Biblical texts dated to 600 BC

**Robyn Banks** · September 30th 2004, 03:58 AM

Scientists try to date the Priestly Benediction
Ancient scroll the subject of archaeological detective
story
By John Noble Wilford, New York Times
http://www.oaklandtribune.com/Storie...431928,00.html

... An archaeological discovery in 1979 revealed that the
Priestly Benediction, as the verse from Numbers
6:24-26 is called, appeared to be the earliest
biblical passage ever found in ancient artifacts. Two
tiny strips of silver, each wound tightly like a
miniature scroll and bearing the inscribed words, were
uncovered in a tomb outside Jerusalem and initially
dated from the late seventh or early sixth century
B.C. -- some 400 years before the famous Dead Sea
Scrolls...

... researchers at the University of Southern
California have now re-examined the inscriptions using
space-age photographic and computer imaging
techniques. The words still do not exactly leap off
the silver. But the researchers said they could
finally be "read fully and analyzed with far greater
precision," and that they were indeed the earliest.

In a scholarly report published this month, the
research team concluded that the improved reading of
the inscriptions confirmed their greater antiquity.
The script, the team wrote, is indeed from the period
just before the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.
by Nebuchadnezzar and the subsequent exile of
Israelites in Babylonia.

The researchers further reaffirmed that the scrolls
"preserve the earliest known citations of texts also
found in the Hebrew Bible and that they provide us
with the earliest examples of confessional statements
concerning Yahweh."

Some of the previously unreadable lines seemed to
remove any doubt about the purpose of the silver
scrolls: They were amulets. Unrolled, one amulet is
nearly 4 inches long and an inch wide and the other an
inch and a half long and about half an inch wide. The
inscribed words, the researchers said, were "intended
to provide a blessing that will be used to protect the
wearer from some manner of evil forces."

The report in The Bulletin of the American Schools of
Oriental Research was written by Dr. Gabriel Barkay,
the archaeologist at Bar-Ilan University in Israel who
discovered the artifacts, and collaborators associated
with Southern California's West Semitic Research
Project....

... Pitard said the evidence for the antiquity of the
benediction was now compelling, although this did not
necessarily mean that the Book of Numbers already
existed at that time. Possibly it did, he added, but
if not, at least some elements of the book were
current before the Babylonian exile.

A part of the sacred Torah of Judaism (the first five
books of the Bible), Numbers includes a narrative of
the Israelite wanderings from Mount Sinai to the east
side of the Jordan River. Some scholars think the
Torah was compiled in the time of the exile. A number
of other scholars, the so-called minimalists, who are
influential mainly in Europe, argue that the Bible was
a relatively recent invention by those who took
control of Judea in the late fourth century B.C. In
this view, the early books of the Bible were largely
fictional to give the new rulers a place in the
country's history and thus a claim to the land.

"The new research on the inscriptions suggests that
that's not true," Pitard said. In fact, the research
team noted in its journal report that the improved
images showed the seventh-century lines of the
benediction to be "actually closer to the biblical
parallels than previously recognized."

Dr. P. Kyle McCarter of Johns Hopkins University, a
specialist in ancient Semitic scripts, said the
research should "settle any controversy over these
inscriptions."

A close study, McCarter said, showed that the
handwriting is an early style of Hebrew script and the
letters are from an old Hebrew alphabet, which had all
but ceased to be used after the destruction of
Jerusalem. Later Hebrew writing usually adopted the
Aramaic alphabet.

There was an exception in the time of Roman rule,
around the first centuries B.C. and A.D. The archaic
Hebrew script and letters were revived and used widely
in documents. But McCarter noted telling attributes of
the strokes of the letters and the spelling on the
amulets that, he said, ruled out the more recent date
for the inscriptions. Words in the revived Hebrew
writing would have included letters indicating vowel
sounds. The benediction, the scholar said, was written
in words spelled entirely with consonants, the
authentic archaic way...

... Dr. Esther Eshel, a professor of the Bible at Bar-Ilan
and an authority on Hebrew inscriptions, said this was
the earliest example of amulets from Israel. But she
noted that the language of the benediction was similar
to a blessing ("May he bless you and keep you") found
on a jar from the eighth century B.C.

If the new findings are correct, the people who wore
these amulets may have died before they had to face
the limitations of their efficacy. They might then
have asked in uncomprehending despair, "Where was
Yahweh when the Babylonians swooped down on
Jerusalem?" ...

**shunyadragon** · September 30th 2004, 06:19 AM

Originally posted by Robyn Banks

Scientists try to date the Priestly Benediction
Ancient scroll the subject of archaeological detective
story
By John Noble Wilford, New York Times
http://www.oaklandtribune.com/Storie...431928,00.html

If the new findings are correct, the people who wore
these amulets may have died before they had to face
the limitations of their efficacy. They might then
have asked in uncomprehending despair, "Where was
Yahweh when the Babylonians swooped down on
Jerusalem?" ...

I agree that this is a remarkable find, but I disagree that the finding of priestly benediction that date to this time indicate that the pentateuch can be dated to this time.

**Robyn Banks** · September 30th 2004, 06:51 AM

Originally posted by shunyadragon

I agree that this is a remarkable find, but I disagree that the finding of priestly benediction that date to this time indicate that the pentateuch can be dated to this time.

Accepting the dating, there is no necessary reason for accepting the existence of the remainder of the Pentateuch. The particular form of the writing may provide some evidence of whether it was a part of the wider Pentateuch. But I can't see anything being very conclusive one way or the other.

On the other hand, 600 BC is not unreasonable a date for the Pentateuch to have been in existence. Who really knows?

Robyn Banks

**shunyadragon** · September 30th 2004, 09:06 PM

Originally posted by Robyn Banks

Accepting the dating, there is no necessary reason for accepting the existence of the remainder of the Pentateuch. The particular form of the writing may provide some evidence of whether it was a part of the wider Pentateuch. But I can't see anything being very conclusive one way or the other.

On the other hand, 600 BC is not unreasonable a date for the Pentateuch to have been in existence. Who really knows?

Robyn Banks

If specific random scrapes of the pentateuch can be found dating to this period with this older writing, like found related to the NT, then the evidence would be very good if not conclusive for the existence of the writen pentateuch.

These priestly benidiction scrolls are important in establishing preistly ritual and the tradition of writen scripture.

**Chavoux** · December 17th 2010, 08:53 AM

I find it strange that theologians are so quick to see the possible links and even postulate the enuma elish and Gilgamesh epic as the origins of the Biblical text and when they have a direct quote from Number 6: 24-26 AND Deut. 7:9 together (b.t.w that is both the P and D "sources" according to the JEDP hypothesis), they still hold that the Pentateuch could not be seen from these quotes as being written before this time.

Please explain to me the reasoning. We now know that alphabetic writing already existed by the time of Moses. We now also know that religions do not evolve from "simple" animism to polytheism to monotheism. We have not a single peace of physical evidence that more than one person wrote the Torah. We have pre-exilic references in the prophets to the Torah of Moses. We have at least one piece of archaeological atifact, dated to pro-exilic times with two quotes from supposedly different sources of the Torah together and still they insist on a late date for the formation of the Torah from separate sources. Why?

**FreezBee** · December 17th 2010, 09:21 AM