King Hezekiah and King Menashe of Judea – the archaeology

If you’ve been following my podcasts recently you might know that I’ve been talking mainly about King Hezekiah and his son Menashe of Judah. Hezekiah lived around the same time as the Assyrian Emperor Sennacharib 705-681 BCE. There is a clay prism in the British Museum which chronicles Sennacharib’s life. It mentions Hezekiah too. It describes Sennacharib’s conquest of Judea and siege of Jerusalem.

(If you are looking for the podcasts scroll to the bottom of the page)

The Taylor Prism viewable in the British Museum

The British Museum used to have a complete transcript available online. It got removed, I will update this page with any further resources.

In addition to the Prism there is also a display  in the British Museum of a wall frieze of the  siege of Lachish, a town in the foothills of Judea. This siege is both mentioned on the Prism depicted above and the Bible, namely in the book of Kings (II Kings 18) and Chronicles (II Chronicles 32).

The Frieze includes:

A depiction of Sennacharib sitting on his throne at the gates to the city:

Source : Wikimedia Author : User:oncenawhile

Depictions of the battle:

Photograph by Mike Peel (www.mikepeel.net)

And, as mentioned in the podcast the capture and punishment of enemies, possibly a cruxifiction, possibly a flaying, what do you think?

Source: Wikimedia Author: Zunkir

Fairly recently an archaeologist called Eilat Mazar found an official Bullae or clay stamp of Hezekiah in an archaeological park called the City of David. I have also sketched my observation of the stamp. Note that the lettering is “Proto – Canaanite script and the “logo” of Hezekiah is a sun with wings and an Ankh.

If you listen to the podcasts posted at the bottom you will hear that this is part of the evidence confirming both Hezekiah (podcast 8) and Menashe (Podcast 9) as historical actors.

Source: Wikimedia Author: Rubén Betanzo S.

“Artist”‘s impression of Hezekiah’s official stamp

Similar “logos” were found on numerous jug handles from the same era possibly for the collection of money or produce for the King, in fact “for the King” was written on many such handles.

More stylised sun with wings logo common to the jug handles.
Author: Hanay
Source: Wikimedia

In addition to this we have a 533m long tunnel outside the Old City of Jerusalem amongst other building projects that as you will hear in podcast 8 Hezekiah and later Menashe (Podcast 9) build structures that include the tunnel depicted below.

IMG_1056

On Tour at Hezekiah’s tunnel, City of David

Podcast 8 : Hezekiah

Podcast 9 : Menashe

As of March 25th 2020 I have been furloughed from all tourism related work, due to COVID-19 all tourist flights have stopped.

If you want to help: please share this article.

In order to produce more articles and podcasts I need to pay bills, contributions will be happily recieved by clicking on the coffee mug below.

Uploaded a past Passover Podcast to YouTube

I’m in the process of uploading my podcasts to YouTube.

This is the latest upload.

A discussion of scriptural references to Arameans in the Passover Seder and their connection to Isaac and Rebecca and Jacob and Esau.

I focus specifically on the verse in Deuteronomy  דברים 26:10  :

Either:

“My father was a wandering Aramean”

Or

“An Aramean oppressed my father”.

Which translation do you favor?

Leave a comment and tell me.

 

Family Tour – Judean Foothills

A hands on educational experience for all the family

Tel Socho also known as “Lupine Hill”

The “Shfeila” or Judean Foothills is the area between the Jerusalem Hills and the Coastal Plain. It has been the battlefield of Judea for more than 2000 years. The soft chalk hills crowned with grassy meadows are a perfect home for many plants and animals. Join me on a fun family adventure, exploring the Foothills of Judea.

Itinerary:

  • Nature Walk in Tel Soho (pictured above). The first part of the David and Goliath Story. In the spring the best place to view flowering Lupines.
  • Dramatic Enactment of David and Goliath at Tel Azeikah.  Bringing the Bible and archaeology to life at a classic archaeological site.

 

Khirbet Midras Bar Kochba Caves

  • Crawl the Bar Kochba Caves.  A system of crawl caves where Judeans held out against the forces of Roman Emperor Hadrian.
  • Lunch in area

  • Underground Adventure at the Soreq Stalactite caves.
  • Animals and The Bible explore the nature in the Holy Land at the Biblical Museum of Natural History.

Continue reading

Building the Temple – a work in progress

A work in Progress

A visit to the Roman Engineering exhibit at the Davidson Center

It is believed that the Herodion Temple Mount took much longer to build than Herod actually lived for. Consider how long it must have took to even build the machinery and work out the engineering to build the entire massive structure.

The Temple Mount had 140,000 square meters surface area. The Western Wall is 488 meters in length alone. The largest stone is well over 280 tonnes (some say 570 tonnes). According to the Christian Scripture it took more than 46 years to build (John 2:20).

It is highly likely that , not unlike this blog, there were many starts and stops!

Stay tuned for more interesting and entertaining blogs, podcasts and videos!

 

Podcast 4: Isaac and Rebecca: The Other Hebrew

Bibliography

Hittite Treaties and Letters, D. Luckenbill

The American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures

Vol. 37, No. 3 (Apr., 1921), pp. 161-211

University of Chicago Press

Reflections on The Mitanni Emergence, G. Schwartz

Berlin Studies of the Ancient World, Vol. 17

The Beginning of Desire: Reflections on Genesis, A Zornberg

Image Books 1996

Studies in Bereishit, Nechama Leibowitz

Jerusalem, WZO, 1976

Pseudo Translation of Yonatan ben Uzziel:

http://targum.info/targumic-texts/pentateuchal-targumim/

Please see the main Bibliography for more.

Bibliography for 1st 3 Podcasts and Timeline of History

The Time of The Patriarchs

 

Bibliography

Tanach – The Jewish Bible, an anacronym of Torah (1st 5 books), Nevi’im (prophets), Ketuvim (Witings). Any Hebrew Tanach with clear print will do. preferably with all the major commentaries for this you will need:

Tanach with Mikraot Gedolot.

The Jewish Bible: Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures — The New JPS Translation According to the Traditional Hebrew Text: Torah * Nevi’im * Kethuvim JPS Paperback – November 1, 1985

An English Translation of Rashi on the Pentateuch M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann (5 vols., London, 1929–34)

Carta Bible Atlas, Y. Aharoni, Hendrickson Publishers, 2015

Archaeological Encyclopedia of the Holy Land, A. Negev , Mackmillan, 1990 (constantly updated)

A Chronology of Israel, A Wolff, 2008

The Jewish People: Their History and Their Religion , D. Goldberg and J Rayner Penguin 1992

Biblical Archaeology Review, Ed. Herschel Shanks, 1975 – present,

The Beginnings of Israel: A Methodological Working Hypothesis, Zecharia Kallai, Israel Exploration Journal, Vol. 59, No. 2 (2009), pp. 194-203

Jar-burial Customs and the Question of Infant Sacrifice in Palestine, WH. Wood, The Biblical World, 36.4  1910

Bereishit (Genesis) Rabbah – A Hebrew midrash, a translation can be found at: http://www.sefaria.org/Bereishit_Rabbah

Midrash Tanchuma – Another Hebrew Midrash, a translation can be found at http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/mhl/mhl04.htm

 

 

 

Podcast Episode One: Right From The Start: Abraham (Metchilah)

 

Welcome to my first podcast in the series: “The History of Judaism”. I shall be telling the History and story of the Jews from an educated Jewish Perspective. the first podcast focuses on Abraham and my decision to place this as the start of my narrative about Jewish History.

Here is a Map of Abraham’s Journeys:

Abaraham's Journey

 

Next time: A Journey to the Other Side: Abraham’s historical narrative

(The music in this podcast is “By Way of Haran” by Pharoah’s Daughter recreated under the following creative commons license “Live on WFMU’s Transpacific Sound Paradise 12/12/2009 byPharaoh’s Daughter is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.” Check out the band at www.pharaohsdaughter.com/music.html )