-Jay-

Hi, reniaa! :wave:

Despite the potential re-use of stones and building materials, evidence of the scope of ancient Jerusalem persists in the form of things as refuse pits, cleared areas, in-fills of post-holes, and such like. There are subtle clues that are relevant to modern archaeologists that wouldn't have seemed useful to diggers 50 years ago.

Certainly reuse of materials removes some evidence, but not all. (If you're interested in a little background, we've got a member here, Hex, who's a professional archaeologist - he's not the only one, either. Hex's posts are usually very detailed and well written. If you're not familiar with him, I'd highly recommend that you search for some of his posts just to get a feel for what modern archaeological techniques can tell us.)

TV documentaries are notorious for their biases. You really have to be careful when you watch them. Anyone can produce a documentary, and they can say pretty much whatever they want. That doesn't necessarily mean they're lying to their viewers, but it certainly benefits the viewers to dig a little deeper if it's a subject they're interested in.

regards,

NinJay

reniaa

hey ninjay

I would agree with what you say but I do still think it's logical to assume that particularily jerusalem has been degraded by 100's of years of interest and I actually agree with an above poster that past religious archaeologists trying to prove bible stories, in their zealousness must have done a lot of damage. I was also thinking of modern actifact sellers too, there is now a booming trade in forgeries of bible actifacts which unfortunately are usually genuine objects from past that are made "more interesting" with hebrews letters engraved on them. I'm thinking of the james ossuary

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Ossuary

surely all of this does compromise jerusalem as a source of archaeological discovery?

Doesn't egypt have similar problems?

Johnny Skeptic

Message to reniaa: Why are you so interested in Biblical archaeology? There is lots of archeological evidence regarding many ancient cultures.

If the God of the Bible exists, if he wanted to provide convincing evidence, all that the would have needed to do would have been to makes lots of predictions regarding when and where some natural disasters would occur, month, day, and year. No God would have any trouble convincing people that he can predict the future.

Johnny Skeptic

What kinds of contradictions do you mean?

What evidence do you have that contradicts the history of all other religious books?

What evidence do you have that contradicts deism?

Regarding the widely accepted claim that King Nebuchadnezzar was a real person, why would anyone want to contradict that claim? The same goes for a number of other people that the Bible mentions that most scholars believe existed.

Withered

The kind where the bible, or a christian interpreting the bible, is clearly and poignantly shown to be wrong. This stems from a desire to be able to counter all of the arguments christians throw at me.
I don't have any. At least not unless they fall into the trap of making claims about everyday stuff like gravity or the like.
This is due to the fact that i am pretty much an apatheist (sp?) regarding pretty much every other religion. Only when i am forced to deal with a religion on a daily basis, or exposed to it's fundies that i read up on it, and learn to deal with it's followers. Hence my time here on IIDB.
I would have to have evidence that supports the notion of a god before i could search for evidence it left or died, right? I have never looked too closely into deism, and have never been preached at by a deist, so...i know very little about it.
Personally i am only interested in contradicting things that christians and their holy book say that are known in this day and age to be untrue. For example, the previously mentioned flood and exodus stories.

Bring them to understand that they are making claims that are not based on fact, or even good science most of the time, and maybe they will either reconsider trying to preach at me and mine, or...run away when presented with overwhelming evidence. With any luck, my children will be less negatively impacted by the dominant religion, (or any religion for that matter) in their future.

Also, i like to read about history and hope to find the truth of it rather than listen to the oft repeated, and much embraced half truths i seem to hear a lot of in my neck of the woods.

Minimalist

There are 25 levels...going back to the neolithic at Megiddo. How come they have no problem sorting that out? There are nine settlements at Troy and a crazed German named Schliemann who did all sorts of damage....none the less they have sorted out Troy. Rome. Athens. Huge cities, still in use, and no problem digging into their past, Reniaa.

You know the problem is not that they have found NOTHING at Jerusalem. The problem is that what they have found does not indicate any sort of major city existing at the time and place the bible claims it existed, just a small village around the water source, the Gihon Spring, which makes sense. We have solid evidence of a Middle Bronze Age city..both archaeological and textual from the Amarna letters. We have solid evidence of an 8th century city from archaeology and textual sources (Assyrian and Babylonian records...in addition to the bible.) But it is that period between the 16th century BC and the 8th century BC that is a near void. Moreover, it is not just Jerusalem. The entire region of Judah was a poor, mainly pastoral region, with a scattered handful of small villages...meanwhile the northern kingdom was rich and vibrant and a major regional power....one which attracted the attention of the Assyrians.

Do yourself a favor and read "The Bible Unearthed" by Finkelstein and Silverman.

reniaa

I have googled this but still find that it is not an established fact what these guys of yours say, many archaeologists disagree with each other on it, ceramics and stuff have been found for these periods and a water course has been found to recently have been used 1000 years earlier than previously thought. All archaeologists agree jerusalem has been compromised by its violent history and heavily escavated sites as well as extreme populations on the same hilltop sites. Atm it's 50/50 on the jerusalem sites some saying the evidence is enough others like your two stating lack of evidence as enough for doubt.
It certainly isn't as cut and dried as you make it out to be.

I would have quoted sources but they were html ones from books so not able to do so.

Johnny Skeptic

But if you want skeptics to disprove the Bible, it is also up to do you disprove all other religions, including deism. It is also up to you to disprove agnosticism. I am an agnostic.

But it is no more encumbent upon skeptics to disprove the Bible than it is enbumbent upon you to disprove all other other worldviews. You have attempted to change the widely accepted burden of proof into the burden of disproof. That does not work. If a man claims that he has a flying pig, and some people question his claim, it is not encumbent upon them to disprove his claim. Rather, it is encumbent upon him to show them his flying pig.

If the God of the Bible wanted to convince everyone that he can predict the future, he could easily have done that thousands of years ago.

How good is tangible, firsthand evidence from a Christian perspective? If another supposed God showed up, what would Christians do? If he proved that he had great powers, Christians would have tangible, firsthand evidence. Consider the following Scriptures:

John 2:23 Now when he was in Jerusalem at the passover, in the feast day, many believed in his name, when they saw the miracles which he did.

John 3:2 The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.

John 10:37-38 If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.

In those cases, obviously, Jesus’ words alone were not enough to convince some people to accept him.

In the NIV, Acts 14:3 says “So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of his grace by enabling them to do miraculous signs and wonders.” That Scripture shows that even though Jesus had performed many miracles, and had appeared to hundreds of people after he rose from the dead, and even though Jesus had criticized Thomas for wanting tangible, firsthand evidence that he had risen from the dead, and even though the Holy Spirit had come to the church, God was willing to provide Christians with even more tangible, firsthand evidence.

Consider the following:

http://members.shaw.ca/tfrisen/evolu...ism/flood.html

You need to explain why God has sorted fossils and sediments in ways that are convenient for skeptics, and have convinced many conservative Christians that a global flood did not occur, including some evangelical Christian geologists. Some conservative Christians do not believe that the Bible indicates that a global flood occurred.

It is your position that God requires Christians to believe that a global flood occurred, and that the Exodus occurred?

It is your position that God is not able to convince more people to love him and accept him without treating them unfairly?

Minimalist

Yes...and the closer their ties to some Baptist Seminary "school" of archaeology the more they disagree. The fact remains that not a single artifact has ever been found from "Solomon's" temple, or "David's" palace....all other "cities" show signs of actually being "cities" and in Jerusalem's case such signs are missing. Yes, people try to make excuses why there is no evidence. The same people try to make excuses for why there is no evidence of any sojourn in Egypt.

Time to ask yourself WHY evidence of all your bible stories is always MISSING.

Then...read the book and learn something.

reniaa

from what you've said you think all archaeologists with biblical leanings are discounted and unreliable but I would argue that those that want to disprove the bible have similar agendas, can any person be unbiased and uneffected by their own held beliefs whatever they are?

In the end we are talking actually minimal evidence here, not lack of and it really must depend totally on the viewpoint of the person viewing the data as to what conclusion they come to in this scenario.