Current Digital Issue • July/August 2013 • Vol. 39 No. 4
About this issue: As we prepare for a scorching summer to bear down on us, the July/August 2013 issue of BAR brings us stories of conquest, cultural contact and community. Did Hazor feel the heat at the hands of the Israelites? The Book of Joshua says that the Israelites defeated the mighty king of Hazor and destroyed the city with fire. Years of excavation have revealed the intentional destruction of the once-powerful Canaanite city—“the head of all those kingdoms”—with a raging inferno that burned at more than 2,350 degrees Fahrenheit. But who did it? According to excavator Amnon Ben-Tor in Who Destroyed Canaanite Hazor? the Israelites are the only feasible candidates. Read more…
Who Destroyed Canaanite Hazor?
The Book of Joshua says the Israelites defeated the mighty king of Hazor and destroyed the city with fire. Years of excavation have revealed the intentional destruction of the once-powerful Canaanite city—“the head of all those kingdoms”—with a raging inferno that burned at more than 2,350 degrees Fahrenheit. But who did it? According to the excavator, the Israelites are the only feasible candidate. Read more…
Aegeans in Israel: Minoan Frescoes at Tel Kabri
Colorful frescoes of bulls, acrobats, griffins and flowers once decorated ancient palaces in Egypt, Turkey, Syria—and Israel. Well known from its home in Crete and Santorini, how and why did this Aegean art style travel hundreds of miles to the east? Excavations at Tel Kabri in Israel are helping to explain the Aegean connection with the easternmost parts of the Mediterranean world. Read more…
Early Israel: An Egalitarian Society
Excavated structures, pottery and other household artifacts offer a glimpse of daily life in the Iron Age highlands of Canaan, but no burials or tombs have been found. What do these findings reveal about the ideology of early Iron Age Israelite society? Read more…
Daphnis and Chloe in the Garden of Eden
Considerable attention has been paid to how Biblical religions influenced one another, but did these religions inspire pagan cultures as well? A charming late-second-century pastoral romance echoes elements of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. Read more…
