Beware of an argument based on “authority.” In the interrelated disciplines of Biblical archaeology and Biblical studies, as well as in contemporary social debates, the argument from authority is often used to make a weak argument. Don’t accept it without looking behind (or under) it.
For example, the Bible says that under Joshua’s leadership Jericho fell to the Israelites (Joshua 6). In the 1930s the British archaeologist Sir John Garstang, excavating at Tell es-Sultan (“Old Testament Jericho”), asserted that he had found evidence for Joshua’s destruction of Jericho in the ruins of the city’s fortifications, which he dated to about 1400 B.C.E. So, he concluded, the Bible was right:
In a word, in all material details and in date the fall of Jericho took place as described in the Biblical narrative…The link with Joshua and the Israelites is only circumstantial but it seems to be solid and without a flaw.1
Garstang’s conclusion is still quoted over and over again in sermons and in blogs, and even in some scholarly books: The Bible is true, and a distinguished archaeologist proved it! Unfortunately, Garstang’s knowledge of stratigraphic excavation and ceramic chronology (the dating of strata by the pottery found in them) was not very advanced, even for his time. In the 1950s, Dame Kathleen Kenyon redug at Tell es-Sultan and corrected Garstang’s dates. The ruined walls that he had dated to the 15th century were in fact over a thousand years earlier, long before Joshua’s time, whenever that was.2 Yet Garstang continues to be cited, not because of the merits of his arguments, but because of the weight of his eminence (enhanced by his having been knighted), especially when his views about the Bible’s veracity are shared by those quoting him. The same cautionary attitude applies to the interpretation of the Bible more generally. Knowledge increases, interpretations change. Biblical interpretation is a conversation, a debate, that has been going on for millennia, and one often learns most from those with whom one disagrees.
“The Bible says” is often regarded as decisive in contemporary debates about such issues as abortion, assisted suicide, the status of women, same-sex relationships, capital punishment and war and peace. The problem is that the Bible is often inconsistent, so much so that Shakespeare observed, even “the Devil can cite Scripture for his purpose” (Merchant of Venice I.iii). No individual believer or community of faith has ever fully followed every Biblical teaching because the Bible does not speak with one voice. It incorporates many different views of different Biblical writers. In the Ten Commandments, God (or is it Moses, or a later Biblical writer or editor?) proclaims that he punishes children for the sins of their parents to the third and fourth generation (Exodus 20:5; Deuteronomy 5:9). That would seem to be an unequivocal statement, especially because, we are told, God does not change his mind the way human beings do: “God is not a human being, that he should lie, or a mortal, that he should change his mind” (Numbers 23:19). Yet Jeremiah emphatically disagrees: “All shall die for their own sins” (Jeremiah 31:30), as does Ezekiel: “A child shall not suffer for the iniquity of a parent, nor a parent suffer for the iniquity of a child” (Ezekiel 18:20). Both prophets concur that God punishes only the person who sins. That would seem to be an obvious principle of justice, yet it is not accepted as such in the Decalogue. Given such multiplicity of views, it is not surprising that both sides in debates on social issues often enlist the Bible to support their positions.
Whether it concerns the Bible itself or the interpretation of the Bible or of archaeological data, there is almost always more than one perspective. Professors, preachers and bloggers who cite only the authorities that support their own presuppositions mislead their audiences. Just because something is written on your computer screen, in a book, in the Bible or even in this magazine doesn’t mean that it’s the only possible view or even that it’s true. As one eminent Jewish Christian authority put it, “Judge for yourselves!” (1 Corinthians 11:13).
Beware of an argument based on “authority.” In the interrelated disciplines of Biblical archaeology and Biblical studies, as well as in contemporary social debates, the argument from authority is often used to make a weak argument. Don’t accept it without looking behind (or under) it. For example, the Bible says that under Joshua’s leadership Jericho fell to the Israelites (Joshua 6). In the 1930s the British archaeologist Sir John Garstang, excavating at Tell es-Sultan (“Old Testament Jericho”), asserted that he had found evidence for Joshua’s destruction of Jericho in the ruins of the city’s fortifications, which he dated to […]
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