Doctor X

Dr. Jim:

How much he believe "history" versus "literary" is Friedman's business. I do not know, frankly. However, his presentation of the DH is not dependent on the history.

This:

rather misrepresents how Friedman makes his argument and how Van Seters ignores his and other proponents of the DH with pre-exilic texts evidence. While like me you may wish to avoid The Hidden Book of the Bible--why just have J?--if you can get it used or out of a library it gives a detailed treatment of the evidence for the sources and what Van Seters conveniently misrepresents. I included the quote because, frankly, it demonstrates a rather pathetic explanation--the assumption that there were these monuments all over the place that gave the late, late DtH the historical aspects of his history!

Friedman's newer book gives a good summary of his and his collegues' case for the date while also stating what is "certain" and what is "speculative."

--J.D.

Celsus

Incidentally, Finkelstein disagrees that the Iron II destruction layers can be attributed to Shishak. Although it has been taken for granted that Shishak's campaign represents a fixed boundary in which to establish a chronology, much of it is circular, as you can see below. There is a destruction layer, there is a 50-year window, and "There is only one known historical candidate that fits the destruction date of Tel Rehov Stratum V, 940 to 900 B.C.E., based on 12 high-quality 14C dates: the invasion of Pharaoh Shoshenq I." (Bruins, van der Plicht, Mazar, quoted below). So J.M. Miller to then challenge Van Seters on Shishak/Shoshenq's campaign as mentioned in the Bible, when the destruction layer's correlation comes from the Bible is a little disingenuous, to say the least. On the notion of what precisely Shoshenq invaded, his victory stele and the towns listed in the Bible differ.

Note: Amihai Mazar et al. produced a paper recently to try to salvage that position. "14C Dates from Tel Rehov: Iron-Age Chronology, Pharaohs, and Hebrew Kings", Science, Vol 300, Issue 5617, 315-318 , 11 April 2003:

• In conclusion, the radiocarbon results, in relation to archaeological, historical, and biblical data, lead us to propose a modified traditional chronology for the Iron Age in the Levant (table S2). The modification is that the Iron Age IIA cultural period includes both the 10th and much of the 9th century B.C.E. (~980 to 835 B.C.E). There is only one known historical candidate that fits the destruction date of Tel Rehov Stratum V, 940 to 900 B.C.E., based on 12 high-quality 14C dates: the invasion of Pharaoh Shoshenq I.
  
  Our research negates an important argument of the low chronology theory, namely, that Iron Age IIA ceramic assemblages should be confined exclusively to the 9th century B.C.E. The 14C dating results imply that it is difficult to distinguish between "Solomonic" and "Omride" pottery. The site of Ta'anach (27), about 8 km southeast of Megiddo (Fig. 1), is also mentioned on the Karnak list of places destroyed by Shoshenq. Period II-B pottery at Ta'anach, assigned to 960 to 918 B.C.E. (27) and to the 9th century in the low chronology (28), is identical to that found in Tel Rehov Stratum V. Period II-B ended in a fierce destruction, which can be related to Shoshenq's campaign in view of our results.

Finkelstein's response is "Comment on 14C Dates from Tel Rehov: Iron-Age Chronology, Pharaohs, and Hebrew Kings", in Science, Vol 302, Issue 5645, 568 , 24 October 2003:

• The Tel Rehov data do not contradict and may indeed support the Low Chronology system. Stratum IV ends the Iron IIA sequence at Tel Rehov (Strata VI to IV). At Megiddo, the same sequence comes to an end with Stratum VA. Both were destroyed in a fire and hence they were probably contemporary. Therefore, the date of around 925 to 840/835 B.C.E. given by Bruins et al. (1) to Rehov IV seems to confirm the dating of Megiddo Stratum VA in the early 9th century instead of the mid–10th century B.C.E. This is also supported by a series of new, yet unpublished, readings from Megiddo, where Stratum VIA, which ends the Iron I sequence, is dated well within the 10th century B.C.E. Hence, the Megiddo palaces, once considered the symbol of Solomonic grandeur in the mid–10th century B.C.E., were actually built by the Omride dynasty in the early 9th century B.C.E.

Celsus

I will look forward to your comments. My point in all these posts (especially the introductory series) is to simply illustrate the interpretive, tentative nature of historical reconstruction. It is not to prove their version of events never happened (obviously an impossible task), but that their approach in reaching their conclusions is flawed. The "neopositivists" (Dever's own label, not mine) sought to discredit the Bible once and for all with their version of events, but when a similar skepticism was brought to bear on their version of events, they had no clue how to respond. Much better is to recognise that what is happening here is subject to debate and discussion, which some people haven't yet realised. If they wish to put forward a case, which is certainly possible, they must respond by more than just Dever's handwaving or others' confident proclamations of what happened. Of course my biases are evident, but I could take the opposite side to even things up a little so long as the difficulties are first recognised.

Joel

spin

Cute fact: of the zillions of one-cow towns Shoshenq I lists, there is no Jerusalem. He went straight through as though it weren't there.

(That was nice C-14 data.)


spin

capnkirk

Dr Jim,

Reading your POV with regards to Friedman's WWtB, I am struck by parallels with my own posts to a recent thread about Ehrman's Lost Christianities. I was challenging him on grounds that were important to me, but were actually incidental to the thesis of Ehrman's book.

Similarly, Friedman's thesis, as expressed in the book title, is: Who wrote the Bible?...Not, Who wrote it? When did they do it? How accurate were their depictions? How well does archaeology support the story as a whole?

His analysis was and is a literary one. His starting point was the OT as a completed work. He finds first that one cannot say that this book was written by A and that one by B. Instead he finds that A and B are each partly written by more than one author, and that the overall construction of authorship has an entirely different basis. He unravels the threads to demonstrate that there are multiple complete and mostly parallel traditions that developed separately and were integrated by others at various points along the way. His methodology would not have been one whit different had everyone stipulated beforehand that the entire story was inarguably myth. His point was to demonstrate that here was one group with one POV, and another with a different and somewhat antagonistic POV, each writing separate accounts. What is important to Friedman, so far as the book's thesis is involved is to show where (within the context of the whole testament) the various POV's of the various factions were integrated, who the factions were, what were their motivations.

I view his analysis as a valuable foundation to stand on to begin to ask the questions you are asking, rather than to fault him for not asking them, which is precisely what I was (unfairly) doing to Ehrman. I am not faulting you for asking questions that reflect on the archaeological historicity of the account. Those questions need to be asked. What I am trying to point out is that Friedman is not who those questions need to be asked of. Quite the contrary, the discovery of the existence and relative POV of separate J and an E authors very clearly points to a period when the kingdom was divided, and that the literary evidence for it runs much deeper than the (easily manipulated) surface narrative, making a much stronger case than if each book had been written by a single author who would be much more free to editorialize. The precise length of the separate kingdoms is left for others to try do tie down. That is both WWtB's strength and its limitation.

spin

I would argue for a common source to both Sam-Kgs and Chr. Each added their own materials and each their own perspective, eg Sam-Kgs has a priestly royal line and its history of Samaria, and Chr moves away from priests to Levites and gives the manic genealogies. The simplest explanation is not a heavy editorial slash/hack of the original, as envisaged for Chr but a simpler upgrade in two different directions by Sam-Kgs and Chr.


spin

Doctor X

I think it is quite clear that Chronicles uses Kings-Samuel as a source. "The Chronicler" follows K-S pretty closely, but makes interesting changes here and there--such as deleting the "Solomon loved foreign women." Solomon does not require any effort to become king--that is, squishing his rivals. There is no need for him to demonstrate his wisdom--it is manefest.

The Chronicler is infamous on recent threads for giving the first example of "Satan" as a figure as a way to remove the fault from YHWH for the Davidic Census.

Basically, the Chronicler makes a great deal legitimizing Solomon's Temple. This makes sense with a post-exilic Chronicler writing around the time of the founding of the second Temple.

--J.D.

spin

Chronicles was probably redacted after the time of Josephus, not too long after Ezra and Nehemiah. There is a tiny Chronicles-like fragment from Qumran which doesn't agree with either Kgs or Chr but is more Chr-like in the few words preserved.

We've been through the several generations of the line of David through Zerubbabel found in Chr., making it at least 150 years after the time of Zerubbabel (1 Chr 3:19-24), none of which bears any resemblance to the two attempts in Mt and Lk. The incessant dabbling in genealogies is a particularly late interest. In fact, its high priestly genealogy (1 Chr 6:1-15) is the most evolved in Jewish literature, more than 2 Esdras, though still inadequate to cover the time it is meant to.

Just to show you what Chr is on about do a search for "Levites" and for "priests" in both Sam-Kgs and Chr. You'll find that they are quite similar in number regarding priests.

Solomon was quite a popular fellow in late biblical times with Psalms of Solomon, Wisdom of Solomon, Odes of Solomon and a few others. This of course was after Ben Sira who had harsh words for Solomon: "you stained you honour and defiled your family line". So when did Solomon's image get tarted up? I'd say definitely after Ben Sira's time.

Another interesting problem in the dating of Chr: it uses the names Huram and Tou instead of Hyram and Toi (as found in Kings). Now the alternation between WAW and YOD is famous in the Dead Sea Scrolls.

When did Belial, as he was known throughout the Qumran literature, start being called Satan?

And I've got lots of other nice juicy clues for dating Chronicles.


spin

butswana

I've only read though the first chapterof WWtB(The World that Produced the Bible 1200-722 bce), but it seems to me that if Friedman is basing his position on the historical accuracy of Samuel-Kings, then he doesn't have much to stand on. While it is a literary analysis, he is attempting to attach authorship to real people. How can he do that if he is assuming the truth of something that has vitually no evidence to back it up?
It appears a bit irresponsible to stake so much on so little actual evidence. Especially when some of the items that were used as evidence have recently had thier authenticity come under scutiny(David stele & Solomon pomegranate). I know the book was written in 1997, so he couldn't have taken into account the whole Golon/Lemuire fraud thing.

Celsus

Please explain, particularly the emphasised part.

Joel