The Oldest Yahweh Inscription: Digging for Truth Episode 49

hi welcome to another exciting episode of digging for truth I'm your co-host Henry Smith and our program is sponsored by the associates for biblical research on our show we talk very much about archaeological discoveries that illuminate and show the reliability of the Scriptures today I have a very special guest joining us all the way from Amman Jordan mr. Joel Kramer from source flicks ministries Joel welcome to the show hey great to be here thanks for having me hey it's great to have you on the program all the way from you know a third of the way around the world we've you've been friends with the a be our ministry for a long time and we're gonna talk about the exciting world of archaeology we're gonna get to a particular artifact that we want to share with the audience that's awesome but before we do that I'd like you to introduce yourself a little bit to the audience tell them about what you do why it's important the calling on your life and your family's life as you're there over in the the Holy Land the extended Holy Land in Jordan yeah I've lived in the Middle East for 25 years actually I grew up in Saudi Arabia and I lived there for 13 years lived in Israel for 10 years and then have lived in Jordan for two years and so many years ago living in Israel I did a film with dr. Brian Wood and we got to be good friends and he's the one that inspired me also to go on to study archaeology so I went in studied archaeology in Jerusalem and got a master's degree in archaeology yeah that's that's tremendous and now if I recall that sort of happened in the Providence of God you if I remember right you didn't go to Israel to get an archaeology degree is that right but now that's kind of what happened right that's exactly yeah very very fascinating the direction that God leads our lives but now that you have this degree you learnt by living in Israel you learned a great deal about what the archaeologists say what the evidence is and so on yeah I spent almost ten years studying archaeology there and being active in many different digs and and so yeah I got quite quite familiar with it and continued to to do work in archaeology as well yeah that's fantastic well so we can call you an archaeologist you didn't intend to go to Israel to become one but you are an archaeologist and we're excited to have you here Joel it's really it's really great to have you on the show now we decided we could talk about thousands of different artifacts I mean there's there's so much to talk about as it relates to the Bible you mentioned Jericho that's another whole subject in and of itself but we're gonna talk about this inscription in the Sudan it's one inscription we've talked about it on our show briefly before but you're gonna really share with us today the importance of this description I'll let you set the stage for the audience of what it is sort of let's set that up a little bit so go ahead well there's actually two inscriptions that are that are very significant they're both located in the country of Sudan in ancient times that was part of Egypt and and one of them was found first in a site called Amaro west when they were excavating a temple built by ramses ii and and he listed out his foreign enemies and one of those was an inscription that translates the nomads of Yahweh and then that was in the late 30s then later in the nineteen the late 50s they excavated another site not too far away from Amara West called Solem and they were excavating there and they found a list of foreign enemies to the pharaoh amenhotep the third and and one of his enemies also was translated than nomads of Yahweh and so this sole of inscription there's and and I want to emphasize this there are many inscriptions that have been found through archaeology that mentioned the name of the God of Israel Yahweh yes but this sole of inscription is very important because it is the oldest inscription that has been found to date mentioning the name of the God of Israel so the area of the of the modern of modern Sudan was under control of the at the ancient Pharaoh's and so the description was found in the in the 1930s when when they started deciphering it back then the archaeologists what did that they recognized the importance of a Joel and what kind of response was there back then or was a tepid well yeah that there was a it was understood to be very important mentioning the name of the God of Israel however there was there never has really been a controversy on what these inscriptions say that they that they mentioned the name Yahweh has you know in all of the translations that have been done they agree that's what it says where the controversy has been is his scholars have been reluctant to attribute who the nomads of Yahweh are in the guards to them being Israel so you know these are the Kenites and these are the these are anybody but the Israelites which is really ridiculous because in the Old Testament of course the name Yahweh appears six thousand eight hundred and twenty three times and so maybe maybe that's the nomads of Yahweh and the reason the reason why they are reluctant to do that is because it throws a monkey wrench and many theories that are out there yeah about the about the development of Israel where they came from and and exactly and those kinds of things now let's talk about the date real briefly as we set up I got about a minute and a half here just let's talk about a the day and the sort of context of that and then we'll build on that in our next segment okay so so the inscription itself dates to the fifteenth end of the fifteenth century BC and of course you know give or take ten twenty years based on how Egyptian chronology kind of shifts back and forth but generally to the end of the fifteenth century BC to the time of Amenhotep the third and and so and it's it's a it's one of his northern enemy so we also know you know that it's an enemy somewhere to the north of Egypt and so yeah it's uh it's very early we're talking about the same half century that Moses lived in we're not talking long after the death of Moses that Amenhotep the third put this for an enemy inscription on his temple excellent so we see a recognition by a foreign power of this particular group of people and we'll talk more about the significance of the Bedouins right call them the Bedouin or the nomads right next segment we'll talk more about that well why is that important but here we have this recognition by this foreign power and we find it again of the Israelite God it's so amazing it's in the Moabite stone to which we've talked about on this program numerous times then yes Yahweh and in other in other inscriptions as well absolutely there's a whole string of inscriptions mentioning the name Yahweh the sole of inscription is the oldest yeah that's that's really tremendous okay folks so if please stick around for our next segment we're gonna build on what we've been talking about here with Joel joining us from source flix ministries all the way from Amman Jordan and we'll be right back in a culture of intense Bible denying skepticism associates for Biblical research exists to strengthen followers of Jesus by affirming the authority of the Bible our archaeological fieldwork and original research form a strong foundation in upholding the reliability of the Scriptures for students or anyone asking really trust the Bible please visit our website and partner with us by joining our prayer team or financially supporting this ministry and thank you for standing with us [Music] hi welcome back to digging for truth I'm joined today by mr. Joel Kramer joining us by Skype all the way from Amman Jordan and today we're talking about a very important inscription called the sole of inscription which mentions the name of Yahweh and particularly people who worship Him the nomads of Yahweh and Joel was sharing in our first segment a little bit of information about this inscriptions found in the Sudan it's dated to the period around the time of the Exodus so Joel let's let's build a little bit sometimes we as the church when we're doing this kind of scholarship sometimes we can be accused of fudging the information or trying to you know make it into apologetics you know we're just trying to defend the faith and justify the Christian faith but you have a great quote from a secular scholar that like you to share with the audience about this inscription go ahead with that this is from Donald Redford this is how I learned about this inscription I was reading his book Egypt Canaan and Israel in ancient times and I came across this quote he says this talking again about this so love inscription he says for half a century it has been generally admitted that we have here the Tetragrammaton the name of the Israelite God Yahweh and if this be the case and listen to what he says here as it undoubtably is the passage constitutes a most precious indication of the whereabouts now here's the date of the inscription during the late 15th century BC of the Enclave revering this God and so I think it is important to emphasize that this is this is an agreed-upon inscription this find and the translation of it is not controversial it's not me and you saying this is what this inscription says this is what secular scholarship how its translated through secular scholarship this is the date assigned to it from secular scholarship the end of the 15th century BC which by the way is the biblical date for the conquest yeah in a previous set of episodes with dr. stripling we've had roundtable discussions about the date of the Exodus and those have been been aired and people can draw upon those to see how we've made that argument and this inscription fits well with that now it's interesting I was thinking I guess twofold maybe you could explain how the secular scholars try to sort of explain this away not the fact that it says Yahweh but what their explanation is and then if you could talk about well this idea of these nomads how that fits the Bible like just expand on that a little bit sure go ahead please yeah I mean the way that secular scholarship does not believe that in the end of the 15th century BC that the Israelites existed and so and they of course believed that the Bible was written much later and so if the Bible was written later then why do we have this group of nomads worshiping Yahweh running around in the late 15th century it's a real problem and and so what they do is they say well this isn't talking about the Israelites this is talking about the Kenites or the and then later when Israel comes into existence then they get they borrow the the name of their God Yahweh well of course if you have the biblical people that are in the Bible that you too might send the Kenites around in the 15th century then why not the Israelites knew the Bible also says are around in the 15th century so it just doesn't work there their arguments don't work and they're just trying to cling to these old theories that really fall apart with evidence like this such as the documentary hypothesis and these kinds of theories and it's also a problem as you brought up for those who believe in a late date for the conquest in the mid 13th century ricey because if you if you have the conquest happening in say 1250 or 1230 BC then again why do we have this group of nomads who are worshiping Yahweh like the Bible says running around in the end of the 15th century BC and and yes this this word that is translated from Egyptian as nomads is chauzu which is which means nomads it's its people as you said like the better one that we see today running around and and so what if you think about Amenhotep the third who is identifying his enemies and he has to identify the Israelites him were reading about in the book of Exodus at this time what better way to describe them identify them you can't identify them as a nation they're not a nation yet you can't identify them as a city they don't live in cities they're nomads so how does he identify them he identifies them by the name of the God that they worship and what better way to describe the people we're reading about in the Bible who are wandering around in the wilderness yeah following a pillar of fire by night and and a cloud by day who are following their God Yahweh it's it's perfect and what there is no evidence there is no inscriptions there's no evidence at all that the or the Kenites or anybody else worship the God Yahweh maybe individuals did but as far as nations go right whereas even as the quote that we just read says this this name that's bound is the name of the God of Israel yeah it fits so well it's almost too good to be true you know I mean maybe you know there's probably problem I think the secular scholars have now they're influenced by these other models you mentioned the documentary hypothesis I mentioned to our audience real quick this is the idea that these the biblical texts have been written centuries after the events they record so and of course we would have always argued well how did they get all this stuff right if they wrote it centuries later there's no way they could do that and so these are these these discoveries really refute this old theory that just won't die it just will will not die in biblical scholarship so I add that thought the other the other part of it is is the other name ring that's their mentions Asheville and it shows you the difference between that right it's naming a place a city right just talk about that a little bit in contrast to the the nomad idea you got about 45 seconds yeah that they if if your enemy is a city state then it's easy to identify them just by giving the name of the city but again with nomads who are moving around in tents and don't live anywhere in particular then how are you gonna identify them and and and so the best way to identify them and actually the way that they're identified both by Rams it's a second in this other inscription in amar OS and in the sole of inscription by Amenhotep the third is to identify them by a more important name than the name Israel by the name that they of the God that they worship which the name of the God that they worship is their identity yes that's why that's why Moses asks God for his name if you're gonna make us your people and free us from our slavery then what's your name because your name will be our identity yeah that's that's really tremendous and you know it also builds on the Exodus events itself the Pharaoh is always identifying his catastrophe with this God Yahweh and that's there's not a land there's a people yes but it's the Lord Yahweh who brings about judgment upon the Pharaoh folks we hope you're enjoying this awesome conversation we're having about this incredible inscription we'll be right back in a few moments to finish up our show with mr. Joel Cramer don't go away Vimal and spade is a non technical quarterly publication published by the associates for biblical research written from a scholarly and conservative viewpoint bible and spade supports the inerrancy of the biblical record and as it must read for both the serious bible student and anyone asking if they can really trust the Bible archaeological evidence properly interpreted upholding the history of the Bible subscribe today at Bible archaeology org [Music] [Music] hi welcome back to digging for truth I'm your co-host Henry Smith today I've been joined by a friend and colleague and ministry archaeologist mr. Joel Kramer with source flix ministries all the way from Amman Jordan today we've been talking about the soul Lev inscription and how it mentions the God Yahweh the people of Israel as nomads and it's very early and a very significant discovery Joel thank you so much for sharing all of that about this awesome inscription I think I think people really need to know about it I think it vindicates our view of the scriptures and really goes against all of these sort of unbelieving theories about the development of the Bible and the history of the people of Israel but what I'd like to do is turn here a little bit and talk about well how did you go and study the subscription how did you fight you found out about it through Redford who we quoted earlier but tell the audience about this excursion that you went on it's really it's really fascinating yeah I mean when I started researching the inscription for myself I found very little information about it and and so it became important for me in order to understand these inscriptions better to actually go to the Sudan and it's a problem if you're living in Israel to travel to the Sudan yes but uh but anyways I was able to go there I was able to find a driver with a four-wheel-drive vehicle because it was both on and off road and I spent a couple of weeks traveling in the Sudan and across the Sahara Desert going through many many checkpoints and sleeping on the ground and anyways it was quite a trip and not a very comfortable trip but I spent over five days at the sole of temple photographing every inch of it and just really studying it and and so for me personally that's why I moved over to Israel and now Jordan is for me really to understand something I got to go there I got to see it I got to put it in its context and so that was really what was behind the trip to Sudan yeah that's that's that's tremendous and course the Lord was with you definitively of Sudan as a as there's some instability there politically and it's a predominantly Muslim country so you know you were coming from Israel so that that your sense of adventure is there I admire you but but of course the Lord is protecting you through all that - quite quite an experience huh yes it was absolutely but but definitely worth it - and it was a little disappointing at the Amara Westside I've been talking about how they reburied that temple so you can't really see the inscriptions there the good thing is is those inscriptions are protected because they were reburied after excavations but it's so lab you can see all the inscriptions including this one that we're talking about yeah that that's excellent as we have the show going on will be showing photographs of the the inscriptions so people can see so let's talk a little bit Joel you you did this wonderful video about this inscription and we're gonna we're gonna give that information to our audience so they could go watch it one of the things that you did in there in the videos I thought was really tremendous and I'd like you to talk about this we're talking about archaeology of course the Bible the reliability of the scriptures but the but but what we want to do is point people to the God who reveals himself in the scriptures and in that video you talk about the name Yahweh and his enduring nature and maybe maybe you could just take it from there and just sort of build upon upon that and go tell our audience a little bit about that well the key is Exodus 3 where Moses asks God for his name and of course he says I am Who I am and that has more to do with what God's name means but his name is Yahweh and so he's given his name Yahweh and then it says in Exodus 3:15 it says God says this is my name forever the name that I shall be called from generation to generation and so that gives a time element that means that God is going to be called by the name Yahweh through all generations and through history and so really the question is is is there archaeological evidence for that that God has been called by the name Yahweh from from this time Exodus 3 on down until today and the answer is clearly yes because of these many many inscriptions that have been found you mentioned that we mentioned - one from about 1400 BC at so loved one from Amara west about 1300 BC you mentioned the Moabite stone which is the ninth century BC that mentions the name Yahweh we have the silver amulets from Jerusalem sixth century BC and the Lakeisha letters and I could go on and on and on yes down to the Dead Sea Scrolls that mentioned the name Yahweh over and over again so we have all these archaeological finds from all these inscriptions that cover from generation to generation proving that God has indeed been known and called by the name Yahweh down through time this is very much in contrast to the nation to the gods of the other nations who have disappeared over time where do people get together in worship Moloch the God of Canaan where do they get together and worship the gods of the Philistines or the ammonites or the Moabites or the say that there they're all gone they've all disappeared through history because the people who believe that in them have become extinct and with them their belief in these false gods whereas the reason that they're still people including ourselves that worship Yahweh today in the world is because he's real he's able to save his people again and again and so that time element is key in understanding what is true and what is false and the true God is obvious when you give it the test of time like that yeah a description is thirty four hundred and some-odd years old and here we are proclaiming his name today now we find his name in the name of Jesus right Yeshua absolutely Yahweh Yahweh saves right absolutely and and Jesus declaring himself to be the very god in the Old Testament Joel we got about 30 seconds to finish up what was the final thing you'd like to say about about this this description and in the name Yahweh being found in there well it's it's really as you pointed out it's really not about the archaeology itself it's archeology the archaeology is just um it's just one of the things that show how awesome the God that we worship is and how enduring he is and how real his salvation is and so it's just it's it's beyond our comprehension just as his creation is and so we just it's one of those things to celebrate in to marvel how his realness has left all this evidence behind that that we can now use to try to persuade others to believe in him amen to that Joel thank you for joining us today thank you friends for joining us we pray that you will turn your heart to Yahweh Jesus who saves have a great day [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Associates for Biblical Research

Views: 130,389

Rating: 4.8113713 out of 5

Keywords: Soleb Inscription, Yahweh, Shasu of Yahweh, Amenhotep III, Associates for Biblical Research, Digging for Truth, Old Testament, Dead Sea Scrolls, Apologetics, Archeology, Archaeology, Biblical Archeology, Biblical Archaeology, Bible Archeology, Jesus, Christianity, Bible, Gospel, Jesus Christ

Id: yXIo5Cp7_jc

Length: 26min 2sec (1562 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 07 2019