Shephelah Archives - Page 16 of 67

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

**When we updated our blog design earlier this month, we accidentally broke the system that sends posts out by email. With that now fixed, we are re-posting the recent roundups, one part each day through Friday.**

The digs may have stopped, but the stories have not. With no roundups the last two weeks, I have more than 60 items of interest to share in the coming days.

A seal and a seal impression found in Jerusalem are rare discoveries from the Persian period.

“A Second Temple period Jewish ritual bath was discovered by chance last month in the Lower Galilee and a group of locals are trying to save it from its current destiny of destruction.” There’s a video report here.

“A new study carried out on pottery items uncovered in the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron suggests the cave . . . was used and visited as a pilgrimage site during the First Temple Period.”

A new study suggests that many cisterns in the Negev may date back not to the Iron Age but to the Bronze Age. (Journal article for purchase here.)

The cancelled archaeology department at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary has found a new home at Lipscomb University in Nashville.

Steven Ortiz, formerly of SWBTS, is interviewed by Bryan Windle in the latest in the Discussions with the Diggers series.

Mark Lanier, who helped bring the SWBTS program to Lipscomb, is interviewed on The Book and the Spade.

Moshe Garsiel has proposed a new theory to support the location of Tell es-Sharia as biblical Ziklag.

Aren Maeir visited the excavations at Tel Hadid, which along with Tell Abu Shusha and Tel Azekah, is one of the few excavations in Israel that were not cancelled this summer.

A study claims that buses and shuttles are a better solution than the planned Old City cable car project.

A couple of officials of the City of David organization give a 40-minute tour of the Siloam Pool and the Pilgrimage Road to the Temple Mount.

Biblical Israel Ministries and Tours is hosting a “Top 10 Israel Photos” contest and offering prizes.

Accordance is offering a number of its graphics collections at big discounts, including:

Bible Lands PhotoGuide (all 6): $74.90
Pictorial Library of Bible Lands: Cultural Images of the Holy Land: $24.90
Pictorial Library of Bible Lands: Trees, Plants, and Flowers of the Holy Land: $24.90
Historic Views of the Holy Land: Views That Have Vanished: $24.90
Historic Views of the Holy Land: American Colony Collection: $89.90
Virtual Tour to the Temple: $39.90
The Virtual Bible (Enhanced): 3D Reconstructions of the Biblical World: $19.90
The Add-On Bundles include many resources at very good prices ($59; $119).

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Alexander Schick, Ted Weis, Charles Savelle, Jared Clark, Explorator

Tagged Discoveries, Galilee, Jerusalem, Judah, Negev, Photo Resources, Shephelah, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

Just as the Biblical Museum of Natural History was about to open in Beit Shemesh, “a plague of biblical proportions struck.” Virtual tours are available at the museum’s website. They are also offering a new book by the museum’s director, The Torah Encyclopedia of the Animal Kingdom, Vol. 1: Wild Animals.

The Hashemite Custodianship of Jerusalem’s Islamic and Christian Holy Sites 1917-2020 CE: White Paper, by the The Royal Aal Al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought (108pp). The labeled photograph of the Temple Mount on page 81 may be of particular interest.

New from Appian: An 80-page study guide to accompany “Lessons from the Land: The Gospels.”

“In Search of King David’s Lost Empire” is a long piece by Ruth Margalit that reviews the history of the maximalist-minimalist debate. Some responses by Eilat Mazar, Gabriel Barkay and others may be found here.

Assyrian soldiers had the edge with the invention of the socketed arrowhead. The underlying IEJ article is on Academia.

An article in the Jerusalem Post summarizes a recent BAR article on life at Tel Hadid near Gezer after the Assyrians deported the Israelites.

Israel should preserve more archaeological sites uncovered in salvage digs, argue some archaeologists. The article reports that there are 35,000 ancient sites in the country.

Tony Cartledge describes his experience in excavating a 12th-century Canaanite temple at Lachish, including his wife’s discovery of what turned out to be a scepter.

Charles Savelle links to three podcast episodes he has enjoyed on Thutmose III and the Battle of Megiddo.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Ted Weis, Mark Hoffman, Alexander Schick, Explorator

Tagged 10th Century, Egypt, Excavations, Jerusalem, Museums, Shephelah, Temple Mount, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

Appian Media has just released “Lessons from the Land: The Gospels,” a 13-part video series aimed at elementary-aged students. Workbooks are coming so that the videos can be used in Bible classes.

David Chapman, editor of the ESV Archaeology Study Bible, is on The Crossway Podcast series explaining how archaeology aids in understanding the Bible.

OVRtour is a new app (for Apple) that provides guided tours in the Holy Land.

A 3D model of Tel Burna has been updated with annotations.

National Geographic has a short piece on the Jordan Trail.

The summer solstice at Stonehenge will be livestreamed this year.

“Recent research highlights the power of the canine nose to uncover buried remains from ancient human history.”

The Ark Encounter is selling individual and family lifetime passes for a limited time.

Carl Rasmussen shares photos that illustrate the NT concept of “running the race.”

HT: Agade, Keith Keyser, Arne Halbakken

Tagged Resources, Shephelah, Tourism, Weekend Roundup

Weekend Roundup, Part 2

The Atlantic sews together the story of the “first-century Mark,” Hobby Lobby, and Dirk Obbink.

Stephen Oryszczuk takes a tour of the only accelerator mass spectrometry lab in the Middle East, and its contribution to ongoing archaeological excavations.

Scholars are studying erasures and corrections in the Leningrad Codex.

Ruth Schuster considers what caused the collapse of Byzantine farming in the Negev highlands.

Ianir Milevski and Liora Kolska Horwitz investigate the domestication of donkeys in the ancient Near East.

The summer issue of Biblical Archaeology Review includes articles on forced resettlement at Tel Hadid, old Christian manuscripts, and the scarab. (BAR appears to have quietly cut its number of issues each year from 6 to 4.)

The British Museum has created historical city travel guides to Nineveh in the 7th century BC and to Rome in the 1st century AD.

Pompeii Live, “the British Museum’s most popular exhibition of the last decade is set to return, in the form of an online broadcast” that will premiere on May 20.

Lachish is the subject of a 7-minute video, the latest in the Life Lessons from Israel series.

The Ancient World Online (AWOL) has now surpassed ten million page views.

Satire: Stanford will be offering a new course entitled “How to be a Gladiator,” and signed waivers will be required to enroll.

A NPR piece looks at what has happened with tourism at Petra, going from 8,000 people a day to zero. Now the place is being taken over by cats, sparrows, and wolves.

Assassin’s Creed Discovery Tours of Ptolemaic Egypt and Classical Greece are free through May 20. Explore those worlds in a “living museum.”

Accordance has photo resources related to biblical archaeology on sale.

There is no shortage of material for an archaeological biography of King Ahab.

Israel’s Good Name describes his university field trip to Tel Arad and Tel Beersheba.

To celebrate his birthday, Shmuel Browns drove up to Sussita and took some beautiful photos.

All locked up: The Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, May 12, 2020

HT: Agade, Ted Weis, Keith Keyser, Joseph Lauer, Explorator, Brian Johnson

Tagged Antiquities Trade, Galilee, Italy, Jordan, Mesopotamia, Museums, Negev, Photo Resources, Shephelah, Technology, Tourism

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

A first-century synagogue discovered at Beth Shemesh will have to be moved because it is in the line of the highway-widening project. An article in Hebrew at Makor Rishon includes a photo.

Haaretz: A “study of the three oldest stone enclosures at Göbekli Tepe has revealed a hidden geometric pattern, specifically an equilateral triangle, underlying the entire architectural plan of these structures.”

A project to preserve and popularize a group of megalithic dolmens in northern Lebanon has been completed.

Brent Nongbri asks whether Qumran Cave 1 is really Cave 1.

Bryan Windle’s Top Three Reports in Archaeology in April look to technology stories as well as the impact of COVID-19.

Wayne Stiles explains how Paul’s incarceration in Rome is instructive in our present crisis.

Christopher Rollston is the guest on The Book and the Spade, talking about the Dead Sea Scroll forgeries (part 1, part 2).

Nijay Gupta recommends the best resources for studying New Testament backgrounds and context. And Brad Cooper shares a broader list of similar resources that also includes online courses, online resources, and more.

The latest Biblical Studies Carnival is online, filled with links to stories, blogposts, podcasts, and book reviews from the past month.

HT: Agade, Ted Weis, Joseph Lauer, BibleX

Tagged Dead Sea Scrolls, Italy, Lebanon, Resources, Shephelah, Turkey

Weekend Roundup, Part 1

A team excavating Khirbet a-Ra‘i (the alleged Ziklag) in January and February discovered “a rare ‘smiting god’ figurine, a bronze calf figurine, two seals and decorated Canaanite and Philistine pottery from the 12th Century BCE.”

With everyone home, antiquities thieves are having a field day in Judea and Samaria.

With the Israel Museum closed, the Dead Sea Scrolls are now safely stored “behind five locked doors in a humidity and temperature-controlled vault at the Shrine of the Book.”

Owen Jairus reports on discoveries made in the Nazareth Archaeological Project, as recently published by its director Ken Dark.

The summer season at Tell es-Safi/Gath has been cancelled. Other excavations have apparently cancelled as well, though I haven’t yet seen those notices.

The Temple Mount Sifting Project has unveiled a new virtual exhibition.

The Palestine Open Maps project has just launched, and it is based on the 1940s survey maps from the British Mandate.

On Kindle for $2.99: Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony, by Richard Bauckham.

Hisham’s Delights is a new digital cookbook from the kitchen of the Albright Institute.

HT: Agade, Ted Weis, Joseph Lauer

Tagged Discoveries, Excavations, Galilee, Jerusalem, Museums, Resources, Shephelah, Temple Mount, Weekend Roundup