Saturday, December 02, 2006
12/02/2006 09:06:00 PM | 
Posted by
JoeSettler
Makor Rishon has an interesting article about an archeological site found in Northern Syria (wiki: Ebla)- hopefully the article (in Hebrew) will be online next week. The site was found some 50 years ago, though apparently discoveries are still being made in it.
For various reasons, the article equates it with the location of Yeshivat Shem v’Ever.
Finally a reason to visit Syria (and not for the Humus).
The site was a huge important city with a palace, library/academy, with tens of thousands of clay tablets covering all sorts of subjects such as birds of the world (classified by type), geography, literary texts, genesis stories, and lots and lots of names.
The Wiki says,
And documents with the name Yah and El were found there along with those of the various Avodah Zarahs – which would chime in nicely with the story that when Rivkah passed by the Yeshiva, Yacov wanted out and when she passed by a makom Avodah Zarah Eisav wanted out.
If you recall a few weeks ago the NY Times had an article about a major flood some 4800 years ago that could have wiped out 25% of the world’s population. Someone mentioned to me that this wasn’t our Mabul, but rather the major flood the medrash talks about that preceded the mabul during the time of Enosh.
What’s my point?
There is a current of revisionism running through MO Judaism lately and can be seen on a lot of well known blogs (and I’m not talking about the Bible critics here at all).
Their idea is to completely explain away stories in the Torah as myth and moshals (and no, this is not an invitation to have that discussion on my blog) and fictionalize the people mentioned.
Yet here we are, and a few months ago scientist found evidence of a major flood that no one knew of before.
And we see a major center existed around the time of the Avos (which even mentions their names and other biblibal personalities of the time) – which could tie in quite neatly with our traditions relating to Yeshivat Shem v’Ever - not to mention it provides external validation to cities and locations mentioned in the Torah.
There’s still a lot more we don’t know than we do, and sometimes a little patience is all that is needed to wait for evidence, science, and history to be uncovered –and discover that events the Torah mentioned are quite grounded in the reality that was around them.
It’s important to read this article where one of the main archeologist of the site says there is no connection to Patriarchs, the Bible, or anything else despite any coincidental similarities in the names of the people and place mentioned in the documents found – while still confirming that it mentions all these biblical sites and names.
It also reveals a lot of the political infighting between the various archeologists and how it affects and twists their interpretations. In fact it, reading the various articles (see the links at the bottom of this last link) we can see that the different interpretations of the various archeologists involved swing widely in different directions depending on their agenda – reminds me of Finkelstein.
An interesting point in the article is how the Syrian government is putting pressure on some of the scientists to ensure that no Biblical links are found/published from the tablets and other items found.
Of course, if Ur is located in Syria as some of the documents imply, that means that we Jews are aboriginal Syrians (to use Pattinato's phrase) – and that must upset them too.
Another interesting side point is how the form of government used in Elba was similar to that of Israel’s. Its leaders (judges) were appointed (in fact, at one point they even had 7 year term limits!).
This article opened up something very interesting, and I recommend reading up on this.
But to return to my original point, this undercurrent of revisionism that is running around the MO world should really start to reconsider its position in light of recent findings.
For various reasons, the article equates it with the location of Yeshivat Shem v’Ever.
Finally a reason to visit Syria (and not for the Humus).
The site was a huge important city with a palace, library/academy, with tens of thousands of clay tablets covering all sorts of subjects such as birds of the world (classified by type), geography, literary texts, genesis stories, and lots and lots of names.
The Wiki says,
“Many Old Testament Genesis names that have not been found in other Near Eastern languages do have similar forms in Eblaite (a-da-mu / Adam, h’à-wa / Eve, Jabal, Abarama/Abraham, Bilhah, Ishma-el, Isûra-el, Esau, Mika-el, Mikaya, Saul, David, etc.). Also found are many Biblical locations: for example Ashtaroth, Sinai, Jerusalem (Ye-ru-sa-lu-um), Hazor, Lachish, Gezer, Dor, Megiddo, Joppa, etc. (Pattinato also claimed to find references to Sodom and Gomorrah).”
And documents with the name Yah and El were found there along with those of the various Avodah Zarahs – which would chime in nicely with the story that when Rivkah passed by the Yeshiva, Yacov wanted out and when she passed by a makom Avodah Zarah Eisav wanted out.
If you recall a few weeks ago the NY Times had an article about a major flood some 4800 years ago that could have wiped out 25% of the world’s population. Someone mentioned to me that this wasn’t our Mabul, but rather the major flood the medrash talks about that preceded the mabul during the time of Enosh.
What’s my point?
There is a current of revisionism running through MO Judaism lately and can be seen on a lot of well known blogs (and I’m not talking about the Bible critics here at all).
Their idea is to completely explain away stories in the Torah as myth and moshals (and no, this is not an invitation to have that discussion on my blog) and fictionalize the people mentioned.
Yet here we are, and a few months ago scientist found evidence of a major flood that no one knew of before.
And we see a major center existed around the time of the Avos (which even mentions their names and other biblibal personalities of the time) – which could tie in quite neatly with our traditions relating to Yeshivat Shem v’Ever - not to mention it provides external validation to cities and locations mentioned in the Torah.
There’s still a lot more we don’t know than we do, and sometimes a little patience is all that is needed to wait for evidence, science, and history to be uncovered –and discover that events the Torah mentioned are quite grounded in the reality that was around them.
It’s important to read this article where one of the main archeologist of the site says there is no connection to Patriarchs, the Bible, or anything else despite any coincidental similarities in the names of the people and place mentioned in the documents found – while still confirming that it mentions all these biblical sites and names.
It also reveals a lot of the political infighting between the various archeologists and how it affects and twists their interpretations. In fact it, reading the various articles (see the links at the bottom of this last link) we can see that the different interpretations of the various archeologists involved swing widely in different directions depending on their agenda – reminds me of Finkelstein.
An interesting point in the article is how the Syrian government is putting pressure on some of the scientists to ensure that no Biblical links are found/published from the tablets and other items found.
Of course, if Ur is located in Syria as some of the documents imply, that means that we Jews are aboriginal Syrians (to use Pattinato's phrase) – and that must upset them too.
Another interesting side point is how the form of government used in Elba was similar to that of Israel’s. Its leaders (judges) were appointed (in fact, at one point they even had 7 year term limits!).
This article opened up something very interesting, and I recommend reading up on this.
But to return to my original point, this undercurrent of revisionism that is running around the MO world should really start to reconsider its position in light of recent findings.
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