KHIRBET QEIYAFA Inscription Photo 1
Bock

Potentially Significant Find from the Time of David- KHIRBET QEIYAFA Nov 1 08

This is a short entry simply to point to a potentially significant find in Israel related to the time of David.

The initial press report can be found here:

This is a short entry simply to point to a potentially significant find in Israel related to the time of David.

The initial press report can be found here:

This is the oldest sample of Hebrew writing yet found. It comes apparently from a settlementon a road between Gath and Jerusalem where 500 or so people lived in a fortification from around the time of the united kingdom in c. 1000 BC (BCE). It is interesting how a little find like this can change our view of things when we have so few objects (called realia) from a given ancient period. This will be debated as the article makes clear. Excavation could take a decade or more. I will keep an eye on this.

Here are a couple of photos:

Photo 1

KHIRBET QEIYAFA Inscription Photo 1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photo 2:

KHIRBET QEIYAFA Inscription Photo 2

KHIRBET QEIYAFA Inscription Photo 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5 Comments

  • Braulio

    Archaeological Find
    Mr. Bock, I am a huge fan of your writing. I guess I am not understanding this too well, but I do not see how this is going to alter history. All the items date to David’s time. What is the controversy exactly?

    • bock

      Find dlb

      Braulio:

       

      Some debate that David existed or that, if he did, whether his rule extended as far as the Bible claims. Some have challenged whether writing goes back this far. So it is potentially important at lots of levels in term of giving corroborative evidence that Israel was in Jersualem this early and how far the rule extended. 

       

      dlb

      • Braulio

        So this article is really
        So this article is really pro-bible. That is really nice for a change because there are so many people out there that are still trying to discredit it. Thanks for the info.

  • Magnus Nordlund

    Biblical Hebrew Grammar
    Dr. Bock!
    Im terrible sorry that I have to bother you with a trivial question like this; but its urgent.
    For the time being, Im studying hebrew and have browsed around at amazon.com and bought the “Basic of Biblical Hebrew” by Practio and Van Pelt. But when I compared the above with our equivalent grammar which are used in class at the seminary/university (written in swedish by a jewish woman named Nava Bergman) I discovered that the former lacked important grammatical information which the latter had…

    The problem, however with a lot of the hebrew grammatics written in English is (as far as I understand it) that there too many of them, and I do not want to buy all of them in order to find out which one’s the best. So Dr. Bock: Which hebrew grammatic would you consider to be the best book (in the field) to buy and which one are you using yourself to maintain your knowledge of biblical hebrew?

    When I did my biblical greek; I had no problem with it. But in comparable with hebrew, the hebrew is much harder – so a good hebrew grammatic can do the difference.

    Sincerely Magnus Nordlund, Sweden.