Well, obviously, there's some things we do not know. There are some names that have not been recorded in modern secular history, but that doesn't mean they don't exist. Even at one point, David was said to not have been a king. But we're going to find out that's not to be so, even with science backing us up. So when we run to science, we're not running there as a way, how should I say this, to back up the Bible. When the Bible says something, that's what it means. If you read through Isaiah right now, well, I'm currently reading through Isaiah, and there's multiple times where it talks about the earth was moved out of her place. The Lord shook the earth and moved it out of her place. It's like, wait, the earth has a place? Well, that's a little different than it talks about the sun standing still and everything like that. So I'll be the first to admit, I don't agree with modern science over how the universe is arranged. And guess what? I'm not the smartest guy in the world, but I'm just going to trust what it says. And if one day I will be proved right, it's like, you know, hey, I took the took the Bible for what it said. Now, if it meant something else, OK, I understand that. Say you're sticking on a point where you're like, no, the Bible says this and then you were wrong in interpretation. At least you were still trusting in the Bible. Right? Okay. So when we run into science, we're not going out of there to prove the Bible, but it helps prove the Bible. It helps prove your stinking carnal mind. All right? When you go through those prophecies and you go through these archaeological findings, you're like, oh, that is kind of a comfort. Whether you want to admit or not, you're like, oh, well, that matches what the Bible said, and that matches what the Bible said. Oh, well, it kind of helps prove the Bible. Even though the Bible, it doesn't need science to prove it. It helps back it up. So that's all we're going to look at today. It's, like I said, it's not to replace the Bible, like those stupid science, believe science. You don't have to believe it. If it's true science, you don't have to believe it. It's provable. It's demonstrable, right? That's the whole thing about evolution. You can't actually apply the scientific methods to evolution. It simply cannot be done. So if you're going to believe science, you got the wrong science. at the end of the day. So when it comes to these archaeological findings, we will be using science. And we're not going to go completely in-depth on that topic. But we do use modern science to help us with these findings. And that will be skeptics and critics' critique of Christians is that, well, guess what? If it wasn't for us educated beings, you wouldn't be able to find these things, right? When it comes to the universe, if it wasn't for our discoveries, you wouldn't use them to back up the Bible. OK, well, just because you have billions and billions and billions and billions of dollars to pump into your system and we don't doesn't mean that you're right and we're wrong. We're not trying to win some sort of game here with who can find the first thing. I remember, was it the Bone Wars of the early 1800s, I believe? And what they're trying to do, they were basically trying to prove evolution. And so they would purposely plant fake fossils into an area and then find them. and then claim, oh, we were the first one to discover this, pecking man, java man, which java man sounds pretty good. He's probably a smart guy. And so we're not in these bone wars. We're not trying to compete with modern science. But if they do back us up, hey, kudos. That's great. So when it comes to these archaeological findings, we will be turning in your Bibles first. And if you want to just turn to Genesis chapter 12 just to get the Bibles open, that's probably a good thing, no matter what. So Genesis chapter 12, that'll be our first discovery. But when it comes to these dating methods, there's plenty of them. Now, they all base themselves off of uniformitarianism. What is that? Well, that's everything has existed and will continue to exist the same way it has from the beginning. all the way to eternity, right? There's no sort of sudden change of the atmosphere. There's nothing like a worldwide flood. They base it off a uniformitarianism, all right? So just because these methods are pretty good, and sometimes they can get them to with, you know, accuracy of maybe 120 years. In some ways, yes, that's very encouraging and very nice. But at the same time, you have to understand, there is going to be a rate of decay that's different throughout history. It's not always the same. Right now, everyone's talking about global warming. OK. We have a different rate of decay going on right now than we did, say, 1,000 years ago. It's just the way it is. So we have to take that in consideration. But some different dating methods they have is stratigraphy. That is the study of the strata, which is basically studying the Earth's layers. And basically, in a nutshell of that, the earliest and most recent things in history will be at the top of the Earth's core, and then the older it gets, the lower it gets down into the strata. Right? You've learned that all throughout high school. That's one of their dating methods. Now, the problem with that is we've seen it before where trees will grow from one layer to the next, to the next, to the next. You can't always predict that. That means something sudden happened and something very drastic happened. Another thing about that is you'll find artifacts that they claim, well, it was found in the second layer of strata, and that since it was in that second layer, that means it can only exist during this time period. Nothing else can exist during this time period, and these artifacts cannot exist anywhere else in history. Well, that's been proven wrong. There's some things you'll find in the first and second layer, and you're like, oh, that proves it. And then you find it in the fourth or fifth layer. And it's just like, OK, well, that defeats your whole method right there. Now, is it a good method? Sure. I'll give you that. That makes sense. The early stuff will be on the highest. But at the end of the day, they all have their own faults. There is also, it's called fun dating. If you're going to be dating, you should have some fun with that. But fun dating, basically all that is, is measuring the fluoride, the uranium, and then the nitrogen of these objects. And it's mostly used for dating bones and whatnot. So just because you have one methodology of dating something doesn't mean it's going to apply to a piece of paper as it does to a bone, right? So you have different things. And then the radiocarbon dating, which is measuring the rate of decay in the half-life of carbon. Very common, but once again, they all base themselves off of uniformitarianism, and you can't trust that 100%. All right. Now, when it comes to some discoveries. We will get into the actual discoveries in the Bible, and we will be flipping to a bunch of pages, mostly through the Old Testament. The New Testament, I'm kind of leaving off, just because that is recent history, right? If you really want to think about it, we have way more historical facts backing up the birth of Jesus Christ than we do, say, Abraham in Genesis 12, okay? So that's why I'm kind of going through the Old Testament. The archaeological findings that I'm going to try to present today don't even come close to how many there are out there. Like, it doesn't sniff how many there are. Kind of like the prophecies. If we went through a handful, went through about 45 minutes to an hour worth of it, okay, that's about as much as we can handle in one night. And if you wanted to do all of them, that would take... weeks, months, years of studying. So when it comes to these findings, there's a couple key things that we have to look at first. One, well, key things, what I mean by that is they help us understand what certain tablets say, right? So you think about the Rosetta Stone. Rosetta Stone was discovered in 1799, and what that had is three different types of writing on it. which is a hieroglyphics, the Greek figures and Demotic figures, all right? And what that did basically was, you know, if you read your, oh, I forget what the exact terminology for it is, but say you're studying out some Bibles, right? And you have the King James over here, and then you have the NIV, RSV, ASV, and all that stuff. Well, basically, The idea with the Rosetta Stone is kind of like a dictionary, but here you have the Greek interpretation of this passage, and then you have the Egyptian hieroglyphics interpretation of this passage. I'm sure you all know this, but basically what it's doing is just confirming each other's stories in different languages. And so that Rosetta Stone was very, extremely important for us to help us understand these old ancient texts, okay? So when we quote the Rosetta Stone, that's what we're referring to. And if you haven't seen that before, it's just basically the size about this pulpit right here, just a big black rock with three different distinct lines running down it of different languages. Then you have the Ross Shamra tablets. And what those are, there's about 1,500 tablets scattered throughout that contain eight languages and 27 letter alphabets. And that dates to about roughly 1,700 BC. So some of these things, when scientists and skeptics would say, oh, this hasn't been proven yet, well, sometimes you look at these tablets and you find out 1,700 BC, that matches up with this event in the Bible, and oh, there it is. It's found. And then the last thing is the Moabite stone, and what that is, is once again about the size of this pulpit, it's just this huge, large black rock that dates back to about 2 Kings chapter 3. Alright, so those are kind of the main studies to help understand languages. And we'll mention this last one real quick, Hammurabi's Code. Hammurabi's Code is a set of 282 laws inscribed in stone by the Babylonian king Hammurabi, and he lived from roughly 1795 to 1750 BC. Basically, he conquered everything in Mesopotamia. He took everything over. So whatever this king said, it was written down, and these laws were passed out throughout the region. So when you get to the Book of Exodus, some of these laws are very, very familiar. All right, Genesis chapter 12. Genesis chapter 12, let's go look and see what we can find. All right. Now, here is one of the first arguments scientists had against the Bible. If you read in Genesis 12, 16, it says, ''And he entreated Abram well for her sake, and he had sheep and oxen, and he asked his men servants and maid servants, and she asked his camels. Like, okay, what's the big deal right there? Well, according to science, at one point in time, camels did not exist in Egypt, all right? They were actually not even domesticated. They said that camels were not domesticated in Palestine until about 1200 BC. Well, I don't know if you have any sort of dates in your Bible, but mine roughly says around 1920 BC. You're like, well, that's 700 years before camels were domesticated. This is impossible. This proves that the Bible is a lie, and we cannot trust it anymore. Well, it's been found that paintings around 1900, they found some paintings in the same area of Palestine that show camels actually being domesticated, camels and cattle, back all the way to 2000 BC. which is before the time of Abraham. So, you know, we're going to find all these little goofy little things, all right? This is not supposed to be mind-blowing by any stretch of the imagination, but it's just like, oh, okay, well, once again, trust science is maybe not the best choice. Alright? In the same passage, you have verse 11 through 13, right? It's talking about Abram here lying. He wants to say that Sarah is his sister, right? Verse 13, So Abram's a little scared chicken over here, which, you know, I understand. But he's going to a strange land, to a strange kingdom, and then it says he's got a beautiful wife. And so he's like, all right, just say you're my sister so they won't kill me for you. and scientists used to say, well, that wasn't a custom back then. They wouldn't have killed Abram to get to his wife. Well, papyrus documents found in Egypt describe Pharaoh taking a beautiful wife, and then killing the husband around 1800 B.C., which was a little after this dating, but as you can tell, It's been around. It's been around for a while. Now, the papyrus fragments, you're like, what is that? Well, basically, papyrus fragments is just sheets of paper, right? Very brittle, but they're sheets of paper. And then when we mention parchment, that is going to be animal skins that they wrote on, all right? Different things, and obviously, clay tablets are pretty explanatory. They were clay, and they wrote on them, all right? Genesis chapter 19. Genesis chapter 19, this is referring to Sodom and Gomorrah. Alright, I can't remember who mentioned it last time, but I want to say it was Brother Matt, I could be wrong, but talking about how now there's the Dead Sea near where Sodom and Gomorrah used to be, and that is 100% true. So in Genesis 19, in verse 1, here we have It says, and there came two angels to Sodom at even, and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom. And Lot, seeing them, rose up to meet them, and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground. So it's talking about gates of Sodom, and that Lot is sitting in the gate. It has been found by two explorers, Kyle and Albright, around 1926 to 1930. They discovered stone benches and seats cut into the city gates of a ruined city around the Dead Sea. And they said also these gates were very heavy. Now, another historian to back that up is Josephus, who around the time of Jesus said that there was five major ruined cities around the Dead Sea. And if you do your actual studying of maps and charts, you'll find out this is where Sodom and Gomorrah used to be. So yeah, that's just so interesting that the Dead Sea is full of salt. It's just cool stuff. Cool stuff. All right. Now, there's a lot of references I could have ran into between Genesis 19 and Genesis 39, which will be our next passage. But it's kind of something else will better explain that. There's multiple passages in here that are explained by what's called the Newsy tablets, N-U-Z-I, or Nuzzy, whatever you want to pronounce it. Basically what those are is more than 5,000 family and administrative archives spanning six generations between 1450 and 1350 B.C. They deal with the social, economic, religious, and legal institutions. The tablets tell of practices similar to those in Genesis, such as, and this is where we get into it. In Genesis 15, in verse 2, it's talking about adoption for childless couples, right? We have Abraham, Sarah, and Hagar. So it talks about that. It talks about inheritance rights. So Genesis chapter 25. Let's talk about that real quick. Genesis chapter 25. talks about here, oh yeah, in verse 29, and Jacob sold, and Jacob sod pottage, and Esau came from the field and he was faint. And here you have the story about Esau selling his birthright to Jacob. Well, these tablets help explain that it was kind of common law in the Bible. Because sometimes you think about it, it's like, where did all these laws come from before, you know, Exodus, right? Exodus 20 and all that stuff. It's like, well, they were actually already, some of them were already in place. It was just kind of cultural back then. Here we have Genesis 28, talks about marriage arrangements, okay? It says in Genesis 28 in verse 1, "...and Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan." And it goes through that whole chapter, and once again, these tablets refer to these marriage arrangements. And then it goes about talking about the significance of deathbed blessings, which is Genesis chapter 27, verse 48. And then Genesis 31. Genesis 31 is one we'll want to look at real quick. Genesis chapter 31. And it says, Here we go, in verse 14. And Rachel and Leah answered and said unto him, is there yet any portion or inheritance for us in our father's house? Go down to verse 30. And now though thou wouldest needs be gone, because thou soar longest after thy father's house, yet wherefore hast thou stolen my gods? You're like, why does it have to do with anything? Well, tradition back then, cultural tradition back then, is these idols that you have here, these daughters stealing. These idols basically passed on the inheritance to whoever had these idols. And so when they're talking about verse 14, getting inheritance from our father's house, it's like, hey, we're leaving our father, but we're not going to have any of these idols because that's wrong, right? We're not going to have any of these idols. We're not going to be connected to him. So we're going to miss out on the inheritance. And he was a very rich man at the time, too. And so it's just this kind of this neat little thing that helps explain. It gives you a little understanding of what the Bible is talking about here. And so these records, these tablets, I should say, tell of how these records of these inheritance of keeping these idols in your house, that the inheritance would be passed down to the sixth generation if you kept these idols with you. So when they left, this is a huge deal to them. They're missing out on a lot. So once again, these tablets kind of explain that. So Genesis chapter 39. Genesis chapter 39, we'll kind of just do a brief descriptions of what's going on, but obviously Genesis 39, that's talking about Potiphar's wife, and then Joseph resisting Potiphar's wife, and skeptics would have said that there's no way this would have happened, because there's no way that Stuart's quarters were attached to the royal family's quarters, right? So they would have had zero interaction with each other. I'm trying to think. No, it doesn't say it. Okay, anyways. But basically, they said there would have been zero interaction between them. Well, there's evacuations in Tell el Armana that have been found that have since shown that Stewart's corridors were actually attached to the back of the house. So think about it here. If Joseph is trying to do right, and he is trying to do right, he's simply trying to go back to his quarters. And then that's where Potiphar's wife interferes with him. So it just proves his innocence in the matter. And once again, proves science and these religious scientists are just flat out wrong. Genesis chapter 41. Here's just an interesting one, Genesis 41, and in verse 45, it says, And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-Paneah, and he gave him to wife Asenath, the daughter of Potipharah, priest of On. And so we're like, what does this have to do with anything? Well, that name, they said it wouldn't have been used during that time. That is kind of important, though, if you think about it, because they say this name wouldn't have been used, so it proves that writers came back, wrote about this, and interjected their own personal things about the time. This person probably had a name change later on. to match the Hebrew culture. Well, that's not true because Egyptologists have found that name used throughout history all the way up until 1600 BC. So this is about 1715 BC, which means that Egyptologists found that this name was used before 1715 and after 1715. Just once again proving the Bible. All right, Exodus chapter 5. Now, this is where I like the book of Exodus a lot. And probably because I really identify with Moses. I feel like him and I would have been friends. But in Exodus, obviously, you deal with the nation of Israel leaving Egypt. And if you study anything about Egypt, you realize we don't understand a thing about it. All right? They're talking about, I just heard once again, you know, you talk about the pyramids, how they're so They're matched up perfectly to the geography of the Earth, and there's just some very unexplained things that happened. Huge, 70-ton stones that weren't even cut. They were perfectly moved from places that were 500 miles away. They're talking about scoop marks in hardened rock that are just smooth as glass, and they moved these rocks all the way over to Egypt. I don't know how you explain that. They talked about the pyramids as tombs for the Egyptian kings, the pharaohs. Now that's been proven. They're like, yeah, this stuff dates way before the Egyptians. So that doesn't have anything to do with the Egyptian kings. It has something to do with something else. So you could go all day into that topic. It's a great topic. It's not even a conspiracy theory. It's just unsolved things of the world. It's just great. If you think about it, they talk about pyramids and temples. Well, temples that have been found in the Amazon have also been found over in India and in Egypt and everywhere else in the world. And they all look roughly the same. And so there's a theory out there that, oh, the world was together at one point in time. And these things were not just markings for kings and for royal families, it was actually for spiritual reasons. And so that's been well documented throughout history. And so when you come to Exodus chapter 5, it's just, you're like, well, this doesn't have to do exactly with the pyramids. It doesn't have to. The Israelites were down there in Egypt, so it's all connected. But in Exodus chapter 5, You have the story, we'll start in verse 6, and when I say story, it doesn't mean it's false, all right? This isn't fiction. Exodus 5 and verse 6, and Pharaoh commanded the same day the taskmasters of the people and their officers saying, you shall no more give the people straw to make brick as heretofore. Let them go and gather straw for themselves. So what's going on here? We know the story. But basically, Pharaoh's like, hey, we provided the straw for you guys to help make bricks, which is the additive during that time. Now, obviously, we've advanced that thing quite a bit, but that's what they used to help thicken that up. And so Pharaoh's like, hey, go get your own straw. Well, keep reading. And in verse 10, So basically keep up your production, but now you have to do even more work than before. All right, ramping it up. All right, now here we go. And so in verse 13, And then if you keep going down, this punishment gets worse. Verse 15, And now they have to actually produce the same amount, but they don't have their own straw. You know, what does this have to do with anything? Between 1883 and 1900, a man named Neville uncovered a tel, which basically what that is is just a mound in Egypt, and it showed bricks made with straw and bricks on top of those with little or no straw. This is crazy. And like I said, the straw was an adjective. And now remember Kyle from Kyle and Albright? He discovered the same things later on around 1905. Just fun, quirky little stuff. Am I saying that's exactly the same bricks that they use in Egypt? I don't know. Could be. I'm not sure. But I'll tell you one thing, it matches with what the Bible says. All right, so Exodus chapter 8 and going through chapter 12. Now, we're not going to actually look into all these, but these are the plagues of Egypt. All right. Now, once again, when I said, what was it, on Wednesday, how it is a history book, the Bible is a history book. So even then, historians will use the Bible and actually kind of use it to prove things in history, but they will use it as a reference point sometimes. And so when it comes to this reference point, it talks about the plagues of Egypt and how does a regular atheist explain the plagues of Egypt. And so it's a very difficult one for them to do. And obviously, they don't believe in the supernatural, which is very ironic because how do you explain the universe without supernatural powers? So when it comes to these plagues, they really don't have a good explanation for it. But this is what they would have to say. And I'm quoting some of these historians, a man named Zevet. It says, some have connected the Egyptian plagues to natural phenomena that were possible in ancient Egypt. Torrential rains in Ethiopia could have sent red clay blood into the Nile, and therefore turning the water into blood, which could have caused a migration of frogs. further causing lice and flies, which cause the death of cattle and human boils, a second set of meteorological disasters, hailstorms, that was a disaster, A second set of these disasters, hailstorms, the seventh of the biblical plagues, and locusts may have been followed by a Libyan dust storm, causing darkness. Many of the Egyptian plagues could also be interpreted as attacks against the Egyptian pantheon, which that is actually interesting. It says, many of the Egyptian plagues mentioned in Exodus in the Bible have some correlation to an Egyptian god or goddess. For example, I'm going to butcher it, but I think it's called Heket, H-E-K-E-T. You can correct me later. was represented as a frog and Hathor as a cow. An ancient Egyptian coffin text refers to the slaying of firstborn gods. So these natural disasters, it's just amazing how these things can all build on top of each other and build on top of each other. And I wonder sometimes if God does that just to kind of mess with these scientists, just to give them enough doubt to disprove the Bible. It doesn't disprove it, but in their mind it does. And so I don't know how you get all that, like the Nile turning into blood, which not only did Moses do, but the Egyptian magicians did that too. So it's not even necessarily something God did, right? If Satan has powers that he can give to his magicians, it's not just God putting the water into blood, it's actually Satan himself turning the water into blood. So it's not like you're defending God by saying the water turned into blood, but you have to, once again, pretend that supernatural things aren't happening. Spiritual things don't happen. And that's always the craziest thing in my mind, too, is people, they'll say, well, I don't believe in ghosts. Well, I don't believe in ghosts either, but I believe in spirits, all right? Spirits are a very real thing. And I talked to someone recently about that. And I went, I probably went, like, I don't know, at the time it feels like 10 minutes going on about these stories, but realistically it was probably two or three minutes talking about story after story after story about spiritual things that have been documented and that I can verify that have happened. And this person at first was like, oh, I don't believe in ghosts, I don't believe in all that stuff. And then later on she's like, oh yeah, yeah, you know, I've had some, I've had similar experiences to that too. What? She's like, yeah, yeah, my brother would say, like, there was somebody in the room and all that stuff, and not gonna go crazy into that stuff right now, but she was actively trying to deny spiritual things, even though her own brother dealt with that while they were growing up. You know, it's crazy what people will do to avoid the truth, and you might come into a story where you have migration of frogs causing lice and flies and everything else. Now, while this cannot be random science, random Mother Earth taking over, the reason why these plagues are miracles If you study them out, it's their intensification, their prediction that they were going to happen. Now, Christopher Columbus, when he came over, he told the tribes at the time, basically, the sun's going to turn red. If you don't give me my gold, the sun's going to turn red. Well, he knew a blood moon was coming around, and so he tricked all these tribal people into thinking that he's a god, because he turned the moon into the blood moon. Right? And so all these things happen and take place, but that's not what's going on with Moses. So when he's predicting them, it's not just this one random thing, it's multiple plagues. Also, something about these plagues that could not have been random is their discrimination. Right? If you think about it, some stuff fell on the Egyptians, some stuff did not fall on the Israelites. It's not all the way across the board. And then there's their order and their moral purpose. Now, that would be interesting, I haven't personally done that, but studying out how each plague represents an Egyptian god, that would be, maybe one of y'all could work on that sometime, that'd be cool. All right, Exodus chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20. Let's talk about, if that does line up, talk about the Lord beating you at your own game. And, yeah, man, that's good stuff. All right, so Exodus chapter 20. This is obviously the commandments, the Ten Commandments. And this has been heavily debated, but a man named Julius Wellhausen, a German critic of the Bible, he grew up in a Protestant church, his dad was a pastor, but he went to higher education in Germany. And if you know anything about Germany, it's not really a place where any spiritual stuff is happening that's amounting to anything good since Martin Luther. And so he's a German critic of the Bible who used Islamic texts He said that, number one, the laws given here in Exodus chapter 20 were too advanced for the Israelites at the time, and that, two, the second commandment wasn't necessary because the Israelites would have known about idols till later on. Okay, they wouldn't know about idols until later on. What does it say there? In verse 3, thou shalt have no other gods before me. That's the first commandment. And it says in verse 4, thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. So they wouldn't have had any inkling of making a graven image at the time. Which is also very interesting because you have the golden cow in these very same chapters. But anyways. So here we go. Let's kind of back these things up. So when I mentioned Hammurabi's code earlier, the laws stated in Hammurabi's code that he passed on to his kingdom, they are very similar to the ones given in Exodus. And you're like, well, is that disproving what God gave to the Israelites? No. No, that's not saying, well, this was a cultural norm, and so these people are just attributing it to God. No, God still gave these specific commandments. I'm just saying that some of these commandments are very similar to what Hammurabi had, what was it, 300 years prior. And so just because you would say, well, this would have been too advanced for the Israelites, it doesn't prove anything. Scientists have now found this to not be true. The second thing, when it talks about the second commandment, having these idols before them, obviously we can go back all the way to what we just were talking about, these idols of inheritance, but excavations in Palestine have revealed figures of gods inscribed into stones that are dedicated to Phoenician gods. Okay, so Israelites would have been around this during this time. All right, so we're going to keep moving on here. We get into Exodus chapter 25 through 30 talking about the tabernacle being built, and they've said, that the seven-branch candlestick and the laver of brass would not have been made until much later in time, until the Babylonian and Persian kingdoms, all the way up to roughly 500 BC. They said this technology would not have existed back in the day. There's been no findings of this thing ever being even a tradition, so there's no way they could have had the candlestick and the laver of brass. Well, excavations in Dothan, Kiriath, Sephar, Egypt, and Palestine have all revealed these to be relevant all the way from 1550 BC to 1100 BC. And so this was taking place, my Bible says 1491. Now, the Exodus has been debated of what date it is. If you have any modern scholar's version of Exodus, he'll date it roughly to about 1250 BC. And there's reasons that we could go into, I don't really think we need to today, but there's a reason why we date it all the way back to 1491. There's been, and this actually kind of goes with archeological findings, because we know that the destruction of Babylon was, was it, no, the captivity of Babylon was 606 BC. And we have actual historical proof that took place during that time. And so if you actually match up from 606 BC all the way back in time to where the Exodus took place, we get back to 1491. If you follow what modern scholars do and put it at 1250, you're 240 years past. And that won't line up. So we don't try to match the Bible to history all the time. But at the same time, when it does line up, it's like, OK, we can help use that as a reference point to back us up. So at the end of the day, once again, we could get into that, but I don't think we're getting into today. But your Bible should say roughly around 1491. And even if it did say 1250 BC, these things were still relevant all the way up to 1100 BC. OK. All right. Joshua 2. Joshua chapter 2. Now this is talking about Rahab's house. Joshua chapter 2 and in verse 15. Then she let them down by a cord through the window, for her house was upon the town wall, and she dwelt upon the wall." That says a lot about her as an individual. We don't need to get into that, but it's talking about her house is built upon the wall. There's been five major excavations of Jericho. of and around Jericho, I should say. And of these five excavations, a man named John Garstand found co-eccentric walls with the outer walls six feet thick, then a 15-foot gap, and then a 12-foot thick inner wall. So six, 15 feet of nothing, and then another 12 feet. Which, if you think about it, is incredible, and just proves a miraculous event of the fall of Jericho. There's no way someone could have ran themselves all the way through Jericho. It was basically Fort Knox. It was an impenetrable fortress, and it still came crashing down. And so the idea behind her house being built upon the wall is that you'd have this six-foot outer wall as the first layer of protection, and if that falls, you got that 15 feet to kind of pick off the enemy in between. And then after that you got that 12 feet of man if they ever get through this we're We're dead. All right, but they're not going to is 12 feet thick I mean I don't know how long this platform is, but that's pretty close. Okay, that's pretty close So you're talking about say this say this platform is probably what 14 feet 14 to 15 feet you're talking about this wall of Jericho being from the back wall to what the second pew that's That's a thick wall right there. There's no way they could have gotten through that And so when you have Rahab's house being built upon the wall, basically what that was, it wasn't on the 6-foot section or the 12-foot section. They found homes being built in that middle area, that 15-foot gap. And so basically, if an enemy would come through and they busted that first wall, they could basically drop houses on people, which is absolutely insane. All right? All right. So that's just another quick little finding. Now, Joshua 6, 26. and 1 Kings 16.34. Now, you remember from Wednesday when I mentioned talking about cursed be that man who would basically build up Jericho again? And then 1 Kings 16.34, you have Hiel rebuilds Jericho. So let's turn to that. 1 Kings chapter 16. And I made some comment last time about there's maybe something weird going on with that building of the wall. In 1 Kings 16, in verse 34, In his days did Hael the Bethelite build Jericho. He laid the foundation thereof in Abiram, his firstborn, and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son Sigub. according to the word of the Lord which he spake by Joshua the son of Nun, in Abiram, and then in his youngest son, Sago." Okay? Now, this has been found. Excavations in Egypt found a home around 900 BC, and I'm not saying this is exactly Jericho, all right? I'm not proving that it's Jericho, but here's the concept. There's this home that's been dated to around 900 BC, that had a mason jar full of the remains of a child built into the gate's masonry. I don't know if that's exactly what took place here, but man, when you think about it, if you start reading the Old Testament and you're like, whoa, God is this vicious God, he's a terrible God, he's a wrathful God. Start reading Isaiah and you realize, oh man. Like I was reading the other day and I thought it was talking about God himself where it's talking about basically Actually, let me just read it for you. Talking about, this is a dual application, but it says, Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes, their houses shall be spoiled, and their wives ravished. And then it says, Behold, I will stir up the meads against them which shall not regard silver, and as for gold, they shall not delight in it. I'm reading through that and before it's talking about the day of the Lord and in that day and in that day multiple times and you're like, is that the Lord doing all that work? Well, historically, it applies to the destruction. Remember, I talked about the Medes and the Persians coming in and destroying Babylon? Because the very next verses are talking about Babylon. So it's historically applying to that event, but then it will in the future, too. And you're like, well, man, that's pretty barbaric right there. And I got something from it that's not even applicable. But it says, their bows shall also dash the young men to pieces, and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb. Their eyes shall not spare children. And I was like, their, they, they, them, them, not sparing children? All right, that was just food for thought on the side. But it was interesting, to say the least. So when you think about it, sometimes you're like, wow, the Lord, maybe he's super barbaric. But even if you read the Old Testament, he doesn't do near the things that the people back in that day did. He actually had a lot of mercy when these other people didn't. And so when you're talking about dedicating this building of the wall of Jericho, and you're going to kill your firstborn son, and then you're going to kill your youngest son and put him in the wall, that's some pretty barbaric stuff going on. If you study that thing out, you'll find some interesting things, too. But anyways. That is just kind of backing up that whole concept why it's kind of worded rather strangely. Now, here we go. I'm gonna try to get through some of these here. Yeah, we're doing good. All right, so Joshua chapter 11. Joshua chapter 11. And like I said, I'm just glancing over a lot of these things. There's thousands upon thousands of findings that back up the Bible. I'm just trying to highlight the most intriguing ones to keep everybody's attention. So Joshua 11, and in verse 10, it says, And Joshua at that time turned back and took Hazar, and smote the king thereof with the sword. For Hazar before time was the head of all those kingdoms. And they smote all the souls that were therein with the edge of the sword, utterly destroying them. There was not any left to breathe, and he burnt Hazar with fire. All right, well, the Bible is true, and we can back it up with science, because John Garstan found, he was actually going through the remains of Hazor, and he said he found events of a fire at this location and dated this to roughly 1400 BC. I don't know what your Bible says, but mine says 1451 BC. It sounds pretty close. Within 50 years, that's really close compared to science. All right, very, very close. All right, and then on one of the Armanna tablets, now what the Armanna tablets are is basically another collection of these tablets. It says, it literally says this on a tablet that has nothing to do with the Bible. All right, this is just pure secular history. It says this, let my lord the king recall what Hazar and its king have already had to endure. Okay, well that backs up the Bible. Alright, we don't have to turn to it, but in 1 Samuel 5, 2 it mentions Dagon as this Philistine god. It's been found that these Ras Shamra tablets, which I mentioned earlier, about 1,500 of these things, names Dagon as a Philistine grain god, and he's also referred to as the son of Baal. Alright, secular history backing up the Bible. All right, here's another interesting one we don't have to turn to. It's talking about David, all right? They were arguing that David has never had any secular history written about him, therefore he was not a king. Which, if you think about it, this is the same skeptic's argument for why the Bible couldn't be true, because there's not enough written during that time, all right? So they'll say, the Bible can't be true because we don't have enough written material to prove that it's true. Therefore, it's false. And then they'll use the same argument, but twist it another way and say, since there's a lack of physical evidence for King David, therefore King David could not exist. And so, once again, it's just like, all right, well, here we go. Let's punch you in the mouth over here. There's this thing called the Tell Dan Steele. And it was said – well, it's not said – in 1993, an Aramaic inscription dating to 900 BC writes about King David. It says, I killed Jehoram, the son of Ahab, the king of Israel, and I killed Ahaziah, the son of Jehoram, king of the house of David. And you're like, well, that's not talking about David. If you go to 1 Kings chapter 19, it's talking about the overthrow of the kingdom with Jehu, and then you have Ahab and Jezebel, and it's the overthrowing of the kingdom. And so when it says, this is actually, I should say, this is King Hazil taking credit. This is actually King Hazil writing here. He's taking credit for the killings, even though Jehu did it. And so it's talking about King Hazael talking about overthrowing these houses, killing Jehoram, the son of Ahab, the king of Israel. And then it mentions the house of David. So it was at first Kings 19. starting in verse 15, And the Lord said unto him, Go, return on thy way to the wilderness of Damascus, and when thou comest, anoint Hazael to be king over Syria. And Jehu, the son of Nimshi, shalt thou anoint to be king over Israel. I should say, Hazael to be king over Syria first. So anyways, basically you're saying, even though Hazael's taking credit for this, even though Jehu did it, that means there's a contradiction in the Bible. No, it's just saying they're both kings at the same time. And so when he's like, hey, go kill this guy, Jehu actually killed him, but really Hazael sent the orders out. So that's your way to get around it. All right. We'll just get through a couple of these real quick. First Kings 11 verse 40 and 12 through 25 to 29 talking about Jeroboam, Jeroboam's golden calves that he built. And if you want to turn to, this is due to First Kings 12, 29 or 12 verse 25. Now beforehand, Jeroboam was kicked out of the kingdom. He was exiled and he went down into Egypt that we all understand and know. And so when he comes back in verse 25, 26. And Jeroboam said in his heart, now shall the kingdom return to the house of David. Right? He's trying to set up his own kingdom. If this people go up to do sacrifice in the house of the Lord at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this people turn again unto their Lord, even to Rehoboam king of Judah, and they shall kill me and go again to Rehoboam king of Judah. Whereupon the king took counsel and made two calves of gold and said unto them, it is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Behold thy gods, O Israel, which thou broughtest thee up out of the land of Egypt. All right, so you have Jeroboam coming from Egypt and then trying to establish his own kingdom over here. It's been proven by excavations that these golden calves Jeroboam made in Israel are the same style that they find in Egypt. Just a little side note. He took the craftsmanship out of Egypt and put it over Israel. Alright, in 1 Kings chapter 16, we'll turn there, we'll hit one or two more and then we'll wrap this thing up. Talking about the reign of King Omri in Israel. From 1908 to 1910, Harvard found Omri's palace with inscriptions clearly stating it was his. The Moabite stone, which I mentioned earlier, had an inscription saying, Omri, king of Israel, he oppressed Israel many days. And if you read in your Bible, 1 Kings 16 to 25, but Omri wrought evil in the eyes of the Lord and did worse than all that were before him. And he walked in all the way of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and his sin wherewith he made Israel to sin to provoke provoked the Lord God of Israel to anger with their vanities." And it says now the rest of these acts were written somewhere else, right? So talking about Omri being just a terrible king and secular history has backed that up. All right, now the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser, this was another find from about 1860 to 1825 BC, that's when it was dated. It says, and it was found by Harvard, so gotta trust them. In 1846, this black obelisk says, Jehu, successor of Omri. And if you read through this passage, Jehu does indeed actually take over for Omri. And you're like, well, it's not exactly right away. Well, that's okay. It doesn't mean he took over right away, but he is the successor of Omri. Now, here we go. Tell you what, go to 2 Kings chapter 20. 2 Kings chapter 20, two more. And I'll tell you one thing, I can understand these things being kind of repetitive after a while, and you're like, OK, this is just another example. I specifically call archaeology and geography, that was our class in PBI, Monday afternoon at 6 o'clock. What did that mean? Well, that means you were working all throughout the week. Then you had your weekend, which basically meant you studied the whole night. For me, it meant Sunday night was getting the dishes done, going grocery shopping, cooking, doing some meal prep, and then getting my studies done and going to bed really late at night. And so by the time Monday afternoon rolls around, I'm kind of tired. And there's, especially in the springtime, the light would hit just a certain way through the glass and right on the desk in front of me. And it was just like, oh. make you go to sleep. It was great, right? I didn't fall asleep too often. I tried my best. But at the end of the day, it was very relaxing. And so you're hearing story after story after story after story of these findings, and you're like, okay, yep, yep, wrote that down. He found five clay tablets over here. Okay, next one, you know. And it can get repetitive and maybe a little bit dull sometimes, right? And trust me, I'm picking out the highlighted ones. I'm not just picking out five tablets here, five tablets there. And so I understand it can get a little bit boring. But there's also some really interesting things in here. So 2 Kings 20, and in verse 20, it says this. And the rest of the acts of Hezekiah in all his might and how he made a pool and a conduit and brought water into the city are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? All right, talking about this pool and a conduit and a water running through it. Well, the Siloam inscription found in 1880 is basically this. In 1880, a boy in the area, found a tunnel, which a lot of tunnels and caves have been discovered by these guys just running around out in the woods. And so this boy finds this tunnel, and in the middle of the tunnel, there's this place where the workers met, where they dug from one side to the other, and this is where you find the Salome inscription. And it's an account of Hezekiah's order to build a tunnel. And it has some things to say about it. But the thing why this is very important, not only does it confirm the biblical account, but when it talks about the detail of how long this conduit is, and if you start measuring everything out, it actually confirms the cubit to be 18 inches long. So that's just a little side note. But last one, Jeremiah 34. Jeremiah 34. And sometimes you'll get that, too. You'll get a part in the Bible where a certain king did this, and then historians will be like, well, this king never did this. This would have happened two generations before him. And you find some diggings and some tablets and everything else where it actually proves, okay, actually there was another king named the same name that was actually a couple generations before. So especially when, if we could have gone into it if we wanted to, that whole Babylonian takeover, right? They'll kind of argue against the Bible. It's like, well, this king actually wasn't in place during the time. And I've got notes after notes after notes about, okay, well, this king was ruling and reigning, but this other king was actually gone off and doing something else at the time. So he really was the one in charge, but this one's taking the credit for it. And these archaeological findings actually help back it up. All right. So Jeremiah 34. Last one here, it says in verse six, And Jeremiah the prophet spake all these words unto Zedekiah king of Judah and Jerusalem. When the king of Babylon's army fought against Jerusalem and against all the cities of Judah that were left, against Lachish and against Azekah, for these defense cities remained of the cities of Judah. So these two cities survived basically the wrath of the king of Babylon. All right, there's these things called the Lachish letters. All right, which matches Jeremiah 34, 7. It is the Babylonians' account of the siege. 21 astraka, which is basically just broken pottery that has stuff written down on it, were found. And on the fourth one, it says this. We are watching for the signals of Lachish according to all the indications my Lord hath given, for we cannot see Azekah. So basically, it's talking about These people that are watching for the signals of Lachish and they cannot see Azekah. Well, that proves two things. It proves two things that Lachish and Azekah were close together. So even though the king of Babylon is destroying everything else, these two cities kind of remain on their own. So it proves that. And then another thing it proves is that they were holding out. Okay? You're like, well, it's not a big deal. Like I said, this isn't mind-blowing stuff. It's just, once again, proving what's going on. And also, on these Lakish letters, last little note, it talks about some biblical characters. It talks about 35, verse 3, you have a man named Jehazaniah, right? He's mentioned on these Lakish letters. In 36.10, you have another character, his name is Gemariah, he's mentioned. And then in 36.4, you have another man, Neriah, which is named. Once again, just proving the Bible. So fun stuff, fun stuff. So don't ask me about all the questions. I'm not digging around for these personally, trying to find the next and best one. But I have respect for those guys that will go after history, and they'll do anything they can to discover something. So kudos to them. But we're kind of reaping the benefits, reaping the rewards of what these men have done. So all right. Yeah, let's take a break right there.