Anat

Acknowledged by whom? I think Finkelstein has parts of Genesis reflecting an attempt to create a common foundation between Judahites and refugees from Samaria under Hezekiah, some bits reflecting later times (the selling of Joseph - international commerce in the days of Manasseh), Abraham's origins in Ur from exilic times and Abraham in Hebron from Persian times (when Hebron was outside the boundaries of Yehud).

Roland

Second, assuming a 13th century date for the exodus and entrance into Canaan, it is indeed likely that sites such as Lachish and Bethel, whose burn layers date to the 12th century, may have fallen to groups other than Israel.

Doesn't the author realize that the moment he allows the assumption that the conquest may have taken place in the 13th Century to stand that he's already lost the argument for Biblical inerrancy?

1 Kings 6:1 clearly states that the Exodus occurred 480 years after Solomon began building his temple. So unless he's willing to place Solomon in the 8th rather than the 10th Century, he's pretty much sabotaged his own argument. :huh:

Minimalist

Roland, they have the same problem with the tel Dan stele: They will jump up and down about how the stele, which mentions the House of David, "proves" the bible.....while completely ignoring the fact that the stele tells a different story of the event than the one that is in the OT.

They are highly selective in what they see.

Roland

Quick correction to my post in #62: Of course I meant BEFORE not after the building of the temple.

Good point, minimalist. Why is there no mention of Egypt's "annihilation" of the Israelites in the book of Judges?

andrewcriddle

According to some strict forms of Biblical inerrancy you are doubtless correct. However many conservative Christians would be quite happy to interpret the 480 years in 1 Kings 6 as meaning 12 generations with a generation assumed by the Biblical writer to be 40 years.

12 real generations before Solomon built the temple would probably put the Exodus in the early 13th century with the conquest occurring at least a generation later.

Andrew Criddle

Roland

Andrew, Is there a place in the scriptures that says 12 generations stretch between the two events or are the scholars just trying to come up with the usual rationalization when confronted with obvious inconsitencies?

It appears that inerrancy is an absolute requirement only when it doesn't prove inconvenient for whatever idea they're trying to get across that day. Then it becomes every man for himself.

semiopen

I also mentioned the irony earlier.

However, Hess is a well known and respected scholar, so I'd be hesitant to dismiss what he says out of hand. He is the author of "Israelite Religions: An Archaeological and Biblical Survey (or via: amazon.co.uk)."

From Amazon:

Your comment reminds me of a comment on Amazon about Richard Elliot Friedman's, "Who Wrote the Bible." The person suggested that Friedman did not know Hebrew which was ludicrous.

As I mentioned previously, I don't agree with Hess's analysis, but there's no need to make light of his stature.

semiopen

Inerrancy is as inerrancy does...

From the Book of Ruth

This is saying that there are ten generations between Judah and David, which looks like 11 generations between Judah and Solomon (or 12 generations between Jacob and Solomon, depending how you look at it.

Now this makes the length of a generation an unbelievable amount of time no matter how you slice it.

The 12 generations are as reasonable as 480 years, both of which are complete crap.

Toto

Also from Amazon: Unique!

Minimalist

I don't know...why is there no mention of the fact that Egypt dominated Canaan for 4 centuries between 1550 and 1150 BC? Maybe they forgot?

Or more likely, when someone sat down to write this tale that little detail had either been forgotten or was politically embarrassing to the authors.