Unearthing The Bible Curriculum

Many of us have heard of the city in Israel called Jericho. Remember, it was a city very close to where the Israelites first entered the Promised Land and is one of the oldest cities in the world. In fact, there's even a kid's song that has been written about the battle there called “Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho.” And in the song it mentions how, with just God's help and without the Israelites not really doing anything other than walking and yelling, the walls came tumbling down. Well, as you can imagine, there are many skeptics who don't believe this story in the Bible about Joshua and the city of Jericho being true. They make fun of the story and ask, “How can the walls of a city just fall down flat by themselves?” Of course, we know it was a miracle from God, but obviously the skeptics won't agree with that. And so many of them insisted that there isn't any evidence from the city of Jericho that the walls just fell down by themselves, like the Bible says. However, a number of excavations have been carried out in the ancient city of Jericho. In fact, it's probably the most excavated area in Israel, outside of Jerusalem. First, there were excavations done in the 1950s, led by a woman, named Kathleen Kenyon, who agreed with the skeptics and said that there was no evidence that the story in the Bible is true. She believed that Jericho was already destroyed before the Israelites even got there. And so there was no city there when they showed up. Fortunately, though, more excavations have been done in Jericho since then, and they appear to disprove most of the conclusions and statements from Kathleen Kenyon. One of the main archaeologists who has investigated the ruins of the city of Jericho after her is a man named Bryant Wood. And when he excavated the ancient city, he found a number of important things that confirm the story in the Bible. First, there is very clear evidence from the ruins that the wall in Jericho definitely did fall down a long time ago. There's a large amount of wall debris on the ground, and this debris dates to the time of Joshua and the Israelites. So that is a strong support to the story of God's miracle. Here is a picture of the collapsed mud bricks from the city wall that fell down to the ground. Also, it's interesting that when the wall fell down, it fell in such a way as to create a ramp that went up to the city. This allowed the Israelites to walk up over the wall that fell down and enter the city of Jericho. In fact, the Bible even says this in Joshua 6:20. It says, “So the people shouted and the trumpets were blown. As soon as the people heard the sound of the trumpet, the people shouted a great shout, and the wall fell down flat, so that the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they captured the city.” Not only that, but there is also a lot of evidence that was found at the excavation site in Jericho that confirmed that the city was burned after the walls fell down. They found charred remains and various signs that there was a fire. And this is exactly what we read in the Bible in Joshua 6:24. It says, “And they burned the city with fire, and everything in it”. So for the skeptics, it's hard to believe that the walls of Jericho could have just come tumbling down and fall down without any type of dynamite or battering ram. But that's exactly what the Bible says happened. And that's exactly what all the evidence from Jericho tells us.