If you don’t end up making it to the end of the current issue of Biblical Archaeology Review, you’ll miss a great review of what appears to be a terrific book. Ziony Zevit raves about The Horsemen of Israel: Horses and Chariots in Monarchic Israel (Ninth-Eighth Centuries B.C.E.), calling this doctoral dissertation by a horse lover a “page-turner” that may have a significant impact on our understanding of the subject. From the review:

Although recent scholarship tends to assume that there were few horses in ancient Israel and that chariotry was relatively insignificant, Cantrell concludes otherwise based on sophisticated inferences from Biblical as well as ancient Near Eastern texts and from an abundance of archaeological evidence. In Iron Age Israel, she argues, there were large numbers of horses.

Concerning those “storehouses” at Megiddo:

Cantrell convincingly argues that archaeological excavations at Megiddo uncovered a major equine complex with stables, an exercise area, watering troughs, hitching stalls, and an adjacent granary for feed.

The author’s background is relevant:

Cantrell has been a rider, trainer, breeder and importer of horses and has engaged in competitive barrel racing, jumping and dressage. Consequently, she approached her research with understanding and a large body of practical knowledge.

The entire review is online. Zevit has convinced me that this is a work I will enjoy reading. The book is published by Eisenbrauns and also available from Amazon.

Eisenbrauns also has recently published a work on Donkeys in the Biblical World. I’m looking forward to a book on those non-kosher mules that keep showing up with a king’s saddle.

The best maps for detailed work in historical geography of Israel are the 1:50,000 series published by the Survey of Israel and the Survey of Western Palestine maps produced in the 1880s by the Palestine Exploration Fund. The first set comprises 20 maps and the second 16 (only going as far south as Beersheba), indicating the level of detail involved. Maps in the first set cost about $20 each and the second set costs in the thousands of dollars in the rare event that one comes on the market. In order to gain access to the Survey of Western Palestine, when one went on the market for sale in Germany some years ago, we purchased it and “shared the cost” by making an electronic version available.

An excellent new resource is available that combines the two maps in a single (free) website entitled amud anan (“pillar of cloud”). You can navigate on either map and then toggle to the other to see the land 130 years earlier (or later). The differences are dramatic. In addition, a “3D” option overlaps the maps on Google Earth topography so that the hills and valleys look like hills and valleys.

The 1:50,000 maps are in Hebrew. If you need to use detailed maps of Israel, and you don’t think you need to know Hebrew for anything else, these maps provide sufficient justification to learn the alphabet. (It really doesn’t take that long; there are only 22 letters and everything is phonetic.)

With a tablet and a good internet connection (or with purchase of the iPad app; Android coming), hiking in Israel may never be the same!

Crossway has just released a 540-page book with more than 20 articles from a number of leading evangelical scholars. The full title is Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? A Critical Appraisal of Modern and Postmodern Approaches to Scripture.

Amazon has a list of endorsements, but I find the table of contents to be much more helpful in seeing the potential value of this book for my studies and thinking. (It’s probable that most of the reviewers endorsed the book based on the table of contents and did not read the book.)

Before adding the (lengthy) contents listing, a few additional notes: (1) Crossway’s website has the first chapter for free; (2) the paperback sells for $23, but the Kindle version is now just $10; (3) I have put in bold the chapters of most interest to me personally.

1. Thomas H. McCall, “Religious Epistemology, Theological Interpretation of Scripture, and Critical Biblical Scholarship: A Theologian’s Reflections”

2. Graham A. Cole, “The Peril of a ‘Historyless’ Systematic Theology”

3. Mark D. Thompson, “The Divine Investment in Truth: Toward a Theological Account of Biblical Inerrancy”


4. James K. Hoffmeier, “‘These Things Happened’: Why a Historical Exodus Is Essential for Theology”

5. Michael A. G. Haykin, “Fundamentum et Columnam Fidei Nostrae: Irenaeus on the Perfect and Saving Nature of the Scriptures”

6. Richard E. Averbeck, “Pentateuchal Criticism and the Priestly Torah”

7. Robert B. Chisholm Jr., “Old Testament Source Criticism: Some Methodological Miscues”

8. Robert D. Bergen, “Word Distribution as an Indicator Authorial Intention: A Study of Gen. 1:1-2:3″

9. John W. Hilber, “The Culture of Prophecy and Writing in the Ancient Near East”

10. Richard L. Schultz, “Isaiah, Isaiahs, and Current Scholarship”


11. Alan Millard, “Daniel in Babylon: An Accurate Record?”

12. Willem A. VanGemeren & Jason Stanghalle, “A Critical-Realistic Reading of Psalms Titles: Authenticity, Inspiration and Evangelicals”

13. Jens Bruun Kofoed, “The Old Testament as Cultural Memory”

14. Robert W. Yarbrough, “God’s Word in Human Words: Form-Critical Reflections”

15. Craig L. Blomberg, “A Constructive Traditional Response to New Testament Criticism”

16. Darrell L. Bock, “Precision and Accuracy: Making Distinctions in the Cultural Context that Give
Us Pause in Pitting Gospels Against Other”

17. Eckhard J. Schnabel, “Paul, Timothy, and Titus: The Assumption of a Pseudonymous Author and of Pseudonymous Recipients in the Light of Literary, Theological, and Historical Evidence”

18. Thomas W. Davis, “Saint Paul on Cyprus: The Transformation of an Apostle”

19. John M. Monson, “Enter Joshua: The Mother of Current Biblical Debates”

20. Richard S. Hess, “Yahweh’s ‘Wife’ and Belief in One God in the Old Testament”


21. Michael G. Hasel, “New Excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa and the Early History of Judah”


22. Steven M. Ortiz, “The Archaeology of David and Solomon: Method or Madness?”

Christianbook.com is running a Fabulous Friday sale on The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible for only $130.

This five-volume work includes 7,100 articles and many illustrations. NIDB is not quite as comprehensive or detailed as Anchor Bible Dictionary but it is more up-to-date. Amazon sells it for $316.

Carl Rasmussen’s excellent Zondervan Atlas of the Bible is also marked down to $18 for the sale (which lasts through Monday).