rob117

I was wondering, with regard to anyone whose read any of the literature on archaeology in the Levant and on the formation of the Bible, which "camp" would you most agree with with regards to archaeology, chronology, and the dating of the biblical sources? I notice Finkelstein seems to come out on top in the Eblaforum articles.

I generally tend to agree with Dever about the United Monarchy (that it existed, but not nearly at the size that the Bible claims) and with Richard E. Friedman with regards to the Pentateuchal sources (i.e. J= ca. 800 BC, E= ca. 750 BC, P= ca. 715 BC, D1= ca. 610 BC, D2= ca. 560 BC, R= ca. 460 BC). I find the "minimalist" views of Thompson and Davies (no sources earlier than Persian period) to be very unlikely, and I also find the "maximalist" view of Mazar (J in the 10th century BC) to be just as unlikely.

Opinions? Which camp(s) would you agree with, generally?

Chris Weimer

I usually put J and E around the same time concerning their general content, which is legends going back several more hundred years than when they were written, and then put into shape around the late eighth early ninth centuries. P should really be just a little later, having knowledge of the two others sources, I'd say early 600's or late 700's. The first Deuteronomistic history is of Josiah and the rest I generally agree with. So yeah, that looks about right.

spin

Were any Hebrew texts written before the "return from exile", when a group of ex-Jerusalem elite re-established themselves as in charge of the city-state? How does one know? If there was no unified kingdom (or David or Solomon) and there was no Judah before Assyria gave Israel such a hard time, then the texts don't tell it like it was. This is often a sign of them having been written well after the events they purport to represent.


spin

Chris Weimer

Just because there wasn't a united kingdom written like it was doesn't mean necessarily it didn't exist. Perhaps it wasn't even a real kingdom at all? And what do you mean if there were no united monarchy that Judah wouldn't have existed until after Israel was destroyed? Am I reading that correctly?

rob117

Finkelstein's theory was that Judah was nothing but a rural backwater until the fall of Israel. Nobody really disputes that Judah was always the poorer and more rural of the two kingdoms, but does that really stop them from having legends about a "golden age," even if it they never had one, or if they had one in a form much smaller than that implied by the texts?

According to Friedman's Who Wrote the Bible?, the Hebrew used in J, E P, and D is in a form earlier than that used in post-exilic works like Ezra, Chronicles, and Daniel. Of course the JEPD texts were edited ultimately in the post-exilic period, but the base of these texts is pre-exilic. We can even tell that J and E date earlier than P and D.

spin

Judah raises its head only when Assyria presses at Samaria, giving the impression that without the Assyria assault the area of Judah would still be under the power of Samaria. The largest city in the area was not Jerusalem but Lachish, so when Samaria lost its control of the south (and it once had control at least down through the Shephelah and Lachish to Kuntillet Ajrud for access to the caravan route) would Lachish have come under the dominion of Jerusalem? NBL. It doesn't matter though: Lachish was sieged by Sennacherib. What appears is the city of Jerusalem, freed from Samarian hegemony, became an independent city-state, which Sennacherib didn't have the time to reduce, as he did with Lachish, because of internal Assyrian affairs which led to his death. The fact that Judah didn't pay tribute to Assyria until late while every power around it sent tribute before, suggests that there was no independent state of Judah prior to that first recorded payment of tribute.

Kings certainly doesn't come across as a chronicle written at the time of each king. It seems more like memories of a few kings padded out with stylised entries for the rest, the main kings not surprisingly being Hezekiah and Josiah. Hey, there may have been a Judah prior to Hezekiah's father, Ahaz. His family may have been the local chiefs. But it only entered history with the payment of tribute.

If Judah were a rural backwater, how could it maintain a scribal school for its development and copying of texts?


spin

Chris Weimer

Good point. Well taken.

rob117

Well, it may not have been quite as much of a rural backwater as previously believed:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/05/in...&ei=5070&8hpib

The foundation of the structure dates from the 10th or 9th century BC. The discoverers claim it is the "palace of David," but I think they're jumping the gun a bit, biblical archaeology being what it is. It may simply be an administrative building or a public building. Regardless of whether the structure has anything to do with David, and whether it is dated to the 10th century BC or to the 9th, it constitutes evidence of urban development in Jerusalem long before the fall of Samaria.

Toto

This was discussed in a recent thread: Israeli Archeologist Claims to Find King David's Palace

spin

There is an interesting variation of "spade in one hand and bible in the other" among some contemporary archaeologists. Eilat Mazar hasn't got a clue how she justifiably can arrive at the conclusion that the building was the "palace of David." Conclusion driven archaeology is never particularly inspiring. What makes this building a palace? Mazar hasn't found enough to tell. If she ever got that far, then she'd have to say what contemporary indications say that this was David's palace. What we have is hype, little more.


spin