Archaeology Continues to Corroborate the Bible

Network of fortified cities showing expanding Judean kingdom at the time of David and Solomon (June, 2023).

This is not a single find but a published survey of evidence by Yosef Garfinkel of Hebrew University from sites he has excavated, including Lachish and Khirbet Qeiyafa (the Elah Fortress, maybe Shaaraim in 1 Samuel 17:52), along with Beth Shemesh, Tell en-Nasbeh (identified as Mizpah) and Khirbet ed-Dawwara, a site on the desert fringe of the Benjamite hill country.

These similarly fortified sites in the Judean foothills or Shephelah, all a half-day to a day's walk from Jerusalem, were on main roads heading into the areas of Jerusalem and David's earlier capital of Hebron, seemingly forming a perimeter around the kingdom's hinterland. They were given basically the same urban layout in the 10th-century B.C. (per radiocarbon and pottery dating). Each had an outer wall abutting dwellings and an interior circuit road. Four of these walls were casemate walls (double and hollow in between for rooms), while the solid wall at Lachish dates slightly later, matching with fortification by Solomon's son Rehoboam in 2 Chronicles 11:5-12. These towns had large administrative buildings with rectangular beams in groups of three, matching descriptions of Solomon's Palace and the temple. Inscriptional evidence displays literacy.

These cohesive factors point to a centralized regional authority, running contrary to the narrative of minimalist scholars who deny the biblical description of an expanding kingdom under David and Solomon, deeming them mere local chieftains or warlords if they existed at all. It should be noted that Garfinkel does not claim to see evidence of the broad expanse of their reigns as presented in Scripture.

Others have pointed out that we should not necessarily expect extensive urbanization at that time beyond what the Bible describes, for while some Israelites dwelt in former Canaanite cities, many were evidently still pastoralists and semi-nomadic. Yet even a nomadic kingdom could still be powerful and opulent-such as that of the Mongols, the largest contiguous land empire in history.

Alabaster panels depicting Sennacherib's siege of Lachish found in secondary use (August 2023).

In Mosul in northern Iraq in 2022, seven large alabaster or "Mosul marble" panels depicting archers, city siege and landscape details were found reused as foundation stones at ancient Nineveh's Mashki Gate. They are now believed to have earlier stood at the site of Assyrian Emperor Sennacherib's Southwest Palace, showing his military campaign in the west against the Phoenicians and Judah, particularly his capture of the Judean city of Lachish in 701 B.C. These panels are very similar to ones on display in the British Museum. It's significant that there is no portrayal in any of these panels of the Assyrians taking Jerusalem, as the Bible shows God intervened to prevent that.

(In our next installment of ongoing archaeological discoveries, we will cover claims from June 2024 that the Assyrian siege camp at Lachish and at Jerusalem have been identified.)

Discoveries at El Araj on the Sea of Galilee reinforce its identification as Bethsaida (August and November 2023).

There are two candidates for the site of Bethsaida, the hometown of the apostles Peter and Andrew (John 1:44). The more traditional site, Et Tell, sits 1.5 miles (2.25 km) from the highwater mark of the Sea of Galilee. That has long been challenged as too far away for a fishing village, the name Bethsaida meaning "House of Fishing." The other site is El Araj, which sits right at the highwater mark. While the first-century Jewish historian Josephus says Bethsaida was later made into a Roman city, Et Tell lacks Roman artifacts. Yet excavation at El Araj shows Jewish settlement, such as stone vessels for ritual purity, along with later Roman finds such as a bathhouse.

Found in a Jewish-period home in 2023 was an inkwell containing numerous small fishing weights-seeming to indicate first-century fisherman could be literate (against those contending Peter and John as fisherman would have been unable to write New Testament books).

Later in the season, a first-century wall was found beneath the remains of a later Byzantine church building-that later church believed to be the one that was reportedly built over the house of Peter and Andrew according to a visiting eighth-century Bavarian bishop. Yet it's not yet known if the first-century wall belonged to a house.

Excavation at the site is challenging due to the high water table in this location very near the Sea of Galilee.

New radiocarbon dating reveals Gezer gate built by Solomon and city destroyed by Merneptah and Shishak (November 2023).

A radiocarbon study mainly of seeds in the stratified layers at the ruins of ancient Gezer, between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, has established a clearer chronology of these layers, published in the PLOS ONE scientific journal.

One destruction layer matches Egyptian Pharaoh Merneptah's invasion into Israelite territory around 1210 B.C. Another destruction layer dating to around 925 B.C. fits with Pharaoh Shishak's invasion during the reign of Rehoboam.

Of great significance is that the city's six-chambered gate is dated to the first half of the 10th century B.C., the time of Solomon, restoring an earlier dating based on Scripture.

Back in the 1960s, archaeologist Yigail Yadin discovered this gate and nearly identical ones at Megiddo and Hazor, concluding that these standardized Iron Age fortifications showed a strong, centralized state, leading him to attribute them to the labor force of Solomon, which according to 1 Kings 9:15 built ". . . Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer." Later, minimalist archaeologist Israel Finkelstein, who doesn't accept the biblical accounts of Israel's United Monarchy under Saul, David and Solomon, rejected Yadin's conclusions and, based on his own pottery and carbon-14 studies, argued these six-chambered gates were built in the 9th century B.C. under kings Omri and Ahab (labeled the Low Chronology).

Finkelstein calls the new study meaningless, saying not enough organic samples were tested, but it was reportedly based on a large number of samples. Many now recognize that the six-chambered gates properly fit with the High Chronology and construction under Solomon.

Artifax magazine points out a critical question Finkelstein ignores in the debate over who built these fortifications: "Why has no six-chambered gate built by Omri and Ahab been found in their own capital cities of Samaria and Jezreel?" (Winter 2024, p. 8). Rejecting Scripture leads to denying the obvious. Once again, the Bible is vindicated.

Discovery of tiny 10th-century-B.C. Phoenician electrum pendant or earring in Jerusalem presented (February 2024).

Announcement was recently made of the 2012 discovery in Jerusalem of a 3,000-year-old basket-like pendant or earring made of electrum (a rare, naturally occurring alloy of gold and silver). Similar to others known from ancient Phoenician sites, this one was found in Jerusalem's Ophel excavations in the upper City of David area below the Temple Mount. The Bible says there was a close alliance between the Phoenician (northern Canaanite) king Hiram of Tyre and David and Solomon, and it attests to Hiram sending workers to help construct David's palace (2 Samuel 5:11).

It's possible the item could have just come through trade, as some argue, rather than being worn and lost by a Phoenician worker. But Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist Amir Golani, expert on First Temple Period jewelry involved in researching the pendant, thinks actual foreign presence in Jerusalem is the likelier explanation-such a pendant being the miniaturization of a known cultic shrine and an important signifier of religious identity, something not likely parted with in international trade. Yet even the trading explanation would highlight a link to the Phoenicians, in accordance with Scripture.

Radiocarbon study authors present a more exact chronology of ancient Jerusalem, showing earlier population increase and western expansion (May 2024).

A comprehensive research project giving detailed dating of ancient Jerusalem by the Israel Antiquities Authority, Tel Aviv University and the Weizmann Institute of Science was published in the prestigious journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences), challenging some prior conclusions. The study involved 100 radiocarbon dates from sampling organic finds in four different excavation areas on the eastern and western slopes of the City of David (the oldest part of Jerusalem)-and extensive calibration of a known phenomenon of inaccurate carbon-14 dating readings through a large part of the Iron Age (perhaps due to lower solar activity in that period).

Significantly, it was discovered that Jerusalem was much more heavily populated and urbanized in the 12th through the 10th centuries B.C. than was previously thought-aligning with the biblical description of the city at the time of David and Solomon, contrary to minimalist scholars who reject the biblical representation of that period.

A surprise finding was dating of the city's westward expansion of wall construction to encompass a major increase in population. It had been thought that this happened at the time of Judah's King Hezekiah in response to both an influx of immigrants when the northern kingdom of Israel fell to the Assyrians and the Assyrian emperor Sennacherib's invasion of Judah a couple decades later. Foundational courses of a wide leg of the western expansion of the city wall known as the Broad Wall (or Avigad's Wall, after the archaeologist who directed the excavation in which it was found) has also been called Hezekiah's Wall (seen as related to Isaiah 22:10). But the new dating shows this wall and westward expansion occurred earlier in the time of Hezekiah's great-grandfather King Uzziah, following the great earthquake during the earlier king's reign (see Amos 1:1; Zechariah 14:5).

Rather than contradicting the Bible, this major defensive building work comports with what the Bible says about Uzziah in 2 Chronicles 26:8-9: ". . . He became exceedingly strong. And Uzziah built towers in Jerusalem at the Corner Gate, at the Valley Gate, and at the corner buttress of the wall; then he fortified them."

Related Information:

Table of Contents that includes "Archaeology Continues to Corroborate the Bible"
Other Articles by Tom Robinson
Origin of article "Archaeology Continues to Corroborate the Bible"
Keywords: archaeology Biblical archaeology

Bible historicity:

Archaeology:

Key Subjects Index
General Topics Index
Biblical References Index
Home Page of this site