For years skeptics have assailed the scriptures with assertions that the dates, places, and people involved in biblical record were fabrications and fictitious bedtime stories designed to scare little children into behaving. The motivation behind these scoffing skeptics has always been to discredit the Bible so as to elevate humanity to the level of God. The so-called “enlightenment” produced unrealistic optimism among humans. Purportedly, humanity had arrived at an age where such myths were no longer needed; we could solve our own problems, and master our own destiny – without God and the Bible! Before such a mindset could be implemented, the ancient records of God’s interactions with men had to be discredited; religious modernism was born.
With religious modernism came an attack upon the miracles recorded in the Bible. The skeptics told us that miracles were obviously fictitious because the regular laws of nature prevented such things like miracles from happening. Moreover, it was believed that God would not intervene in the events of the world to enact miracles because He was “above” such things. That the claim against miracles was based upon the philosophical presupposition of empiricism/materialism was ignored, and today, the walls of this philosophical fortress are crumbling. In 2010 Oxford University Press published the book “The Waning of Materialism.” The book sets forth the philosophically rigid and technical case against the idea that matter is the only thing that exists.
Along this same line of thought came the Biblical minimalists. These were figures who said that people such as Solomon and David never existed; the kingdoms of these men were never real; ancient Israel was simply a loosely organized agrarian society with a minimal population, and what we have in the Bible regarding David and Solomon are more closely akin to the tales of King Arthur and the knights of the round table than historical truth. Of course, under the presuppositions of Biblical modernism, everyone who is anyone adopted these views and set them forth as the truth.
It is with much satisfaction, then, that those of us who never bought into Biblical minimalism have watched archaeological events in the past ten to twenty years unfold. In the latest Biblical Archaeology Review, there is an article titled “The End of Biblical Minimalism” by Yosef Garfinkel. The article is a compendium of evidence against the theories set forth by the biblical minimalists.
Among other things, the author points out the discovery of the Tel Dan stela in 1993 which references specifically the “house of David.” This discovery led to a reevaluation of some of the lines on the Mesha Stela, which also speaks of the “house of David.” Additionally, the article highlights the numerous radiocarbon dating efforts that have transpired over the past twenty years as more and more archaeological sites from the period of David and Solomon have been unearthed. The evidence shows that the Biblical chronology is accurate. Another area of controversy was whether or not there were “urban centers” (multiple fortified cities) as the biblical record indicates. Excavations at the fortress of Khirbet Qeiyafa have solidly answered this question. Once again, the Bible is vindicated.
Another argument set forth by the minimalists was that the people of that day and age did not have the education necessary to sustain a scribal population, which would have been necessary given the Biblical narrative. This objection was overcome with the discovery of the Qeiyafa ostracon, a piece of pottery found in 2009 with writing on it. The writing was analyzed and discovered to be a document of high quality and caliber such as would be produced by a scribal community. It is proof positive that the capabilities for composing the biblical narrative existed during the times of David and Solomon. Additionally, some very interesting jar handles with finger and thumbprints were discovered. The fingerprints on these jars were the central government’s way of approving these jars as accurate measures for taxes, similar to today’s department of weights and measures stamp you see on the gas pump. Such jars prove that urbanized civilization was prevalent in 10th century B.C. Judah, exactly as the Bible says.
With more and more archaeological evidence coming to bear upon the Bible, it continues to withstand the onslaught of the skeptics. Such discoveries continue to corroborate the biblical account and bolster our faith in the word of God. As biblical minimalists retreat and concede in the face of the overwhelming evidence, we look forward to the day when Biblical modernism is also relegated to the ash heaps of history. As we are encouraged by these events, nevertheless we continue to proclaim, “Let God be true, but every man a liar” (Romans 3:4).