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What Did the Biblical Writers Know and When Did They Know It?: What Archaeology Can Tell Us about the Reality of Ancient Israel

by William G. Dever

Publisher:

Eerdmans

, 2002

ISBN: 9780802821263

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Overview

For centuries, the Hebrew Bible has been the fountainhead of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Today, however, the entire biblical tradition, including its historical veracity, is being challenged. Leading this challenge is a group of scholars described as the “minimalist” or “revisionist” school of biblical studies, which charges that the Hebrew Bible is largely pious fiction, that its writers and editors invented “ancient Israel” as a piece of late Jewish propaganda in the Hellenistic era. In this fascinating volume, noted Syro-Palestinian archaeologist William Dever attacks the minimalist position head-on, showing how modern archaeology brilliantly illuminates both life in ancient Palestine and the sacred Scriptures as we have them today. Assembling a wealth of archaeological evidence, Dever builds the clearest, most complete picture yet of the real Israel that existed during the Iron Age of ancient Palestine (1200–600 BC).

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Interested in ancient Israel? Be sure to check out the Eerdmans Israelite Studies Collection (5 vols.).

Attacks the minimalist position head-on
Assembles a wealth of archaeological evidence
Builds a clear and complete picture of the real Israel

The Bible as History, Literature, and Theology
The Current School of Revisionists and Their Nonhistories of Ancient Israel
What Archaeology Is and What It Can Contribute to Biblical Studies
Getting at the “History behind the History”: What Convergences between Texts and Artifacts Tell Us about Israelite Origins and the Rise of the State
Daily Life in Israel in the Time of the Divided Monarchy
What Is Left of the History of Ancient Israel, and Why Should It Matter to Anyone Anymore?

Top Highlights

“Population estimates, based on well-developed ethnographic parallels and site size, indicate a central hill-country population of only about 12 thousand at the end of the Late Bronze Age (13th century), which then grew rapidly to about 55 thousand by the 12th century, then to about 75 thousand by the 11th century. Such a dramatic ‘population explosion’ simply cannot be accounted for by natural increase alone, much less by positing small groups of pastoral nomads settling down. Large numbers of people migrated here from somewhere else, strongly motivated to colonize an underpopulated fringe area of urban Canaan, now in decline at the end of the Late Bronze Age.” (Page 110)

“‘early Israel’? Consider the ‘assemblage’ described above. It is demonstrably a new phenomenon at the dawn of the Iron Age ca. 1200, despite a few continuities with the Late Bronze Age. This village culture is also intrusive, at least in the previously underpopulated hill country with its few urban centers.” (Pages 117–118)

“the Queen of Heaven.’ The latter is either Asherah or her counterpart ʿAstarte; the two often coalesced in the Iron Age.” (Page 195)

“have suggested that we go further, adopting the term ‘Proto-Israelite’ to designate this 12th–11th century complex.” (Page 118)

“revisionism. This is not sound, careful, balanced, honest scholarship: it is demagoguery” (Page 52)

Dever is one of the very best archaeologists of the Near East, and everything he writes needs to be taken with the utmost seriousness. . . . Required reading.

—David Noel Freedman, former Endowed Chair in Hebrew Biblical Studies, University of California, San Diego

Dever provides a judicious analysis of archaeological data and shows how it squares with what much of the biblical text tells us. . . . Highly polemical (and for good reason), this book attempts to correct various recent assertions based more on feelings for the modern Israeli-Palestinian question than on any concern for honest history. . . . Dever’s accessible book offers a sound critical examination of Israel’s origins. An advisable purchase for all academic and most public libraries.

—Library Journal

A helpful introduction to the world of Syro-Palestinian archaeology and its possible interaction with biblical studies.

—Publishers Weekly

Meticulously detailed . . . very illuminating, well-informed and surprisingly balanced.

—The Jerusalem Report

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William G. Dever is professor emeritus of Near Eastern archaeology and anthropology at the University of Arizona in Tucson. He has served as director of the Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology in Jerusalem, as director of the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, and as visiting professor at universities around the world. He has spent 30 years conducting archaeological excavations in the Near East, resulting in a large body of award-winning fieldwork.