Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Ian Hutchesson <mc2499 AT mclink.it>]

At 19.25 30/05/00 +0200, John Ronning responding to Walter wrote:
>I used "bait and switch" as a description of
>the effect of the so called research and conclusions being
>carried out by scholars and ameteurs alike.  Whether those
>engaging in it are doing so deliberately or negligently I
>cannot say.  I might mention a couple more examples:
>
>Ai:
>(1) the "bait" - let's consider whether archaeology sheds
>light on the historicity (or otherwise) of Joshua's conquest
>of Ai.
>(2) the "switch" - we'll say that et-Tell is Ai, even though
>et-Tell cannot be the biblical Ai for two substantial
>reasons - it doesn't have a valley to the north, and it is a
>huge site (Joshua's Ai is comparitively small to Jericho and
>Gibeon).
>(3) the "sell job" - et-Tell has no occupation from early
>bronze to iron age, so Joshua's account is just made up (or
>mangled somehow).
>
>That et-Tell can't be the biblical Ai was pointed out more
>than 50 years ago, but perhaps there's another factor than
>"bait and switch" at work that prevents scholars from coming
>to sound conclusions.

This does not reflect the analyses of the vast majority of archaeologists.
There is no "switch" going on, except by those who don't like the fact that
Ai has been identified as a site which doesn't fit late literature (ie the
biblical) and want to switch it to some other site. If it was pointed out
fifty years ago, it was obviously seen as unconvincing [..].

Amihai Mazar writes: <<The identification of Bethel with the village of
Beitin is almost universally accepted... Between Beitin and the desert to
the east, there is only one site which could have been referred to as "`Ai"
-- the large mound of et-Tell near Deir Dibwan. The mound's name is
actually an Arabic translation of the Hebrew biblical name "`Ai," meaning
"ruins." A long gap in occupation followed the large Early Bronze Age city
at `Ai until a small village was established there during the Israelite
settlement in the twelfth and eleventh centuries BCE.>> He goes on to
suggest an aetiological reason for the `Ai story. (Archaeology of the Land
of the Bible, Doubleday, 1992.)

Ahstrom is not saying anything radical when he writes: "the fact that such
cities as Ai, Gibeon, and Jericho in Cisjordan and Heshbon in Transjordan
did  not exist in the thirteenth century BCE makes the conquest model
unacceptable." This is from his massive archaeological survey, "The History
of Ancient Palestine", Sheffield/Minneapolis, 1993/4, p.343.

>Another example - Ur-kasdim:
>(1) the "bait" - let's consider whether archaeology sheds
>light on the historicity (or otherwise) of the call of
>Abram.
>(2) the "switch" - we'll say that Ur-kasdim of the Bible is
>the famous Ur in Southern Babylonia (even though ALL of the
>internal evidence of the Bible puts Ur-kasdim in Northern
>Mesopotamia near Haran, and the southern Ur is never called
>"Ur-Kasdim")
>(3) the "sell job" - there were no Kasdim in southern
>Babylonia until 1000 years after Abraham supposedly existed,
>so genesis is anachronistic.
>
>Like I said, some may use such bait and switch techniques
>deliberately, others simply through shoddy scholarship.

We've been through this waltz before, John, and the only thing we find is
people like John sending ad hominems about shoddy scholarship. You are
deliberately misrepresenting scholarship [..]. Why do people continue to
make the connection between Ur of the Chaldees and the Ur of Babylonia?
It's in the archives.

>> This decline in the fortunes of Jericho
>> and other sites in Canaan is the direct result of the establishment of the
>> Egyptian 18th Dynasty and the expulsion of the Hyksos into Palestine
>> (Kenyon 1973: 555-56)." (ABD 3.736, T.A. Holland, "Jericho," 1992)
>
>Saying it doesn't make it so - what evidence is there that
>either the Hyksos or the Egyptians conquered Jericho?  

Will a few Hyksos tombs in Jordan help? Will the Hurrite names that
survived into the Amarna age help? Will the chronological dating of the
exodus of the Hyksos correlating with the destruction of various sites in
Palestine help??

>The
>only tradition we know of of the conquest of Jericho (Joshua
>6) happens to agree in detail with the archaeological
>findings.

This is simply not true. The most recent excavations of Jericho have shown
that there was no Late Bronze wall to the city. If you doubt this contact
the excavators of the site who are from Rome's "La Sapienza" university.
These are the same people who brought you the good stuff about Ebla. (I can
supply an email address if you want it.)

>No, as far as I know the erection of the mud brick wall
>which stood on top of the middle bronze stone revetment wall
>cannot be dated.  The bricks fell in a heap on the outside
>of the stone revetment wall, so you wouldn't necessarily
>find pottery under them.  There was another revetment wall
>further inside, but little remains of it.

There are basically few finds from the Late Bronze at Jericho, John, so you
may pin your hope on the fact that you can't date this wall, but you'd
still have a wall that has no artefacts to support it being Late Bronze.
Here's what the English archaeologist Roger Moorey wrote in 1991: "In her
(Kenyon's) re-examination of the upper levels of this much eroded tell she
revealed only a tiny area of occupation in the Late Bronze Age and no
traces of this period in archaeological material from the lower slopes. At
the end of Kenyon's work in 1958 it was clear to her that archaeology only
offered evidence for a small unwalled settlement at Jericho c.1425-1275
BCE, with no fortifications or of the destruction attributed by Garstang to
Joshua's assault c. 1400 BC. This site had then been abandoned by the
second quarter of the thirteenth century and not reoccupied until the
eleventh BC." The site was not worked on again until the arrival of the
Italian team in 1997. The finds have so far confirmed those of Kenyon.

Incidentally, I cannot see this wall on any of the plans in the first
volume of Quaderni di Gerico (1998), Universita' di Roma "La Sapienza".
 
>> Holland observes:
>> 
>> "All the MB buildings were violently destroyed by fire and their walls were
>> covered with a thick layer of debris during the subsequent period of
>> abandonment and erosion...the heavy tilting of the area H walls to the east
>> (Kenyon 1981:: pl 339 section) may indicate earthquake activity." (ABD 3.
>> 736, T.A. Holland, "Jericho," 1992)
>
>Agreeing nicely with the biblical account in all details,
>including the falling of walls due to other than the action
>of an enemy army.

It's a shame your source cannot be dated before the second century BCE --
if that. It is useless as a historical record for before that time (even
though it might be correct: you have no way of knowing).

The important fact [..] is the timely arrival of the Hyksos in Palestine
aligning with a Middle Bronze destruction of various cities there. We at
least have a historical presence.

For some reason you overlook the fact that Hebrew shows no sign of having
existed as a language in the twelfth century BCE -- if it cannot be
distinguished from Phoenician in the ninth century. The language shows no
signs of any Egyptian influence, so a literature based on such a language
cannot be older than the language -- unless translated from some other.

>> Even if Late Bronze sherds were to be found under the wall debris, it still
>> would not prove your point that Joshua was responsible. 
>
>That was not my point - I'm not the one trying to prove
>something with archaeology, you are; I am simply pointing
>out that you are not convincing - you don't explain a lot of
>data that doesn't fit your theory that joshua 6 is simply
>manufactured.

Whatever your point is, John, the archaeology is clear. There is evidence
against your views.

[I'll leave you and Walter to slug it out on Dibon. I wouldn't like to take
bets either way.]

>One might also mention Jerusalem, which according to the
>archaeologists was practically a zero in the late bronze
>age, but which according to the Amarna letters was a rather
>important city (maybe we should learn to regard written
>sources as being able to correct the findings of
>archaeologists, if that's not too dangerous an assumption?).

You are misrepresenting the information from the Amarna letters. Uru-salim
may have been Jerusalem, but if it was, where exactly was it? There's an
article I read recently by Margreet Streeter on the terrace system of
Jerusalem (was it IEQ?) that poses this problem because of the archaeology.


Ian