The View from Nebo: How Archaeology Is Rewriting the Bible and Reshaping the Middle East Book

A curious but inconclusive whiste-stop tour of emerging trends in scholarly research into the real history of the old testament. One may be surprised by how much is vindicated by real historical investigation. On the other hand, one may be left with the feeling that we have been left with a very idosyncratic account of the continuity of peoples from which to form our entire cultural frame of reference.

Historical trends that loosely touch upon the proud but small empire of Moses, David and their forefathers/descendants loom much largely in significance than the experiences of the sons of Israel, or any of the sons of Abraham, for example the Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, counting just some, and ultimately Romans until our era's creations of the Ottoman and British empires.

I chose this extract to illustrate how the book manages to illuminate the preocupations of the bible's authors:

While the Scriptures treat the Ammonites with unremitting contempt, the feeling they express about the Edomites, the Israelites' neighbors in southern Jordan, are much more complex. Like all the tribes in the region, the Israelites and the Edomites share a long history. Over the course of hundreds of years, they try to conquer each other and often find themselves competing for the best access to important trade routes. Despite the-ongoing tensions, the Bible admonishes the Israelites, "You shall not abhor an Edomite, for he is your brother."

...What exactly the Edomites might have done, though, is never made clear in the biblecal text. Take the story about Jaoob and Esau, twin sons of Isaac and his wife Rebecca. They are portrayed as aways fighting. They fight in the womb over who is going to be born first, and Esau emerges with Jacob's hand wrapped around his ankle. They fight over the all-important birthriught of the firstborn son, which Jacob eventually wins through deceit, his mother's timely assistance, and the face that the dying Isaac is too blind to see which son stands before him demanding a blessing. All this certainly explains why Esau, and his descendants might harbor ill will toward Jacob and Jacob's descendants, and yet the story doesn't permit such an interpretation. Jacob and Esau, after years of not seeing each other, eventually meet up again. Jacob expects war, and comes offering gits, hoping to placate Esau. Instead, Esau greets him warmly, says he's prospered since they last met, and the two part on friendly, if not brotherly, terms.

....Indeed, the archaeoogical work done in the Negev in the past few yeras has turned up a wealth of pottery and religious objects traditionally associated with the Edomites, who at the very least cast along cultural shadow there in the seventh and sixth centuries BCE. This is also the period during which, Bible scholars believe, the Jacob and Esau traditions were either written or revised to show some sort of kinship between Judah and Edom.