Introduction to Archaeology

[Celsus]

Contentless bluster ahead: Delete if not acceptable to the moderators.

I have been writing an introduction to archaeology series over the last few months, and have finally got round to part III after a long delay. Fair warning: These pieces introduce scholarly consensus and debate, not apologetics.

Part I: Archaeological History and Method (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=26)
Part II: The Grand Narrative: From Stone to Bronze (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=27)
Part III: The Rise of Some People or Other (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=227)

Comments on all are welcome, though I do not have the time to engage in active debates.

Joel

[ChrisChillin]

I just read Part I. It's quite a good intro, so kudos to you! :thumb:

"Minimaximalism", eh? Funny!

Any critique?....Hmm...I suppose I would've started w/ the Rosetta Stone, and not Petrie. But that's gettin' nitpicky.

Apart from that, so far so good.

[Celsus]

I just read Part I. It's quite a good intro, so kudos to you! :thumb:

"Minimaximalism", eh? Funny!

Any critique?....Hmm...I suppose I would've started w/ the Rosetta Stone, and not Petrie. But that's gettin' nitpicky.

Apart from that, so far so good.
Thanks Chris,

I look forward to what you have to say when you reach the latter parts. :)

Joel

[Vorkosigan]

I look forward to what you have to say when you reach the latter parts. :)

Hey! No kinky talk in here! ;)

Anyway, Celsus' writing is first rate! Take a moment and look it over.

Vorkosigan

[Celsus]

After a very long hiatus, I've finally slogged through to get #4 up:

Ascendance and Decline (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?p=5578#5578)

The HTML/printable versions can all be found here (http://eblaforum.org/library/bcah/). Comments welcome.

Joel

[shunyadragon]

Contentless bluster ahead: Delete if not acceptable to the moderators.

I have been writing an introduction to archaeology series over the last few months, and have finally got round to part III after a long delay. Fair warning: These pieces introduce scholarly consensus and debate, not apologetics.

Part I: Archaeological History and Method (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=26)
Part II: The Grand Narrative: From Stone to Bronze (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=27)
Part III: The Rise of Some People or Other (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=227)

Comments on all are welcome, though I do not have the time to engage in active debates.

JoelThis view of the history of the Holy Lands and the fertile cresent is one I have held in a general sense for many years. It will take me a few weeks to digest and check out what you have posted so far.

I believe strongly in resource and changing environments after the last Ice Age as important factors for the evolution of primative cultures into the Stone, Bronze and Iron Age Civilizations.

I have always though the Pentateuch evolved from Babylonian legends, myths and laws through eastern cultures like Urgarites and then blended with the traditions of the local tribes of the Palistine region.

One comment I would like to add is concerning the evolution of the role of the pig in Middle Eastern diet. I have been in several debates where many Jews and Christians try and use the evidence to support the Biblical role in determining who did and did not eat pigs.

My analysis is primarily based on the history of the environmental conditions of the region and I believe the distribution of the use of the pig in the diet fits this model, even though I have only had a limited exposure to the data available. The region including North Africa has been in drying trend since the last Ice Age. The pig is endemically a mesic animal and does not do well in semi-arid to arid environments. Goats and sheep are better adapted to these environments and suited to the nomadic life styles of these regions. The distribution of the use of the pig in the diet of different people in the region will most likely be in the wetter regions. as the region dried out these regions were limited to coastal areas and major river valleys

The Stone Age semitic tribes the Hebrews and Arabs evolved from were mostly nomadic tribes of semi-arid to arid environments better adapted to goat and sheep herding. When they settled down in the Bronze and Iron Ages they kept their cultural preference for sheep and goat.

The pattern is the same in the Orient the tribes of the semi-arid to arid regions almost exclusively relied on nomadic goat and sheep herding. The tribes that later evolved into the Han and other tribes of the more temperate and mesic regions relied primarily on the pig for the domestic meat source. In fact the daddy of the legendary dragon of China is most likely the pig, but that's another interesting story.

I am presently living in China and doing a personal study on the evolution of the culture of China related to jade because it is basically the least understood and most important aspect of the origins of Chinese culture.

[Celsus]

Brian Hesse and Paula Wapnish (husband and wife team) have some fairly comprehensive treatments of the pig bone issue in "Pig Lovers and Pig Haters: Patterns of Palestinian Pork Production", Journal of Ethnobiology, 10.2: 195-225, 1990 and "Can Pig Remains be Used for Ethnic Diagnosis in the Ancient Near East?" in "The Archaeology of Israel: Constructing the Past, Interpreting the Present" (eds. N.A. Silberman and D. Small) Journal of the Study of the Old Testament Supplementary Series 237, 1997. From the latter article, the opening lines:
If the absence of pig bones in an Iron Age archaeological site is taken as diagnostic for the presence of ethnic Israelites, there were a lot more Israelites in the ancient world than we ever suspected. Beginning sometime late in the second millenium BCE in a wide swath from Anatolia to southern Mesopotamia, from Persia to the Mediterranean, Yahweh's devotees abounded in almost every village and town, swamping the few populations of pork eating non-Israelites still holding out in widely scattered communities. If this sounds unbelievable, it is, but it also reflects the uncritical interpretation biblical historians, theologians, and archaeologists have loaded onto reports of pig bone finds. (p. 238)
If you can get your hands on the latter, you'll find pretty plenty of support for your position.

Joel

[grmorton]

Celsus, in part II you start with the Acheulian. Any reason why you left out the Oldowan tools of 2.6 million years ago?

[Celsus]

Celsus, in part II you start with the Acheulian. Any reason why you left out the Oldowan tools of 2.6 million years ago?
Are there Oldowan-age tools in Palestine at that time? This introduction relates specifically (as possible) to that region, hence the omission of some areas and inclusion of others. It's also a race through the paleolithic (as you will notice, the latter periods cover shorter and shorter periods) because it's not really something I'm familiar with. If you have any references though, I'd love to hear them. I am quite happy to revise them, especially after this article (http://biolog-e.ls.biu.ac.il/synapse/uploads2/Goren-Inbar_2004.pdf) came out (PDF-- If you have access to Science it's here (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/304/5671/725)), but it's also only as early as the Acheullian. As far as I know, there are limited numbers of sites in the Levant of great age, the oldest at 'Ubeidiya 1.4 million years ago (Ma) and Evron quarry 1Ma. Gesher Benot Ya'aqov is relatively young at .78 Ma (and probably the most extensively surveyed) so that's the period where I would start. I would be interested in expanding that section though, if you have more information. Once we get to about 10,000 B.C.E things start to get interesting from a civilisation point of view.

Joel

[grmorton]

Are there Oldowan-age tools in Palestine at that time? This introduction relates specifically (as possible) to that region, hence the omission of some areas and inclusion of others. It's also a race through the paleolithic (as you will notice, the latter periods cover shorter and shorter periods) because it's not really something I'm familiar with. If you have any references though, I'd love to hear them. I am quite happy to revise them, especially after this article (http://biolog-e.ls.biu.ac.il/synapse/uploads2/Goren-Inbar_2004.pdf) came out (PDF-- If you have access to Science it's here (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/304/5671/725)), but it's also only as early as the Acheullian. As far as I know, there are limited numbers of sites in the Levant of great age, the oldest at 'Ubeidiya 1.4 million years ago (Ma) and Evron quarry 1Ma. Gesher Benot Ya'aqov is relatively young at .78 Ma (and probably the most extensively surveyed) so that's the period where I would start. I would be interested in expanding that section though, if you have more information. Once we get to about 10,000 B.C.E things start to get interesting from a civilisation point of view.

Joel


Hi Joel, One thing we know for sure, people with Oldowan technology did pass through Palestine (or more properly the Levant) prior to the advent of the Acheulian. In Georgia in the Caucasus we find that men using Oldowan tools were there 1.8 myr ago! HEre is a bunch on that site.

"Lithic artifacts from Dmanisi are consistent with a late
Pliocene-early Pleistocene age. Over 1000 artifacts consisting of
rare choppers, chopping tools, a few scrapers, and numerous flakes
have been recovered from unit A and B strata. The artifacts are
made entirely from local basalt sources using an Oldowan (Mode 1)
technology. No bifaces or developed Oldowan artifacts have been
found. Most of the artifacts retain sharp edges which suggests
little transport, although no refits of flakes on tools were
observed. The Dmanisi assemblages of East Africa that appear as
early as 2.4 Ma, predating Acheulean assemblages that first appear
about 1.6 Ma."

There are also reports by Robin Dennell several years ago of Oldowan tools found in Pakistan.
The results of the excavations at Dmanisi have shown that the
first wave of human expansion took place at an earlier date than
previously thought, with simple tools similar to "Oldowan"
technology used in Africa for 750,000 years before these humans
reached Dmanisi. If it was not new technology that let humans
leave Africa, perhaps it was new biology. Time will tell."http://www.archaeologytoday.net/web%20articles/082901-
dmanisi_skulls.htm
accessed 09-28-01


"If the Dmanisi people managed to travel thousands of miles with
these simple tools, 'this means that the Oldowan adaptation was
more complex than people thought,' comments Milford Wolpoff, a
paleoanthropologist at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor."


"The finding coupled with previously known fossils from
Dmanisi whose antiquity was originally doubted overturns a popular
theory aimed at explaining what prompted the first colonizers to
venture out of Africa. The stone tools from 'Ubeidiya represents
an advanced industry known as Acheulean, which includes carefully
crafted hand axes and other double-edged tools well suited to
carving meat. The earliest Acheulean tools come from Africa and
date to about 1.6 million years ago. Prior to that, hominids were
using a more primitive technology dubbed Oldowan. Researchers thus
proposed that the development of the Acheulean enabled early
humans to finally leave Africa, because the tools gave them a
better means of scavenging and hunting. Dmanisi, however, has
yielded Oldowan, not Acheulean tools."


" At the gates of Europe, excavations in Dmanissi
(Georgia) have yielded Oldowan lithic industry associated with a
jaw and crania of probably H. aff. Ergaster, in alluvial deposits.
A basalt layer that is overlain by the sediments containing human
remains gave A 40/A39 date of 1.85 +/- 0.01 Ma, whereas the
sediments give reversed (Matuyama) polarity, constraining the date
to lie between 0.78 and 1.77 Ma. Additional evidence (especially
the faunal assemblage) places the Dmanissi site around the
Pliocene-Pleistocene boundary, with an age slightly younger than
1.77 Ma. Also in the Caucasus, the Akhalkalaki site has yielded an
Acheulean industry and a faunal assemblage that suggest an age
slightly younger than Dmanisi. In Western Europe, dates are even
more problematic, and until the early 1990s there had been no
convincing documentation of human presence older than 0.5 Ma.
Localities such as Le Vallonet, Soleilhac (France), Isernia La
Pineta (Italy), and Atapuerca (Spain) are older than 0.5 Ma and
are known to contain Oldowan tools. In any case,, the genus Homo
was ready to occupy various regions of the Old World at about 1
Ma, as indicated by the eastern Mediterranean sites at Ubeidiya
and Gesher Benot Ya'aqov (Israel, both containing Acheulean
tools."

[Celsus]

Thanks for that information. Unfortunately, that's pretty much outside the scope of the introduction, but I may add in a sentence or two to that effect ("Humans must have passed through the Levant because they ended up in Georgia").

Joel

[WILLOWTREE]

Contentless bluster ahead: Delete if not acceptable to the moderators.

I have been writing an introduction to archaeology series over the last few months, and have finally got round to part III after a long delay. Fair warning: These pieces introduce scholarly consensus and debate, not apologetics.

Part I: Archaeological History and Method (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=26)
Part II: The Grand Narrative: From Stone to Bronze (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=27)
Part III: The Rise of Some People or Other (http://eblaforum.org/main/viewtopic.php?t=227)

Comments on all are welcome, though I do not have the time to engage in active debates.

Joel
From: Cambridge Ancient History, Third Edition, Vol.2, Part 2 [1975] Chapter VII "Archaeological Evidence" pages 331,332:

"One must not forget that the interpretations of these finds {in Palestine} has been and still is largely dependant on the school of biblical exegesis to which the excavator adheres."
The above quote is saying if the archaeologist is an atheist then their interpretations of evidence will obviously contradict the Bible. The reverse is true for theists.

There is one common denominator in the Celsus post and links: The body of evidence was produced by atheists.

How could an atheist INTERPRET evidence that confirms the claims of the Bible ?

This is like leaving a Catholic priest alone with a young boy.....what happens ?

Answer: molestation and perversion.

When atheists are deciding the validity and veracity of a source to which the Deity therein is their known enemy how could the Bible not be perverted ?

What qualifies atheist archaeologists to determine the validity of literary texts ?

Do they have any education or degrees in Divinity ?

In religion ?

In Biblical scholarship ?

How can atheist archaeologists produce and interpret discoveries that confirm Biblical miracles when their worldview demands that a miracle is nonsense/irrational ?

The answer to all these questions is obvious: Atheists cannot confirm or corroborate that which their worldview is implacably hateful towards - the Bible.

Yet it is atheist archaeology which controls the mainstream and whose voice the media (atheists too) gives outlet to.

MYTH #1:

"There is no evidence of ancient Israel in Egypt or Sinai and no evidence of the Exodus"

Dr. Cyrus Gordon, "Common Backround of Greek and Hebrew Civilizations" [1965]

Gordon says the soil and sand of Lower Egypt are "nitrous" and yield no remains of its ancient history. Everything we know about Egypt is derived from Upper Egypt where the same conditions do not exist. Also contributing to the destruction of the ancient history of Lower Egypt is the fact that the Nile overflowed and flooded the entire region on a regular basis thus wiping out its historical contents.
These facts are why the Bible was written - to preserve knowledge that would otherwise be lost.

The Bible says ancient Israel dwelt in Goshen/Lower Egypt.

Egyptologists/atheists know this yet they conveniently fail to mention these facts when asserting there is (allegedly) no evidence of Israel in Egypt.

But this still evades the central point:

Archaeology is an inferior art.

Archaeology is not the arbiter of truth.

Literary text is the supreme source and arbiter of truth.

Why ?

Because archaeology is dependant upon the callous and unpredictible kindness of environment and time. Not to mention the arbitrary and capricious interpretations of the atheist status quo.

Atheist archaeology has placed literary evidence on the defensive and the world at large including much of idiot christianity has bought into this fraud.

The correct and controlling posture is: archaeology is on trial and its judge and jury is literary text/Bible.

Literary evidence is premium and archaeological is subordinate.

http://www.bibleorigins.net/Shatter...itictablet.html (http://www.bibleorigins.net/ShatteredProtoSinaitictablet.html)

"Despite claims by a number of scholars that there is NOTHING -archaeologically speaking- to link to the Exodus traditions to in the Southern Sinai, I maintain that there is. I have attempted to "link" various elements and motifs appearing in the Exodus narratives with archaeological findings in the Southern Sinai left by Asiatics FROM Egypt."

The above link and excerpt was produced by an honest atheist.

Please note when reading the material how the author refers to the Biblical text as "traditions" despite presenting evidence supporting the Bible at face value.

Just extract the archaeology evidence and recognize the bias/assumption of Biblical content to be of a much lesser degree of truth called "traditions" instead of "historical truth/facts". I already established the trait of atheists to assume Biblical text anything but true and this is seen in the link and its descriptions of the O.T.


http://biblicalstudies.qldwide.net.au/chronology_of_egypt_and_israel.html


The above link is super archaeological evidence which confirms the Bible.

The link clearly shows how evidence is mishandled against the Bible. The mishandling is caused by an ingrained prejudice which assumes what the Bible says is not true.


http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html)

"In the case of the Conquest, archaeological data have not always been subjected to the Bible's own claims. V. Phillips Long noted that the Bible speaks of both violent and non-violent aspects of the Conquest.9 (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html#9) On the one hand, Israel was commanded by YHWH to capture the Amorite cities, destroy all life, and burn the religious icons (Num 33:51–53; Deut 7:1–5). Joshua 10–11 repeatedly reports the faithful observation of these instructions during the southern and northern campaigns. On the other hand, Israel did not have to raze all of the buildings and then build new ones from the rubble. While the book of Joshua records the burning of three cities (Jericho, Ai, and Hazor), it also reports that Joshua did not burn the cities surrounding Hazor (11:13).

This, however, is not an admission of disobedience. In the context of warning the tribes not to forget YHWH's goodness, Moses had said that they would live in houses which they did not build, enjoy furnishings which they did not buy, drink water from cisterns which they did not dig, and eat the produce from vines and olive trees which they did not plant (Deut 6:10–12). Later in his farewell address, Joshua similarly reminded the tribes that YHWH had given them cities which they had not built and vineyards which they had not planted (Josh 24:13). Given the Bible's own statements, one should not be too surprised that archaeology has found little evidence for a violent conquest in the fifteenth century.

The problem with archaeological findings is that they are subject to different interpretations. A classic example is the earlier debate between John Garstang and Kathleen Kenyon concerning the destruction of Jericho. Both were competent archaeologists who examined the same evidence and came to incompatible conclusions about the date of Jericho's fall.10 (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html#10) Archaeological artifacts are brute facts that can be used to bolster any number of historical reconstructions.11 (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html#11) In the hands of historians, archaeological evidence must always be supplemented by inferential reasoning that goes beyond the facts." 12 (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html#12) But such theoretical extrapolations cannot be separated from the interpreter's presuppositions. According to Miller, "Most biblical scholars, regardless of their methodological purity on matters historical, operate with more or less fixed notions in mind regarding the general course of ancient Israel's history."13 (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html#13) Therefore, they "consciously or unconsciously tend to rely on models" and so adjust the evidence to fit their reconstruction of the Conquest.14 (http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_conquest_ulrich.html#14)"

In regards to Garstang and Kenyon:

Atheists champion Kenyon's work as refuting Garstang. IOW, one of their own came along and "revised" the truth.


http://www.apologeticspress.org/defdocs/rr1993/r&r9311a.htm

"However, archaeologists generally believe that the Israelites entered Canaan about 1230-1220 B.C., nearly 200 years later than the biblical date (Bimson, 1987, 13[5]:40-42). Again, excavations at Jericho, the first fortified city conquered by the Israelites (Joshua 2-6), are at the heart of this controversy. John Garstang was the first to employ modern pottery chronology to explore this biblical site. He uncovered a residential area in the southeast slope of the tell, which he called “City IV.” This city had been destroyed by a violent conflagration. Based on pottery in the destruction debris, and other artifacts in the nearby cemetery, he associated City IV with the first city Israel defeated in the conquest. Garstang dated this destruction level to the late 15th or early 14th century B.C., and he believed that the invading Israelites caused the destruction, in harmony with the biblical record (Joshua 6:24; Wood, 1987, p. 7).


Kathleen Kenyon critiqued Garstang’s work in 1951, and did additional excavation at this site during 1952-1958. Kenyon disagreed with Garstang’s date of the destruction level, and placed it at c. 1550 B.C., many years before the biblical date of the conquest. She further contended that in 1400 B.C. there was no fortified city for Joshua’s army to conquer, and that the archaeological evidence does not agree with the biblical description of a large-scale military incursion contemporary with the destruction of Jericho (Kenyon, 1957b, p. 259). Kenyon based her conclusions largely upon the absence of pottery typically used around 1400 B.C.

Subsequently, scholars have critiqued Kenyon’s work and have vindicated the conclusions of Garstang, and, by implication, the biblical chronology (Wood, 1990; Livingston, 1988; see also Jackson, 1990). Kenyon’s conclusions, however, caused Jericho to become the classic example of the difficulties with correlating the biblical account of the conquest with the archaeological record. Pottery stands at the center of the interpretive and dating discrepancies of the conquest. "

In addition to the quotes above I would point out that all of manistream/atheist archaeology vocally insist Kenyon's work is settled fact.

IOW, one atheist archaeologist and her interpretations void the entire Biblical record of the Exodus and Conquest = astronomic irrational bias.

Obviously Kenyon had an anti-Bible axe to grind.

http://www.ldolphin.org/alanm/exod2b.html

Now the above link is probably the best all around objective documentation of the entire subject of when the Exodus took place.

The link argues each major camp and its contentions.

The link concludes for Velikovsky and his defense of the Biblical Exodus date of mid-15th century.

May I remind that Immanuel Velikovsky was a Jew and an atheist. He had zero predisposition for Biblical miracle claims. His major work "Ages in Chaos" [1952]
still reigns and has gone unrefuted.

The greatest Bible scholar in the world Dr. Gene Scott (Ph.D. Stanford University) (www.drgenescott.com (http://www.drgenescott.com/)) on Velikovsky:

"He was the greatest scholar of the 20th century.....he disproved every egyptologist....that is why he is so hated."


http://biblicalstudies.qldwide.net.au/chronology_of_egypt_and_israel.html (http://biblicalstudies.qldwide.net.au/chronology_of_egypt_and_israel.html)

The above link (previously posted above) provides wonderful proof supporting Velikovsky via C-14 dating.



Exodus Date 1453 BC

CONFIRMATION OF 1453 BC VIA HISTORICAL INTERLOCKING JUBILEE AND SABBATIC CYCLES (source: Dr. Gene Scott and Rutherford/"Pyramidology III" [1957] Chapter X, pages 650-654)

Leviticus 25 (excerpts)

And the LORD spake unto Moses in mount Sinai, saying,

Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD.

Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof;

But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard.

That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: for it is a year of rest unto the land.

And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years.

Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land.

And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family.

A jubile shall that fiftieth year be unto you

Levitical law required the Israelites to refrain from farming the ground and releasing those in servitude to go free every 7th year. This became known as the Sabbatic Year/7-year Sabbatic Cycle.

Although these Cycles could not be fully operational until they entered the promise land/Canaan, their inaugural reckoning was the year of the Exodus. Thus the 50th year/Jubilee would come 50 years after the Exodus, which would be the 10th year (civil) since the entry into Canaan.

1453 - 40 year Wilderness journey - 10 years in Canaan = 50th year/Jubilee = 1405-1404 BC (inclusive of year 1453).

However, only after Israel enters Canaan does the first Jubilee Cycle begin, hence Cycle No.1 commences 1405-1404 BC. This Cycle No.1 is counted as such because the Leviticus text specifies "when they come into the land" (Leviticus 25:2).

The Jubilee/50th year would be celebrated at the end of 7 sets of 7 year Sabbatic Cycles. The silver Jubilee trumpet would sound throughout the land on the Day of Atonement (10th Tishri) and this new year would be observed as the Year of Jubilee.

According to the "Jewish Encylopedia", Vol.10, page 607:

"The 16th Jubilee occurred in the 18th year of Josiah's reign."

This historical fact produces the following tabulation:

16th Jubilee, that is 7 x 7 Sabbatic Cycles = 16 x 49 = 784 years.

1453 - 40 - 10 = 1405-1404 = date of first Jubilee Cycle.

Josiah's 18th year (621-620 BC) is when the said 16th Jubilee occurred.

The difference between 1405-1404 BC and 621-620 BC = 784 years.
784 divided by 49 = 16 with NO REMAINDER.

IMPORTANT: The fiftieth year was the Jubilee year, but the cycle ended at the 49th year. Hence, the 50th year is the Jubilee AND the first year of the NEXT cycle.

Remember, the Leviticus text says, "when ye enter the land" is when the 1st Jubilee Cycle is to begin.

The date of the Exodus begins the Inaugural Jubilee.

In my case that would be 1453 BC.

1453 - 40 year wilderness journey THEN the Jordan crossing begins Israel's entry into Canaan.

10 years later is 50 years from the Exodus.

1453 - 50 = 1404 BC (inclusive of year 1453).

1404 BC BEGINS the FIRST Jubilee Cycle (Leviticus 25 clock begins).

1,2,3,4.....45, 46, 47, 48, 49 - 50/1,2,3,4.....45,46,47,48,49 - 50/1 etc.etc.

The above enumeration should help in understanding that the 50th year is the Jubilee AND the first year of the next cycle - dual purpose.

The above evidence DECIMATES in it tracks every Exodus dating scheme other than the correct one/Biblical of 1453 BC.

The in-built corroboration of Jubilee Cycles within Holy Text and its subsequent verification of the date of the Exodus is nothing less than spectacular.

This evidence also supports the claim of literary evidence to be premium and archaeological to be inferior due to the arbitrary interpretation of discoveries, and the fact that archaeology is dependant upon the callous and unpredictible kindness of environment and time.

WT

[Celsus]

Willowtree, please take the time to peruse this article (http://www.eblaforum.org/library/philosophy/intphi16.html#ad_hominem). Did you know that Cyrus H. Gordon wasn't a literalist? I've actually spoken to someone who found Gordon's works instrumental in his deconversion. Be careful who you rely on for authorities. :D

Joel

[WILLOWTREE]

Willowtree, please take the time to peruse this article (http://www.eblaforum.org/library/philosophy/intphi16.html#ad_hominem). Did you know that Cyrus H. Gordon wasn't a literalist? I've actually spoken to someone who found Gordon's works instrumental in his deconversion. Be careful who you rely on for authorities. :D

JoelWho said Gordon was anything much less a literalist ?

Your rejection of Gordon is because he has proven that Greek civilization orginated from Egypt via Semitic peoples c.2000 BC.

This of course fully supports Genesis that descendants of Eber/Hebrew are the genesis race and not Sumer or any other.

Like my Theist response said, atheist archaeology rejects everything that confirms the Bible.

Gordon was, in part, responsible for my conversion.

Gordon has proved there was two other Exoduses - (all Shemites/Semites populated) in addition to the Mosaic Exodus.

I urge you to stop arguing the man and address evidence if you have the time.

WT

[Celsus]

I don't reject "Gordon". He was a scholar for his time (that is, the 1960s). There's plenty of work that has since overturned the optimism of that period, but which unfortunately, you seem to be unaware of. And since your initial reply constituted plenty of ad hominem nonsense, I suggest your saying I'm arguing against the man is highly ironic (or I urge you to demonstrate how I "reject" him). I'm aware of your style and tactics, so I won't be wasting an further time on this. If you have specific criticisms of anything I wrote, I'll be glad to answer them, but I won't pander to you trying to change this into a debate on your pet Velikovsky project.

Joel

[BrianJ]

I don't reject "Gordon". He was a scholar for his time (that is, the 1960s). There's plenty of work that has since overturned the optimism of that period, but which unfortunately, you seem to be unaware of. And since your initial reply constituted plenty of ad hominem nonsense, I suggest your saying I'm arguing against the man is highly ironic (or I urge you to demonstrate how I "reject" him). I'm aware of your style and tactics, so I won't be wasting an further time on this. If you have specific criticisms of anything I wrote, I'll be glad to answer them, but I won't pander to you trying to change this into a debate on your pet Velikovsky project.

Joel

I read your links Celsus and do not see any references to that great archaeologist Mr. Ron Wyatt, I think you have missed out a major source for supporting the truth of the Bible. :tongue:

Brian.

[WILLOWTREE]

but I won't pander to you trying to change this into a debate on your pet Velikovsky project.Your avoidance of Velikovsky is no mystery.

"Ages in Chaos" chapter 3: irrefutably proves that the Queen of Sheba is Queen Hatshepsut.

Chapter 4: irrefutably proves that Thutmose III was Shishak of Rehoboam's day.

Chapter 6: irrefutably proves that the Amarna Letters and era were 870 - 840 BC.

The evidence in these chapters is voluminous.

I understand why you want no part of Velikovsky.

I only have ONE point:

Contrary to their claim, atheists are not loyal to evidence where ever it may lead.

Velikovsky, the atheist/agnostic naturalist Jew proves this.

Velikovsky ended his book by saying that it was for future scholars to decide HOW to incorporate his pioneer research into a chronology that satisfies the histories of all the kingdoms of the Near East.

Two things are certain:

Conventional Egyptian chronology contains serious errors.

"Ages in Chaos" proves Biblical veracity.

WT