In today's lecture, we started off by going through Canaanite Jerusalem and what life was before the Israelites came in and conquered. Jerusalem existed before David settled there, and the settlement began next to the Gihon Spring. This is an obvious choice because without a fresh water source, the city would not be able to survive. The existence and history of Jerusalem is evident though things like execration texts and amarna letters/tablets. Execration texts were writings on clay figures that were supposed to be symbolic of their enemies. They would write a curse on the figurine and then smash it, similar to voodoo dolls. There is reference to Jerusalem before 1900 BCE. This shows that Jerusalem was big enough at the time to have enemies and was a relevant settlement in the area. Amarna letters, which are "plea" letters, basically made a deal between a small city and big city for protection in exchange for money. Letters from kings of Jerusalem once again reveals the relevance of Jerusalem during and the impact it had with other places like Egypt and the surrounding cities in the area.
After learning about Canaanite Jerusalem, we turned to the conquest of the Israelites and the taking of Jerusalem. The history of this can be found in the chapters Joshua and Judges in the Bible, known as the conquest narratives. The most popular story from the conquest is David vs. Goliath. There is debate on whether the "conquest" story actually existed. There are three stances on the conquest of the Canaanites. The first view that what the Bible says about the conquest is true, and that the Israelites destroyed and slaughtered all the Canaanites under God's command. The second view is the "immigration" view, which is that the Israelites slowly immigrated into Israel and told heroic stories of how they got there. The third view is the "mixed ethic origins", which believes that the Israelites were originally Canaanites and had an internal revolt of some sort. Some believe that there are contradictions in the Bible, so therefore we should throw it out altogether. On the other hand, some believe that the Bible is absolutely true and is God-breathed, therefore it is perfect and inerrant. These different beliefs are what create the different views of the conquest of the Canaanites.
Towards the end of class, we talked about David's Jerusalem, which was around 1000 BCE (Iron Age). Some scholars deny that David and his son Solomon ever existed because there are no concrete evidence to prove they did except the Bible. There were no texts of any sort that talked about David and his reign in Jerusalem. An inscription, known as the Tel Dan inscription, is known to be the first extra biblical reference to David. The inscription, which lists the names of people the author conquered, includes the house of David. Still, there is are no records of whether a kingdom ruled by David ever existed. I was surprised to hear that records of David have never been found, which put into question the existence of David's Jerusalem. However, those who believe the Bible know for a fact that David and his stories are true. I have begun to realize how important one's view on the inerrancy of scripture is. Belief in the legitimacy of the Bible has massive implications. For example, whether or not you believe that a king David ever existed depends on whether or not you think the Bible is true or not.
No comments:
Post a Comment