Archeologists in Israel have shocked religious officials with a new finding that the revered Western Wall in Jerusalem is not what people have long believed: a wall built by the Jewish ruler Herod. Newly discovered coins underneath wall strongly indicate that it was built long after Herod’s death.
The wall has long been described as part of Herod’s compound built to replace the older Jewish temple. The area is known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary. The coins found under the wall however are stamped by a Roman proconsul 20 years after Herod’s death.
The four bronze coins were stamped around 17 A.D. by the Roman official Valerius Gratus the predecessor to Pontius Pilate.
They would suggest that the wall was built generations after Herod. It further confirms the one contemporary account by Jewish general Josephus Flavius, who wrote that the compound was completed by King Agrippa II, Herod’s great-grandson.
It is not known if it will now be called Agrippa the Second’s wall. It does not have quite the same cache.
Source: Yahoo
rafflaw – don’t you mean archeological theory?
and Otteray Scribe, any “fundie” should accept the implications of honest archaeological findings. This discovery is not a big deal in terms of theological consequences.
Carol, you apostate you! How dare you apply the most reasonable interpretation of language? We all know you adapt the language to your pre-conceived notion of the divine. 😀
mespo,
It is all in the spin….
I guess we need a definition of “under”.
I once worked in a bank coin room. When the bank was moved across the town square we found coins “under” the cabinets that were all newer than the cabinets themselves.
Wouldn’t ‘turning of the wall’ refer to going around the corner?
Ordinarily turning of the wall would refer to a corner but this is the Bible and a chronical of a Biblical event. As we know the Bible is meant to be taken literally so turning of the wall refers to the wall being turned and the only way to explain the apparent conflict with archeological evidence the wall would have to have been turned upside down. It really is the only explaination. (Warning: the previous statement may contain traces of sarcasm)
As any Biblical scholar (like Kirk Cameron) knows, Agrippa merely dropped a few coins on the top of the wall generations after it was built and then divinely ordered the wall flipped over. It’s all very logical when you adopt the right mind set. Here’s the “proof”:
Moreover Uzziah built towers in Jerusalem at the corner gate, and at the valley gate, and at the turning of the wall, and fortified them.
~2 Chronicles 26:9 King James Version (KJV)
that would have been a good scene at the beginning of the tv show “the walking dead”. somebody shoots a zombie with long hair and a beard then somebody else runs up and screams “OMG you shot jesus”.
Mayhaps they’ll opt to dig no further.
“Don’t look for it, Taylor. You may not like what you find.”
(Dr. Zaius)
I thought so. I hope this leaves the door open to my contention that the pyramids appeared per the command of Gozer the Gozerian, the Traveler, the Destructor, Lord of the Sebouillia. Many Shuvs and Zuuls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the Slor that day, I can tell you!
Good ol’ Josephus, right again.
I am waiting for blowback from the fundies. It is all the archaeologist’s fault. Five….Four…..Three…..
raff,
Look at the bible as rewritten history….
A religious theory is debunked? Unheard of!
Some have Agrippa on the facts, while others re-Agrippa history……..
Still worth genocide though.
“Oops” just doesn’t seem sufficient.
Excellent. I the conflict will now end immediately, right?
Old timey names can, inter alia, be confusing like old timey legal talk.
For example, Josephus Flavius needs a comma Josephus, Flavius.
That historian dude’s full name was Titus Flavius Josephus.
He lived during several Herod escapades.
Herod is like Pharaoh, Caesar or Bush.
There are various versions of them: Bush I, Bush II, Herod Agrippa I, Herod Agrippa II, Pharaoh Ramses, Pharaoh Tutankhamen for examples.
The dudes carving names on rocks on Friday near quitting time may have fudged it from time to time, confusing later rock readers. 😉
Oh dear and there’s all that fuss over it too.
Yawn. Like so many things, the symbol overwhelms the substance, the myth glosses over reality, making conflict over same even more odious than fighting over the original. See e.g. (one site of many):
http://becomingone.org/templemount.htm