Відео

Best video ever

brilliant

Well done, thanks to all of you.

So proud and happy! Congratulations to Matt, the contractors and the staff for making the Albright beautiful again!

Well done and impressive. Looking forward to a visit. Thanks for all of your work and to the Albright staff and personnel. It is a delightful place.

You should be so proud! I was there as a student with Dr. John Kampen in 2019, and what a difference! Congratulations!!

This particular lecture presents a research and analytical methodology (and philosophy) that can be emulated by Lankan historiography and archeology which would help distil more credible and socially useful record of the evolution of Lankan society in early times. As against the current popularisation of myth-privileged popular historiography as well as historiography aimed at legitimising current ethnic politics and general national identity politics. Thanks, Israel Finkelstein!

That looks fantastic guys, well done!

Hello I am cool

Ever since I discovered him, thanks to You Tube, I am a heavy fan of Israel Finkelstein. As an archeology lover, journalist and a social activist interested in ending the abuse of religion for ethnic supremacism, I immediately focused on his work, enjoying his mischievously polemical style in You Tube debates. May he work and communicate more and long! Aayubovan! (as we say in my language)

Mahalo

Great presentation. Even if there is no evidence of complex literary activity before the 8th century and that a good part of what is written reflects 8th century reality, it is hard to imagine writers recording so many details and with relative precision without written records at their disposal. It is also very hard to imagine the building of fascinating palaces and strong fortresses without some form of writing. No one how smart a writer, how powerful an oral tradition might of how knowledgeable the informants were, no one can simply remember that much and with so much accuracy. Not even a genius! In my opinion, this is one of those examples in which an "argument of silence" is precisely an "argument." Thanks

I watched all the videos of this series. They were great. The experience was informative, enlightening, challenging, and thought-provoking. Among other things and beyond the loopholes that are part of any human endeavor to "understand" and "explain" the past, Matt's good questions and Finkelstein's well-researched presentations illustrate and reaffirm the centrality of how communities (through the example of Ancient Israel) look at the past from their own "social locations" and through the eyes of faith, in an effort to find identity and meaning (many times and sadly with an imperfect use of privilege and power) by echoing memories and putting them in writing, only to do that again and again . Thank you so much!

Good presentation. Question: Based on the assumption that walls do not simply “evaporate” and many times they are rebuilt at later times, and considering that the Hasmonean walls are a substantial remodeling and enlargement of the 6th century walls, wouldn’t it be theoretically possible (despite the lack of archaeological evidence from the Persian period and to sort of explain the 400 year-gap) that these 6th walls did not suffer too much damage, that this damage was fixed during Nehemiah’s time, and that those fixed walls were way improved during the late Hasmonean era? Or is it better to assume that the walls of Nehemiah’s time are an idealistic social construction written at a much later time, say, during the late Hasmonean era (which would date the composition of Jeremiah at the end of the late Hellenistic era)? And what about the notion of “earlier memories” that are always part of any version of history? What role, if any, does this concept play in the hypothesis of the presenter? Thanks

Methodologically, the idea of “ideology” (understood a set of formal and informal ideas that make analysis and knowledge somewhat possible and that function of criteria to achieve this goal) is behind and in front of both “theology” and “history.” In this sense, neither angle is more “ideological” than the other or not necessarily more “historical”; they are aspects in “tension” as Finkelstein rightly point. But, from this perspective, they are not necessarily “opposites,” they are “different” to say the least In the narrator(s) assessment of Ahaz, Hezekiah and Manasseh, for instance, the labels used to name these two approaches (theological and historical as defined in the presentation), somewhat in a fused tension, are two differentiated positioned ways of understanding and/or evaluating what “happened.” Again, events in themselves without interpretation have no meaning. And interpretation and the attributed meanings are, at the end of the day, “social constructions of reality,” not reality in itself.

Great, informative and thought-provoking interview and presentation. The initial remarks made me think of the following idea. The notion that you can talk about or assess (with absolutely surgical precision) (perhaps informed by the hard sciences and.or historicist approach to "reality") what “really happened” (as in the case of the so-called Deuteronomistic History or based on any approach to the past) without inserting ideas to frame the meanings of events, people, and circumstances to determine what took place, at the end of the day, cannot be separated from the necessary interpretations and the attribution of meanings. Even a historicist approach to the past taking into account that past and from a present location has its own ideological presuppositions. It is not less or more ideological than say a “theological” approach. Thanks

Nice Hope you put out more vids Wahiawa Hawaii

Loved your interview with Prof Israel Finkelstein. Would love to see more content like that.

Hi

10:46 very important

20:54 very important

Genius. Finkelstein is the Einstein of the Bible - deciphering the incredibly complex universe of the Old Testament. What a brain. And on top of that a gifted teacher and seems like a lovely man too.

Great! 21:41, the bitter end of King Josiah. Josiah made a secret contract with Neo-Babylonian empire and was its loyal ally, IMHO. Babylonians were to finish Assyria, and Josiah would fulfill his dream of big united Jewish kingdom on the territories of Judah and Israel. This entity would be an important buffer between Babylon and Egypt, so Babylon would support it heavily. Necoh II knew that his Assyrian ally is about to be destroyed. He didn't hurry to help him, but rather to take a share of dying Assyria. Maybe Necoh II tried to restore the Egyptian presence in Northern Levant. That's why Josiah opposed Necoh II. But both Necoh II and King Josiah failed, and Babylonians became masters of the Levant for the next 50 years.

Good teacher

Great interview/lecture as usual. Fun story in North Africa among natives (Amazigh) they replaced the orthodox Christmas after converting to Islam with the celebration of Shishonq (Libyan king) conquest of Egypt and becoming Pharoah there. This is a great example of how people can manipulate and manufacture traditions to preserve or establish identity and culture which is the main source of politics and the public is totally oblivious and never question it.

If Greek Orthodox Christian inside the Wall were slim, where is the data? I need name of person from 1916 to 1940. May be from the Armenian quarter.

מעניין, תודה!

Absolutely loved this series! Incredibly detailed and left the desire to learn and explore more. Very grateful for the time Dr Adams and Dr Finkelstein put into organizing and presenting a coherent exposition on a extremely convoluted topic. Thank you again! Looking forward to exploring the rest of the channel

Amazing!

Thank you for uploading this. As a student of prof. Greenberg I’m very happy to see his vast knowledge and insights receive more exposure.

I really feel like you need to invite Robert Downey Jr. to one of these.

Livestrum is now the only appropriate past-tense of livestream

@42:52 Finkelstein says: "Now we have the monastery sitting here, and we are not going to disturb the monastery by excavating here where we are sitting, right?" - May I ask why not? Would the monastery object to a test trench dug in the place where he was sitting or nearby, to see if there are traces of a temple that might even be dated with pottery? It's not like Jerusalem where all groups are jealously guarding their rights to a space and to access. The monastery could even benefit from increased interest in the ark if some finds confirm the importance of the place and more visitors want to see the place where the ark once stood.

Just fabulous. Thank you both.

Audio is awful guys. Not really able to understand which is a pity.

Thank you very much, I have learned a lot from the whole series, magnificent achievement of an accurate scientific and critical approach!!! Thanks for your work, thanks for sharing the results with the public!

Thank you so much for this series!! One of the best I have ever seen. Not only have I learned an incredible amount about the early history of my people but I feel like I got to sit in the presence of two extremely brilliant minds. Dr Finkelstein has a great talent for exposition and Dr Adams is a fantastic interviewer (and I suspect he has a lot of his own ideas that would be fantastic to hear about as well!) There is so much reference to external material that needs to be looked at now to go even deeper. I have so many questions! I am looking forward to visiting Israel again soon and seeing the places there with yet another layer of appreciation.

Thank you for sharing! Fascinating!

Wonderful seminar. Thank you!

Great video thanks for sharing :)

My question is: no matter whether David or Solomon existed historically, did a United Monarchy exist during their supposed reigning period? If yes, where is the base or capital? Thirst were not directly answered. The impression is that though there were interactions between the two branches, but the development of the north was mostly continuous down the Saul line, though different dynasties.

Can archeology estimate how many people living in Judah of 695 BC were refugees from the North and their descendants? More than 50%? Even if they were a minority, they must have been many, and many educated among them. . . . I wonder how they saw themselves: maybe as only temporary residents of Judah that God would lead back into their homeland? Had some of them the keys of their house doors with them, like Palestinians after the Nakba in 1949, teaching their sons never to forget their origin and tribe? (If doors had already keys in 722, which I don't know.) The many refugees and their descendants could have become a political problem for the Judahite kings. How to channel their wishes and frustration into support for Judah? . . . @9:31 Finkelstein says the Deuteronomistic history was definitely a Jerusalemite composition that might express the hopes of Judah. But a large part of it could have been the hopes of the Northern descendants living in Jerusalem. They might have desired or even demanded a Joshua leading them back to their homeland with force. Their allegiance to their land was strong but their allegiance to their former kings non-existent after their defeat and many years without them. A Davidic king would do. . . . Finkelstein mentioned as two important points of the Deuteronomistic history: the Territorial Ideology, the wish for a whole Israel, virulent since the fall of the Northern kingdom (plus the central cult) @11:32 Finkelstein says when the Assyrians pulled out, the opportunity to fulfill territorial ideology seemed to open up. A group within the descendants from the North might have pushed the king of Judah to use it now or never, maybe pushing with some support from Judahite in-laws. The Deuteronomistic history might have been their party program. And it shouldn't surprise us so much to see political leaders opposing a political party, like here King Manasseh, being called The Worst.

Could we say that we see the development of writing also in the prophetic writings that have come to us in the bible? We know from the Book of Kings that the Northern kingdom had powerful prophets in Elija and Elischa, but we don't have a Book of Elija or a Book of Elischa. Was writing not yet widespread enough to preserve their sermons and sayings? The first prophets leaving us their written thoughts are Hosea and Amos in the North in the middle of the 8th century BC when writing had become widespread in the North (through Amos was from the South). The first books of prophets in the South like Isaiah and Micha are from times when writing had picked up in Judah after the fall of the Northern kingdom.

Thank you for sharing this!

Wow these are just amazing. Dr. Finkelstein is a great mind and the conversation is super engaging. Please publish these in podcast format!

@25:48 Finkelstein says: "we have not discussed maybe enough the Judahite, the Southern patriarchal tradition of Abraham" - True. @26:03 "there is a dispute in biblical scholarship about the rise of the character of Abraham ... (about Jacob) ... I don't think that there is a possibility to describe the two Hebrew kingdoms with patriarchal tradition only in one of them ... I would say that the character of Abraham and the early narrative comes from late monarchic Judah" - does that mean already before 722 when there was some contact between the kingdoms, or only after 722 when Judahites became more familiar with Jacob and might have felt envious they didn't have anything alike? . . . Is there any evidence, biblical or archeological, for the Abraham narrative before 722? Before 587?

@33:30 Finkelstein says: "we don't have enough information from Bethel. Please remember that the main target of the cult reform in the time of king Josiah is the very much hated Northern temple at Bethel, which posed some sort of a cult threat to the traditions of Judah ... there is a very detailed description of Josiah's move to the North to Bethel, destruction, annihilation of activities there ... however, we have no information about this on the ground" . . . Why don't we have not more archeological information from Bethel? Has nobody dug there ever? Can't anybody dig there today, because it's part of the occupied territories? Or have people dug there and haven't found anything? Or, worse, dug there and found that there can't anything be found due to special circumstances like erosion?

@17:40 Finkelstein says: "we cannot ignore also the incorporation of Northern texts into the Judahite bible, the Jerusalem composition work of the 7th century BC" We've watched many episodes in this series about the narratives from the North (Ark, Jacob, Exodus, Saul) that were incorporated into the bible after 722. What were the narratives from the South in 722 that were incorporated into the bible? Was the David narrative (a great one admittedly) the only one incorporated? . . . We've heard that the Abraham narrative was southern, centered around Hebron, but are there indications that the Abraham narrative existed already in 722? I searched online, but the only early mentions of Abraham I found were exilic: - a criticism of Judahites back in Judah by the exile that the Exodus defined the Jewish people, not being descendent from Abraham (similar to the preference by Hosea of the Exodus over the Jacob narrative) - the addition of the birthplace of Abraham in Ur to his living in Haran in Syria, because the Babylonians respected the old city of Ur, and it could give the exiles more respect

Thanks a lot for this excellent series! I watched them all! When I looked at the Nehemiah 3, it doesn't really say how the wall was fixed? Did they use the old stones, mudbrick, or just earth, and some wood (in doors)? - assuming that some of the wall was actually fixed to some height in Nehemiah's time.

Extremely interesting and thank you . I have both The Bible Unearthed and David and Solomon . Absolutely fascinating .