The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts | 
 enlarge | Authors: Neil Asher Silberman, Israel Finkelstein
Publisher: Free Press
Category: Book
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Avg. Customer Rating:  111 reviews
Sales Rank: 36491
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 400
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.5 x 1.1
ISBN: 0684869136
Dewey Decimal Number: 230
EAN: 9780684869131
ASIN: 0684869136
Publication Date: May 28, 2002
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Amazon.com Review
The Bible Unearthed is a balanced, thoughtful, bold reconsideration of the historical period that produced the Hebrew Bible. The headline news in this book is easy to pick out: there is no evidence for the existence of Abraham, or any of the Patriarchs; ditto for Moses and the Exodus; and the same goes for the whole period of Judges and the united monarchy of David and Solomon. In fact, the authors argue that it is impossible to say much of anything about ancient Israel until the seventh century B.C., around the time of the reign of King Josiah. In that period, "the narrative of the Bible was uniquely suited to further the religious reform and territorial ambitions of Judah." Yet the authors deny that their arguments should be construed as compromising the Bible's power. Only in the 18th century--"when the Hebrew Bible began to be dissected and studied in isolation from its powerful function in community life"--did readers begin to view the Bible as a source of empirically verifiable history. For most of its life, the Bible has been what Finkelstein and Silberman reveal it once more to be: an eloquent expression of "the deeply rooted sense of shared origins, experiences, and destiny that every human community needs in order to survive," written in such a way as to encompass "the men, women, and children, the rich, the poor, and the destitute of an entire community." --Michael Joseph Gross
Product Description
In this iconoclastic and provocative work, leading scholars Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman draw on recent archaeological research to present a dramatically revised portrait of ancient Israel and its neighbors. They argue that crucial evidence (or a telling lack of evidence) at digs in Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon suggests that many of the most famous stories in the Bible -- the wanderings of the patriarchs, the Exodus from Egypt, Joshua's conquest of Canaan, and David and Solomon's vast empire -- reflect the world of the later authors rather than actual historical facts. Challenging the fundamentalist readings of the scriptures and marshaling the latest archaeological evidence to support its new vision of ancient Israel, The Bible Unearthed offers a fascinating and controversial perspective on when and why the Bible was written and why it possesses such great spiritual and emotional power today.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 106 more reviews...
 NO PROOFS November 15, 2008
0 out of 3 found this review helpful
The authors suceeded into raising questions-but thats all- the haven't succeeded into disproving the bible.
 Challenging and provocative October 18, 2008
It's very hard to score the work in the scientific area especially if you are not a professional in this field. Nevertheless this book gives the fresh insight and powerful arguing about the Book that affected entire Judeo-Christian civilization. From other hand, it reveals the real (at least more documented) meaning of the classic history picture. Technically it does not touch the question of the God existence - there is all about the Book, about the Myth and the Reality. You can believe to authors or you can argue to them but most of readers will be definitely not apathetic.
The Bible Unearthed October 7, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
A meticulous examination devoid of mythological leanings, based in the accuracy of measurable examinations yielding erudite conclusions throughout. Such works should not dismiss ones want of faith; as unbiased research only affirms the footing of facts which are truly there and those which in word or deed, never were. Simply put, this is a sophisticated, wonderful work.
Joseph's Camels Don't Fit May 29, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
Ancient Israel was not an empire of great cities but was a tiny kingdom. The spell-binding saga of the Exodus was not a historic epic but was a moving product of human imagination. Many of the stories happened in a different era than portrayed in the Bible; many were exaggerated and misrepresented; some didn't happen at all.
Here's just one example of how we know this:
The stories of the patriarchs are loaded with camels but archeology clearly tells us camels were not domesticated and widely used until centuries later. The camel caravan in the Joseph story carried gum, balm, & myrhh, products of 7th & 8th century BCE trade during the Assyrian empire, but not before. Likewise, numerous cities, significant in the 7th & 8th centuries BCE, were mentioned in Genesis, but were either non-existent or were merely insignificant villages at the time.
This is just a tiny part of the voluminous evidence that tells a story much more mundane than does the Bible. The stories of the patriarchs reflect concerns of a seventh century Israel - projected onto the lives of legendary figures from a mythical past. The first archeologists studied the holy land with a "Bible in one hand and a shovel in the other." William Albright provided us with the first book representing more modern archeological methods in 1945. F&S have provided us with the first comprehensive update to that book - well worth the time of anyone interested in this subject.
A must for the layman or student April 6, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
The thesis set forth in this book is not new for those who have been following modern research on the Tanach (Hebrew Bible), and the bibliography is not the kind one would expect in a serious scholarly treatise.
However, the book was not written with the intention of being an original contribution to the scholarly discourse - ecen so, in some ways it is - but to provide the educated reader with the latest theorization about the origins of the Tanch, in particular its historiographical literature, and this it does with great success.
The writing is lucid and readable, the ideas clearly presented. The bibliography at the end of the book is basic, but it includes some of the most important biblical research literature.
I recommend this book to all my Bible students (in its Hebrew translation), and in one of my courses, several chapters are required reading.
Dr. Jonathan D. Safren
Dept. of Biblical Studies
Beit Berl College
Beit Berl, Israel
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