The Bible Unearthed

[naomi24]

Did anyone watch this? Any thoughts? Very interesting. I'll definitely get the book.

http://www.thehistorychannel.co.uk/site/tv_gui de/full_details/World_history/programme_2704.p hp

[jake-the-peg]

Not seen this actual program but I've seen a lot of this material before.

Especially the size of Jerusalem - not sure quite how definative it is as I'm not sure how much was actually excavated. Definately looks like a one sided program rather than a "weighing of the facts one". Which is OK I guess as long as it doesn't try to pretend to be something it's not.

In terms of the History of the Bible I can strongly recommend John Romers book Testament from the Channel 4 series. Sadly I think the tapes for that are gone and there was no DVD.

It's out of print now but can be got from Amazon sellers

http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/185479 0056

isbn 1854790056

Romer's a serious archaeologist and goes through the development of old and New Testament and the process of how people unearthed and dated the oldest existing tracts.

EG The earliest new testaments fragments are all in upper case with no word spacing, this was invented later.

[Octavius]

I agree with jake, I have read much of Romers works on Ancient Egypt and it is thoroughly fascinating stuff. I haven't read that one though so I will look it up.

[Theland1]

Wow! I don't believe in fairies, but I don't spend and exhorbitant amount of time investigating them and debating them ..................

So why ......................... ?

[naomi24]

Maybe you should. You might learn something, Theland. And why? Because rather than believe what someone else tells me, I prefer to seek out the truth, that's why.

Jake, The programme seemed fairly objective to me, otherwise I'd have switched off. It didn't simply highlight events that couldn't have happened, as many do, it also concluded that some are probably based on fact. Thanks for the link.

[terambulan]

belief - truth, two contradictory words, naomi

[jake-the-peg]

OK, you certainly can't judge a program from a web page so I'll take your word for it.

Theland. Living in acountry like the UK so much of our history has been defined by the tramslines of Christian religious thought.

Not many do believe in fairies but people still spend huge amouts of time pouring over Shakepere's a midsummer night's dream!

You have to remember that the Bible didn't appear in one fell swoop but was written by dozens of different people, and decisions were made on what was in and what was out. Some books made it only to be cast into the apocrapha, others such as the Gnostic gospels didn't make it at all.

You don't have to believe in it to find it interesting!

[naomi24]

terambulan, Precisely - and that's the point. I'm pleased you said that.