I mispoke, the story includes Israelite conscriptions as forced labor.
Hiram built Solomon's temple.
by peacefulpete 24 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Narkissos
Peacefulpete: I have no problem agreeing with you on the so-called Solomon Temple. I have only limited and second-hand knowledge in archaeology, but I guess at least the Hezekiah (716-687) and Josiah (640-609) stories requires one royal temple (whatever its size) in Jerusalem. About the city itself, I think the old Jebus tradition may well retain something of its origin. From what I have read there are traces of fortifications on the Jebus / City of David hill as early as the 18th century BC.
Gumby: according to mainstream historical criticism the Egypt-Exodus-Wilderness-Conquest tradition is mainly literary creation (as the United Kingdom of David-Solomon).
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Leolaia
Here is a good article on the subject:
http://www.truthbeknown.com/jerusalem.htm
PP.....In saying that the site was "not inhabited" in the tenth century, you would be correct in implying that there were no residence dwellings necessary for the site to constitute a "town" or "city," but it is not true that it was abandoned. It was during Iron I (1200-1000 BC) that a terraced fortification system (not to be confused with the Stepped Stone structure) existed, and for the tenth century, there is evidence of the massive Stepped Stone structure, a defensive wall, a few public buildings, and possible evidence of small Canaanite temple (remains of a statue of a god and a cult stand) at the site. According to Steiner, the site would have been a small but impressive town with mostly administrative buildings and probably a small temple. It wasn't until the eighth century that it urbanized to the extent of being a substantial city with a residential district.
That the site was originally not a city but a fortified administrative centre is also suggested by the name siyon "Zion" which in Hebrew means "fortress, place of defense". That is exactly what the site was in the tenth century. And in 2 Samuel 5:7, Zion is designated explicitly as both a fortress and a "citadel": "David captured the fortress of Zion, the Citadel of David." Although the term "Citadel" or "City of David" is presently used to designate the entire residential portion of Jerusalem, it seems equally possible that here "Citadel of David" is just a grandiose name for the fortress. And while the text could be read as glossing the name Zion with the more familiar "City of David," this seems rather improbable (considering how common "Zion" was as an ideological name in the poetic literature) and I wonder if here we are dealing with a genuine anachronism: that the fortress was already called the Citadel of David, even before the supposed time of David! That made me wonder. It raised the possibility that the site was originally a refuge where the governor or king would retreat to in times of war and strife. It had its own water supply, it was raised on its own mount, and it was from the tenth century protected by an outer wall and stone fortifications. During times of peace the Judean king would have ruled from Hebron (cf. Numbers 13:22 which described Hebron as a capital city like Tanis in Egypt, and the tradition in 2 Samuel 2:11 that David was originally "king in Hebron over the House of Judah"), but it was during times of war and conflict that the king would have temporarily ruled from the stronghold.
When we look at the record in 1 Kings, we find just such a period of strife around 930 B.C. -- the wars between Jeroboam and Rehoboam. I think we can agree that the United Monarchy did not exist, but that does not necessarily mean that the period of strife between Israel and Judah during the subsequent period did not exist. If we consider this possibility, we can note that time of the two kings (930-910 B.C.) fits right into the tenth century period when the site was fortified. And curiously, the narrative in 1 Kings explicitly describes Jeroboam as building fortifications in mountain sites in Israel: "Jeroboam fortified Shechem in the mountain country of Ephraim, and lived there. Then, leaving there, he fortified Penuel" (1 Kings 12:25). Might Rehoboam have similarly retreated to Jerusalem and fortified the site as well? The omission of this from 1 Kings would be understandable since it would conflict with the earlier claim that it was already a substantial city. But 2 Chronicles 11:5-11 attests a separate tradition about Rehoboam's substantial fortification activity: "Rehoboam lived in Jerusalem and built fortified towns in Judah. He rebuilt Bethlehem, Etam, Tekoa, Beth-zur, Soco, Adullam, Gath, Mareshah, Ziph, Adoraim, Lachish, Azekah, Zorah, Aijalon, Hebron -- these were fortified towns in Judah and Benjamin. He fortified them strongly and put commanders in them with stores of food, oil, and wine." Then there was also the campaign of Shishak (1 Kings 14:25-28), where the king's presence of Jerusalem would have also been understandable. The campaign city list of Sheshonq I does not list a city named Jerusalem among the conquered localities, but it does mention Judah-malk "the king of Judah" as a place name. This locality is unknown, but if the king surrendered from his own citadel, that could explain why the Judean king himself is stated as a locality, instead of a city.
I also have some ideas about the origin of the David and Solomon traditions and how they were associated with the later city. Solomon could easily be explained as the name of the deity the town was named after -- Yeru-salim (Urusalimmu in older Bronze Age texts) could have been interpreted as "founded by Solomon," with Solomon as the eponymous ancestor of the Jerusalemites. As for David, I think it is possible that the name is a vestigal memory of the Bronze Age period of Egyptian hegemony in Canaan. I always thought it was quite remarkable that, though the Israelites and Judeans were derived from ancestral Canaanite populations, there is hardly a hint about Egyptian presence in Canaan (Numbers 13:22 might be one such hint). But what if the legend of the United Monarchy is really a dim memory of a time when all the lands of Israel and Judah were united under Egyptian control? It was the Thutmose dynasty that secured control over these lands, and local governors were subject to the Egyptian king. Thutmose means "son of Thoth" and in Egyptian the name of the deity was Djehuty (dj-h-w-t-y). David (d-w-d in Hebrew) would correspond to Djehuty if the /h/ is elided (as it is in the Greek form Thoth which derives from an underlying dj-w-t). Now what is especially interesting is that Thutmose III in his Palestinian campaign (c. 1482 B.C.) had a general named Djehuty who (in a papyrus from the 19th Dynasty) was famous for capturing cities in the Levant -- particularly along the later Philistine coast. Djehuty's exploits became legendary in Egypt and inspired tales about his cunning and trickery in taking the city of Joppa. All this recalls David's extensive involvement with the Philistines, his warrior cunning, his defeat of the Philistines, and his capture of Jerusalem (cf. 1 Samuel 17:40-54, 21:11-16, 29:1-11; 2 Samuel 5:6-12, 17-25). A golden bowl discovered from the time of Thutmose III has a funerary inscription for Djehuty which refers to him as a general ("keeper of all the troops"), viceroy in the Levant ("keeper of all foreign lands"), treasurer ("filling stores with lazuli, electrum, and gold"), and "royal scribe". Like David, Djehuty thus appears as viceroy of lands in Syro-Palestine and his role as royal scribe recalls David's literary fame. The tradition about David wresting the city of Jerusalem from the hands of the Jebusites (a suspicious name meaning"downtrodden") could reflect either Djehuty's or Thutmose III's conquest of Canaanite cities formerly under native control. The god Thoth was also regarded as the scribe of the gods, renowned for his wisdom and associated with literature, arts, and learning, and so perhaps Djehuty the man and Djehuty the god merged in later Judean tradition. Since the Thutmose kings were also named after Thoth, the figure of "David" might also conflate Djehuty with the pharaohs themselves. Exactly like Thutmose III, David is represented as defeating a coalition of Syrian and Canaanite kings and establishing garrisons and local governors in their cities (2 Samuel 8:5, 6). I have also long wondered if the book of Joshua preserves memories of the campaigns of Ahmose I and Thutmose III. And also just like Thutmose III, David's dominion is described as extending to the Euphrates (2 Samuel 8:3; 1 Kings 4:21) with garrisons in Syria as well (2 Samuel 8:13). And this also explains why Solomon marries the daughter of the Egyptian pharaoh (1 Kings 11:1) and why the contemporaneous Edomite king Hadad marries the sister of Queen Tahpenes of Egypt (1 Kings 11:19; cf. t3-x(mt)-p3-nsw "wife of the king") -- both are memories of the period of Egyptian hegemony when loyal Egyptian vassals married members of the royal court.
There is also the similarity between the phrase "House of David," which was used to refer to Judah or the Judean kings (1 Samuel 20:16; 2 Samuel 3:6; 1 Kings 12:19, 17:21), and which was first attested in the ninth century B.C. stele from Tell Dan, and the Egyptian use of "house" or "great house" (pr`3) which in the 18th Dynasty referred to the king and his dynasty. Might "House of David" be derived from pr`3 djhwtyms "Great House of Thutmose" and refer to Judean kings who trace their authority back to Djehuty or Thutmose, vaguely recalled as a native Judean named David? Note also that 2 Samuel 2:8-10 attests "House of Judah" as a synonym of "House of David" which raises the question of whether both names are related: dwd and yhwdh could both be regarded as differing Hebraizations of the same underlying foreign name dyhwd- (=djhwd), one tradition altering it to resemble the word for "beloved" and the other changing it to resemble the word for "praise" (hwdh, imperfect yhwdh). I know this is all terribly speculative, but it makes some sense because there was indeed been a time in the distant past when the disparite peoples of Canaan were under centralized control by Egypt. After the collapse of Egyptian hegemony, the Philistines were installed by the Egyptians to maintain order, and the nations of Israel and Judah arose through efforts of the local Canaanite population to resist Philistine influence. The legendary exploits of "Djehuti" against the same coastal cities had relevance in the current struggle, and thus the legendary figure was nativized as a Judean folk hero, with the bit about him being Egyptian getting forgotten in the process. The destructive campaigns of Ahmose and Thutmose III against the Canaanites became campaigns by Joshua and David against the Canaanites. The era prior to Philistine hegemony became viewed as a golden age, with genuine memories of empire and influence being mixed with legend. With the ideological focus on native sovereignty, Egypt was remembered as only a friend and partner of David's empire -- not as the nation that had real political control. The Judean kings viewed themselves as the heirs of ancient empire-builder "David" (in reality an amalgam of Thutmose III and Djehuty) and called their dynasty the "House of David". That would also explain why the royal fortification of Zion came to be known as the "Citadel of David," as it would at times form a temporary seat (in the tenth century B.C.) of the "House of David". Then centuries pass and the Deuteronomist History (comprising Judges to 2 Kings) assembles the many traditions together. By this time, Jerusalem had urbanized into a major city and the early existence of the "Citadel of David" led to the tradition that David himself had ruled from there. This was combined with another tradition about Solomon as the founder or early king of the city. The name Urusalimmu is known from texts as early as the 19th century B.C., and the name was also attached to the local area in Armana texts from the 14th century -- and it has been pointed out that the name in Canaanite means "founded by Shalem," that is, by the Canaanite god of dusk (the twin brother of Shahar). This suggests that the site, prior to the rise of the town and administrative center, was home to a shrine to Shalem. This shrine, in the early days of the Judean monarchy, would thus been a temple of Shalem -- which, when Shalem was historicized as Solomon and Yahwism became the religion in Jerusalem, became known as the "Temple of Solomon". There is direct evidence of this: the Assyrian version of Shalem is Shalman (which recalls the Greek form of the name, salomon) and the consort of Shalman was Shalmanitu, who was called the goddess of Urusalimmu. And in the Song of Songs, we have a love poem between "Solomon" (slmnh) and the "maid of Shulamit" (swlmyt) -- originally a love poem between two Canaanite gods? It is also interesting that David's two sons are both named after Shalem (cf. Absalom "Shalem is father"), and that Shalem is associated with a priest-king in Genesis 14:18 whose name Melchizedek ("Zedek is king") contains the same priestly suffix -zedeq "righteous" that also occurs in the name of Adoni-Zedek ("Zedek is Lord") the king of Jerusalem in Joshua 10:3-5, and as the name of the high priest of Jerusalem in the time of David (2 Samuel 20:25) and Solomon (1 Kings 4:4). Might "Zedek" be a local epithet of Shalem? Finally, the old tradition about David and his golden age antedating the Philistines stood in contradiction with the Exodus traditions of the Pentateuch, which designated the ancestors of the Israelites and Judeans as Egyptian slaves entering the land already populated by Philistines. And so the cycle of legends associated with David was moved to the time of the Philistines, during the time the nations of Israel and Judah actually took shape.
Anyway, it's an interesting idea....
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gumby
Hey Pete and Narc....you don't have to convince me the bible is a farce....I ALREADY believe that......I'm on your side......remember?.
I was simply supplying some info. from the believers point of view .
Gumby * ducks from rotten eggs thrown by Mouthy.
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Pistoff
dang, leolaia.........your research is seriously good.
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peacefulpete
I'll second Pistoff's comment. I like it a lot. The pieces have been suggested before but I've never seen the keystone in place. The Egyptian dominion of palestine as framework for the conquest tradition.
A comment from Helmer Ringgren (Israelite Religion pp83,4) about tsedeq: ...is neither exclusively nor even primarily a juristic concept. On the basis of Aabic, the original meaning of the root is something like "be right, stable, substantial."..."conformity to a norm."
He goes on to say that tsedeq can mean a great many things in various contexts, however, the uses in the OT have definate Baalist overtones. The Divine granting of rain and produce as needed is associated with His agent the King in Ps 72,85,93,97,110,etc. The Sacred King concept is IOW embodied in Melchizedek. The King is the manifestation of the god and his presence ensures productivity and balance, the balance that Baal achieved thru his battles. So whether this adaquately explains the use of the word or we have need yet to see tsedeq as the name of a local deity I have no opinion. (imagine that) -
stillajwexelder
Please do not laugh or mock -- but if you want to read around the subject -- read books about Fremasonry -- design of Solomons Temple features highly -- and yes it was designed and built by Hiram according to Masonic Fokelore
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Valis
Every good thread needs its own illustration...*LOL* and ya Leo is dangerously smart...we might have to get a restraining order...*LOL*
Sincerely,
District Overbeer
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Leolaia
One interesting matter is the origin of the names of the tribes, which suggests a heterogenous and native origin of the Israelites and Judeans in the land. The tribe of Dan who affiliated themselves with Israel rather late should probably be identified with the Dny(n) Sea People who settled in the Levant and known to the Greeks as the Danaans (cf. Judges 5:17, which in a genuinely archaic text describes the tribe of Dan as a seafaring people, and Ezekiel 27:19 which represents the Danites as traders of merchandise with Javan, that is, the "Greeks"). Genesis 9:27 appears to be an early Yahwistic tradition on the settlement of the Aegean Sea Peoples (including the Dani, Peleshet, and the Shardana) in the Levant, and it would have been through their influence that figures such as Japheth (cf. Greek Iapateos) entered the primeval tradition. I think there should then be more attention paid to the possible early influence of Greek mythological traditions in Israel -- if Aegean Greeks were subsumed into the later Israelite state. In Greek legend, Danaus was associated with the demigod Cadmus; just as the tribes of Dan and Gad were united within the state of Israel. Cadmus was the brother of Phoenix, the founder of Phoenicia, and Cilix, the founder of Cilicia. His father was Agenor, the king of the land later named Phoenicia. Thus Cadmus appears to be the eponymous ancestor of a people in Syria -- associated perhaps with the Hittites or Phoenicians. Interestingly also is the fact that Gad was the name of the Phoenician and Aramaean god of luck, who is mentioned in Isaiah 65:11 (cf. also Joshua 11:17) and is believed to have been the source of the name of the tribe (cf. Westermann, Skinner). The name of the deity derives from Aram. gdd "decide". Might Cadmus and Gad be the same deity? Now according to Greek myth, Cadmus slayed a giant serpent but was later turned into a serpent himself (just as an oracle had prophesied). In the Blessing of Jacob, the tribe of Gad is prophesied to "attack them [robbers] at their heels," an expression that specifically recalls the curse on the serpent in the Eden story (cf. 3:15; 49:19); moreover the prophecy also says that Dan (likewise linked with the Danaus-Cadmus legends) "shall be a serpent along the way, a viper by the path that bites the horses' heels" (Genesis 49:17). Since the Greeks believed that Danaus and Cadmus hailed from the Levant (also crediting to Cadmus the introduction of the Phoenician alphabet to Greece), the connection is an intriguing one indeed. One other final point is that the Moabites knew of a neighboring people named Is-gad "Men of (the god) Gad", a name which recalls the tribe of Issachar, which on analogy would be etymologically Is-sakar "Men of (the god) Sakar," the latter deity being an Egyptian god of death.
The tribe of Asher is thought to derive their name from the goddess Asherah, while other tribes (e.g. the Leah tribes) take their totemistic names from animals: Reuben takes its name from a word for "lion" (cf. Arabic ri'-bal "lion") and Simeon takes its name from "hyena" (cf. Arabic sim'- "hyena, wolf"). Other names are elucidable as geographically-based names relating to tribal location. Benjamin, meaning "sons of the south" (cf. yaminu "south," e.g. Yemen), refers to the southernmost of the Rachel tribes, Zebulon refers to Mt. Zebul, sanctuary of Baal-zebul (the -on suffix is common in mountain names, cf. Sirion, Lebanon, Hermon), Ephraim means something close to "fertile tract" (cf. 'pr "fertile soil"), located as it is a fertile plain, and Naphtali (cf. npt "height") refers to the nothern highlands W of the Upper Jordan (cf. the pre-existing town of Nepheth of Joshua 17:11). Finally, the names of many tribes were attested as toponyms in Canaan prior to Israelite "settlement". Asher appears in Egyptian monuments as the name of a district in NW Palestine as early as Seti and Ramesses II, Zakkar (Issachar, lit. Ta-[k]-ka-ra) occurs as the name of a Canaanite district since Thutmose III and near Dor in the 12th century B.C.
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peacefulpete
In reading this thread again many years later, I'm still fascinated with the impossible task of reconstructing the ancient past. The world was filled with shared legends and origin stories adopted and adapted for local audience. I've come to the impasse that fragmentary documents and clues necessarily leads. What was history? what was legend? Ancient 'historians' saw little difference. The temple at Tyre itself was described as 2300 years old by the 5th century Herodotus making the temple (if story is correct) far older than any historical Hiram. Was Hiram himself a historical person? was his legend simply one of the many familiar to the writer/s of the Jewish stories and incorporated into the golden age tales of the birth of the nations of Israel and Judah?
