The Role of Biblical Archaeology in Exegesis: An interview with Professor Israel Finkelstein, Part 2

By Louis C. de Figueiredo

This is part 2 in the two part interview with Professor Israel Finkelstein. Please click here to read, “The Role of Biblical Archaeology in Exegesis: An interview with Professor Israel Finkelstein, Part 1.”

Do you think that there was no possibility of Israelites escaping from the control of the Egyptians under Ramesses II, crossing the desert to enter Canaan? Josephus cited Manetho’s history associating the Hyksos with the Israelites. Of course, the problem is that scholars today think that Manetho was mistaken.

Manetho had already known about the Exodus tradition, so I doubt whether his work can help solve the riddle of Exodus. As far as I can judge, the Exodus traditions represent an accumulation of traditions and memories, from different periods. The old core could have been the expulsion of Canaanites from the Nile Delta in the 16th century BCE, but there are other, later layers in the story. For instance, the geographical description of the Delta, as it appears in the text, represents the knowledge of authors in the 7th to 6th centuries BCE, which was the Saite period in Egypt. On the other hand, the Exodus tradition already appears in the eighth-century BCE prophecies of Hosea and Amos. All this demonstrates how complex this issue is.

Professor Donald Redford is of the opinion that the early Israelites were a group among the Shasu Bedouin of southern Canaan and there are texts that refer to a deity, “Yhw in the land of Shasu”, and this deity is also attested in Egyptian texts in the 13th century BC. Would the deity be a part of the pantheon you mentioned and only came to be accepted as the one, true God after 586 BC? Professor D. N. Freedman wrote an interesting paper where he dwelt on religious progression, from henotheism to monolatry and then monotheism.

I agree with Redford. The Shasu and Apiru groups were among those that settled in the highlands in Iron Age I, following the collapse of Bronze Age Canaan and the withdrawal of Egypt from the Levant. In this sense, at least some of the early Israelites were what the Egyptians described as Shasu and Apiru. Others were probably farmers who were uprooted and withdrew from the turmoil in the lowlands and resettled in the hill country.

On the subject of YHWH, the deity does indeed appear relatively early in connection with the south. In this regard I note the reference to YHWH of Teman, that is, YHWH of the south, in the early 8th century BCE Kuntillet Ajrud inscriptions. Interestingly, this site, though located in the southeastern Sinai, is culturally and geo-politically affiliated with the Northern Kingdom, rather than Judah. Indeed, other inscriptions there refer to YHWH of Samaria, the capital of the North. The question is when and how was YHWH incorporated into the two Hebrew kingdoms and what was his role in the early days. Note that the Hebrew kings in both the North and the South carry Yahwistic names starting in the 9th century BCE.

What can be said about Hazor today, so many years after the excavations led by Yigael Yadin, who dated the destruction to circa 1225 BC? Can it confirm Joshua’s conquest as described in the Bible (Joshua: 11:10)? The excavations have uncovered several Egyptian statues, with heads and arms chopped off. There are scholars who say that the conquest as described in the Bible was not a factual account of historical events.

The conquest in the Book of Joshua is a “conquest to be”, that is, an ideological construct that advances the Deuteronomistic ideology of Josianic times. It is not an historical account. The fall of the Canaanite urban centers was a long process, which lasted a century and a half or so, from the demise of Hazor sometime in the middle of the 13th century to the destruction of places such as Lachish and Megiddo, not earlier than ca. 1130 BCE. This is clear from both extra-biblical historical records and archaeology, including radiocarbon dating. So Hazor was in fact destroyed as part of the stormy events in the entire eastern Mediterranean at the end of the Bronze Age. If one accepts that at least some of the groups involved in this process later settled in the highlands, there is a sort of link between Hazor and early Israel. But, again, there was no marching Israelite army under one leader. Finally, there is the question of why the Bible refers to Hazor as “once the head of all those kingdoms” (Joshua 11: 10). Is this the memory of the situation in the Bronze Age? I prefer to interpret this verse as an etiology, that is, a story based on the phenomenon of the big ruins of Bronze Age Hazor, which were known to the Israelites in later centuries.

Would you say that archaeologists today are more careful and are able to insist on evidence that they see in the ground? As serious and honest an archaeologist and scholar as Yigael Yadin had a problem after excavating Masada. He is reported to have known that the Romans sacrificed pigs at burials and pig bones were indeed found with human remains at the site. Of the twenty-five skeletons found there, just one was laid out in burial fashion. It does seem that Josephus’ account (The Jewish War, 389-406) was used as a guide, viewed a priori as historically accurate, an example of text dominating the field operation.

I will talk about biblical archaeology in general instead of dealing with Masada. In the past, literal reading of the biblical text dominated and in many ways even dictated the interpretation of the finds. In a way, the textual evidence predominated over archaeology, which was used as little more than decoration, not sufficiently consulted. Therefore, at least in certain cases, biblical archaeology lagged behind methods employed in world archaeology and historical interpretation.

The situation today is more complex. Though there are still “pockets” of this traditional and conservative biblical archaeology, many field researchers have thrown off the shackles; they do not allow themselves to be guided by a simplistic, literal reading of the biblical text and now give their finds their proper role in the overall interpretation of the past.

Which goes to say that some texts have to be ascribed to a period later than what Wellhausen proposed?

As far as I can judge, the earliest written text in the Hebrew Bible should be ascribed to the first half of the 8th century BCE. This does not of course exclude the possibility that earlier traditions and memories are embedded in them. The peak “projection” of biblical texts took place in Judah of late monarchic times and after the destruction of Jerusalem, perhaps mainly in Babylon. The latest texts in the codex represent realities of the 2nd century BCE.

Do you agree with Professor Jan Assmann about cultural memory?

Yes, I agree with Jan Assmann about cultural memory. He made a great contribution in this field. My understanding of the development of the Exodus question is very much influenced by his ideas.

But are there distortions in this cultural memory?

Any memory that is being transmitted over centuries absorbs the realities of the periods involved. In this sense it is not possible for such a memory to go through these periods unchanged. This is why I think that the word “accumulative” should be added in certain cases to the idea of cultural memory.

Does that mean that you believe that Professor Assmann is the scholar who comes closest to connecting the dots? Professor James Hoffmeier has disagreed with him on some points. He believes that the Exodus is plausible and also that Akhenaten was the first monotheist, but by placing Moses in the Egyptian court he is inevitably led to the renowned Egyptologist and also to Freud. If that is the approach it is like saying that there was a direct connection between Moses and the controversial pharaoh’s Atenism and the purpose of an exodus can be questioned.

I do not share Hoffmeier’s views and I am certainly closer to Assmann on this matter. I am in favour of reading different layers in the Exodus traditions, some transmitted orally and then written down, other layers representing later stages of compilation. The entire process, from the possible earliest tradition or memory to the latest reality embedded in the text, took centuries.

Yes, I get your point, however it raises a problem. Such views can create doubts in the minds of some scholars. In a recent article Professor Thomas Thompson of the Copenhagen School maintains that both Professor William Dever and you have not really distanced yourselves from the kind of archaeology conducted by Professor William F. Albright. You are neither a ‘minimalist’ nor a ‘maximalist’ and have avoided the two extremes.

Indeed, I see myself as representing the “view from the centre”, what the French Assyriologist Jean-Marie Durand very cleverly described as “positive deconstruction”. Minimalists like Professor Thompson see no value in the Hebrew Bible for reconstructing the history of Iron Age Israel and Judah. This is because they date the texts to the Persian and Hellenistic periods. The Hebrew Bible is layered and contains materials which shed light on the history of the Hebrew kingdoms and I see no reason to ignore it. Ironically, this too can be supported by archaeology, for instance, when we look at the lists of towns such as the ones in Joshua, chapter 15. In other words, archaeology plays a “positivist” role here. Needless to say, biblical texts should be studied critically, with a good grasp of modern biblical exegesis and texts of the Ancient Near East.

You are excavating in Megiddo and have said that it is a laboratory for new methods to conduct archaeology. Can you explain further?

In the last few years my team and I have made Megiddo a laboratory for implementing existing methods in micro-archaeology and developing new techniques. I refer to the contribution of the exact and life sciences to archaeology and historical reconstruction. The archaeological record is divided into two: macro-archaeology: that is, what can be seen by the naked eye, as for example, walls, pottery vessels, metal objects; and micro-archaeology, that is, the record, which cannot be seen with the naked eye. Today we understand that working without the latter does not allow establishing a full picture of the past. So we are now advancing at Megiddo studies in fields such as tracing molecular residues in ancient pottery vessels, which can teach us about commodities shipped in these vessels, ancient DNA and the like. We also advance dating methods in the sense that we use our very impressive bank of radiocarbon results in order to make progress in other physics-related “clocks” such as paleomagnetism. Indeed, a few years ago we convened an international colloquium at Megiddo under the title “Setting the Clocks at Armageddon”…

Is there a possibility of micro-archaeology clashing with carbon dating when the results are examined?

The only possible clash with radiocarbon dating can come from other physics-related “clocks”. At present, — and I suppose that this will be so in the foreseeable future — radiocarbon dating has better accuracy, that is, lesser uncertainty, than other available methods such as paleomagnetism and optical stimulated luminescence. That is why our set of C14 dates from Megiddo can help advance these methods.

Do you think that your discoveries can undermine faith, Jewish and Christian faith?

No, I don’t think there is any connection. I deal with archaeology, history, historicity and historiography, and strongly believe that there should be a clear distinction between theology, ideology and of course the faith of people on the one hand and scholarly studies on the other.

Louis C. de Figueiredo is a journalist, reviewer, and researcher on the Bible and theology.

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