Biblically Compatible Archaeology and Geography

by Damien F. Mackey The calamity here refers primarily to geography – to what has been the utterly disastrous attempt to locate the ancient land of Chaldea. “… but despite knowing the names of dozens of Chaldaean cities and towns from Assyrian records, none has ever been located, not to mention excavated, despite the fact that many of them are known to have been walled and strongly fortified”. Royce (Richard) Erickson That there is a significant Chaldean (Chaldaean) Problem, to go along with so many others in ancient geographico-history (e.g. the well-known “Sumerian Problem”), is apparent from what the late professor Gunnar Heinsohn wrote about the famed Chaldeans: https://hive.blog/heinsohn/@harlotscurse/sumerians-and-chaldaeans …. Though the ancient Greeks freely admitted that their science teachers were Chaldaeans (from Southern Mesopotamia/Babylonia), they never gave any hint that they trailed their inspirators by one-and-a-half millennia. They rather gave the imp...

“A burned Ba'alat temple, built by Amenemhat III, and references to the ‘Gate of the Accursed One’, likely Pharaoh’s gate, hint at resistance against Egyptian authority”. Stacy Liberatore For my (Damien Mackey’s) reconstruction of the life of Moses during ancient Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty, see e.g. my articles: Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty oppressed Israel (2) Egypt's Twelfth Dynasty oppressed Israel and: Moses in Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty (2) Moses in Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty I certainly do not accept the over-inflated BC dates given in the following article: STACY LIBERATORE FOR DAILYMAIL.COM Mysterious message 'from Moses' found in ancient Egyptian mine could prove the Bible true | Daily Mail Online Mysterious message 'from Moses' found in ancient Egyptian mine could prove the Bible true …. Published: 02:13 AEST, 29 July 2025 | Updated: 03:35 AEST, 29 July 2025 A controversial new interpretation of markings etched on the walls of an ancient...

“The fascinating mosaic presents groundbreaking physical evidence of the practices and beliefs of early Christians, including the first archaeological instance of the phrase ‘God Jesus Christ’.” Dr. Yotam Tepper https://www.museumofthebible.org/newsroom/a-new-documentary-explores-one-of-the-greatest-arc A New Documentary Explores One of the Greatest Archaeological Finds of the 21st Century the Megiddo Mosaic WASHINGTON, D.C., February 28, 2025 — Museum of the Bible announces their partnership with Angel Studios and Evolve Studios for the release of the documentary, “The Mosaic Church,” about the discovery of the 1,800-year-old Megiddo Mosaic in Megiddo, Israel. The documentary tells the story of the Megiddo Mosaic, a decorative floor of the oldest-known Christian worship space in history, dated to AD 230, located within a Roman military camp 15 miles southwest of Nazareth. The mosaic was discovered in an excavation by the Israel Antiquities Authority underneath a maxim...

by Damien F. Mackey “They called for the king; and Eliakim son of Hilkiah the palace administrator, Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went out to them”. 2 Kings 18:18 “In the eighteenth year of Josiah’s reign, to purify the land and the Temple, he sent Shaphan son of Azaliah and Maaseiah the ruler of the city, with Joah son of Joahaz, the recorder, to repair the Temple of the LORD his God”. 2 Chronicles 34:8 Merging, as one, “Joah” of Hezekiah and “Joah” of Josiah There is an apparent repetition of names between the above two texts, in Shebna-Shaphan and Joah-Joah, which is perfectly understandable in my revised context, according to which Hezekiah, “the king” of 2 Kings 18:18, was the very same person as king Josiah in 2 Chronicles 34:8. On this, see e. g. my article: Damien F. Mackey’s A Tale of Two Theses (8) Damien F. Mackey's A Tale of Two Theses But such a coinciding of names is apparently worrisome to the text book commentators - wh...

by Damien F. Mackey Hold it right there. This is entirely a fake history. According to the received tradition, which I must reject (to be explained): https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1571/early-muslim-conquests-622-656-ce/ Islam arose as a religious and socio-political force in Arabia in the 7th century CE (610 CE onwards). The Islamic Prophet Muhammad (l. 570-632 CE), despite facing resistance and persecution, amassed a huge following and started building an empire. The tenets of this empire were to be humanitarian and its military might uncontestable. After he died in 632 CE, his friend Abu Bakr (l. 573-634 CE) laid the foundation of the Rashidun Caliphate (632-661 CE), which continued the imperial expansion. Though a feeble force at first, the Islamic Empire soon became the most important influencer in the Middle East and the Mediterranean. Within a few decades, the empire expanded from the city of Medina in Hejaz to engulf all of Arabia, Iraq, Syria, Levan...

by Damien F. Mackey “If we add to this list the fact that the phrase in Jonah 1:1 (“now the word of Yahweh came”) also introduces Elijah in 1 Kings 17:2, 8; 21:17, 28 then we are subtly led to this conclusion; one of the goals of the Jonah narrative is to compare the prophet from Gath-hepher with Elijah”. Community ConneXions Church A: Elijah to Amos My search for the prophet Jonah has led me 'all around the mulberry bush'. Or perhaps, to be more contextual, all around the 'kikayon' (קִיקָיוֹן) bush (cf. Jonah 4:6). With 2 Kings 14:25 in mind: “He was the one who restored the boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Dead Sea, in accordance with the word of the LORD, the God of Israel, spoken through his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet from Gath Hepher”, I did what other commentators tend to do, and that was to search for the Jonah incident during the time of an Assyrian ruler contemporaneous with king Jeroboam II of Israel, say, an A...

by Damien F. Mackey Morton Scott Enslin has intuitively referred to the Book of Judith’s Bethulia incident as the “Judean Thermopylae” (The Book of Judith: Greek Text with an English Translation, p. 80). Introductory We have found that not all so-called Spartans were really ancient Spartans, but were fictitious characters based on actual Hebrews (and Egyptians). The famous Lawgiver, Lycurgus, for instance, was based on the Hebrew Moses, with whom Lycurgus is so often compared: Moses and Lycurgus https://www.academia.edu/27900244/Moses_and_Lycurgus The esteemed Spartan “Lawgiver”, Lycurgus, is so reminiscent of the biblical Moses as to inspire scholarly efforts to attempt running ‘parallel lives’ between these two characters. Given the semi-legendary nature of early ancient Greek ‘history’, the apparent ‘Dark Ages’, and the constant borrowings of Greece from its more easterly neighbours, might not “Lycurgus” be simply another of those manifold Greek appropriati...

by Damien F. Mackey “Hazael said, ‘How could your servant, a mere dog, accomplish such a feat?’” 2 Kings 8:13 Introduction This, one of the more incredible stories of (ancient) history - yet to be fully told - has become possible due only to Dr. Immanuel Velikovsky’s felicitous recognition, in his Ages in Chaos (I, 1952), that the El Amarna (EA) age must be re-located down the timescale from the C14th to the C9th BC. Arguably the most convincing thesis to be read within this context was Dr. Velikovsky’s identification of two EA strong men of Amurru, the succession of Abdi-ashirta and Aziru, with the Syrian (biblical) succession of, respectively, Ben-Hadad and Hazael. This Amurru-Syrian pairing was well received amongst readers of Dr. Velikovsky’s revised historical series - even by some who would later abandon Dr. Velikovsky’s entire corpus to pursue so-called ‘new’ chronologies. Two of these former enthusiasts were Peter James (RIP) and Dr. John Bimson, the latter ...