The Bible

[M.Dancer]

It's been said by Jesus that there wouldn't be any more miracles (and I assume He refer to big miracles like parting of the Red Sea). Therefore to me, that means miracles were truly in literal sense.

Where does he say that?

Is raising the dead a lesser miracle than parting the sea of reeds?

[betsy]

You have painted yourself into a corner.

1) either the city and walls were gone when the Israelites made there march...

or as a few have said, the Israelites were already in Canaan 100s of years before the march which means

2) the story of exodus is factually incorrect, they did not leave egypt to go to Canaan, they were already there.

So your choices are

1)either the Joshua story is incorrect

2)the exodus story is incorrect

3)both stories are incorrect

...as you have correctly proved.

But there shouldn't be any choices, at all.....not yet anyway. For the simple reason that there are still refutations/debate going on. In other words, there is no clear verdict yet.

Furthermore, these evidences - all together - hold weight, for their are substantial.

The correlation between the archaeological evidence and the Biblical narrative is substantial:

• The city was strongly fortified (Joshua 2:5,7,15, 6:5,20).

• The attack occurred just after harvest time in the spring (Joshua 2:6, 3:15, 5:10).

• The inhabitants had no opportunity to flee with their foodstuffs (Joshua 6:1).

• The siege was short (Joshua 6:15).

• The walls were leveled, possibly by an earthquake (Joshua 6:20).

• The city was not plundered (Joshua 6:17-18).

• The city was burned (Joshua 6:20).

http://www.biblearchaeology.org/post/2008/05/did-the-israelites-conquer-jericho-a-new-look-at-the-archaeological-evidence.aspx

Did you check out and read every each one of these enumerations? How they were explained in that article? You should.

The fact about the grains alone that were found which means that the place was not plundered - which was specifically forbidden by God - is one crucial evidence!

Why would you burn so much grain???

Here are excerpts from one long detailed article that also gives several arguments. For those arguments, you need to read the whole article.

The Exodus Controversy

Aug. 2009

We find, then, that the archaeological evidence better fits the traditional date of the Exodus backed by the Bible.

Recent Discoveries

Another argument that the Exodus never occurred is that there are no signs that the Israelites wandered in the Sinai desert for 40 years. However, we must remember that during the Exodus the Israelites were forced to live nomadic lives. No longer did they reside in villages with sturdy houses and artifacts that could have survived as evidence. Instead, in the wilderness environment, every item had to be used to its fullest capacity and then, if possible, recycled. Also, the portable tent encampments during those 40 years would have left few or no traces that could be found 3, 400 years later, especially in the shifting desert sands.

Interestingly, recent satellite infrared technology has revealed ancient caravan routes in the Sinai. George Stephen, a satellite-image analyst, discovered evidence in the satellite photographs of ancient tracks made by “a massive number of people” going “from the Nile Delta straight south along the east bank of the Gulf of Suez and around the tip of the Sinai Peninsula.” He also saw huge campsites along the route, one that fits the description given in the book of Exodus (Price 1997:137).

Could this evidence be a coincidence? If nothing else at least it shows that a large number of people could be sustained in the same region and on the same path as that taken by the Israelites during the Exodus.

The Sturdy Anvil

We have covered only some of the evidence for the Biblically derived date of the Exodus. It seems that every year more discoveries are made that confirm the existence of Biblical persons and places. But the skeptics know what is at stake, and in this world of growing unbelief they will not be deterred from striking at the foundations of Christianity and Judaism.

Although almost 200 years old, a statement by 19th-century writer H.L. Hastings regarding skeptics’ attacks on the Bible holds true:

For 1800 years, skeptics have been refuting and overthrowing this book, and yet it stands today as a solid rock...The skeptics, with all their assaults, make about as much impression on this book as a man with a hammer would on the Pyramids of Egypt. When a French monarch proposed persecuting Christians, an elderly advisor told him, “Sir, the Church of God is an anvil that has worn out many hammers.”

So the hammers of the skeptics have been pecking away at this book for ages, but the hammers are worn out, and the anvil still endures. If this book had not been the book of God, men would have destroyed it long ago. Emperors and popes, kings and priests, princes and rulers have all tried their hand at it; they have all died and yet this book lives on.

http://www.biblearchaeology.org/post/2009/08/09/The-Exodus-Controversy.aspx

We'll have to wait some more on this issue.

Edited July 7, 2011 by betsy

[betsy]

FACT: ARCHEOLOGY DISCOVERED THE NUZI TABLETS, SHOWING THAT THE CULTURAL PRACTICES WRITTEN IN GENESIS ARE AUTHENTIC

This article was first published in the Winter 2005 issue of Bible and Spade.

Nuzi was a Hurrian administrative center not far from the Hurrian capital at Kirkuk in northern Iraq. The Hurrians are equivalent to the Horites in the Old Testament, also called Hivites and Jebusites. Excavations were carried out at Nuzi by American teams from 1925 to 1933. The major find was more than 5,000 family and administrative archives spanning six generations, ca. 1450-1350 BC. They deal with the social, economic, religious and legal institutions of the Hurrians.

The tablets tell of practices similar to those in Genesis such as adoption for childless couples (Gn 15:2 children by proxy (Gn 16; 21:1, inheritance rights (Gn 25:29, marriage arrangements (Gn 28 and levirate marriage (Gn 38; Dt 25:5.

They also demonstrate the significance of the deathbed blessing (Gn 27; 48 and household gods (Gn 31:14 30. Some Nuzi tablets, called “tablets of sistership,ve agreements in which a man adopted a woman as a sister.

In the society of the Hurrians, a wife enjoyed both greater protection and a superior position when she also had the legal status of a sister. In such a case, two separate documents were drawn up, one for marriage and the other for sistership. This may explain why both Abraham (Gn 12:10 20:1and Isaac (Gn 26:7) said their wives were their sisters. It is possible that they had previously adopted them to give them higher status, in accordance with the custom of the day.

As with Mari, the Nuzi records demonstrate that the cultural practices recorded in the book of Genesis are authentic. The accounts are not fictional stories written at a much later time, as some critics claim, since the customs were unknown in later periods.

http://www.biblearchaeology.org/post/2006/02/great-discoveries-in-biblical-archaeology-the-nuzi-tablets.aspx

For list of all posted facts

http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index.php?showtopic=18914&st=810

Edited July 9, 2011 by betsy

[betsy]

FACT: ARCHEOLOGY DISCOVERED THE MARI TABLETS

Mari was discovered in 1933, on the eastern flank of Syria, near the Iraqi border. A Bedouin tribe was digging through a mound for a gravestone that would be used for a recently deceased tribesman, when they came across a headless statue. After the news reached the French authorities currently in control of Syria, the report was investigated and digging on the site was started on December 14, 1933 by archaeologists from the Louvre in Paris. Discoveries came quickly, with the temple of Ishtar being discovered in the next month. Mari was classified by the archaeologists as the "most westerly outpost of Sumerian culture". Since the beginning of excavations, over 25,000 clay tablets in Akkadian language written in cuneiform were discovered. Finds from the excavation are on display in the National Museum of Aleppo, the National Museum of Damascus, and the Deir ez-Zor Museum. In the latter, the southern façade of the "Court of the Palms" of Zimri-Lim's palace has been reconstructed, including the wall paintings.[2]

Mari has been excavated in annual campaigns published in Syria, 1933-39, 1951-75, and since 1979; a journal devoted to the site since 1982, is Mari: Annales de recherches interdisciplinaires. The 21 seasons up to 1975 were led by Andre Parrot. Less than half of the 1000 by 600 meter area of Mari has been uncovered as of 2005. Although archaeologists have tried to determine how many layers the site descends, it has not proved possible as of 2008.

The Mari Tablets are a large group of tablets discovered by French archaeologists in the 1930s. More than 25,000 tablets in Akkadian were found in the Mari archives, which give information about the kingdom of Mari, its customs, and names of people who lived during that time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mari,_Syria

Some of the tablets have been dated back 200 years before Zimri-Lim's time, which would place them around the same time that the Bible says Abraham's family departed Ur. Information translated from the Mari tablets would seem to indicate that the Sumerian Ur, not Ur of the Chaldeans, is more likely the place where Abraham and his family started their journey.

Genesis 11:31-32 gives no indication why Abraham's father, Terah, would suddenly uproot his large extended family and head toward the city of Haran, which was some 500 miles north of the Sumerian Ur. However, the Mari tablets offer information about political and cultural strife around Abraham's time that scholars think offers clues to their migration.

The Biblical World notes that some of the Mari tablets use words from the Amorite tribes that are also found in Abraham's story, such as his father's name, Terah, and his brothers' names, Nahor and Haran (also ironically the name for their destination). From these artifacts and others, some scholars have concluded that Abraham's family may have been Amorites, a Semitic tribe that began to migrate out of Mesopotamia around 2100 B.C. The Amorites' migration destabilized Ur, which scholars estimate collapsed around 1900 B.C.

As a result of these findings, archaeologists now surmise that those who wanted to escape the era's civil strife had only one direction to go for safety: north. South of Mesopotamia was the sea known now as the Persian Gulf. Nothing but open desert lay to the west. To the east, refugees from Ur would have encountered Elamites, another tribal group from Persia whose influx also hastened Ur's downfall.

Thus archaeologists and biblical historians conclude that it would have been logical for Terah and his family to head north toward Haran to save their lives and livelihoods. Their migration was the first stage in the journey that led Terah's son, Abram, to become the patriarch Abraham whom God in Genesis 17:4 terms "the father of a multitude of nations."

http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/amen/a/122710-CW-Archaeological-Evidence-About-The-Story-Of-Abraham-In-The-Bible.htm

These tablets, although not directly mentioning the patriarchs, still constituted such valuable testimony about their life-styles that the late Professor William F. Albright (the then-acknowledged "dean" of Palestinian archaeologists) concluded that "the narratives of Genesis dealing with Abram may now be integrated into the life and history of the time [the second millennium B.C.] in such surprisingly consistent ways that there can be little doubt about their substantial historicity" (Biblical Archaeologist, July 1973, p. 10). Professor Albright's conclusion was based on the following evidence from the Mari and Nuzi tablets:

1.Names like Abraham and Jacob were in common use among the Amorites in northern Mesopotamia about 2000 B.C. and later.

2.Mari was the center of a vast network of trade routes ranging from Crete to Elam, from Cappadocia to Megiddo. Merchants constantly traveled these routes from one end to the other. Seen in this context, Abraham’s journey from Ur to Haran, then to Canaan and Egypt, is not as improbable as the critics once thought.

3.Abraham's relationship with Hagar (Genesis 16) and Jacob's with Bilhah (Genesis 30) can be better understood by a comparison with a marriage contract from Nuzi, in which the wife was required, if she proved to be barren, to provide a substitute for her husband.

4.Abraham’s reluctance to drive out Hagar and Ishmael (Genesis 16:6) is understandable in the light of Nuzi customs governing such relationships.

5.Another Nuzi tablet revealed the adoption by a childless couple of a servant born in their house. He became the heir if he cared for them in their old age (see Genesis 15:2-3).

6.Jacob’s relationship with Laban (Genesis 29) becomes more understandable when compared to other tablets from Nuzi.

Overall, the patriarchs’ way of life conforms so closely to the cultural world described by these tablets that there is no reason to doubt that they were real people.

http://www.gci.org/bible/torah/abrahm

The Nuzi and the Mari Tablets give valuable insights to the people and culture of the time, in line with the Biblical narrative of Abraham.

Edited July 9, 2011 by betsy

[betsy]

FACT: THREE SEPARATE BIBLICAL FACTS CONFIRMED BY NEBO-SARSEKIM CUNEIFORM TABLET

Excerpt from:

Nebo-Sarsekim Cuneiform Tablet Volume 61 Number 1, January/February 2008

by Laura Sexton

Last June, Austrian Assyriologist Michael Jursa was doing what he has done since 1991, poring over the more than 100,000 undeciphered cuneiform tablets in the British Museum. But while analyzing records from the Babylonian city of Sippar, he made a startling discovery with Biblical implications. It came in the unlikely form of a tablet noting a one-and-a-half pound gold donation to a temple made by an official, or "chief eunuch," Nebo-Sarsekim.

The tablet is dated 595 B.C., the ninth year of Nebuchadnezzar II's reign. The Book of Jeremiah relates that after Nebuchadnezzar took Jerusalem in 587 B.C., he committed the prophet Jeremiah to Nebo-Sarsekim's care.

"It is so incredibly rare to find people appearing in the Bible, who are not kings, mentioned elsewhere," says Jursa. "Something like this tablet, where we see a person mentioned in the Bible making an everyday payment to the temple in Babylon and quoting the exact date, is quite extraordinary."

http://www.archaeology.org/0801/topten/cuneiform.html

In July of this year that line of attack against the Bible became harder to maintain because of a small but important discovery made by Michael Jursa an Austrian Assyriologist translating cuneiform tablets at the British Museum in London. Jeremiah Chapter 39:3 reports that someone named Nebo-Sarsekim, Nebuchadnezzer II’s “Chief Officer”, was with him at the Babylonian siege and conquest of Jerusalem in 587 BC.

The tablet that Professor Jursa recently translated is a receipt from the Babylonian temple of Esanglia acknowledging a payment of 1.5 minas (1.65 pounds) of gold. The year of the payment is 595 BC and the payer is King Nebuchadnezzer II’s Chief Eunuch, Nabu-sharrussu-ukin (Nebo-Sarsekim in Hebrew). This confirms three separate Biblical facts Nebo-Sarsekim actually existed, he was Nebuchadnezzer’s Chief Officer and he lived at the time of the siege.

Why This is Important

It is the very minor nature of the details confirmed by this tablet and similar discoveries that make them so important. In the words of Dr. Irving Finkel, one of the British Museums specialists, “This is a fantastic discovery, a world class find. If Nebo-Sarsekim existed which other lesser figures in the Old Testament existed? A throwaway detail in the Old Testament turns out to be accurate and true. I think that this means that the whole of the narrative takes on a new kind of power.”

Dr. Finkel’s observation is well taken. If such obscure and minor facts as those verified on this tablet, “throwaway detail” as he calls them, are correct, it is likely that other facts reported by Jeremiah and other Biblical authors are also accurately reported.

Source: London Daily Telegraph, telegraph.co.uk, July 11, 2007.

By: Lawrence Vescera, Ph.D.

http://www.idscience.org/2007/08/17/archaeological-discovery-supports-biblical-accuracy/

For list of all posted facts

http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index.php?showtopic=18914&st=810

Edited July 17, 2011 by betsy

[Oleg Bach]

`

[betsy]

FACT: ARCHEOLOGY FOUND LACHISH

Biblical references to Lachish include

Joshua 10:3, 5, 23, 31-35; Joshua 12:11; Joshua 15:39;

2 Kings 14:19; 2 Kings 18:14, 17; 2 Kings 19:8;

2 Chronicles 11:9; 2 Chronicles 25:27; 2 Chronicles 32:9;

Nehemiah 11:30; Isaiah 36:2; Isaiah 37:8; Jeremiah 34:7; and Micah 1:13.

During the 19th and early 20th centuries, Lachish was identified with Tell el-Hesi from a cuneiform tablet found there (EA 333). The tablet is a letter from an Egyptian official named Paapu, reporting cases of treachery involving a local kinglet, Zimredda. However this hypothesis is no longer accepted.

[3] More recent excavations have identified Tell ed-Duweir as Lachish beyond reasonable doubt.

LMLK seals

Another major contribution to Biblical archaeology from excavations at Lachish are the LMLK seals, which were stamped on the handles of a particular form of ancient storage jar.

LMLK seals were stamped on the handles of large storage jars mostly in and around Jerusalem during the reign of King Hezekiah (circa 700 BC) based on several complete jars found in situ buried under a destruction layer caused by Sennacherib at Lachish.[1]

More of these artifacts were found at this site (over 400; Ussishkin, 2004, pp. 2151-9) than any other place in Israel (Jerusalem remains in second place with more than 300). Most of them were collected from the surface during Starkey's excavations, but others were found in Level 1 (Persian and Greek era), Level 2 (period preceding Babylonian conquest by Nebuchadnezzar), and Level 3 (period preceding Assyrian conquest by Sennacherib).

It is thanks to the work of David Ussishkin's team that eight of these stamped jars were restored, thereby demonstrating lack of relevance between the jar volumes (which deviated as much as 5 gallons or 12 litres), and also proving their relation to the reign of Biblical king Hezekiah. [14] [15]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lachish

Edited July 17, 2011 by betsy

[betsy]

FACT: THE LACHISH LETTERS INLINE WITH THE BIBLICAL NARRATIVE OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH

The Lachish Letters (Hoshaiah Letters) are a group of letters written in carbon ink in Ancient Hebrew on clay ostraca. The individual ostracon probably come from the same broken clay pot and were most likely written in a short period of time. They were written to Joash, possibly the commanding officer at Lachish (modern Tell ed-Duweir), from Hoshaiah, a military officer stationed in a city close to Lachish (possibly Mareshah). In the letters, Hoshaiah defends himself to Joash regarding a letter he either was or was not supposed to have read. The letters also contain informational reports and requests from Hoshaiah to his superior.

The letters were probably written shortly before Lachish fell to the Babylonian army in 588/6 BC during the reign Zedekiah, king of Judah (ref. Jeremiah 34:7). The ostraca were discovered by J.L. Starkey in January-February, 1935 during the third campaign of the Wellcome excavations. They were published in 1938 by Harry Torczyner and have been much studied since then. They are currently located in the British Museum in London.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lachish_letters

LACHISH LETTER l

Israelite, 586 BC

From Lachish (modern Tell ed-Duweir), Israel

A letter written on a piece of pottery

This is one of a group of letters written on ostraka (pot sherds) found near the main gate of ancient Lachish (modern Tell ed-Duweir) in a burnt layer associated with the destruction of the city by the Babylonians in 586 BC. It is written in ink in alphabetic Hebrew, and reads:

Gemaryahu, son of Hissilyahu

Yaazanyahu, son of Tobshillem

Hageb, son of Yaazanyahu

Mibtahyahu, son of Yirmeyahu

Mattanyahu, son of Neryahu

Presumably this list had some administrative function. Though several of the names occur in the Old Testament, it cannot be proved that the same individuals are intended.

In 598 BC Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, invaded Judah after it had rebelled against him. He captured Jerusalem and took the royal family captive. He installed Zedekiah, the former king's uncle, as his choice of ruler. However, rebellion broke out again. Nebuchadnezzar showed no mercy this time and in 587 BC he beseiged and then destroyed Jerusalem.

This was the period at which this letter was written. It came from an officer named Hosha'yahu who was in charge of a military outpost. He was writing to Ya'osh, military commander at Lachish, as the situation worsened.

LACHISH LETTER 2

In 598 BC Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, invaded Judah after it had rebelled against him. He captured Jerusalem and took the royal family captive. He installed Zedekiah, the former king's uncle, as his choice of ruler. However, rebellion broke out again. Nebuchadnezzar showed no mercy this time and in 587 BC he beseiged and then destroyed Jerusalem.

This was the period at which this letter was written. It came from an officer named Hosha'yahu who was in charge of a military outpost. He was writing to Ya'osh, military commander at Lachish, as the situation worsened.

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/me/l/lachish_letter_ii.aspx

Letter Number 3

Your servant, Hosayahu, sent to inform my lord, Yaush: May YHWH cause my lord to hear tidings of peace and tidings of good. And now, open the ear of your servant concerning the letter which you sent to your servant last evening because the heart of your servant is ill since your sending it to your servant. And inasmuch as my lord said "Don't you know how to read a letter?" As YHWH lives if anyone has ever tried to read me a letter! And as for every letter that comes to me, if I read it. And furthermore, I will grant it as nothing. And to your servant it has been reported saying: The commander of the army Konyahu son of Elnatan, has gone down to go to Egypt and he sent to commandeer Hodawyahu son of Ahiyahu and his men from here. And as for the letter of Tobiyahu, the servant of the king, which came to Sallum, the son of Yaddua, from the prophet, saying, "Be on guard!" your ser[va]nt is sending it to my lord.[2]

Notes: This ostracon is approximately fifteen centimeters tall by eleven centimeters wide and contains twenty-one lines of writing. The front side has lines one through sixteen; the back side has lines seventeen through twenty-one. This ostracon is particularly interesting because of its mentions of Konyahu, who has gone down to Egypt, and the prophet. For possible biblical connections according to Torczyner, reference Jeremiah 26:20-23.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lachish_letters

The leading character of the Lachish Letters is a high military officer, Hoshayahu at Qiryat Ye'arim, suspected by one party, as reported to his superior Ya'ush, of treachery to the king in aiding the prophet, and by the other of betraying the prophet by revealing the contents of his warning letter to the king: this letter revealed to the king that the prophet was fleeing to Egypt. Likewise his superior officer, Ya'ush, who had been ordered to investigate him, "appears to be on the best of terms with the king. But still both men respect the prophet and believe in him, in spite of the king's attitude to him, and their hearts ache that they should be responsible for his destruction."40

http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/transcripts/?id=34

Edited July 17, 2011 by betsy

[DogOnPorch]

She sells seashells down by the seashore.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Anning

[betsy]

She sells seashells down by the seashore.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Anning

What's your point? Explain pls.

[DogOnPorch]

What's your point? Explain pls.

Not familiar with the tongue-twister? The origin is as explained via my link re: Mary Anning. She's of your age...you'd be the minister's fire and brimstone daughter while she'd be digging up dragons by the seashore...or in your mind...demons...and much like the Beatle's song 'Piggies' in need of a damn good whacking. They still burn witches in betsyville if I'm not mistaken.

[betsy]

Not familiar with the tongue-twister? The origin is as explained via my link re: Mary Anning. She's of your age...you'd be the minister's fire and brimstone daughter while she'd be digging up dragons by the seashore...or in your mind...demons...and much like the Beatle's song 'Piggies' in need of a damn good whacking. They still burn witches in betsyville if I'm not mistaken.

oh.

Edited July 18, 2011 by betsy

[Chippewa]

The Bible is a pretty new book. Its only been around for less then 2000 years, and was written 200 years after the Jewish Leader Christ Died. So in a time of no computers, and really no books. How could anybody remember such a long made up ficticious story about a Jewish Leader who died 200 years earlier at the hands of his own people. The Bible was made up of Hear Say stories, and is the most bull crap story in the world.

If anybody was cured of the Bible, im sure it was the First Nations in Residential Schools they were forced into Slave Labour, Internment Camps, and abducted from there families, all for the Bible.

Bible toughting Terrorists are no better then any other Terrorist Organizations in the world.

[betsy]

The Bible is a pretty new book. Its only been around for less then 2000 years, and was written 200 years after the Jewish Leader Christ Died. So in a time of no computers, and really no books. How could anybody remember such a long made up ficticious story about a Jewish Leader who died 200 years earlier at the hands of his own people. The Bible was made up of Hear Say stories, and is the most bull crap story in the world.

If anybody was cured of the Bible, im sure it was the First Nations in Residential Schools they were forced into Slave Labour, Internment Camps, and abducted from there families, all for the Bible.

Take a number and get in line.

Not to be insensitive....but what is new in history?

The Jews and Cambodians had a horrific hellish time too. By non-Christian monsters! Not only were they enslaved, forced into labour and concentration camps....they were getting systematically annihilated to boot.

Bible toughting Terrorists are no better then any other Terrorist Organizations in the world.

Do you have anything relevant to say....like a contradiction to the Bible facts posted in this topic?

Edited July 24, 2011 by betsy

[betsy]

FACT: Archeological findings in TELL EN-NASBEH in-line with the Biblical narratives.

(adapted and expanded from "Nasbeh, Tell en-." In The New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land, edited by E. Stern, vol. 3, 1098-1102. Jerusalem: Carta, 1993.)

Identification

Located 12 kilometers (8 miles) northwest of Jerusalem, Tell en-Nasbeh (M.R. 1706-1436) is probably to be identified with Biblical Mizpah of Benjamin (Joshua 18:26). It has also been identified with Beeroth or Gibeon. Beeroth and Gibeon, however, were occupied in the Late Bronze age, which Tell en-Nasbeh was not. Ataroth-Addar was another possible identification because a village named 'Attara was located at the southern foot of the tell.

Ataroth-Addar, however, is mentioned only in the boundary descriptions in Joshua, and so was apparently a place of little importance, not at all in keeping with the remains uncovered on the tell. Those who maintain this latter identification suggest that Ataroth-Addar was the site's original name, and that when Asa fortified the town its name was changed to Mizpah.

History

Tell en-Nasbeh was occupied in the Late Chalcolithic and Early Bronze I periods, when it was a relatively small village. After this time the site was virtually abandoned until the beginning of the Iron Age.

If one accepts the identification with Mizpah, the Biblical text records that the Israelite tribes gathered at Mizpah before their battle against Gibeah (Judg. 20:1, 3; 21:1, 5, 8), and later against the Philistines (I Sam. 7:5-12). Saul was appointed king at Mizpah (I Sam. 10:17). Along with Gilgal and Bethel, Mizpah was one of the towns visited by the prophet Samuel on his circuit (I Sam. 7:15-17). When Baasha, the king of Israel, encroached on the territory of Judah, Asa of Judah bribed the king of Damascus to invade northern Israel. Asa then called up the people of Judah for corvee labor and fortified Mizpah and Geba with the materials Baasha had brought to fortify Ramah. (I Kings 15:22; II Chr. 16:6). Asa is also said to have constructed a great cistern at Mizpah (Jer. 41:9). During the Iron Age Mizpah may have been home to some form of cultic establishment (I Sam. 7:9; Hosea 5:1; I Macc. 3:46). After the fall of Jerusalem to Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonians appointed Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam, over what remained of the area of Judah. He made Mizpah his capital, and along with many of his entourage, was murdered there by anti-Babylonian conspirators (II Kings 25:23,25; Jer. 40:6-10, 13, 15; 41:6, 9-10, 14-15 ). How long Mizpah remained the capital is uncertain. It was still the capital of its own district when the walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt (Neh. 3:7, 15, 19). Pottery, coins and other small finds indicate some settlement at the site into the Hellenistic period. It was at this time that Judas Maccabee gathered his army at Mizpah to confront the Seleucid army (I Macc. 3:46). During this and the subsequent Roman period the tell was probably an agricultural estate, occupied by a watch tower, kilns, a few buildings and fields. The tell does not seem to have been occupied in later times, though Byzantine tombs were found in the extra-mural cemeteries and the floor of a Byzantine church near the west cemetery was uncovered.

http://www.arts.cornell.edu/jrz3/frames2.htm

Edited July 24, 2011 by betsy

[betsy]

FACT: Archeological finding at TAHPANHES in-line with Biblical narrative of Jeremiah

Tahpanhes (also transliterated Tahapanes or Tehaphnehes; known by the Ancient Greeks as Daphnae, now Tell Defenneh) was a city in Ancient Egypt. It was located on Lake Manzala on the Tanitic branch of the Nile, about 16 miles from Pelusium. The site is now situated on the Suez Canal.

According to the Hebrew Bible, the Jews from Jerusalem fled to this place after the death of Gedaliah and settled there for a time (Jeremiah 2:16; 43:7,8,9; 44:1; 46:14; Ezekiel 30:18).

A platform of brick-work, which there is every reason to believe was the pavement at the entry of Pharaoh's palace, has been discovered at this place.

"Here," says the discoverer, William Flinders Petrie, "the ceremony described by Jeremiah 43:8-10; "brick-kiln", i.e., pavement of brick] took place before the chiefs of the fugitives assembled on the platform, and here Nebuchadnezzar II spread his royal pavilion".

The site was discovered by Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie in 1886; it was then known by natives as the "Castle of the Jew's Daughter".[1]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tahpanhes

Jeremiah 43: 8-10

8 In Tahpanhes the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah: 9 While the Jews are watching, take some large stones with you and bury them in clay in the brick pavement at the entrance to Pharaohs palace in Tahpanhes. 10 Then say to them, This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: I will send for my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and I will set his throne over these stones I have buried here; he will spread his royal canopy above them.

Edited July 24, 2011 by betsy

[Chippewa]

The Bible has been responsible for creating a higher archy that simply gave people a sense of belief in "God", and the creation of ficticious belief. The people who used the Bible, preyed on the weak minded individual who had no sense of belonging, or history in the world. This book gave people the power to let there minds relax into a new fantasy land "Heaven", if they followed the ways of the Church. So when somebody cafefully constructed the Bible, they ensured that the "Bible Laws" are the only way to live life. So this book really took off in big strides, by attracting the State, and the State used the Church by co-existing with them, to create power over the people. THis still is effect to this date.

Here is a fact about the bible.

FACT

First Nations people in Canada were torchured, raped, murdered, and abducted by the Church Officials, and RCMP all for the purpose of teaching the Bible to FIrst Nations people. Nobody was ever sent to prison for War Crimes, Genocide, and the Church has since moved around Child Molesting Priests from Canada, and hide them away from being sent to prison in other Countrys. The Vatican City is really a place that went from hiding Nazi War Criminals, but to hiding Molesters from being charged in other countrys. The Pope, and that system works like Gansters, and mobsters, they move people around in different networks to hide them from prosecution. That is way the Racketeering Laws need to be applied to the Vatican City, and that organization.

[Oleg Bach]

The Bible is a pretty new book. Its only been around for less then 2000 years, and was written 200 years after the Jewish Leader Christ Died. So in a time of no computers, and really no books. How could anybody remember such a long made up ficticious story about a Jewish Leader who died 200 years earlier at the hands of his own people. The Bible was made up of Hear Say stories, and is the most bull crap story in the world.

If anybody was cured of the Bible, im sure it was the First Nations in Residential Schools they were forced into Slave Labour, Internment Camps, and abducted from there families, all for the Bible.

Bible toughting Terrorists are no better then any other Terrorist Organizations in the world.

The people who used the Bible as a guide book to do harm were reading from the old Testiment...which is a glorified history of bad human behavour - I am sure if Jesus Christ was around he would have destroyed residential schools and beat the hell out of those that ran them.....There is only one mention of capital punishment by Jesus...."Anyone who brings harm to these little ones (children) will wish that they were never born - and should have a millstone tied to their necks and be tossed into the sea" - I guess the missonaries skipped that part.

[betsy]

The Bible has been responsible for creating a higher archy that simply gave people a sense of belief in "God", and the creation of ficticious belief. The people who used the Bible, preyed on the weak minded individual who had no sense of belonging, or history in the world. This book gave people the power to let there minds relax into a new fantasy land "Heaven", if they followed the ways of the Church. So when somebody cafefully constructed the Bible, they ensured that the "Bible Laws" are the only way to live life. So this book really took off in big strides, by attracting the State, and the State used the Church by co-existing with them, to create power over the people. THis still is effect to this date.

Here is a fact about the bible.

FACT

First Nations people in Canada were torchured, raped, murdered, and abducted by the Church Officials, and RCMP all for the purpose of teaching the Bible to FIrst Nations people. Nobody was ever sent to prison for War Crimes, Genocide, and the Church has since moved around Child Molesting Priests from Canada, and hide them away from being sent to prison in other Countrys. The Vatican City is really a place that went from hiding Nazi War Criminals, but to hiding Molesters from being charged in other countrys. The Pope, and that system works like Gansters, and mobsters, they move people around in different networks to hide them from prosecution. That is way the Racketeering Laws need to be applied to the Vatican City, and that organization.

Never mind your so-called fact. And your incessant whining.

The last time I looked, apology to First Nations was finally given, and attempts at rectifying mistakes are being undertaken. You may not not be satisfied at what's being done for you now....but that's another story.

Your grievances for the First Nations now - today - somewhat pales when compared to what's happening in other parts of the world.

You're only trivializing horrific realities when you bring up past atrocities done to First Nations.

Current persecutions and injustices are still happening as we speak - killings of Christians in numerous parts of the world, human trafficking/slavery in parts of Africa, genocides and ethnic cleansings, etc..,

That so-called rational reasoning that you invoke has been used a hundred times in this forum:

Blame God for the sins of mere humans.

Use sinning mortals as an excuse to forsake God!

Same old-same old. No one is personally responsible anymore! It's always somebody else's fault!

Quite convenient to deflect!

Barking at the wrong tree....what else is new?

If you want to pursue your premise about First Nations, create your own topic!

Now, back to my own premise.

So, you want to discredit the Bible, that much is obvious. Stop waltzing around the issue.

Be relevant and give a contradiction or refute the posted facts in this topic! Go for the bulls-eye!

Edited July 26, 2011 by betsy

[cybercoma]

Never mind your so-called fact.

Now, back to my own premise.

You're insufferable. It's like talking to a child. Edited July 26, 2011 by cybercoma

[Oleg Bach]

You're insufferable. It's like talking to a child.

A child uses big font. It's like a kid screaming to get their half baked point across.

[Oleg Bach]

A child uses big font. It's like a kid screaming to get their half baked point across.

Furthermore -Christianity is logic based...a well thought out argument would be more effective...I suggest Betsy takes the time to use some simple rational thought - The Bible is an interesting topic - but the big print is a turn off..

[Chippewa]

Religion needs to be banned. What brainwashing scheme to control the masses.

[bloodyminded]

Religion needs to be banned. What brainwashing scheme to control the masses.

In some ways, it turns out that way, at times, though I put it to you it's a big oversimplification. At any rate, the last thing we need is a ban on what we choose to think and believe.

[Chippewa]

In some ways, it turns out that way, at times, though I put it to you it's a big oversimplification. At any rate, the last thing we need is a ban on what we choose to think and believe.

Except what you believe in, starts to manipulate and control your thoughts.

I'm wondering why Batman never took off as a religion. He faught evil minded fictional characters too, just like Jesus and the Devil.