The Fundamentals: Volume 2, Chapter 2: The Recent Testimony of Archaeology To The Scriptures
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CHAPTER
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TfIE RECENT T T ES ES TIM ,QNY QNY OF ARCHAE 0LOGY TO 1
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THE SCRIPTURES. I
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M ,. G. KYLE,
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EGYPTOLOGIST •
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PROFESSOR
D.,
D. D., LL.
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BIBLICAL
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XENIA
ARCHAEOLOGY,
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THEOLOGICAL
,S.EMINARY EMINARY ,. CONSULTING •
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PAST,
WASH-
INGTON,
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· (The n n··umber umber s in parenthese .s tl1 tl1r ,ough ough ,out out this article refer t ,o the notes at the end of the article.) · •
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INTRODUCTI .ON• ON •
Recent is a dangerousl ,y capacious Word to intro.st to an . archaeologist. Anything this side of the Day of P entec_ost is re ,c,ent ent ·in ·bib: bib:(.i,i ,iaa:l a.rch, rch ,aieology. eology. For this review, ho ho,,wever, wever, , anything ,since since 1904 is accepted to be, in a general wa wa,,y, y, the meaning of the , word rec ,ent. ent. · ·· R ecent ha eologyt may be either the testi ecent.. test ,imony imony of arc ,ha rnon,,y of recent discoveries o~ recent testimony of form~r dis rnon etation, if it c,overi1 overi 1s: ·· new interpr ,etation, it·· be established t :0 be a true interpr ,etation, etation, i,s a ,discovery. discovery. For to · uncover is not al ways,, to discover; indeed, the real value of · a di ways di..scovery scovery is not its emergence, but its significance, and the discovery · of its rea1 .significance · · significance is the re re,,al al disc9very. The most i1nportant testimony to the Scriptures of this five five,, aeolo gical period admits of sonte clas year arch ,aeolo clas,,sification sification : ·
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I~ THE HISTORICAL S,ETTING ATRIAR ,CHAL1 CHAL1REETTING Q,F THE P ATRIAR, , CEPTION IN EGYPT.
The ,reception reception in Egypt accord ed to Abraham and to J acoh acoh and bis sons<1 , and tl1e elevation of Joseph the the~ ~e<2 , per1
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The Fu1idame Fu1idame 1tals. '
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emptori]y demand ,either either the acknowledgment of a mythical element in the stories, 0 r the belief in a suitable historica 'l set ting therefor. Obscure, insignificant insignificant,, p ,rivate rivate citizens are not ourt . accorded such recognition . at a foreign and unfrien ,dly dly c,ourt 1
While some have be, be,en en conceding a mythical el in the el,,ement ement .in stories cs>, archae ,ology ology has uncovered to view such appropriate historical setting that the patriarchs . are seen no no..t to hav ·e been obscure, insignificant, private citizens, nor Zoan a foreign and unfriendly court. The , presence ,of of the Sem Sem::i.tic tic tongue in Hyksos' territory p ,at. at .riarchal riarchal has lo, lo,ng ng been known< ); from still earlier than p, times until much later, the Phoenicians, first cousins of the Hedi,,d the forei forei,,gn gn business of the ,_ _ -ptians( 5 >, as the brews, di 1
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English, t·h e Germans, and and t.he he Fsome ·rench renchfamiliarity, do the foreign of the Chinese of today; even business sympa· th,,y, th y, with · Semiti ,c religion has · been strongl ,y suspected from the Hy Hy''kso, kso,s kings with the patriarchs< 1 >; the interview of 'the but the discovery in 1906'7 ', by Petrie, 0£ the great fortified camp at Tel-el-Yehudiyeh set at rest, in the the,, main, the biblical biblical.. question of the relation between the patriarchs and the Hyksos. os scarabs and the almost total ab The abundance of Hyks ,os senc..e of all others mark the camp as certairily a a:yksos · senc ca1np<>; the original charact ,er be,,for-e er of the fo ·rtifications, rtifications, be
the Hyksos learned the builders'
craft from the Egyptians, shows them to have ,depended depended upon the bow for def en.se<> and, finally, the name Hyksos, in the Egyptian :Haq Shashu' 10·i cl,,ear, ear, ~he harmonious ''Be ,douin douin princes,'' brings out, sharp and cl pie.tare of which we have had . glimpses for a long time, of the Hyksos as · wandering tribe tribe··s of the desert, of ''Upper and Lower Rutben''< 11 >; i.e. Syria and Pal estine, northern and Ar..abia,J abia,J ''Bow pe western Ar pe,,ople''( ople''( 12 > , a .s the E , tians called them, their traditional enemies as fa fa··r back as pyramid 1
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shoul..d not • the the,, pa ad a roy roy..al al reWhy, then, shoul pa,,triarchs triarchs have b.ad ceptien in Egypt? They were tl1emselves also the heads of •
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Recent Testim .ony ony of A ·rchaeo. rchaeo.lo, lo,gy gy to t,he he Scriptures. •
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wandering tribes of Upper and Lower Ruthen, in the tongue of the ptians, Haq S11as S11as1u, 1u, Bedouin princes ; and ,among among i,s a prince, however small his principality. princes, a prince i, So Abraham, the Bedouin princ e, was accorded princely con- · si,,deration si deration at the Bedouin court in Egypt ; Joseph, the Bed Bed..ouin ouin tl1e wis wis,,dom dom of , ,s]a, s]a,ve,, ve,, became ag, ag,ai: ai:n the Be douin prin c,e,·whe11 tl1e God with him and his rank by birtlt became kno wn. And Ja ,cob ob1 1and his other so11s were welcome, with all their followers and their wealth, as a valuable acquisition to the court i party, a,Jways Jways harasse ,d by the re s ti ti,,ve ve ,and and rebe llious native , · Egyptians. This does not prove racial identirf between. the Hykso .s an an..d the patriarchs, but very close tribal reli rel iati~nship ati~nship .. And thus every suspicion o · a 1nythical elemen t in the na~na~-.. 1
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rative of the reception accorded the patriarchs in Egypt di diss appears when archaeology has testified to tl1e true hi hi..storica1 storica 1 setting. •
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THE HITTITE
VINDICATION.
A second recent testimony of arcliaeology giv giv,,e·s us tlie' tlie' gr gr''t lit Hittite vindic, vindic ,ation. ation. The Hittites have been, in one respect, the Trojans of Bible his i11 1 dee dee··d, d, the inha ,bitants bitants . of old · his,,to· to ·ry· ry· i1 Schli hliemann emann to vindica~e Troy were scarcely more in need of a Sc their claim to reality than the Hittites of a Winckle ,r.. r.. . In 1904 one o,f the foremost archaeologists of Europe saitl to me: i,I do not believe there eve eve,,r wer ,e s,uch uch people as .tne tne · ~ittites, and I do not believe Kheta~ in the Egyptian inscrip th..at at tions was meant for the ·name Hittites ,, ,, We will allow th . archaeologist to be nameless now. But the ruins o,f Troy vin dicated th, th ,e right of her people to a place in real history, and the ruins of Boghatz-KOi bid fair to afford a more striking lindication of the Bible representation of the Hittites. Only the preliminary announcement of Winckler s ~eat 1
Boghatz-Koi hatz-Koi has yet been · · treasury of documents from Bog 1 gr··eat eat tnade<:: >. T11e complete unfo iding 0£ a Iong-ec]ipsed gr tnade< national history is still awaited impatiently. But -enough has 1
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utidamentals. The F utidamentals.
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been publishe d to redeem , this people completely from their half-mythical plight, ,and and give them a firm place in sober history greater than i.magination magination ha d ever fancied for th th,,em em under the stimulus of a~Y hint contained in the Bible . There has, has , been . brougl1.t ·to li..ght ght a Hittite empire<15 > in to li Asia Mino r, with central power and vassal dependencies round about and with tr eaty rights on equal te :rms rms with the greatest nations of antiquity, thus making t ·1e Hittite power a third great p owe owe,,r with nd Egyp t, as as,, ·was, ndee'.d, f ore with.. Ba Ba..byl yl..011i 011i a a ·nd was, i.ndee'. shado,ved in the great treaty of the Hittites with Rame ,ses ses II _, inscribed on . 'the the pro ,j'ecting wi11g of ·the the south wall of the Temple of Amon at Karnak< 10 >, though Rameses l tried s.o hard to obscure the fact. The ruins , at the village of Boghatz-K9i 1
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are shown also to mark the location ,of of the Hittite capital< 11 >, and the unknown language on the cunei f orin tablets recov ,ered ered the1·e to be the Hittit ,e tonguec 1 s>, while the cuneifor1n met met,,hod hod of writing, as already upon the Amarna ta 'bI bIets<11 >, so still mo mo..re re clear .ly ly here, is seen to have been the diplomatic script, and in good measure th e Babylonian to have been the diplomatic Ian· gu~ge of the , Orient in that age re age..<0 >. And the large admixtu ,re of Babylonian words and f o,1·rns 1·rns in these Hittite inscriptioqs ,open. open .s the way for the , r ·eal eal d ecipherment o( the Hittite lan-1
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guage<21> , and imagination can scarcely promise too much to our hopes for the light which sttch a decipherment will th th··row' row' upon tl1e historical and cultural backgr ·ound ound of the Bjble. 0 nly nly one important point remains to be cleared up, the relation between the Hittite language of these cuneifo1·1n tab~ lets and the language o, o,f' the Hittit ·e hieroglyp ,bic bic inscrip tion<··22). tion< 22). That these were identical is probable; that the , hiero glyphic inscriptions rep rep··r,esent esent an older f' f'orm orm of tl1e language, i,s possible ; th th..at at it was e. a kind of '' .Hieratic, Hieratic, e.ssentially ssentially dif 1
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f ,erent erent from the language of thes e tablets is improba 'bl, bl,e. e. There has been the Hittite vin illurni..n.ation ation o, o,f vin,,dication dication ; the comple compleiite te illurni Hittite history is not likely to be long delay ed~ 1
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Recent Testimo ny of Archaeology Archaeology to the Scriptur es III.
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THE PALESTI N IA IAN N CIVILIZATION.
Ot her r ecent testimo ny of ar ar ~ha ~haeeology brings befor e us the Palesti ni nian an civilizatio n of the conqu est period Palestinian explorations within the las last few years have yielded a start ling array of finds illu illusstrating things 1nentioned in the B ible, finds of the same things, find findss of like things, and finds in har tnony with thing s <3 > Individual mention of them all is here neither possible nor des de sirable. O f incomparably greater impor tance than the thesse individually intere sting relics of Canaanite antiquity is the answer afforded by recent researc research h to two questions: 1. First in order, Does the Canaanite culture as as revealed by the excavations accord with the story story of Israel at the con quest as related in the Bible? How much of a break in culture culture 1
s required by the Bible account, and how much is revealed by the excavations? For answer, we mu t find a standpoint somewhere between that of the dilettante traveler in the land of the microscopic scientist scie ntist thousands of miles away. The careful excavator excavator in the field occupies that that sane and safe mid dle point of view. Petrie< 2 4 > Bliss<2 5 > Macalister<26 >, Schu tnackerczn and Sellin < 8 >-the se are the men with whom to Stand. And for light on the early civilization of Palestine, Pales tine, the treat work of Macalister at Gezer stand s ea eassily firs fir s t. HISTORICAL
VAL U E OF POT TERY. VA
In determining this que quesstion of culture, too much impor tance has been allowed to that e t imate of time and chrono logical order which is gained exclu exclussively from the study of Pottery. The pottery remain remain s are not to be undervalu undervalued, ed, an d neither are they to be overv over valued. T ime is is only one thing that shows itself in similarit y or diss di ssimil imilaa ri rity ty in pottery. Dif ferent stages of civilization at different places at the same titne, and adaptation to an end either at the same tin1e or at 'Nidely different times, show them selve elvess in pottery, and render \tery uncertain any chronological chronological deducti deductio on. And , still more,
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available material may result in the production of similar pottet}7 in two very diff e1 e1·e ·en ni: civilizations arising one thousand )·ears or more apart. This civilization of pots, as a deciding criterion, is not quite adequate, and is safe as a criterion at all only wl1en carefully compared witl1 the testimony of loca loca tion, intertribal relations, governmental domination, and liter ary attainments. These are the things, i11 addition to the pots, pots, which help dete1·1ninc indeed, which do determine to dete1·1ninc ho\v mucl1 of a break in culture is required by the Bible account of the Co11quest, and l1ow much is shown by excavations. Since the Israelites occupied the cities and towns and vineyards and olive orchards of the Canaanites, and their houses full of all good thing£ < 29 >, had the same materials and in the main the same purposes for pottery and would adopt methods of cooking suited to tl1e cot111t1·y, poke the language of Ca naan <30>,and were of the sa111e ace as 1nany of the people of Canaan, intermarried, thougl1 against their law<31 >, with the people of the land, and were continually chided for lapses into the idolatry and sttper titious practices of the Canaan ites<32>, nd, in short, ,vere greatly different from them only in religion, it is evident that tl1e onl) n1arked, immediate change to be expected at the Conqttest is a change in religion, and that any othe1· break in c11lture occasioned by the devastation of ,var will be only a b1·eak in continuance of the same kind of culture, evirlence of demolition poliation, and reconstruc , tion. Exactly such change in religion and interr11ption in cttl· tttre at the Conquest period excavations sho\\ r. RELIGIO
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C U LTURE.
(a ) Tl1e rubbish at Gezer sho, v l1istory in distinct layers j and the layers themsel\·es are in distinct groups< 33 > At tl1e bottom are layers Canaanite not Semitic; above these, layer s orite giving place to Jewish; and higher still, Semitic, er s o f Jewish cultt1re of the monarchy and later ti1nes. lay
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Rece1it Testiniony of A1 cJ1a eology to t·lie Scriptitres. eology
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(b) The closing up of tl1e great tunnel to tl1e spring withat Gezer is placed by the layers of his111 the fortifications tory in the rubbish heap at the period of the Conquest< 34 But when a great fortification is so ruined and the power it represents so destroyed that it loses sight of its water-st1pply, •
surely the culture of the tin1e l1as had an interruption, thougl1 • it be not much changed. Then this tunnel, as a great engineer• tng feat, is remarkable te timony to the advanced state of ci,,ilization at the time of its con truction; but the more ren1arkable the civilization it represents, the more terrible must have been the disturbance of the ct1lture v.rhich caused it to be ost and forgotten< 35 >. ( c) Again, tl1ere is appa1·ent a11 enlargement of tl1e popu lated area of the city of Gezer by encroaching upon the Temple area at the period of the Conquest <6 > showing at once tl1e crowding into the city of the Israelites without the destruction of tl1e Canaanites, as stated in the Bible, and a corresponding decline in reverence for the saered inclosure of the High Place. While, at a time corresponding to the early period of the Mon arcl1y<3 arcl1y <37>, 7>, there is a sudden decrease , of the populated area co1·re ponding to the destruction of the Canaanites in the city b) the father of Solomon s Egyptian wife<38 >. b) d) Of startling significance, the hypothetical Musri Eg)1)t in N cr th Arabia concerning which it has been said <39 >
the pat1·iarcl1s descended thereto,
the Israelites escaped tl1ere f rom, and a princess the1·eof Solomo11 mar1·ied, l1as been final ly a11d definitely di scredited. For Gezer was a marriage do\,yer do\, yer of tl tl1at 1at prince ss , vhotn Solomon marr·ied <40 >, a por tion of her father s d om ominion, inion, and so a part of the supposed Mttsri, if it ever existed, and if so, at Gezer, then, we shot1ld fi11dso1ne evidence of this people and their civilizatio11. Of i s not a trace.
But, in s tead, we find from very early times, but especially at this time, Egyptian remains in great abundance< 41 >. ( e) Indeed, even Egyptia11 refinement and luxuries were St1cl t1cl1 1
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not incongruous in the Palestine of the Conquest period. The 42 great rock-hewn, and rock-buiit cisterns at Taa11nek< >, the remarkable engineering on the tunnel at Gezer< 43 >, the great forty-£ oot city wall in an Egyptian pictt1re of Canaanite war< 4 •>, he list of ricl1es ricl1estt Canaa 11 11te te booty given by Thoth1nes •
III. <45 >, the fine ceramic
and bronze ute.:.1il ute.:.1ilS S and weapons 16 recovered from nearly ever y Palestinia11 e_~cavation< >, and 47 the literary revelations of the marna tablet sc , together with the reign of law seen by a comparison of the sc ri ptura l account with the Code of Hammurabi, sl1ow<9 > Ca11aa11ite civilization of that period to be f t1lly equal to that of Egypt . ( f) Then the Bible glimpses of Canaanite practices and the produets of Canaanite religion no\V uncovered e;~actly agree. The mystery of the High Place of the Bible narrative, with its sacred cave s, lies bare at Gezer and Taan11ek. 1 '1c sacrifice of infants, probably first-born, and the foundati o n . and other sacrifices of children, either inf ant or partly grow 11, •
appear .in all their ghastliness
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''practicaily all over the hill'' at Taannel(C 49 >. (g) But the most ren1arkable te s timony of archaeol ogy of this period is to the Scripture representations of the spirit, ual monotheism of Is1·ael in its co11flict with tl1e horrible idola- trous polythei s m of the Ca11aanites, the final overthro\V of tl1e latter and the ultimate triumph of the former. The historf of that conflict is as plai11ly written at Gezer in the gradt1al decline of the High Place and giving way of the revolting sac' rifice of children to the bowl and and lamp deposit as it is in tl1e •
inspired account of Joshua, Judges and Samuel. And the line that marks off the territory territory of divine revelation in religioJl from tl1e impinging heatheni sm round about is as disti11.ct a that line off the coast of Ne\vfoundland where the cold ,vaters •
of the North beat against the warm life-giving flow of the Gt1lf Strean1.
The revelation
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tand out every day more clearly tl1e revelation Tl1ere is no evidence •
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tl1at vile culture, but rather of a purer religion coming down and overwhelming it. 2. Another and still more important question concerning Palestine civilization is, Wha t was the source and cour s e of the dominant civilization and especially the religious culture re flected in the Bible accou11t of the .millennium preceding and tl1e millennium succeeding the birth of .Abraham? Was it from without toward Canaan or from Canaan outward? Did Palestine in her civilization and culture culture of t hose days, in much or in all, but I'eflect Babylonia, or was sl1e a luminary ? •
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PALESTINE
AND BABYLONIA.
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The revision oi views concerning Palestinian civilization forced by recent excavations at once puts a bold interrogation point to the opinion long accepted by many of the source and course of re]igious influence during this f ormative ormative period of patriarchal history, and the time of the working out of the principles of Israel's religion into the practices of Israel's life. If the Palestinian civilization during this per iod was equal to that of Egypt, and so certainly not inferior to that of Baby lonia, ,then the opinion t11at the flow of religious influence was then from Babylonia to Pa lestine must stand for its defense. He re arises the newest probletn of biblical archaeology.
And one of the most expert cuneiform scholars of the day, Albert T. Clay<3<>>,has essayed this problem and anno anno,,unces unces a revolutionary solution of it by a new interpretation of well known material as well as the in terpretation of newly acqttired material. ~he solut ion is nothing less, indeed, than that in ~tead of the source of religious influence being Babylonia, and its early course from Babylonia into Palestine, exactly the ~everse is true. i'That the Semitic Baby lonian religion is an importation from Syria and Palestine (Amurru), that the crea tion, < eluge, ante-diluvian patriarchs, etc., of tl1e Bab, Bab,ylonian ylonian came . from . urru, instead of the Hebraic stories having come from Babylonia, as held by nearly all Semitic scholars.'' •
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This is startling and far reaching reaching in its consequenc consequences, es, Clay s ,vork must be put to tl1e te t; and so it will be, before it can be finally accepted. It has, ho,vever, this initial advantage, advantage, that it is in accord with the apparent self-consciousness of the Scripture writers and, as ,ve have seen, exactly in the direction i11 ,vhich recent discoveries discoveries in Palestinian civilization point. IV.
PALESTINE
A ,.D EGYPT.
Again archaeology has of late fitr1iished illuminatioti of certai1i special qitestions of bot/1 Old atid New Testa1ne1it • • • crii ticism. cr 1. Light from Babylonia by L. W. King<51 > of the British Museum on the chronology of the first three dynasties
the Exodtts, date of and, Harrunu .rabi, rabi, has and introduced so of Abraa l1elps to I1am calldeter·1nine and of the indeed, corrective element into the chronology of all subsequent his- tory down to the time of David and exerts a far-reachi far-reaching ng influence upon many critical questions i~ which the chron- ological element is vital. SACRIFICE
IN EGYPT.
2. Tl1e entire absence from the offerjngs of old Egyptian religion of any of the great Pentateuchal ideas of sacrifice, . ubstitution, atonement dedication, fellow hip, and, indeed, of almost every essential idea of real sacrifice, as clearly estab lished by recent ,~ery exhaustive examination of the offering scenes <52 >, makes for the element element of revelation in the Mosaic Mosaic ystem by delimiting the field of rationalistic rationalistic speculation on the Egyptian side. Egypt gave nothing to that system, for she
11adnothing to give. THE
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F U TURE LIFE I _ T H E PE
TATEUCH.
3. Then the grossly materiali tic character of the E tian conception of the other ,vorld and of the future life, and the fact, every day becoming clearer, that the so-called and •
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.~ s?-much-talked-about resurrection in tl1e belief of the Egyp , tians was not a resurrection at all, but a resuscitation to the ,e: e: sa~e ol old life on ''oxen, geese, bread, wine, beer, and al good
Pentateuchal documents. For, whether they came from Mose s when he bad just come from Egypt or are by some later author attributed to Mo ses, ,when when 11 e had just come from Egypt, the problem is the same : Why is tl1e idea of tl1e resurrection so 1
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tion the 1de, 1de,a of · the resurrection at tl1at time, be£01 .e tl1e ,growth growth of s,piritual piritual j,, j,,deas of Go d ~nd of worship here, of the 11 tl1 1e people other world and the future life the~e, and before tl under th e influence of these new ideas had outgrown their 1
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r ~gyptian training, wo, wo ,uld uld have carried over into Israel's relig~ 1ous thinking all the low, degrading materialism of Egyptian S' belief on this subject. The Mosaic system made no use of 1
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hiy it usable, and it kept away £1·omopen presentation of the subject altogether, because that was the only way to get the peopii]e peop ]e away from Egypt's concep tion of the subject .. 1
WELLHAUSEN'
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,S MISTAKE. .
Tl1e discovery of the Aramaic papyri at Syenec53 > 1i tnade possible a new chapter in Old Testament criticism, raised .
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portant points. Tolerable, though not perfect, identifications are made out .for Bagoas, Governor of the Jews; of Josephus and Diodorus; Sanballat, . of Nehemiah and Josephus; and Jochanan, of Nehemiah and Josephus. But more important than all thes e identifications is the information th ,at at the Jews
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had, at that period, built a temple and o,ffered ffered sacrifice far I
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of the foundation of his Pentateuchal criticism in these words: ''The returning exiles ,vere thoroughly imbued with the ideas of Josiah's reformation and had no thought of worshiping except in Jerusalem. It cost them no sacrifice of their feel ings to leave the ruined High Places unbt1ilt. From this date, all Jews understood, as a matter of course, that the one God So much We 'llhausen. llhausen. But here l1ad only one sanctuary. is this petition of the J ,vs at Syene in the year 407 B. C. after Nehemiah's return declaring that they had built a temple there and established a system of ,vorship and of sacrifices, and evi dencing also that they expected the approval of the Jews at Jerusalem in rebuilding tl1at temple and re-establishing that sacrificial ~ orship, and, what is more, received from the gov ernor of the Jews permission so to do, a thing which, had it been opposed by the Jews at Jerusalem \\1as utterly incon sistent with the Jewish policy of the Persian Empire in the days of Nehemiah. NEW
TESTAME
T GREEK.
5. Then the redating of the Hermetic writings< 6 ~> whereby ~>whereby they are thrown back from the Christian era to 500-300 B. C. opens up a completely new source source of critical mate rial for tracing the ri se and progress of theological terms in the Alexandrian Greek of the New Testament. In a recent letter from Petrie, who has written a little book on the sub ject, he sums up the whole case, as he sees it, in these words: 11y position simply is that the current religious phrases and ideas of the B. C. age must be grasped in or(jer to under stand the usages of religious language in which the New Tes tament is written. And we can never kno\v the real motive of .. r e,v Testament ,vritings untii we kno\v how much is new thought and ho,v mucn is cu rrent theology in terms of which the E1t angelos is expressed. Whether or not all the new dates for the \vritings sha ll be permitted to stand, and ~etrie's point of view be justified, a discussion of the dates and a criti-
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cal examination of the Hermetic writings from the standpoint of their corrected dates alone can determine ; but it is certain that the products of the exa exa··mination mination cannot but be farreaching in their influence and in the il il..lumination lumination of the teach-
ings of Christ and the Apo s tles. V.
IDEN TIFICAT IONS IONS ;
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Last and more gener .ally, ally, of recent testimony from arch
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aeology to Scripture we mttst mttst consider the identification .of pl,,aces, pl aces, peop les, and ev eviients ents of the Bibl Bibl··e n.arrative. arrative. archaeologists looked up helplessly at the For many years archaeologists pinho ,]es ]es in the pediment o,f the Parthenon, vainly speculating about what might have been the important announcement in in·· bronze once fastened at those pinhole s . At last an ingenious ca ·ref ref ull young the·· pinholes, and erican student ca· ull..Y copied the lass t the whole imfrom -a study of the collocation divined at la perial Roman decree once fastened there. there. So, isolated identi fication of peoples, places, and events in the Bible may not mea..n so much; however startling tl1eir char mea cter.., they ·may char..acter may be., after all, only pinholes in the mosaic of Bible historyt but the collocation of these identificatiotis, identificatiotis, when many many of them have been found, indicates at last t h e whole pattern of the mosaic. Now the progress of important identifications has of late 1
been very rapid. It will suffice oniy to mention those which we have already studied for their intrinsic importance togeth er with the long li lisst of others within recent years. In 1874, Cle1111ont-Ganneau discovered one of the boundary stones of 1141 Gezer< , at which place now for six six.. years Mr. R. A. Stew ... art Macalister has been uncovering the treasures of history o that Levitical city city< <7 >; in 1906, 1906, Winckler dis di s covered the Hit tites at their capital city; in 1904-5, Schumacker explored Megiddo; in 1900-02, Sellin, Taannek; Jericho has now been a~c1:1,ratelyocated . by Sellin and the foundations of her walls laid bare; the Edotnites, long denied existence in patriarchal times, have been given historical place in the time of Meremp .. •
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Tlie F ·z ndame ndame1itals.
tah by tl1e papyrus Anasta s ia ( j S) ; 11oab, for some time past in dispute, I identified beyond further controversy at Luxor i11 1908, in an inscription of Rameses II., before the time of tl1e Exodus <9 ) ; while Hilprecht at ippur < 0 ) , Glaser in Arabia <01 > 62
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the r o ute of the Exodus ( and along Petrie atatMaghereh and Reisner Samaria have been adding a multitude of geograph ical, ethnographical and historical identifications. The completion of tl1e whole li lisst of identifications i rap idly approaching, and the collocation of these identifications has given us anew, from entirely independent testimony of archaeology, the ,vhole outline of the biblical narrative and its surroundings, at once the necessary material for the his torical imagination and the sure s t foundation of apologetics .. .. Fa11cy for a moment that the peoples, places and events of the
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wanderings of Ulys ses should be identified : all the strange route of travel followed; ·the remarkable lands visited and de scribed, the curious creatures, half human and half monstrot1 s , and even unmistakable traces of strange events, found, all jttst a s the poet imagined, what a tra11sformation in our views of Homer ' s great epic mu s t take place Henceforth that romance ,vould be history. Let us reverse the process and fancy that the peoples, places, and events of the Bible story were as lit tle kno\vn from independent sources as the wanderings of Uly sses; the intellectual temper of this age would unhesitat ingly put the Bible story in the s ame mythical ategory in which have always been the romance s of Homer. If it ,vere po ssible to blot out biblical geography, biblical ethnology, a11d biblical history from the realm of exact knowledge, so would w·e fUt out the eyes of faith, hence£ orth our religion would be blind, stone blind. Thus the value of the rapid progress of · identificatio ns appear s . It i s the identificat ion s which differentiate hi sto1·)r from myth, geography from the ''' ' land of nowhere," the re recc
ord of event s from tale s of '' never ,vas, ,va s,"" Scripture from folk Go spel of the Saviour of the world from the delore, and the Gos •
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Recent Testimony of Arcliaeology to the Scriptures
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Ev ,ery Ev, ery i dentificati dentificati,,o·n limits by slo ·much much the •
field of historical criticism. When t .he field he progress of identifica identifica tion shall reach comple tion, tion, the wo ,rk rk of historical criticism will be finished. · CONCLUSION. The present status of the tes tes..timony timony from archaeology to Scrip tt1re, as t·hese hese latest discoveries mak e it to be, may be point,,ed point ed out in a f e·w w,ords. ords. 1
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N OT OT E1VOLUTION. VOLUTION.
1. T he he hi hi..story story of civilizati ,on on as everywhere illuminated is fou11d to be only partially that of the evolutionary theory of ,early early Israelite history, but very exactly tl1at of the biblical •
narrative; that is to say, this history, like all history sacred or profane, , shows at times, f or even a century or two, st st..eady eady P·t ·ogress,1 ogress, 1 b,ut ut the regular, orderly progress f r ,om om tl1e most pritnitive state of society toward the highest degree of civiliza tion, which the evolutionary theory imperatively demands, if : it fulfill its intended 1nissio11, ails utterly. The best ancient . work at Taannek is the earliest. From the cave dwell ·ers ers to the city builders at Gezer is no long, long, gentle evolution; the , early Amorite civilization leaps with rapid rapid strides to the great engine,,ering engine ering · feats on the de de,,£ens ens..es es and the water-works. 1
I Wherever it has been possible to institute comparison between Palestine and Egypt, the Canaanite civilization in handicraft, art, en. en .gineering, gineering, architecture, . and education has been found to suffer only by that which climate, materials and location r impose; in ·genius and in practical execution it is equal to that of Egypt, and only eclipsed, before Graeco-Roman times, by : the brief glory of the Solomonic period. . •
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HARMON~ HARMON ~Y WITH SCRIPTURE.
When w e come to loo loo k more narrowly a.t the ,de· de·tails, tails , of archaeological testimony, the historical se setting tting thus afforded · for ·the the events of the Bib1e narrative i s seen to be exactly in 2
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, harmony with the narrative. This is very significant of th« · final out ,come come of res, res ,ea1-.~h ea1-.~h n early Bib Bib,,le le hi hi,,story. story. Be Be,,cau cau · . views of Scripture n1ust fina lly s.quare quare with the results o archaeo logy; that is to say, with contemporaneous history, and 1
the of these five , years ,well wellThe; in~ dica,,tes dica tarchaeological es the present testi1nony the past finalfive, trend toward conclusion. . Bible narrative ·plainly plainly interp ,r,et, et,ed ed at its f la~e a~e value is e,very very d, while, of the gr ,eat eat critical theories pr< where being sustaine ,d, oth ,e po sing to take Scripture recording events of that ag e at ,oth, illi.'.'e1 e1.. ,cy than the face value, as the illi cy of early Weste ,rn Se Se··mitic mitic people, the rude nomadic barbarity of Palestin ,e and the De se sert rt in tl1,e patriarchal age, the patri ,archs archs not individual ,s bu bu''t per~ sonifications, the Desert ''Egypt, ''Egypt, the gra~ual invasion of Pal- estine, the naturalist ,ic ic origin of Is rael's reli reli,,gion,. gion,. the , incon· 1
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sequence of Moses as a law -giver, t 'l1e hip 0£ l1e late authors ,hip 0£·· tt1e Pe ntateuch, and a dozen others, not a single one is being defi. he results of arcl1aeological re re,,search. search. In• nitely supported by t .he deed, reconstructing criticism hardly finds it worth while, ot · th e m,ost ost part, to look t o archaeology fo :r support. . The recent testimony of archaeology to Scripture, like 31 1 such testimony that has gone before, is d,efinitely efinitely an d unifontl' ly f,avo, avo ,r ·able. able. to th ,e, Scriptures at their face ·,value, value, and not to the Scriptures as recon structed by criticism, 1
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AUTHORIT IES REFERRED 'TO TO ABOVE . •
ABBREVI ATIONS
US ,ED ED IN REFERENCES.
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0. L. Z. Orientalistis ,chen chen Litterat11r-Zeitu ,ng. ng. Q. S. _ uarterly Stat S tat ement o,f the Palestine Explora tion Sod., ety, . . t
REFERENCES.
(.1) (2)
(3)
Gep. 12 :10-20; 13 :1; 47 :1-12. Gen. 41 : 14-46. Orr, ''Tl 1e Problem of the Old Testa1nent,''
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57-5 -58 8, p,p. p. 57
quoting Schu ltz ltz,, Weilhausen, Kuenen, W, R. Smith, G. B. Gray, I-I. P . Smith, F. H. Woods , •
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. Recent Testimony of 41~cJiaeologyo tlie Scr Scr··iptj iptjii,re.s. ii,re.s. 45 ,.
(4) Brugsch, ''Egypt (5) (6) (7)
(8) (9) ( 10) (11) ( 12) (13) ( 14) ( 15)
un ,der der the Pharaol1s ,'' Broderick
tio ,11 tio, 11 Ch ap. VI. Ibid . Gen.. 41 :25 Gen :25-- 39. Petrie , ' 'Hyks os and Israel ite Cities. Cities.,,
edi•
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Ibid, pp. 3 and 10, Plate I X . . Ibid, pp. 5-9. Plates I I, III, I,V. Budge, ''History .of Egypt,'' Vol . III, pp. 137137- 138. · Kyle, Recueil d,e T ,rava rava ,ux, ux, Vo l. · XXX, '' G,eogra, eogra,phic phic and Ethnic Li st s of Ram ,eses eses II. MUiler,' ''Asie11 und Europa . ztes Kapitel. Ibid. Winckler, 0. L. Z., December 15, 1906. Ibid. . . 1
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( 16) Bouriant, Recuei] de T ravaux, Vol. XIII, pp. 15 ff.: Budge, ''Hi story of Egypt, 1 Vol~ V pp. 48 ff.; Good win, ''Record s of t he Past,'' 1s t S,eries, eries, Vol. J IV, pp. ·. 25 ff . ( 17) Mitteil ungen der Vorderasiatischen Ges se sells ch af t: 19 02, ·p. 5. Muller, Recueil de Tr ,avaux, avaux, V 0 1. VIII, 126 ff. Budge, ''Histo ry of Egypt,'' V, 30 ff . ._ ( 18) Winckler, 0. L . Z., Decemb ,er er 15 15,, 1906. ( Sonderabzug, . . p, 15.) (19) Ibid . . (Sonderahzug, p. 22.) (20) Conder. ''Tel Amarna Tablet .'' Bud ge, ' 'History of Egyp t ,',''' Vo 'l. l. IV, pp p p . 184-241. ( 21) Winckler, 0. L. Z., December 15, 1906. Sonderabzug. {22) Mes s er smi dt, Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesselchaft; Corpus, Unscrip. Het. 1902. 1
(2 3) (23) (24) (2 4) (25) ( 26)
Vincent, ''Canaan.''
·
Petrie, ''Lachi sh . ' Bliss, ''A M ound of Many Citie s .'' .Macalister, Macalister, ''Bible Side Ligh t s from
· Gezer.''
( 27) Schumacker,
''Excavations
tl1e Mo und · of
a t :rviegiddo.'' •
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The Fundamental s. s.
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(28) Sellin, T el-Taannek, t'Denkschriften der Akademie in Wien.'' ;· Neh. 9 :25. (29) Deut. 6 :10-11; Josh. 24 :13 ;· 1
(30) I ,sa. sa. 19:18 19:18,, ( 31) E2ek. 16 :44-46; Det1t. 7 :3. ( 32) (33) (34) ( 35) ( 36) ( 37)
Kaiserlicber, •
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Judges 2 :11-15; 3 :7; 8 :33-35; 1.8 :30-31~ Macalis ter, Q. S., 1903, pp. 8-9, 49. Macalister,Q. S., 1908, 1908,,, p~ p~ 17. Vincent, in Q. S., 1908, p. 228. Macali lster, ster, Q. s . 1903, p 49. Ibid. 1
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( 38) I. King Kingss 9 :16. ( 39) Winckler, Orientalistische Forsch ungen, Series I pp pp.. 2:4-41. 4-41. ( 40) I. Kings 9 :1 :1,,6. 6. ( 41) Macali5te Macali5te··r, r, Q. S., 1903, PP-.. .309. 309. ( 42) Sellin. Sellin ., ''Tel-Ta ,annek,'' annek,'' p. 92. 43,,) Macalister, Q. S., 1908, Jan.-Apr. 43 ( 44) Petri e, ''Deshasha,'' Plate I\ T. . PI> (45) Birch, ''Records of the Past, 1st Series, Vol. IJ, PI> .'' Also Lep .sius, 35-52, ''B ,att1e att1e of Megid do ,.'' sius, ''Denk ... maier.'' Abth. III. Bl. 32, 31st, 30th, 30B, ''Aus wahl,'' XII, L. 42-45. · ( 46) Macalister-Vincent, Q. S., 1898-08. · 1
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( 47) Budg ,e, e, '''Hist 'Hist ,ory ory of Egypt,'' Vol. IV, pp pp••. 184-241• (48) Gen. 21-38. Ki11g, 'Code of Hammurabi_,, ,
(49) Macalister, Q. S., 1903, ff. and ''Bible Side Lights g Cl1ap. III. Also Sellin, ''Tel-Taannek,'' pp. 96-97. ( 50) Clay, '' Amurru, 'Th Th ,e Ho1ne ,of of the N or ·thern thern Semites.'' (51) King, ''Chronology of the First Three Babylonian Dy nasties . ' ( 52 )1 Kyle, Recueil de Travaux, ''Egyptian Sacrifices~'' Vol . . XXVII, ''Furth ,er er Observations,'' Vol. XXXI. Bibli&1
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theca Sacra, Apr., 190,5, 5, pp. 323-33 6. ( 53) Margoliouth, ''Expository Times,'' December, •
. 1907.-- ] <r 1907.
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sephu ,s, ' Ant adorns Siculus. Se c. 3; nt,,iquiti) iquiti )es,'' es,'' 11 :7; D 1,adorns 17-35. Neh. 13:28; 12:2 12:2,,2; 2; 2 Es dra s ,5:14. 5:14. Welll1ausen, Ency. B ri t., Vol. 18, p. 509 Petri e, ''Person .al al Religi on in Egyp ·t Be£o Be£o re Chr .isti isti,,an an ity. ' . Clermont -Gan -Gannea neau u in ''Bible S.ide ide Lights, pil 22. Macalister, ''Bible Side Light s .' Also Q. S., 1902-09. MiiI]e,,r, MiiI]e r, ''Asien un d Europa. Kyle, Recueil de . Travaux, \ Tol. XXX~ ''Ethnic and Geographical Lists of Ra1nese s II. Hilp ·rech rech ,t, t, ' 'Exploratio ns i11 B,, ,,bylonia. bylonia. Weber, Forschungsre ,isen isen Edo11ard Glaser; also ''Stu Webe,,r·. dien zur · Siidarabiscl1en Altertun1 skunde,' ' Webe Petrie, ''R esearch esearch..es. es. in Sinai.' '' 1
(54)
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