18 replies to this topic

[Kay]

Biblical Archaeology Review - BAR

From the Biblical Archaeology Society comes the Biblical Archaeology Review Magazine which most are perhaps familiar with.

The Society send out regular emails (which I have subscribed to for a number of years) on Archaelogical finds and other items which may be of interest to members of CBDF.

This thread will include such items and links to http://www.bib-arch.org items.

The site also has a number of free downloadable e-Books and Daily News items.

Please feel free to comment on any items in this topic (if a topic post receives a good deal of dialogue it may be split out to a separate topic.

[Kay]

Daily News Item:

Link directed to Washington Post:

Babylonian artifact the Cyrus Cylinder returns to British Museum after loan to Iran

By Associated Press, Published: April 19

"LONDON — A 2,500-year-old Babylonian artifact sometimes described as the world's first human rights charter was returning to the British Museum Monday after a seven-month loan to Iran.

Hundreds of thousands of people viewed the Cyrus Cylinder while it was on display at Iran's National Museum."

Further Reading

[Kay]

Daily News Item:

Link directed to Zwinglius Redivivus:

The Elah Valley Coins

APR 21

Posted by Jim

Via Joseph Lauer, who provides the translation

Maariv – Friday, April 15, 2011 14:17

News – Tens of ancient coins were discovered in the Elah Valley: Archaeology Doctoral candidate from the Hebrew University uncovered in Khirbet Qeiyafa coins used in the Persian and Hellenistic periods

Dalia Mazori- "A wonderful discovery was made at the excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa in the Elah Valley: at the site were discovered some of the earliest coins ever found in the Land. The discovery was reported by Yoav Farhi, a doctoral candidate from the Hebrew University's Institute of Archaeology, at the 37th Israel Archaeological Congress that was held on Thursday, [April 14, 2011,] at Bar-Ilan University. The coins were from the Persian and Hellenistic periods, the fourth and fifth centuries BCE, about a hundred or more years after the return from exile and the building of the (original) Second Temple. The land was under Persian rule until 332-333 BCE, when the area was conquered by Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic period began."

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[Kay]

Daily News Item:

Finkelstein Weighs In on City of David

April 28, 2011

Link Redirected to The Jewish Daily:

In the Eye of Jerusalem’s Archaeological Storm

The City of David, Beyond the Politics and Propaganda

By Israel Finkelstein

Published April 26, 2011, issue of May 06, 2011.

"Archaeological activity in Jerusalem has been sucked into a whirlwind of conflicting political agendas, and the site commonly referred to as “the City of David” is in the eye of the storm. At issue is a place of seminal importance for the Jewish people and indeed for anyone who cherishes the heritage of Western civilization.

When dealing with archaeology in Jerusalem, one must first know the facts. Otherwise it is easy to be led astray by unfounded historical interpretations or to succumb to misinformation from those pursuing their own political agendas."

Read More

[Kay]

Articles:

BAR 37:03, May/Jun 2011

The Bible In the News: Who's Afraid of Abishag?

By Leonard J. Greenspoon

"Abishag? Abishag the Shunammite? If the name doesn't ring a bell, do not despair. The young woman with this name makes only a brief appearance in the Hebrew Bible, in the first two chapters of the First Book of Kings, during the story of the succession of power from David to Solomon. Perhaps because of her role—to provide warmth to the aging (no, aged) David (1 Kings 1:1–4)—she has assumed far greater prominence in the post-Biblical, especially modern, world than she did in antiquity. Based on numerous references to her in the press, however, it is uncertain whether she would have been flattered, or flattened, by this enhanced notoriety."

Article in Full

[Kay]

Articles:

BAR 37:03, May/Jun 2011

The Birth & Death of Biblical Minimalism

By Yosef Garfinkel

"“Biblical minimalism,” as it is known, has gone through a number of permutations in the recent past. Its modern career began about 30 years ago, when BAR was still a youngster. Since then it has been part of the ongoing debate regarding the extent to which historical data are embedded in the Hebrew Bible.

In the mid-1980s the principal argument involved the dating of the final writing of the text of the Hebrew Bible. The minimalist school claimed then that it had been written only in the Hellenistic period, nearly 700 years after the time of David and Solomon, and that the Biblical descriptions were therefore purely literary."

Continued

[Kay]

Articles:

BAR 37:04, Jul/Aug 2011

Biblical Views: Insertions in the Great Isaiah Scroll

By Eugene Ulrich

"The Dead Sea Scrolls have revolutionized our understanding of various aspects of the Bible, ancient Judaism, and the ancient Jewish religious milieu from which Christianity was born. BAR editor Hershel Shanks, when preparing his review of the new publication of the Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa),1 noticed that one of the Biblical advances highlighted by that scroll was "isolated interpretive insertions." Hershel asked me if I would describe for BAR readers what these "isolated interpretive insertions" were."

Article in Full

[Kay]

Articles:

BAR 37:04, Jul/Aug 2011

First Person: The Bible as a Source of Testable Hypotheses

By Hershel Shanks

"In the highest, most sophisticated levels of professional Biblical archaeology, there is a certain prejudice against the Bible.

I take as my text a passage from a new book of which (full disclosure) the Biblical Archaeology Society, publisher of BAR, is a copublisher with the Israel Exploration Society. The book, written by my good friend Ronny Reich of Haifa University and excavator of the City of David,1 is titled Excavating the City of David (reviewed in this issue). It is a magnum opus that will be read and studied a hundred years from now; but it does treat dismissively the excavation of another good friend, Eilat Mazar of the Hebrew University. (Ronny even accuses Eilat of acting “unethically,” but that is another matter.2)"

Article in Full

[Kay]

Article:

BAR 37:04, Jul/Aug 2011

New Synagogue Excavations In Israel and Beyond

By Joey Corbett

It seems like almost everywhere archaeologists dig in the eastern Galilee these days, they are coming up with ancient synagogues.

"In 2007, a third–fourth-century C.E. synagogue with beautifully decorated mosaic floors depicting Biblical episodes was discovered at the site of Khirbet Wadi Hamam outside Tiberias; just last summer, European archaeologists digging only 4 miles away, at Horvat Kur, announced that they, too, had found a synagogue, probably dating at least a century later.

Perhaps the most exciting recent synagogue discovery in Israel was in Magdala, reputedly the home of Mary Magdalene. (Was this the synagogue she regularly attended?) On the shore of the Sea of Galilee, the newly discovered Magdala synagogue, excavated by archaeologists with the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), is one of only seven uncovered in Israel that was in use during the first century C.E., when the Jerusalem Temple still stood. The others include Masada, Herodium and Gamla, with which BAR readers are familiar.a Other possible examples have been excavated at Herodian Jericho, Qiryat Sefer and Modi'in.b"

Article in Full

[Kay]

Articles:

Understanding the Jewish Menorah

Does this ancient menorah graffito show the Temple menorah?

Biblical Archaeology Society Staff • 10/17/2011

"The Jewish menorah—especially the Temple menorah, a seven-branched candelabra that stood in the Temple—is the most enduring and iconic Jewish symbol. But what did the Temple menorah actually look like?

In early August, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) issued a press release announcing the discovery of "an engraving of the Temple menorah on a stone object" in a 2,000-year-old drainage channel near the City of David, which is being excavated by Professor Ronny Reich and Eli Shukron. (An unusually well preserved iron sword in its leather scabbard, which presumably belonged to a Roman soldier, was also found there.) The IAA release went on to say that "a passerby who saw the [Temple] menorah with his own eyes … incised his impressions on a stone." The excavators were quoted as saying that this graffito "clarifies [that] the base of the original [ancient] menorah … was apparently tripod shaped."

But does it?"

Article in Full

[Kay]

Articles:

Ancient Gravestone Epitaphs Give Insight into Early Jews and Christians

Understanding Christian and Jewish tombstones from ancient Zoora

Biblical Archaeology Society Staff • 03/01/2012

"Amid the desolate, rocky wasteland of Biblical Zoar (ancient Zoora) along the southeastern shore of the Dead Sea, Konstantinos Politis and others have discovered hundreds of remarkable tombstones that preserve detailed portraits of life­and death­among the Christians and Jews who once dwelled there (see also “Ancient World’s Largest Cemetery Identified at Biblical Zoar”). The often brightly colored and intricately decorated stones are a treasure trove of information about these two communities during the fourth to sixth centuries C.E. when Zoar (then known as Zoara or Zoora) was the seat of a major Christian bishopric and also home to a significant Jewish population.

In “Tales from Tombstones” in the March/April 2012 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review, two scholars expert in interpreting the gravestone epitaphs and iconography­Professor Steven Fine and Kalliope I. Kritikakou-Nikolaropoulou­provide separate discussions of the Christian and Jewish tombstones of Zoora."

Article in Full

[Kay]

Articles:

Book of Nehemiah Found Among the Scrolls

Scroll scholars find first fragment of Nehemiah

Biblical Archaeology Society Staff • 05/15/2012

"Anyone familiar with the Dead Sea Scrolls can tell you that portions of nearly every book in the Hebrew Bible are represented in these ancient texts discovered in caves near the Dead Sea.

The only exceptions were the Book of Esther and the Book of Nehemiah;* scholars assumed the latter had been written on the same scroll as the Book of Ezra (as was common) but simply hadn't survived - until now. In a recent blog post,** Norwegian scroll scholar Torleif Elgvin of Evangelical Lutheran University College in Oslo, Norway, announced that he and colleague Esther Eshel of Bar-Ilan University will be publishing a collection of more than two dozen previously unknown scroll fragments, including the first known fragment of Nehemiah."

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[Kay]

Scholar's Study:

First Person: Should Israel Return the Tablets of the Law to Egypt?

Cultural Heritage: A Hypothetical Case Study

Hershel Shanks • 09/21/2012

Hershel Shanks’s First Person as it appeared in the September/October 2012 Issue of Biblical Archaeology Review.

"In 1969, barely two years after the 1967 Six-Day War, a team of Israeli archaeologists made an exploratory excavation at the base of one of the numerous sites in the Sinai Peninsula proposed as Biblical Mt. Sinai. It was not long before a member of the team exposed a piece of rock with a single Hebrew letter on it. This naturally led to more intensive excavation in this area, as a result of which additional, larger pieces of inscribed stones were recovered. They were taken to Israel for further study.

When examined by paleographers, experts in dating inscriptions by the shape and form of the letters, they were in agreement that this inscription dated to about 1200 B.C.E."

Continued

[Kay]

Where Were the Old Testament Kings of Ancient Jerusalem Buried?

Archaeologist Jeff Zorn reinvestigates an old theory

Biblical Archaeology Society Staff • 11/26/2012

"Jeffrey Zorn presents some of Raymond Weill’s early-20th-century plans from his Jerusalem excavations in “Is T1 David’s Tomb?” in the November/December 2012 BAR. Take a closer look at Weill’s detailed drawings in the Bible History Daily exclusive “King David’s Tomb–A Closer Look.” Zoom in on pictures from the magazine, and get a fresh look at additional web-exclusive photographs, plans and drawings.

Nearly a century ago, French archaeologist Raymond Weill excavated what he identified to be tombs in Jerusalem’s City of David—perhaps the royal necropolis of the earliest Old Testament kings. Some scholars have since disputed this claim, but a new examination of the evidence by archaeologist Jeff Zorn suggests that Weill might well have been right."

Continued

[Kay]

The Edomite Stronghold of Sela

Is this where 10,000 Edomites were thrown to their deaths?

Glenn J. Corbett • 12/13/2012

"In one of the Old Testament’s colder and more brutal episodes, King Amaziah of Judah (c. 801–783 B.C.E.), after having slain nearly 10,000 Edomites in battle near the southern end of the Dead Sea, is said to have thrown another 10,000 captives from the top of nearby Sela, where they were “dashed to pieces” (2 Chronicles 25:12; 2 Kings 14:7). While the Biblical account provides only vague clues as to where this horrible event took place (Sela simply means “rock” in Hebrew), the archaeology of a little-known mountaintop stronghold in southern Jordan may hold the answer."

Continued

[Kay]

Top 20 Biblical Archaeology Events and Discoveries of 2012

Noah Wiener • 01/11/2013

"I hope that everyone in the Biblical archaeology community enjoyed the holidays and is having a wonderful start to the new year. I wanted to take the time to look back at some of the biggest Biblical archaeology news stories, events and discoveries of 2012. I’ve put together links to 20 stand-out Biblical archaeology moments in 2012, and I would love to hear which discoveries intrigued you most, and what you’d like to hear more about in 2013. So please, share your ideas in the comments section below!

-Noah Wiener

BAS web editor

**The stories below are listed in no particular order and all are available for free in Bible History Daily**"

Continued

[Kay]

Interested in the future of archaeology? Learn about Cyber-Archaeology directly from the leaders in the field. A must-read for anyone directing, participating or interested in archaeological fieldwork.

Cyber-Archaeology in the Holy Land — The Future of the Past

In this free eBook, pioneering researchers at the University of California, San Diego’s Calit2 laboratory showcase cutting-edge archaeological methods that are helping create a new and objective future of the past.

By Thomas E. Levy, Neil G. Smith, Mohammad Najjar, Thomas A. DeFanti, Albert Yu-Min Lin and Falko Kuester

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Note: You will have to provide an email address (also your name) to download the book. In so doing you also may receive updates from BAR - as example, current news items (usually daily)

[Kay]

Ehud Netzer Publications Available to Public

Noah Wiener • 02/15/2013

"Ehud Netzer, a prominent Israeli archaeologist and the world’s leading authority on Herodian architecture, died on October 27, 2010 from a fall at Herodium, where he had been digging for 38 years in search of Herod’s tomb. Herod the Great was the ancient world’s builder par excellence. Netzer described Herod as “a king who lived and breathed the art of construction, deeply understood its ways and, quite simply, loved to build.” One might fairly say that Ehud Netzer himself lived and breathed the man and the works of Herod."

Continued

[Kay]

Herod the Great: Friend of the Romans and Parthians?

Jason M. Schlude explores how King Herod manipulated his position between two regional powers

Jason M. Schlude • 03/29/2013

"Often we think of Herod the Great in relation to ancient Rome. We understand the king as steadfast in his loyalty to this western imperial power – and rightly so. Herod’s behavior routinely betrayed his Roman interests, and inscriptions attest to and advertise this allegiance by identifying him with such titles as “Friend of the Romans.” It is entirely appropriate then to apply the modern label “Roman client king” to Herod, as scholars have done for so long."

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