Archaeology as a High Court in Ancient Israelite History: A Reply to Nadav Na’aman

Israel Finkelstein

doi:10.5508/jhs.2010.v10.a147

Abstract

This is a rejoinder to N. Na'aman, "Does Archaeology Really Deserve the Status of A ‘High Court’ in Biblical and Historical Research?," B. Becking and L.L. Grabbe (eds.) Between Evidence and Ideology (OtSt, 59; Leiden: Brill, 165–183) that claims that although archaeological evidence can be fragmentary and may be misinterpreted, when solid data from well-excavated sites is compared to assumptions regarding the nature of biblical texts and their date of compilation, the former should prevail, at least until tested by new archaeological evidence or extra-biblical texts.

Highlights

In a recent article Nadav Na’aman (2010) expressed doubts regarding the meaning of negative archaeological evidence for reconstructing biblical history, especially regarding sites in the highlands
Na’aman rightly spotlights the discrepancy between the testimony of the Amarna letters, which describe sites such as Jerusalem, Shechem, Gezer and Lachish as strong polities, and the meager 14th century BCE finds unearthed in the excavations at these sites
I think that the problem should be phrased differently: Would an archaeology-based, textfree study of the Late Bronze II produce a map of Canaanite citystates that would be considerably diverse from the one drawn according to the Amarna letters? I believe that such an investigation—even without the results of the mineralogical study of the tablets (Goren, Finkelstein and Na’aman 2004)—would point to Lachish, Gezer, Pehel, Megiddo, Hazor and possibly Ashdod as centers of city states, or peer polities

Summary

INTRODUCTION

In a recent article Nadav Na’aman (2010) expressed doubts regarding the meaning of negative archaeological evidence for reconstructing biblical history, especially regarding sites in the highlands. 180 bullae in a late Iron IIA context in the rock-cut pool near the Gihon Spring in Jerusalem (Reich et al 2007) as a case in point for the coincidental nature of archaeology and an indication for extensive writing in the capital of Judah at that time, “though it may have been used only by the royal palace and the elite”. He concludes that “The reconstruction of tenth-ninth century Jerusalem made on the basis of the archaeological evidence alone, while ignoring the biblical text, might be misleading”. He backs this statement up with three arguments: 1) Major Judahite cities in the Shephelah and Beer-sheba Valley were fortified in the 9th century and it is only logical to assume that the capital of the kingdom was fortified too

I am mentioning this because of a different kind of discrepancy

SUMMARY