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Displaying 1 - 20 of 53 results
Ancient Biblical Interpreters vs. Archaeology & Modern Scholars
Around 25 years ago, Jim Kugel and I confided to each other that we each wanted to write a book for the general public. We both believed it important to make scholarship accessible to all. As it turned out, we each wrote several such books...
Biblical Archaeology Review, January/February 2008
Scholars Face Off Over Age of Biblical Stories
Friedman vs. Van Seters
In the December 1993 BR we published a lengthy review of John Van Seters’s Prologue to History: The Yahwist as Historian in Genesis (Bible Books, BR 09:06). Our reviewer, Richard Elliot Friedman, of the University of California at San Diego, leveled numerous criticisms at the book, writing at one point, “There is therefore reason to doubt the soundness of method and reasoning in Van Seters’s work. In this scholarship the [Bible’s] text rarely speaks for itself …. Rather it is the scholar’s spin on the text that houses the point.” Van Seters’s rebuttal to Friedman’s critique follows this introduction; Friedman’s reply follows that.
Bible Review, August 1994
Is the Cultic Installation at Dan Really an Olive Press?
A discussion that started in BAR escalates in the scholarly world
In an article in the September/October 1981 issue of BAR (“The Remarkable Discoveries at Tel Dan,” BAR 07:05), John Laughlin identified an unusual installation at Tel Dan, in northern Israel, as an Israelite cult installation associated with...
Biblical Archaeology Review, November/December 1984
Searching for the Better Text
How errors crept into the Bible and what can be done to correct them
Ancient versions of the Bible are far from error-free. Happily, a better understanding of the Dead Sea Scrolls and of how manuscripts evolved has helped resolve some of the vexing textual problems.
Bible Review, August 1999
Treasures from the Lands of the Bible
Elie Borowski survived his personal losses and the collective tragedy of Jews in World War II with a belief that humankind can “best achieve ethical and spiritual fulfillment by becoming conscious of its historical origins.” Borowski’s...
Biblical Archaeology Review, March/April 1985
Is Everybody a Bible Expert?
Not the authors of the Book of J
It is a strange fact that we biblical scholars always seem to meet people who are surprised that we really know things about the Bible. They assume that the study of the Bible is a matter of opinions and interpretations, with few...
Bible Review, April 1991
What Price the Uniqueness of Jesus?
To wrench Jesus out of his Jewish world destroys Jesus and destroys Christianity.
Bible Review, June 1999
Answers at Lachish
Sennacherib’s destruction of Lachish identified; dispute over a century’s difference in Israelite pottery dating resolved by new excavations; stamp impressions of Judean kings finally dated.
Lachish was one of the most important cities of the Biblical era in the Holy Land. The impressive mound, named Tel Lachish in Hebrew or Tell ed-Duweir in Arabic, is situated about 25 miles southwest of Jerusalem in the Judean hills. Once a...
Biblical Archaeology Review, November/December 1979
Big City, Few People
Jerusalem in the Persian Period
I would like to take a somewhat radical, maximalist view of the size of Jerusalem when the Israelites (or, more precisely, the Judahites) returned from the Babylonian Exile and restored the city walls, as described in the Book of Nehemiah...
Biblical Archaeology Review, July/August 2005
The Aleppo Codex
Ancient bible from the ashes
The date was December 2, 1947, four days after the United Nations decision to partition Palestine into a Jewish state and Arab state. Arab mobs in Syria were once again looting, burning...
Bible Review, August 1991
Taking the Biblical Text Apart
For centuries, scholars from many backgrounds—religious and nonreligious, Christian and Jewish—have worked on discovering how the Bible came to be. Their task was not to prove whether the Bible’s words were divinely revealed to the authors...
Bible Review, Fall 2005
Kadesh-Barnea—In the Bible and on the Ground
Kadesh-Barnea, Tell el-Qudeirat, hasn’t been excavated since the 1980s, but a new pottery analysis indicates a settlement was there at the time of the Exodus.
Biblical Archaeology Review, September/October 2015
Love Your Neighbor: Only Israelites or Everyone?
It’s one of the most famous lines in the Bible: “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18). Impressive. Fascinating. Inspiring. Capable of a thousand interpretations and raising 10,000 questions. A remarkable proposition coming out of...
Biblical Archaeology Review, September/October 2014
The Ancient Cardo Is Discovered in Jerusalem
1976 excavations in Jerusalem have revealed a portion of the ancient Cardo—the principal street through the city depicted on the mid-6th century A.D. Madaba map (see illustrations). This famous mosaic map of the Holy Land, which...
Biblical Archaeology Review, December 1976
Gudea of Lagash Ends Long Journey
Statue from Iraq acquired by Detroit Institute of Arts
Sometimes an archaeological discovery permits us to glimpse the soul of an ancient man—to “see” one person who loved, hated, inspired fear or respect. When the discovery is a work of art, fashioned by a gifted pair of unknown hands thousands...
Biblical Archaeology Review, May/June 1983
Coarse Language In The Bible?
It’s culture shocking!
In an article I recently wrote in Bible Reviewa on the problems of Bible translating, I distinguished two styles of translation:...
Bible Review, April 1989
Back to Megiddo
A new expedition will explore the jewel in the crown of Canaan/Israel
Tel Megiddo is widely regarded as the most important archaeological site in Israel from Biblical times, and as one of the most significant sites for the study of the ancient Near East...
Biblical Archaeology Review, January/February 1994
As Simple as ABC
What acrostics in the Bible can demonstrate
Acrostics are alphabetical texts. Bible scholars disagree on their purpose. Consequently, translations differ. Despite differences in emphasis, Every translator acknowledges that Form and meaning are connected. Given the strictures of...
Bible Review, April 1997
“From These Hills … ”
Midianite tent shrine found amidst ancient Negev copper mines. Recent excavations lead to new understanding of ancient mining technology; no evidence of King Solomon.
For almost two decades and still continuing, Israeli archaeologist Beno Rothenberg has investigated the Timna Valley—called in Arabic wadi Mene’iyeh and known to thousands of visitors as “King Solomon’s Mines”...
Biblical Archaeology Review, June 1978
Jezreel—Where Jezebel Was Thrown to the Dogs
One day in 1989 rumor reached me that monumental Israelite architecture had accidentally been uncovered at Tel Jezreel in the Jezreel Valley in northern Israel. I was then, as now, a...
Biblical Archaeology Review, July/August 2010