BBS Biblical
Flashback
Introduction
What is for the most part an exact
copy of the script follows. There are a
few places where individual speakers could neither be heard nor understood: for
this we apologize. Every effort was made
to be precise: there were just spots that defeated us. Since this is a quote in its entirety it
seemed unnecessary to mark it with quotation marks. The notation for each speaker is tedious
enough: Narrator, Reader, etc. If you
discover bothersome errors please reply to this Blog and point them out. You may verify the script more easily by
starting to replay it where the “time” stamps indicate discussion begins. The second of the above links is free from
advertising and thus easier to use.
http://swantec-oti.blogspot.com/
This is a radical rewriting of
history, designed to undermine the actual history of the period. The flashback to Abraham is unrelated to
1208. The flash ahead to David and Goliath
avoids all the relevant material from the Bible, which must be studied in
detail to provide reality for this period.
Several false claims, must be
refuted. The Israelites did not write
the Bible. The Jews did not discover
monotheism. Monotheism does not lead to
Yahweh, the God of the Bible; it is not a foundation for Christianity, Islam,
or modern life. The synthesis is not at
all new.
Script
A
Biblical Flashback (time 6:00)
N: The ancient Israelites are best known for familiar
stories that chronicle their history, Abraham and Isaac, Moses and the Ten Commandments,
David and Goliath. It is the ancient
Israelites who write the Bible.[1] Through writing the Hebrew Bible the belief of
the ancient Israelites survived to become Judaism, one of the world’s oldest
continuously practiced religions. And it
is the Jews who give the world an astounding legacy, the belief in One
God. This belief will become the
foundation of two other great monotheistic religions, Christianity, and
Islam. Often called the Old Testament to
distinguish it from the New Testament which describes the events of early
Christianity; today, the Hebrew Bible, and the belief in one God are woven into
the very fabric of world culture. But in
ancient times all peoples, from the Egyptians, to the Greeks, to the
Babylonians, worshipped many gods, usually in the form of idols.[2] How did the Israelites, alone among ancient
peoples, discover the concept of One God?
How did they come up with an idea that so profoundly changed the world?[3] Now, archaeologists and biblical scholars are
arriving at a new synthesis that promises to reveal not only fresh historical insights,
but a deeper meaning of what the authors of the Bible wanted to convey. They start by digging into the earth and the
Bible.
Dever: You cannot afford to ignore biblical
text, especially if you can isolate it from the kernel of truth behind these
stories, and then you have the archaeological data.[4] Now, what happens when text and artifacts
seem to point in the same direction?
Then I think we are on very sound ground historically.
Commentary
Having begun with the Merneptah
Stele dated at 1208, we are now hopelessly lost with an irrelevant flashback to
Abraham (1951-1736) and Isaac, Moses and the Ten Commandments. The only function of this flashback is to
cast doubt on the historicity of Genesis.
Given the date of 1208 as a target,
we should have begun with a terminus a quo for the Exodus at either 1446 or
1406. The difference in years is caused
by a text variation between the Masoretic Text (MT) and the Septuagint
(LXX). When 40 years is allowed for the
Wilderness Wanderings we may estimate the date for Joshua crossing the Jordan
at either 1406 or 1366. Our terminus ad quem
would be 966 for the fourth year of Solomon in either case.[5] If we take 970 as the year of Solomon’s
ascension; then 1010 would be the date of David’s ascension over Judah.[6] David ascended to the monarchy 7 years, 6
months later 1003/02. So 1010 marks the
end of the period called Judges.[7]
So it is the period of Joshua and
Judges from 1406 or 1366 to 1010 which is right around our target date of 1208,
which should be our range of interest, rather than Genesis, or anything else in
Torah. Torah is simply irrelevant to the
topic at hand.[8] The information sources for this period are
Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and 1 Samuel, together with the first four chapters of 2
Samuel, Psalms, and 1 Chronicles. This
is what should have been the subject matter for any flashback related to the
Merneptah Stele.
By 1406 or 1366 the Israelites had
conquered several nations east of the Jordan, and no doubt left woman,
children, and non-combatant men behind in occupation of the newly gained east
bank territories.
What happened next? What happened during this period? Joshua crossed the Jordan with the
Israelites.[9] Yahweh waged war against Jericho.[10] Contrary to the popular spiritual, it was not
“Joshua fit the battle of Jericho.” Then
Joshua embarked upon two campaigns against Ai and Bethel, during the first of
which, Israel was defeated.[11] Finally Joshua participated in three major campaigns
or raiding parties: first through the center of the Holy Land, second to the
south, and third to the north;[12] returning to his main
camp at Gilgal.[13]
These campaigns are too frequently
understood as the obliteration of Canaan. However, few people with military experience
would have this understanding of the account.
Joshua faced organized armed resistance.
Noncombatants hid themselves, and possibly even Canaanite reserves
retreated from combat out of fear and certainty of defeat.[14] What Joshua annihilated was the armed
resistance that confronted him, nothing more.
These major battles were not generally conducted within cities. Nor did Joshua conduct a slash and burn
campaign. Hazor was one of the few
cities which Joshua was said to have burned.[15] When Joshua departed from Hazor, he did not
leave a battalion behind, he didn’t leave anything behind.
Subsequent to these campaigns the
Israelites did not meet any major armed resistance for perhaps ten or so years.[16] Even so the work of conquest was not
finished.[17]
What happened as soon as Joshua
returned to Gilgal after the last campaign, since no armies of occupation were
left behind in the west? As soon as Joshua
was gone, the noncombatants came out of hiding and began to clean up. Routed reserve units reorganized. Enemy nations like Egypt, Philistia, Edom,
Ammon, Moab, Syria, Assyria, and possibly the Hittites, saw a chance to
stabilize regional control and gain political influence. Even though Joshua had decisively won every
major battle except for the first battle of Ai, he had conquered too much land
to occupy.[18] This amounts to sixteen or seventeen acres of
land for each Israelite soldier to rid of enemy guerrillas and insurgents: not
so easy to do in rugged hilly highland terrain.
Five acres of land is a lot for a man to manage without the aid of
modern agricultural equipment, and without any enemies. Moreover, the Israelites were saddled with
inferior bronze weapons.[19]
After every major direct conflict,
the broken and defeated armies automatically revert to guerrilla warfare, if
they have any resistance left at all; or they resort to crime. The Israelites did not readily take up the
duties of an army of occupation.[20] The Canaanites were given space and time to
regroup, thus necessitating a second battle of Hazor.[21] Caleb and his family alone are reported to
have taking this occupational duty seriously.[22]
The book of Judges describes such an
occupation as an era of extreme turmoil, during which Israel was not always
dominant. Not only did the Israelites
quit on Yahweh; but Yahweh also got “fed up”, and quit on them.[23] This turmoil provides the background for the
suffering of Ruth, and continues through 1 Samuel; where the decisive defeat of
the Israelites at the hands of the Philistines is described in detail.
Later when The Bible’s Buried
Secrets chooses to finally address this era they will conveniently
avoid all of this material from Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel
Chapters 1 through 4, Psalms[24], and 1 Chronicles, even
though it provides the perfect intersection with the Merneptah Stele and 1208. They will conveniently avoid any reference to
Eli, Samuel, or Saul, and the many prominent events and persons that lie in
between.
Instead The Bible’s Buried
Secrets ignores all of this material and immediately leaps to David and
Goliath. From thence, the irrelevant
leap to a false idea about biblical authorship is immediately made. It is simply untrue to say, “It is the
ancient Israelites who write the Bible.”
It is equally misleading to suggest that such a national writing process
evolved into Judaism. Rather, we should
say that Yahweh, through the Bible and through suffering forged the Israelites
into whatever they are today. Judaism,
however, lapses and fails to become the foundation of much of anything:
certainly not a foundation for either Christianity or Islam. It is equally false to claim “the Hebrew
Bible, and the belief in one God are woven into the very fabric of world
culture.” What is firmly woven into modern
world culture is pagan animistic and pantheistic polytheism, and this has been
true since at least 1449 AD.[25] There is also evidence from ancient times
that at least some people were monotheistic Yahweh worshipers.[26] Nor is this synthesis new; it was first
invented in the nineteenth century by Julius Wellhausen.[27]
Conclusion
This is a radical rewriting of
history, designed to undermine the actual history of the period. The flashback to Abraham is unrelated to
1208. The flash ahead to David and
Goliath avoids all the relevant material from the Bible, which must be studied
in detail to provide reality for this period.
Several false claims, must be
refuted. The Israelites did not write
the Bible. The Jews did not discover
monotheism. Monotheism does not lead to
Yahweh, the God of the Bible; it is not a foundation for Christianity, Islam,
or modern life. The synthesis is not at
all new.
[1]
This in defiance of the claim that Moses and the prophets wrote the Bible.
[2]
constructed from various materials
[3]
Where is JHVH in this discussion? Where
is the claim that JHVH appeared to the Israelites in His Shəkinah
Glory and revealed Himself to them? The
theocentric idea that God found them, is turned inside-out to pose the
impossible anthropocentric question, “How did they find Him? Answer: They did not; they could not; they
were hopelessly enslaved. It is amazing
how one can reconstruct an ancient archaeological narrative, as long as one is
willing to erase or ignore the central claim of the document. Once JHVH and His Shəkinah Glory
are deleted, one can literally get away with murder, by way of reinterpreting
the evidence.
[4]
This is a profound observation. Without
the Bible, we would not know where to dig in search of archaeological evidence;
or what to call it, once it is found.
Archaeology is totally dependent on the Bible, but the Bible remains
independent of archaeology. Although
Dever claims, “You cannot afford to ignore biblical text,” this does not mean
that he intends to respect the biblical text, or that it expresses any
authority of Yahweh over his life.
Rather, Dever intends to pick and choose from the Bible as he sees
fit. In such a case, the god who
authorizes and empowers the Bible is Dever himself. This is nothing less than self-idolization.
[5] The
terminus a quo is calculated from the terminus ad quem. The terminus ad quem is a firmly fixed date,
being verified by the inscriptions related to Shishak I or Shoshenq I on the Bubastite Portal at Karnak
and many other cross linkages. See 1
Kings 6:1. The MT has 480 years in this
verse; while LXX has 440 years. The
terminus a quo is calculated, simply by adding 480 or 440 to 966, getting
either 1446 or 1406 as a result.
Discovering which of 1446 or 1406 is better is more difficult. For decades we have adhered blindly to the
MT: yet, this becomes a kind of idolatry in its own right. Today, we tend to prefer LXX: this requires a
complete restudy of all the dating prior to 1010, which we do not have either
the tools or the time to accomplish presently.
So our investigation of Joshua and Judges will have to live with a
potential 40-year error. Considering the
material of Judges, such a 40-year error in dating is almost irrelevant.
Later in these blogs, we will have much more to say about the Bubastite Portal at Karnak, and provide
more detailed references then.
[6] 2
Samuel 5:4-5
[7]
Because of the sound linkage with 966 this must also be considered a fixed
date; the ascension of David is not really debatable.
[8]
Even if the bogus theory that Torah was written in 500 is accepted for the sake
of argument, the subject matter is still irrelevant; it simply has no
relationship to the events between 1406 and 1010 whatsoever.
[9]
Joshua chapters 2 through 4
[10]
Joshua chapter 6
[11]
Joshua chapters 7 through 8
[12]
Joshua chapters 10 through 11
[13]
Joshua 4:19, 20; 5:9, 10; 9:6; 10:6, 7, 9, 15, 43; 12:23; 14:6
[15] It
is possible that only chariots were actually burned. Joshua 11:6, 9, 13
[16]
Joshua 11:23
[17]
Joshua 13:1; Judges 2:23; 3:1-7
[18]
Modern Israel, excluding the east and west banks, occupies in excess of 8,000
square miles. With no stretch of
imagination, including both east and west banks, Joshua needed to bring 16,000
square miles of territory under control.
That’s a land area bigger than Maryland; half the size of South Carolina. That’s in excess of ten million acres. At that time the census if Israelites was
603,550 male combatants: including women, children, and other noncombatants, a
gross population of as many as 2.5 million.
This amounts to an average of 4 acres per person, most of whom would be
city dwellers. Each soldier would need
to keep piece over 16 or more acres.
This is not difficult if a region is free from criminal or other enemy
behavior.
[19]
We are on the brink of the coming Iron Age in Israel. It is clear from the text that some, perhaps
all, of the Canaanites had already reached the Iron Age. Although the Israelites were able to capture
iron, there is no indication either that the Canaanites gave up their iron
metallurgy, or that the Israelites figured out how to crack such iron
metallurgy. The “trade secret” gave the
Canaanites a distinct military advantage, especially in terrains where iron
could be employed to advantage against bronze or brass. It is thought that a steel sword could cut
through a bronze sword with a single blow, yet swords are not mentioned, only
chariots. The place name, Iron, may
indicate that this was the only iron smelting facility in existence at this
time. Joshua 6:19, 24; 8:31; 17:16, 18;
19:38; 22:8; Judges 1:19; 4:3, 13.
[20]
Joshua 13:13; 15:63; 16:10; 17:12, 13; 23:13; Judges 1:19, 21, 27-36; 2:1-3,
11-13; 3-1-7
[21] The
first battle of Hazor is recorded in Joshua 11:1-13. The second battle of Hazor is recorded in
Judges Chapters 4 and 5. It should be
clear that Jabin is not a personal name: it is some sort of family (last) name
or Canaanite title. Sisera
is most likely a family name as well.
Neither battle was fought within the city proper of Hazor, but both
battles led to the eventual conquest of the city. Hazor was choice real estate and valuable for
occupation and reoccupation: as soon as Solomon occupied it, he made it a
fortress. The time span between the
first and second battles for Hazor is roughly 171 years. Since the time span between the start of the
first and second world wars was only 25 years, it does not stretch our
credulity to believe that multiple battles were fought over major cities, and
that rebuilding immediately followed the cessation of conflict. Joshua and Judges report to us the exact
nature of war and occupation.
[22] Joshua
14:6-14; 15:13-18; 21:12; Judges 1:12-20; 3:9
[23]
The first time, at Ai, was relatively minor, lasting only a few days. The second time, with the Philistines was
colossal, lasting years. The final time,
yet to come, would be nearly permanent, lasting centuries, even millennia.
[24]
Psalm 76:8-11, 54-72, especially verse 66; 106:34-43; 135:10-12; 136:17-22; 141:7
[25]
The close of the Council of Florence
[26] Genesis
Chapters 5; 10; 11 through 50; Exodus Chapters 1 through 18, especially Moses’
father (Amram: See Exodus 6:20; Number 26:59) mother (Jochebed) and sister
(Miriam), as well as Jethro (Moses’ father-in law); Psalm 110:4
[27] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Wellhausen
[28] If you have been blessed or helped by any of these meditations,
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