Bible Archeology Discoveries

18th Dynasty Pharaoh Amenhotep IV temporarily replace Egypt's polytheistic religious order to a form of monotheism, choosing to worship only the God, "Aten." (the Sun disc). To reflect this transition, he changed his name to "Akhen-aten" and moved the capital of Egypt to a new city he began to build at Akhetaten, (modern. day Amarna).

The "Amarna Letters" are a group of several hundred clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform that date to thime of his reign (ca. 1353–1336 B.C.). Since Egypt is outside the area where cuneiform writing developed, the Amarna Letters testify to the use of the Mesopotamian script and the Akkadian language across the eastern Mediterranean during this period. The majority of the tablets are letters sent from rulers of the lands north of Egypt, with wo types of letters distinguishable. The first type comprises letters written from rulers of cities and small vassal states in the Levant.

These rulers wrote deferentially to the Pharaoh and related stories of squabbles with other Levantine rulers along with discussions of trade and tribute. Many of the letters, however, implored the Pharaoh to provide security assitance for these dependent city states. Many tablets came from different regional Canaanite rulers expressing consternation and even terror at the fact that “all the lands” were being overrun by a mysterious people they called the "Habiru." So who were the Habiru?

One tablet is a plea from Abdi-Heba, the mayor of Jerusalem: “Message of Abdi-Heba, your servant. … May the king [Egypt’s pharaoh] provide for his land! All the lands of the king, my lord, have deserted. … Lost are all the mayors; there is not a mayor remaining to the king, my lord. … The king has no lands. That Habiru has plundered all the lands of the king. If there are archers this year, the lands of the king, my lord, will remain.” The Habiru invasion was not localized to a handful of cities. According to the mayor of Jerusalem, these people conquered virtually the entire region, and just in the time period that Bible chronology shows that the Israelites invaded.

Skeptics believe that Habiru simply referred to wandering marauders of no particular ethnicity. Some scholars speculate that the term Habiru began as a social category and turned into an ethnic one, theorizing that it may have encapsulated a broad range of then nomadic peoples that included the Israelites (e.g. Midianites, Kenites, etc). This wider appellation would not be contrary to the biblical account given that Abraham—as a “Hebrew”—was father of the Midianites, Ishmaelites, etc (Genesis 25:1-4). T hough the term may have evolved from a social reference to an ethnic one, the Bible says the opposite. Genesis 11:14 shows the name Hebrew is a derivative of Eber, the name of Abraham’s forefather.

A belief that the Habiru were a largely insignificant, ragtag group of raiders that occasionally stole from Canaanite towns is relatively common. However, this stands in contrast to the text inscribed on clay tablets by the Canaanite kings who witnessed the actual Habiru.

“The Habiru have plundered all the lands of the king.” “The Habiru are stronger than we.”  “The land of the king is lost.”

These outcries from Canaanite vassal rulers certainly seem to describe events much like those we read in the bible's Book of Joshua.