 In
the wake of the 19th century European colonial takeover of Palestine, explorers,
theologians and devout Western Christians alike developed a fascination for
places and artifacts which in these people's minds bore witness to the
Bible. Archaeological excavations started to dot the Palestinian
countryside in search for the "truth of the Bible". Those
beginnings determined the status of the developing discipline of Biblical
archaeology for a long time as a handmaiden to Bible studies. Biblical
archaeologists were pictured as those who dug with the spade in one hand,
and the Bible in the other. The most ardently asked question was whether
archaeology could indeed prove the historicity of the Bible. From the
1950s, however, the archaeology of Palestine started to slowly detach
itself from the dominance of Bible studies and has now emerged as a
scholarly discipline in its own right. Biblical archaeology, as it is seen
nowadays, neither proves the Bible nor simply illustrates biblical stories.
Instead, archaeology helps to clarify the historical context of the
biblical writings.
The class will unfold the interaction of the two disciplines of Biblical
studies and Biblical archaeology. It will illuminate their methodological
development and introduce students to the study of selected archaeo-
logical sites with an emphasis on Greco-Roman Palestine.
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