Northern Palace (Amarna)

Transcription

Creation? Evolution? Dinosaurs In the beginning... Origins Plants, Animals, Humans Design? Flood, Fossils, Sedimentary Rock Observation Evidence Reason Facts Stones of Israel Part 1: Presented by Don Patton, Ph. D. Dr. Don Patton: We have some exciting things to talk to you about this evening, to show you. The most frustrating part to me is we have only two 40-minute sessions. There is much more evidence and I have been a little bit selfish. I am featuring the things that I have been personally involved in or at least many of them. There is much more evidence that is available but we hope to give you an idea. But in order to appreciate the nature of... and the significance of this kind of evidence, I want to begin by telling you a little bit about the controversy, the context of controversy in which this evidence is being presented and is being opposed today. Notice the statement by Dr. Herzog, who is the Professor of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University. This is the largest University in Israel, and you would expect that the Professor of Archaeology there would be one who is telling you about things that support the Bible, but that is not the case, as in our country many of the universities which used to do that now are dominated by those who oppose the Bible and so we have statements like this, he says, "This is what archaeologists have learned from their... ...excavations in the Land of Israel: The Israelites were never in Egypt... ...did not conquer the land... ...in a military campaign and did not pass it on to the 12 tribes of Israel." That is what we learned, from the study of Archaeology. Now, why would a fellow who is the Professor of Archaeology in Israel, make a statement like that? We have to put this in a larger political context, and I think we can see that context if we compare it with the statement made by the late Yasser Arafat who is former president of the palestinian authority and I think you can appreciate why he would make a statement similar to this he says, "The notion a Jewish origin... ...in Jerusalem is a religious myth... ...used to justify occupation and colonialism." Well, he is fighting a political battle, he says that there never was a temple in Jerusalem, and there is no archaeological evidence anywhere; this is a myth! Many of the secular Jews, do not really care that much about the religious battle but they know that there is a lot of mad Palestinians... there is a war going on and they would like to live in peace. They do not like their malls being blown up and so you just do not say things that aggravate them. So, it is not going to help those who are religiously inclined, but so what? Peace is more important! This is the context that we see this battle going on in the middle of it. In spite of the effort to establish the right of Palestinians to the land or the Jewish right to the land based on Archaeology, we need to just back up and look at the evidence and see what the actual facts are and that is of course going to be our approach. We want to see what the evidence is for the Bible, for the history of Israel from the stones of Israel and I want to begin with the Altar of Joshua and I believe that is exactly what it is on Mount Ebal. In Deuteronomy 27, we find the instructions given, "...when you have crossed over the Jordan, you shall set up these stones, about which I am commanding you today on Mount Ebal, and you shall cover them with plaster. And you shall build an altar there to the LORD... ...an altar of stones on which you have not used an iron tool." And so it is a very specific type of altar, they wrote the law in the plaster. They were excellent stone cutters at this time, just phenomenal stonecutters, but no stones that were cut were to be used here. Verse 11 says, "The same day... Moses charged the people as follows: When you have crossed over... (you will) stand on Mount Gerizum for a blessing..." Then verse 13 says, "(you will) stand on Mount Ebal for the curse..." This is a good teaching method we are going to read you the law, now here is half of the group on this mountain and half of the group on the other mountain and you are going to recite what will happen if you keep this law and then the others are going to recite what would happen if you do not keep this law. And here is the blessings and here is the cursings, they understood exactly what happened, of course, we see those things taking place as they obeyed or as they did not obey. But this altar was the center of that event. This is up in Samaria and here we can see Mount Ebal and nearby Mount Gerizim. Dr. Adam Zertal, is the chairman or was the chairman of the Department of Archaeology at the University of Haifa. He was an atheist, he was taught in his education that Joshua, Moses, David, Solomon... were all fictitious creatures like Zeus and you do not believe this foolishness. But he is an archaeologist and he begins to look at what you can find from archaeology and he took the Area of Manasseh and over a period of about twenty years was doing a survey - meter by meter - of that area to see what could be found. And he found an altar, he knew nobody was ready to admit that this was an altar on Mount Gerizim. They looked on top and it was not there, and so they assumed that the altar that you read about in Deuteronomy was not there. Of course, the high places were reserved for the idols, when you study the Old Testament. Literally it says that this altar was in the mountain at about two-thirds the way up. And when he came across this during his survey, he reported it in the journals: Could this be Joshua's Altar? And there was just a surge of ridicule. Dr. Lawrence Stager, the Professor of Archaeology of Israel at Harvard University says, "If a sacrificial altar stood on Mount Ebal, its impact on our research is revolutionary... all of us have to go back to kindergarten." Because they are teaching that none of this happened - there was no Exodus, there was no Moses and no Joshua - but here is the altar just as it is described in Deuteronomy. Some say, "well no that is not really an altar, it is a farmhouse or it is a watchtower." Okay but it is not on top of the mountain and it is short and squatty, it is not a very good watchtower. It does not have any windows or doors, so it does not make a very good farmhouse. What is it? Well they began to look and we will let Adam Zertal in his own words tell you the implications of this (discovery). Adam Zertal: "If there was an altar on Mount Ebal, the most ancient and the first, Jewish or Israelite altar here. The meaning is that all the story of Deuteronomy and parts of the story in (the Book of) Joshua are scientifically true!" Don Patton: This is what I think is absolutely so, and even the enemies understood it and so they are opposed it. Here we see the altar looking across to Mount Gerizim, where the blessings were read and one of the things that impressed me when I was there was how do you get a group over here and a group that far away and you hear each other. We sent Dr. Willie Dye across to the other side, he has by the way 6 earned doctorates in Archaeology from Berkeley (University), he went across and we yelled as loud as we could you yell saying, "Dr. Dye! Can you hear us?" He said, "Yeah I can hear you." The acoustics were just, well you can not believe it unless you were there it was just astounding! It was apparently just designed to accomplish exactly what was done. As he continued to excavate and look at this area, we find a large complex here, where a large group of people were obviously camped. It has been restored to look like this and obviously this short, squatty building with the ramp going up with no steps is exactly what we see described in Deuteronomy, it probably look like this with its surface being covered by plaster and we are reminded there in verse 25 of Exodus 20 that it was not to be made of cut stones, you will not go up by steps, this is in contrast to all of the Canaanite altars, that you might find in the area, But exactly what you find (in the Bible). What do you find in the center? Well, they began to dig down into the center of the area and they found that it was filled with ashes - is not that a surprise - some of the vessels there had ashes in them and they allowed these ashes to be examined at the Department of Zoology at the University of Haifa. They found 942 bones indicating some 50 to 100 individuals and what kind of animals were these? If this was Canaanite altar, they would be sacrificing eagles, snakes and various animals but not so with the Israelites, what they found were sheep, goats and cattle. All kosher animals, if you please, and of the ones that they could determine the sex and the age, all of them were one year old males (Exodus 12:5; Numbers 7:57). Wow! This is not a Canaanite altar, it is not a farmhouse, it is not a watchtower. Pottery was also found and both culturally and with thermal luminescent dating, the two methods most appropriate for pottery, was dated to the time of the Exodus approximately the 13th century. In addition, he found Egyptian scarabs that came from Egypt, this is used often to date Egyptian artifacts this is from Ramses the Second, who was probably the one who was reigning at the time of the Exodus though it is not precise but generally the time of the Exodus, all on this fit and make a picture that is just very impressive. It was an honor to be a part of the excavation there but let us take note of the statement by Adam Zertal who was convinced as a result of this and other evidence that he uncovered that the Old Testament was God's Word and not only that but the Messiah that the Old Testament predicted was the Christ and he is a believer in Christ and has established a church up there in Samaria independent of any denomination or organization. They are teaching what appears to be New Testament Christianity to me - baptism for the remission of sins - about a group of 40 members up there in in the middle Palestinian territory. He published this material over a series of years, a number of articles as each was discovered and then made this comment: "What (has) happened regarding the new accumulation of fact (that) I have cited? Almost nothing. Since the appearance on the detailed report and the many articles (that) I have published on the excavation silence has descended on the scholarly world." They have nothing to say! Well I do, I think Professor Stager needs to go back to kindergarten. [Audience Laughs] That is what he said and I agree with him. We find that Adam has continued to work and decided that he would look in the area that the Bible indicated would be Gilgal this is where they (the Israelites) first camped when they came across the Jordan, no one had really investigated here because most of the archaeologist had no confidence that this was a true story anyway and they had not looked! And so he went to look. Joshua chapter 4: "...the people came up from the Jordan on the tenth of the first month and camped at Gilgal on the eastern edge of Jericho." Well, that is very specific now here is where it is: "Those twelve stones which they had taken from the Jordan, Joshua set up at Gilgal." Well he (Adam) found the spot and found more than he anticipated to find. He was just amazed. Here is a diagram that he has from his research, it is in the shape on a shoe, now at the "heel" you find a configuration that fits precisely the dimensions of the tabernacle which is what they set up here when they came across out on the "toe" you find a circular area there that we will look at again in a moment. But what is this about? And as he thought about it, he reflected back on Deuteronomy Chapter 11 where Moses told them that, "Every place on which the sole of your foot treads shall be yours; your border will be from the wilderness to Lebanon, from the river, to the Euphrates, as far as the western sea." And then Joshua said in Chapter 1, "Every place on which the sole of your foot treads, I have given it to you, just as I spoke to Moses." The people got there and they set up this area to make the claim, "This is ours!" and they set up this double pathway of stones; the pathway in between the the two rows of stones in the shape of a foot and evidently they marched around perhaps with the Ark of the Covenant saying basically, "This is ours!" and that "heel" portion that you can see again is exactly the dimensions of the tabernacle, and that circular area down near the "toe" has not been published yet, you would not be able to read this possibly until next year. But in the middle of that circular altar appearing is 12 standing stones. I think that is awesome! I know where those stones came from I believe, but here is a picture of that double pathway that surrounds and defines this foot, where they were making, I believe, the claim that this country is ours. As you look at this off in the distance you see Jericho; it is on the eastern edge just exactly where the Bible indicates it should be. As we go to Jericho, of course, a very famous area and where a great deal of archaeological work has been done, we recall Joshua Chapter 6 verse 3, "You shall march around the city, all the men of war....do so for six days." verse 4,"...priests shall carry the rams' horns..." they blow the rams' horns, or the trumpets. The "walls fall down," on the seventh day, so that the people "will go up straight ahead." Pretty amazing story, not exactly a reasonable sounding battle plan just march into there, go around and around and it falls down, well this is not a normal plan; this is a supernatural plan. And a lot of archaeologists have been here, the original archaeologist Garstang did work in the early 1900 and was confident that this was Joshua's Jericho, but then that was refuted, we are told. There is a cable car that allows you to go up and over the Tel (hill or mound), which you see here in the circle, this is the mound where the ancient city is found and quite a bit of excavation can be seen from the air. Not too many people riding the cable car nowadays, this is the Hamas headquarters. They have not quite got the knack for promoting tourism there, shooting everybody, but after Garstang had done his work, Kathleen Kenyon took over. She is one of the ones who we are told has modernized archaeology in Israel, and she says that the city belong to a much earlier time and could not be biblical Jericho based on the absence of the imported Cypriote ware pottery; this is special pottery from Cyprus. That should be there if this is Joshua's time and there is some fairly reasonable conclusions regarding that. She dug and she did not find it. And so she concluded it could not be Joshua's Jericho. She did acknowledge that things were burnt and the walls had fallen, the lack of pottery proved that it could not be Joshua's Jericho, and then she died, fortunately. We will have more to say about her later. Bryant Wood began to work there in the late 19th and after the turn of the century and found exactly what she said, would indicate that it was Joshua's Jericho but she said that it was not there, he found that it was! This is expensive pottery, she was digging in the poor part of the city, he said that you ought to look in the prosperous part (of the city) and he found a lot of them (Cypriot pottery). And by the way, we do have an excellent example of that Cypriot pottery back in the museum, in the artifact room that you can examine. But not only did he find the pottery - that she said would indicate Joshua's Jericho - he found a continuous series of Egyptian scarabs with dated inscriptions! How do you nail it down (confirm this) any better? An "...unbroken series extended from the eighteenth century B.C.," way before the Exodus, up to the time of the conquest (by Joshua) where it stops. An unbroken series right up to the time of the conquest and then it is over! There is no way to establish it any better than that! He found a number of things, some of which Kenyon had found, the remains of a fortified tower, storage containers that were indicated to have been full of grain at the time that it was burned. Normally, you would not find that with a conquered city because grain was a commodity much like our money today and so the people, who would conquer it, would take the grain but they did not here. Well, we know they were commanded not to take things from Jericho and furthermore in Joshua Chapter 3, we are told that when they came across the Jordan this was at the time of the harvest and so the storage containers would be full and they would leave them full and then the burned city was piled on top of them. Again confirming what we found, he found a revetment (retaining) wall at the base of the Tel, that had reinforced it. He found the falling brick outside that revetment wall that formed basically a ramp going up toward the city. Here are some of those fallen bricks where we were just a few months ago, this is the diagram that Bryant Wood made showing the fallen brick, making virtually a ramp going up the retaining wall toward the Tel and this is the way that they conquered the city. One of the most amazing things that he found, that just made chills go up and down my spine, there is one portion of the wall that was still remaining; the whole wall did not fall. There was one. Remember there was a promise that was made to one (person) whose house was on the wall that it would be preserved and we look at that one portion that is left and we see the house! I think I know who lived there! Joshua Chapter 2, "...she let them down by rope through the window for her house was on the city wall, so that she was living on wall." And she was promised that her house would be preserved. The only portion that was left! I find that thrilling! We move from there to consider the story of the Prophet Balaam, this has been one of the favorite objects of ridicule of the atheists, after all, he has a talking donkey, who in the world can believe that! And of course that story is preserved for us in the Book of Numbers. He was working with Moabites, the Ammonites; the enemies of the children of Israel. In the time of the Exodus they were marching toward the promised land and were mowing down the people (Canaanite tribes), one after another, and we see what they did to this group and to that group and the Moabites were afraid they would be conquered and so they hired themselves a prophet to curse the children of Israel - Balaam. At Tel Deir'Alla and the word "Tel" is a term for the mounds on which the cities were built, usually they had been destroyed several times. And the mound was the accumulation of destruction, they would build the next city on top of it and we find that all over Israel and in the area. But here is Tel Deir'Alla, this is on the other side of the Jordan as the Jabbok River meets the Jordan (river). And that was excavated just a few years ago and in this Tel, they found what was actually an administration building for the Amorites; this was not the Israelites, this is the enemies of the Israelites. And it was covered with plaster that had fallen off but on that plaster they had written various stories and down at the base of the wall you see the broken plaster that they could then put together written on with black and red ink. And like a jigsaw puzzle, they put this back together to see what the Amorites had to say and there were a number of administrative details that they had but as they put that together they found, of all things, the story of Balaam, the prophet - again not written by the Israelites but by the enemies. And here is one line which says, "Warnings given by Balaam, the son of Beor. A seer of the gods." Now, this is from the 8th century B.C. A story of Balaam, the prophet, by the enemies of God. Numbers 22 says, "So he sent messengers to Balaam, the son of Beor, at Pethor, which is near the River." They saw what Israel had done to the Amorites and here is what the Amorites had to say about it and of course we continue reading the latter part of the verse, "Behold, a people came out of Egypt..." This relates directly to the Exodus which the archaeologists deny today and of course relates to what we read in verse 28, "...the LORD opened the mouth of the donkey..." A crazy story? Well, we have archaeological confirmation, of that story and of that prophet from the enemies of the children of Israel! I think that is awesome! This material is now on display In Amman, Jordan and you can go there and look at it in the museum. Shiloh as the way it is referred to by most of the Israelis. Joshua Chapter 18 verse 1 says, "...the whole congregation of the sons of Isral assembled themselves at Shiloh, and set up the tent of meeting there..." This was the first permanent place for the Ark of the Covenant, during the period of the Judges and it stayed there for several hundred years. As you read further you see pretty specific instructions about where this was and so you can get obviously very close and we found a church in the area that was built about four hundred years after the time of Christ, the Byzantine period, to commemorate Shiloh, the place where they had parked the tabernacle - if you please - and the beautiful mosaic floor happened to match the dimensions of the tabernacle and so it was thought that this was the spot that had been chosen 400 years after Christ, long after of course, the actual event that was on the spot where the tabernacle was. Well, that is not really the case. Just recently with further excavation on the Tel, (specifically) the northern part that Tel, they found that this was just to commemorate the spot but not built on the spot. This is the gate that they found and that opens the way to the path that leads up to the plateau where the tabernacle actually was and it is so well confirmed that even the Department of Antiquities there in israel has put up a plaque saying that this was in all probability is where the tabernacle stood. Up on that plateau, that has been newly excavated, we have this stone wall which was the base, now you cannot really get the dimensions in this picture; we will get more in just a moment. But the thing that really "nailed this down" (confirmed this) was they found fourth century B.C. inscriptions, this is 800 years earlier than this Byzantine church, that clearly identified this as Shiloh. Now, it did not really say "Welcome to Shiloh," but it was pretty close four hundred years before the time of Christ. And as we look at the outline here in stone we see where the tent poles were; the holes (for the poles), in regular intervals that go right around (the perimeter) and were to support the tabernacle. Looking at this picture, you really need to be fifty feet (50') in the air, which was kind of hard me to do, but with the line here you can see the dimensions of the tabernacle which fit beautifully. This is where the tabernacle was for well over 300 years and where they worshiped during the period of the Judges. This was the "capital" of Israel during that period - if you please - this was where the sacrifices and the annual feasts took place, where the land was allotted to the tribes, where Eli judged, and Hannah prayed and Samuel served and where Eli fell and died, actually it was not here at this spot (on screen). The text says that when he heard the story of the capture of the Ark and of the loss on the battle and the death of his sons, he (Eli) was at the gate. Well we found the gate, if you recall that leads to this place, this is where he would have been sitting and where he fell and died. From all the evidence, it has convinced even the skeptics. One after another...this... ...the inscriptions were found in the last six months so it is just almost every month we are finding new confirmation. The Fortified Gates of Solomon have been known for a half-dozen years but they are an interesting confirmation of what we read in for First Kings Chapter 9, this is the account of the forced labor which King Solomon levied to build the House of Lord, his own house and Milo; this is in Jerusalem, and then also he built at Hazor and Megiddo and Gezer. Well of course, Solomon is this fictitious creature like Zeus that the real scholars do not believe in. But, what did he do at Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer? Well, you go there and you find these strange-looking gates that guard the city. It is very, difficult to break through these gates into the city, with this kind of fortification and the places where you find these gates are at Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer and the pottery that we found associated with the gates is from the time of Solomon. Is not that a surprise? I think that is exactly what the text describes that is where Solomon built (them). One of the most exciting bits of evidence was found a number of years ago but brand new evidence has been uncovered within the last two years. It involved 2 silver amulets, from the 7th century B.C. They were found in Jerusalem at the place now occupied by St. Andrews Scottish Presbyterian Church just south of Old Jerusalem. The first find, was made in 1979 Gordon Franz was the supervisor of this dig actually under the guidance of the director, Gabriel Barkay, who was not there when the actual find took placed. Judith Hadley is the one who actually found the silver amulets, she was a graduate student at Wheaton College and she is now a professor at Villanova University. But one of her colleagues is laying here in what was a tomb; it is a collapsed tomb near was over him at the time that this was originally built and under where he was laying is a storage area with a number of pottery and various artifacts and it was in the corner as Barkay is indicating in the inset there that this amazing find was made, silver amulets that were rolled up but they had inscriptions on them from the Bible. This is from Numbers Chapter 6 verse 24, "The Lord bless you, and keep you...make His face shine upon you..." The Priestly Blessing, was what the priest wore around their neck, they inscribed this on the pieces of silver rolled it up and wore it as an amulet. This is from Jeremiah's time clearly identified from the pottery as well as from other cultural implications and really not to even contested by the Liberals. Well, how did they inscribed (these words) so well on silver? In fact, we found with infrared technology in the last two years much more than what they originally found (written). Numbers 6:24, 25 and 26 were very obvious as we developed more technology, reported in the New York Times by the way just two years ago, almost the whole chapter of the context is engraved on the back of it! How did they do that? I think we get a hint from Jeremiah 17, where we read, "The sin of Judah is written down with an iron stylus; With a diamond point it is engraved upon the tablet of their heart," evidently they were doing some engraving with diamonds at the end of an iron stylus and so on this, you do you have the text. Now, the significance we relate it to this morning, when we were talking about the Dead Sea Scrolls, the documentary hypothesis says these books that comprise the earliest books supposedly written by Moses and the early writers were not written then at all, but written after the captivity and this is what the "documentary hypothesis" is supposed to approved and then we found some of the Dead Sea Scrolls that were actual copies of the Paleo-Hebrew (ancient Hebrew) which had to have been written prior to the Exile, because that was the only time that style was used. Now, when they found the 300 B.C. copies it was not from before the Exile but there were copies of what was before the Exile. This (on screen) was not a copy! This was written before the Exile. This was written 400 years older than the Dead Sea Scrolls! And it is precisely like the text that we have today. Identical! Two renditions of it and almost a whole chapter on the back side, 400 years older than the Dead Sea Scrolls! That just says to people that have given their faith to the "Documentary Hypothesis," have made fools out of themselves, as they try to deny the Word of God. We move to Tel Dan, this is up at the northern end of Israel. Now, we can see Mount Hermon in the background, this is the northern extremity of Israel and there we find Dan. You remember when the kingdom (of Israel) split and Rehoboam took the ten tribes to the north and he set up at Dan and at Bethel, altars, to keep them from going back to Jerusalem. Now, even the Department of Antiquities now have recognized that they have found that altar at Dan and they have their signs put up that commemorates Jeroboam's Altar at Tel Dan. This is a picture of the metal part that has been restored but they have found with the utensils, clear indications that, that is what that is. This is Dr. Clifford Wilson who was the head of excavations at Gezer for a number of years. He is a very strong believer in the Word of God, the utensils that they found, that were used by the priests to offer the sacrifices are now in the museum there in Jerusalem this was one of two altars you remember, at Dan and at Bethel. Well the altar at Bethel was destroyed was not it? By the curse remember the young prophet and the old prophet in that story, that he cursed that altar and it split (1 Kings 13:4) this one did not! And it is this one that we have found. On the southern side, of the city of Dan, that has been excavated over a number of years we see the gate to the city. A number places in the Old Testament you read that they sat the gates and this is where judgment was rendered, remember that Job sat at the gates in the city (Job 29:7) and others had judgment rendered there. This is a scene that gives insight into that, here is where the judge sat, the elders sat beside him, now these wooden poles, of course, had been restored but they fit into the sockets that were there and they were for the wooden poles and looked just like this. Just outside that gate, another excavation took place in 1993, here is where the gate was that we just looked at, just outside an inscription that formed a stele, this is an upright stone with writing on it, commemorating some historical event typically, was found in 1993 by an official provenance dig. One of the objections the archaeological people make if you find something that they do not like, they say, "Well it is not a provenience dig; it was not under the authority of the Department of Antiquities." And most of the great finds - like the Dead Sea Scrolls - were not found in that manner, but this was, this was by one of the leading archaeologists in Israel, a provenience dig under the auspices (support) of the Department of Antiquities and it describes a battle between Hazael, the king of Aram and the kings of Judah and Israel, again this was written by the enemes, by the one who actually defeated Israel and basically it says that I (Hazael) just "whooped them bad" (utterly defeated them) or that I (Hazael) destroyed (defeated) the "House of David." Now, one of the statements that you find commonly in the standard text books is that there is no reference to David, there is no archaeological evidence for this great kingdom, we will see some of that in just a moment. And it is not so! And here is absolute proof that there was a House of David and that this claim that they never existed, is just dishonest! Because it has been archaeologically confirmed again by the enemies of God. (End of Part 1) Stones of Israel Part 2: Presented by Don Patton, Ph.D. I have been in one of the Area Supervisors for the City of David, now for about four years and I am working with some... ...some very brave men. The City of David, we often think refers to Bethlehem and there is a sense in which that can be called the City of David but that is the term that was used by David to refer to the city that he conquered from the Jebusites, that was Jerusalem. Second Samuel 5 tells us that the king's men, "....went to Jerusalem against the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, and they said to David, 'You shall not come in here, but the blind and lame will turn you away'; thinking, 'David cannot enter here.'" It was a highly fortified city, this is long after they conquered the land, took possession of it, lived in it, this was about the last thing that was done back all the way to David's time. This was a strong fortification that had not been conquered. "Nevertheless, David captured the stronghold of Zion, that is the city of David." And we continue to read how that happened, verse 8, "...David said on that day, 'Whoever climbs up by way in the water shaft and defeats the Jebusites (the lame and the blind, who are hated by David's soul), he shall be chief and captain.'" As we read the story we find that Joab was the one who was brave enough to go up the water shaft and got inside the city, opened the gates and said okay fellows come on in and they marched in and took the city. Verse 9, says, "So David lived in the stronghold and called it the city of David. And David built all around from Milo and inward." This "Milo," we did not know what that was but I think we have got a pretty good idea at this point. Continuing, "David became greater and greater, for the LORD God of hosts was with him. Then Hiram king of Tyre sent messengers to David with cedar trees and carpenters and stonemasons; and they built a house for David." Okay here is this great king, with these great monuments that were built; monumental buildings, and he became greater and greater! Where is the evidence? Well there is sort of a "catch-22" (dilemma) here: What happened? The Babylonians came in and destroyed it. And what happens to cedar when you set fire to it? It burns! On the other hand, if you were to find this house of David built with cedar and of course stone as well, then you would know that the story was false! But you do not find it - they (skeptics) say, "Well see it is false!" But you should find evidence, and foundations and indications that it was there and indeed we do. But let us look at some historical background to the contest here over the city of David and it again with Kathleen Kenyon again. She was of course from Oxford University and is noted for "modernized" archaeology in Israel, that means, that she got people to disbelieve the Bible. She worked in Jericho from 1952 to 1958. as we have indicated and spent time there. And after she finished in Jericho, she worked on City of David from 1961 to 1968. And here is her conclusion, "It may seem disappointing that the excavations have discovered none of the buildings of David's city...virtually no area remains in which there is any hope of the finds of the period... The whole of this area must therefore be written off as far as any knowledge of early Jerusalem is concerned." But just forget about it; there is nothing here, go away. Do not even look! I (Kathleen) have looked and it is over. And a lot of people were influenced by that She died, and then Yigal Shiloh took over the excavations at the City of David and did a very courageous job! Now he became sick and died an early death. He excavated from 1978 to 1985 and died before his finds were published, but he refuted Kenyon's work just step-by-step. He was a very courageous person. Jane Cahill is in the process of publishing his work and I have received copies of the original work and it is in the process of being published. In the meantime, since he died, the digs there in the city of David have been taken over by Ronny Reich and Eli Shukron, who is my supervisor and one that we have worked with there for a number of years, and these men, I think they are very brave men for exposing the truth under fierce opposition. Now, Ronny Reich is more the politician, he does not come out as brashly as Eli Shukron does, who just tell is as it is, and has gotten into some trouble but nevertheless, they are fighting for the truth. On the other side, opposing what they are doing, are men like Israel Finkelstein of Tel Aviv University. He is the Director of the Institute of Archaeology and I think you need to know what is being said in opposition to get the context of these investigations. He says, and this was in 2003, "...almost no signs of monumental building operations... The mythical united monarchy is a literary construct..." And from the way that he is standing there, you can get an idea of where he is coming from. And that is not an illusion, he is not a Bible believer obviously, in fact, he was lecturing here in the United States recently, and his seminar was entitled, "What, No Moses?" And of course, that is what he was contending for. His colleague, David Ussishkin, there at Tel Aviv University made this comment in the same publication, "I am afraid that evidence regarding the magnificent Solomonic capital was not discovered because it is nonexistent, not because it still hidden in the ground." Now that is in Israel where they have some opposition and [Don chuckles] that might sound like wild and reckless but you have not seen wild and reckless until you get over to Europe, where they build upon that (false idea) and just really exaggerate Here is Niles Peter Lemche at the University of Copenhagen "Archaeological data have now definitely confirmed that the empire of David and Solomon never existed." Now, how does archaeological data confirmed that something never existed? You could confirm something did exist but maybe you may find something tomorrow that confirms it, but you have not found it today, and so anyway that is another story. Jane Cahill, the successor or at least publisher of Shiloh's material, is likewise a courageous individual who is fighting back and in Biblical Archaeological Review in 2004 she says, "The most frequently voiced argument by those who challenge the historical existence of the United Monarchy is a supposed..." And I would underscore supposed! "...lack of archaeological evidence." Now, you do not find the palace of David with all the cedar planks and this huge structure, monumental buildings that were destroyed by Babylonians and by Romans but still it is appropriate to say it is "a supposed lack of evidence." And "In most cases..." she continues saying, "...these arguments are either grossly misleading, illogical, disingenuous or all three." Now you might think, "Well she is "a little over the top" (exagerating) here in her response, but let us look at the evidence first before you make that judgment and see if that kind of a statement is justified. What is the evidence for this City of David?" We are looking here at the Temple Mount and the triangular area (on screen) just south of the Temple Mount was the area that was occupied by the Jebusites and that is referred to as the City of David. The earliest reference to this city is from the Amarna Letters that date back to the 14th century B.C. This is considerably, I believe, before the Exodus, and here is a letter from the ruler of Jerusalem to the Egyptian Pharaoh and in the inset here - the white boxed letters - you see a reference to Jerusalem, before the Exodus! After, of course, the Exodus, and after David and his people arrived, then we likewise see evidence. This is the way it has been reconstructed; this is the way they believe it appeared at the time that David arrived on the scene. We see the irrigation system over on the right hand side, I think the pool of Siloam is down at the bottom, up at the top we see the temple, that was ultimately built by Solomon, and David's palace there below that. The thing that came under first investigation by Cahill and by others was the area that is referred to as the "step structure" that the arrow was pointing to, obviously something is going on here, Cahill tried to say that it was built by a number of different people over hundreds of years. Yigal Shiloh refuted that by citing the square shaft that you see up at the top and with that shaft showed that the whole thing was interconnected and interdependent and had to be built, at the same time; not over long periods, but was built by the Jebusites and was there at the time that David arrived. On foot of this sloping step structure, which is the foundation of obviously something that had to be really big - what needs that kind of a foundation? It has been estimated to maybe a six-story building, you would not need that much foundation without it. On the foot, you see later buildings and this dates back to the end of the First Temple period just before the Babylonians marched in and especially in one of these structures on the foot, later structures, you have what is referred to as the "Archive Building," for a good reason, important papers were kept here. Well, the papers were burned, they are not available to us, but the papers were sealed with a clay seal, stamped by a signet ring or by stamp of the official who was sending this important document. And this is where a number of them were stored because you find a lot of the seals and when it was burned, actually the fire... ...fired up the clay and helped to preserve it, 51 of these stamps referred to as "bullae" have been found from this Archive Building that dates to the time of the end of the First Temple period right up to the time when the Babylonians came in and burned it. As we pointed out, these seals are often used to date things and you see that the thing that did this impression is on the left side and the stamped clay that has been fired is on the right hand side, 51 of these were found and as they began to look and read what they said, it was astounding! Here is one from as Azariah, the son of Hilkiah who is mentioned in First Chronicles 9, this was a member of the family of high priests who officiated, at the end of the First Temple period, then we read of Gemariah, the son of Shaphan, he was one of the scribes, a high official in the court of Jehoiakim, who was the king at the time that the Babylonians came marching in, and reigned at the end of the First Temple period. Then Baruch, mentioned in the same verse, if you are familiar with Jeremiah, this was his scribe. He (Baruch) is mentioned some 26 times by Jeremiah and we have two of Baruch's seals, actually one of them has his thumb print, in the back of it. This rather liberal, I would say semi-liberal, archaeology book published in 1998, "Archaeology in the Old Testament" says "This lump of clay used to closed a papyrus document, was sealed by none other than Baruch, the son of Neriah," specifying here, Jeremiah 36:4. Then the king's son who gave the orders to seize Jeremiah and to throw him into the pit, Jerahmeel, his seal (is there). I mean these were the kind to people that would have documents with their stamp on them and that is what we find in this Archive Building, with the seal of king's son in there. Actually of the 51 bullae that were found, they attest to 26 people mentioned in the Bible, 26 out of the 51 you have referenced to! And of course, the Bible would be describing the officials of the court. Wow! How do you get greater and more obvious confirmation, that the Bible knows what it is talking about? When it describes these people. Let us move back in history to the water shaft, that is mentioned that Joab went up to conquer the city. First Samuel Chapter 5, "'Whoever climbs up by way of the water shaft and defeats the Jebusites...'" There has been a lot of questions about this and some things that were proposed as the water shaft that really were not. But there was an irrigation system, a spring, we will look at that in just a moment, in the city of Jerusalem. And water from that spring, ran down the outside edge and then there were holes that allowed the water to go out into the fields - to irrigate. So, Joab went through one of those holes, came up that water shaft and then entered the city. Today, you can walk right down that water shaft as my wife is doing here and if you travel over there, this is one of the things that you want to do, just like Joab did. The water comes from the Gihon Springs, which is of course mentioned numerous times in the Bible, it provides water for the city of Jerusalem and is one of the few sources of water in Israel, and it is a very prolific spring, mentioned in Second Chronicles 32, "It was Hezekiah who stopped the upper outlet of the waters of Gihon and directed them to the west side of the city..." They of course now occupy the city and here comes in Sennacherib (king of Assyria) ready to attack the city, it was the Assyrian king. And (Hezekiah thought) okay maybe they are going to come up the water shaft like Joab did, so we have got to protect this (shaft), and he did so with an outer wall and by redirecting the water back to the western side of the city. When you look there at the spring and you can see the shaft that was cut, where it is pointed toward the western side of the city. And we will see where that shaft goes in just a moment but there at Gihon, there was a tower that was surrounding it, that formed a large area where Solomon was coronated. And we look to First Kings Chapter 1, "The king said (this is king David) to them, 'Take with you the servants of your lord, and have my son Solomon ride on my own mule, and bring him down to Gihon (where the springs are). "Let Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anoint him... and blow the trumpet..." Here is a big ceremony that they are going to have. And it would be in this restored area in the center of this area pointed to by the yellow arrow. That is where the spring is and these towers were built around it, to protect the spring, well they are not really towers, it really is just one tower that we have found out now since this picture was drawn. Where is this area that the coronation took place? There was a little room about 8 feet by 12 feet (8' by 12') that the archaeologists said, "This is all it could be." David Aleed, is one of the archaeologist who is working there with us in the city of David, was listening to one the tour guides say this and thinking about what he had read in scripture. There were mules in here, the prophets were there and there was a big ceremony in this little room? This just does not make any sense! And he just kind of went berserk, they thought, grabbed up a sledgehammer and started beating on a wall he said, "There has to be more than this!" And the wall was actually built (the one that he was beating on) by queen Helena some 300 years after Christ. She was the mother of Constantine and made a lot of messes over there (in Israel). He broke the wall down and it opened up into this huge area, not quite as big as this auditorium but close, certainly room for several mules and the ceremony that they were talking about as would be reflected in the area that you are looking at here that is inside that area, there at the spring of Gihon. Water was also stored from the spring at a pool that we have determined dates back to the time of Melchizedek but at the time that Sennacherib came, they decided to fill it in because this was to protect the water from anyone who would be coming and that was militarily significant. We were involved in helping to excavate that pool which had been filled in by king Hezekiah and you see all kinds of pottery and artifacts and idols from the time of Hezekiah. And at this point we see, my son at the center and then a broken idol that he found at the excavation there. There was several of them, every one of the idols that had been found, were broken. Many of the jars were intact, many of the oil lamps were intact, but all of the idols were broken. Well, Hezekiah did not get along well with the idolaters did he? He helped to destroy, bring down, break down the idols and he broke the idols (2 Kings 18:4) before he piled them into the pool. This is the south end of a northbound calf, which they typically worshiped. The text says that he diverted the water to the west side of the city (2 Chronicles 32:30) and we saw the little outlet there from this spring that headed to the west side, again Second Chronicles 32, "...Hezekiah stopped... the waters of Gihon and directed them to the west side..." And "...made the pool and the conduit... brought the water in the city...(2 Kings 20:20)" This is a diagram of what we are looking at, here is the Gihon springs there in red and the dark line is the tunnel that Hezekiah dug to redirect the water, from the original course indicated by the light blue line, which he then protected by an outer wall as we will see but the water then went down this dark blue line, it was through a tunnel that he had dug. Well, you can walk down those tunnels that are described in scripture as being built by Hezekiah. And there is an inscription that was found, several years ago, that described how the tunnel was built. This is a picture on it, it described beginning from either end and as they approached they could hear each other and they finally met "as axe was against axe," against the length of the tunnel - it is there - just like the Scriptures would indicate and as confirmed by the inscription. That tunnel continued down to the pool of Siloam, the text says in Scripture. Well, here is this little bitty (tiny) pool that the tunnel goes to, that was a puzzle because the pool of Siloam ought to be more significant than this. And it is just a little dinky (small) thing that you can see here in this picture, that the tunnel does go to, and the scripture says okay it goes to the tunnel but this is not much of a pool. Actually, what is built around it is Byzantine, so it is not really very old. What we found was that, that is not the Pool of Siloam, this light blue area lower (down) is a much larger pool; it is well over an acre, then we found in 2004. But wait a minute, the the tunnel does not go down to the big pool! Well, yes it does! We found out last year, rather last summer, as we helped to excavate, the tunnel just kept right on going passed that little dinky thing (that they have been saying is the Pool of Siloam for years), to the big pool (actual pool). Let us go back up to the Gihon Springs, where there were towers built around to protect it. And that tower, I think is referred to in Scripture in Luke Chapter 13 but it is pointed to here by the arrow. Now remember Jesus said, "...do you suppose that these eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse culprits than all the men who... (Luke 13:4)" Eighteen people were killed here! And sure enough, we found where that tower had fallen and these huge stones that were probably laid there by the the Jebusites had fallen and that was what had been protecting. And this was where eighteen people were killed and actually we got a nineteenth. [Audience laughs] No, that is actually my son, here posing as the nineteenth. He (my son) found the vertebrae here of a donkey, right next to the tower as we were excavating, and came up with the theory that maybe the donkey kicked tower over. I do not think so [Don chuckles]. We were enjoying ourselves as we were excavating this area. The Wall of Hezekiah is a very impressive find, found by Eli Shukron, again back in Second Chronicles 32:2, "...Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib had come and that he intended to make war on Jerusalem... he took courage and rebuilt all the wall that had been broken down and erected towers on it, and built another outside wall..." So in addition to redirecting the water to the west side, he built an outside wall, that we see here protecting what Joab had climbed up through. And here it is! Kenyon referred to this specifically but said that it did not exist! "There is no wall!" "If there was a wall, then I (Kathleen) would have found it!" Well, if she had been looking for it, I think she would have found it. Obviously, I mean this is hard to miss; this is huge! But when you are not looking for it and do not believe that it is there, then it is easy to miss. And she did (not believe), but it is obviously there, just as described in scripture. On the west side, the far extremity, there is a description of the wall that was built, when Nehemiah was rebuilding the walls, in (Nehemiah) Chapter 2:17, he rebuilt the wall of Jerusalem. In verse 8 of chapter 3 says that they restored Jerusalem as far as the broad wall. This is as far as the western direction (for Jerusalem), goes. Well, you go to the western side, and you look at the wall and there it is, and it is 23 feet (23') across, that is the broadest part, of that rebuilt wall. And that is exactly, the way that it is described. The tombs of the House of David were one of the things that Kenyon referred to and said there is no reference to the tomb in First Kings 2, it says that, "...David slept his fathers was buried..." Well if you find some of the tombs of the prophets, and there are several there, you ought to certainly find where David was buried, well we did! It was difficult because Queen Helena had made this her quarry, and I think it was a beautiful edifice initially - there are several indications of that - but you see where the square areas are, she was quarrying stones here to build her buildings and had destroyed this but even the liberals now acknowledge, "Yes, this is is David and Solomon's tombs. And they were probably beautiful before Queen Helen destroyed them. The walls that surrounded the Temple, a few portions of that do remain, Remember of course, the story of the Romans marching in, destroying Herod's Temple and a portion of the retaining wall; not the Temple, but the retaining wall is seen here in what is referred to often as the "Wailing Wall," or the "Western Wall." The upper portion, that you can just barely see with the smaller stones, was built by the Crusaders. The mid section was done by Hadrian, but the lower section - the much bigger and more elaborate stones, were laid down by Herod, And actually they continue about 30 feet below the street level there, you can not see all of it, but here is some of those large stones that Herod built and you can see the bosses (finishing) around the edges. The southern extremity of that same wall was excavated about fifteen years ago and it is really interesting! Again you see the small stones up top that were done by the Crusaders and then at the base, you see Herod's wall, but notice this structure here in the side, it probably looked like this. In fact, there is really good indication that it is referred to as "Robinson's Arch." He excavated and found this, a good while back about a hundred years ago. Though, they had not excavated below that but this is where that arch connected and led to shops - first century shops - that are down here in the foreground. It was arched over a first century street. But all where the Crusaders have built here, there were huge buildings; very elaborate buildings that came tumbling down when the Romans destroyed this - again not the Temple walls - but the retaining wall around the Temple. And what we see at the base of that wall is where those huge stones hit that first century street and just pummeled it; destroyed it, which is exactly what we read about in scripture. So those walls together with the fact that they have fallen, all testifies to just exactly what we read about in Scripture. As we read the description of the Temple Mount and the Pool of Siloam and this area of the city of David, we read of the stairs that go down to the pool. Nehemiah 3:15, when they were rebuilding it, spoke of the Pool of Siloam and the stairs that go down from the city of David. Well, about ten years ago a bible-believing archaeologist excavated on the south side where they would be going down and found the stairs that go down - according to the Scriptures - to the Pool of Siloam. Now, it is about half of 1 mile down there and so we have not got all of them (stairs), but they began looking at these stairs. Now, these would be significant. These are the stairs that Jesus stood on, these are the stairs that the apostles stood on. Right here, is the gate "Beautiful," the edifice built into it and covering it up was built by - Guess who? [Don chuckles] Queen Helena, Constantine's mother, now why did she do this? I am not sure, I do not know. But she covered up the gate "Beautiful" but right below where that area is, is where the lame man in Acts Chapter 3 jumped up and that is where Peter and John were preaching. As we turn to the right we can see those stairs extending along with southern extent of the Temple Mount and toward the Mount of Olives, in the background. We are reminded of the statement that from the Temple to the Mount of Olives was a Sabbath day's journey (Acts 1:12) - how long was that? Well, there it is, you can see (how close it is). And as you turn back around to the right again you see down those stairs toward the city of David, actually a little bit more to the right, going down those stairs, we have sunk shafts and those stairs do continue all the way down to the Pool of Siloam, Though, we could not find them as we neared the pool. This is referred to in John 9, where Jesus told the blind man, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam." As we suggested in 2004, we finally found the real pool which is this green area, covered by the fig trees and pomegranates, and owned by the Anglican Church who say, "This is our Fig tree grove and you can not have it." [Don chuckles] We are negotiating at this point, but in June of 2004, they were repairing a sewer pipe and as they did, they found these steps going down. Eli Shukron immediately recognized this as the Pool of Siloam, though he was ridiculed by many! By November of that year, when we were there, we took this picture. Obviously, much more had been excavated. And then by June of 2005, it looked like this, now we still do not have a permit. We have a permit to fix the sewer pipe, and so we are fixing the daylights out of that sewer pipe. [Audience Laughs] But this is what we believe the pool looked like, from some shafts that we have been able to sink in various areas. You can baptize 3,000 people there, all at the same time. A magnificent pool. The Temple Mount is back to the left, this escarpment over here is blocking the way. And where are the stairs that go up to the Temple Mount? Well, there are stairs that we found over here (at the red arrow), and they led to a plaza with a colonnade and we thought, "Well maybe they go this direction and then they turn and go back to the north." The more we excavated, the more realize that was not the case, but here is the extension as we showed that goes all the way down to the pool of Siloam. We have been excavating there since 2004 and here is my wife working with Ronny Reich, here in the red shirt, remember, one of the supervisors and this is the way it looked last June. Obviously, a huge pool but where are the stairs? Well this escarpment over here on the right is blocking the way and we kept looking. Here is the description again from the Nehemiah Chapter 3, "...repaired the wall by the Pool of Siloam... the steps going down from the City of David." Well, here we see one of the supervisors marching toward the area and this arrow is pointing to what was found just a few months ago. There was an area in this is escarpment that was just a little too symmetrical. It had been filled in with the debris from the destruction of Jerusalem and it covered over this huge tunnel that went through the escarpment. and so you see the wooden stairs there just barely that lead right up to that area and as we stepped through that we said, "Wow, there are the stairs!" That we have been looking for that go right on up to the Temple Mount. We learned more about that from Josephus who describes these stairs and a tunnel that is underneath them. It was a sewage tunnel originally, but here we read that, "...news have reached him that many had earlier escaped from the sieges of Jerusalem had collected there." They were trying to get out of Jerusalem when siege was laid by the Romans. "Arriving (there) at the spot..." that is, the Romans, they found these Jews who were in this tunnel down under the stairs and "...he (Machaerus) ordered the infantry to... break down into the streets..." Under the stairs, and you can see where the holes are broken there in this in the stairway. And they poured boiling oil down into the tunnel and killed 3000 Jews, according to Josephus. Of course, many more were killed in the siege but this was one of the tragedies. We can go into that tunnel, we can see where they were and here you see the stairs above them and the tunnel below. And that has been extended in the last few months and gets much larger about 10 feet high. Notice the statement by Eli Shukron who is one of the directors there in the city of David. He says, "...many (of the) Jews tried to escape Jerusalem. When the Romans pursued them, they broke the flagstone and descended into the canals of the drainage system, hiding there for days at a time, as was described by Josephus Flavius. "You know what we discovered here, inside these tunnels? We found cooking vessels and pots, with the remnants of food inside; (which Josephus by the way had mentioned)..." "...stone vessels and other objects still presrerved from that era. Our assumption is that these vessels were used by the Jews who were hiding here, until they were caught by the Roman soldiers." If you look in our artifact room, you will see one of those pots that he refers to you, that the Jews were carrying with them when they were burned alive in the tunnel. A much larger portion has just been revealed and was announced September the 11th of this year and so this is an ongoing saga. But we found it, because we believe what the Bible says! And we are looking exactly where the Bible says it should be, and that is where we found it. Let me mention one more thing before we conclude this evening, this was announced in the New York Times in 2005. "King David's Palace Is Found..." The thing that Kenyon said is not there, do not look... just forget it. "An Israeli archaeologists says she has uncovered in East Jerusalem what may be the fabled palace of the biblical King David. "...king of Tyre sent messengers to David with cedar trees and carpenters and stonemasons; and they build a house for David (Second Samuel 5:11). Tyre is the capital of Phoenicia, and he is building a house for David, who must have married his daughter, and so we would look for a Phoenician style palace in the middle in Jerusalem, which would be rather easy to identify and that is exactly what Dr. Eilat Mazar has found. She is with Hebrew University, it was her grandfather who found those steps on the southern part of the Temple Mount that is there beside the gate "Beautiful." Where is this monumental building? Well, here is a monumental building that she found, it is huge! This is what was uncovered actually just a... ...this picture was taken this year and that is just a part of it. It continues on the other side of the street! It is at least six stories (storeys) high and from this picture on the other side of the street, where we working this past summer, you can see the levels as it goes down and down and down it is huge! Monumental is a...[Don chuckles] ...almost a trivial word by comparison. It was a joy to be able to work there and to be able to help excavate this. You can get a little bit of an idea of the work that is going on. Looking at the pottery, we found that this was clearly identified, some of it pictured here in place as it was being uncovered, is from the 10th century which is definitely identifying it as the time of David. The location is seen just below the Temple Mount as indicated here by this red square (on screen). Notice, her description of how she found it, and this is from the New York Times, "Archaeology is technical, but you dig with a mind open to historical sources, and anything can help. I work with the Bible in one hand and the tools of excavation in the other, and try to consider everything...one of the main clues in finding King David's palace," says Mazar, "was surprisingly from the Bible itself." 2 Samuel 5:17, "....David heard about it and went down from his palace to the citadel." And we know where the citadel (city) was, the palace has to be up above. And so she published in one of the technical journals, "This is where the Bible says it ought to be, and I need to raise some money. I want to go dig (paraphrasing)." This is a test on what the Bible says, before anything was found! And that is where she dug and she found it! Just exactly as she had published that she should find it. Notice, the way that this was analyzed. I think scientifically in one of the commentaries there from Jerusalem. "We have a biblical text describing in detail the creation of a Phoenician-style palace by David high up on a particular mountain..." (On a particular mountain you got a Phoenician-style palace and we got the text describing it). "...around the end of the eleventh or beginning of the tenth century before the current era (b.c.e.). Then, "...we have a grand structure of the Phoenician-style dating from the same time, on the summit of that very mountain, located with assistance from the text and previous archaeological discoveries..." "...This was not stumbled upon, moreover, but carefully hypothesized, and the current dig was proposed as the test. The likelihood of this happening by chance is extremely small." And I think you just have to say, "Amen!" This is the way that science should proceed, it did and it is confirmed! Sorry liberals, that is just the way it is! So, let us summarize looking at the evidence of the stones. Began with the Altar of Joshua on Mount Ebal, the Gilgal stones from Jordan, the Fallen Walls of Jericho and Rahab's house, the Balaam inscription, the Shiloh plateau, the Fortified Gates of Solomon, the Hebrew text from Jeremiah's time, Jeroboam's altar at Dan and the "House of David" inscription. And then we get to the City of David, and we see first the 14th century cuniform tablets identifying it before the Exodus,the Stronghold of Zion (this stepped structure), the Administration Buildings built on the foot of it with 51 bullae (with 26 characters from Scripture identified), Joab's Water Shaft, the Gihon Spring, the Coronation Site (found because he believed what the Bible said), the Pool of Melchizedek, the Tunnels of Hezekiah, the Tower of Siloam (that fell), Hezekiah's Wall (a huge wall), the rebuilt broad walls by Nehemiah, the tombs of David and Solomon, the Pool of Siloam, the stairs from the Temple down to the pool and the palace of David (monumental palace, almost 200 yards across and the six storeys (stories) high! Jane Cahill was telling the truth! When she says there is "a supposed lack of archaeological evidence" and she is not over the top (exaggerating) when she says, "In most cases these arguments (denying this)...are grossly misleading, illogical, disingenuous..." Or as I would say all three! You know, to put it in Texan terms, "They are just lying through their teeth!" When they say that there is no evidence for the City of David. Grossly misleading, illogical and disingenuous! We will conclude with a statement again by Adam Zertal. He had been surveying Manasseh, now for twenty years, beginning as an atheist and wounding up (ending) as a believer (in Christ). He says, "After years of research, however, I believe it impossible to explore Israel's origins without the Bible... again and again we have seen the historical value of the Bible...Again and again we have seen that an accurate memory has been preserved in its transmuted narratives... waiting to be unearthed and exposed..." (Not just by imagined stories in a Sunday School lesson but) "...by archaeological fieldwork and critical mind work." This is referring to his effort there in the Manasseh Survey. "The area is relevant in particular for the reliability of the early Bible." "...nearly 1000 new sights..." (Now this is what he has found in the twenty years of the survey just in the Manasseh area. A thousand new sites that can be referenced in scripture!) "...create a new archaeological reality, which connects the books of Deuteronomy, Joshua and Judges to the territory where they have happened." A thousand data points is pretty heavy (very strong). How do you argue with that? That is just... ...I think unanswerable which is what he is saying, and so when we consider the actual evidence, apart from the political battles and the religious denials, the evidence is just overwhelming and we have exactly what Peter commands us to give (1 Peter 3:15)! A ready defense, a reason for the hope that is in us. That will stand and will embarrass the opposition. Stones of Israel Part 2: presented by Don Patton, Ph.D. End