Walking the Bible (63 page)

I
NTRODUCTION

The early history of the Fertile Crescent is discussed in many places, including, most recently, Jared Diamond’s
Guns, Germs, and Steel
and Robert Wright’s
Nonzero
. The relations between the stories of Genesis and Mesopotamia are examined in Thorkild Jacobsen’s
The Treasures of Darkness,
O. R. Gurney’s
The Hittites,
Samuel Noah Kramer’s
The Sumerians,
and Nahum Sarna’s
Understanding Genesis
. The history of Noah’s ark is the subject of
The Incredible Discovery of Noah’s Ark
by Charles Sellier and David Balsiger and
Noah’s Flood
by William Ryan and Walter Pitman.

B
OOK
I

The historical roots of the patriarchal narratives are discussed in E. A. Speiser’s
Genesis,
John Bright’s
A History of Israel,
and Susan Niditch’s
Ancient Israelite Religion
. Many of the extrabiblical legends of the patriarchs are gathered in Louis Ginzberg’s
The Legends of the Jews
(the first three of seven volumes), Angelo Rappoport’s
Ancient Israel
(two volumes), and the writings of Josephus, gathered in
The Works of Josephus,
translated by William Whiston. Popular retellings of the stories appear in Chaim Potok’s
Wanderings
and Thomas Cahill’s
The Gifts of the Jews
.

Two extraordinary books of contemporary commentary on the Bible stand out as exemplary works of popular scholarship: The first is Jack Miles’s breathtakingly original
God:A Biography;
the second is James Kugel’s monumental
The Bible as It Was
. I have benefited immensely from both, and highly recommend them.

The question of the Bible’s authorship is examined in Harold Bloom’s
The Book of J
and Richard Elliott Friedman’s highly accessible
Who Wrote the Bible?
The history of biblical archaeology is told thoroughly in P. R. S. Moorey’s
A Century of Biblical Archaeology,
Moshe
Pearlman’s
Digging up the Bible,
and Neil Asher Silberman’s masterly
Digging for God & Country
. Silberman is also the author of
A Prophet from Amongst You:The Life of Yigael Yadin;
Leona Glidden Running and David Noel Freedman are authors of
William Foxwell Albright: A Twentieth-Century Genius
. Other scholarly books on archaeology I consulted include
Archaeology of the Land of the Bible
by Amihai Mazar and
The Oxford Companion to Archaeology,
edited by Brian Fagan. Easily the most popular book ever on biblical archaeology is Werner Keller’s
The Bible as History,
which is still in print today in English. It has a companion,
The Bible as History in Pictures
(New York, 1963).

B
OOK
II

T. G. H. James has written several landmark histories of ancient Egypt, including
An Introduction to Ancient Egypt
and
Ancient Egypt
. I also consulted Barbara Mertz’s
Temples, Tombs, and Hieroglyphs
and Emil Ludwig’s magisterial
The Nile,
the kind of ornate history that is rarely written today. I also highly recommend Alan Moorehead’s
The White Nile
and
The Blue Nile
.

The subject of Egypt’s relationship with the Bible is addressed in Donald Redford’s powerful and comprehensive
Egypt, Canaan, and Israel in Ancient Times,
as well as in his biography
Akhenaten:The Heretic King
. Other books that explore the relationship between Egypt and the Bible include James Hoffmeier’s
Israel in Egypt,
David Rohl’s
Pharaoh’s and Kings,
Ian Wilson’s
Exodus:The True Story,
and Sigmund Freud’s
Moses and Monotheism
.

The story of Joseph in Egypt is retold in Thomas Mann’s four novels,
Joseph and His Brothers, Young Joseph, Joseph in Egypt,
and
Joseph the Provider
. Though these books are hard to find, they are, to my mind, unrivaled acts of imagination and prose.

B
OOK
III

The best single book I found on the Sinai, Saint Catherine’s, and Jebel Musa is
Mount Sinai
by Joseph Hobbs.
Exploring Exodus
continues the tradition of detailed examination of history, the natural world, and the
text that Nahum Sarna initiated with Genesis. Jonathan Kirsch’s biography
Moses
follows a similar pattern, with thoughtful literary analysis as well.

Other books I consulted include
Sinai
by Burton Bernstein,
Guide to Exploration of the Sinai
by Alberto Siliotti, and
Sinai:The Exodus Trip
by Mario Vinei. On the subject of early monasticism, I highly recommend
The Wisdom of the Desert
by Thomas Merton, an elegant and inspiring book.

B
OOK
IV

There are many contemporary histories of Israel. Two I have enjoyed and consulted frequently are
The Siege
by Conor Cruise O’Brien and
A History of Israel
by Howard Sachar. A broader history of the entire region is
The Middle East
by Bernard Lewis. The relationship between Israel and Britain, with particular focus on the Bible, is treated in Barbara Tuchman’s graceful
Bible and Sword
.

B
OOK
V

The defining piece of adventure writing about the Middle East remains
The Seven Pillars of Wisdom
by T. E. Lawrence. Other masterworks in this field include Sir Richard Francis Burton’s
Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina,
Charles Doughty’s
Travels in Arabia Deserta,
and John Lloyd Stephen’s
Incidents of Travel in Egypt, Arabia, Petraea, and the Holy Land,
each of which is fascinating, if only in pieces. The collective impact of these writings is brilliantly illuminated in the opening chapters of Robert Kaplan’s
The Arabists
.

Two pieces of contemporary travel writing, William Dalrymple’s
From the Holy Mountain
and Bruce Chatwin’s
Songlines,
are sterling examples of how to mix the sacred and the profane into compelling personal narratives.

I benefited from a number of books on Petra and contemporary Jordan, including
The Art of Jordan,
edited by Piotr Beinkowsky,
Petra
by Iain Browning
,
and
Petra
by Jane Taylor. The same applies to
The JPS Commentary on Numbers
by Jacob Milgrom and
Moses and the Deuteronomist
by Robert Polzin.

I would also like to recommend a number of novels I read that relate directly, or in part, to life in the Middle East, or the desert:
The Sheltering Sky
by Paul Bowles,
Damascus Gate
by Robert Stone, and the incomparable
Quarantine
by Jim Crace.

The Internet has proved to be fertile territory for information about the Bible. There are newsgroups available for Bible research at alt.christ-net.bible and soc.culture.jewish. Recent archives for the extraordinary magazine
Biblical Archaeology Review,
the international standard-bearer of the field, can be found at www.bib-arch.org. The online search Bible I used most frequently contains the King James translation as well as the Revised Standard Version. It can be found at http://etext.virginia.edu/ frames/bibleframe.html.

In the spirit of keeping this ongoing conversation about the Bible alive, and in an effort to provide further help for those interested in visiting some (or all) of the sites described in this book, I have a started an online site of my own, www.walkingthebible.com. E-mail inquiries to me, or to Avner, are welcome at that site. The forum for discussing the biblical stories may have changed dramatically over time, but, as I believe our journey made clear, the desire of people around the world to connect themselves to these stories remains as strong—and as passionate—as ever.

Index

Aaron

death of

tomb of

Abdullah, King of Jordan

Abdullah II, King of Jordan

Abel

Abimelech, King

Abraham

Abimelech and

as Abram

altars built by

at Beer–sheba

at Bethel

binding of Isaac (
akedah
) by

birthplace of

characteristics of

circumcision of

at Dan

dating of

death of

Dome of the Rock and

in Egypt

at Gerar

God’s covenant with

God’s promises to

at Harran

Hebron burial site purchased by

in Jewish tradition

kings defeated by

Lot’s separation from

meaning of name of

migration of

in Negev

as pastoralist

route taken by

at Shechem

Sodom bargain negotiated by

succession of

three messengers’ visit to

tomb of

well of

Abu Tayeh, Ada

Abu Tayeh, Fawaz

Abu Tour

Adam

meaning of name

Adam and Eve story

adonai yireh,

agricultural revolution

Ain el–Qudeirat

Ain Musa

Air Force One

Akhenaten, Pharaoh

monotheism of

Akiva, Rabbi

Akkad

Albright, William Foxwell

Albright Institute of Archaeological Research

Alexander II, Czar of Russia

Alexander the Great

alphabet, Semitic

Amalek

Amenhotep III, Pharaoh

Amman, Jordan

Ammon, Ammonites

Amon–Re

Amorites

Anakites

Anati, Emanuel

ANZAC (Australian–New Zealand Army Corps) memorial

Apocrypha

Arabic

Arabists

Arabs

Ishmael as progenitor of

see also
bedouin

Arad

Arafat, Yasser

Aramaic

arch, at Dan

archaeologists

minimalists

archaeology,
see
biblical archaeology

Archaeology

Ark of the Covenant

Armenians

Ashrawi, Hanan

Assyria, Assyrians

astrology

Aswan High Dam

Aten

Atkinson, Eddie

Augustine, Saint

Avni, Yehuda

Babylonians

Creation story of

flood stories of

gods of

Baedeker guidebook

Balaam

Balsiger, David

Barkay, Gabriel

silver rolls discovered by

Baruch

Basemath

bedouin

ancient burial site of

clothing of

daily life of

desert as viewed by

divorces of

fire carried by

gathered for tea

green as viewed by

hospitality of

houses of

Lawrence and,
see
Lawrence, T. E. legal system of

medicinal plants of

museum of culture of
nawamis
discovered by

number of

Petra’s Treasury urn as viewed by

quail netted by

religion of

tents of

ululation by

see also
Nabateans