“Is ‘Bible’ a Dirty Word?” I titled my First Person column in the September/October 2015 issue of BAR.a One of the things I mentioned was a recent conference about Jericho at University College London that featured, as I wrote, “scholars from England, the United States, Holland, Italy, Denmark and the Palestinian Department of Antiquities … [but] no scholars from you-know-where … The keynote address was given by Professor Lorenzo Nigro of the Sapienza University of Rome, who has led a major new excavation at Jericho.”
I received a heated letter from Professor Nigro telling me that “Israeli scholars [had been] invited” to address the conference. Moreover, the “final part” of his opening lecture was indeed devoted to Jericho and the Bible.
I replied that we would publish his letter, lightly edited mainly to eliminate verbiage that reflected Professor Nigro’s slightly Italianate English.
I also asked Professor Nigro for the names of the “Israeli scholars” who had been invited to participate in the conference. Professor Nigro replied that “as regards the Israeli scholar [singular] invited to the conference,” the organizers prefer not to disclose his name.
I also asked Professor Nigro for a copy of the part of his lecture dealing with Jericho and the Bible. He replied, “You will read the part of my London paper dealing with Jericho and the Bible when it is published (as everybody).” He added that he did not authorize me to publish his earlier letter; it was, he said, “a personal letter.” As for his remarks on Jericho, he had already referred me to his entry on “Jericho” in the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology (2013).
At this point, I decided to take him up on it and read his entry on “Jericho” in the Oxford encyclopedia. In that entry, he does indeed discuss the Bible and Jericho’s archaeology. He recounts the Biblical story, and he then describes the archaeological discoveries—but not a word about whether there is any relationship between the two, not a word about whether or not there is any history in the Biblical account.
To compare Professor Nigro’s treatment, I pulled from the shelf the entry on “Jericho” in another Oxford encyclopedia, the Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East (1997) by another leading Jericho scholar and excavator, Thomas A. Holland of the University of Chicago. In contrast to Professor Nigro, Holland devotes a significant part of his entry to the historicity vel non of the Biblical account. “The Late Bronze Age period at Jericho,” Holland writes, “is perhaps the most controversial with regard to its fortification system and its historical connection with the Biblical Joshua story (the entry and settlement of the Israelites into Canaan).” He then even-handedly discusses and cites the various scholarly views, including both those who found “no archaeological data to support” the Biblical account and those who “made recent arguments against this view.”
What, if any, light do Professor Nigro’s new excavations shed on this issue? I suppose we will have to wait for the publication of his London lecture to find out. Or perhaps I have not read his many publications carefully enough to find out. I’m sorry Professor Nigro would not tell us. But I may be able to guess.
“Is ‘Bible’ a Dirty Word?” I titled my First Person column in the September/October 2015 issue of BAR.a One of the things I mentioned was a recent conference about Jericho at University College London that featured, as I wrote, “scholars from England, the United States, Holland, Italy, Denmark and the Palestinian Department of Antiquities … [but] no scholars from you-know-where … The keynote address was given by Professor Lorenzo Nigro of the Sapienza University of Rome, who has led a major new excavation at Jericho.” I received a heated letter from Professor Nigro telling me that “Israeli scholars [had […]
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