The Sean McDowell Show - How Archaeology Supports the Bible: A Conversation with Joel Kramer

Episode Date: August 23, 2024

What are the top archaeological discoveries that confirm the Bible? How good is the archaeological record for Scripture? In this interview, I talk with archaeologist Joel Kramer about the top 10 archaeological findings and his latest book "Where God Came Down." READ: Where God Came Down, by Joel Kramer (https://amzn.to/3n3v5Ca) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [SMDCERTDISC] for $100 off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://twitter.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: @sean_mcdowell Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org

Is there evidence that the patriarchs actually lived? What about King David? What about the place where Jesus was born, he grew up, and the place where he died and was crucified? Well today we're going to look at the archaeological evidence and how it intersects with the Bible. And we're here with a friend of mine who is streaming all the way from Amman, Jordan, who's an archaeologist. He is a filmmaker, got a master's degree at the University of the Holy Land in archaeology, and has been practicing archaeology for 15 years, living in the Middle East 26 years, and has written just a great new book called Where God Came Down that we're going to talk about today. So, Joel Kramer, really appreciate you coming on.

Hey, absolutely. It's my pleasure. So before we get into some of the specific archaeological evidence and how it intersects with the Bible, tell me your story. Like how did you become an archaeologist living in the Middle East with your family? Yeah, well, I was raised in the Middle East. I grew up in Saudi Arabia. I ended up in Utah, and I ended up pastoring there for eight years. And I lived in a town called Brigham City, Utah, and I used to make videos. They were outreach videos to Mormons, Bible versus the Book of Mormon and such. And so I was challenging the Mormon faith, and one thing that the Mormons were challenging me with was, well, what about the challenges to your own faith? Interesting.

You know, do you ever address those? Do you ever deal with those? And do just that, to study. I ended up studying in the university for 10 years under secular scholars with the idea of, you know, study under the ones that are making the criticisms of the Bible so that you're getting it straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak. And so that's how I got into archaeology. And I was privileged to work under a very active archaeologist named Dr. Shimon Gibson. And so I got, it was a blessing working under him because I was able to get a lot of experience because he was actively doing several digs. So I had the privilege to dig in Jerusalem for many, many seasons, in Bethlehem and different places. Joel, you and I met 10 years ago when I brought a group of students

with our friend Eric Johnson to Israel, and you took us to the cave of the Dead Sea Scrolls. You took us to Jericho, a number of other places, and I appreciate that you have a master's, you have training, but you're actually involved in digs. So you have the practical work, you might say, and the academic work as well, which is unique. As a whole, looking at the field of archaeology, since this is your specialty, how would you describe the belief of many archaeologists when it comes to the Bible? Do they accept it? Do they reject it? Ambiguous? How would you capture as a whole that position? Yeah, it's quite confusing. It was confusing to me as I initially was introduced to the field of biblical archaeology, because the name of the

field makes it sound very positive towards the Bible. And really that's not the case. It's one thing people have to understand about the field of biblical archaeology is that it is a secular field. And so therefore our expectations of, you know, what archaeologists believe should be in line with that. And so, you know, there are a few Bible-believing archaeologists that are out there working in Israel in the land of the Bible, but the vast majority of biblical archaeologists are secular. And so you have a clash of worldview. You have, you know, for me personally, my worldview is the Christian biblical worldview. And so I'm in a field that is the secular humanistic worldview. Those of you joining, we have some folks coming in from New Jersey, different parts of the world, from Kentucky. We're going to jump into your book,

Where God Came Down, which by the way, Joel, I was telling you we chatted before. I'd seen your films but not read your book and I was just thrilled. It's so interesting. You're telling stories, supporting it visually. I'm sharing some things with my family. I was like, hey, did you guys know this? I was talking to my wife about it last night. It's a great, great book. But before we dive into some of the specific archaeological finds, and then we're going to take some of the questions here, you used an illustration I thought was very helpful at the beginning of the book where you described the relationship between the Bible and archaeology

compared to a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle. Explain. Yeah, I'm a very visual person, and so I'm always wrestling myself to try to understand things and and i usually do that visually and so if you uh say say you find a um box with a jigsaw puzzle box and you open it up and all that's in there are five pieces of a 500 piece jigsaw puzzle and you take those five pieces and you look at those five pieces and you analyze them what can you tell about this jigsaw puzzle based on only five pieces and the answer is uh next to nothing and uh and and then yet if you

look at the uh cover on the box, then there'll be a picture of the jigsaw puzzle that will show you what that is about. And if you use that picture, then you can go back to your five pieces and you can understand the context of where they come from in the puzzle. And so it occurred to me that this is like archeology,

that the five pieces of the jigsaw puzzle are the archaeology when you dig you don't find whole buildings you don't find whole cities you don't find usually even whole pots um you find pieces of everything okay and uh and so so but but those five jigsaw puzzle pieces demonstrate that there once was an actual jigsaw puzzle. And so then the picture that's on the front of the cover of the jigsaw puzzle is like the Bible. The Bible gives us the big picture of what happened in the past and where those things happened and so when we dig in the ground as archaeologists and we find these pieces of evidence we need a bigger context in order to understand them and that's that's where the Bible comes into and sometimes

especially these days in the field the secular field of biblical archaeology, things can get out of order. And we can be taught or think that it's actually the five pieces of the jigsaw puzzle that is teaching us about the jigsaw puzzle or testing the jigsaw puzzle. But really, it's the other way around. And so when we're told things like, well, archaeology tests the Bible and its reliability. Now, really, the Bible is what's needed to understand the archaeology that's coming out of the ground. And so, you know, and the Bible can be used to test what archaeologists are telling us to determine whether it's true or not. And so, yeah, it's a matter of perspective.

But the Bible, between Mesopotamia and Egypt, the most important set of ancient texts that archaeologists use or should use to interpret what they're finding in the ground from the places and the periods that the Bible is talking about is the biblical texts. And if you start ignoring those, then you're just talking about speculation. And if you have 10 archaeologists looking about the same thing and not basing their understanding of that on an ancient text, then they're going to say 10 different things, and there's going to be a lot of confusion. And what clears up the confusion, how you can learn biblical archaeology, is to use the Bible. So very, very quickly, the puzzle piece, we have five out of 5,000 or whatever. It's the picture that helps place where those go. Without the picture, we don't

have a map, so to speak. So if the archaeological world rejects the Bible, which we would consider a map, they're going to interpret the data very, very differently. So really, it comes back to the worldview somebody's bringing to the archaeological dig and the data more than anything. Is that a fair assessment? Absolutely. It's, you know, somebody who believes in God, believes in the supernatural, believes in miracles, is going to interpret evidence, archaeological evidence, completely differently than somebody who doesn't believe in any of those things. And you know, that five pieces from a 5,000 piece puzzle is relevant to archaeology in Israel, because the estimation of how many of the biblical sites and how much of each site has

been dug over the whole time that archaeology has been going on in Israel is about estimated at about 1%. Wow. And so what that means is if anybody says, well, you know, that can't be true because that's never been found. Well, we're only talking about a 1% sample that's been dug out of the ground in all the places that could be dug in the land of the Bible. And yet, it's amazing to look at how much evidence we have that comes out of just that 1% sample. I remember an article years ago from Edwin Yamauchi, and he said 1% of the Holy Land has been excavated.

Of sites that have been excavated, only a small percentage of those actually sites have been excavated. Of the small percentage of sites excavated, only a small percentage of that has been reported. And of those reported, only a small percentage of that has made its way so much to the popular world. And I thought, my goodness goodness that helped put a framework so to speak in our expectations of what archaeology would reveal now we're going to come to your book where god came down joel let me go off script for a second because one of the questions was about

where's a dig you're working on right now and what have you found when i went to israel 10 years ago with you one of my favorite things is you took us to Jericho because the traditional story is Kathleen Kenyon in the middle of the 20th century, roughly pretty much dismissed that Jericho matches up with the biblical record without going into all the detail. What is just one or two things you found on site digging there that makes you think, ah, that's a little bit too quick. There is some evidence that supports the biblical account. You mean at Jericho specifically? At Jericho, yeah.

Yeah, because I haven't ever actually dug at Jericho. But I've studied Jericho for years and years and years, and it is a good example that we got to look at things in the big picture. First of all, one thing we focus on is everything that the archaeologists disagree about. What's amazing is everything that the archaeologists agree about, so think about Jericho. They all agree that Jericho is Jericho. How do they know that Jericho is Jericho? Well, the only ancient text that talks about Jericho from the time period know that Jericho is Jericho? Well, the only ancient text that talks about Jericho from the time period, you know, Joshua and the conquest, is the Bible. So the only way that they even know that they're talking about Jericho

is through the Bible. And everybody agrees that Jericho was Canaanite, and then something happened, and then later in history it became Israelite. And so what happened there? Well, maybe we should go to the one historical, you know, the historical document that we have that tells us what happened. Then everybody agrees that the city wall of Jericho collapsed. We have a fallen wall at Jericho. And what, of course, is Jericho famous for in the Bible? It's famous for the walls that came tumbling down. And so really, when you boil down to what, in this case, Kathleen Kenyon is saying critically about the Bible, she's saying that, well, even though this is Jericho, even

though this was Canaanite and became Israelite, even though we have a fallen wall and a burned destruction here, the Bible can't be true because there's this one particular kind of pottery that that uh is from Cyprus that wasn't that I didn't find here so um really it's uh it's it's it's just an illogical ridiculous claim that in the big picture, everything fits. And so they're going to try to disqualify, you know, based on some little tiny detail that here's a possibility. Maybe the archaeologist is wrong and the Bible is right. You know, that's a possibility right there. And so, yeah, you have all these examples of these minute details that nobody understands that they're trying to use to claim that the

Bible doesn't get it right when ignoring the big picture of how is it that this, the biblical text told archaeologists what they would find if they ever got around to digging Jericho, what they would find under the ground. And it told us what would be found, this fallen wall, thousands of years before archaeologists came along and dug it and found a fallen wall. A seven-year-old would understand that as evidence, and that would be the end of the story. You know, they wouldn't understand this whole explanation about imported pottery from Cyprus and why that discounts the Bible. And so really, when you look at the criticisms of the Bible, they're really groundless. They're not intimidating.

That's awesome. I remember you describing that. Thanks for the clarification. You didn't dig there. But I remember you took our group and we walked around Jericho, and you pointed out when they find the city, it describes in the Bible they burnt it. Well, there's burnt pottery. The grain matches up with the season that it was.

So these kind of findings that I remember you pointed out to us was really helpful. Now, I show your video, and then we're going to move back to the book to my students. Tell us the name very quickly when you go on site and describe Jericho for those watching if they want to check it out Yeah, it's called Jericho unearthed and When I got to Israel the first question that I asked the question To the professors that I was studying under and I said, what's the number one challenge to the Old Testament? And they said Jericho so I started with Jericho and did that film and brought in the only one that was still alive that had worked as a staff member under Kathleen Kenyon. And he stayed with me for three weeks.

And so, yeah, it was. And I've been studying that site ever since. It is the number one challenge to the Bible, but it should be the number one example of how the Bible correlates with the archaeological evidence. I mean, it's amazing. You have a city that the wall fell down, that was burned, that laid abandoned, and then was occupied by Israelites. And what does the Bible say the events were? Well, they say that the wall fell down, that the Israelites burned the city, that Joshua put a curse on it that laid abandoned until the time of Ahab when the bible says it was finally rebuilt as a city so that's the chronology of events that you have in the bible and that's

the chronology of events that you find in the ground uh what's the problem yeah exactly you know what let's do a whole show on this in the future let's have you back and do that i think would be really interesting i think people would enjoy it So let's jump back to your book where God came down and you start with the patriarchs. And one of the standard narratives, at least that I've read, correct me if I'm wrong, that many in scholarship completely dismiss these stories as being mythological. You take issue that, for example, believe we actually have the very campsite where Abraham stayed, known as Mamre. Explain why that site is significant first, biblically speaking. Okay, yeah.

First of all, to the claim that you hear all the time that there's no archaeological evidence for Abraham. Okay, well, first of all, Abraham lived in a tent 4,000 years ago. You know, archaeology is the study of ancient people from what they've left behind. So what does a guy living in a tent 4,000 years ago leave behind? What should we expect? We should expect nothing. And in fact, I hang out with Bedouin. I've been hanging out with Bedouin for years and years and years. And I can assure you, it is very difficult to figure out where a Bedouin campsite was a week after they moved, much less 4,000 years after they, because they don't have a bunch of excess stuff that they

leave behind. Everything that they have, they use. And when they move their camp, I mean, they're gone. Where were they? And so it's really a hypocritical statement that you hear over and over again. Well, there's no archaeological evidence for the patriarchs. Well, what would we expect? So that's why it's so amazing that there is archaeological evidence for Abraham. Now, why? Because for most nomads that lived in the ancient past, there isn't. So why with Abraham? And the answer is, is because God came down and met with Abraham and promised him promises. And one of the main promises that he made to Abraham at Mamre, Genesis chapter 18, is he promised Abraham that you will become something more than you are right now. You will become a great and powerful nation. Well, archaeologically great and powerful nations do leave things behind that show that they exist. And so we know Abraham

archaeologically through what he becomes, just as Mamre we know as an archaeological site because of what it becomes. So we have this amazing event where God comes down and speaks to Abraham and his wife, Sarah, and promises them a son. And then we have the Israelites remembering that. And so they built a structure around that site to remember and to commemorate that important event in their history. And then we have Herod the Great, for example, building on that site and enclosing it with a wall to please his Jewish subjects. And of course, people, the Jews continue to worship at that place and visit that place. And then we have in Constantine's day in the Christian era, the Byzantine period, we have one of four churches that Constantine builds in the land there at Mamre. And so and then and then we have Islam also honor the site, which is important because the Palestinian town of Hebron, as it as it grew out to that area, didn't cover it over, but

grew around it. They recognized it as sacred ground. And so what you have then is you have this stack, one thing on top of another, of all these different periods and the structures that were built that date all the way from the Islamic period, all the way back in time, archaeologically to the time of Abraham, who built an altar there. That's what he left behind in his campsite. The Bible specifically says that when God made him that promise, he built an altar. And it was that altar that was then being commemorated and other structures being built around it. And of course, that original altar was used for all kinds of things like pagan rituals, and it was destroyed and rebuilt and all these kinds of things.

But you can see in the site itself that it is built around a center point, and that center point is where Abraham's altar was. So if the claim that Abraham is mythological is true, then you have to explain what this stack of archaeology is that commemorates some event that dates all the way back to 4,000 years ago, and what is the reason for that? Why have people considered this ground sacred for so long, for thousands and thousands of years? You have to give an explanation for that, which of course they don't. And the best explanation, again, is in the historical text that talks about that place and what happened there. And so it stands as an archaeological monument to the realness of Abraham, the father of our faith. So connect for me the place itself. How do we know what is labeled today as mammary is the site abraham was at i see that

there's church fathers there were muslim scholars and others going back but what originally tells us they got the site right because if they got it wrong and people believed it and then these others came after him it'd be like oh that makes sense because they trusted the earliest sources what's the chain of command that gets us back as close as we can to the events themselves? Yeah, it's it's you know, I mean, one of the main things with a site like Mamre is when the Bible describes where Mamre is. Mamre is in the land that is controlled by the city of Hebron. And so it would be a problem if these different commemorated sites from these different periods were in several different places so that you have three or four or even two places that are called Mamre and that are understood to be the campsite of Abraham.

We don't have that in this case. We have them not in different places. We have them stacked on top of each other. Okay. So the archaeology that shows that the site was occupied at the time of Abraham, which is pottery, and this altar that was built there, that's what is being commemorated in each one of these periods that are building walls around it and commemorative walls around it. And then we have also a whole list of historical sources, as you mentioned, that are speaking about this place. And so it's actually quite obvious because you have basically three archaeological sites that are mentioned in the Hebron area, the city itself of Hebron, the Mamre, which was the campsite of Abraham, and then where the patriarchs were buried at Machpelah,

and you have all three of them that have been found. So when you're asking the question, well, you know, this famous person was buried in this tomb or buried in this cave or had this campsite of all the places around here that could possibly be that campsite or be that cave that they were buried. How do we know which one it is? Well, it's the one that has this commemorative stack of archaeology built over the top of it that is saying it's right here. And it goes back. The pottery we have and other archaeological evidence fits that time and place.

So you can rule out other options. I think some people forget how small Israel is. I realize you can take a plane across it. Not that long at all. It feels like the U.S. or Alaska. There's endless space. But there's really only so many options. So in some ways, it's just isn't this kind of a process of just ruling out following the data and when it comes to memory these pieces just kind of fit together yeah and there there are a few

instances where there are competing uh sites you know where where the same event is claimed to have happened at two different places just like like in manuscript evidence, we have situations where two manuscripts are conflicting. They're saying different things. So what's the general rule of thumb with manuscript evidence? Well, the general rule of thumb is that we take the earlier manuscript. And it's the same way in archaeology. If you have two sites that are okay commemorating an event you take the older one the one that goes back um further a great example of that would be the

garden tomb and uh and the site which is now the church of the holy sepulcher both of them are saying you know this is the tomb of jesus where he was raised in Golgotha and everything. So which one do we take? Well, one of them, uh, archeologically goes back in the stack to, uh, the time of the events in the new Testament. And the other one starts in the late 1800s. So if you're thinking manuscript evidence, you would take the first century manuscript over the one that, uh, the first copy is in the 1800s. Let's take a couple more from the Old Testament, then we'll jump to the New Testament. I just noticed that our books line up. It almost looks like we could be in the same room together. Almost. Not perfectly, but we're actually 7,000 miles away because I'm in Southern California.

You're in Amman, Jordan, where you're studying and actually a part of archaeological digs. Those of us joining us, we're here with Joel Kramer, archaeologist, and we're talking about his recent book where God came down and some of the evidence pointing towards the Bible getting it right archaeologically speaking. Now, you mentioned Machpelah. I've been to Israel four times. I've studied archaeology to a degree. I don't know how I missed it, but I was reading your book and you said it is the second most revered or holy site in Judaism. Can you explain why it's so significant? And then we'll jump to some of the evidence that we actually have that site known today. Yeah, it's not on the tourism trail, as you said, but it's definitely, you know, for the Jews that live in the land, they visit it quite frequently and so forth.

And it's, you know, Mamre would also be a very important site to them, but they don't have access to mammary like they do uh to meccapella because of the the political situation over there but um yeah it's uh it's the burial place of the patriarchs it's uh it's very similar to um the temple mount in that um it's never been excavated because it's a it's a important site to both the Jews and the Muslims, and so to excavate at the Temple Mount would probably start World War III, and the same is the case in Hebron, which is where Machpelah is. But yeah, it's where Abraham and Sarah and Isaac and Rebecca and Jacob and Leah are buried. Not Rachel, because if we'll remember, the Bible says that she was buried near Bethlehem. And so when you look at the specific patriarchs and matriarchs that are buried at Machpelah, they are the

lineage of King David, who ruled there at Hebron for seven and a half years. And of course, they're also the lineage of Jesus, the Messiah. And so, it's a pretty amazing experience when you go there, because Herod the Great built walls, commemorative walls around that site, just as he did at Mamre, just as he did at Mount Moriah, the Temple Mount. And when you're standing there in front of the wall at Machapela, you wouldn't know whether you were there. It's like our bookshelves. You wouldn't know if you were there or at the Western Wall because the stones, you know, look the same. And so, and of the places that Herod the Great built up and commemorated, the one that's the best by far preserved is Machiavelli. And that's what another reason why Mamre is so important because Mamre has been excavated down to bedrock.

Whereas the other two sites that are like it, Mount Moriah, Temple Mount, and Machapela, that have never been excavated, we can learn a lot about them through Mamre that has been so what's one or two of either say early church fathers or like an archaeological digger discovery that tells us we got mac macpela right where they actually were buried like how do we know that wasn't added later on yeah so so um so when you're at the city of Hebron and you're looking out to the surrounding hills and, you know, which the bedrock is showing, like in any ancient city in this part of the world, you have tombs. You know, the living live inside the city and the dead are buried on the ridges outside surrounding the city. So you have lots of tombs and you have lots of caves for burial. So when you're looking out there, one of these caves has the biblical patriarchs buried in it, the Bible tells us at Hebron. So how do you know which one it is? Well, it's probably the one that's got this massive wall built in the first century BC around it that is commemorating that cave as that thing. So then when somebody like

Josephus or somebody is mentioning that place and what it looked like, you know, in their day, you know what they're talking about. It's obvious because they're talking about the site that was commemorated in their day, because because of course Herod the Great was before Josephus for example and so you have the same thing how do you know of all the hills that are in Jerusalem how do you know which one is Mount Moriah it's the one with a big massive ancient commemorative walls that are built around it you know, that served as a platform for the buildings to be built on top of. And so it's obvious there's not, you know, five tombs commemorated in such a way. There's one tomb commemorated in such a way. And then it's

discussed in historical sources as being Machapela. And what else would it be okay so let me play skeptic and then we'll move to mount moriah uh this is four four thousand years ago and you describe walls built in the first century bc that gets us halfway to the time of abraham so we're trusting a source as far from abraham as we are from the time of jesus without the tools we have today to study things archaeologically so is that where we're just saying yeah they probably got right we're trusting them what would be the basis for trusting those first walls that were put up and the tradition yeah that's a good question and um and you know the way i would answer that is well that's what mammary would have looked like before it was excavated. You would have seen the Herodian walls sticking out from the mound of ruins, you know, at that time. And you would have said, huh, this must be something significant. Look at these walls from the first century BC. Then an archaeologist named Mater comes in and he excavates down and then he finds in the layers underneath that first century BC, he finds a gate that's from an earlier period that was an enclosure. Most of it was destroyed when Herod the Great built his enclosure, but there's enough of it left to know there was an enclosure. Then you keep going down from there, and you find the pottery that dates to the time

of Abraham, and so that has been done for Mamre, but it can't be, it hasn't been done for a mecapella or for the Temple Mount, because again, it would probably start World War III. Gotcha. So, but even, and the same is true with the temple mount even though we can't excavate there archaeologically there's still plenty of archaeology that you can see without even digging so you could look at it the other way um you know it wasn't herod herod the great didn't come along or in his time they didn't come along and just, you know, randomly pick some. There was something there that was commemorative of that cave.

There were people visiting it for centuries and centuries before. And so his archaeology, you know, he wasn't a great father. He wasn't a great husband, but he was a great builder. And so, yeah, so his walls still stand to this day. And unless we can get in there and do some archaeological work, then the specific questions of what comes before that can't be answered. But if we know that the archaeology goes all the way back to Abraham at Mamre, there's no reason to think that if we could dig the Temple Mount and Machapela that we would find similar evidence. So in a sense, when I did my research on the apostles, I came up with a probability scale. Peter was as high as possible because it's consistent early sources and nothing that

contradicts his early martyrdom and even where he was martyred. Then I get to some other apostles a little later. I think it's more probable than not, but not as strong. So Mamre, because they've dug there, there's a very strong case. Machpelah is the most likely place, but since we haven't dug there, we'd have to admit that our confidence is a little less than Mamre. Is that fair? Yeah, I think that would be fair, but the other thing about it is that there's not competing. We know that the patriarchs were real people. They died. They were buried. We know they were buried in a cave that was bought from the people in Hebron. And so it's right next to Hebron.

And so we have one commemorative cave that the walls that without digging go back to the first century B.C. We don't have any other site that says this is the cave that the patriarchs were buried in. So there really isn't a controversy about it where where there might be, in what you were studying, there might be controversy about that, and people arguing all different things. I'm not aware of anybody arguing that that, that Machpelah isn't actually, you know, the site. I mean, of course, the scholars that don't believe in the Bible and believe that it's all mythology aren't going to believe in it, but for anybody that does, there would be no controversy. I don't know of any controversy with Machapelo.

And again, the ones who are saying that there isn't any evidence for the patriarchs is ignoring the big picture reality that the cities that are talked about and patriarch narratives exist, and that these holy sites where God came down, as I called my book, and spoke to the patriarchs, and met with them, and therefore these places were commemorative, that stack of archaeology has to be explained. What's it doing there? Why is that cave being commemorated if it's not what it what it uh what the bible is saying you know it is that makes sense we've talked about three archaeology things from the old testament they all start with them mamre machpelah mount moriah you hinted at all towards abraham which is fascinating we're going to skip the chapter on king david you have a chapter that talks about confidence where his tomb was and

where uh the not only the temple obviously but where his own palace was and i was there a few years ago and i remember our guide took us through and said you go back just a few decades and a lot of people doubted that david even existed but then they find the the the tella uh the little inscription so to speak to the Tel Dan inscription. And now we have the Palace of David. If people want to see visuals and a good case for this, check out Joel's book, Where God Came Down. Let's shift to the New Testament now for sake of time. Nazareth, pretty obvious question, but why is this significant?

And you talk about some modern day temples and archaeology over the years. At the very bottom, they find something very significant from the first century. Tell us about that. Yeah, it's the same thing that we've been talking about. It's the evidence for Nazareth is one thing on top of another. And so if you take the layers as they dug down, first of all, they had to remove an old church. They tore it down that was built in the 1730 so that they could build the one that stands today. So when they got that out of the way, then they could dig down layer by layer. So they dug down through the ruins of a crusader church which you can see still see then they got down to a byzantine layer where there was a byzantine church and then um and and the crusader and byzantine

church were oriented as they usually are towards the east towards the rising sun then remarkably underneath that were the ruins of a um a synagogue and um and And the floor of the synagogue was oriented in a different direction than the church floors above it. And it was oriented south. Now, why would a building be oriented south? Well, all of the synagogues in that area, and like around Galilee and that area that have been dug face south because they're facing the temple in Jerusalem. And then we have the mosaic floor, a large patch of it that is

preserved from that synagogue. And then we have all kind of symbolism that is Christian in nature, you know, like crosses and whatnot, and then, and graffiti that mentions Mary, and we have the name of Jesus represented, and so forth, and then underneath that, from the house itself that once stood there, we have a mikvah, which is a Jewish ritual bath. So from my own experience of excavating, you know, I've excavated in a couple of villages. And so how do you know when you're digging a house? How do you know if that is a Jewish house? Well, one of the major ways is if you find a mikvah, this Jewish ritual bath, and you know that that's a Jewish house. And so that is what's left. Because you've got to keep in mind that you've been to Israel and you see pottery everywhere.

And you pick up a piece of pottery. Well, that piece of pottery is evidence that once there was a whole pot and that's the way that archaeology works you're not finding entire buildings you're finding pieces of them that are left and if if you think about it logically the further you go down in your layers the less you would expect to find intact because of sense. Because, of course, it's being rebuilt and rebuilt on top of each other, and stones are being reused, and they're digging down to the bedrock to put their walls in like the previous buildings did, builders did. And so at Nazareth, again, we have this stack of archaeology

where the archaeology itself goes down through these periods all the way back to the time of the event that is being talked about in the New Testament with the announcement to Mary that she's going to conceive and have the Messiah. So, and you don't have stacks of archaeology all over. You have one stack that's been commemorated. And so today we have the Church of Annunciation built in the 50s and 60s standing over this site. And they did a great job as far as preserving the archaeology that had been uncovered so that when you walk into that church today, you can go up and look down and you can see the floor from the synagogue and you can see the apse from the Byzantine church

and you can see the wall and the apse is from the crusader building. And so you can see the mikveh. And so it's an amazing sight. It's a stack of evidence saying, physical evidence saying, this right here is where this event that you're reading in the Bible happened. A couple of things. There's quite a few people saying they really appreciate your work. So I just want to encourage you.

Thanks for all that you do. So they're enjoying that in your conversations here last question this one then we'll move to another one what about the name nazareth how do we know that's actually the city itself going back to the first century well we have uh we have name preservation um a lot of the a lot of the cities that we're reading about in the Bible were called the same thing down through the different time periods. And so we have a lot of the same names that are in the Bible that are still called today. And then what's really interesting is because Hebrew was, of course, spoken. And then over time, you know, Greek took over Aramaic and then Greek.

And then even in the Roman period, Greek, because we're talking about the Greek eastern side of the Roman Empire. And then and then eventually Arabic was spoken in these areas. So when, um, when, uh, when a city Nazareth is Palestinian now, when a city is, is called by a name that doesn't mean anything in Arabic, then, um, it's preserving usually the ancient name of that site. So we have many, many examples of name preservation in the land. And so Jerusalem would be one, Bethel would be one. And we also have Nazareth mentioned in an inscription that was found in a synagogue in Caesarea. And so we do have an inscription mentioning Nazareth and, and, and then we have the town of Nazareth, which it hasn't been lost. It's kind of like comparing the Bible

manuscripts to, to some other manuscript that got lost and had to be discovered again. Mamre would fit in that description where it's, it was kind of lost for a while. People weren't sure what these ruins were, and then they were excavated and realized, oh, this is Mamre. Whereas a site like Nazareth or Jerusalem is like the Bible. It never was lost. It always was passed on down to present time from ancient times, and that's what these names were. Because there were pilgrims visiting Nazareth, visiting Bethlehem, visiting Jerusalem from the time of the events right after the time of the events until today. So a lot of cities over time change in their names, like Stersburg wasn't always saint petersburg you're saying it comes to nazareth this name has been preserved through the archaeological record

the written record back to the first century and potentially earlier so there really is no debate that we have nazareth as a place is that is that fair yeah yeah okay exactly yeah and even jerusalem was called alia capitalina for a while but but the understanding that a lea capitalina was the Jerusalem of the Bible was never lost gotcha that makes sense by the way there's a quick comment here it's written in Spanish it says Sean thanks for your work we need to get this translated Spanish I believe in YouTube there's a feature you can go in that will put in the language in spanish maybe somebody can comment and help me out here if i'm mistaken but i believe there's a way to do that if you trust

youtube translation um side note let's keep going uh one of the other new testament places you talk about is the birthplace of jesus now i'm going to read to you what you wrote because i know this was intentional but it sounds pretty strong. You said, quote, the textual and archaeological evidence places the birthplace of Jesus at Bethlehem into the category of historical fact. I'm not even going to ask you why the birthplace of Jesus is important. Actually, I will, for sake of prophecy, very quickly tell us why does it matter that we have the place? And then let's look at the evidence defending that claim. Well, I mean, it's amazing. The fulfillment of prophecy is an amazing and persuasive evidence for the Bible being true, obviously. And so in order to establish that, first of all, you have

to show that a prediction is really a prediction. So Micah 5.2, which is the passage where Micah predicts that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, is found in the Dead Sea Scrolls and predates the birth of Jesus by 125 years. So there's the evidence that this is really a prophecy. This is really a prediction. And so then on the other side, in order to show that it was fulfilled, then you have to show that the birth of Jesus is historical and that he is a historical person and that that he really was born in Jerusalem, so, or sorry, in Bethlehem, and so Bethlehem is in particular important to me, because I worked

there, and excavated in the Church of Nativity, and just next to it, And so I've had several seasons as a staff member digging there. And I dug under two co-directors in that project, both of them secular scholars. One is a secular historian and the other one is a secular archaeologist. And I go into the quotes with them because but but basically. Secular historians don't dismiss that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. I do hear that argument in America. It seems like in America, the main argument against Jesus is that he's a myth in this part of the world. You don't ever hear that. You'd be laughed out of a room if you ever said that. That would just be ridiculous.

Oh yeah, that'd be like me trying to argue that Mormonism isn't true because Joseph Smith never existed. See, it doesn't work. And so nobody argues that over here. And nobody argues that Jesus wasn't a real person. Where would Christianity have come from if he wasn't a real person? And so, of course, they don't believe that he was the Messiah. They don't believe that he was God. They don't believe in those kinds of things. But they certainly believe that he was a historical person. And every historical person's born somewhere. Why not the place that the historical documents point to? And so that's what I asked Joan Taylor, who was the historian. And she, you know, and it's a stupid question that I'm asking her. She's looking at me like, you know, so how do we know that Jesus was really born here? And she's looking at me like, what are you asking me that for? I mean, what do you think we're digging here for? You know, all the historical sources say that Jesus was born here, both in the Bible and extra biblical sources.

And so there really isn't a debate on that, at least in this part of the world. And if students are being taught that Jesus is a myth or that he wasn't born in Bethlehem, then that's just some irresponsible teacher teaching that, you know, without any basis to do so whatsoever. Like I said, you're going to get laughed out of the room. So one thing that I do in my book is I interview a Jewish archaeologist. Because I want to make the point that even this well-known Jewish archaeologist, I ask him the question, hey, where was Jesus born? And he's looking at me like, what are you asking me that question for? He was obviously born in Bethlehem.

That's where all the historical sources, that's where the archaeology points. And so it's not an issue. It's not a controversy. It's a historical fact. It's also an archaeological fact, because when we dug Bethlehem, you know, we're digging inside of a church, but that church is sitting on top of a tell, an ancient ruin okay and so we could dig uh down through the floor of that church which we did and then down to uh the material and the village that uh from the time of jesus and then you can keep going you can go down to uh the time of david and and find material from the time of david because that's also where david was born and where he was from. And you can keep going even beyond that, you know, back to the time of Abraham and back to the time when it was a Canaanite city and so forth. So that's why I asked that question to Joan Taylor, a secular historian. That's why I asked the same question to my archaeology professor. Are you sure that Jesus was born here? And he's like, what do you think we're digging here for? Of course he was born here? And he's like, what do you think

we're digging here for? Of course he was born here, you know? And that's why I asked it also to a Jewish archaeologist. And I, you know, in my interview with him, I say, I'm asking you this because you're a Jewish archaeologist. And he says, that's good, you know? And so where was Jesus born? Well, obviously he was born in Bethlehem. Sure. So nobody is arguing that he was born somewhere else. Let me read the quote from your book. He says, you say, where personally do you believe Jesus was born?

And this is Barkay, who's a Jewish archaeologist. He says, under the church and the nativity in Bethlehem, there are some caves, and those cavities were in use in the first century beyond any doubt. For very important places, very significant places in Christian faith, I would regard the traditional place as authentic. That's pretty significant. That's a great quote, and you're saying that's pretty much the standard view among archaeologists, at least on this issue, even though they differ on others. That's a standard understanding, because what he means by the

tradition is he means the historical sources that we have that say where Jesus was born, all say that he was born in Bethlehem. That's why people have been coming to that site for thousands of years and commemorating it and building it up. And that's why Constantine built the church over it. And so to try to change that now would be impossible. How would you do that? You would claim he was born somewhere else. Well, there's nothing commemorating it. And there's no historical sources that say that that's the case. It would just be your modern take on it and you would be laughed out of the room and to say that Okay, he didn't exist is is in the same category so it's been interesting to me the

the arguments and the things that people talk about and say and argue in America are quite different than what they What they argue about and and talk about over here. That is really interesting. By the way, you got what I would presume would be maybe the greatest compliment you could get being an archaeologist. That is you remind someone of Indiana Jones. So I'm thinking that's probably – I mean what's cooler than that? So you got an awesome – you know what? There's a ton of questions in here about Sodom and Gomorrah, about the Copper Scroll. I'm thinking, why don't we have you come back and we'll just do kind of a live Q&A.

I realize you haven't studied all of these issues and know some more than others, but we can do the one of the conquests. It'd be fun to have you on and just kind of say, hey, what do you think about this? And just kind of unpack archaeology. I think based on the comments, people would really, really enjoy that. So let me ask you one last one. For sake of time, I'll kind of jump in there. You'd say the evidence points towards not only having the birthplace of Jesus, Bethlehem, the city he grew up in, Nazareth, but quote, you say we can be sure. And to me, anytime a scholar says sure, that gives me pause because we're

told to nuance things and not overstate the evidence. You said we can be sure that the church of the Holy Sepulcher standing today in the old city of Jerusalem marks the place where Jesus died and where he rose again. Now, obviously where he rose again is a belief that we hold for different reasons than the site itself establishes, but you are sure that the church of the Holy where he rose again. Now, obviously where he rose again is a belief that we hold for different reasons than the site itself establishes, but you are sure that the church of the Holy Sepulcher is where Jesus died. Tell us what basis that, give us the reasons you have for such confidence in the death place of Jesus at the Holy Sepulcher. Yeah. I mean, first of all, I would say, you know, in regards to all these places that people don't forget. People don't forget. I mean, think about American history.

Think about something that happened more recently, like 9-11. Do you think that it's been 20 years now since 9-11? Do you think that Americans have forgotten, New Yorkers have forgotten what happened and where it happened. Everybody would agree, no. Do you think they'll forget in 50 years from now? 100 years? 200 years? 300 years? They're not going to forget. They're not going to forget where those towers stood and what happened. And so as long as there are Americans in America and New Yorkers in New York, they will not forget where that event happened. And that is the key to understanding the place where Jesus was buried and crucified, is that Christians lived in Jerusalem, followers of Jesus lived in Jerusalem from the time of that event until today, unbroken, except for one

tiny little time period in the destruction, the 70 AD destruction, but they left for that destruction and came back right afterwards. They're not going to forget where Jesus, where the two most climatic events of all human history happened and so we have the most archaeological commemoration this stack of archaeology that i've been talking about for these other sites is there in abundance in these places we have the most historical sources that are referring to those places we have them in the new testament explaining you know where they are and describing hold this yeah hold your thought just a second this is crazy we give me 30 seconds hang on just a second i forgot to plug in my mac i was about to lose the entire stream so keep going i apologize brother

no so so you have uh you know john's uh description in the Gospel of John telling us how close the place of crucifixion and the tomb were to each other, that they were nearby, that they were in the same garden. And then you have the text. To me, it's an incredible story where you hear of what Constantine is saying to do, and Eusebius is recording it all for us. And so they are given the task to go and dig up the tomb of Jesus. And they do that. It takes two years. It's a two-year project. They got to rip down a temple that has been put over the site to desecrate it, to supplant it, which has a statue of Jupiter over the tomb of Jesus and a statue of Venus over the crucifixion place. And so the question is, is how did they know where to dig a hole for two years to find these sites? Well, they knew because they had been desecrated and everybody knew where they were. They were under the temple that desecrated them.

And so you have all these. To me, that's the first recorded archaeological dig in Jerusalem because they're digging for something from antiquity. And so you have all this history. You have all these historical sources you have, it doesn't look like much when you go there today, because the church itself, you know, everybody says the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, but of course the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is crusader. Before that, there were previous churches that were destroyed, and when an enemy comes in and destroys a church, they're going to also destroy that which it commemorates,

which in this case is the tomb and the crucifixion place. And so it's gone through several destructions and all those kinds of things. But the historical sources and the archaeology is phenomenal for those sites, as you would expect, because it doesn't get any more important than those two events. And so if we don't know historically and archaeologically where jesus was crucified and buried and rose from the dead if we don't know that we don't know nothing you know i mean because we have uh you know again back to uh gabi parkai the jewish uh the jewish archaeologist where where does he believe Jesus was crucified and buried? That would be a stupid question to him.

It really would. He'd be like, what, you don't know anything? Everybody knows where Jesus was crucified and buried in Jerusalem. Are you brand new here? Do you not know? Have you not read the... I mean, it's that obvious. It's not controversial at all. The whole thing between Protestants and so forth, looking at the, you know, that the garden tomb came along and everything like that,

it had a lot to do with the Reformation and the way that Protestants were being treated when they went to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and, okay, well, we're going to go find our own tomb over here and that kind of thing. And so, again, it's like comparing a manuscript that the oldest copy of it is late 1800s to a manuscript that evidence that goes back to the first century. There is no comparison, really. And it's important because there's so many deceptions. One of the films that I did is called The Jesus Tomb Unmasked because there's this huge deception in Jerusalem, which will eventually get to America, but that where they're claiming, this is the tomb of Jesus. Over here, we found the bones of Jesus, see, and there's this whole argument. Well, if you're gonna, if you're, you know, the

New Testament says that they stole the body of Jesus away. Well, now we're saying we found where they put it, where they put his bones and all this kind of stuff. And so to defend against that, you really want to use the real tomb of Jesus and the real evidence. You don't want to use something that doesn't have any backing or support. And that's what we have. And I understand that it's sensitive to people. These things can be emotional because we went and we visited the garden tomb, and we had an amazing experience there and everything. So then to be told,

well, that's not where the evidence lies for the tomb of Jesus can be emotional for people. And I want to be sensitive to that and so forth. But at the same time, we want to, you know, reaching a younger generation, we want to teach them the truth about where these places are and how we know those things so that they can understand it and utilize it. So, yeah, that's why I'm passionate about it. Good. Well, your passion's coming through. I get passionate, you know, and I get kind of bottled up over here. Hey, that is totally understandable. I appreciate your sensitivity, too. I've been to the Garden Tomb, and everything inside of me wants to believe that's the place.

Absolutely. Because it feels like it. You get to walk into the tomb. There was the cliff before it fell recently that looked like a skull. I mean, it just matched what you want it to be like. Yeah. But truth has to be supreme,

and I appreciate you promote that. And there are a ton of questions. Oh, go ahead. And just think about this, though, for a second. What would you expect the tomb of Jesus, knowing human nature, to be like 2,000 years later? Would you expect it to be a nice, peaceful garden where the birds are singing and a nice place that you could worship? place of absolute mad chaos where people are bringing their cultures and their beliefs and their rituals from all over the world to this place. And that's what you have in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is madness, craziness. But it in itself is also evidence that this is the

place, you know. That's such a good point, what would we expect knowing human nature? Because I've been to Bethlehem, you know, the church where they believe he's born right over the spot. The Garden of Gethsemane, there's the church, I forget, the Annunciation of Mary, I forget the title of it, that's right next to what's believed

to be Garden of Gethsemane. The Church of All Nations, yeah. Oh, like I said, Church of All Nations. I'm kidding, that's exactly what it is. And there's this sense where we're not comfortable with this just not earthly, powerful, and humble ruler, and we still want to make him in our image. Now, I understand that beautiful churches are bringing a reverence and respect. I get that point.

But there's still the sense where we kind of want to make Jesus into somebody that he never was. And that tension is very interesting to me when you visit those sites. Well, Joel, I got to tell you, there's a ton of questions that are coming up here for you about the garden tomb. We didn't get to the copper scrolls about your thoughts on the ark. If you're okay, we'll have you back and we'll just do an archaeological q a and we will open it up for folks we've had a good number streaming and i think they would really enjoy hearing your opinions on that so those of you quite a few of you gave some positive comments appreciating joel's work one thing you could do is just support him his new book called where god came down can i tell you where god came down it It's excellent. It's interesting. I'm sharing it

with my kids. I was telling my wife about some of the things last night that as much as I've studied this, I didn't know. So pick up a copy of Where God Came Down, and that's one way. Do a book review for him. You can just kind of spread the word and support what Joel is doing. If you've enjoyed this interview, give us a thumbs up. Make sure you hit the subscribe button because here's some of the other interviews we have come up we have come up with the medical doctor soon on near-death experiences barna is releasing a second part to the gen z study the gen z study they did was has sold more copies than any other study from gen z that they put into a monograph part two comes out we're to have the first interview on some of that data. Next week, talking to Rachel Joy Welcher about purity culture and have an interesting discussion there. Lee Strobel, Nancy Piercy. We got a lot of interesting guests coming on.

So make sure you hit subscribe, the notification, and this channel is brought to you in partnership with Biola Apologetics. We are now fully online. So if you have ever thought about getting a master's degree from really anywhere in the world and you have an undergrad degree, we would love to help train and partner with you to be a resource to the church. There's information below. So Joel, hang on. Don't disappear. You've got to be falling asleep because it's so late there in Jordan.

But to the rest of you, thanks for coming in. Thanks for great questions. And somebody jokingly said they'd pitch in to get me a new avengers shirt i am always up for new superhero shirts so uh bring it on i'm welcome to that one all right everybody god bless have a have a great rest of your day