Waltke, the Date of the Conquest

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WTJ 52 (1990) 181-200

THE DATE OF THE CONQUEST

BRUCE K. WALTKE

I. Introduction

T

HE date of the Exodus depends in part on the chronology of Israel's

taking of territory on both sides of the Jordan River, about forty years

after the Exodus according to the Bible. Israel's chronology in taking of this

land, however, depends on the theoretical model used to represent this

occupation. Three primary models have been proposed: immigration, re

volt, and conquest. The last is further analyzed into the double-conquest

theories, the early-date theories, and the late-date theory.

The Bible, however, does not present a pure model. For example, the

conquests of Jericho and Ai stand in contrast to the settlement reached with

the Gibeonites, and both of these leave unexplained how Israel occupied

Shechem, where whey renewed covenant with Yahweh. Archaeological

results strengthen the supposition that the process of Israel's entrance and

occupation of the land was complex. Nevertheless, although most moderns

think that the nature and chronology of Israel's entrance into the land does

not lie absolutely in one of these three alternatives but in a combination of

them, they generally accept one as the more adequate and dominant

model. In this essay the writer presents the three models, mentions their

leading exponents, analyzes their sources, and critically appraises them by

considering their strengths and weaknesses with an aim to establish thechronology of the conquest and so of the Exodus.

II. The Immigration Model

The immigration, or peaceful settlement model, created by Alt,1devel

oped by M. Notti,2 defended by Weippert,3 followed by Fohrer4 and

1Albrecht Alt, "Die Landnahme der Israeliten in Palstina" (1925); "Erwgungen ber

die Landnahme der Israeliten in Palstina" (1939); both reprinted inKleine SchriftenzurGe


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( ); p f

182 WESTMINSTER THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

Hermann,5and adapted by Kochavi,6Finkelstein,7et al., based itself orig

inally on extrabiblical texts, especially on the annals of Thutmose III and

on the Amarna Letters, and secondarily on archaeology. It reconstructs the

development of the biblical narratives to fit the model in keeping withhistorical criticism. Many of the individual narratives in Joshua 2-11 are

designated as late aetiologies, composed to give historical support to Israel's

claims to the possession of the land.

From the list of rebel city-states in the military annals of Thutmose III

(1479BC),Alt discerned a basic difference in the territorial division of the

land. The vassal city states, whose territory extended only about five kilo

meters around the fortified city, lie almost entirely on the coastal plain of

Palestine and in the plain of Megiddo. On the other hand, since these tinycity states were not found in the same proportions in the mountainous

regions of Palestine, he drew the conclusion that these regions took no part

in the great struggle against Thutmose III.8

For further clarification of the geopolitical situation in the mountains Alt

turned to the archives of Amenophis IV at Tell el-Amarna, which reflected

that the center of the revolt in his days was no longer in the plains, as in

the century before under Thutmose III, but, with a few limited exceptions,

in the mountains, especially those of Judah and Samaria. These documents,

however, yielded the same territorial divisions of Palestine, namely, small

city states in the plains and larger territorial formations in the mountains

with a few exceptions such as Jerusalem and Bethlehem in Judah, Shechem

in the central highlands, and Hazor in Galilee. This distinction was further

validated by the stele of Sethos I (ca. 1300) erected at Beth Shan, cele

brating that Pharaoh's imposed recognition of himselfasoverlord of cities

in the Jordan depression.

Alt now turned to the territorial divisions of Palestine at the beginning

of the monarchy. Here he found the geopolitical map radically altered.New states were all named after tribes and peoples who had played no part

in the earlier history of the country, namely, Philistines, Israelites, Judeans,

Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites, and Arameans. Their territories resemble

the larger territorial formations oftheearlier period and seem to extend as

far as men who belong to the same people or tribe have settled, and even

include areas where previously the city-states had prevailed. Alt theorized

that the original nucleus of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah lay away from

5S. Hermann, "Basic Factors of Israelite Settlement in Canaan," inBiblical Archaeology

Today: Proceedings of the International Congress on Biblical Archaeology Jerusalem April 1984


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Today: Proceedings of the International Congress on Biblical Archaeology, Jerusalem, April 1984

THE DATE OF THE CONQUEST 183

the city-states, but after the states had consolidated their power they sec

ondarily expanded their territories by conquering resisting city-states; the

role of the fortified cities of the plains ceased as independent states and

became only administrative units within the structure of the larger kingdoms.This change, Alt argued, could not have come about merely through the

collapse of Egypt as a world power after Rameses III (ca. 1200) for one

would have expected the political and territorial patterns that had devel

oped over centuries to persist. Alt is now ready to consider the Israelite

settlement.

According to Alt's model, the tribes later known as "Israel" entered the

land as nomadic clans or confederacies of clans who were forced by weather

conditions to leave their rainy winter and spring pasturage in border territories between the desert and cultivated land and to enter in the drought

of summer into the relatively sparsely settled mountain regions and to come

to an understanding with the owners of the land for the pasturage of their

small cattle. Gradually these nomadic entities settled down in the relatively

sparsely settled upland areas and began to farm the land after they turned

its woodlands into arable land. The precise form of the settlement varied

from area to area. The conquest of city states in the plains and in certain

valleys had to wait until the institution of Israelite kingship turned wholeheartedly to a policy of territorial and political expansion.

Alt entertained the notion that the Apiru of the Amarna correspondence

might be the Israelites and so their settlement might have occurred during

thefirsthalf ofthefourteenth century, but since the relationship was never

convincingly proved, he thought it occurred after this time. His followers

flatly rejected the equation. Because the pre-Israelite tribes gradually set

tled the land, Noth argued, an exact date for the Israelite occupation can

not be given. The Amarna period provides histerminusaquobecause at thattime Bethlehem was still "a city of the land of Jerusalem" and only later

became a center of the tribe of Judah, and because the letters record the

destruction of Shunem, producing the necessary gap in the Canaanite sys

tem of city-states in the vicinity of the Jezreel plain for Issachar to settle

down there. Noth drew the conclusion, "We must therefore place the be

ginning of the Israelite occupation in the second half of the 14th centuryBC.

The final conclusion of the process will probably have taken place at least

a hundred years before the accession of Saul."9

The immigration model has much to commend it. First, its understand

ing of the territorial divisions from the Egyptian sources supports the bib


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ing of the territorial divisions from the Egyptian sources supports the bib


the period when Egypt ruled Palestine, it answers that the Egyptians never

completely subjected the mountains as they did the plains. Third, Alt's

study of the period before and after the Israelite settlement provides the

student with many valuable insights into the territorial divisions of the landand their history. Fourth, and this is its main evidence, later archaeological

researches have shown the sudden emergence of dozens of settlements in

forested hilly areas of Galilee and of Judea, and in the Negev (Aharoni,10

Kochavi,11and I. Finkelstein12).

On the other hand, the history of tradition approach to the biblical

sources and its results are problematic. First, its unexpressed presupposi

tions favoring historical criticism directly contradict the biblical view of

history. Second, although the facts of Israel's entrance into the land are farmore complex than the stylized biblical account, nevertheless this approach's

skepticism regarding the historical validity of biblical narratives seems un

warranted in light of their many particular validations from extrabiblical

texts and archaeology. As pointed out by Bimson,13Alt never demonstrated

that the annals of Thutmose III or the archives of Amenophis IV contradict

the Bible. Third, the reconstruction of the history of Israel's tradition is

arbitrary and subjective. Often internal and external evidence militate

against reading a narrative as an aetiology. For example, why does the

narrative about Ai mention Israel's failure to conquer the town in its first

attempt? Fourth, Yeivin14argued that the national tradition of the enforced

sojourn in Egypt and the conquest of Palestine is so entrenched in all the

later stages of Israel's development, that Israel's existence apart from this

history is incomprehensible. Fifth, by denying that the so-called nomadic

clans and confederated clans that later came to form Israel after the set

tlement had commonly experienced the Exodus and conquest, Greenberg15

objected that this approach does not explain their spiritual and political

union. Sixth, Gottwald16

pointed out that archaeological features at sitessuch as Tel Masos, its well-developed traditions of building and pottery

making, its high incidence of bovine animals, and its indications of exten

sive trade with the coastal plain and Transjordan, do not square with a

broad pastoral nomadic hypothesis. Finally, although the dozens of newly

10Y. Aharoni "Nothing Early and Nothing Late,"BA39 (1976) 55-76.11Kochavi, "The Israelite Settlement."12I. Finkelstein,The Archaeologyofthe IsraeliteSettlement,which is reviewed by A. J. Frendu,

Orientalia 57 (1988) 410-12.13J.J. Bimson, "Can There Be a Revised Chronology Without a Revised Stratigraphy?" in

A i Ch ? (Cl l d E l d S i t f I t di i li St di 1982)


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Ages in Chaos? (Cleveland England: Society for Interdisciplinary Studies 1982)


formed settlements are probably Israelite, the immigration model is never

theless an unproved induction.

III. The Revolt Model

The revolt model, created by Mendenhall,17 modified by Norman

Gottwald,18 and elaborated by many moderns (e.g. Engel,19 Coote and

Whitelam20), agrees with the immigration model in regarding the biblical

narratives as indeterminately reliable sources for Israel's premonarchic his

tory and in viewing Israel as a later creation within the land (sometime

between 1250 and 1150). It differs from the immigration model, however,

in appealing primarily not to extrabiblical texts, though Mendenhall appealed toApiruin the Amarna Correspondence, but to historical and com

parative studies from the social sciences and interpreting the development

of the biblical traditions and of the archaeological evidence in that light.

According to the revolt model as developed by Gottwald, the pre

Israelite subgroups were predominantly based in Canaan and were not

pastoral nomads, though the biblical "sagas" may represent the history of

a fraction who migrated from Egypt to Canaan.21 These Canaan-based

Israelites opposed neither Canaanites in order to claim the land nor eachother for ethnic or religious reasons, but rather they were peasants and

other kinds of producers and providers of services who revolted against the

feudal system established in Palestine at the time of the Hyksos and ex

tended throughout the Egyptian domination of Canaan during the eigh

teenth and nineteenth dynasties (ca. 1570-1200); namely, against the forced

labor, military service, and tribute imposed on them by the overlords of the

city-states. In the course of their revolt they took command of the agrarian

means ofproduction,whereby they were forged into a self-conscious socialand religious people around Yahweh, the God of one of the subgroup(s)

who was celebrated for delivering it/them from sociopolitical bondage and

promised continuing deliverance whenever Yahweh's autonomous people

were threatened. The revolt of these restive serfs originated in the hill

country where the Canaanite overlords in the plains were too weak to

contest the revolt effectively, and the"conquest"went forward with measur

able success throughout the land.

17 G. E. Mendenhall, TheTenth Generation: TheOriginsof the Biblical Tradition (Baltimor

J h H ki U i it P 1973)


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Johns Hopkins University Press 1973)


Gottwald22tried to fan some smoke in the biblical sources into a flame

to support his theory. For example, he supposed that Num 21:27-30 and

Deut 3:11 conceal a conversion of Amorites to Yahwism (Num 21:27-30);

that the detailed lists of Edomite leaders in Israel's tradition (Genesis 36)also supposes their conversion; that the Danites derived from the Sea Peo

ples known from Greek and Egyptian sources as the Denen orDanuna;that

the list of kings in Joshua 12 represents kings overthrown by the revolu

tionaries; and that the assembly at Shechem (Joshua 24) can be construed

as a great act of incorporation of the Canaanite populace who threw off

Baal who was associated with their oppressors.

Gottwald23confesses that he is uncertain how, and even if, this model can

be tested archaeologically. According to him,24 military conquest couldhave been the major strategy of the Canaan-based Israelites in order to

secure settlement of the land, but it is wrong-headed to attribute these

victories to "biblical" Israelites.

In sum, according to the peasant revolt model, the question "Who is the

Pharaoh of the Exodus?" is misguided and skews the archaeological evi

dence. Israel as a religiopolitical force never entered the land.

This model has the advantage of being able to incorporate the conquest

material without being embarrassed by archaeological gaps at critical sites,gives a plausible reason why some Canaanite subgroups converted to Yah

wism, finds some support in the sociopolitical dimension of the term Apiru

in the Amarna letters, proposes a way of accounting for the phenomenal

rise of Yahwism according to the dictates of historical criticism, and ex

plains the poorer nature of Iron I Culture.

On the other hand, if the immigration model strains one's credulity in its

handling of the biblical text, this model, as Gottwald himself admitted,

"positively boggles the mind."

25

It suffers even more acutely from the sameobjection raised against the immigration model for its cavalier handling of

biblical narrative. The only biblical evidences that may be fairly construed

as supporting the revolt model are the assembly at Shechem who embraced

Yahwism and possibly the reference to the "mixed multitude" that accom

panied Israel. Furthermore, Herrmann26rightly argued that only a model

that has closer connections with the biblical and extrabiblical texts, to

gether with careful consideration ofthearchaeological results, will survive

the test of future scholarship. The only firm data supporting the model,

namely, the activity of the Apiru in the Amarna correspondence, cannot be


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equated with the biblical Israelites even as Weippert argued27 and Gott

wald recognized. Hauser,28moreover, called Mendenhall's definition of the

Apiru into question. In sum, the theory is speculative.

IV The Two PhasesConquestModels

Three major models of conquest have been proposed: two phases, early

date, and late date. Although they all envision a conquest model, they differ

so radically in their use of historical and biblical criticisms and of archae

ology that it seems best to treat then separately.

C. F. Burney29theorized that the migration of the patriarchs, Abraham,

Isaac, and Jacob, as recorded in the book of Genesis represents the sequential movements of tribes from east to west under the guise of individuals.

The Jacob tribe, for example, having settled in the land for some time later

migrated eastward and subsequently returned to Canaan increased by

fresh Aramean accessions. Burney equated their movement with the Apiru;

at this timetheJacob-tribes seized the district of Shechem (cf. Genesis 34).

After the Apiru-invasion, the Joseph tribes broke off and moved into Egypt

where they were subsequently oppressed by Rameses II and made their

exodus during the reign of Merneptah or immediately after. The tribes of

Levi and Simeon, he supposed, merged with proto-Judahite clans and

moved northwards with them into the Negev and the hill-country (cf.

Judges 1). The Joseph tribes and some Lvites split off and traveled round

Edom to enter Canaan under Joshua's leadership from Transjordan.

T. H. Meek30analyzed the Hebrew origins into three broad groups, only

two of whom were involved in conquest and settlement. "One," he wrote,

"was in the far north: Asher, Dan, Napthali, Issachar, and Zebulun, all of

whom were more drawn into the Hebrew confederacy by a common peril,

beginning about the time of Deborah."31The other two groups he identifiedwith the Apiru, known from the Amarna archives. One of these, "a com

posite group, perhaps more Aramean than anything else,"32 under the

leadership of Joshua "at first were able to conquer only the Jordan valley

and the eastern highlands of Ephraim, and only gradually extended their

occupation westward."33While this group of the Apiru migrants were tak

ing advantage of unsettled conditions in Palestine to carve out for them

selves a homeland, the mass of the migrating hordes had to seek pasturage

elsewhere, and some of the more venturesome ones, most certainly Levi,

27 W i t Th S ttl t f th I lit T ib 63 102


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27 W i t Th S ttl t f th I lit T ib 63 102


migrated to Egypt, where they experienced the events recorded in the Bible

about the Exodus. Under the leadership of Moses, this group "pushed north;

from Kadesh to Beersheba, to Hebron, until finally they controlled most of

the land south of Jerusalem between the Dead Sea and Philistia."34

Hedated this invasion in the twelfth century, that is about two centuries after

Joshua. This southern confederacy included Judah, Levi, Simeon, and others.

Rowley,35 like Meek, thought that Zebulun and Asher were already in

the land in the fourteenth century and, like Burney, associated the Jacob

stories with the Amarna age, linking the Apiru with the treacherous inci

dent involving Simeon and Levi (Genesis 34) in an abortive attempt to take

Shechem. Shortly after the Amarna age, according to Rowley, Judah and

Simeon carried out from the south an incursion into the land, together withcertain non-Israelite elements, including Kenites and Calebites, while north

ern tribes were pressing in, either singly or in small groups, simultaneously

with those in the south. When Levi and Simeon were defeated at Shechem,

Rowley further supposed, they withdrew from there and eventually made

their way into Egypt where they were oppressed by Rameses II and de

livered by Moses at the time of Merneptah. They entered the land after

only two years in the wilderness under Joshua at ca. 1230.

Rowton36supposed that there were two exoduses from Egypt. The first

involved the Josephites who reached Palestine early in the thirteenth cen

tury and who, once established in Palestine, founded the amphictyony of

Israel. The second involved the Lvites at ca. 1170, but they did not enter

Palestine until a generation later, ca. 1125. Aaron belongs to thefirstexodusand Moses and Joshua belong to the second.

Aharoni37and Yeivin,38finding a contradiction between Num 33:41-49

and Num 20:14-21, suggested Israel followed an earlier route through Edom

and Moab and a later route bypassing them.39

These theories helpfully remind us that the biblical record may be incomplete by querying how Joshua and his host proceeded directly to Shech

em from Ai without encountering any opposition and by supposing that the

situation at Shechem may have been altered by the incidents associated

with Jacob centuries earlier (cf. Genesis 34).

On the other hand, they have little to commend themselves. First, they

too are based on the alien presuppositions of historical criticism and upon

questionable biblical criticism. Second, they all so drastically rewrite Is-

34Ibid.,30.

35 H H Rowley From Joseph to Joshua (London: Published for the British Academy by


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H. H. Rowley, From Joseph to Joshua (London: Published for the British Academy by


rael's history that were they true, it would be hard to understand how the

biblical account ever came into existence. More specifically, Rowley denied

the "tradition" of the wilderness, leaving the reader perplexed how it ever

came into existence.40 Meek so completely reversed the chronology ofMoses and Joshua and so completely divorced them that the entrenched

biblical "traditions" regarding them are incomprehensible; the same can be

said against Rowton's separation of Moses from Aaron. Third, and correl-

atively, they demonstrate their arbitrary and subjective character by can

celing out each other. Fourth, they are guilty of substituting the plain

plausible statements of tradition withnovel,unnecessary explanations. Row-

ton, for example, found support for his two-exodus theory in two narratives

regarding the circumcision of the Israelites in Egypt and at Gilgal, in twodifferent routes, one by the brook of Zered, the other all the way round

Edom, in conflicting accounts of the Egyptian attitudes toward the Isra

elites, first hostile, then friendly. A plain reading of the biblical text, how

ever, readily accounts for some of these differences, even as Y. Kaufman41

convincingly harmonized the differences between Joshua and Judges 1.

Regarding the alleged contradiction between Numbers 20 and33,note that

Zalmonah lies on Edom's western border and that both accounts mention

Oboth and Ije-Abarim, lying on Edom's eastern border. Aharoni and Yeivin locate Punon in the heart of Edom, but Budd42says its location is not

certainly known, thereby effectively removing the alleged contradiction

between Numbers 20 and 33. Fifth, thefirstthree theories are only as good

as the questionable theory that links the Apiru with the Israelites.

V.Early Date ConquestModeh

Three theories that rightly eschew a biblical criticism that sets a canon

above canon but questionably read the biblical chronology as a modern

history have emerged. All three assume that Scriptures assert that during

the second half of thefifteenthcentury ("the early date"), in contrast to thesecond half of the thirteenth century ("the late date"), Israel conquered the

land as a unified and complete achievement in two stages: the conquest of

Transjordania under the guidance of Moses (Num 20:21-22:1) and the

conquest of Gisjordan under the leadership of Joshua (Joshua 1-12), after

which the conquering tribes of Israel for several centuries struggled for

integration and settlement of the land as well as for their defense of the


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integration and settlement of the land, as well as for their defense of the


They differ, however, in their interpretation of the archaeological data to

be correlated with this date.

Early-date advocates commence their reasoning with the only notice

bearing directly on the date of the Exodus, 1 Kgs 6:1 (MT, LXXL): "In thefour hundred and eightieth year after the Israelites had come out of Egypt,

in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv, the

second month, Solomon began to build the temple of the Lord." If one

adopts Thiele's widely accepted conclusion that Solomon's fourth year is

966 Be, a reading of the text according to the dictates of modern histori

ography yields the date 1446 for the Exodus and, allowing forty years for

the wilderness wanderings (Num 32:13), 1406 for the conquest. If one were

to follow the revisionist chronology of LXX, which in 1 Kgs 6:1 reads 440

instead of 480, one would arrive at 1366 for the conquest, the time of the

Apiru.

Second, Jephthah's statement, made about 1100, that Israel had occu

pied Transjordan for 300 years fits the higher chronology and, if read as

modern history, cannot be squeezed into the 170 years demanded by the

lower chronology.

Third, Bimson noted that1Chron6:33-37presents eighteen generationsbetween Korah, who presumably lived at the time of the Exodus, and

Heman, the singer in David's time. Ifonecalculates twenty-five years per

generation, and adds the generation between David and Solomon, one

would arrive at a date close to 480 years between Solomon and the Exodus.

Fourth, although the chronological notices in the book ofJudges must be

compressed according to either the higher or lower chronology, they better

suit the higher chronology than the lower. In fact, they fit so much better

that some think that the reference to 300 years in Judg 11:26 was second

arily fabricated and interpolated into the text to match the other chron

ological notices.Fifth, the chronological notices in the book of Judges must be adjusted

to absolute dates by means of archaeology. Bimson noted that the Philis

tines do not appear as major contenders for the land in the book until the

time of Samson, toward the end of the period of the Judges. If the main

wave of Philistines entered Canaan around 1200 one would have expected,

according to the lower chronology, the earlier narrativesinJudges to have

mentioned numerous clashes between Israel and the Philistines throughout

much of the period of the judges. Whereas this silence in Judges 1-12, apart

from the curious, laconic reference in Judg 3:31 and the reference in 10:7

accords badly with the late-date theory it matches well the higher chro


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accords badly with the late-date theory, it matches well the higher chro


1. TheTraditional View

Traditionalists, represented by J. Jack, J. Garstang, M. Unger, G. Ar

cher, L. Wood, S. Horn, W. Shea, and this writer,43

concur with the generally accepted chronology of Palestine, namely, Late Bronze (LB) I =

1570-1400 and LB II = 1400-1300. Accordingly, they date the conquest

between LB I and LB II and identify the Pharaoh of the Exodus with

Thutmose III or with Amenhotep II. Advocates of the early date restrict

their attention for destruction layers to three cities mentioned in the Bible

as having been burned; namely, Jericho, Ai, and Hazor.

RegardingJericho.**The first major excavation at Jericho was conducted

by an Austro-German expedition under the direction of E. Sellin and C.Watzinger from 1907 to 1909 and again in 1911.

45Watzinger concluded

that Jericho was unoccupied during LB.46Garstang,47a British archaeol

ogist, questioned these results and mounted his own expedition from 1930

to 1936. He argued convincingly, despite disclaimers, that Jericho fell to

Joshua before the reign of Akhenaten (ca. 1375) because: (1) not one of the

distinctive, plentiful, and well-established archaeological criteria charac

teristic of Akhenaten's reign has been found; (2) there is no reference to

Jericho in the Amarna letters; and (3) no scarab after Amenhotep III

(1412-1375 BC)has been found there, though there survived an abundant

and continuous series of scarabs of the Egyptian kings from MBA right on

down through the reign of Amenhotep III. He also identified a collapsed

wall with LB, ascribing the destruction to invading Israelites.

Garstang asked his student K. Kenyon to review and update his findings.

Kenyon48came to Watzinger's conclusion: Jericho was unoccupied in LB.

She headed up her own campaign from 1952 to 1958 and found the city

wall Garstang associated with the Israelite invasion collapsed in fact 1000

years earlier! Also, on the basis of the absence of pottery imported from

Cyprus and common to the LB I period she concluded that the city was

destroyed at the end of MB (c. 1550BC)and was unoccupied during the LB

age.49

43 B. K. Waltke, "Palestinian Artifactual Evidence Supporting the Early Date of the Exo

dus,"BSac 129 (1972) 36.44 The writer depends heavily in this history of the excavations at Jericho on B. Wood, "Did

the Israelites ConquerJericho?"BAR16/2 (March-April, 1990) 44-59.45 Ernst Sellin and Carl Watzinger,Jericho:Die ErgebnissederAusgrabungen (Jericho)(Leip

J G Hinrichs 1913)


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J G Hinrichs 1913)


B.Wood,50

an archaeologist at the Universityof Toronto,reinvestigated

herfinalreportspublishedafter her death in1978.Heconfirmed her dating

ofthewall in question but rejected her method of dating thefinaldestruc-

tion phase by theabsence of distinctive, imported ware to the neglect ofdomestic ware.Hisstudyofthe ceramic remnants, royalscarabs,carbon14

dating,seismicactivity in the region, the abundanceofgrainwithinthe city

at the time of its fall, destruction by fire, and even ruins of toppled walL

produced whatisbeing called impressive evidence that the fortified city was

destroyed about 1400BC.Wooddrawsthe conclusion:"Whenwe compare

the archaeological evidenceatJerichowiththebiblicalnarrative describ-

ing the Israelite destructionofJericho,wefinda quite remarkable agree-

ment." If his interpretation survives critical appraisal, Wood has provided

very strong evidence for the traditional model, even though there is no

archaeologicalproof that the Israelites caused the city'sfinaldestruction.

Regarding Hazor. Yadinassociated the complete andfinaldestruction of

the Canaanite city, Stratum la (terminated ca. 1230)with the Israelite

conquest.The reference in Judg4:2,however, to Hazorasa Canaanite city

in the opposition to Israel in the time of Barak, at least three or four

generations after Joshua, precludes the late date and demands that one

associateJoshua'sconquestwithoneofthe earlier destruction levels ofthat

city. The only way around this argument is to suppose either that thebiblicalnarrative atJudges 4 isflawedor that the archaeological evidence is

incomplete.

Can an earlier destruction level be identified withJoshua?This writer

attempted to identify itwiththe endofStratum 2 by meansofaburntgate

in Area of the Lower City, but Bimson51

showed that his argument was

fallacious and that the gate must be dismissed fromthe discussion. Stratum

2 (=LB I) emerged as one of great prosperity and culture, and according

toYadin

52

"this is nodoubtthe Hazor of the Thutmosis III period." Thisstratum was completely destroyed before Stratum lb (=LBII).Stratum 2

could fit Joshua's attack, but theexcavatorsare vague about both the time

and the natureofitsdestruction. Evidently there is no evidenceofburning

(contraJoshua11),a lack that argues against the traditional early date but

doesnot decisively refute it.

Stratum la (=LB III), this writer contended, should not be associated

withJoshuabutwithBarak. Kitchen53

noted that Jabin IPsmain strength

is "curiously" not in Hazor but with Sisera in Harosheth. The apparent

weakness of Hazor at the time of Barakfindsarchaeological support inStratum la for at that time the Lower City ceased to be fortified and its


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THE DATEOFTHE CONQUEST 193

temples were abandoned and apparently plundered, being rebuilt after-

wards in a very poor and temporary form. According toAharonithe last

town was concentrated mainly on the Upper City. Yadin, however, ex-

plained that its meager remains may be due to erosion.54

RegardingALJudith (Marquet)Krause uncovered at Et Tell a largeset-

tlement gap between Early Bronze (EB) III and Iron I, without a trace of

the Late Bronze Age town presupposed in the Bible (cf. Joshua7).This gap

embarrasses the traditionalists, Bimson, and advocates of the late date.

D.P.Livingston55

argued convincingly in1970and in1971in thisjournal

that Beitin is not biblical Ai. Later he identified Bethel with Bireh and

biblical Ai with Khirbet Nisya. After six seasons or excavations at Kh.

Nisya, however, Livingston failed to validate archaeologically his thesis.Although he turned up some Canaanite pottery sherds, giving Kh. Nisya

someadvantage over Et Tell, he found no architecture from the Canaanite

era.56

The writer, having served as an external examiner in June 1989of

Livingston's Ph.D.dissertation atAndrewsUniversity, on the basis of the

archaeological evidence essentially corroborates A. E Rainey that Nisya

cannot be equated with biblicalAi.57

Livingston, though describing the site

as "a small, isolated, highland agricultural settlement," nevertheless, ar-

gues that the Canaanite walls and buildingswere robbedout.

Traditionalists attribute the archaeological evidence for the late date of

the conquest to later Israelite and Philistine conquests and settlementdur-

ing the period of the Judges. Courville and Bimson, however, think that the

archaeological evidence, especially the lack of walls and configuration at

Jerichoandofconflagration atHazorbetweenLBI andII,demand a more

or less radical revision ofPalestinianarchaeology.

2. CourvilWs Theory

D.Courville forced the extrabiblical textsand archaeological data to fit

the 1406date.Withregard to the former he found amenable to his recon-

struction Velikovsky's radical revision of Egyptian chronology, most nota-

bly his associating the plagues inflicted by Mosesupon the Egyptians with

asimilar account in the Ipuwer Papyrus, dated about the twelfth dynasty,

and his dating the Hyksos' takeover of Egypt after their expulsion by the

Israelites at ca. 1400. Having moved the late twelfth and the following

dynasties to a date later than 1400,Courville is free topullthe end ofEB

5 4

Yadin Hazon 37


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Yadin Hazon 37


down 600 years, from about 2000 to 1400; to explain the Egyptian char

acter of the Middle Bronze (MB) to the fact that Israel recently emerged

from Egypt; and to attribute the brilliant culture ofMBand LB not to the

Canaanites but to the Hebrews. Above all, he can now identify the fallenand/or breached walls and configurations at EB Jericho and Ai with the

Israelite conquest. Histour deforceof the data even allowed him to pin point

the Pharaoh of the Exodus as Choncharis, known form the Sothic list of

Egyptian kings and validated by Josephus. Courville's method allowed him

to fit his interpretation of the archaeological evidence quite nicely with

biblical evidence, but he did not play fair with the extrabiblical evidence,

and in spite of his high-handed tactics not all the data fit.

Virtually all qualified Egyptologists reject Velikovsky's reconstruction of

Egyptian history. It is not the purpose of this paper to pass judgment on the

other radical realignments of ancient Near Eastern synchronisms. W. H.

Stiebing, Jr.,58 objected to Velikovsky and Courville on the following

grounds. (1) The Amarna Letters are now dated to the mid-ninth century,

but the names of persons and places and Egyptian-Palestine relationships

one gets from themisfar different from the names and picture one gets from

the Bible during the Israelite monarchy. (2) According to this theory the

Pharaohs of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties belong to the Israelite

Iron Age, but objects bearing the names of these Pharaohs have been foundwith Late Bronze artifacts so that these Pharaohs must have lived before the

Iron Age. (3) If Jericho felltoJoshua in connection with the end ofEB,its

MB occupation and walls do not match the biblical claim that Jericho lay

in ruins for centuries after Joshua. (4) According to Courville's dating of the

various archaeological periods, Samaria would have served as the capital

of Israel during LB. But no LB remains were uncovered during the exca

vations of Samaria. In addition to these arguments, W. Shea59called atten

tion to a letter from Aphek apparently to be dated to the time of RamesesII.Since it belongs to the LB II period of Palestine, it offers strong evidence

for the traditional chronology linking the nineteenth dynasty with the Late

Bronze era.

3. Bimson's Theory

Bimson's theory consists of two parts: a trial hypothesis that radically

reconstructed the linkage between the stratigraphy of Palestine and the

chronology of Egypt60

and his main theory that redates the MB and LBages of Palestine. W. Stiebing, Jr.,61 soundly refuted Bimson's hypothesis


15/21


reconstructing Palestine stratigraphy from LB downward and informed his

readers that Bimson himself has rejected his own published ideas on "a

revised chronology for Egypt and its consequences for Palestinian strati

graphy,"62though Bimson does hold that the end ofLBI may be dated ataround 1360 or even later.63 Stiebing, however, did not refute Bimson's

main thesis that MB IIC should be redated from the first half of the six

teenth century to the second half of the fourteenth century. Here Bimson is

on firmer ground. Instead of assuming with most scholars that the numer

ous destructions of MB sites in Palestine occurred as the Egyptian army

campaigned into Canaan in retaliation against the Hyksos, Bimson asso

ciated them with the Israelite conquest. He argued that there is no histor

ical evidence either for an Egyptian retaliation against the Hyksos beyondtheir invasion of Sharuhen on the coastal plain or for equating the MB

defenses at such sites as Jericho and Hazor with the Hyksos. With the

Egyptian retaliation eliminated, the Israelites offered Bimson a most fa

vorable alternative explanation for the MB IIC destructions. Moreover,

according to him, the bichrome ware that characterizes LB I can just as

well be dated after the Israelite invasion as before it. His scheme demanded

a drastically reduced LB I period, but he noted that Kenyon and others had

already anticipated reducing the period by as much as over a hundred

years.

Bimson's new identification of the destruction levels that terminated MB

IIC with the Israelite invasion nicely fits the evidence from Jericho and

Hazor, which attest extensive conflagrations at this time, but Ai still re

mains a problem. In addition, his interpretation better suits the evidence

of Hebron, Hormah, Arad, Gibeon, Dan, and other sites destroyed at the

end of the MBA than "the traditional view" because they exhibit little

evidence of occupation during the LBA. In sum, as Ramsey64wrote, Bim

son "has given a reasonable archaeological context" for the conquest.

Bimson's thesis for redating and reinterpreting MB IIC has been criti

cized as follows. (1) Among other objections, Callaway65alleged that Bim

son's list of cities on p. 230 which favor his view over against the late-date

theory is "self-serving" and "deceptive" because the conclusion would have

been different had Bimson included sites which were not destroyed in MB

IIC (e.g. Heshbon, Edom, Moab, and Arad). To be fair, however, Bimson

had earlier considered Arad.66(2) Callaway also objected that Bimson ac

cepted numbers that supported his redating scheme, while those whichresist fitting into the scheme may be "artificial." In fact, however, Bimson


16/21


did not take the 480 years at face valueand regard it as anembodiment

of 12 40. So also he did not take the numbers40 and 80 in the bookof

Judges at face value.

(3) A. Rainey67criticized Bimson for accepting Livingston's identifica-tion of Bethel with elBira instead of with Beitin. In fact, however, the

identification of Bethel and Ai constitutes a problem for all views of the

conquest. (4) He alsocriticizedhim for accepting theidentificationof Debir

withTellBeit Mirsim, whenKhirbet Rabud "was not in existenceduring

the Middle Bronze period." (5) Finally, Rainey chided Bimson for not

properly taking into account the "society and political situation in the

elAmarnatablets"which"leavenoroomfor the Israelites as weknowthem

from the Book of Judges."(6) G. Ramsey,

68 who was otherwisequitefavorable to Bimson's thesis,

noted that Bimson offered no archaeological reasons for loweringthe date

ofMBIIC. (7) Ramsey alsonoted that because the scheme in thebookof

Judges isartificial, it is useless for the calculation of dates.

(8)T. L. Thompson69

notedthat manysiteshavingbeenabandoned in

MBIIwere not resettled until the Iron Age.

(9)M. Bietak70

on the basis of his excavations at TellelDabaca in the

Eastern Nile Delta says MB IIC cannot be datedlater than between1530

and 1515 BC.

VI. The Late Date ConquestModel

Until recently most American and Israeli archaeologists, notablyW. F.

Albrightand Y.Yadinrespectively,accepted the conquest modelbut dated

it in the secondhalfof thethirteenth century.Althoughthey believed that

thebiblicalsourceswere developedandwrittendown fromaperiodoftime

quiteearly in Israel's history (e.g.,xodus 15, Judges 5, Genesis 49, Deuteronomy 33, and Numbers 23-24) and at a much later period (especiallythe narratives of Joshua and of Judges) and that over the years they weremodified and adapted to suit contemporary interests and to serve contemporary purposes,71they nevertheless believed on the basis of extrabiblicalwritten documents and above all the results of the Palestinian excavationsthat they contain a solid core of valid information and should be acceptedas substantially true.

Adherents of this model assert that the archaeological evidence, on theone hand, validates the biblical presentation in Joshua 1-12 that Israel


17/21


conqueredPalestine, and, on the other hand, exposes that the biblical chro

nology cannot be accepted at face value. Instead, they redate the conquest

to about 1230 and identify Rameses II as the Pharaoh of the oppression.

According to most the 480 years in 1 Kgs 6:1 is a combination of theschematic numbers, 12 and 40, referring to the number of generations and

the artificially reckoned years of a generation respectively. In absolute

terms, however, a generation is somewhere between 20 and 25 years so that

the time between the conquest and Solomon's building of the temple may

be well under 300 years. The mention of Israel on the Merneptah stele at

about 1220 establishes their terminusadquern for the conquest.

The sudden emergence of hundreds of new sites by pastoral nomads in

Iron I contrasts sharply with the reduced number of sites in LB in comparison with MB. Kochavi72 wrote: "During the Late Bronze Age, and

especially towards its end, new small unfortified settlements are known.

However, with the beginning of the Iron Age, they suddenly appear by the

hundreds." I. Finkelstein73elaborates:

Altogetheronly25-30sites wereoccupiedin the Late Bronze II(c. 1400-1200BC)betweenthe JezreelandBeer-Sheva valleys.Humanactivitywasconfined mainlytothe large central tells.... Itishighly unlikely, therefore, that many additional

Late Bronze sites will bediscoveredin thefuture, because itisdifficulttooverlooksuch major settlements. Other regions were also practically deserted during theLate Bronze period. . . . In Iron I there was a dramatic swing back in the population ofthehill country. About 240 sites oftheperiod are known in the areabetween the JezreelandBeer-Sheva valleys;96 inManasseh,122in Ephraim. . .and 22 in Benjamin and Judah. In addition, 68 sites have been identified inGalilee, 18 in the Jordan Valley and dozens of others on the Transjordanianplateau.

In addition, numerous, widespread, and catastrophic destructions separate the markedly different and more sophisticated "Canaanite" Late

Bronze Age, and the cruder "Israelite" Iron Age. Moving from north to

south these cities are, Hazor (Tell el-Qedah), Megiddo (Tell el-Mutesellim),

Succoth (Tell DeircAlla), Bethel (Beitin), Beth Shemesh (Tell er-Remeileh),

Ashdod (Esdud), Lachish (Tell ed-Duweir), Eglon (Tell el-Hesi), and Debir

or Kiriath-Sepher (Tell Beit Mirsim or Khirbet Rabud). Of these cities,

four are specifically said to have been destroyed by Joshua: Hazor (Josh

11:10-11), Lachish (Josh 10:31-33), Eglon (Josh 10:34-35), and Debir (Josh

10:38-39); Bethel is said to have been taken by the house of Joseph (Judg

1:22-26).


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)


These include Gibeon (el-Jib) (Joshua 9), Taanach (Tell Tacannak) (Judg

1:27), Shechem (Tell Baiatali) (Josh 24), Jerusalem (el-Quds) (Josh 15:63;

2 Sam 5:6-9), Beth-shean (Tell el-Husn) (Judg 1:27-28), and Gezer (Tell

Jezer) (Josh 10:33). Following the destructions at Hazor, Succoth, Bethel,and Debir (possibly also Gezer and Ashdod), unfortified and architectually

simple, even crude, settlements appear.

The evidence from Transjordan is also used to corroborate the late-date

theory. According to Glueck there was no sedentary occupation in the

regions east of the Jordan from 1990 until 1300. Although Glueck later

revised certain features of his original synthesis, as Sauer74noted, Glueck

and his fellow advocates maintain the overall principle. For example,

Campbell and Wright interpreted the Late Bronze "Amman Airport Temple" as a semi-nomadic shrine for a twelve-tribe league. Advocates of a

late-date conquest argue that Israel's encounter with Edom (Num 20:17)

and Moab (22:6) on its way to the sworn land must have occurred after

1300.

But the theory has problems. First, negative archaeological results from

Jericho, Ai, Heshbon, Arad, and Makkedah argue that these towns were

not in existence at the alleged time of the conquest. Other sites, such as

Dan/Laish and Jarmuth, mentioned as destroyed by the Israelites, have

such meager LBA remains that one may assume they had been merely

small hamlets or only burial grounds at that time.75Without the advantage

of B. Wood's study, Albright drew the conclusion that although Jericho was

in existence in the fourteenth century, the Tell is so badly eroded that

remains of this occupation have disappeared. Yadin,76on the other hand,

thought that the LB settlement at Jericho reused the city wall from the MB

Age. Regarding the gap at Ai, Albright theorized that tradition transferred

the conquest of Beitin to Ai (i.e. "the ruin") because Ai looked like a ruin.

Callaway77 suggested that there were two cities at Ai. The first, he suggested, was a Hivite city and this is the settlement that the Israelites con

quered. Yadin argued that his argument is untenable. Livingston vainly

identified it with Khirbet Nisya, and others think the site has yet to be

identified. The same may be true of Heshbon and Arad as well.

Second, Franken78denied the identification of the cruder Iron Age set

tlements with Israelite culture. Weippert79 urged caution, while Kenyon

depreciated the strength of the evidence. I. Finkelstein80thinks "the vast

74J. A. Sauer, "Transjordan in the Bronze and IronAges:A Critique of Glueck's Synthesis,"

BASOR 263 (1986) 3


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BASOR 263 (1986) 3


majority of the people who settled in the hill country and in Transjordan

during the Iron Age I period, must have been indigenous," but not ac

cording to the peasant revolt model. While it is true that the Sea Peoples,

or other invaders of the land, or internecine warfare between the Canaanitecity, and/orfirefrom natural causes may account for the destruction levels,

it seems more probable to identify most of them with Israel.

Third, although adherents of the late date sometimes present the nu

merous destruction levels at this time as due to a monolithic invasion, in

fact, they are sometimes separated by centuries. For example, Kochavi

contended that Hazor met its final fate around 1275, while Lachish was

destroyed about one hundred years later around 1160 according to D.

Ussishkin.81

Judg 1:23 associates the destruction of Bethel, Albright's principal exhibit for dating the conquest to the thirteenth century not with

Joshua but with the later expansion of the House of Joseph.

Fourth, as noted above, by dating the end of Hazor with the Israelite

conquest, no place is left for Israel's later conquest there as recorded in

Judges 4. B. Mazar solved the problem by concluding that the chronolog

ical order of events in Joshua and Judges must be reversed, that is, that the

battle of Deborah (in Judges) in fact preceded the destruction of Hazor

(describedinJoshua 11). Yadin82

drew the conclusion that the reference to"Jabin the king of Hazor" in Judges 4 is a later editorial gloss. His sug

gestionfindssupport in the fact that the poetic account of this battle makes

no mention of Hazor or Jabin. This writer rejects both solutions.

Fifth, Bimson83documented that the ceramic evidence at these sites was

handled somewhat subjectively to fit the theory.

Regarding the alleged gap in Transjordan, Bimson noted that Edom and

Moab as characterized in Numbers could have been nomadic or semi-

nomadic at the time Israel encountered them, and so left behind them littlearchaeological remains. Mattingly84and Sauer85have shown that recent

archaeological evidence from Transjordan is more and more undermining

this buttress for the late date.

Seventh, Bimson attributed the silence in the book of Judges about the

military campaigns of Seti I and Rameses III to the theological intention

of the book. He supported his argument by noting the book's silence about

the military campaigns by Merneptah and Rameses III after the time Israel

was in the land according to the late-date theorists.

81 D U i hki "L hi h K t th I lit C t f C ?" BAR 13/1 (1987)


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81 D Ussishkin "Lachish Key to the Israelite Conquest of Canaan?" BAR 13/1 (1987)


VIL Conclusion

The immigration, revolt, and two-phase conquest models should be re

jected because they depart too radically from the Bible, the primary sourcerecounting Israel's taking of the sworn-land. These new models betray their

arbitrary and subjective nature by their radical differences. They also ex

hibit the danger of reconstructing the text according to the latest piece of

archaeological evidence.

This evidence, however, does not support conclusively either the early-

date or the late-date models of the conquest. Courville's model must be

rejected because it creates archaeologically and historically insurmount

able problems. Ai presents a problem for the other three models of the

conquest. The main archaeological support for the traditional early datecomes from Jericho, but the archaeology of both Transjordan and of Cis-

jordan do not otherwise commend it. Hazor and the heavily walled cities

that characterize the MBA provide the chief claim for Bimson's model, but

no other established archaeologist accedes to his late dating of MB IIC.

Otherwise, the archaeological horizon favors the late date, especially the

hundreds of new settlements by pastoral nomads that spring up in Israel at

about 1200BCin contrast to their absence in LB; nevertheless, Hazor re

mains an intractable problem.On the other hand, one cannot assume that the Bible is representing

absolute, elapsed time. K. Kitchen,86followed by E. Yamauchi,87suggests

that the total number of years given in the Bible represent sums which

involved concurrent years, as in the case of some Egyptian records, and

even Bimson thinks the 480 years is a stylized figure.

In sum, the verdictnon liquetmust be accepted until more data puts the

date of the conquest beyond reasonable doubt. If that be true, either date

is an acceptable working hypothesis, and neither date should be held dog

matically.

Westminster Theological Seminary

Philadelphia


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Waltke, the Date of the Conquest

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