Archaeological data can be a valuable aid to interpreting texts, as well as providing independent conclusions of a text’s historical accuracy. Archaeology provides a general background to the events of the Bible, helps us in understanding the translation and many passages directly, and it has given us insight into the religious setting of the Bible.
Archaeology provides historical credibility to the events of the Bible. This helps provide analytical scholars more on the context of the Bibles environment or geographical setting. Just glancing at the Bible or reading it does not always show the significance of the situation in which the narrative takes place. Often knowing about the location where something occurred will help us to understand …show more content…
Sometimes we will find a word in a manuscript written in a similar language, with another meaning that fits the Biblical context better. For example, in Davies An Analytical Approach, he states, “Somehow, some of Jesus’ words spoken in the Aramaic language around 30 CE appear in different form in the Greek language about sixty years later in the Gospel of Luke.” (Davies 10). Here, we see how the language has changed as noted but archaeologists are constantly researching this, learning how it has changed. We can see in Reed’s Visual Guide to the New Testament how the discovery of manuscripts made in the mid-twentieth century at Nag Hammadi and the Dead Sea revolutionized the understanding of the New Testament (Reed 6). The Egyptian papyrus has contributed a great deal of understanding and knowledge of the world of the New Testament as well. In addition, the Dead Sea Scrolls have also helped to get the word of God down to us over a period of hundreds of years. They have also served to illustrate the language and thought of the common people and thus, the New Testament Church. So this helps us to get a better idea of exactly what the author meant by the use of a particular …show more content…
To give an example of this, we can see in Davies An Analytical Approach where he says, “Protestant churches recognize thirty-nine Old Testament books, while the Roman Catholic Church recognizes forty-six. The books about which there is disagreement on are called, by the Protestants, the Apocrypha. Catholics call those books Deurero-Canonical.”(Davies 1). Here, we can see two different religions and the effect they have on how many books there truly are in the Old Testament. This all comes into viewing the Bible on an archaeological point where we can see the variations in religion. The notion of a monolithic or unified Jewish religion during the time period between the Testaments was quickly dispelled after the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Through examples like this, we can see the timelessness of the Bible. Even the excavation of a town not mentioned in the Bible, like Pompeii mentioned in Reed’s Visual Guide to the New Testament (Reed 27,31), which was destroyed by Mount Vesuvius in AD 79, gives us a clear idea of the type of town in which Paul would have delivered his
Archaeology provides historical credibility to the events of the Bible. This helps provide analytical scholars more on the context of the Bibles environment or geographical setting. Just glancing at the Bible or reading it does not always show the significance of the situation in which the narrative takes place. Often knowing about the location where something occurred will help us to understand …show more content…
Sometimes we will find a word in a manuscript written in a similar language, with another meaning that fits the Biblical context better. For example, in Davies An Analytical Approach, he states, “Somehow, some of Jesus’ words spoken in the Aramaic language around 30 CE appear in different form in the Greek language about sixty years later in the Gospel of Luke.” (Davies 10). Here, we see how the language has changed as noted but archaeologists are constantly researching this, learning how it has changed. We can see in Reed’s Visual Guide to the New Testament how the discovery of manuscripts made in the mid-twentieth century at Nag Hammadi and the Dead Sea revolutionized the understanding of the New Testament (Reed 6). The Egyptian papyrus has contributed a great deal of understanding and knowledge of the world of the New Testament as well. In addition, the Dead Sea Scrolls have also helped to get the word of God down to us over a period of hundreds of years. They have also served to illustrate the language and thought of the common people and thus, the New Testament Church. So this helps us to get a better idea of exactly what the author meant by the use of a particular …show more content…
To give an example of this, we can see in Davies An Analytical Approach where he says, “Protestant churches recognize thirty-nine Old Testament books, while the Roman Catholic Church recognizes forty-six. The books about which there is disagreement on are called, by the Protestants, the Apocrypha. Catholics call those books Deurero-Canonical.”(Davies 1). Here, we can see two different religions and the effect they have on how many books there truly are in the Old Testament. This all comes into viewing the Bible on an archaeological point where we can see the variations in religion. The notion of a monolithic or unified Jewish religion during the time period between the Testaments was quickly dispelled after the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Through examples like this, we can see the timelessness of the Bible. Even the excavation of a town not mentioned in the Bible, like Pompeii mentioned in Reed’s Visual Guide to the New Testament (Reed 27,31), which was destroyed by Mount Vesuvius in AD 79, gives us a clear idea of the type of town in which Paul would have delivered his