BARlines

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International Symposium Charts the Future of Biblical Archaeology

If you’ve only recently heard of the New Archaeology (or “processual archaeology,” as it is sometimes called), you are too late. The field of Biblical archaeology has moved into a post-processual phase, or even, some say, post-post-processualism.

Don’t let the fancy terminology daunt you. New Archaeology, a movement that began among American archaeologists a generation ago, attempts to imitate the physical sciences, adopting more rigorous methodologies and emphasizing objective description and the importance of processes such as environmental degradation, rather than historical texts (which are regarded as biased) or speculations about behavior and motivation. “It is the kind of archaeology you do,” says one Biblical archaeologist half-seriously, “when you have no data,” meaning historical data. This explains why it began in North America, which lacks ancient texts. Until the 1970s, this kind of archaeology never made much headway in Biblical archaeology, which has an abundance of texts.

But that is all in the past, according to an international symposium held in La Jolla, California, from January 29 through 31, 1993. Sponsored by the Judaic Studies Program and the Department of Anthropology of the University of California, San Diego, “New Approaches to the Past: Archaeology in the Holy Land in the 1990s and Beyond” brought together prominent Biblical archaeologists and prehistorians from Israel, England, France, Canada and the United States. These scholars presented 31 papers covering, in chronological order, the history of the Holy Land from 120,000 B.C. to the present. The papers will be published in early 1994 by Leicester University Press as The Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land, edited by Thomas E. Levy, the organizer of the symposium.

The symposium began with several papers that gave an overview of the potential value of increasing interdisciplinary research. One of the most interesting of these was “Man and the Natural Environment” by botanist Avinoam Danin (Hebrew University). Danin argued for a greater awareness of the unexpected ways that humans can modify the environment and emphasized the need for archaeologists to work more closely with experts in ecology. By way of example, he pointed out two surprising uses for rock piles. Because they increase and concentrate the surface area on which water can condense, rock piles provide a place where Tabor oaks can grow in a dry region; many are seen today growing from piles in the Carmel. Rock piles were also used by ancient peoples as a means of increasing run-off of rainwater: Exposure of the ground when stones are stripped away promotes the growth of bacteria, which binds with the soil to create a mat; this reduces the soil’s permeability, thus increasing the run-off rainwater, which can be channeled, collected and stored.

In another of the introductory papers, “Power Politics and the Past—A History of Research,” science historian Neil Silberman gave a simple but much-needed warning. Now that archaeologists are refining their methods, filtering out every bit of subjectivity, they may come to believe that they have achieved pure scientific objectivity. Silberman showed, however, that ideology has influenced interpretation throughout the history of the field and that it is probably impossible to completely expunge it. His argument—at least as to the present crop of scholars—was not fully accepted either by some of the scholars present or by the many archaeology graduate students in the audience, who grumbled about what they viewed as a too pessimistic view of the quest for objectivity.

These grumbles may have reached the ears of the distinguished Biblical scholar David Noel Freedman (University of California, San Diego), who took the opportunity as moderator of a later session to praise Silberman’s talk and to reinforce the lesson with a recent example. The meaning of the famous inscription from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud^a (“I bless you by Yahweh of Samaria and by his asherah”) is perfectly clear, he insisted. The people at this late ninth century B.C. site conceived of Yahweh as having a wife or consort. Yet some scholars have constructed convoluted interpretations that avoid this conclusion presumably because 022the theological implications would be too upsetting for some people to take. As if to illustrate Freedman’s point, a scandalized audience member scurried through her Bible when the session ended and complained to a friend, “That can’t be true. God wouldn’t have a wife, let alone a consort.”

Caroline Grigson (Royal College of Surgeons of England) gave a tour-de-force talk on “Plants and Animals in the Rise of the Economy of the Levant.” Marshalling statistics for the occurrence of plant and animal remains, she revealed numerous interesting patterns. For example, in all areas of the Levant, the percentage of sheep as compared to cattle increases from the Chalcolithic period (4500–3150 B.C.) to the Early Bronze Age (3150–2200 B.C.) and then remains steady. Since sheep need more grazing, and are thus called “the rich man’s animal,” this increase seems to serve as a marker for the shift from a subsistence economy to a market economy.

Ram Gophna (Tel Aviv University) began his fascinating lecture by noting the long continuity of occupation at settlements in the land of Canaan in the Early Bronze Age, a fact that has facilitated his study of settlement patterns in this period. He has found a dramatic demographic change between Early Bronze I sites, which were unfortified, and Early Bronze II sites, which were fortified. During the transition between these periods, most of the small and middle-size sites were abandoned, while the large sites shrank dramatically in area and in estimated population. For example, Megiddo shrank from 160 acres to 13 acres, and declined in population from about 9,000 to about 900 or 1,000. The scale of the event is so great as to warrant the term “crisis,” but the cause remains a mystery. There is no evidence of an invasion by an outside people. Instead, much of the population appears to have turned nomadic for unknown reasons.

Exciting new ideas and insights abounded:

• Israel Finkelstein (Tel Aviv University) has found that about half the Iron Age I (1200–1000 B.C.) sites in Israel’s central highlands (i.e., those associated with the emergence of Israel) are reoccupations of Middle Bronze and Early Bronze sites. This suggests to him that these settlements are not likely to have resulted from migrations of alien groups, whether from Transjordan or from the lowlands. He has also observed a dichotomy between a more sedentary north and a more pastoral south, which he 090proposes may be related to the later division between the kingdoms of Israel (north) and Judah (south).

• Lawrence E. Stager (Harvard University), in a discussion of the Philistines, said that the fall of Ugarit can now be related to the influx of the Philistines in 1185 B.C.

• Øystein LaBianca (Andrews University) has concluded that Ammon, Moab and Edom were not true states but rural tribal kingdoms and that there is no reason to believe that their peoples originated outside their traditional territories.

• Shlomo Bunimovitz (Tel Aviv University) pointed out that rich finds and elaborate temples and burials do not necessarily indicate general prosperity, but may be examples of conspicuous consumption.

• John S. Holladay (University of Toronto) observed that the Israelites and Judahites had to cope with a problem familiar to us, a trade deficit: They imported valuable metallic goods, but could offer only less valuable agricultural goods in trade.

Israel Finkelstein objected to Holladay’s use of the Bible as an “anchor” for the chronology of the period. When Holladay insisted he was not using the Bible as an anchor, Finkelstein pointed out his references to King Solomon and others. Holladay then offered to call the king in question the “red-burnished pottery king,” referring to the characteristic pottery associated with Solomon’s reign, and asked whether Finkelstein would prefer that verbal construction. This incident highlights the trend to deemphasize the Bible in Biblical archaeology, an issue previously noted in BAR.^b

The symposium displayed a healthy interest in reaching out to the general public by offering open, free admittance to the proceedings. The policy seemed to succeed; about 250 to 300 persons of all ages attended the Saturday sessions and almost as many attended on Sunday. It was rumored that the scholars, when they heard about the open meetings, spent the evening before the first session cutting and simplifying their papers for public consumption, until Levy told them to keep their papers as originally written and to continue to address their colleagues. This probably strikes the right balance between public access and high scholarly standards.

One day at lunch, prehistorian Isaac Gilead (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev) asked me whether I thought the general public would be interested in archaeology’s new direction rather than in what another archaeologist scathingly referred to as the “story orientation” and “pretty artifacts” approach promoted by museums and “certain popular magazines” (yes, he meant us). Would BAR readers care about the socioeconomic and anthropological questions that archaeology increasingly pursues? I replied that I thought they would, especially if the material were presented in a way that shows its relevance to larger questions of history. Clearly, this is the future of archaeology.

Israel to Give Sinai Artifacts to Egypt; Will Turkey Return the Siloam Inscription to Israel?

Israel has agreed to give Egypt the artifacts that Israeli archaeologists excavated in the Sinai during the period after the 1967 Six-Day War when Israel controlled the area. Before the transfer of artifacts, however, Israeli archaeologists will complete their study of them. Since the government of Israel is anxious to transfer the artifacts for political reasons, the Israel Antiquities Authority has persuaded the government to allocate more money to accelerate the process of studying and publishing the finds.

Archaeologists hope that replicas of the artifacts can be made to be kept in Israel, but the rare artifacts pose a problem because of the risk of damage. Perhaps the process of stereolithography, reported in this column in BAR 18:05 (See BARlines), can be used to replicate the rare artifacts.

Pondering the larger implications of this event suggests two thoughts:

We can hope that this transfer of artifacts to Egypt will set a precedent that will encourage Turkey to return to Israel the Siloam inscription. This dramatic record of the completion of Hezekiah’s Tunnel in 701 B.C., found in the tunnel in 1880, is one of the most important pieces of Israel’s heritage. Carried off to Turkey during the Ottoman rule of Palestine, it now rests in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum.^c

Giving these artifacts to Egypt also highlights the questionable basis used to determine who ought to possess archaeological discoveries. Currently, modern national boundaries determine who rightfully owns antiquities. Yet, it is unlikely that the Egyptians will share Israel’s concern, for example, for the artifacts recovered from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud, which are critical to understanding the ancient religion of Yahweh.^d It might be more sensible to entrust antiquities to nations that have a cultural stake in preserving them.

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Remembering Virgil Corbo, Noted Biblical Archaeologist

Virgilio Canio Corbo—the excavator of Capernaum for almost two decades—died in Israel on December 6, 1991 at age 73. Born in Italy in 1918, Corbo came to the Holy Land when he was ten years old to study at the Minor Seminary of the Custody of the Terra Santa. He was ordained a priest in 1942 and received his doctorate from the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome in 1949.

Corbo’s earliest archaeological excavations were at Khirbet Siyar el-Ghanam (Shepherd’s Field), at the monasteries in the desert of Judea and at two sites on the Mount of Olives (the area next to the shrine of the Ascension and the grotto of the apostles at Gethsemane). In 1960, Corbo began the restoration of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Shortly thereafter, he excavated Herodion (1962–1967)—the Judean desert mountain fortress-palace of Herod the Great—and the shrine at Mt. Nebo in Jordan (1967–1970).

From 1968 to 1986, Corbo directed the excavations at Capernaum that uncovered remains from the Middle Bronze Age (23rd–16th centuries B.C.) to the Arab period (seventh to eleventh centuries A.D.), dated the exquisite, columned synagogue to the fourth to fifth centuries A.D., uncovered traces of an earlier synagogue from the time of Jesus^e and excavated the probable house of St. Peter, later used as a place of worship.^f During these years, Corbo also participated in digs at Magdala on the western side of the Sea of Galilee (in the 1970s), at Dabburiya on the slope of Mt. Tabor (1978) and at Herod’s fortress of Machaerus in Jordan (1978–1981).

Corbo was a familiar sight to tourists and pilgrims for over 20 years in Capernaum, where he also directed the restoration of the ruins and arranged for a memorial to St. Peter, dedicated in 1990, which shelters the ruins of St. Peter’s house. In his later years (1984–1990), he also served as professor of Christian archaeology at the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum.

On the occasion of his 70th birthday, Corbo was honored by publication of Christian Archaeology in the Holy Land: New Discoveries (see the review). He is buried in Capernaum beneath the memorial, beside the house of St. Peter.

City of David Excavations to Resume

Archaeologists plan to resume excavations in the City of David, the oldest inhabited part of Jerusalem, to coincide with the 1996 celebration of the 3,000th anniversary of Jerusalem as the capital of the Jewish people. Planning for the new dig is only in a preliminary stage, and no director has yet been announced. The 1978–1985 excavations under the direction of Yigal Shiloh uncovered evidence of a variety of cultures in the 11-acre site located on a spur south of the Temple Mount. But Shiloh believed there was still much more to be found, especially on top of the hill.^g Mendel Kaplan, Johannesburg businessman, chairman of the Board of Governors of the Jewish Agency for Israel and longtime supporter of the City of David excavations, is currently working on a popular book about the Shiloh dig and is spearheading the plans for renewed excavation.

Beer-Drinking at an Early Age

The world’s earliest chemical evidence of beer has been discovered in a jug in Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum. The jug (c. 3500–3100 B.C.) was excavated by Dr. Cuyler Young at Godin Tepe in western Iran in 1973. The Sumerian sign for beer—a pottery vessel with interior lines—was a clue that led graduate student Virginia R. Badler to examine the deep grooves inside some pots. In the jug from Godin Tepe, she found beerstone, a sediment of barley beer that settles on the bottom and sides of storage vessels. The Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania carried out the chemical examination.

Correction

The photograph of the seal of Jezebel, which appeared in “The Many Masters of Dor, Part 2: How Bad Was Ahab?” BAR 19:02, was taken by the Israel Museum in Jerusalem and published with the permission of the Israel Antiquities Authority. The editors apologize for the inadvertent omission of this credit.

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Do You Teach Bible?

Do we need a Bible Teachers Association?

If you teach Bible—in Sunday school or high school, in a discussion group of adults or anywhere else—you have no organization within which to share your concerns and interests, to learn what’s new in your field, to sharpen your skills or to press others to support your needs so that your teaching will be more effective.

The Biblical Archaeology Society (BAS) would like to remedy that situation. But it is really up to you.

We would like to create under our auspices, and affiliated with BAS, an Association of Bible Teachers (ABT).

This is not for Bible scholars. They already have a very effective organization. This is for people who teach Bible and archaeology in a non-university and non-seminary setting (although we would not exclude anyone who wishes to join us). This is for people who teach Bible to, well, just people.

Whether ABT will ever be organized is up to you. We are looking for a small group of people from all over the country, people who teach Bible in various settings, but primarily people with vision, dedication, energy and a willingness to do all the unpleasant tasks—from licking envelopes to asking people for money—involved in creating a new organization. In short, we are looking for an organizing committee.

What will ABT do?

Well, it could organize regional conventions of members where talks would be given by master teachers, as well as by recognized scholars. But that would be up to you.

It could have a national convention where thousands of members would gather. But that would be up to you.

At the regional conventions and/or national convention, an exhibit hall could display all the new books for teaching at our level, all the new teaching aids from coloring books to slide sets to videos to archaeological replicas. But whether the conventions would include exhibits would be up to you.

ABT could have a variety of committees to address special concerns of our members from teaching Bible in the public schools, to programs for bringing different denominations together, to pay scales and pensions, to how to find a full-time position, to relations between those who accept the Bible literally and those who do not, to, well, you name it. It’s up to you.

ABT could have a page or more in BAR or its companion magazine, Bible Review, for a kind of newsletter of its activities and ideas. But that is up to you.

There is obviously much more that ABT could do, but that depends on your imagination, dedication and creativity.

What will BAS do? We will serve as an organizing secretariat. We will provide advice and guidance—which may be accepted or rejected! We will even underwrite the initial expenses.

If you are interested in being on the organizing committee, please write to us with your ideas and interests at ABT, Biblical Archaeology Society, 3000 Connecticut Ave., N.W., Suite 300, Washington, DC 20008. Please don’t volunteer unless you are wholly dedicated to this project, recognizing that it will take a major effort on your part. If there is sufficient interest, we will fly a small group of participants to Washington for an initial meeting—after first developing an agenda by telephone, FAX and modem.

The rest will be up to you. But we will be behind you all the way.

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Museum Guide

Life and Death on the Nile: Sun, Gods and Mummies in Ancient Egypt

If you like Egyptology and you are especially interested in the Amarna period and the revolutionary Pharaoh Akhenaten, then you should not miss this exhibit. The “Life and Death on the Nile” exhibit features a rare collection of Egyptian mummies and artifacts over 3,000 years old. The collection of more than 900 pieces focuses on daily life and concern for the afterlife. Among the “Death on the Nile” section are coffin and mummy masks, sacred amulets, falcon shrines, mummified falcons and a human mummy of the Ptolemaic period. The “Life on the Nile” section displays art and utensils of daily life, including carved objects of alabaster, ceramic and limestone.

This permanent exhibit also highlights a collection of more than 400 pieces from the Amarna period (1368 to 1351 B.C.). During this period, ancient Egypt was ruled by Pharaoh Akhenaten, often identified as the first monotheist because he proclaimed the sun god Aten a new and unique deity.^h Akhenaten then built the capital city of Akhetaten where he lived with his Queen Nefertiti and their six daughters. The objects in the Amarna collection were found at Tell el-Amarna, the site of ancient Akhetaten.

The Amarna collection came to the museum through the sponsorship of Ellen Browning Scripps, who helped finance the excavation of Amarna by the Egypt Exploration Society in the 1920s and 1930s. Now on exhibit for the first time in 27 years, this collection constitutes one of the largest from Amarna in the United States. The highlights of the Amarna collection include a quartzite head of an Amarna princess, a granite stela that shows Akhenaten making an offering to Aten and cartouches of Nefertiti and Akhenaten.

International Symposium Charts the Future of Biblical Archaeology

If you’ve only recently heard of the New Archaeology (or “processual archaeology,” as it is sometimes called), you are too late. The field of Biblical archaeology has moved into a post-processual phase, or even, some say, post-post-processualism.