Sermons and Biblical Studies

Gary A. Byers Tyre’s significance in the 14th century BC can be seen in the Amarna Letters. These cuneiform-inscribed clay tablets found in Tell el-Amarna, Egypt, represent correspondence between minor Canaanite kings ruling under Egyptian auspices during the reign of Egyptian Pharaohs Amenhotep III and his son Akhenaten. This is the century immediately following Joshua’s … Continue reading “TYRE
AND THE TELL EL-AMARNA TABLETS”

Gary A. Byers The names Tyre and Sidon were famous in the ancient Near East. They are also important cities in the Old and New Testaments. Both are now located in Lebanon, with Tyre 20 mi south of Sidon and only 12 mi north of the Israel-Lebanon border. Today each is just a shadow of … Continue reading “THE
BIBLICAL CITIES OF TYRE AND SIDON”

Michael C. Luddeni Just a few miles north of Bierut, the Dog River (Nahr el-Kalb) flows west from the Lebanon mountains to the Mediterranean Sea. The river’s mouth is a deep gorge cut through a limestone bluff rising up from the shoreline. It was a significant natural boundary and made the river difficult to cross. … Continue reading “NAHR
EL-KALB
(DOG RIVER)”

Lebanon, Syria and the Bible Gary A. Byers During the spring of 2001, I was part of an Associates for Bible Research team that visited Lebanon and Syria. It had been almost 30 years since my last visit as a college student to both countries, and I have very few recollections of sites in either … Continue reading “EDITORIAL”

Perhaps archaeology’s most dramatic find among the treasure troves of the past was the remains of the ancient Assyrian Empire. Assyria first appears as an empire early in the second millennium BC. The remains of a ziggurat, or temple tower, from that era still stand near the site of its ancient capital. In the ninth … Continue reading “THE
MIGHTY ASSYRIAN EMPIRE EMERGES FROM THE DUST”

Scott Ashley You’ve read the articles. You’ve watched the reports and listened to the stories. Routinely they allege or at least suggest that the Bible isn’t really believable. By now everyone knows that these reports imply the Bible’s stories could not have happened the way they are written. After all, plenty of reporters, professors, and … Continue reading “THE
BIBLE: MYTH OR HISTORY?”

Gordon Franz Death is a subject that intrigues and frightens. Death is discussed, debated, covered-up, and ignored. I remember visiting the Egyptian wing of the Brooklyn Museum several years ago. In one of the far back rooms a mummy was on display. While I was looking at other objects in the room, a group of … Continue reading ““AT
HOME IN DEATH”:
AN ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXPOSITION OF PSALM 49:11”

Third of Three Parts John J. Davis Dead men still tell tales and their stories are fascinating commentaries on their physical, social and religious lives. The amount of information burial excavation provides for the student of Scripture is truly remarkable. Human skeletal remains, for example, whether articulated or disarticulated, can inform us as to the … Continue reading “BONES,
BURIALS AND BIBLICAL HISTORY:
THE RESULTS OF BURIAL EXCAVATION”

Alan R. Millard A book known from fragmentary copies to be at least 2000 years old, reports the history of kings of Israel whose rule began 1000 years earlier. Although the Book of Kings was certainly written before ca. 200 BC, when it was translated into Greek, its actual age cannot be determined. The last … Continue reading “KING
SOLOMON IN HIS ANCIENT CONTEXT”

Austin Robbins Biblical scholars today are divided into two camps by their views on the age of the earth: those who believe the earth to be relatively young, and those holding to a very long history of the earth. Definitions Young Earth View This theory accepts the account of creation in Genesis 1 and 2 … Continue reading “A
QUESTION OF TIME:
OLD OR YOUNG EARTH?”