BiblePlaces Blog

Beth Yerah: It's an Arabic Palace, not Synagogue

2010-03-18T08:35:00.001-05:00

Earlier this week, there was a story about the discovery of an Umayyad palace that was previously identified as a synagogue. Early reports contained very few details, but a new story yesterday makes things a bit clearer (HT: Gordon Govier).

The site is still not named, but a little checking around has revealed that it is Khirbet Beth Yerah (Khirbet el-Kerak) on the southwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee (see map below). A synagogue was discovered here in the 1950s by P. L. O. Guy and Pesach Bar-Adon. Current excavations led by Rafi Greenberg of Tel Aviv University now identify the building as an Arabic palace dating to the 7th-8th centuries A.D. How did they get it so wrong?

The palace was also dismantled down to its foundations after the fall of the dynasty, leaving nothing behind but a foundation and few clues to help date the structure.

Archaeologists at the time also believed, erroneously, that the early Arab caliphates did not carry out many large-scale building projects.

Researchers first began to raise doubts about the origins of the structure in the 1990s, but it wasn't until 2002 that archaeologist Donald Whitcomb from the University of Chicago first suggested that the site might in fact be the missing Umayyad palace. That identification was confirmed by archaeologists this week.

The identification of the structure as a synagogue was based on the image of a menorah that the early excavators found carved into the top of a pillar base. But the scholars behind the new review of the site realized that the carving was a red herring -- that surface would have been covered by a pillar in the original structure, so the carving must have been added later.

The article on Beth Yerah in The New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land (1993) provides more information on the “synagogue”:

Within the area of the Roman fort, Guy and Bar-Adon uncovered the remains of the foundations of a synagogue (22 by 37 m). The building was divided by two rows of columns into a nave and two aisles. There was an apse in the middle of the southern wall, oriented to Jerusalem. The nave was paved with a colored mosaic, partially preserved, depicting plants, birds, lions, and other motifs. Carved on the base of a column were a menorah, lulab, ethrog, and incense shovel (1: 258).

A couple of brief comments. The apse oriented toward Jerusalem also faces Mecca. The mosaic’s depictions might surprise some unfamiliar with Arabic tastes in this period, but it closely resembles the Umayyad palace in Jericho (Kh. el-Mafjar). Apparently the decorated column base threw the original excavators off. (And you thought archaeologists used pottery for dating.)

You can read more about the Tel Bet Yerah Research and Excavation Project at the official site.

From Sheet 6 of the Survey of Western Palestine Maps. Kh. el-Kerak = Beth Yerah.

Cook on the Qeiyafa Ostracon

2010-03-17T09:31:00.001-05:00

Edward Cook has a good summary and analysis of the Qeiyafa Ostracon on his blog. He concludes that the inscription is:

(1) A text written from left-to-right.

(2) A text written in the Old Canaanite form of the alphabet, the form that the letters took before (but more about this later) the evolution of national scripts.

(3) A text whose language, although North-West Semitic, is still undetermined.

(4) The most significant fact about the ostracon, in my view, is the date. If the dating of the level it was found in is correct – late 11th/early 10th century BCE – then the use of this Old Canaanite script is surprising. Within a century or less of the ostracon's writing, another inscription would be made in ancient Israel of a very different sort.

Read the whole thing for his explanations.

Hurva Synagogue Dedicated

2010-03-15T19:39:00.001-05:00

The Hurva Synagogue was dedicated this evening. Located in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, prayers have not been held in the synagogue since it was destroyed in the 1948 war. From the Jerusalem Post:

After a nearly 62-year hiatus, the renowned Hurva synagogue inside the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City has been rebuilt and is again an operational house of prayer.

Hundreds of people, braving the wind and an unexpected Jerusalem chill, crowded into a courtyard opposite the outer walls of the synagogue on Monday night to take part in an official rededication ceremony for the newly-rebuilt shul – which stands in the exact spot it did before its destruction at the hands of the Jordanian Arab Legion during the War of Independence in 1948.

[...]

Rivlin went on to speak of the Hurva’s history, beginning with its first incarnation in 1701, when it was constructed by disciples of Judah Hahasid. Its first destruction came some 20 years later, when those same disciples lacked the funds to repay local creditors, who in return burned the Hurva to the ground.

It was nearly 150 years before the Hurva stood again, but in 1864, after a massive construction project was approved by the Ottoman Turks and funds were procured from Jewish communities the world over, a neo-Byzantine Hurva was soon towering over the rest of the Jewish Quarter.

However, that Hurva, which hosted the likes of Theodor Herzl and Ze’ev Jabotinsky before the creation of the state, also met with ruin. The Jordanian army took Jerusalem’s Old City in May of 1948, loaded the building with explosives and set off a blast whose smoke cloud could be seen miles away.

Arutz-7 has posted a 10-minute video of the service (unedited, almost exclusively singing and music). For previous posts on the reconstruction, see here and here and here.

Dead Sea Scrolls in Minnesota

2010-03-14T15:15:00.001-05:00

A special Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition opened on Friday at the Science Museum of Minnesota. From the Minnesota Daily:

As a precaution against weathering, each set of scrolls can be displayed for just 10 weeks. By the end of October, three sets of five scrolls will have been on display. This is the first time three sets of scrolls have been part of an exhibit in the United States, SMM Vice President Mike Day said.

Imholte said the largest task has been to replicate the cave environment that kept the scrolls so well preserved. The case for each scroll has its own climate control system that keeps the temperature about 68 degrees and the humidity at 50 percent.

Ensuring that the scrolls are lit sufficiently is another battle. Imholte said light is one of the most damaging elements to them.

And although the scrolls are the focal point of the exhibit, they are surrounded by a wide array of archaeological material from the region, which Imholte said will set it apart from all other Dead Sea Scroll exhibits.

“There will never be another one like it, and there has never been one like it before,” he said.

“This exhibit is really one-of-a-kind from the point of view of new material and new way of presenting it,” said Dr. Hava Katz, IAA chief curator of national treasures.

Katz has spent the last 16 years overseeing all Dead Sea Scroll exhibits in her home country of Israel and around the world. As chief curator, she is responsible for more than a million artifacts, the most important of which are the scrolls.

If you’re in the area, you should make plans to visit.

Weekend Roundup

2010-03-13T08:11:00.001-06:00

Insight for Living (with Chuck Swindoll) is now touring Israel, and at the end of each day they’re posting a short video of their travels. Author Wayne Stiles is traveling with them and is also posting daily. One of his photos shows an actor dressed up as King Herod Agrippa I, in his silvery garments (see Acts 12).

You can now view more than 35,000 photos in the Oriental Institute Museum Photo Archives Database. Enter as “guest.”

The Job section of the Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary Set: Old Testament is now posted for free viewing from the

Logos has some great pre-pub prices on some scholarly collections now. My eye was caught by the three-volume World of the Aramaeans ($50; retail $480), but you may be interested in the collections on Daniel, Amos, Biblical Narrative, Chronicles, Samuel, or David. Some of these volumes cost $100 in print, but they are closer to $10 in the pre-publication promotion.

Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History

2010-03-12T08:13:00.001-06:00

The story of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls is a fascinating one, though it’s not always easy to separate fact from fiction. For instance, the notion that a shepherd accidentally discovered the first cave of scrolls while chasing a stray sheep seems less likely given the history of the Bedouin in finding and selling ancient artifacts. The intrigues of the first decade is now clearer with the publication of the first volume of Weston Fields, The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History. The book is being promoted by the publisher with a interesting review by Jerome Murphy-O’Connor. You can download the full review as a Word document here. You can get a flavor from the first paragraphs:

Even though the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered only 62 years ago, much of their early history has been shrouded in obscurity. Details of persons and places were compromised by focus on the scrolls themselves, and on occasion deliberate deception facilitated the continuation of illegal, but highly profitable, excavation. In 1998 Marcel Sigrist, OP, suggested to Weston Fields, Director of the Dead Sea Scrolls Foundation in Jerusalem, that the only way to acquire clarity would be to record critically the testimony of the original eye-witnesses. Some had already died, others were getting old, and this would be the last opportunity.

Fields took up the challenge, and the thoroughness of his oral history is illustrated by the fact that he even gives the number of sheep (about 55) in the care of Muhammed ed-Dib the day he threw the stone into what became Cave 1. The surviving actors were all happy to cooperate, and a number revealed that they had extensive private archives that had never been exploited. These amounted to tens of thousands of pages of precise written and photographic documentation, which was contemporary with the events. This greatly widened the extent of the project, and gave it a much more solid base. No longer did Fields have to rely on aging memories, and the unsupported word of one witness against another. He had documentary evidence that could be compared, contrasted, and critically evaluated. In the case of the ten actors who have died since the project began he just got there in time.

So much material became available that it quickly became clear that one volume would not be enough. The change in de facto ownership of the scrolls in the aftermath of the Israeli invasion of June 1967 might seem an obvious place to break. Fields, however, opts for 1960, both for practical reasons, and because that year caused an even greater upheaval in the publication of the scrolls. The Rockefeller funds supporting the full-time scholars working at the Palestine Archaeological Museum (PAM) dried up, and the team had to disperse to find jobs that ate into the time they could devote to the scrolls. Publication inevitably slowed.

From 1947 to 1960 Fields follows a strictly chronological order, often with subheadings of great precision, e.g. “19 July 1947, Saturday”; “Last week of July 1947” . He wisely refuses to treat the scrolls as a unified whole. The circumstances concerning the discovery, acquisition, and publication of Cave 1, for example, differed radically from those of Cave 4, and again from those of Murabba‘at, and still more from those of Cave 11. Thus separate topics are treated individually and chronologically. Fields is also right in quoting as much as possible from letters and interviews. As he points out, this is the only way “to taste the flavor, and to enjoy the nuances of entire letters or other documents from the earliest actors in the unfolding drama of the scrolls” (13 my emphasis). More importantly, it enables the attentive reader to formulate his or her own conclusions based on the evidence. Was the writer stating a bare fact or merely being ironic or sarcastic? Was the presentation tailored to the recipient?

Download the full review here. You can also read it directly online at Amazon in what initially appears to be the author’s review of his own book. The publisher’s description of the 600-page, $99 book is here. Fields also published a 128-page A Short History in 2006.

HT: Joe Lauer

Jerusalem Dishes

2010-03-11T08:45:00.001-06:00

Rooftops in the Old City, Jerusalem

In the New Jerusalem, everyone will have cable.

Netaim Finally Found!!

2010-03-10T08:41:00.001-06:00

Livescience.com’s report (also on MSNBC) on the site identification of Khirbet Qeiyafa begins with this sentence:

Scientists think they’ve finally found the real location of a city called Neta'im mentioned in the Bible.

I’d rephrase the sentence a little: One historian has proposed that a site is Neta'im.

As for the suggestion that they have finally found the real location, that’s extremely exciting unless you know that the only mention of the place is buried deep in the genealogies of Chronicles (just after the prayer of Jabez). Then they write:

Archaeologists have previously associated Khirbet Qeiyafa with the biblical city Sha’arayim, which means “two gates,” because of the discovery of two gates in the fortress ruins, and because Sha’arayim was also associated with King David in the Bible. But now researchers claim this site is really Neta'im.

Actually, the excavators still believe that Qeiyafa is Sha’arayim, but one historian has proposed that it is Neta'im with very little evidence to support it. In fact, his best argument is that the name Neta'im is preserved somewhere else.

Lectures in Philadelphia: Jerusalem in Babylonia

2010-03-10T08:16:00.001-06:00

Evidence of Jewish exiles living in Babylon in the 6th-5th centuries BC will be the subject of a conference at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. From Newswise:

Saint Joseph's University's Ancient Studies program is sponsoring a conference focusing on a collection of recently discovered documents that shed light on a Jewish settlement in ancient Mesopotamia. “Jerusalem in Babylonia: New Discoveries from the Exilic Period,” will be held March 21-22 in the University's Campion Student Center.

The cuneiform documents date from the fifth and sixth centuries BCE, and are referred to as the “Al-Yahuda texts,” based on the name of the place where the documents themselves say they were drawn up.

“The phrase ‘Al-Yahuda’ means ‘city of Judah,’ which in the Bible refers to Jerusalem,” said Bruce Wells, Ph.D., director of the Ancient Studies program and an assistant professor of theology.

What makes the documents so noteworthy, however, is that they weren’t discovered in Jerusalem. They were found in modern day Iraq, in the territory that was known as Babylonia at the time they were written. That time was the so-called “exilic period” when a number of people from Judah (the southern part of modern day Israel) were taken as captives to Babylonia.

[...]

The conference, which is co-sponsored by SJU's Institute for Jewish-Catholic Relations and Department of Theology, is free and open to the public. It will be held on March 21 from 1:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. and March 22 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Read the article or see the university’s website for more information and contact details.

HT: Yehuda News

Hurva Synagogue Video Tour

2010-03-09T07:43:00.001-06:00

Reconstruction of the Hurva Synagogue is nearly complete and the dedication ceremony is scheduled for next week. Arutz-7 reports on the final stages of the work. Their story includes a 5-minute video tour of the synagogue and an interview with a construction company spokeswoman.

The restoration and construction of the Hurva Synagogue in the Old City of Jerusalem nears completion, with the dedication of the synagogue scheduled for next Monday, March 15. The Company for the Reconstruction and Development of the Jewish Quarter has completed one of the artistic aspects of the project - restoration of the synagogue's wall paintings. Arutz Sheva TV brings you in to the synagogue for a first visit to the restored Hurva.

A significant difficulty in the preservation and internal renewal of the Hurva Synagogue, which had been the center of life in ancient Jerusalem until Arabs destroyed it in 1948, was dealing with the many alterations that took place over the years the synagogue stood. The Holy Ark curtains, wall paintings, lamps, pulpits and other parts of the synagogue had all undergone various changes. leaving the restorers with the need to decide on which period of time the restoration should be based.

[...]

Restoration of the wall paintings entailed conducting a search for the names of the artisans who had decorated the synagogue in each period of time separately, an in-depth analysis of the painting methods and technologies of every period, examination of historical photographs in order to compare colors between black and white photos and those in color, analysis of the paintings' compositions and thorough comparison between the periods, and analysis of issues regarding wall paintings in synagogues in general and in the Hurva in particular.

[...]

The Hurva Synagogue will be dedicated on the eve of Rosh Chodesh (first day of the Hebrew month) Nissan, 5770 (the day construction of the Biblical Tabernacle was completed), in the presence of ministers, Members of Knesset, rabbis and other dignitaries.

The synagogue will host regular prayer services, visitors and tours. During the opening week, the Company for the Reconstruction and Development of the Jewish Quarter will conduct free tours during the day and will show a sound and light presentation during evening hours.

After more than four years, the crane over the Hurva Synagogue was removed this week.

For previous stories and photos, see here and here.

Weekend Roundup

2010-03-07T14:11:00.001-06:00

The level of the Dead Sea rose this winter for the first time in 13 years.

More than 250 silver coins were discovered by a man building his home in Syria, including many tetradrachmas.

An exhibit of 21 “authentic recreations of ancient musical instruments” opens next week in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Two middle-aged men were arrested while surveying an archaeological site in southern Jerusalem with a metal detector.

I think that this online Bible video project would be even better if people read their portions on location.

Bombing of King David Hotel (1946)

2010-03-06T07:15:00.001-06:00

One of my side interests that I’ve not pursued much beyond occasional reading is the history of the land of Israel in the 20th century. This includes the time of the British Mandate and the birth of the state of Israel. My photo projects have always been aligned with courses I have taught—namely, the subjects of historical geography and archaeology, both inside and outside the land of Israel. But as I worked on the creation of photo collections from the American Colony, I saw a worthy set of photos about this important period of history. Thus the Early 20th-Century History CD strays beyond the bounds of “Bible places,” but many, like me, find that their interest in biblical history naturally leads to the dramatic events of recent years.

One reason for this interest is simply that these realities are part of your world when you’re in Israel and Jerusalem in particular. Zion Gate is of interest not only because it leads to Mount Zion with the “tomb of David” and “Upper Room,” but also because of its pockmarked exterior caused by fighting in the War of Independence of 1948. Everything has a story, and these stories explain why things are the way they are.

One story I’ve heard and repeated came more to life for me when I saw the photo below. The King David Hotel was bombed by Jewish terrorists in 1946 and ninety-two people were killed. The hotel was quickly rebuilt and no signs (that I know of) exist. I always had trouble envisioning it, and understanding what was meant that a “wing” of the hotel was destroyed.

King David Hotel after bombing, July 22, 1946

Rather than describe the story myself, I prefer to quote a brief portion from Martin Gilbert’s wonderful book, Jerusalem in the Twentieth Century. If you have any interest in Jerusalem itself, or in the modern history of Israel, I highly recommend this book. Gilbert writes:

Hatred of the British had been inflamed among these two groups [Irgun and Stern Gang] by the refusal of the British to allow survivors of the concentration camps into Palestine. The Jewish terrorists, who included two future Israeli Prime Ministers, Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, believed that by “blood and fire” they could drive the British out of the country, and establish a Jewish State. Their most devastating attack was made on 22 July 1946, when members of the Irgun, disguised as Arabs, brought explosive charges in milk-churns into the hall outside the Regence Cafe in the basement of the King David Hotel. Above the cave, the south wing of the hotel, five floors in all, was being used as the British administrative headquarters. An anonymous woman telephoned the switchboard operator at the hotel to say that the hotel must be evacuated as there would be an explosion “in a few minutes.” Her warning was ignored.

At 12.37 the explosives went off. Five floors and twenty-five rooms collapsed into rubble. Ninety-two persons in the wing were killed: Britons, Arabs and Jews. Among the dead were military and civilian officials, soldiers, clerks, typists, cleaners, drivers and messengers. The British dead included the Postmaster-General of Palestine, G. D. Kennedy, a veteran of the retreat from Mons in 1914. One of the Arabs killed, Jules Gress, a senior assistant accountant with the Secretariat, was a Catholic. He had been an officer in the Turkish army in the First World War, when he was taken prisoner by the British. While at his bank that morning he had asked to be served quickly, so as not to be late for a Secretariat meeting. Commented the Palestine Post: “He hurried back to his duty and his death.”

[...]

The Jewish Agency denounced what it called “the dastardly crime” perpetrated by a “gang of desperadoes,” and called upon the Jews of Palestine “to rise up against these abominable outrages” (172-73).

If, like me, you knew only sketches of the story, perhaps now the picture is clearer.

Policemen Hurt in Attack on Western Wall

2010-03-05T06:35:00.001-06:00

From the Jerusalem Post:

Fifteen policemen were lightly wounded in their attempt to restore order on the Temple Mount after Arab youths emerging from Friday prayers started hurling rocks down onto those worshiping at the Western Wall.

Having restored calm with the use of stun grenades, police left the Temple Mount compound in cooperation with the waqf to allow older worshipers to leave.

[...]

The repeated clashes in Jerusalem follow Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's announcement incorporating the Cave of the Patriarch's in Hebron and Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem onto Israel's list of national heritage sites.

The full article is here. The Haaretz article is similar, but adds this statement:

The clashes later calmed when adult Muslim worshippers dispersed the young stone throwers.

Galil: Qeiyafa is Biblical Netaim

2010-03-04T09:27:00.001-06:00

Gershon Galil has proposed in a message posted on ANE-2 that Khirbet Qeiyafa should be identified with biblical Netaim. You can read the entire message on the list, but he summarizes as follows:

So in my opinion Khirbet Qeiyafa is Neta‘im for three main reasons: (a) it is located near Gederah; (b) its name is preserved in Khirbet En-Nuweiti‘; (c) it was inhabited only in the 10th century. That is why Neta‘im is not mentioned in the list of the cities of Judah in Josh. 15, which is dated to the 8th or 7th century BCE.

Netaim is mentioned only in 1 Chronicles 4:23, and not much can be deduced from this passage. It’s apparent that Netaim is in the territory of Judah, may or may not be located in proximity to Gederah, and was home to a group of royal potters.

1 Chron 4:23 (ESV) These were the potters who were inhabitants of Netaim and Gederah. They lived there in the king’s service.

That’s not a lot to go on. I’m probably less inclined to believe that the name of Netaim was preserved 2 miles (3 km) away, as Galil proposes. That’s a long distance in the densely occupied Iron Age Shephelah.

Elah Valley and vicinity. Red=Kh. Nuweti‘; blue=Kh. Qeiyafa; green=T. Zakariya (Azekah); purple=Kh. Abbad (Socoh). SWP Map 16-17.

Galil has previously offered his translation of the Qeiyafa Ostracon, and he concludes his message by relating his identification to the inscription.

This new identification indicates that Khirbet Qeiyafa/ Neta‘im was inhabited by potters who worked in the king's service. In the same city, a member of a family of scribes (probably also in the king's service), wrote the Qeiyafa inscription, the most ancient and important Hebrew inscription ever found:

[……] (1') do not do (it), but worship […].
(3') Judge the slave and the widow / Judge the orph[an] (3') and the stranger.
Plead for the infant / plead for the poor and (4') the widow.
Avenge (the pauper's vengeance) at the king's hands.
(5') Protect the poor and the slave / suppo[rt] the stranger.

I will be interested to read more of Galil’s argumentation if/when he publishes an article. I think it’s noteworthy that he does not accept Garfinkel’s identification of Qeiyafa as Shaaraim, but he does believe that Qeiyafa had two gates and was settled only in the 10th century.

The Dating of Mazar’s Wall

2010-03-03T08:25:00.001-06:00

Last week Eilat Mazar announced the discovery of a massive wall in Jerusalem dating from the time of Solomon. Unfortunately, the information was communicated on location in a press conference, and it has been difficult to figure out what exactly she said. It seems that ambiguity served her well, for it apparently disguised some important details, such as the fact that most of what she announced she had previously excavated, announced, and published in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. Whatever she discovered in the brief excavation of 2010 either was not announced, not reported, or identical to what she has previously reported.

There are other problems. One concerns the definition of terms. What you think of as a “wall” is what Mazar calls the exterior of two buildings, one of which she (but few others) believes is a gate. Perhaps these buildings served as the defensive line of the city. Perhaps she found a new section in 2010 that is a city wall. But if you’re thinking she found a wall line like at Megiddo, Lachish, Hazor, Dan, or other places in Jerusalem, then you’re mistaken.

Another problem is that her previous publications give the sense that she is changing her interpretation to fit a more biblical narrative and date without new data to support this conclusion. My friend Danny Frese has compared her publications of the site and we think they suggest that her analysis of the data owes more to what she would like to find than what she has found.

Concerning Building C, “The Gatehouse,” she wrote in 1980s about a fill under the floor of the south chamber. The fill held about 50% EB and MB sherds; the latest pottery found in the fill was “from the Iron II” (1987: 62). More specifically:

There was also a small quantity of wheel-burnished sherds [in the fill] which indicate a date sometime in the ninth-seventh centuries B.C.E. (ibid.).

She notes two particular sherds from the fill that are from distinctive bowls which appear in the 10th and 9th centuries (1989: 20).

The ceramic data as presented above do not enable precise determination of the time of construction [of the gatehouse], which must be cautiously defined as between the 9th and 7th centuries B.C.E. (1989: 20).

Unfortunately the finds in the locus [in the south chamber] are extremely scanty and do not permit a more accurate dating than between the 9th and 7th centuries (1989: 59).

But in 2006, she wrote concerning the two sherds from distinctive bowls mentioned above:

Bowls of this type have been studied extensively and date mainly to the 10th century, continuing into the 9th century BCE. The ceramic data were insufficient to provide a more precise determination within the terminus post quem [earliest] time frame for the construction of Building C (2006: 783-84).

In other words, the evidence for dating the gate to the 10th century are two sherds that were also in use in the 9th century.

Concerning Building D, “The Royal Building,” she wrote in 1989 about the dating of the lower floor, beneath which was:

an intact black juglet of the type characteristic of the 10th and 9th centuries B.C.E. The juglet was found hidden between stones of one of the foundation walls of the room, as if it had been placed there intentionally by the builders as a sort of private foundation deposit. On the basis of the pottery finds, including the juglet, the time of the laying of the lower floor, and hence also of the entire building, can be determined as the 9th-early 8th centuries B.C.E. (1989: 60).

But in 2006, with no additional excavations having occurred since 1989, she wrote about the black juglet:

It was found hidden, as though placed there intentionally by the builders as a construction offering of sorts. The juglet appears to be characteristic of the 10th century BCE; there are clear differences between this early type of juglet and its later 8th-century form, examples of which were also found in the excavations on the eastern slope of the Western Hill. Unless further research conducted on the typology of black juglets indicates otherwise, it seems clear that the early type with the straight neck, ovoid body, and button base, like the example found in the Ophel, is characteristic first and foremost of the 10th century BCE (2006: 784).

The question we ask: what changed? Distinguishing between pottery of the 10th and 9th centuries has not been clarified in the intervening years. If anything, the debate has only intensified. Yet Mazar concludes in her 2006 article:

A new understanding of the finds from the excavations of the monumental fortification line in the Ophel has enabled its dating to as early as the 10th century BCE (2006: 75).

The “new understanding” was a reinterpretation of a juglet to an earlier date without any supporting evidence. That allows the entire “gate complex” to be dated to the 10th century. And suddenly you can publish an article entitled “The Solomonic Wall in Jerusalem.”

Given her press conference announcement, we presume that she found new material in her 2010 excavations that confirm her earlier conclusions. Her case would be more compelling, however, if it didn’t appear that she had a pre-determined outcome.

Sources Cited:

Mazar, Eilat. “Ophel Excavations, Jerusalem, 1986.” Israel Exploration Journal 37.1 (1987) 60-63.

Mazar, Eilat and Benjamin Mazar, Excavations in the South of the Temple Mount: The Ophel of Biblical Jerusalem. Qedem 29. Jerusalem: Hebrew University, 1989.

Mazar, Eilat. “The Solomonic Wall in Jerusalem.” Pp. 775-86 in “I Will Speak the Riddles of Ancient Times”: Archaeological and Historical Studies in Honor of Amihai Mazar on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday. Edited by A. Maeir and P. de Miroschedji. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2006.

The Letter and the Scroll

2010-03-02T08:24:00.001-06:00

I received in the mail today a new book from National Geographic, The Letter and the Scroll: What Archaeology Tells Us About the Bible. I’m not mentioning it only because I am pleased that some of my photos are in a National Geographic book, but also because readers here may not be aware of it. As you would expect with National Geographic, the book is loaded with stunning photographs. Some that I really enjoyed as I flipped through include:

An aerial view of the excavations of Herod’s Tomb at Herodium
Father de Vaux and Lankester Harding working at the entrance of one of the Qumran caves
A locust swarm over southern Israel in 2004
An aerial photo of Nebi Samwil after a snowfall
A nice rolling stone tomb image with burial niches visible inside
An aerial view of the Broad Wall while excavations were in progress

In addition, there are many maps and beautiful aerial photographs of sites in Israel. I could do a separate post just on the dozens of photos of ancient inscriptions, some of which I’ve studied and taught, but not seen photos of previously.

I noted a few bumps along the way:

The close-up of the Hulda Gate is turned on its side (p. 156) .
The photo of Dhiban on page 179 is actually Samaria (Sebaste).
They say that the Jeroboam seal “is likely a reference to the Lion of Judah.” Probably not, since Jeroboam was a king of the north and the seal was found at Megiddo.
The Church of the Nativity is dated to the 11th century, but it actually goes back to the 6th.

I don’t have time to read through the book at present, but from a brief overview it appears to take an approach characteristic of mainstream scholars today. For example, they assume a late date for the book of Daniel. On the other hand, in connection with the 10th-century Gezer Calendar and Khirbet Qeiyafa inscriptions, they say, “Political consolidation under Kings David and Solomon may have promoted writing by providing royal support for scribes and schools” (p. 18).

The writers’ intention is “not to prove or disprove the Bible but to explore the world that gave rise to its Scripture and consider them in their historical context—an approach that can enhance one’s appreciation for the Bible both as a work of history and as a statement of faith. Reverence for Scripture can withstand careful study, as shown long ago by devout scholars like Martin Luther...” (p. 19). Based on other books written by Robin Currie, I would guess that he is a man of faith.

The scope of the book reaches from “Sumer and Akkad: Land of Abraham” to “Jerusalem: A Land Besieged” after the time of Christ. It looks like a fun and interesting book, especially when you can get it for only $26 from Amazon (or used for $9)!

Weekend Roundup

2010-02-28T13:59:00.001-06:00

You never know what will start a riot in Israel. In this case, it was the government’s adding two historical sites to a list of 150 that should be restored. Today Israeli police forces entered the Temple Mount in order to remove 20 masked protesters who were throwing objects at tourists.

G. M. Grena notes that BAR has posted a good photograph of the Qeiyafa Ostracon.

Egypt has announced the discovery of a large red granite head of Pharaoh Amenhotep III in his mortuary temple on Luxor’s West Bank.

Tom Powers has followed up the “Under the Temple Mount” post here with some beautiful watercolors of the same areas on his blog.

If you’re looking for more reaction to Eilat Mazar’s “10th century” “wall” announced last week, take a look at this roundup by John Hobbins. I expect to post more on the matter this coming week.

Today is Purim and in honor of this festive holiday, the Israel Antiquities Authority has posted an online exhibit of “Masks, Rattles and Purim Customs.” Some images are available in high resolution here (zip).

Under the Temple Mount

2010-02-26T09:35:00.001-06:00

I want to return to a recent post on the 360 degree views in Jerusalem. There are some images here that I did not notice or note carefully before, including Solomon’s Stables, the Well of the Souls, and the passageway of the Double Gate.

First, go to the Al Aqsa tour. Counting the images from the left, #6-8 show Al-Marwani Mosque, built a decade ago inside the area known traditionally as “Solomon’s Stables.” You can see the Herodian masonry in the columns.

#9 is the Well of the Souls, the cave underneath the Dome of the Rock.

#10-11 were taken inside the passageway of the “Double Gate.” If you look up you can see the beautifully carved (but now plastered over) domes from Herod’s time.

These are really extraordinary images of places that are very difficult for non-Muslims to access. The limited captions on the website do not explain what you’re seeing. Leen Ritmeyer has a nice screenshot showing the domes.

BiblePlaces Newsletter Move

2010-02-25T09:02:00.000-06:00

The BiblePlaces Newsletter is being sent out today from a new server. Most subscribers were transferred directly, but about 10% will receive a confirmation email which requires that they click on the link in order to continue their subscription.

If you do not receive the newsletter by the end of the day (it sometimes takes some hours for the server to process all of them), you can do this:

Check your “Spam” or “Junk E-Mail” folder. In an effort to get rid of spam, some filters remove the wheat with the chaff. If you find it there, change your settings so that you receive the newsletter directly each time.
Verify your subscription. Go here and type in your email address. If you’re already subscribed, it will tell you. If you’re not already subscribed, you will receive a confirmation email. (If it doesn’t arrive, check your “Spam” folder.) Click the link in that email and you’ll be set.

As always, we hate spam and promise to never use your email address for any purpose other than this newsletter. And you are always free to unsubscribe at any time.

Aren Maeir Lecturing in New England

2010-02-24T06:03:00.000-06:00

Aren Maeir, excavator of Philistine Gath, will be lecturing in New England next week. From his blog:

On Wednesday, March 3rd, I will be giving two lectures at Brandeis University. The first one, entitled: “The Archaeology of Love and Sex in the Ancient Near East” will be from 2:10 – 3:30 pm at Lown 202, as part of Prof. M. Brettler’s class “The Song of Songs”.

The second one, entitled: “Canaanites, Philistines, Israelites and Crusaders: The Excavations at Tell es-Safi/Gath, Israel” will from 5:10 – 6:30 pm at Lown 2, as part of a joint lecture for the Depts. of Anthropology and of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies.

On Thursday, March 4th, I’ll be presenting a lecture at the Laboratory for Engineering Man/Machine Systems at Brown University, on the excavations at Tell es-Safi/Gath.

If anyone is in the area, please do feel free to come to these talks.

These sound interesting!

Previous Publication of Mazar’s “Solomonic Wall”

2010-02-23T10:23:00.001-06:00

A.D. Riddle has pointed me to a chapter that Eilat Mazar published a few years ago entitled “The Solomonic Wall in Jerusalem” (full bibliographic data below).

It includes a diagram similar to the one published on Hebrew U’s Facebook page yesterday. I’ve added labels in English.

Mazar’s diagram with English labels added (original here)

My impression in reading Mazar’s chapter is that yesterday’s press conference was mostly a re-statement of the conclusions of her 2006 article, which was based on her excavations in the 1980s. In short, she argues that Building C is a four-chambered inner gatehouse which may have been an entrance into a royal palace. She notes that its dimensions are “virtually identical” to those of palace Gate 1567 at Megiddo VA-IVB. With regard to date, she states that “the ceramic data were insufficient to provide a more precise determination within the terminus post quem time frame for the construction of Building C.”

She found two floors in Building D, the later of which was laid “no earlier than the 8th century.” She believes an intact black juglet was placed under a foundation stone as a “construction offering” and dates the building to the 10th century.

She concludes in part:

Based on the finds sealed below the floors of Buildings C and D, the construction of the fortification complex in the Ophel should be dated to the 10th century BCE. This date corresponds to the biblical passage announcing that King Solomon built a defensive wall around Jerusalem. There is no reason to assume that someone other than Solomon constructed or reconstructed the Ophel fortification line at some time during the 10th-9th centuries BCE.

It sounds as if Mazar has found more evidence in her recent excavation that confirms her previous conclusion that this fortification system dates to the time of Solomon. I don’t believe that her previous conclusions met with much enthusiasm from the scholarly community; we’ll see how the archaeologists evaluate her new material.

The bibliographic data for this publication is as follows:

Mazar, Eilat. 2006 “The Solomonic Wall in Jerusalem.” Pp. 775-786 in “I Will Speak the Riddles of Ancient Times”: Archaeological and Historical Studies in Honor of Amihai Mazar on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday. Ed. A. Maeir and P. de Miroschedji. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns.

This two-volume work is available from Eisenbrauns.

Follow-Up on Mazar’s Iron Age Buildings

2010-02-23T09:26:00.001-06:00

There was some question yesterday about the purpose of the dig and the relationship of the material excavated in the 1980s with that uncovered recently. Science Daily gives some background:

The excavations in the Ophel area were carried out over a three-month period with funding provided by Daniel Mintz and Meredith Berkman, a New York couple interested in Biblical Archeology. The funding supports both completion of the archaeological excavations and processing and analysis of the finds as well as conservation work and preparation of the site for viewing by the public within the Ophel Archaeological Park and the national park around the walls of Jerusalem.

This sounds like a clean-up dig, where the archaeologist returns to the area to do some additional work in preparation for publication of the reports. Unfortunately, Mazar seems to have presented it as all brand-new discoveries. I’m still not sure what they “know” now that they didn’t “know” six months ago.

The Arutz-7 article now includes a 4-minute video of Eilat Mazar. Unfortunately the guy holding the video camera doesn’t seem to know where to point the camera, as he shows lots of excavations entirely unrelated to the Iron Age wall, “gate,” and tower. The explanation is geared towards those who are new to the subject and she doesn’t clearly answer the reporter’s question about what is new and what is not.

G. M. Grena notes in a comment to yesterday’s post that the three LMLK handles shown in an excavation photo have not been published previously.

Leen Ritmeyer comments on his blog about the difficulty of identifying one of the structures as a gate:

The possibility of having found an Iron Age gateway was proposed in confidentiality to Eilat Mazar by myself, but it was reported to the press before I was given a chance to explore this hypothesis (Jerusalem Post, April 22, 1986). The difficulty of identifying the building that was excavated by the late Prof. Benjamin Mazar with a gateway is that the chambers are constructed very differently from gate chambers of that period.

Ritmeyer has some other interesting observations, though be sure to note his update and the comment by Barnea Levi Selavan.

The Jerusalem Post reports on the story and includes this caution from a friendly archaeologist:

Aren Maeir, an archeology professor at Bar Ilan University, said he has yet to see evidence that the fortifications are as old as Mazar claims. There are remains from the 10th century in Jerusalem, he said, but proof of a strong, centralized kingdom at that time remains "tenuous."

Jonathan Tobin writes in Commentary:

These new discoveries, along with those of a previous dig in a different area of the city of David, contradict contrary Palestinian claims that the Jews have no claim to the area. They also debunk the assertions of some Israeli archeologists who have sought to portray the kingdom of David and Solomon as an insignificant tribal group and not the regional empire that the Bible speaks about.

My response: since the issue has obvious political implications that can be seized on by guys like Tobin, archaeologists have a greater burden to exercise care in publicizing their finds. Mazar’s approach seems to be the opposite: get the sensational headline before careful analysis or peer review can be done. Sometimes this leads to embarrassing situations like reading an inscription backwards.

I find this photo and photo caption interesting:

Archeologist Eilat Mazar, center in red...

She certainly knows how to get attention...

Eilat Mazar’s 1980s Excavations and Today

2010-02-22T09:01:00.001-06:00

Concerning Mazar’s “discoveries” announced earlier today, I think that some readers would be interested in the report given in the New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land (1993). A section on the Ophel was written by Hillel Geva and I quote it at length because (1) it reveals what was discovered in the previous excavation that appears to be re-reported as new today and (2) it indicates that the identification of the building as a gate was the excavator’s identification. I have marked some statements in bold for emphasis.

In 1986 to 1987, B. Mazar and E. Mazar continued to excavate the complex of Iron Age II public buildings in the southeastern part of the Ophel. The buildings were partially unearthed in B. Mazar’s 1970 excavations; he identified them as remains of the biblical “house of Millo.” The renewed excavations revealed many additional remains that add up to a complex of several interconnected, but well-defined building units. The quality of the construction is impressive, featuring thick walls founded on bedrock, sometimes preserved to a height of some 4 m. The first stages of these buildings date to the ninth century BCE, at the earliest; they were destroyed, together with the rest of Jerusalem in 586 BCE, as the visible signs of destruction and conflagration indicate.

The remains of building C consisted of the walls of two rooms, the foundations of the walls of other rooms, and sections of floors. They have been identified as belonging to a four-chamber gatehouse of the type characteristic of the Iron Age II. The earlier excavations had exposed dozens of vessels, including many storage jars, in the gate’s southwestern chamber. Building D, which adjoins building C on the east, consisted of several rooms, in which pithoi [large storage jars] were found, suggesting that the building was a storehouse.

The various building units combined to form a dense complex whose outer walls created a continuous line of fortifications along the eastern side of the Ophel, overlooking the Kidron Valley. The gate may be associated with the large tower (building B) to the south, discovered by Warren in the Ophel wall between 1867 and 1870, and with another, smaller tower (building A) whose eastern side Kenyon exposed in 1967 in her site SII.

The gate has been identified with the biblical “Water Gate” (Neh. 3:26) that was part of the complex known as the “upper house of the king.” The excavators believe that it was a gate in the western section of the Jerusalem city wall, providing access to a separate royal quarter, which stood on the Ophel until the end of the First Temple period (Vol. 2, p. 715).

Given this report, I cannot determine what, if anything, has been discovered recently. The only thing that appears to have changed is the date (back now to the time of Solomon).

Massive Wall in Jerusalem Dated to Solomon’s Time

2010-02-22T08:45:00.001-06:00

Eilat Mazar announced today the discovery of a large stone wall that she attributes to King Solomon. The article with the most detail is at the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs (with a copy here). Arutz-7 has a similar report, and others have brief summaries. Trying to sort out all the pieces is a little difficult from these sources, but here’s a summary:

A well-built wall was uncovered that is 220 feet (70 m) long and 20 feet (6 m) high. The width is not given. The wall is located on the eastern side of the Ophel atop the western slope of the Kidron Valley (see photo below). She dates it “with a great degree of assurance” to the 10th century BC on the basis of (1) comparison with walls and gates in other cities and (2) pottery.
A large four-chambered gatehouse was found, similar in style to those at Megiddo, Beersheba, and Ashdod. This gatehouse is 20 feet (6 m) high.
A tower adjacent to the gate is buried underneath the road but is believed to be 75 by 60 feet (24 by 18 m) in size.

The report mentions some inscriptions, but it is not clear what was found in Mazar’s dig and what comes from the Temple Mount debris sifting operation. These should not be reported in the same article, and I sense that some of these inscriptions have been announced previously. [See update below.]

In fact, I think that a good portion of these “discoveries” were made already in 1986-87. Mazar excavated in the southern portion of her grandfather’s “southern Temple Mount excavations” and claimed that she found an Iron Age gate. The article mentions in this connection large storage jars, and I am sure that these were published decades ago. Thus, I surmise that the present excavation is an extension of the old one, but that they are reporting old and new together, without distinguishing between them. It’s fine to report previous discoveries in order to give context, but that does not appear to be how the excavation results are being communicated to the journalists.

Mazar’s claim that the building she excavated in the 1980s was an Iron Age gate never met with widespread (or even non-widespread) agreement among archaeologists. They felt that the evidence did not support the identification as a gate. I’ll write more on this in a follow-up post.

Sources tell me that Mazar has found some very interesting material than has not yet been announced.

Excavation area (circled) south of the Temple Mount

UPDATE: BibleX points to this Hebrew article which has better photos of the excavation and discoveries.

UPDATE #2: I’ve learned that the reason why the Temple Mount Sifting Project was mentioned is that Mazar contracted with them to wet-sift some of her material. Also, there are some more photos from the excavation at the Hebrew U’s Facebook page.

Weekend Roundup

2010-02-21T14:27:00.001-06:00

Leen Ritmeyer has posted a reconstruction drawing of Jerusalem during the Byzantine period, including an arrow pointing to the newly discovered Decumanus. (I think that I am the only one calling this street the Decumanus.)

Foundation Stone has a slideshow with 16 photos of the Decumanus excavation and press conference.

A 10th century Arabic inscription was discovered in excavations in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem. The IAA press release is here, but you can apparently only access the high-res photos by a direct link (zip).

Yahoo has a slideshow with about 5 photos of the Byzantine winepress.

Israel has added the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron and the Tomb of Rachel in Bethlehem to their list of national heritage sites.

HT: Joe Lauer