Biblical Archaeology : Factual Evidence to Support the Historicity of the BibleDA 111 Paul L . Maier This article first appeared in the Christian Research Journal , volume 27 , number 2 ( 2004 ) . For further information or to subscribe to the Christian Research Journal go to : http : / / www . equip . orgArchaeological finds that contradict the contentions of biblical minimalists and other revisionists have been listed above . There are many more , however , that corroborate biblical evidence , and the following list provides only the most significant discoveries : A Common Flood Story . Not just the Hebrews ( Gen . 6 – 8 ) , but Mesopotamians , Egyptians , and Greeks all report a flood in primordial times . A Sumerian king list from c . 2100 BC divides itself into two categories : those kings who ruled before a great flood and those who ruled after it . one of the earliest examples of Sumero - Akkadian - Babylonian literature , the Gilgamesh Epic , describes a great flood sent as punishment by the gods , with humanity saved only when the pious Utnapishtim ( AKA , “ the Mesopotamian Noah ” ) builds a ship and saves the animal world thereon . A later Greek counterpart , the story of Deucalion and Phyrra , tells of a couple who survived a great flood sent by an angry Zeus . Taking refuge atop Mount Parnassus ( AKA , “ the Greek Ararat ” ) , they supposedly repopulated the earth by heaving stones behind them that sprang into human beings . The Code of Hammurabi . This seven - foot black diorite stele , discovered at Susa and presently located in the Louvre museum , contains 282 engraved laws of Babylonian King Hammurabi ( fl . 1750 BC ) . The common basis for this law code is the lex talionis ( “ the law of the tooth ” ) , showing that there was a common Semitic law of retribution in the ancient Near East , which is clearly reflected in the Pentateuch . Exodus 21 : 23 – 25 , for example , reads : “ But if there is serious injury , you are to take life for life , eye for eye , tooth for tooth , hand for hand , foot for foot … ” ( niv ) . The Nuzi Tablets . The some 20 , 000 cuneiform clay tablets discovered at the ruins of Nuzi , east of the Tigris River and datable to c . 1500 BC , reveal institutions , practices , and customs remarkably congruent to those found in Genesis . These tablets include treaties , marriage arrangements , rules regarding inheritance , adoption , and the like . The Existence of Hittites . Genesis 23 reports that Abraham buried Sarah in the Cave of Machpelah , which he purchased from Ephron the Hittite . Second Samuel 11 tells of David ’ s adultery with Bathsheba , the wife of Uriah the Hittite . A century ago the Hittites were unknown outside of the Old Testament , and critics claimed that they were a figment of biblical imagination . In 1906 , however , archaeologists digging east of Ankara , Turkey , discovered the ruins of Hattusas , the ancient Hittite capital at what is today called Boghazkoy , as well as its vast collection of Hittite historical records , which showed an empire flourishing in the mid - second millennium BC . This critical challenge , among many others , was immediately proved worthless — a pattern that would often be repeated in the decades to come . The Merneptah Stele . A seven - foot slab engraved with hieroglyphics , also called the Israel Stele , boasts of the Egyptian pharaoh ’ s conquest of Libyans and peoples in Palestine , including the Israelites : “ Israel — his seed is not . ” This is the earliest reference to Israel in nonbiblical sources and demonstrates that , as of c . 1230 BC , the Hebrews were already living in the Promised Land . Biblical Cities Attested Archaeologically . In addition to Jericho , places such as Haran , Hazor , Dan , Megiddo , Shechem , Samaria , Shiloh , Gezer , Gibeah , Beth Shemesh , Beth Shean , Beersheba , Lachish , and many other urban sites have been excavated , quite apart from such larger and obvious locations as Jerusalem or Babylon . Such geographical markers are extremely significant in demonstrating that fact , not fantasy , is intended in the Old Testament historical narratives ; otherwise , the specificity regarding these urban sites would have been replaced by “ Once upon a time ” narratives with only hazy geographical parameters , if any . Israel ’ s enemies in the Hebrew Bible likewise are not contrived but solidly historical . Among the most dangerous of these were the Philistines , the people after whom Palestine itself would be named . Their earliest depiction is on the Temple of Rameses III at Thebes , c . 1150 BC , as “ peoples of the sea ” who invaded the Delta area and later the coastal plain of Canaan . The Pentapolis ( five cities ) they established — namely Ashkelon , Ashdod , Gaza , Gath , and Ekron — have all been excavated , at least in part , and some remain cities to this day . Such precise urban evidence measures favorably when compared with the geographical sites claimed in the holy books of other religious systems , which often have no basis whatever in reality . 10 Shishak ’ s Invasion of Judah . First Kings 14 and 2 Chronicles 12 tell of Pharaoh Shishak ’ s conquest of Judah in the fifth year of the reign of King Rehoboam , the brainless son of Solomon , and how Solomon ’ s temple in Jerusalem was robbed of its treasures on that occasion . This victory is also commemorated in hieroglyphic wall carvings on the Temple of Amon at Thebes . The Moabite Stone . Second Kings 3 reports that Mesha , the king of Moab , rebelled against the king of Israel following the death of Ahab . A three - foot stone slab , also called the Mesha Stele , confirms the revolt by claiming triumph over Ahab ’ s family , c . 850 BC , and that Israel had “ perished forever . ” Obelisk of Shalmaneser III . In 2 Kings 9 – 10 , Jehu is mentioned as King of Israel ( 841 – 814 BC ) . That the growing power of Assyria was already encroaching on the northern kings prior to their ultimate conquest in 722 BC is demonstrated by a six - and - a - half - foot black obelisk discovered in the ruins of the palace at Nimrud in 1846 . on it , Jehu is shown kneeling before Shalmaneser III and offering tribute to the Assyrian king , the only relief we have to date of a Hebrew monarch . Burial Plaque of King Uzziah . Down in Judah , King Uzziah ruled from 792 to 740 BC , a contemporary of Amos , Hosea , and Isaiah . Like Solomon , he began well and ended badly . In 2 Chronicles 26 his sin is recorded , which resulted in his being struck with leprosy later in life . When Uzziah died , he was interred in a “ field of burial that belonged to the kings . ” His stone burial plaque has been discovered on the Mount of Olives , and it reads : “ Here , the bones of Uzziah , King of Judah , were brought . Do not open . ” Hezekiah ’ s Siloam Tunnel Inscription . King Hezekiah of Judah ruled from 721 to 686 BC . Fearing a siege by the Assyrian king , Sennacherib , Hezekiah preserved Jerusalem ’ s water supply by cutting a tunnel through 1 , 750 feet of solid rock from the Gihon Spring to the Pool of Siloam inside the city walls ( 2 Kings 20 ; 2 Chron . 32 ) . At the Siloam end of the tunnel , an inscription , presently in the archaeological museum at Istanbul , Turkey , celebrates this remarkable accomplishment . The tunnel is probably the only biblical site that has not changed its appearance in 2 , 700 years . The Sennacherib Prism . After having conquered the 10 northern tribes of Israel , the Assyrians moved southward to do the same to Judah ( 2 Kings 18 – 19 ) . The prophet Isaiah , however , told Hezekiah that God would protect Judah and Jerusalem against Sennacherib ( 2 Chron . 32 ; Isa . 36 – 37 ) . Assyrian records virtually confirm this . The cuneiform on a hexagonal , 15 - inch baked clay prism found at the Assyrian capital of Nineveh describes Sennacherib ’ s invasion of Judah in 701 BC in which it claims that the Assyrian king shut Hezekiah inside Jerusalem “ like a caged bird . ” Like the biblical record , however , it does not state that he conquered Jerusalem , which the prism certainly would have done had this been the case . The Assyrians , in fact , bypassed Jerusalem on their way to Egypt , and the city would not fall until the time of Nebuchadnezzar and the Neo - Babylonians in 586 BC . Sennacherib himself returned to Nineveh where his own sons murdered him . The Cylinder of Cyrus the Great . Second Chronicles 36 : 23 and Ezra 1 report that Cyrus the Great of Persia , after conquering Babylon , permitted Jews in the Babylonian Captivity to return to their homeland . Isaiah had even prophesied this ( Isa . 44 : 28 ) . This tolerant policy of the founder of the Persian Empire is borne out by the discovery of a nine - inch clay cylinder found at Babylon from the time of its conquest , 539 BC , which reports Cyrus ’ s victory and his subsequent policy of permitting Babylonian captives to return to their homes and even rebuild their temples . So it goes . This list of correlations between Old Testament texts and the hard evidence of Near Eastern archaeology could easily be tripled in length . When it comes to the intertestamental and New Testament eras , as we might expect , the needle on the gauge of positive correlations simply goes off the scale . To use terms such as “ false testament ” for the Hebrew Bible and to vaporize its earlier personalities into nonexistence accordingly has no justification whatever in terms of the mass of geographical , archaeological , and historical evidence that correlates so admirably with Scripture . LET ’ S REVISE THE REVISIONISMIn view of the overwhelming evidence , to banner an article in Harper ’ s as “ False Testament ” when referring to the Hebrew Bible is clearly an outrage . A cartoon in that article , showing the Bible being eaten away with vast corridors cut through its text , is an appropriately false caricature that goes with the rest of the article . This , however , is quite typical of the way biblical matters are reported in today ’ s news media . An extraordinary archaeological discovery that confirms the biblical record barely receives any notice in the press , as witness the bones of the first biblical personality ever discovered in November , 1990 . Generally , only one in a hundred know that the remains of Joseph Caiaphas , the high priest who indicted Jesus before Pontius Pilate on Good Friday , were found at that time in an ossuary in the Peace Forest of Jerusalem south of the Temple area . Let sensation - seeking writers claim , however , that the patriarchs were mythical , that David was a petty hilltop chieftain if he existed at all , that Jesus married Mary Magdalene , or that God predicted the assassination of Israeli premier Itzhaak Rabin through some arcane Bible code ( yet did nothing about it ) , and the press covers it sympathetically and in full . In no way is this fair , ethical , or even logical . Nor is the press alone in this deception . Radical revisionist biblical scholars and pseudoscholars , like members of the notorious Jesus Seminar , are well aware of this sad sensationalizing formula for success and exploit it regularly . This may , admittedly , be impugning the motives of some in that category who are driven instead by a desire merely to be “ politically correct ” when it comes to biblical scholarship ; that is , to be ultracritical of anything biblical . In this connection , sadly , secular historians of the ancient world often have a much higher opinion of the reliability of biblical sources than some biblical scholars themselves ! Lest this critique be written off as the meaningless chatter of some conservative curmudgeon , however , I must point out that , in fact , it represents the majority view in biblical scholarship today . University of Arizona archaeologist William Dever , for example , is well known for his objection to the term “ biblical archaeology , ” since it seems to convey a probiblical bias ; yet he assails some of the unwarranted conclusions of biblical minimalists in a strongly worded article in BAR : “ Save Us from Postmodern Malarkey . ” 11 He does not have kind words for the minimalists in his book , What Did the Biblical Writers Know and When Did They Know It ? either . “ I suggest , ” he writes , “ that the revisionists are nihilist not only in the historical sense but also in the philosophical and moral sense . ” 12 BAR , which provides the literary arena for the traditionalist vs . minimalist battles and tries to keep a neutral stance in the process , similarly found the Harper ’ s article to be “ only one side of a very hot debate in the field . Nowhere does [ the author ] try to evaluate the merits of the other side ’ s case . In fact he gives no indication that he ’ s even aware there is another side . ” 13 Let the debate continue , but let all the evidence be admitted . Ever since scientific archaeology started a century and a half ago , the consistent pattern has been this : the hard evidence from the ground has borne out the biblical record again and again — and again . The Bible has nothing to fear from the spade . notes 1 . Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman , The Bible Unearthed : Archaeology ’ s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts ( New York : The Free Press , 2001 ) . 2 . Daniel Lazare , “ False Testament : Archaeology Refutes the Bible ’ s Claim to History , ” Harper ’ s , March 2002 , 39 – 47 . 3 . Ibid . , 40 . 4 . See Kenneth Kitchen , “ The Patriarchal Age : Myth or History ? ” Biblical Archaeology Review ( hereafter BAR ) , March / April 1995 , 48 ff . 5 . A considerable , and growing , body of literature exists on the Hebrews in Egypt , the role of Joseph , the pharaoh who befriended him , the Hyksos , the pharaoh of the Oppression , the pharaoh of the Exodus , and the Exodus itself . See recent issues of Bible and Spade , especially no . 16 ( Winter 2003 ) . Joseph P . Free and Howard F . Vos , Archaeology and Bible History ( Grand Rapids : Zondervan Publishing House , 1992 ) , 69 – 105 is also helpful , as is Alfred J . Hoerth , Archaeology and the Old Testament ( Grand Rapids : Baker Book House , 1999 ) . 6 . Kathleen M . Kenyon , Digging up Jericho ( London : Ernest Benn , 1957 ) ; Excavations at Jericho , vol . 3 ( London : British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem , 1981 ) . 7 . Bryant G . Wood , “ Did the Israelites Conquer Jericho ? ” BAR , March / April 1990 , 44 – 58 . 8 . Lazare , 45 – 46 . 9 . Hershel Shanks , “ Biran at Ninety , ” BAR , September / October 1999 , 44 . 10 . For example , in The Book of Mormon , proper names of places and people have no substantiation from outside sources . 11 . William A . Dever , “ Save Us from Postmodern Malarkey , ” BAR , March / April 2000 , 28 . 12 . William A . Dever , cited in Gordon Govier , “ Biblical Archaeology ’ s Dusty Little Secret , ” Christianity Today , October 2003 , 38 . 13 . Steven Feldman , “ Is the Bible a Bunch of Historical Hooey ? ” BAR , May / June 2002 , 6 .