The Catalog of Good Deeds: Biblical Archeology

Showing posts with label Biblical Archeology. Show all posts

Jerusalem. Archaeologists say they are stunned with the discovery of a “magnificent and untouched” burial chamber in the ancient city of Megiddo known from the Bible.

National Geographic states that the extraordinary discovery may provide some insight into the royal dynasty that ruled that region to the South from Haifa (present day Israel) before its conquest by Egypt in the early 15th century B.C.

For about 5000 years, since 3000 B.C. to 1918, Megiddo was an important strategic point for international military and trade routes.

Megiddo is mentioned in the Revelation of John the Theologian 16:16 as the place called “Armageddon”, which comes from Har-Megiddo, or 'Hill of Megiddo'.

Archaeologists state that they have discovered the chamber of the 15^th century B.C. – the period when Megiddo was besieged for 7 months by the by the forces of the Egyptian pharaoh Thutmose III. The city surrendered, and Thutmose III turned Canaan into a province of his empire.

Israel Finkelstein and Mario Martin of Tel Aviv University and Matthew Adams of the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeology, who have been conducting archaeological excavations there since 1994, discovered an underground corridor near the palaces of the bronze age in 2016.

The discovered chamber contained the remains of three people — a man, a woman and a child —adorned with delicate gold and silver jewelry. The male body had been crowned with a gold diadem, which proves a high level of the local craftspeople’s skill.

“We are speaking of an elite family burial because of the monumentality of the building itself, the findings are rich and because of the fact that the burial is located close to the royal palace,” – Finkelstein explains.

Moreover, in addition to the three individual burials, archaeologists found other human remains that had been interred at an earlier point according to the burial traditions of that region.

Melissa Cradic, an excavation team member, said that the condition of the three found bodies in comparison with the others that had been removed, makes sure that they were especially important.

The DNA study of the bodies found in Megiddo is supposed to define whether the common citizens of the Canaanite city were of the same background as the royal ones.

The results of the study can change the perception of the Canaanite population, since scientists assume foe a long time that the hurrians, the mountain people, that appeared in that region in 3000-4000 B.C., could play an important role in the building of the first cities in the Middle East.

“These studies can just revolutionize everything we know about the population of Canaan," - says Finkelstein

Source: http://www.sedmitza.ru/text/7947946.html

Largely ignored by much of Christendom, the Orthodox today celebrate “Lazarus Saturday” in something of a prequel to next weekend’s Pascha. It is, indeed a little Pascha just before the greater one. And this, of course, was arranged by Christ Himself, who raised His friend Lazarus from the dead as something of a last action before entering Jerusalem and beginning His slow ascent to Golgotha through the days of next week.

One of the hymns of the Vigil of Lazarus Saturday says that Christ “stole him from among the dead.” I rather like the phrase. Next weekend there will be no stealing, but a blasting of the gates of hell itself. What he does for Lazarus he will do for all.

Lazarus, of course, is different from those previously raised from the dead by Christ (such as the daughter of Jairus). Lazarus had been four days day and corruption of the body had already set in. “My Lord, he stinks!” one of his sisters explained when Christ requested to be shown to the tomb.

I sat in that tomb last September, as I mentioned in my last post. It is not particularly notable as a shrine. It is today, in the possession of a private, Muslim family. You pay to get in. Several of our pilgrims did not want to pay to go in. I could not stop myself.

Lazarus is an important character in 19th century Russian literature. Raskolnikov, in Crime and Punishment, finds the beginning of his repentance of the crime of murder, by listening to a reading of the story of Lazarus. It is, for many, and properly so, a reminder of the universal resurrection. What Christ has done for Lazarus He will do for all.

For me, he is also a sign of the universal entombment. That even before we die, we have frequently begun to inhabit our tombs. We live our life with the doors closed (and we stink). Our hearts are often places of corruption and not the habitation of the good God. Or, at best, we ask Him to visit us as He visited Lazarus. That visit brought tears to the eyes of Christ. The state of our corruption makes Him weep. It is such a contradiction to the will of God. We were not created for the tomb.

I also note that in the story of Lazarus – even in his being raised from the dead – he rises in weakness. He remains bound by his graveclothes. Someone must “unbind” him. We ourselves, having been plunged into the waters of Baptism and robed with the righteousness of Christ, too often exchange those glorious robes for graveclothes. Christ has made us alive, be we remain bound like dead men.

I sat in the tomb of Lazarus because it seemed so familiar.

Source: http://orthochristian.com/45977.html

Archaeologists announced they found the first physical evidence of the existence of Prophet Isaiah, The Daily Beast says with the reference to the recent article in Biblical Archaeology Review magazine. The evidence itself comes in the form of a small piece of clay (an impression left by a seal), a mere 0.4 inches long, which appears to bear the inscription “Isaiah the prophet.”

The item was found during the excavations of the trash heap in Jerusalem. The debris contained figurines, pottery fragments, pieces of ivory, and some clay seal impressions, known as bullae. These impressions were created when the owners of the seals stamped their seals into the soft clay and include the mark of King Hezekiah.

According to Eliat Mazar, an Israel archaeologist, “alongside the bullae of Hezekiah there were 22 additional bullae, among these was the bulla of “Yesha‘yah[u] Nvy[?],” which is most straightforwardly translated as “Isaiah the Prophet.” Given the importance of Isaiah to religious history, this seal impression is of great significance to Jews and Christians alike.

According to the Book of Isaiah, Isaiah was an 8 century BC prophet during the reign of King Hezekiah. Isaiah began prophesying during the reign of King Ussiah and appears to have lived through the reigns of Kings Jotham, Ahaz, and the first 14 years of the reign of Hezekiah. “People loved him so much that they even wrote “The Ascend of Isaiah” – a story about his martyrdom and ascend to Heaven”.

“Now, for the first time, we have an example of what might be his “signature”. Not only is this proof that Isaiah existed (not something scholars truly disputed), but also the evidence of his role in 8 century BC Jerusalem society. Not everyone who had a seal was of elevated high status (as they were a means of solidifying identity), but the Bible does describe Isaiah as a counselor of the king to whom the monarch would turn for advice. The discovery of his seal impressions in close proximity to that of King Hezekiah confirms the picture of a court prophet that we get from the Bible” – the article says.

Mazar acknowledges in her article that there are some problems with the seal. Some of the letters that appear to have broken off. Additionally, most seals identify their owner with reference to their father “X, the son of Y.” The inscription on the Isaiah’s seal does not correspond to this format. According to Mazar, the inscription on the seal states his profession – prophet.

Robert Cargill, the editor of Biblical Archaeology Review, told The Daily Beast that this was a “carefully written, responsible article” and that the magazine was careful not to claim definitively to have found the seal of Isaiah. He added that he personally believes that Mazar found the seal of Isaiah and said that it was “the first archaeological and non-biblical reference to the prophet”.

Source: http://www.bogoslov.ru/text/5741693/index.html

One of the last two undeciphered Dead Sea Scrolls has been read by researchers at the University of Haifa in Israel.

The 900 scrolls, discovered in desert caves at Qumran in the 1940s and 50s, are the work of scribes belonging to an ancient Jewish sect and include some of the earliest biblical manuscripts.

The newly decoded document is made up of more than 60 tiny sections written in a secret code. They were originally thought to have belonged to different scrolls, but researchers Dr Eshbal Ratson and Prof Jonathan Ben-Dov showed they were from a single document.

The scroll – originally written in code – gives an insight into the unique 364-day calendar used by the sect. According to the researchers, this calendar was involved in one of the fiercest debates between different groups during the late Second Temple period. The lunar calendar, which Judaism follows to this day, requires a large number of human decisions. People must look at the stars and moon and report on their observations, and someone must be empowered to decide on the new month and the application of leap years. By contrast, the 364-day calendar was perfect. Because this number can be divided into four and seven, special occasions always fall on the same day. This avoids the need to decide, for example, what happens when a particular occasion falls on the Sabbath, as often happens in the lunar calendar.

'The Qumran calendar is unchanging, and it appears to have embodied the beliefs of the members of this community regarding perfection and holiness,' the researchers explain.

Dr Ratson told Haaretz that arguments about the calendar 'may be one of the reasons this sect left the Temple and went to the desert. They had many disputes and this was one of them – they couldn't celebrate holidays together.'

The scroll gives the most important dates in the Qumran sect's calendar, including two special occasions not mentioned in the Bible. It also provides, for the first time, the name of the day marking the transition between the seasons – 'tekufah' or 'period'.

According to the university, the scroll also reveals that the person who wrote the scroll – probably one of the leaders of the sect familiar with the secret code – forgot to mention several special days marked by the community. Another scribe corrected the errors, adding the missing dates in the margins between the columns of text.

'The scroll is written in code, but its actual content is simple and well-known, and there was no reason to conceal it,' the authors say. 'This practice is also found in many places outside the Land of Israel, where leaders write in secret code even when discussing universally-known matters, as a reflection of their status. The custom was intended to show that the author was familiar with the code, while others were not. However, this present scroll shows that the author made a number of mistakes.'

Source: https://www.christiantoday.com/article/researchers.decipher.dead.sea.scroll.assembled.from.tiny.fragments/124407.htm

On Monday, January 1, 2018, the Department of Antiquities of Israel announced a unique discovery: during the excavations near the Wailing Wall, a unique seal was found, which belonged to a Jerusalem ruler, who lived 2700 years ago, as the Israel mass media say.

The seal has the shape of a clay oval (13-15 mm) and is 2-3 mm thick. Two men dressed in striped clothes and greeting each other with raised hands are pressed on the seal.

The scientists decoded the inscription on the seal as, “belongs to the Ruler of Jerusalem”.

According to the archeologists, the finding dates back to the 7-6^th century B.C., which is the late period of the Solomon’s Temple. The Department of Antiquities states that “rulers of Jerusalem” (another variants of translation are “town governor”, “governor”) are mentioned twice in the Torah. The same name belonged to Joshua, who ruled in Jerusalem during the time of Hezekiah’s reign (the 8th century B.C.), as well as Maaseah, who was the governor of Jerusalem during the reign of Josiah (the 7^th century B.C.).

Shimon Kohen, an archeologist, found the seal when he was sifting the soil near the ruins of the building, which dates back to the late period of the Solomon’s Temple. This building is 100m to the West from the western wall of the Temple (the Wailing Wall).

It is not a fact that the seal belonged to one of the Jerusalem governors. His owner could be one of the reputable citizens, who received it from the governor as the sign of their friendship or just as a souvenir. Such seals could be also used as stamps on goods.

Another version says that this is a seal used for covering letters. Earlier, archeologists have found dozens of such seals of that time, but none of them had inscriptions indicating that the seal belonged to the governor of Jerusalem.

Source: http://pravoslavie.by/news/u-steny-placha-nashli-pechat-prinadlezhavshuju-pravitelju-ierusalima-kotoryj-zhil-2700-let-nazad

Subscribe to: Posts ( Atom )

Search This Blog

featured Slider

The Discovery of the Oldest Piece of Gospel of Mark

The Discovery of a “Magnificent and Untouched” Burial Chamber in Megiddo

Exploring the Tomb of Lazarus

Archaeologists Found Physical Evidence of the Existence of Prophet Isaiah

Researchers decipher Dead Sea from tiny fragments for important information

Ancient Seal Found Belonging to a Jerusalem ruler who lived 2700 years ago

Partners