Israelites were allowed their independence but were under the protection of the Assyrian Empire from the looming threat of the growing Arameans to the north. Obviously this treaty formed between the two kingdoms only went well for Assyria since Israel was later exiled in 722 BCE in which the alliance put the southern Kingdom of Judah in danger as well as we saw with the Annals of Sennacherib.
 
Tune in tomorrow for number 5 as we are 5 days away from Christmas!
 
-Tal
            

Perhaps one of the more interesting takeaways from the objects on this list are that most of these discoveries are from outside of Israel Palestine and they are in reference to people and events which take place in the Bible. Not only is the extra-biblical evidence (outside of the Bible) but also it is "extra-Israel/Palestine" (outside of the region of modern day Israel/Palestine). The Kurkh Monolith is among these discoveries which actually mention an Israelite king and while also providing information concerning the strength of his empire.
 
These monoliths were found in Turkey by a British archaeologist by the name of John George Taylor. They are monuments with Akkadian writing describing a famous battle known as the Battle of Qarqar which was between the Assyrian king, Shalmaneser III,  and the other West Semitic kings in 854  - 846 BCE.

Among these West Semitic kings listed is one “ "A-ha-ab-bu Sir-ila-a-a" which is generally accepted among scholars as “Ahab of Israel,” assumed to be the very same biblical Ahab of the house of  Omri mentioned in the 2 Kings chapters 18 – 22. The inscription mentions each West Semitic king by name and by the military might which they brought to the fight. Ahab was said to have brought “2,000 chariots, 10,000 soldiers” which is a massive military force, second in strength by numbers only the Hadad-ezer of the Arameans. This shows the might of the Northern Kingdom of Israel as well as their significance in the Ancient Near East.
 
The picture being painted here is one that shows the background of the impending exile of the Northern Kingdom in 722 BCE. Ahab is trying to show his military might against the Assyrians, which the Bible says the prophets have been warning them since the beginning. Ahab is clearly unsuccessful and his war with the Assyrians ends with later Israelite kings forming an alliance with them. 

The stele is also one of the few archaeological discoveries which also mentions, by name, the nation of Israel rather than "House of _____"  (ex. House of Omri, House of David, etc.) in an ancient context.
 
See you tomorrow for number 6 in our countdown to Christmas!

​-Tal

​Today’s archaeological discovery that illuminates the world of the Bible are the Annuls of Sennacherib found on a series of objects known as prisms. These clay prisms were inscribed in cuneiform and contain the same text, the annuls of the Assyrian king, Sennacherib.
 
It was discovered in 1830 by Colonel Robert Taylor in the ancient city of Nineveh. The account dates to the early 7th Century BCE and discusses Sennacherib’s exploits and campaigns across his vast empire. It is also important for biblical studies because it mentions the siege of a certain Judahite king named Hezekiah and his royal city, Jerusalem.
 
This event is also recorded in the Bible in the books of Isaiah (chapters 36 and 37), 2 Kings (ch. 18), and 2 Chronicles (32). In this account, Sennacherib takes siege of the city only to be decimated by the army by and angel of the Lord, forcing Assyrian King to retreat.

​The account on the prisms are different however, as it mentioned “Hezekiah of Judah” by name and states that Sennacherib had him “caged like a bird in his own royal city.” His annuals do not mention his defeat at the hands of an angel or heavenly host, nor does it say that he conquered the city, however, it does say that Hezekiah paid tribute to him in the end implying that the siege was successful
 
Perhaps the most interesting point to take away from this study (I have written about in a previous post), is that Sennacherib did not conquer the city of Jerusalem. It is implied that he took the city for himself as Hezekiah is forced to pay tribute. But this victory is only mentioned in these annuls.
 
My previous post on the Lachish Relief (#9), discovered in the very same palace in Nineveh, shows Sennacherib’s army winning a glorious battle against a major city in Judah. The question then is: where is the relief for the siege of Jerusalem? If Jerusalem is such a royal city, as mentioned in his annuls, why not explicitly say that he took the city, and carried off slaves and gold from the treasury by force? 

​Assyrians were masters of psychological terrorism and intimidation (look at some of the images from the Lachish Relief). Though the taking of Jerusalem, the royal city of the Hezekiah of Judah, seems like an aside. A relief or boasting of an event such as this would be expected to be plastered in many palaces throughout the Assyrian Empire. Sennacherib only mentions the destruction and battles of smaller cities and towns (46 in all), but Jerusalem remains standing.
 
Thank you for tuning in this week! I hope you have enjoyed the list so far. Be sure to check in tomorrow for number 7 in our countdown.
 
-Tal
 

Number 9 in our countdown for archaeological discoveries that help provide context to the Bible are the Lachish reliefs found in the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh. It was carved sometime between 700 and 681 BCE and located in the Palace of Sennacherib, whom was mentioned prior in our number 10, the Siloam Inscription post.
 
The reliefs were discovered in 1853 and first assumed to be to be an another city conquered by the Assyrians proposed by Henry Rawlinson. However Yigael Yadin, a famous Israeli archeologist, points to the excavations at Tel Lachish and show that the excavations match precisely the events shown on the relief. 

The Bible also describes siege of Lachish in 2 Chronicles 32:9 “"Later, when Sennacherib king of Assyria and all his forces were laying siege to Lachish, he sent his officers to Jerusalem with this message for Hezekiah king of Judah and for all the people of Judah who were there.” The reliefs depicts a major battle of a walled city showing archers firing, the building of a siege ramp to breach the wall, soldiers being impaled on stakes, and prisoners being marched away bound.
 
The excavations at Lachish discovered a major destruction layer, many Assyrian arrow heads and a massive siege ramp made which is still in view today (see image above). There is little doubt among scholars that this Lachish is the same mentioned in the Reliefs in Nineveh that Sennacherib is claiming as his prize.
 
I have a previous post in which I discuss the site of Lachish further in relation to (spoilers) number 8 in our countdown for tomorrow, the Annals of Sennacherib.

See you tomorrow!

​-Tal

Number 10 in our countdown is the Siloam inscription, discovered in Jerusalem in 1836. The pools of Siloam are the only known water source which brought water into the city. 2 Kings 20 mentions a construction of an underground conduit which brought water into the spring. It states, “And the rest of the events of Hezekiah and all his mighty deeds, and how he made the conduit and the pool, and he brought the water into the city, they are written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah."
 
The ancient city Jerusalem was on a mountain and easily defensible on all sides. However, when the threat of the Assyrians loomed over the city of Jerusalem, King Hezekiah feared that the water system would be exploited during the siege. 2 Chronicles 32:2-4 says “And he took counsel with his officers and his mighty men to stop up the waters of the fountains that were outside the city, and they assisted him. And a large multitude gathered and stopped up all the fountains and the stream that flowed in the midst of the land, saying, ‘Why should the kings of Assyria come and find much water?’”

The inscription found in the tunnels contains six lines of early Hebrew script which dates to about the 8th Century BCE. It reads:
 
... the tunnel ... and this is the story of the tunnel while ...
the axes were against each other and while three cubits were left to (cut?) ... the voice of a man ...
called to his counterpart, (for) there was ZADA in the rock, on the right ... and on the day of the
tunnel (being finished) the stonecutters struck each man towards his counterpart, ax against ax and flowed
water from the source to the pool for 1,200 cubits. and (100?)
cubits was the height over the head of the stonecutters ...
 
The inscription records the process by which the tunnel was created in how two groups of men worked on both ends of the tunnel and met in the middle. The mention of them using their voices perhaps indicates that the workers used acoustics in order to better locate each other.
 
This is a fascinating discovery which displays some context to Hezekiah’s reign in Jerusalem both creating the water system and perhaps how he blocked it during the Assyrian Siege under Sennacherib. The inscription itself is exhibited in the Istanbul Museum in Turkey and Hezekiah’s tunnels are still famous today as you can tour them yourself in Jerusalem. It is a nice tour to do in the hot summer.  

See you tomorrow to see what number nine is in our countdown of 12 Days of Archaeology and the Bible!

​-Tal

Very few times does archaeology harmonize to what is mentioned in text. Yet, both text and archaeology are lenses by which we view the world and neither one usually give the whole picture. It is the interpretation of this picture, which is what we call “history.”
 
There is a passage in the book of 1 Kings in 9:15 that says “And this is the account of the forced labor that King Solomon drafted to build the house of the YWHW, his house, the Millo, the wall of Jerusalem and Hazor, and Megiddo and Gezer.”
 
The passage refers to the reinforcement and building projects King Solomon implemented on the temple, his own palace, the walls of Jerusalem, and the walls of some major cities within his kingdom -- at Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer. There is not evidence of his building projects on the Temple since it was destroyed in 586 BCE and later built over by Herod the Great in the 1st Century BCE. What may remain from Solomon’s palace is under centuries of occupations in Jerusalem which is also not to mention a living, thriving city. However, the building projects for rebuilding walls of these other cities in interesting may provide a clue to King Solomon himself.
 
In gate structures during this period, we have what are called “chambered gates.” This is a particular architectural gate style which emerges in the Iron Age II period (10th – 9th Centuries BCE). There are two chamber gates, four chamber gates and six chamber gates reflecting the amount of chambers each gate has (see schematic image above).  The purpose of these chambers was span from their use in cultic shrines for travelers to offer sacrifices, to watering areas for animals and livestock. 

Around this time period we have only three examples of what are known as the 6 Chamber Gates, which are the largest and more significant of the three types. The sites which contain this mysterious architectural feature are only found at Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer, the three cities where Solomon supposedly reinforced the city walls mentioned in 1 Kings 9.
 
Do the discoveries of these three gates exhibit the building projects implemented by Solomon during his reign in Israel? The topic of David and Solomon’s historicity is another hotly debated subject and many have used this architectural feature to champion for Solomon’s relevancy.

See you tomorrow with number 10 of our countdown!

​-Tal

​First on our list are a group of artifacts known as the Tel El-Amarna letters. These letters were found in Egypt and date the Late Bronze Age New Kingdom of Egypt 1360-1322 BCE. They are a collection of over 300 clay tablets which are correspondence between the 18th Dynasty Egyptian Pharaoh, Akhenaten, and the major kingdoms of the Ancient Near East.
 
These tablets were inscribed in cuneiform (wedge writing) and written in a language known as Akkadian which was the lingua franca, or common language of the ancient world in this time period. Most of the correspondence contain devotion and praise to the pharaoh as well as providing details as to the culture and events of these distant kingdoms.

​This information provides biblical scholars with a wealth of knowledge since majority of these tablets are written from kings living in the areas of modern day Syria, Lebanon, and Canaan. Evaluation of these texts can help quite literally “set the stage” and provide the historical and geographic context for the emergence of the Israelites in Late Bronze/Early Iron Age in Canaan.
 
Some of these texts also mention the troubles the Canaanite kings have had with two people groups known as the Hapiru and the Shasu. Both of these groups have been linked with the “Hebrew” people. Some prominent scholars have suggested that these are in fact the emerging ethnic group of the Israelites infiltrating the land of Canaan however this is heavily debated.
 
Tune in tomorrow for Day 11 in the 12 Days of Archaeology and the Bible!
 
Sources and for further Reading.
Dever, William G. (1997). "Archaeology and the Emergence of Early Israel" . In John R. Bartlett (Ed.), Archaeology and Biblical Interpretation, pp. 20–50. Routledge.
 
Hoffmeier, James K. (2005). Ancient Israel in Sinai, New York: Oxford University Press, 240–45.
 
Rainey, Anson F. (1995). "Unruly Elements in Late Bronze Canaanite Society". In Wright, David Pearson; Freedman, David Noel; Hurvitz, Avi (eds.). Pomegranates and Golden Bells. Eisenbrauns.
 
Stager, Lawrence E. (2001). "Forging an Identity: The Emergence of Ancient Israel". In Michael Coogan (Ed.), The Oxford History of the Biblical World, pp. 90–129. New York: Oxford University Press.
 
El-Amarna Tablets, article at West Semitic Research Project, website of University of Southern California accessed 12/12/19.