Old Testament and Semitic Studies

Manfred Görg proposed to read the name Israel on a broken Egyptian inscriptionäm21687, which is now kept in the storage facilities of the New Museum in Berlin. New research during the last number of years has confirmed this reading, although the writing of the name is different from that of the Merenptah inscription. Some characteristics appear to demonstrate that this inscription is older than the Israel stela of Merenptah and may likely date to the 14th or earlier 13th centurybce. The paper will present some ideas about an earlier beginning of the formation of what is generally called Israel and about the way, how this early Israel came about.

The Arabic root šḥḥ is used in both the Qur’an and pre-Islamic poetic records. Most traditional lexicons have translated it to “stinginess.” In this article it is argued that the Arabic root šḥḥ is derived from Proto-Semitc *ŝx-x̣-x̣ ‘thin, fine.’

Recent issues of Antiquity have seen much discussion on the topic of Carthaginian infant sacrifice: was it a Graeco-Roman fiction or did it really happen? There are strongly held opinions on both sides of the argument, with much resting on the age profile of the children interred at the cemetery known as the Carthage Tophet. Here, the authors respond to claims by Smith et al. (2011, 2013) that their ageing of the infants and children was incorrect, and so also by extension was their interpretation that not all interments at the Tophet were the result of sacrifice.

Recent issues of Antiquity have seen much discussion on the topic of Carthaginian infant sacrifice: was it a Graeco-Roman fiction or did it really happen? There are strongly held opinions on both sides of the argument, with much resting on the age profile of the children interred at the cemetery known as the Carthage Tophet. Here, the authors respond to claims by Smith et al. (2011, 2013) that their ageing of the infants and children was incorrect, and so also by extension was their interpretation that not all interments at the Tophet were the result of sacrifice.

In the light of the possible hermeneutical relevance that the opposition between Jerusalem and Galilee in the Gospel of Mark can have for present-day social problems, the historical critic therefore represents a gap in existing research. The pragmatic dimension of theological reflection is largely ignored by historical critics. The literarycritical approach has certainly emphasized the interests that Galilee ｾ ､ ＠ Jerusalem represent in Mark as narrative. These interests appear to be in conflict with each other. Nevertheless, there are deficiencies in the literary-critical approach, for reasons such as that this conflict of interests is not anchored within a social program peculiar to the first-century Mediterranean world. The ideological-critical approach in the exegesis of Mark indeed places emphasis on such a political and social program. The hiatus with regard to this approach is that references to pre-industrial, agrarian social problems in New Testament texts are erroneously attributed to modern economic and political ideologies, as though the same or similar dominant ideological forces that Karl Marx identified-with regard to the modern industrialized century-had been present in the first century. Van Eck considers that an association of narratology and social-scientific criticism in exegesis could flll these gaps in existing research. By means of narratology, Galilee and Jerusalem are responsibly studied as spheres of interest in the plot of the Gospel of Mark. Social-scientific criticism enables one to see the advanced agrarian society of the first-century Mediterranean world as the macrosociological framework of the Gospel of Mark. Van Eck regards the narrated world of the Gospel of Mark as a reflexive microsociological version of the agrarian society, seen from a macrosociological perspective. Using an association of narratological and social-scientific criticism, he intends interpreting the ideological communication strategy of the narrator (narrator's point of view) in Mark as a social program without making himself guilty of anachronism or ethnocentricism. Van Eck's presupposition is, therefore, that the narrator's concern in Mark's story about Jesus is communicated from an ideological perspective. This ideological concern is conveyed with aids such as symbols. Galilee and Jerusalem (as topographical references in the Gospel of Mark) function as symbols that represent particular interests. Galilee represents the interests of the 'open household' ('politics of commensality') and Jesus ' message of God's unmediated presence. Jerusalem represents the interests of the temple system ('politics of holiness') and the idea of God's constraining presence. Galilee (household) and Jerusalem (temple) thus function as narrative and sociological oppositions. Andries G van Aarde Editor Hervormde Teologiese Studies ii H'.fS Supplementum 7 (1995)

Ziemers Ergebnis freilich ist ernüchternd: »Es ist so gut wie ausgeschlossen, aus einem gegebenen Text dessen literarische Vorlage auch nur annähernd vollständig in Stil, Wortlaut, Umfang und Inhalt zu rekonstruieren. Das gilt schon für eine unmittelbare Vorlage, es gilt aber erst recht für eine Vorstufe zweiten oder dritten Grades« (Ebd.: 396). Zusammen mit der Evidenz der Textfunde aus Qumran, dass nachmals alttestamentliche Texte noch bis ins 2. Jh. v. Chr. mit großer Freiheit Neugestaltungen und Auslassungen unterzogen wurden, erschüttert dies

Manfred Görg proposed to read the name Israel on a broken Egyptian inscriptionäm21687, which is now kept in the storage facilities of the New Museum in Berlin. New research during the last number of years has confirmed this reading, although the writing of the name is different from that of the Merenptah inscription. Some characteristics appear to demonstrate that this inscription is older than the Israel stela of Merenptah and may likely date to the 14th or earlier 13th centurybce. The paper will present some ideas about an earlier beginning of the formation of what is generally called Israel and about the way, how this early Israel came about.

The recent global economic crisis left millions of people destitute without formal work and further alienated the poor from the rich. As a remedy, modern Neoliberalism proposes that the poor must hope and steadily work their way up the economic ladder. What is the solution to such unbridgeable social and economic chasm? This article used the contemporary situation of economic inequality to imagine events during the first century, during Jesus’ time, whereby the rich increasingly amassed wealth to the disadvantage of the poor majority. In this article, Mark 9:33–42 and 10:10–16 was used to explore how Jesus developed an alternative economic system − one that contrasted itself in every respect from that of the hierarchical and patriarchal Roman Empire. This article argued that Jesus formed communities that directly responded to the economic challenges faced by the landless and the homeless majority by creating an alternative economy based on love and hospitality. This was done by prop...

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This will be a comparative study of mythology about the origin of the world, pinpointing the philosophical principles guiding that knowledge. Usually, studies on cosmogony within anthropology and comparative mythology aren’t categorical – meaning to aim towards a universal model – and when they are, they fail, because they are too close to the visual representations they aim to explain.

Recent issues of Antiquity have seen much discussion on the topic of Carthaginian infant sacrifice: was it a Graeco-Roman fiction or did it really happen? There are strongly held opinions on both sides of the argument, with much resting on the age profile of the children interred at the cemetery known as the Carthage Tophet. Here, the authors respond to claims by Smith et al. (2011, 2013) that their ageing of the infants and children was incorrect, and so also by extension was their interpretation that not all interments at the Tophet were the result of sacrifice.

Debates over the purpose and propositions of Genesis 1 continue to be concerned with its poetic nature. This issue is related to how “poetry” is defined, formally in terms of forms or patterns or informally in terms of function and powerful, persuasive language. This article is focused on the more structural aspects of poetry in Genesis 1 (i.e., parallelismus membrorum and other structural patterns and parallels). The purpose is to demonstrate that this chapter, while not a poem per se, contains poetic features not previously emphasized. While the text remains in its present form elevated prose, the nature of this elevation is greater than often admitted. Some evidence exists for speculation of an original poem on which the extant Hebrew version is based. What is suggested is a text with repetitions that remind one of a song with stanzas. That a rigid, literal hermeneutic is not the only valid option for reading this text becomes clear. The answer to why the author employed a normal...

Debates over the purpose and propositions of Genesis 1 continue to be concerned with its poetic nature. This issue is related to how “poetry” is defined, formally in terms of forms or patterns or informally in terms of function and powerful, persuasive language. This article is focused on the more structural aspects of poetry in Genesis 1 (i.e., parallelismus membrorum and other structural patterns and parallels). The purpose is to demonstrate that this chapter, while not a poem per se, contains poetic features not previously emphasized. While the text remains in its present form elevated prose, the nature of this elevation is greater than often admitted. Some evidence exists for speculation of an original poem on which the extant Hebrew version is based. What is suggested is a text with repetitions that remind one of a song with stanzas. That a rigid, literal hermeneutic is not the only valid option for reading this text becomes clear. The answer to why the author employed a normal...

Students of the Bible often make mistakes that can be avoided if they are aware of errors that others have committed. One of the errors is the “Evidential Fallacy” which fails to approach the text with the presumption that it is accurate. Another mistake is the “Superior Knowledge Fallacy” which occurs when one, in approaching difficult texts, practices textual emendation to accommodate the critic’s ignorance. A third mistake is the “Word Study Fallacy” which uses imaginative extrapolations to find unjustified meanings in individual words. The “Fallacy of Reading Between the Line s” reads in to the Scriptures what one thinks the text implies. Another mistake occurs i n improper explanations of the two tenses of Hebrew verbs, the perfect (or qatal) and the imperfect (or yiqtol). Occasionally in the NT, the “Fallacy of Ignoring Particles” causes an interpreter to miss emphasis that is conveyed by Greek particles. Sometimes a translation leaves out words found in the original language ...

Making sense of ancient economies requires careful attention to particular details as well as a consolidating model that combines the detail into a coherent form. While there is always the danger that economic models will over-determine the detail, models are useful heuristic devices. In this article a model that draws on Marxist economic analysis is assembled and then used to trace a geographically pervasive and historically enduring economic system in the ancient world, stretching from the Ancient Near East to Greco-Rome, and so underlying much of biblical history and story. The article argues that the model of a tributary mode of production, administered through a city-state political system, may also prove useful exegetically and ethically, enabling us to understand particular texts more "economically" and to provide important perspective to our present day economic decisions.

Although scholars have generally treated Ugaritic ltn as a cognate of Hebrew liwyātān, the vocalization of this word and its relationship to the Hebrew form remain debated. In this article, we will argue that ltn should be vocalized /lītan-/ and that Ugaritic ltn and Hebrew liwyātān derive from Proto-Northwest Semitic *lawiy-(a)t-an through a series of attested sound changes. We will also discuss the morphology of *lawiy-(a)t-an- and the syntax of the Northwest Semitic formula *lawiy(a)tanu baṯnu barīḥu … baṯnu ʕaqallatānu "Leviathan, the fleeing serpent … the twisting serpent" found in KTU 1.5 i 1-3 and Isa 27:1.

In Galilee, Herod Antipas built cities such as Sepphoris and Tiberias, which were dedicated to the emperor's family and in which considerable wealth was concentrated gained by heavily taxing the local Galileans. Tiberias, Herod's power base in Galilee, was one of the earliest examples of gentrification 1 undertaken by the empire and its imperial agents. The city played a key role in perpetuating Rome's practice of systematically moving resources from peripheries of the empire to the metropolitan capital of Rome. 2 In order to maintain their elite lifestyle, the Herodians also siphoned off the wealth of the land for their own benefit, without giving anything back in return. 3 Contrary to the Traditional Jewish ideal of an inclusive community in which all shared in the blessings of the land and its fruits, the upkeep of Sepphoris and Tiberias drained the countryside of its resources, natural and human, causing resentment and opposition. 4 The vast majority of the people in the region were villagers who lacked the means to cope with the economic and cultural impact of massive construction projects and other exploitive economic policies of the Roman empire. 5 Thus a feeling of distance, even antipathy, however, can be detected during the ministry of Jesus to the villages of Galilee. These villagers, peasants, artisans, and others at the bottom of the economic ladder likely made up most of Jesus's audience in the Gospel. In Mark, as Richard Horsley observes, Jesus's mission focuses primarily on village communities in the region of Galilee. 6 The lifestyle of those dwelling 'in the houses of kings' is viewed critically when contrasted with the values advocated by both Jesus himself and John the Baptist. 1.2. Jerusalem Religious Context 1 The process where the character of a poor area is changed by wealthier people moving in, improving housing, and attracting new businesses, but often displacing the original inhabitants in the process.

This article is part of a more extensive diachronic study 1 of the Biblical Hebrew of the Book of Daniel, and it illustrates how certain Hebrew terms can play the role of diachronic markers within the text of the Book of Daniel. These terms have also been studied from the point of view of their semantics, whenever it was necessary. We concluded with the suggestion that the Hebrew of Daniel belonged to the Persian period (539-333 BC), rather than to the Maccabean period, as it is generally assumed.

This paper addresses W. Zwickel and P. Van der Veen's recent study in Vetus Testamentum 67 about the possible earliest reference to "Israel" found in an Egyptian stele, dating probably to the fourteenth or early thirteenth century BCE. The present comments focus on the wider implications of having such an early, previous to pharaoh Merenptah's stele dating for the name "Israel" for the historiography of "ancient Israel", or better the Southern Levant, in the Iron Age, and on the need for a problematisation of the data and the interpretative concepts deployed in history writing. RÉSUMÉ Cet article aborde l'étude récente de W. Zwickel et P. Van der Veen dans Vetus Testamentum 67 sur la possible référence la plus ancienne à « Israël » trouvée sur une stèle égyptienne datant probablement du XIV e siècle ou du début du XIII e siècle avant notre ère. Nos réflexions historiographiques traitent des implications de cette mention, précédant la stèle du pharaon Mérenptah, laquelle probablement porte le nom « Israël », pour l'historiographie de « l'ancien Israël », ou mieux du Levant méridional, à l'âge du Fer et pour une problématisation des données et des concepts interprétatifs déployés dans l'écriture de l'histoire. In a recent issue of the journal Vetus Testamentum, Professors Wolfgang Zwickel and Peter Van der Veen, 1 while following an original proposal by Manfred Görg, 2 have presented us with a very cautious argument and an

The term "gospel" is arguably the most prominent Christian keyword, at least in the Protestant tradition. But how should it be understood? This has been fiercely debated for more than a century, especially with reference to the Gospel of Mark, which is the only one of the four gospels to frame its narrative from the first verse as a "gospel-narrative". In this article, it is argued that "gospel" should neither be understood as sin-management nor a subversive message aimed at countering the Roman gospels of its day, but instead as a relational category, as reconciliation.

In the backdrop of every major Christian doctrine lies cosmology. A wrong view of the origins of creation leads inevitably to a wrong view of the Creator. Do away with the creatorship of God, and thus goes his
sovereignty. Dispose of his creation as free, entire, and ex nihilo, and the doctrines of divine aseity, omnipotence, and infinity lie on crumbling foundations.1 Yet, while many Christians are thoroughly acquainted with the struggle between secular conceptions of cosmology and theistic “intelligent design” postulations or with the controversy regarding the “days of creation,” comparatively few are familiar with the intra-evangelical debate regarding the nature of the creation of the cosmos as it is reported in Gen 1:1-3. Three major views have emerged in this area, each founded on a different construction of Gen 1:1-3 and subsuming numerous diverse views. These are the initiation view, the subordinate clause view, and the summary view. While perhaps more obscure, this is a debate with wide-reaching effects on core doctrines of the Christian faith. It is the purpose of this study to demonstrate that the initiation view is to be preferred for both exegetical and theological reasons.

The relationship between Gen 1:1-2 and the rest of the first chapter of the Hebrew Bible has occasioned a long scholarly debate, which has produced in its wake a considerable amount of literature. The divergence and polarity of views on these verses seem to result from the atomistic nature of traditional approaches in biblical studies. Approaching the text from the perspective of grammatical textlinguistics and pragmatics, this article has yielded results that both confirm and reshape scholarly thinking on Gen 1:1-2. This fresh look at the text brings with it a re-interpretation of ‫בראשׁית‬ "in the beginning." Gen 1:1-2 presents as antecedent information that succinctly relates a previous act of creation. Thus understood, the pragmatic function of ‫בראשׁית‬ is to distinguish this previous creation (vv. 1-2) from the six-day creation in (vv. 3-31), particularly to indicate that ‫השׁמי‬ ‫ם‬ and ‫הארץ‬ (v. 1) were not created on ‫אחד‬ ‫יום‬ (i.e., the first day of the six-day creation). The article, therefore, demonstrates that the textlinguistic/pragmatic approach promises a fresh avenue for understanding and interpreting the biblical text, especially such difficult passages as Gen 1:1-2.

The number twelve in the Judaic tradition corresponds to the People of God, or the Israelites. A seminal force in both spiritual and secular thought, the Biblical text describes the Twelve Tribes of Israel as patriarchic communities: their number does not derive merely from historical analysis but is a cosmological symbol acquired through long disputes, arguments, and differences of opinion. Fortified by monotheism, cultural unity is the outcome of a social process that transformed pre-exile tribal conflict into a revolutionary political outlook: the pan-tribal creation of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel.
The idea of a nation germinated in the desire to overcome tribal divisions and foster a stable, cohesive society. For centuries this rootstock nourished and took nourishment from the cultures encountered during the experience of exile and diaspora, and it did so addressing a dichotomic need: to preserve an identity as a people while integrating into a non-Hebraic sociopolitical, economic, and cultural order. The nature of the historical–-institutional secularization of Hebraism may be summed up in the concept of Dina de-malkhuta dina (the law of the state is law). Instinctively endowed with a critical/self-critical spirit, this rational vitality has maintained an unbroken dialogue with the world, from the Roman lex to the modern Haśkalah. Sociability, integration, acculturation, and civil life delineate intellectual interaction that is uncompromisingly open to the surrounding community: the defense and transmission of the Jewish identity adapt to the social, legal, and ethical values of the West. The birth of the State of Israel respects both the fundamental inspirational principles of the unification of the Twelve Tribes and the pillars of government in advanced democracies.

My correction of Thiele's at first perfected but by afterthought marred biblical chronology builds upon its foundational part I, correcting the chronology of Sennacherib's first five years, which revealed 702 BC as the true date of Sennacherib's invasion of Judah, enabling correction of Dr. Edwin Thiele's error in his widely accepted chronology of the Hebrew kings. Part I proved that Sennacherib's third campaign, biblically recorded in king Hezekiah of Judah's 14th regnal year, did not take place in 701 BC as Thiele had trusted for the cornerstone of his chronology, but rather in 702 BC, vindicating and perfecting his work. The lion's share of credit for my having discovered the ultimate biblical chronology belongs to Thiele (1943) as given improvement and correction by his indirectly participating colleagues Valerius Coucke (1928), Leslie McFall (1991), and Rodger C. Young (2003) who advanced Thiele's work without essentially modifying its chronological structure (CTMY). CTMY made possible my solution (solved in 2005, perfected and first published in 2015). My results validate not only their work, but the Masoretic Text (MT) as confirmed by its majority Dead Sea Scrolls representation, on which this chronology is exclusively based, and into which this chronology was imperceptibly (indeed mystifyingly according to over 2 millennia of effort since the 3rd century BC LXX futile effort to make sense of it) woven into the MT as a watermark or hologram of its authenticity.

By his Assyrian cornerstone thus out of place, no other Assyrian synchronism would fit Thiele's at first perfect internal biblical chronology, "IBC", (my solution has 8). So he emended it in Jotham's reign (2 Kgs. 15:30-33), adding 4 years to Jotham to shift Ahab's disastrous 853 Battle of Qarqar (Shalmaneser III's 6th year) immediately before Ahab's 1 Kgs. 22 fatal battle against his Qarqar ally Benhadad. Thus Shalmaneser's 18th year receipt of Jehu's tribute in 841, 12 (= 18 - 6) years after Qarqar by IBC, harmonized Jehu's 841 accession with his 14th year of Hezekiah set in 701! But Thiele failed to notice that annihilation of Ahab's powerful military at Qarqar per Shalmaneser's 6th year annals, made impossible his 1 Kgs. 22 participation in his fatal war with Benhadad. Likewise Shalmaneser's 18th year annals report of Hazael's total incapacitation for his 2 Kgs. 9:15-16 wounding of Israel's Joram in battle, discredited Jehu's having killed both Joram and his sickbed visitor Judah's king Ahaziah in 841 (Appx. H, chart 2/19), stripping Thiele of all Assyrian synchronisms.

The Chronology Comparison Chart Fig. 3 exposing the difference between my and Thiele's chronologies, shows my two simple structural corrections: First Thiele's 701 BC synchronism with Hezekiah's year 14 is corrected to 702 BC. Second, Thiele's 4 fabricated years by which he (I believe honestly) found a self-deceptive pretext to lengthen Jotham's reign in order to contrive a specious but futile 853 BC Battle of Qarqar synchronism in Ahab's year of death in battle against his Qarqar ally Benhadad, are removed: Jotham's 2 Kgs. 15:30 actuarial 20th year (4 years after Jotham's death) used to synchronize Pekah's death in his official chronicle, in my chronology properly observes Jotham's official 2 Kgs. 15:33 16th regnal year of death.

One of the earliest and ultimately most fruitful clues in not only exposing Thiele's error, but confirming my entire resulting Bible chronology, was the common but hitherto unproven observation that the two fallow years in succession of 2 Kings 19:29 in Hezekiah's 14th year (Sabbatical years 7 & 1 in Fig. 3) suggested the Lev. 25:2-13 49th year of a jubilee cycle (fallow), followed in the next year by its figurative 49 + 1 = “50th” in the post-Sabbatical 7 + 1 = “8th” per Lev. 25:20-22, namely Hezekiah's 15th calendrical year (also fallow), observed on its Tishri 10 by celebration of the 49-year jubilee cycle just completed in the first year of its next sabbatical cycle, whose purpose was to establish and regulate perpetual and inalienable land ownership in ancient Israel on a jubilee cyclical ceremonial basis. This exposed the purpose of the Ezra 7:7 mission from Babylon to Jerusalem on the same 49 year cycle as that of 2 Kgs. 19:29 (arguably prophesied in Daniel 9:25 dating the start of its 70 Lev. 25 Sabbatical weeks of years, namely 10 Jubilee cycles), and likewise that of the first 2 years of Bar-Kokhba's revolt against Hadrian (introducing Appx. A), thus triply confirming Moses' jubilee cycle in synchronism with Benedict Zuckermann's sabbatical cycles.

Appendix C shows the 4 structural charts for my chronology. Appendix D offers scholarly confirmation of Thiele's biblical chronological method. Appendix E examines Sennacherib's 702 BC 3rd campaign synchronism with Hezekiah' 14th year. Appendix F discovers my 21 April 1443 Exodus date shown in Fig. 7 in proper synchronism with Amenhotep II's short and final military campaign begun on 11 November 1444 (the “Amenophis” of Mantheo, clearly the Exodus pharaoh as preserved in Josephus' “Contra Apion”). Appendix G concisely details all 25 of my extrabiblical synchronisms validating the breakthrough nature of my discovery. And Appendix H presents the complete set of my 19 key chronology charts, where my correction of Thiele in a span of 40 years is illustrated in my Chronology Comparison Chart “CCC,” shown as Fig. 11/19, also shown as Fig. [fig:Chronology-Comparison-Chart].

Appendix [sec:25-Extrabiblical-Synchronisms], “Synchronisms for Thiele's & my chronologies” lists and locates expositions of its 2 Egyptian, 8 Assyrian, 6 Babylonian, 1 Tyrian, 3 Persian, 1 Sabbatical, and two pairs = 4 of Jubilee synchronisms (49th & 50th year Jubilee pairs, extrabiblically anchored to Bar Kokhba's spring-summer of 132 AD 49th Jubilee cycle year launching his revolt against Hadrian) totalling 25. These include synchronism of the Exodus with Amenhotep II's year 10, a Tyrian and Sabbatical year synchronism with Solomon's accession, Assyrian and Jubilee synchronisms in Hezekiah's 14th and 15th years, and Persian and Jubilee synchronisms of Ezra 7:7; exposing 3 historical Jubilee years in synchronism with Benedict Zuckermann's 1857 Sabbatical cycle.

My correction of Thiele's at first perfected but by afterthought marred biblical chronology builds upon its foundational part I, correcting the chronology of Sennacherib's first five years, which revealed 702 BC as the true date of Sennacherib's invasion of Judah, enabling correction of Dr. Edwin Thiele's error in his widely accepted chronology of the Hebrew kings. Part I proved that Sennacherib's third campaign, biblically recorded in king Hezekiah of Judah's 14th regnal year, did not take place in 701 BC as Thiele had trusted for the cornerstone of his chronology, but rather in 702 BC, vindicating and perfecting his work. The lion's share of credit for my having discovered the ultimate biblical chronology belongs to Thiele (1943) as given improvement and correction by his indirectly participating colleagues Valerius Coucke (1928), Leslie McFall (1991), and Rodger C. Young (2003) who advanced Thiele's work without essentially modifying its chronological structure (CTMY). CTMY made possible my solution (solved in 2005, perfected and first published in 2015). My results validate not only their work, but the Masoretic Text (MT) as confirmed by its majority Dead Sea Scrolls representation, on which this chronology is exclusively based, and into which this chronology was imperceptibly (indeed mystifyingly according to over 2 millennia of effort since the 3rd century BC LXX futile effort to make sense of it) woven into the MT as a watermark or hologram of its authenticity.

By his Assyrian cornerstone thus out of place, no other Assyrian synchronism would fit Thiele's at first perfect internal biblical chronology, "IBC", (my solution has 8). So he emended it in Jotham's reign (2 Kgs. 15:30-33), adding 4 years to Jotham to shift Ahab's disastrous 853 Battle of Qarqar (Shalmaneser III's 6th year) immediately before Ahab's 1 Kgs. 22 fatal battle against his Qarqar ally Benhadad. Thus Shalmaneser's 18th year receipt of Jehu's tribute in 841, 12 (= 18 - 6) years after Qarqar by IBC, harmonized Jehu's 841 accession with his 14th year of Hezekiah set in 701! But Thiele failed to notice that annihilation of Ahab's powerful military at Qarqar per Shalmaneser's 6th year annals, made impossible his 1 Kgs. 22 participation in his fatal war with Benhadad. Likewise Shalmaneser's 18th year annals report of Hazael's total incapacitation for his 2 Kgs. 9:15-16 wounding of Israel's Joram in battle, discredited Jehu's having killed both Joram and his sickbed visitor Judah's king Ahaziah in 841 (Appx. H, chart 2/19), stripping Thiele of all Assyrian synchronisms.

The Chronology Comparison Chart Fig. 3 exposing the difference between my and Thiele's chronologies, shows my two simple structural corrections: First Thiele's 701 BC synchronism with Hezekiah's year 14 is corrected to 702 BC. Second, Thiele's 4 fabricated years by which he (I believe honestly) found a self-deceptive pretext to lengthen Jotham's reign in order to contrive a specious but futile 853 BC Battle of Qarqar synchronism in Ahab's year of death in battle against his Qarqar ally Benhadad, are removed: Jotham's 2 Kgs. 15:30 actuarial 20th year (4 years after Jotham's death) used to synchronize Pekah's death in his official chronicle, in my chronology properly observes Jotham's official 2 Kgs. 15:33 16th regnal year of death.

One of the earliest and ultimately most fruitful clues in not only exposing Thiele's error, but confirming my entire resulting Bible chronology, was the common but hitherto unproven observation that the two fallow years in succession of 2 Kings 19:29 in Hezekiah's 14th year (Sabbatical years 7 & 1 in Fig. 3) suggested the Lev. 25:2-13 49th year of a jubilee cycle (fallow), followed in the next year by its figurative 49 + 1 = “50th” in the post-Sabbatical 7 + 1 = “8th” per Lev. 25:20-22, namely Hezekiah's 15th calendrical year (also fallow), observed on its Tishri 10 by celebration of the 49-year jubilee cycle just completed in the first year of its next sabbatical cycle, whose purpose was to establish and regulate perpetual and inalienable land ownership in ancient Israel on a jubilee cyclical ceremonial basis. This exposed the purpose of the Ezra 7:7 mission from Babylon to Jerusalem on the same 49 year cycle as that of 2 Kgs. 19:29 (arguably prophesied in Daniel 9:25 dating the start of its 70 Lev. 25 Sabbatical weeks of years, namely 10 Jubilee cycles), and likewise that of the first 2 years of Bar-Kokhba's revolt against Hadrian (introducing Appx. A), thus triply confirming Moses' jubilee cycle in synchronism with Benedict Zuckermann's sabbatical cycles.

Appendix C shows the 4 structural charts for my chronology. Appendix D offers scholarly confirmation of Thiele's biblical chronological method. Appendix E examines Sennacherib's 702 BC 3rd campaign synchronism with Hezekiah' 14th year. Appendix F discovers my 21 April 1443 Exodus date shown in Fig. 7 in proper synchronism with Amenhotep II's short and final military campaign begun on 11 November 1444 (the “Amenophis” of Mantheo, clearly the Exodus pharaoh as preserved in Josephus' “Contra Apion”). Appendix G concisely details all 25 of my extrabiblical synchronisms validating the breakthrough nature of my discovery. And Appendix H presents the complete set of my 19 key chronology charts, where my correction of Thiele in a span of 40 years is illustrated in my Chronology Comparison Chart “CCC,” shown as Fig. 11/19, also shown as Fig. 3.

Appendix G, “Synchronisms for Thiele's & my chronologies” lists and locates expositions of its 2 Egyptian, 8 Assyrian, 6 Babylonian, 1 Tyrian, 3 Persian, 1 Sabbatical, and two pairs = 4 of Jubilee synchronisms (49th & 50th year Jubilee pairs, extrabiblically anchored to Bar Kokhba's spring-summer of 132 AD 49th Jubilee cycle year launching his revolt against Hadrian) totalling 25. These include synchronism of the Exodus with Amenhotep II's year 10, a Tyrian and Sabbatical year synchronism with Solomon's accession, Assyrian and Jubilee synchronisms in Hezekiah's 14th and 15th years, and Persian and Jubilee synchronisms of Ezra 7:7; exposing 3 historical Jubilee years in synchronism with Benedict Zuckermann's 1857 Sabbatical cycle.

Josephus nailed Solomon's ff969/968 accession!: Hiram's Solomonic Temple contract in ff969/968 by Josephus' Tyrian, Greek, & Roman dating, confirms Thiele's 2005-2015 corrected chronology


Valerius Coucke's 1928-published near-dating of Tyrian King Hiram's fall-to-fall (ff) 969/968 12th year Solomonic Temple construction contract was one year late (ff968/967) only due to his misreckoning as May (sic.) 1207 BC the Parian Marble's correct ca. June 1208 BC fall of Troy. This latter was by Justin quoting Trogus (18.3) 1 year after the ca. June 1209 founding of Tyre, which in turn by Josephus quoting Meander (Ag. Ap. I.18) was 241 years before Hiram's 12th year 1 Kings 5:1 contract with Solomon to build his Temple ca. June 1209 - 241 = spring/summer 968 BC (ff969/968). Just here David died by my 2005-2015 correction of the Coucke/Thiele/McFall/Young chronology by its wholesale 3 years later offset up to Uzziah's death. Thus: {[June 1208 fall of Troy] - 1 = June 1209 refoundation of Tyre} + 241 years until Hiram's 12th year Temple contract = June 968 = spring/summer ff969/968 1 Kgs. 5:1 accession of Solomon.

The Fig. 1 Tyrian kings chronology based on Josephus' copy of Meander's Tyrian King List using only Athenian, Tyrian, and Roman records, validates Coucke's method and confirms its result by use of my chronology: Hiram's certain ff969/988 12th year start of Solomon's Temple project invalidates the Coucke/Thiele/McFall/Young version of Thiele's chronology because by it Hiram was 2 years dead when required to receive Solomon's 1 Kgs. 9:10-14 20th year construction bonus (E, 8/19). By the Thiele chronology's unavoidable 1 Kgs. 6:1 Temple assembly start, that bonus fell in Solomon's 24th year, while by my chronology's 1 Kgs. 5:1 start, it fell 2 years before Hiram's death in Solomon's 20th (sec. 2.3). A tiny wrinkle in Assyrian chronology (701 BC, E 11/19) misled Thiele to corrupt his internal biblical chronology to make it absolute.

Coucke failed to follow through in developing his near-solution to its full potential for unlocking the entire Dead Sea Scrolls-based Masoretic Text's chronology, or at least its Hebrew kings foundation as Thiele nearly did by 1943, independently of Coucke. But Coucke provided corroborating independent results anticipating Thiele's better work, further refined by Leslie McFall (1991) and R. C. Young (2003).

Dating Hiram's Temple contract with Solomon
Tyrian kings chronology synchronized to & confirming my correction of Thiele in 20 pages:

Valerius Coucke's 1928-published near-dating of Tyrian King Hiram's fall-to-fall (ff) 969/968 12th year Solomonic Temple construction contract was one year late (ff968/967) only due to his misreckoning as May (sic.) 1207 BC the Parian Marble's correct ca. June 1208 BC fall of Troy. This latter was by Justin quoting Trogus (18.3) 1 year after the ca. June 1209 founding of Tyre, which in turn by Josephus quoting Meander (Ag. Ap. I.18) was 241 years before Hiram's 12th year 1 Kings 5:1 contract with Solomon to build his Temple ca. June 1209 - 241 = spring/summer 968 BC (ff969/968). Just here David died by my 2005-2015 correction of the Coucke/Thiele/McFall/Young chronology by its wholesale 3 years later offset up to Uzziah's death. Thus: {[June 1208 fall of Troy] - 1 = June 1209 refoundation of Tyre} + 241 years until Hiram's 12th year Temple contract = June 968 = spring/summer ff969/968 1 Kgs. 5:1 accession of Solomon.

The Fig. 1 Tyrian kings chronology based on Josephus' copy of Meander's Tyrian King List using only Athenian, Tyrian, and Roman records, validates Coucke's method and confirms its result by use of my chronology: Hiram's certain ff969/988 12th year start of Solomon's Temple project invalidates the Coucke/Thiele/McFall/Young version of Thiele's chronology because by it Hiram was 2 years dead when required to receive Solomon's 1 Kgs. 9:10-14 20th year construction bonus (E, 8/19). By the Thiele chronology's unavoidable 1 Kgs. 6:1 Temple assembly start, that bonus fell in Solomon's 24th year, while by my chronology's 1 Kgs. 5:1 start, it fell 2 years before Hiram's death in Solomon's 20th (sec. 2.3). A tiny wrinkle in Assyrian chronology (701 BC, E 11/19) misled Thiele to corrupt his internal biblical chronology to make it absolute.

Coucke failed to follow through in developing his near-solution to its full potential for unlocking the entire Dead Sea Scrolls-based Masoretic Text's chronology, or at least its Hebrew kings foundation as Thiele nearly did by 1943, independently of Coucke. But Coucke provided corroborating independent results anticipating Thiele's better work, further refined by Leslie McFall (1991) and R. C. Young (2003).

The discovery of the law code of Hammurabi in 1901 reveals that there are close relationships between the law code of Hammurabi and the Book of Covenant. There are many case laws in both texts that are paralleled to one another. One of such is lex talion. It is the commonest law among case laws in Ancient Near Eastern codes. It is found in other four law codes. The contexts in these law codes are not the same. However, the lex talion in CoH 196-201 is more closely paralleled to the one in Exodus 21:22-25, and it will help greatly in the interpretation of Exodus 21:22-25. Thus, this research paper examines the lex talion in Exodus 21:22-25 in the light of the one in CoH 196-201 by providing its interpretation and applying it to the contemporary situation. The thesis of the paper is that the lex talion in Exodus 21:22-25 is not to be applied literally, rather figuratively whereby God alone is considered the center of existence and the final arbiter of justice.

In this article we will examine the sacrificial terminology referring to the Imperial Cult in the Leptian neo-Punic inscription Labdah N 13. Particular attention is devoted to the phrase bcl šlm hršt which is explained as a gloss for flamines Augusti Cæsaris

Manfred Görg proposed to read the name Israel on a broken Egyptian inscription ÄM 21687, which is now kept in the storage facilities of the New Museum in Berlin. New research during the last number of years has confirmed this reading, although the writing of the name is different from that of the Merenptah inscription. Some characteristics appear to demonstrate that this inscription is older than the Israel stela of Merenptah and may likely date to the 14th or earlier 13th century BCE. The paper will present some ideas about an earlier beginning of the formation of what is generally called Israel and about the way, how this early Israel came about.

The Bible contains many different genres. In order to obtain an accurate understanding of the scriptures, an understanding of context and different methods of interpretation are required. This essay will look firstly at which scriptures make up the creation narratives (CN), and secondly aim to determine how they should be understood.

As is well known, many Semitic languages have semantically similar roots that are identical except for one radical. The differing radicals have similar sounds or belong to the same " family " of consonants, such as the labials or the sibilants. For example, gzr, gzm, and gzl, each of which ends with a different labial, express the general meaning of cutting; while 'ls, 'lz, and 'lṣ, each of which ends with a different sibilant, express the general meaning of happiness. The purpose of this paper is to show that this phenomenon occurs also with ʼ and q by revealing 18 cases of interchange between these consonants in semantically similar roots in Hebrew and other Semitic languages , especially Arabic.*

Recent issues of Antiquity have seen much
discussion on the topic of Carthaginian infant
sacrifice: was it a Graeco-Roman fiction or
did it really happen? There are strongly held
opinions on both sides of the argument, with
much resting on the age profile of the children
interred at the cemetery known as the
Carthage Tophet. Here, the authors respond
to claims by Smith et al. (2011, 2013) that
their ageing of the infants and children was
incorrect, and so also by extension was their
interpretation that not all interments at the
Tophet were the result of sacrifice.

In the study of literature from the Ancient Near East (ANE), many scholars, both secular and religious, argue that the creation story of Genesis is mythology akin to, and shaped by, the cultural milieu of the ancient world. The mythology of Genesis, they argue, represents the theory of creation as the Hebrews saw it, but which readers today see as incompatible with a modern worldview. As mythology, the creation account of Genesis has no revelatory insight or authority in regard to scientific understanding for how the Universe came into being. Walton, for example, asserts that to properly interpret Genesis, one must recognize that it “pertains to functional origins rather than material origins and that temple ideology underlies the Genesis cosmology.” In other words, Genesis was written as a late document to validate Israel’s temple worship and has no insight into the material origins of the universe. These two arguments; Genesis is culturally conditioned literature and functionally unscientific mythology, are interconnected in the reasoning of scholars represented by John H. Walton and Kyle Greenwood. This paper addresses both arguments and demonstrate the uniqueness of Hebrew cosmology among ANE literature and its compatibility with modern scientific exploration.