Queries & Comments

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In these troubling times, we appreciate that you keep sharing your opinions with us (the editors) and one another. It is great to see so many of you engage critically with the diverse content we strive to bring you no matter the circumstances. You can find more letters online, along with a few responses, at biblicalarchaeology.org/letters.

What a Joy!

I want to share my joy—yes joy—at the direction BAR has consciously chosen to move in the past two years. You have increased the scope and breadth of subject matter; openly welcomed—nay, encouraged—discussion and debate; and exhibited new openness, receptiveness, and candor—all while maintaining the most rigorous professional standards. Collectively, these decisions can be risky and place you directly in the epicenter of heated debate and contentious argument. That takes courage and the willingness, not seen often in the academe (especially among biblical scholars), to be vulnerable and to trust us (the audience) to read as honestly as you publish.

I will say it again: What a joy! Congratulations, and thank you.

Don’t Agree, But…

Regarding those few who cancel their subscription because they find something they don’t agree with or understand, it seems they only want to listen to or read what they agree with. An echo chamber effect.

I use a literal, grammatical, historical hermeneutic in approaching the Scripture. I may not agree with the view of the Scripture and some of the conclusions your various writers arrive at, but I am always challenged to think through what I’m reading. If we only look at what we agree with, how can one learn or understand differing viewpoints?

Keep up the good work.

Differing Presuppositions

Dr. Cargill, I agree with your response to Daniel Simon’s letter (Queries & Comments, Spring 2020) regarding Sidnie White Crawford’s review of the new Archaeology Study Bible that archaeology is a science. Thus, its methods should always conform to sound scientific principles and procedures. However, interpretation of the data yielded up by these investigations will be guided by the presuppositions of the interpreter. Obviously, Mr. Simon’s presuppositions differ from Dr. Crawford’s.

I am a long-time subscriber to BAR (and Bible Review before that) and affirm the infallibility and inerrancy of Holy Scripture. I appreciate and am grateful for the hard work and care that goes into the production of your magazine.

First, GO HAWKS! (although Jesup may be Panthers country). Second, I appreciate that different individuals with different opinions can read various claims and critiques and do so with appreciation for divergent points of view. This is what I love about BAR and its readers.—B.C.

Small Print

Why such a big margin and small print in the new BAR? I have gotten BAR since the first issue.

The margins are to keep the magazine from looking busy and to allow people to make notes. The print size is a happy medium between easy to read and allowing us to fit maximum content into each issue.—B.C.

Going Quarterly Now?

The dual/duel cover stories on Bethsaida in the latest BAR (Spring 2020) were great!

I noticed that the cover date is no longer tied to months, but rather says 010 “Spring.” Does this mean you are switching to a quarterly (four instead of six issues per year) publication schedule?

Yes. Our publisher made this decision earlier in the year and sent out letters to our subscribers announcing this change. And I, too, particularly loved the Bethsaida cover and stories.—B.C.

Thank you for these concise and thoroughly researched articles. My sincere thanks for the opportunity to digest these well-written papers.

An older student,

Obscuring Labels

A big thank you for a great periodical! It’s always a welcome sight in the mailbox. Oh, and for me once a quarter is a perfect frequency of publication.

Here’s my little problem and request: The front cover is where the mailing label is being applied. The feature article cutline is often partially or totally obscured by the label, not to speak of the aesthetic loss. Do postal regulations allow for mailing label placement on the back? Or, could the front cover be redesigned to prevent the cutline from ending up behind the label?

Thanks, and keep up the good work!

Our printer places the label in the right bottom corner, where it is least likely to interfere with text or an essential part of the cover image. In the new design, the image takes up the entire cover, so the label will inevitably obscure some of it. As for the back cover, advertisers don’t pay to have their ads covered.—ED.

Missing Worldwide

I like the new format very much, especially the fact that you don’t have to go to the back of the magazine to finish reading an article.

One section of the magazine is no longer there. On the back page there used to be Worldwide. Each month there was an article about an artifact from outside of the Middle East and Egypt. I miss this section very much. The artifacts reminded me of the many archaeological sites that my late husband and I visited all over the world. We enjoyed our travels. I hope this section can be reintroduced. I have been a subscriber to your magazine for at least 15 years.

Don’t worry, Worldwide hasn’t gone away. It now appears within the Strata section; it just may not appear in every issue.—B.C.

Battle Over Bethsaida

Neither Notley and Aviam (“Searching for Bethsaida: The Case for El-Araj,” Spring 2020) nor Arav (“Searching for Bethsaida: The Case for Et-Tell,” Spring 2020) have proven their cases for the identification of Bethsaida beyond reasonable doubt, as they have based their arguments entirely on circumstantial evidence, without describing it this way. No inscription has so far been found at el-Araj or et-Tell to identify either as Bethsaida or, for that matter, any other place. Until such inscription is found, the equations remain working hypotheses, not historical facts.

There has been a regrettable tendency since the 19th century for specialists to rush into print with suggested biblical toponyms for sites in the southern Levant and to insist on their accuracy, as if their reputations depended on it. All these experts would be well advised to heed the lesson from the example of Ekron, which was identified with a number of different sites in southwestern Canaan, until Trude Dothan and Sy Gitin proposed Tel Miqne. It came almost as an anti-climax that an inscription turned up confirming the equation. The rarity of finding an inscription bearing a place name is no excuse for not waiting for it to occur.

If Et-Tell is deemed to be the site of the biblical Bethsaida, there would seem to be three possible explanations for its distance from the Sea of Galilee. First, the nearby rivers silted in the area—as happened at Ephesus. However, near et-Tell there are no high-relief mountains and no surging rivers to result in silting. Second, et-Tell is not Bethsaida. Third, the Sea of Galilee has receded that great distance.

Rami Arav tacitly accepts that Jesus walked by the seashore of Bethsaida. By the common dating—about 30–33 C.E.—Arav also posits that “in the mid-first century C.E. [say 50–70 C.E.], the level of the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea dropped to unprecedented levels.” Thus, the argument is that within 20 or 30 years there was such a climatic change as to have the Sea of Galilee recede approximately one mile, thereby allowing for the creation of a new city by the sea, at el-Araj. What is the evidence for such a catastrophic event?

Rami Arav Responds:

The Sea of Galilee added 2 cm today (May 6) and is now standing at 208.90 Meters Below Sea Level (MBSL), which is 3 m higher than five months ago! In 1996, the level was record high—208.80 MBSL. Only five years later, in 2001, it was record low—214.87 MBSL. If heavy rains can cause such rise, a similar fluctuation could have taken place in the first century C.E.

See full response online, at biblicalarchaeology.org/letters.

The “Battle Over Bethsaida” reminds me of the famous Solomonic story of the two “mothers” each claiming a child her own. When the wise king threatened to cut the child in half, Solomon knew that the woman who surrendered the child to the other was 012 the true mother. We have the same situation here. Review again the concluding statement of each of the articles:

(1) “Although no one has declared the search for Bethsaida-Julias to be concluded, the mounting evidence has made el-Araj the leading candidate for Bethsaida-Julias …”

(2) “Et-Tell is Bethsaida-Julias.”

The real mother here is el-Araj.

I have been a subscriber since the beginning, even including Bible Review and Archaeology Odyssey while they existed. I enjoy the magazine for what it does: interface between the professionals and those of us who are simply interested.

I want to protest your acting like the school agitator, “Let’s you and him fight!” by asking archaeologists to “prove” their case for something against one another. We all know that in a perfect world the facts generated by the studies would lead to the conclusion. It seems unprofessional to practice “sic ’em.” Hershel didn’t make a lot of mistakes while he was editor, but you may be one.

Asking archaeologists to “prove” their case for something is a fundamental aspect of science and scholarship—when you make a claim, you must back it up. Often, other scholars disagree and say so, and they provide their own evidence. BAR provides a venue for scholars to publish ideas and new discoveries, and not everyone will agree, including other scholars, who sometimes respond and say so. But this is not hosting a dogfight; this is the scholarly method.

And if you don’t think that Hershel ever pitted one scholar against another, then you may have missed reading the first 43 years of BAR.—B.C.

As part of the team that has excavated Bethsaida (et-Tell) for more than 21 years, we are not convinced so far by the findings at el-Araj over et-Tell. Et-Tell is a large mound, and we have so far uncovered only a fraction of what is there. Only continued excavation, hopefully, will tell which “Tell.”

The Biblical Bethsaida cover story was interesting and current. Our Sunday evening, winter-time Bible study group here in Alberta, Canada, recently viewed the 2003 BAR 3-DVD set An Archaeological Search for Jesus, hosted by Hershel Shanks. One segment concerned et-Tell about a mile north of the Sea of Galilee. The reason they give for this being Bethsaida is that the water level in the lake has dropped significantly in 2,000 years, combined with a damming of the Jordan due to an earthquake. Really?? Interesting, but we found it hard to believe.

Going through some books, I read through a well-used copy of In the Footsteps of Jesus, by Wolfgang E. Pax, from 1970. It is a great book with some terrific photos. An earlier black-and-white photo on page 118 depicts a marshy, riparian lowland with winding Jordan as it enters the Sea of Galilee. The caption reads, “The former site of Bethsaida. Some towns near the lakeshore of Galilee like Bethsaida, refused to accept the teachings of Jesus.” This site is, of course, el-Araj. It just makes more sense. Eh!

I just finished reading “Searching for Bethsaida.” There seemed to be a remarkable number of coins to be found. It sounds like every probe hit silver. Were the people of antiquity clumsy, or is there an assumption that there were so many natural and man-made disasters in those days that every ruin should be sprinkled with coins dropped by fleeing refugees?

I’m not challenging the finds or the dates—just trying to figure out why cultures we often think of as near impoverishment would leave so much cash lying around.

Parsimoniously yours,

Like today, many coins that were dropped in antiquity fell into places that were irrecoverable, such as drains and cracks in streets. Excavation of these areas causes this phenomenon.—B.C.

I have loved this magazine since discovering it in graduate school when working on my master’s in theology. But this issue was outstanding! I especially loved the debate on the location of biblical Bethsaida. I was convinced about el-Araj until I read about et-Tell. I’ll be rereading the articles to see if I can be swayed.

It was also very good to see another fine article that “redeems” Eve and gives her the place of blessing and equality she deserves as one created in God’s own image (Amanda W. Benckhuysen, Biblical Profile: “The Gospel According to Eve,” Spring 2020). Such a great reminder 013 about the need for a nuanced translation of “Adam” and the Bible in general.

Delighted, too, by “Shining Up a Silver Shrine” (Strata, Spring 2020) and, really, could just list the whole table of contents!

Archaeological Primacy

My answer to “Who conducted the first officially sanctioned excavation in Palestine?” (Strata, Spring 2020) is apparently 1,500 years too early: Saint Helena!

We discounted early pilgrims and empresses, as their pre-scientific methodologies often relied on miracles and legends. Then again, the emperor’s mother could do what she wanted.—B.C.

Incomplete Eve

“The Gospel According to Eve,” by Amanda W. Benckhuysen, was quite interesting, but I was surprised with the lack of reference of the core biblical passages regarding the sin of Eve. Genesis 2:16 relates that man is commanded: “but of the Tree of Knowledge you must not eat.” In Genesis 3:3, Eve cites God to the serpent as saying: “You shall neither eat of it nor touch it.” Touching was not prohibited by God, so the only source of that prohibition had to be Adam; hence it is arguably Adam’s extension of the prohibition that paved the way for the serpent’s deception. This caution may be applied to rabbinic “fencing” of the Law as well.

Whence the Mistake?

The Spring Issue of BAR reached me very recently, and I was drawn to your Whence-A-Word essay on the “apple of his eye” (Epistles, Spring 2020). You end by saying, “It is a mistranslated invention of the King James Version in 1611.” I was surprised at that. The King James translators are not known for such inventions—I went to the same school as one of them, Lancelot Andrewes, but long after him. In fact, the phrase already appears in William Tyndale’s translation of Deuteronomy and in John Wycliffe’s before him.

The Oxford English Dictionary (s.v. apple) has the following: “the apple of one’s eye: a person of whom one is extremely fond and proud [originally denoting the pupil of the eye, considered to be a globular solid body, extended as a symbol of something cherished.]”

You have given BAR a bright new look while retaining its variety and style. Thank you for taking it on! With best wishes,

Thank you for your kind note. I stand corrected. I focused my study on the origin of the phrase in the Hebrew and its mistranslation into English, and I failed to notice the earlier English language instances prior to the publication of the KJV, which merely popularized the earlier mistranslated expression. Thank you for the correction.—B.C.

Thank you very much for BAR! I have been a faithful subscriber since the September/October 2007 issue. And I must say that BAR keeps getting better.

I would like to take exception to the last sentence of Whence-A-Word. The subject of the column is “apple of his eye.” May I respectfully point out that, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word “apple” had been commonly used to mean the pupil of the eye for nearly 800 years (beginning in 885 A.D.) when the King James Version was produced, and was still in use in that sense in 1611. The phrase is not a mistranslation but a very apt idiom that accurately reflected the Hebrew for the people of that time.

Thank you. My questions would then be (1) How did “apple” become a synonym for “pupil”? Was it due to a misunderstanding of these Hebrew words from these verses? and (2) How did “apple of my eye” become a term of endearment instead of a simple reference to one’s eye?—B.C.

Ass to the Rescue

BAR has done it again! Like I usually do (see the first letter in Queries & Comments of the July/August/September/October 2019 issue), three days after receiving the Spring 2020 issue, I was looking for art associated with Matthew 21:1-11 (Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem), and there it was—a Palmesel, or Palm Donkey (Epistles, Spring 2020). You made my work easy. Thanks! The Met’s website, along with their publication on medieval sculptures, gave me additional useful information.

Dear Bob Cargill, we always look forward to receiving BAR. Each edition is replete with challenging, insightful, well-researched articles. Your informative comments on the Hebrew language and idioms (as in the Spring issue) capture our attention and are much appreciated. For me, the inveterate professor of German language and literature, it was also interesting to notice your entry about the German Palmesel (Epistles, Spring 2020). I don’t think this harks back to when you audited my German course at Pepperdine University, or does it? How did you come upon this?

Dear Herr Dowdey, it’s so good to hear from you. While you did teach me German, the Palmesel piece was written by our Associate Editor, Marek Dospěl. In fact, Marek is responsible for a lot of the clever, well-researched pieces you so appreciate about BAR.—B.C.

In these troubling times, we appreciate that you keep sharing your opinions with us (the editors) and one another. It is great to see so many of you engage critically with the diverse content we strive to bring you no matter the circumstances. You can find more letters online, along with a few responses, at biblicalarchaeology.org/letters. What a Joy! I want to share my joy—yes joy—at the direction BAR has consciously chosen to move in the past two years. You have increased the scope and breadth of subject matter; openly welcomed—nay, encouraged—discussion and debate; and exhibited new openness, receptiveness, […]