Judahite Fortress

Hebrew University archaeologist Yosef Garfinkel believes the discovery of the two fortified gates at Elah Fortress not only proves the existence of Sha'arayim named three times in the Bible in connection with David, but also suggests that the fortified city was part of a centralized government administered by King David.

Elah Fortress is the oldest known fortress of the biblical period. It dates to the tenth century B.C. The fortress is southwest of Jerusalem on what was the border between the Kingdom of Judea and the coast lands of the Philistines. The massive stone gate faces Jerusalem.

Garkinkel's team also found a 3,000-year-old pottery shard with five lines of text at the Elah Fortress. He believes the text provides evidence for the existence of a vast kingdom under David's rule. Garfinkel believes the site was the westernmost outpost maintained by the Kingdom of Judea, which controlled land in southwest Asia and Palestine before the Kingdom of Israel.

Read more here and here.

Logos-Light-Life

A recently retired friend of mine, a Anglican priest, wrote this sermon in which he points to the dynamic Word, the Logos, as the key to living a life pleasing to God. Here is what Paul wrote:

Living in the Word - Rev Paul Taylor, LL.M.

The Gospel of John is unique. St. John Starts off by stating that in the beginning the Word was God and God is the word. The Word is a dynamic and not passive concept. This parallels Genesis. In Genesis the earth is a void (chaos) and the Word of God brings order to the chaos.

John using this image shows that the Word is God. John talks about light and the darkness not be able to comprehend the light. It is the Word that brings the light into the world.

The Word is used through out John's Gospel. John then goes on to say that you can be believe in God. You can believe in Jesus Christ, but if the Word is not in you then you are not a believer
(cf John 5:38,8:31, 8:37, 8:43 , 14:23, 15:3,15:25).

These passages only skim the gospel of John. The point is that the Word has to be in you and that you have to live according to the Word.

One can be a cradle Episcopalian and know the prayerbook and the hymnal well. For these people the word is something those dreadful Bible thumpers talk about.

You can be a Catholic and go to Mass every week. The word is something those awful protestants talk about.

You can be a Baptist and hear the preacher talk about the word and it sounds just great.

You can be a continuer and worship the missal and talk about how catholic you are. "What word?" you ask.

You can be born again and raise both hands at every service and sing the hymns from memory.

Who needs the word? You have the spiritual connection. It matters not whether the spirit is holy roller or New Age you've got the spirit.

John doesn't mention any of these people. John is there to share the Good News of Jesus Christ.

Read it all here.

The Celestial Dance Observed by the Magi

Alice C. Linsley

Rick Larson spent over eight years researching the Star of Bethlehem and discovered the difference between sidereal astronomy and astrology. Sidereal astronomy is real science, based on observation of the arrangement and movement of the fixed stars and planets. This science originated among Abraham's Nilo-Saharan ancestors who had recorded information about the fixed stars and clock-like motion of the planets and constellations for thousands of years. They shared this knowledge with the kings of Egypt.

For the ancient Egyptians the stars in the constellation of Leo were especially important because the Nile rose when the Sun passed through the constellation of Leo. Therefore, the Lion and the rising strength of the water were associated.

The Magi were sidereal astronomers who lived east of Israel, probably in Babylon. They were heirs of the same astronomical knowledge as the ancient Egyptians because they were from Judah, like Daniel and the other men of Judah (Jews) who served as advisers to King Nebuchadnezzar.

They clearly were aware of God's promise concerning a King whose kingdom shall endure through all the ages (the Messianic Psalm 145:13, which is found repeatedly in Daniel, punctuates the theme of the rise and fall of kingdoms). These astronomers from the East recognized the singular event of Jupiter's triple spiral that brought it in close proximity to Regulus. The Babylonians called Regulus 'Sharu', which means 'king.' The Persian (Farsi) word shir means lion (leo).

Using Starry Night, a soft ware program that can track celestial events at any time in history, Larson discovered that Jupiter, the Planet of Kings met Regulus, the Star of Kings at the beginning of the Jewish New Year in the year 3 BC. The conjunction produced the appearance of a single extraordinarily bright star. Larson believes that this is when the Angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she was chosen to bear Messiah.

Larson explains, "In 3/2 BC, Jupiter's retrograde wandering would have called for our magus' full attention. After Jupiter and Regulus had their kingly encounter, Jupiter continued on its path through the star field. But then it entered retrograde. It 'changed its mind' and headed back to Regulus for a second conjunction. After this second pass it reversed course again for yet a third rendezvous with Regulus, a triple conjunction. A triple pass like this is more rare. Over a period of months, our watching magus would have seen the Planet of Kings dance out a halo above the Star of Kings. A coronation."

We know from the number symbolism of the Afro-Asiatic peoples that the number 3 associated with a King means universal shalom. This message of peace corresponds to the angels' proclamation to the shepherds tending their flocks outside Bethlehem at the time of Jesus' birth.

If you haven't watched Rick Larson's Star of Bethlehem DVD, I encourage you to do so. You can order the Star of Bethlehem DVD here: http://www.bethlehemstar.net

The plurality of stars, planets and constellations speaks of the immeasurable nature of the universe, yet all are the work on the Ancient of Days, who alone is God, dwelling in light. The unique celestial events that surround the Annunciation, Nativity and Visitation of the Magi (the first Christmas) confirm that God set the universe's clock from before time. The orderliness of the heavens was such that the astronomers of old, whose work it was to observe the heavens, could not have missed the conjunction of Jupiter and Regulus and the emergence of Virgo, the Virgin, with the sun at her head and the moon at her feet.

As Vern Poythress has said, "So, at the very beginning of arithmetic, we are already plunged into the metaphysical problem of unity and plurality, of the one and the many. As Van Til and Rushdoony have pointed out, this problem finds its solution only in the doctrine of the ontological Trinity."

Related reading: Horite Expectation and the Star of Bethlehem; Who Were the Wise Men?; David's Royal City; The Ark Rested in Bethlehem

Excavation of Temple Mount Reveals Surprises

The photo archives of a British archeologist who carried out the only archeological excavation ever undertaken at the Temple Mount's Aksa Mosque show a Byzantine mosaic floor underneath the mosque that was likely the remains of a church or a monastery, an Israeli archeologist said on Sunday.

Excavations under the Aksa Mosque in the 1930s, photographs of which were recently uncovered, revealed a Byzantine mosaic floor.The excavation was carried out in the 1930s by R.W. Hamilton, director of the British Mandate Antiquities Department, in coordination with the Wakf Islamic Trust that administers the compound, following earthquakes that badly damaged the mosque in 1927 and 1937.

In conjunction with the Wakf's construction and repair work carried out between 1938 and 1942, Hamilton excavated under the mosque's piers, and documented all his work related to the mosque in The Structural History of the Aqsa Mosque.

Hamilton also uncovered the Byzantine mosaic floor and beneath it a mikva (ritual bath) from the Second Temple period, which he pointedly did not include in the publication about the mosque, but instead photographed and labeled in a file about the mosque, archeologist Zachi Zweig said on Sunday.

Zweig uncovered the photographs in the British archeological archives that are kept at the Antiquities Authority in Jerusalem.The Byzantine mosaic floor, which was uncovered under the Umayyad level of the mosque, is "without a doubt" the remains of a public building - likely a church - which predated the mosque, Zweig said in an address at a Bar-Ilan University archeological conference.

A similar mosaic can be found at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, he said."The existence of a public building from the Byzantine period on the Temple Mount is very surprising in light of the fact that we do not have records of such constructions in historical texts," Zweig said.

Read it all here.

Food for Thought

Harran Linked to Jerusalem

The first Temple seal found in an excavation in the ancient City of David shows a cresent moon, the emblem of the divinity Sin, regarded as a Babylonian deity. Besides the crescent moon, Sin's symbols include the bull and the lampstand. Some of Sin's temples were called "Houses of Light."

On January 16, 2008, the excavator Eilat Mazar announced that a team she is leading south of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem had uncovered an inscribed seal dating to the time of Nehemiah. She read the name on the seal as “Temech” (tav, mem and het). It was first thought that the seal indicated the Temech family, servants in the first temple in Jerusalem. They were among those taken into Babylonian captivity, as mentioned in Nehemiah: "These are the children of the province, that went up out of captivitiy, of those that had been carried away, whom Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, had carried away, and came gain to Jerusalem and to Judah, every one to his city." (Nehemiah 7:6)

European scholar Peter van der Veen believes that Mazar erred by reading the inscription. He argues that it should have been read backward, since a seal creates a mirror image when used to inscribe clay. He suggests that the seal bears four letters (shin, lamed, mem and tav) and that the correct reading is "Shlomit". Mazar now acknowledges that the seal should be read as "Shlomit."

The 2,500 year old seal shows two priests standing on the opposite sides of an incense altar. Over the altar there is a crescent moon, and at the bottom of the seal are four Hebrew letters.

The crescent moon represents the lunar phases. Ancient peoples measured time by the sun and the moon, but the lunar phases allow for more exact measurements. The relationship between priests and crescent moons has to do with the role that priests played in making calendars. Priests who observed only a solar calendar were at risk if their calculations were wrong. If priests didn’t perform sacred ceremonies on exactly the right days, they were blamed for everything that went wrong. If the chief died, or the crops failed, or there was a natural disaster, the priests were blamed. They may not have been executed by an unhappy emperor, as happened to Chinese astronomers who failed to predict the 2134 B.C solar eclipse, but ancient priests were still highly motivated to avoid mistakes.

The principal cities for the worship of Sin were Ur and Harran, both mentioned in Genesis 12. Terah, Terah's father Nahor, and another chief named Harran apparently controlled the waterways and commerce in this area during the the Afro-Asiatic Dominion that extended from west central Africa to the Indus River Valley.

The discovery of this seal in David's City supports the Genesis picture of Semites and Babylonians sharing a cosmology.

Read more about the controversy surrounding the temple seal here.

Isaac's Cousin Bride: A Poem

Genesis XXIV
By Arthur Hugh Clough

Who is this man
that walketh in the field,
O Eleazar,
steward to my lord?

And Eleazar
answered her and said,
Daughter of Bethuel,
it is other none
But my lord Isaac,
son unto my lord,
Who, as his wont is,
walketh in the field,
In the hour of evening,
meditating there.

Therefore Rebekah
basted where she sat,
And from her camel’
lighting to the earth,
Sought for a veil
and put it on her face.

But Isaac also,
walking in the field,
Saw from afar
a company that came,
Camels, and a seat
as where a woman sat;
Wherefore he came
and met them on the way.

Whom, when Rebekah
saw, she came before,
Saying, Behold
the handmaid of my lord;
Who, for my lord’s sake,
travel from my land.

But he said, O
thou blessed of our God,
Come, for the tent
is eager for thy face.
Shall not thy husband,
be unto thee more than
Hundreds of kinsmen
living in thy land?

And Eleazar answered,Thus and thus,
Even according
as thy father bade,
Did we; and thus and
thus it came to pass:
Lo! is not this
Rebekah, Bethuel’s child.

And, as he ended,
Isaac spoke and said,
Surely my heart
went with you on the way,
When with the beasts
ye came unto the place.

Truly, O child
of Nahor, I was there,
When to thy mother
and thy mother’s son
Thou madest answer,
saying, I will go.
And Isaac brought her
to his mother’s tent.

The Writing of David's Realm

What may be the oldest known Hebrew text, found on a hilltop above the valley where David is said to have battled Goliath, could lend historical support to some Bible stories, archaeologists say.

The 3,000-year-old pottery shard with five lines of text was found during excavations of the Elah Fortress, the oldest known Biblical-period fortress that dates to the 10th century B.C.

It is the most important archaeological discovery in Israel since the Dead Sea Scrolls, according to lead researcher Yosef Garfinkel of the Hebrew University's Institute of Archaeology.

His team believes the text may provide evidence for a real-life King David and his vast kingdom, the existence of which has been long doubted by scholars.

Carbon-14 dating of olive pits found at the archaeological site, as well as analysis of pottery remains, also place the text to between 1000 and 975 B.C., the time King David, head of the Kingdom of Israel, would have lived.

"This means that historical knowledge of King David could pass from generation to generation in writing—and not just as oral tradition."

The exact nature of the text— believed to be Hebrew written in Proto-Canaanite script, a type of early alphabet—has yet to be determined, but a number of root words have already been translated, including "judge," "slave," and "king."
Read it all here.


This discovery confirms that scribes recorded information and that royal archives existed in David's realm. This is the raw material that enabled the development of the Genesis narratives and the story of Ruth. The seals and ostracon of that period reveal that names were spelled differently depending of the source of the writing. Archaeologists acknowledge that the Holy Name and theophoric elements were spelled one way in the northern populations and another way among the southern populations like the Dedanites.

David is said to have ruled a territory that extended from the Nile River to the Euphrates. This is but a small portion of the older Afro-Asiatic Dominion that extended from the Atlantic coast of modern Nigeria to the Indus River Valley. David may have sought to extend his political influence into the Nile Valley through the house of Sheba to which he was related. Scribal adaptation of Nilotic and Thamudic scripts would have served to that end.

Related reading: The Writing System of Menes; Enigmatic Petroglyphs of Saudi Arabia's High Plateau; Who Were the Kushites?; Nimrod (Sargon) was a Kushite Kingdom Builder; Proto-Elamite Script; The Urheimat of the Canaanite Y; Yahu Seals

The Real Adam

Alice C. Linsley


Genesis presents Adam as real in the Platonic sense. This is how St. Paul thinks of him when he writes of the first Adam and the Second Adam. St. Paul was comfortable with Platonic thought having been raised in Tarsus, a Greek-speaking city with a famous philosophical academy. In his writings, he compares (1 Cor. 10:6d) and contrasts (Rom. 5:15) Adam and Christ, the temporal and the eternal, which for Paul are equally real.

Paul recognized the usefulness of platonism in explaining eternal truths known to the Jews to Gentiles. In his writings, Paul often employs platonism in comparing and contrasting temporal figures with eternal Forms. He speaks, for example, of Adam as a type of Jesus Christ. By the first came sin and death, and by the Second Adam came forgiveness and life.
In Platonic thought, the temporal is a reflection of the eternal. The temporal passes away, but the eternal can neither pass away nor be corrupted. The eternal Form of Man exists outside time. So when Adam was made in the image of the eternal true Form, he was truly made in the Divine Image. Jesus Christ's incarnation marks the radical event of Divinity 'begotten' in the human image, but without the fallenness since His existence is from before time.

Adam must be platonically interpreted as the Form of Man in order to speak theologically of him as the federal head of all humanity. Likewise, Genesis speaks of certain ancestors as federal heads of entire peoples, i.e., Cain is the head of the Kenites and Abraham's son Midian is the head of the Midianites.

Genesis distinguishes between archetype and ancestor and often poses them as parallel. Consider Psalm 8:4 which poses Enoch as the temporal head of the lines of Cain and Seth (Gen. 4 and 5) as the parallel to Adam the archetype. What is man (Enoch) that you spare a thought for him, or the son of Man (ben' adam) that you care for him?

We should not be surprised to find archetypes in Genesis. Plato conceived of archetypes as the pattern of real things. He didn't invent this idea. He borrowed it from the ancient Egyptians, who asserted that the pattern is the real thing and the earthly shadow, but a reflection. In this view, the material world resembles, participates in and aspires to the transcendent Forms. To understand the worldview of Genesis, which is really the worldview of Abraham's Kushite ancestors, we must grasp the realness of archetype, something that we fnd difficult, living in western societies which are define real as having material substance.




Related reading:  The First Historical Persons in Genesis; Are Adam and Eve Real?; Adam and Eve as Archetypes; The Loss of Wisdom