The Lack of Evidence in Biblical Archaeology
Lesson 1: Introduction
Everyone has heard of archaeological discoveries. The major finds are broadcast throughout the world via newspapers, television and the now the internet. The problem with such media proclamations is that the unaware or the uninformed will often assume that the archaeologist has seen far more than what has been reported or that complete information has been found alongside the artifact or discovery.
This is not usually the case and as this course progresses, the student will see how little information is actually found with the find and how the discovery is handled by those who claim to be the experts. It is an assumption to think that a Biblical scholar or archaeologist is an expert on every subject they encounter on one of their digs. Not so and the student needs to be aware of the fact that archaeologists and biblical scholars will and do make mistakes as they work.
Throughout this course the student will be exposed to different aspects of archaeology in order to properly explain why there is so little evidence for a particular person, i.e. King David or a nation of people, i.e. the Hittites.
Lesson number two will look at the attitudes, beliefs and agenda of the archaeologists in relation to archaeological discoveries, either made by them or other researchers. It will also take a look at those people outside the mainstream, who practices often interfere with gleaning knowledge from finds. Some of these people are called pseudo-archaeologists and others are grave robbers or simply nomads needing to make some money. Each factor plays an important role in how discoveries are handled.
Lesson three will look at the size of a dig, how much area is actually explored and the problems that exist with looking into the past. This lesson will rely heavily upon K.A. Kitchen’s work, The Bible in Its World, for he lays out a very good scenario on the problems of an archaeological dig, whether it is size or some other mitigating factor.
Lesson four turns to the problem of dating, mislabeling, misidentifying the artifacts or manuscripts and the conjecture that is part of the archaeological world. This happens all the time and how it takes place depends upon the perspective of the discoverer, the corroborating evidence and those that either oppose the conclusions or have a different idea what the discovery is telling us.
Lesson five will be used as an example to illustrate another problem that arises when making discoveries in an archaeological dig. What do we do with a history changing discovery? Many people are out there trying to prove the Bible true and they will make claims that they have found the ‘smoking gun’, the ‘missing link’ that Biblical archaeology needs to finally silence the skeptics and once and for all demonstrate that the Bible is true.
It happens all the time and this lesson will explore the problems that come with such ‘discoveries’ and why evidence is lacking.
Finally, lesson six will deal with the Christian response to this problem. The secular world wants to see first then believe, much like doubting Thomas unfortunately that is not how things work with God and the Christian must separate themselves from the secular mentality and desires, so that they can be walking in line with God’s will and please Him.
Archaeology is not an exact science, it is not a science where we can return to the exact spot and review the discoveries where they were found. Once dug up and moved, the context is altered and conclusions are based upon theory, conjecture and guess work.
They say that archaeology is a destructive science and in a way that is true, once a site has been dug, we cannot return to the original setting and start over if a mistake has been made. That is one reason why, many archaeologists do not dig up the whole site. They leave bits and pieces for future work, technology, and other discovered information to help decipher what will be found in later years.
Unfortunately that means that the archaeologist, the Biblical scholar and other researchers are working with limited and incomplete data which will bring a distorted or confused view of the past. These factors help explain why there is so little evidence discovered in archaeology. Yes, museums are filled with finds from the past, so much that they have a problem with storing all the items found but these items are not grand individual discoveries, Rather they are just more of the same thing. Pottery was widely used in the past and archaeologists dig up, walk over, and stumble across myriads of shards, and other bits of broken pottery as they pursue their quest to discover information from the past.
What are rare finds are those textual manuscripts (mss.), monuments, and other pieces of physical evidence that definitively show a biblical character, event or group of people existing, living and acting as described in the Bible. We have two inscriptions that mention the house of David, We may have 1 artifact from King Solomon’s temple (it is in dispute at the moment), we may or may not have discoveries concerning the Israeli sojourn and exodus in and from Egypt (depends upon a person’s perspective and acceptance of what we do have).
This is the reason for this course, so that the student gets a fuller and deeper knowledge of the world of Biblical archaeology and so they will be aware that the conclusions given by professional experts are not always what they claim to be, enabling the student to stand strong in their faith and not be led astray.
Lesson 2: Attitudes, Agendas & Archaeologists
1. Disbelief: One of the main reasons we have so little physical evidence for the Biblical record is that often the archaeologist or biblical scholar are not believers and their lack of faith influences their opinions and their work. Even when faced with actual evidence they cannot bring themselves to change their minds. Phillip Davies, a known minimalist and who has openly stated that Genesis and other parts of Israeli history just did not happen. Even when presented with evidence he refuses to change his mind and simply repeated his mantra, ‘it just did not happen’.
This kind of attitude influences the interpretation of the artifacts found and tends to put them into another category making their value lost to the people of the world. Disbelief is one of the attitudes that hinders archaeological work and helps construct a false record of the past.
The mishandling of the ancient artifacts and the manipulation of the historical record contribute to the loss of physical evidence and why so many items are hopelessly stored in the basement of museums, never to be seen by other researchers and archaeologists.
2. The Lack of Objectivity: usually the principle of any science is for the scientist to be objective in his or her work yet that is never the case. William Dever quotes states in one of his books that ‘not since the death of 19th century positivism have any respectable historian been naïve enough to think that they could be entirely objective…’ (Dever 2005 pg.83)
So we what we have here is that the conclusions of many archaeologist will slant towards their personal ideologies and how they present artifacts will also be influenced by the same attitude. Thus if a non-believer dismisses the Biblical record, we can rest assured that their ‘interpretation’ of the physical evidence will alter the reality of that artifact and change the meaning of the artifact to something closer to their liking.
3. The Double Standard: This attitude makes it very difficult to present artifacts as physical evidence in support of the Biblical record. What is allowed for the secular world to practice is NOT allowed for the believer nor for the Bible.
As illustrated above, we see that the secular world does not demand that they be ‘objective’. In fact Dever, in the introduction to his book came right out and boldly stated, “ This book…although it hopes to be true to the facts we know, does not attempt objectivity; for that is impossible and perhaps undesirable.” (Ibid pg. ix) Yet later on page 71, Dever makes this accusation, “The perspective of all the Biblical writers is a factor that limits their usefulness in another regard it is no exaggeration to say that all biblical literature…constitutes what is essentially propaganda. The writers make no pretense to objectivity.” (Ibid)
So Dever, and other secular archaeologists, hold the Bible to a standard that they themselves refuse to follow and denounce its words simply because It presents God’s revelation from God’s perspective and not their own.
This double standard then influences how archaeologists see the physical evidence and if the evidence is from Israeli history then it is dismissed because it is not from a secular source yet these same archaeologists will accept physical evidence about a secular nation whose source is from that same nation without requiring corroborating evidence from other surrounding nations.
The double standard plays a large part in limiting physical evidence and contributes to the lack of evidence in archaeology for the Biblical record.
4. The Agenda: Many archaeologist come to Biblical Archaeology with their own personal agenda simply because they do not like what the Bible has recorded and said thus they want to change the record to fit their ideas and the limited physical evidence they have uncovered.
Israel Finkelstein is one such person as he writes, “ Although it seems probable that David and Solomon were actual historical characters, they were very different from their scriptural portraits…Our goal is to show how the legends if David and Solomon developed’ (Finkelstein & Silberman 2006 pg. 22)
So here we have a clear agenda that the authors do not accept the Biblical story of either king and now are out to re-write the Bible because of that rejection of the Biblical record. In their attempts to do so, they down date much of the evidence they have uncovered at Megiddo to fit their theory not the truth.
This restructuring of the evidence to fit an agenda also contributes much to the lack of evidence for the Biblical record and short changes the public who assume these people are telling the truth when in reality, they are simply following and working their own beliefs or lack of them.
It isn’t just David and Solomon who are being attacked as we read in Dever’s book, ‘Even the more sensible of the doctrinaire feminists are often characterized by what Susan Ackerman describes to me as wishful thinking. They hope to reconstruct a past in which women’s full equality or even superiority was actually realized, but which in their view has been obscured by make scholars” (Dever 2005, pg. xiv)
This is but a brief glimpse into what takes place in the field of archaeology which influences the amount of physical evidence for Biblical archaeology. The believer must consider the source of the theories, hypothesis and conclusions that pertain to the Biblical record. There is a lot of personal ideologies, lack of belief, and other factors which play a role in reducing the amount of artifacts and texts which support or validate the Bible.
Just because a person claims to be an expert, or does archaeology professionally does it mean that they are telling the truth, being fair, or honestly attributing the physical evidence to its proper place in history. The believer must not blindly accept what professionals are saying for the professional does not always share the same beliefs or hopes that the believer does and they are in rush to support the Biblical record.
The believer needs to consider the source, then look to God to help them discern the difference between the truth of the physical evidence and the false conclusion or theory. Everyone , both secular and believing archaeologists and Biblical scholars, all have the same evidence. There are no hidden pieces locked away waiting for ‘the right moment’ to be thrust upon an unsuspecting world.
The difference is in the ‘interpretation’ of the person making the discovery and that is where the believer has to be careful for not all professionals serve God.
Lesson 3: Factors and Size involved in a Dig
One of the biggest reasons why there is so little evidence for the Biblical record or archaeology is that the amount of a site that is dug up is so minimal that it is impossible to obtain anything but a minute fraction of information that is buried there.
1. Size of the Site: K.A. Kitchen has done a very good job in documenting the reality when it comes to archaeological digs. His account is honest, accurate and does not sugar coat what is really taking place thus this lesson will quote strictly from his work, The Bible in its World.
“And normally, only a minute area of an entire site can ever be dug, especially if explored to any great depth. Thu, ancient Ashdod comprises…some 90 acres in all- but only 1 ½ acres of this surface (less than 2%) has been excavated.” (pg. 12)
Less than 2% of the total has been uncovered which tells us that 98% is still lying in wait for the archaeologist to dig them up. Yet many professionals think they can draw conclusions from this lack of evidence about the city, the people and the major events that transpired throughout its living history.
“At Tell el-Areini, the excavated areas cover barely 4% of the whole site, and likewise in the Early Bronze Age city at Arad. Only about 1/10 of the area of Et-tell has been dug and similarly at Tell el=Ajjul.”
Granted there are sites with more acreage uncovered but given their size and longevity, for example Jerusalem, the amount being dug is minor in comparison. Jerusalem has about 7,000 years of history to it yet we have barely scratched the surface of what lies underneath. One must remember that, there are places that cannot be dug simply because homes, schools and other modern buildings occupy the site.
2. Gaps and Time: But size is not the only problem when it comes to extracting important information about the past. Sometimes the archaeologist will pick the wrong spot to dig, even though surveys indicate they have found a site that has much information and artifacts to yield.
“But as even ‘full-scale’ excavations rarely touch more than a fraction of a site…important features can still be missed by accident. If levels of a particular period occur in only one part of a site- a part not dug- then the archaeologist’s ‘record’ will appear to show a gap…”
In other words, the archaeologist can miss important data by picking the wrong part of the site to dig. Thus mistake contributes much to the lack of physical evidence to Biblical archaeology. Now as to time, there are sites where the archaeologist has to toil for years before producing even a tidbit of remains:
“Ancient Gibeon is a good example. Despite the narration in Joshua… which presupposes a settlement there in the Late Bronze Age, the first 3 seasons of a very successful excavation by Professor J.B. Pritchard yielded not a scrap from that period other than a stray Cypriot sherd or two. Only in the 4th season were found a handful of fine Late Bronze Age tombs, refuting the supposed contradictions between Joshua and ‘archaeology’.”
Thus one cannot expect to find the proof they want as soon as the shovel hits the ground, one has to be patient and continue searching before the realize their goal. Both the length of time needed and the picking of the wrong spot, robs Biblical archaeology of much needed evidence and information. This lack of discovery often fuels the skeptics argument that archaeology does not support the Biblical record but such arguments are often dishonest because the skeptics fail to factor in these reasons and the following factors
3. Other Factors: Here we have the most important circumstances that contribute to the lack of physical evidence—destruction; both natural and human.
“Such mud brick buildings were highly convenient, but not too permanent, lasting about 25/30 years. Unseasonably wet winters, accidental fires, or demolition by invading enemies could quickly turn houses, palaces or whole towns into desolate ruins. Then if the inhabitants decided to rebuild, they often just leveled off the debris and built on top…”
But these are not all of the destructive forces that were or are at work in the Middle East.
“At periods where a town site was deserted, driving wind, sand and rains would often erode away the uppermost levels of the abandoned houses and walls. Thus, at Ur, the town of Neo-Babylonian times was largely swept away…, while 20 feet depth of human occupation-remains had been lost from ancient Babylonian Eshnunna…before it was excavated.”
Archaeologists cannot recover what is not there. Volcanoes, floods, human invasions all play a vital role in destroying the remains of the past leaving the modern world with very little to find or use to investigate the past. It is no wonder that skeptics reject much of the Bible, they cannot find what they are looking for.
One last example of destruction and that is for some ancient societies, their written material was not recorded on long lasting material and time, nature, as well as humans, have taken their toll on their existence.
“It was upon papyri that fine literature, religious texts, and all administrative records were written. Thus, as 90% of Egyptian papyri are lost forever, our losses to knowledge here are enormous.”
Papyri does not last long and with this loss of writings we loss much information about the past. Who knows, maybe the record of Joseph, the Israelite sojourn, enslavement and exodus were recorded after all? We will never know unless we get lucky and dig in the right spot which contains jars holding the papyrus that contain such data.
Destructive powers, whether natural or human, also contribute much to our lack of physical evidence and it is beyond our control to stop. We hold no authority over such forces because their work has been done hundreds, if not thousands, of years ago. Long before recapturing the past became vogue and a priority for universities and museums.
Lesson 4: The Problem of Dating and Labeling the Evidence
1. Identification and Labeling: Unlike today, ancient discoveries do not come with printed labels stating their manufacture date nor do they come with a date or bar code which contains the information pertaining to date of manufacture. Nor do they come stamped with a ‘made in ____’ tag.
To identify and label the correct nation of origin, plus the approximate date of production takes a lot of work comparing with other discoveries and other notes made by other archaeologists on other digs. Most often any written text which carried a ‘date’ usually used the current king’s reign as a marker. Problem was there was no legend to go with the text to explain how the ‘date’ fit in the over-all context of time.
There were over-laps of reigns, co-regencies, gaps in rulers and so on which make it very difficult to pin down precise times. Even the pottery dating system cannot be of much help as that was done in a manner similar to stratigraphy which the pottery closer to the surface was given a younger date, while those buried deeper, an older one. Even with that concept, one could not be sure if the older pottery was made in 2000 B.C. or 1500 (according to the Julian calendar).
Even the archaeological periods can be of little help for their origination did not come by methodical work and investigation but by one man setting up a display who did not know how to place his artifacts. So he arbitrarily placed all stone tools in one category, regardless of their real era, and called the category, the Stone Age. The Bronze artifacts were placed together and called the Bronze Age and the same for the iron artifacts, which were then labeled the Iron Age.
Unfortunately, history does not go in such neat packages and the timing of the past was thrown off by this effort to simplify a presentation. Forever after, the scholastic world has had the door open to arguments and disagreement as to when an artifact should appear in the chronological order.
Case in point: the Ipuwer Papyrus. This document describes events similar to those that took place in Egypt prior to the Exodus but, scholars cannot or will not agree as to the age of the text.
“Although Jacobovici states that many scholars date the Ipuwer Papyrus to the Hyksos period, the fact of the matter is that most Egyptologists date it to the First Intermediate Period (ca. 2100 BC) or the late Middle Kingdom (ca. 1700 BC), well before Jacobovici’s Exodus date of 1500 BC.” (Wood, 2006)
As one can see, the labeling of the date plays a large role in the amount of physical evidence available for Biblical events. Scholars, without a firm and honest timeline, will not agree as to when something was written or made. This disagreement is based upon many factors, the ideologies of the scholars involved, their religious beliefs, or lack of them, the corroborating evidence (i.e. pottery found with the papyrus or other artifacts that can be dated approx. to a certain time) and so on.
All of these factors play a role in diminishing the physical evidence, as does the archaeological periods timeline and the pottery chronology. What also lends a hand in misidentifying the artifact is that we have no knowledge if the item was a family heirloom passed down through many generations or if it was simply a replica of an ‘antique’. Such variables play a part in confusing or misleading the archaeologist when they go to label the discovery.
99% of the time artifacts are found without textual records confirming the date or its purpose and the solution to that dilemma is left up to the head archaeologist and his ‘interpretation’. Unfortunately, the archaeologist’s ‘interpretation’ can further mislead others as it can be wrong and the item be mislabeled.
2. Pet Theories: More often than not, the archaeologist’s ‘interpretation’ is influenced by his favorite (or pet) theories. If they have spent years working on one idea, it is very hard for them to let it go and change course to match the truth. More often than not, the archaeologist will mislabel or misidentify an item simply because he does not want to see his life’s work vanish over one discovery.
“In reviewing Finkelstein’s arguments about terraces, I cannot escape the impression that he is too attached to his theory of pastoral-nomadic origins to see the point of his own data. Consequently he has skewed the evidence for both the relative dating of the sites and for the origins of the settlers.” (Dever 2003, pg. 115)
As we see by this quote, archaeologists will allow their judgment to be clouded because the refuse to let go of their theories and make errors when they come to dating artifacts and origins of people. This clumsy work contributes much to the lack of evidence for the Biblical record simply because one person or a group of people, independently or corporately, place the date of an artifact long before its time or long after.
3. Personal beliefs: A final example is the personal belief of the scholar or archaeologist. Yehezkel “Kaufmann believed that the Israelite religion was an original creation of the people of Israel…For him, then, the Hebrew Bible’s story of Israel’s divine calling and unique origin is literally true.” (Dever 2003, pg. 129)
So for Kauffmann, his dating would reflect the Bible’s and be very close to what it says concerning when these events transpired and when the people lived. But for others like Martin Noth who “interpreted the biblical stories of a twelve tribe league in the light of Greek tribal confederations known as amphictyonies…”(Ibid pg. 130) His dates , then, would reflect this belief and would be quite arbitrary as there was no real timeline one had to adhere to.
His theories were “abandoned because of a lack of agreement on interpreting the biblical texts on which it rests and because there was never any archaeological support for such an amphictyony” (Ibid). Even with the abandonment, his thinking was influential for approx. 30 years which in turn would influence many other scholars and their labeling of dates.
What the scholar believes, in spite of their efforts to be ‘objective’, clearly reflect their dating, labeling and identification methods and as it happened with Dr. Finkelstein. All this does is cause the evidence discovered to be mislabeled or misidentified and placed in the wrong era or category leaving the public with less evidence to use.
What is lost is bone fide verification of the biblical events or person in question, allowing for doubt to enter in a person’s, whether a believer or not, mind. This doubt then influences them concerning the Bible and soon many lose their faith as has happened to many a professional scholar.
One other factor plays a part here as the professional expert, if a non-believer, will dismiss the data found in the Bible because they label it as religious writings, which were written for a specific purpose and not an ‘honest’ retelling of the history of the Israelites. With such a demotion, it is no wonder the secular expert is often lost when it comes to evaluating and analyzing evidence they have dug up. They have to scramble to invent a scenario to make up for the void.
This act not mislabels and misidentifies the evidence but it reduces available proof or verifications, in one sense, the Biblical archaeologist needs to shore up their defense of the Bible. The believer may accept the evidence but they will have a fight on their hands with those who have no interest in proving the Bible true. {a fact that underlies this whole problem of a lack of evidence for Biblical archaeology}.
Lesson 5: What to do with Discovered Evidence
Throughout this course, it has been emphasized that the Biblical Archaeological world has been left with little or no evidence to support its claims. But what if a major discovery took place? What would happen in the world say, for example, if Noah’s Ark was really found? What are we to do with it?
1. A Scenario: First, there would be big fanfare. Every Christian would make sure all the news outlets carried the news. Second, reporters would be interviewing the successful explorers who persevered until they achieved their objective and have them describe in every detail the minutest parts of their journey. Third, all the talk and news shows would be having these explorers on to tell their story, ad nauseum.
Fourth, Christians round the world would be happy, relieved that the quest is now over and joyful that the Bible has been proven true. Or was it?
Soon, after the euphoria died down, scholars and skeptics started to take a closer look and the questions began to be asked. How do we know it is the ark? One of the explorers answered, ‘well we found it on a mountain near Ararat.’ The next question came, ‘but couldn’t someone have planted a copy? After all, this one is in pieces and quite decayed.?’ The answer ‘ we did C14 testing on the wood and it came back as being approx. 5,000 years old.’ Yes but couldn’t someone just take old redwood cedar and make fake remains?’
By now the euphoria was dying down and started to go quicker with the next questions. ‘How do you know this is gopher wood? From what I have read, we have no idea what gopher wood is or what it looks like. So how do you know this is the wood that Noah used?’ the answer, ‘ We just take it by faith because we found it on a mountain and there was hay still inside.? ‘The next question, ‘how do you know that is the same hay? Couldn’t a shepherd leave some up there for his flock and used the boat for safekeeping?’ the answer,’ That is a possibility but this hay is like no other that we have found in the modern world? ‘How so?’
The explorers are getting exasperated by this point as they see their discovery slipping away into doubt and skepticism. Then the next question, ‘What corroborating evidence do you have that proves this is Noah’s ark?’ the answer, We have none, but this boat meets the Biblical criteria.’ The next question, ‘I do not believe the Bible, it is a book of fairy tales, so why would I accept its criteria? How do I know you didn’t edit those criteria to make this discovery fit your Bible?’…
And on it goes.
2. The Problem: This little scenario presents a common problem that comes with physical evidence. We may make great discoveries with major pieces of missing evidence but how can we prove definitively that the artifact discovered is actually what we say it is? How can we point to an inn in Jerusalem and say, Jesus was born here. It looks like every other inn of the first century and there is no manger, no angels, nothing but modern items to indicate that it is anything but a modern inn.
We could discover David’s sling, but how could we prove it was the actual sling used in his fight with Goliath? How would we convince the unbelieving world of its validity? There was no notarized text found next to the weapon, there was no Hebrew lettering spelling David’s name, and even there were how could we prove the sling did not belong to one of the myriads of David’s of the ancient world?
Carbon 14 dating would only suggest an age, not make a positive identification. The material used to make the sling could only be used to possibly corroborate the C14 figure but that is about it. And on it goes. Skepticism will always try to find a way to not believe any physical evidence that supports or prove the Bible true.
Those who do not believe, will continue probing until they find their escape route which allows them to continue in their present unbelieving lifestyle and not deal with the truth. In reality, we cannot ultimately prove that a major discovery, or any discovery is what we think it is because there are too many possibilities which could fit the item under scrutiny.
2. What the Bible Says: The Bible provides us with an explanation why skeptics will always remain skeptics and why they will always find a way to not believe. Just as the illustration of Phillip Davies, in the beginning of this course, demonstrated no matter all the evidence in front of His eyes he still remained in denial and refused to accept what he was shown.
In Luke 16 there is the story of Lazarus and the rich man and in it the rich man dies, goes to hell and is tormented. He makes a request that Lazarus be raised from the dead and sent to his brothers to warn them of their impending torture and suffering. But the response to his request provides us with the answer as to why the skeptic or unbeliever will deny that the discovered ark in the above scenario was real. Verse 31 says:
“But he said unto him, ‘if they do not hear Moses and the prophets neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ We can apply that last line to Noah’s ark. It is ‘dead’ and if it were ‘resurrected’ through discovery, the unbeliever would still not believe the Bible or that the discovery was the ark because they still do not hear or believe Moses and the prophets.
In John 5:46-7, Jesus makes a similar comment about Himself; ”For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about ME. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My Words?’
We, as believers, really do not need physical evidence nor prove the Bible true. We do need to study the past, as Dr. Bryant Wood said, ‘to keep the secular scholars honest’ (Wood, 2005) but we do not need a lot of proof for our faith and the next lesson will delve into this aspect.
To answer the question the initial question that started this lesson, we do not have to do much with any major or minor piece of evidence. We just present it, let the unbelieving world make up their own minds and be prepared to correctly, properly, honestly answer their questions.
We do not have to lament that we have little or no physical evidence to prove the Biblical record true because that is the secular world’s way of doing things, not God’s.
Lesson 6: We Walk By Faith
In the past few lessons many different aspects have been looked at to explain why there is so little physical evidence for the Bible record and Biblical archaeology. We have seen how the attitudes and agendas of many professionals interfere with recovery of evidence and we have seen how their ideologies, theories, preferences and other factors help them misidentify, mislabel and misdate the artifacts and texts that are discovered.
We have also seen how natural destructive forces, along with the human element, play their role in eliminating much of the evidence we seek. It is unrealistic to think that the past will be transported 100% intact into the modern world and it is also unrealistic to think that all the evidence we desire will come into our grasp.
There is one more important reason why Biblical Archaeology and the Biblical Record lack physical evidence to support their accounts. Simply it is God. He has designed the world to run by His ways not secular man’s. We will look at this in two ways.
1. The Just Shall Live By Faith: Secular archaeologists, biblical scholars and many others do not walk by faith. They need to see something in their hands, they need to read the actual words or they need to see some sort of physical proof to persuade them to believe in the Bible and Jesus.
But God has not designed the world to operate by sight, it is designed to operate by faith for humans cannot provide proof of heaven or hell, nor can they provide proof for the Garden of Eden, the flood or many other events and circumstances that have taken place over history. The past is dead and gone and all we have left are broken pottery, texts and other artifacts that only prove that someone existed at some point in time who manufactured such items.
We cannot produce any flood evidence for how would we be able to distinguish it from the destruction of local floods? How would we be able to definitively prove what evidence we do find as being from Noah’s flood? Sir Leonard Woolley tried with the evidence he discovered but because the flood layer was not uniform throughout the land, his conclusions were dismissed. Yet how would we know if Noah’s flood layer settled uniformly? We have no ancient documents describing any research done and we doubt it was actually carried out for the survivors did not need to research, they lived it.
Their close descendents did not need to research it for they knew the survivors, thus in today’s world we have to take the flood by faith. Even if we found Noah’s ark, it would be next to impossible to prove that it was ‘the’ ark.
Thus we humans are left with faith.
2. One needs to use faith to please God: This is the most important thing in the Christian life, pleasing God and His rules demand that we use faith not physical evidence to meet that goal. God’s way is to accept and believe His words without proof for that shows that those who claim to be his followers actually love Him.
So why do we have so little evidence for the Biblical record and Biblical archaeology? Simple, God will provide only enough evidence to support and strengthen our faith, He will not provide more so that what pleases Him is destroyed.
This is the key. We may not have all the answers, nor will we be able to explain all the details because we do not know them but we can point to what we have and explain that one needs faith to believe and please God. For it is through faith we are saved not through physical evidence.
That is why it seems we have so little physical evidence at our disposal to point to when we are in discussions with unbelievers. But as one looks at different passages of scripture, we can see how what has been discovered adds up to supporting the biblical record and we have a lot more physical evidence than we thought. It just doesn’t come in the form we want or expect.
For example, in the book of Ecc. There is the verse, ‘there is nothing new under the sun’ and through archaeological and historical work we can see the that verse proven correct as discovery after discovery shows that what we in the modern world think is new or novel has actually been done thousands of years before and throughout history.
The Greeks were not the discoverers of math equations and other things, as the Babylonians studied them 2,000 years earlier (Pellegrino 1991). The physical evidence lines up with the Bible and as has been stated long before this course, there is not one archaeological discovery that has disproven the Bible or made false any of its statements.
What tries to disprove the Bible is the conjecture, the theories and the conclusions of those secular archeologists and Biblical scholars who do not believe and look for alternatives to the Bible. We do not need to lament the fact that we may not have all the evidence we would like, but even if we had more, we could not guarantee that the secular professional would change their minds and accept Christ as their savior.
We can rejoice that we have the opportunity to please God by using faith but that does not mean we stop researching and doing archaeology. No, we must continue, to make sure that the truth is always told and that the people hear it and not the false ideas of those who do not believe.
