B. H. Manners

Greetings,

Could anyone give me some websites which deal with defending Kathleen Kenyon's dating of Jericho versus John Garstang's dating of the city with Joshua's invasion. In addition, it would be appreciated if the web sites dealt with the dating of pottery fragments found at the digs.

Thank you,

B.H.

Jayhawker Soule

Yes. Bring up some search engine such as Google and type "Garstang Kenyon Jericho".

B. H. Manners

Good Afternoon,

Thank you ReasonableDoubt. I looked up several websites and all but one disagreed with John Garstang in dating Jericho at the time of Joshua's conquest. This one site stated that the University of London confirmed Kenyan's date of 1500-1600 B.C.through carbon-14 testing of grain samples found in the ruin after erroneously dating a piece of charcoal at the 1400 B.C. time frame.
However the most frequent charge I noticed is that Kenyan stated that pottery sherds matching others found at the time of Joshua at other sites were not at Jericho. Biblicists state that Garstang did indeed find conquest era pottery sherds at the level Kenyan states was flourishing at 1500 B.C. time frame. Does anyone know of any books,articles, or sites dealing with this issue? The reason I ask is because biblicists will doubt any carbon-14 test as inaccurate or corrupt that does not back their views.

Thanks,

B.H. <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" />

Jayhawker Soule

Mazar, who tends to be somewhat of a Biblical apologist, states: "Thus, in the case of Jericho, the archaeological data cannot serve as decisive evidence to deny a historical nucleus in the Book of Joshua concerning the conquest of this city." [Archaeology of the Land of the Bible; 10,000 - 586 B.C.E. by Amihai Mazar, pg. 331]

This is hardly a powerful defense of the Torah. Compare this with the following: "A detailed comparison of this [i.e., Biblical - RD] version of the Hebrew takeover of Palestine with the extra-Biblical evidence totally discredits the former. Not only is there a complete absense, as we have seen, in the records of the Egyptian empire of any mention or allusion to such a whirlwind of annihilation, but also Egyptian control over Canaan and the very cities Joshua is suppose to have taken scarcely wavered during the entire period of the Late Bronze Age. Far more damaging, however, than this argument from silence is the archaeological record. ..." [Egypt, Canaan, and Israel in Ancient Times by Donald B. Redford, pg. 264-265]

Similarly, Finkelstein and Silberman note; Thus the famous scene of the Israelite forces marching around the walled town with the Ark of the Covenant, causing Jericho's mighty walls to collapse by the blowing of their war trumpets was, to put it simply, a romantic mirage. ... Only recently has the consensus finally abandoned the conquest story." [The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman, pg. 81-82]

[ February 23, 2002: Message edited by: ReasonableDoubt ]</p>