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Home THE BIBLE UNEARTHED: THE MAKING OF A RELIGION -- ILLUSTRATED SCREENPLAY & SCREENCAP GALLERY |
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[Israel Finkelstein] So now that we look at Genesis, we know that Genesis does NOT describe the background of the 18th century. We are NOT in the Middle Bronze Age. There are enough anachronisms there about the Philistines, about the camels, that show us that we are not in an environment of the Middle Bronze. Instead, it is clear that we are in the 7th Century B.C. All of the details, or many of the details in Genesis fit perfectly the 7th Century B.C. So we have already answered one question: "When?" But there's still another question: "Why?" We need to look at the authors of Genesis and ask, "Why did they tell the story of Genesis in this way?"
[Narrator] The fact that the Biblical texts state that Abraham left Mesopotamia for the Holy [?] Land,
tells us nothing about the authors of the text. Our investigation will therefore now turn to the ultimate destination of his migration:
[Thomas Romer, University of Lausanne] According to the Biblical story, Abraham arrived from the North. He traveled through important sites in the North,
but finally came to settle in Hebron. His settlement in Hebron was in fact confirmed by Abraham's acquisition of a tomb from the inhabitants of the area.
[Narrator] The names of biblical places attracted the attention of a German researcher
who in the 1940s made an inventory of all the places where the Patriarchs' stories took place.
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