Katie Haldane sits down with Dr Kyle Keimer, who specialises in the archaeology of ancient Israel and the Hebrew Bible (currently at Pillar Seminary in Omaha, Nebraska; PhD from UCLA). Kyle has excavated at Caesarea Maritima and at Khirbet El Rai, a site he and his Israeli colleagues have proposed as biblical Ziklag, David's base while he served the Philistines.

You'll hear:

•     How a love of Indiana Jones turned into a career in biblical archaeology

•     Why the Bible is a historical document, and why we need to learn to think like an ancient Israelite

•     What an excavation actually looks like: square holes, soil colours and "spinning a yarn" from the dirt

•     What a burn layer, three nearly complete houses and a shifting landscape tell us about Ziklag, the Philistines and the Amalekites

•     Whether Moses could have written, given an upbringing in Pharaoh's household

•     How historical geography unlocks Amos 6 and Gideon in the Jezreel Valley

•     The Jericho debate, and why the Bible and archaeology need to be read carefully before they talk to each other

•     Kyle's top tip: go to Israel and Jordan, or get a good map

Chapters

00:00 Bridging the gap

00:27 Welcome Dr Kyle Keimer

01:29 From Indiana Jones to Caesarea Maritima

03:19 Why archaeology matters for reading the Bible

05:09 Learning to think like an ancient Israelite

06:27 Digging Ziklag at Khirbet El Rai

10:10 What an excavation really looks like

13:35 What the site tells us: houses, Lachish and a burn layer

16:46 Who burned it? Ziklag and the Amalekites

19:07 The Ancient Israelite World

20:55 Could Moses write? Egypt's New Kingdom

25:19 Historical geography and Amos 6

28:41 The biggest geographical shock

31:12 Go to Israel (or get a good map)

32:24 The Jericho debate

36:34 The Biblical World podcast

Mentioned in this episode

•     Caesarea Maritima and the foundations of Herod the Great's temple

•     Ziklag (1 Samuel) and Khirbet El Rai

•     Anson Rainey: archaeology is "the art of digging a square hole and spinning a yarn from it"

•     Amos 6 and the conquest of Karnaim; Gideon and the Jezreel Valley

•     The Jericho debate in Joshua

•     Jerome's line: how can you understand Athens, or Jerusalem, if you've never seen them?

•     Books: The Ancient Israelite World (co-edited by Kyle Keimer) and New Studies in the Historical Geography of the Ancient Near East (co-edited by Kyle Keimer)

•     Kyle's podcast: The Biblical World

•     Map resources: Biblical Backgrounds

New to The Bridge? It's the podcast from Trash Your Bible where real biblical scholarship meets plain language. Academics for the average Joe.

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