Open_Minded Posted September 27, 2006 Share Posted September 27, 2006 Hello Everyone: I'm doing some research on the relationship between ancient Canaanites and ancient Israelites. What is available out there in solid archealogical research about the origin of ancient Israelites? Did they conquer the land of Canaan? Did they enslave ancient Canaanites? These types of questions. If any of you know of solid archealogical information and good sites I'd appreciate the information. Thanks in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest VorJack Posted September 27, 2006 Share Posted September 27, 2006 I don't have anything really solid at hand, so I'll just throw something out and be brief. I don't think there is much consensus right now as to the origin of the Isrealites. We're only decades out from the period where archeologists went down to the middle east, cracked open a bible and started digging until they found confimation. From what I've read, the archeologists have blasted through several theories and are currently formulating new ones as fast as they can (all very healthy for the field, but not very satisfying to those of us on the outside.) The last several theories I've heard of, however, posit that the Isrealites WERE Canaanites. There was no major invasion, no exodus, instead an internal revolution or transformation. That comes from a near total lack of evidence for invasion. I hope that others may have more solid information. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taphophilia Posted September 27, 2006 Share Posted September 27, 2006 http://cc.usu.edu/~fath6/contents-bible.htm This guy is a PhD, Professor, Anthropologist, and has written several college level textbooks on the subject. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted September 28, 2006 Share Posted September 28, 2006 Israel Finkelstein has done a lot of work in the field of archaeology to basically put the history of Israel prior to about 700-800BCE into question. His work is showing that Israel came from the Canaanites as two groups (Israel and Judea) in a mostly peaceful set of movements. If you read the bible you can see the texts do reflect this as well (and were later merged). He has written a number of books on the subject. He is currently digging at Megiddo (sp?) and will likely force the redating of the site from ~1000BCE (Solomon's times) to ~800BCE. He will eventually force the removal of Solomon from history as their is no support for him or his kingdom. David and Saul are only still there by a thread and the evidence for the latter doesn't even exist (and there's only questionable evidence for David). DNA evidence shows Israelites tied to Palestinians and not Egyptians as well. I'll have to try to dig out my online resources so I can do something more than make blanket assertions though. If you want the books just look up his name on Amazon and he'll show right up. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dhampir Posted September 28, 2006 Share Posted September 28, 2006 I too read a while back that the isrealites and Canaanites came together at some point. I read that their religions had a common origin, and their patriarchs were Abraham and Jacob respectively. To me it explains a lot about that part of the bible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted September 28, 2006 Share Posted September 28, 2006 As I recall it was on the Ebla tablets that had references to Canaanite gods with the names (my spelling may be off here) such as Ab-ra-mu (Abraham) or Is-ra-ilu (Israel) and these later turned into the familar names and places we know today (they mention Sodom and places like that for example). So the patriarchs, it would seem, could be Canaanite gods and religions that were taken and rewritten into Jewish mythology as the belief systems were absorbed over time. So, for example, the Merneptah stele that was found that describes how the pharoah conquered various lands but only a people of Israel. The wording could indicate that they were simply a follower of this god (which given the time period would have been after the exodus and should have been the land of Israel but the words do not indicate this and the territory conquered is in Canaan not lower where Israel is). The tablets I mentioned speak of Canaanite gods bearing the names of many patriarchs. If memory serves they have Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Israel, Isaac, Saul, David and others. Again, I'll have to see if I can dig up my resources for this. This site (I don't know how reliable it's info is so take it with a grain of salt...it simply came up on a quick Google search) http://www.mystae.com/restricted/streams/thera/canaan.html has some info if you search the page for "Ab-ra-mu" that lines up with what I recall. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aspirin99 Posted September 28, 2006 Share Posted September 28, 2006 On a related note, I'm currently studying the Amarna Letters, which are cuneiform tablets (about 300 of them) that were discovered in 1887. Many of them are correspondence between the Egyptian ruler and government officials of Canaan in the Late Bronze Age (which is around the time of traditional dates for Joshua's conquest). Most of the letters are from a time frame several years after Joshua should have been in strong control of Canaan (were the story accurate). However, it shows non-Hebrew leaders in local control, who are mostly vassels of Egypt. See my timeline in my sig for more details and links. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Open_Minded Posted September 28, 2006 Author Share Posted September 28, 2006 Thanks everyone - I really appreciate all the information you've given me and will be spending much time reading through it all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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