Through the next four excavations, Zertal found large amounts of ash and bone in the area around the large structure. With the stones gone, Zertal was able to more clearly delineate the large structure, which measured 30 meters square and 3 meters in height. During the first excavation, the team removed layers of field stones that seemed to have been placed intentionally for the purpose of covering the structure below. He went on to conduct five excavations at El-Burnat between 19. But we must be careful only excavation can reveal the truth.” … It seemed likely that at the very last minute we had stumbled upon an extraordinary site-there is no other explanation for its shape or location. When we approached from the east, however, it looked like a fortified tell. “We’d spotted the rock pile earlier, but attached no significance to it. “As usual, the surprise of the day came at the last minute!” Zertal recounted in his field journal. His team was exploring El-Burnat, the Arabic name of a site on the east side of Mount Ebal, about 200 meters below the mountain peak. On April 6, 1980, Zertal made his most famous and electrifying discovery. His massive “Manasseh survey” began in 1978 and ended in 1990, yielding dozens of ancient sites, 80 percent of which had never been documented. “No one before us had been granted an opportunity so grand and a responsibility so great.” “A window of opportunity had opened, and for the first time, my generation would steal a glimpse at the place where the central narratives of the Bible took place,” Zertal wrote in A Nation Born. Adam Zertal of Haifa University.įollowing Israel’s victory in the Six-Day War, Zertal surveyed and explored the territory that had been acquired from Jordan, especially the northern territory known in biblical times as the hill country of Manasseh. This debate began in the 1980s largely as a result of the work of the late archaeologist Prof. Historians agree on Mount Ebal’s identity, but have debated for decades whether Joshua actually built an altar there. Mount Ebal is located in Samaria, roughly 30 miles north of Jerusalem. However, the discovery of the Late Bronze Age curse tablet on Mount Ebal, the mountain of curses, at the precise location of a massive stone structure resembling an altar, vindicates the accuracy of Bible history. Ebal altar and Israel’s epic outdoor concert to be fiction. Many people have considered the account of Joshua’s Mt. Joshua began this momentous event by building an altar on Mount Ebal and sacrificing offerings to God. “Then Joshua built an altar unto the Lord God of Israel in mount Ebal, As Moses the servant of the Lord commanded the children of Israel, as it is written in the book of the law of Moses, an altar of whole stones, over which no man hath lift up any iron: and they offered thereon burnt offerings unto the Lord, and sacrificed peace offerings” (Joshua 8:30-31). The tribes on Mount Gerizim sang the blessings the tribes on Mount Ebal sang the curses (Deuteronomy 11:29 27:1-13).īefore this grand alfresco choral performance, Joshua did something important. The six tribes on each mountain then sang back and forth, their voices resonating across the valley. Leaders of the tribes then read from the book of Deuteronomy about the blessings they would receive if they obeyed God and the curses they would receive if they disobeyed. Six tribes were to gather on Mount Gerizim, the other six on Mount Ebal. Moses’s instructions were explicit and detailed.
Following the battles at Jericho and Ai, the Israelites were told to assemble in the mountains surrounding Shechem, the place where Abraham first sacrificed to God when he arrived in the region roughly 500 years earlier. Just before he died, Moses instructed Joshua on how he should lead Israel into the Promised Land. But outside the discovery of the writing itself, or even the use of God’s name, the other startling element is where the tablet was found: Mount Ebal. The inscription is by far the earliest use of the Hebrew name of the Israelite God found in Israel, yhw (more commonly spelled yhwh), predating the next-earliest inscription by centuries. Gershon Galil of Haifa University, the discovery represents “absolutely the most important inscription ever found in Israel.” Put together, the 40 alphabetical characters that have thus far been deciphered make a stunning pronouncement:Ĭursed, cursed, cursed-cursed by the God yhw Measuring 2 by 2 centimeters, the square curse tablet ( defixio) contains the most ancient Hebrew inscription ever discovered in Israel, dating to the Late Bronze Age ii period (circa 1400–1200 b.c.). It is hard to overstate the importance of a tiny biblical archaeological discovery released to the public on March 24.
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