“Such is the story of heaven and earth when they were created.”[165]

For many years, the Bible was our primacy source of information about life in Ancient Israel.  “From a Jewish or Christian faith perspective,”[166] it was assumed that the Bible was historically accurate.[167]  However, “our knowledge of the people of the book is no longer limited by the information contained in that book.”[168]  New literary and archaeological evidence has led many people to question the historical accuracy of the Bible.

Today, at one end of the spectrum, some Fundamentalist scholars still insist that since the Bible is the “written word of God,”[169] it must be completely accurate in all of the historical and scientific facts it discusses.  Bloesch noted:

“Many latter-day evangelical Christians have felt the need to extend the meaning of inerrancy to cover purely historical and scientific matters, even where the treatment of these in the Bible does not bear upon the message of faith.”[170]

To put it simply, “the fundamentalists rigorously maintained that Scripture contains no discrepancy or flaw as modern science would understand this.”[171] 

At the other end of the spectrum, based on the evidence uncovered in the last century, some secular scholars believe “there is hardly any historical relation”[172] between actual events and the written text.  They believe it is almost impossible “any more to uphold this idea of the [Biblical] literature as a historical source in the classical sense of the word.”[173]  Finkelstein and Silberman asserted: 

“…it is now evident that many events of biblical history did not take place in either the particular era or manner described.  Some of the most famous events in the Bible clearly never happened at all.”[174]

In this view, “the patriarchal narratives contain historical information only to the degree that they present a historical scenario pertinent to the time when the patriarchs supposedly lived.”[175]

Most scholars fall somewhere in between these two extremes.  While they believe “history cannot be found simply in the sources,”[176] they do believe the text can be tied to many historical events.  For example, the Books of Kings “preserve a large amount of accurate historical information—for example, in relation to the names and dates of foreign kings and international affairs.”[177]  Freedman suggested:  “It may help the cause of progress in the truth to note that neither the archaeologists nor the biblical writers are necessarily infallible, and that neither or either or both may be correct with regard to the presentation or interpretation of ancient events.”[178]  While these scholars believe the Biblical text can be useful in helping us understand historical events in Ancient Israel, it is unable “to stand alone”[179] due to a number of factors.

First, scholars have recognized that “it is perfectly obvious that [the Biblical texts] cannot possibly represent the total literary productions of ancient Israel.”[180]  In fact, the Bible, Homer, Hesiod and all of the other records “formed only a fraction of the written discourse of ancient times.”[181]  For example, the Hebrew Bible itself bears record to “over twenty”[182] other books which were considered authoritative in ancient Israel but are presently lost to modern society.[183]   Only a fragment of the entire social structure is preserved by the present canonical text.[184]  Therefore, it is likely that the picture of society which is contained in the Hebrew Bible is skewed by an incomplete presentation. 

Second, the Biblical texts are actually of “secondary or tertiary value”[185] in understanding Ancient Israel because of censorship during the Second Temple period. Blenkinsopp noted:  “Most of these texts are also heavily edited, and more often than not, date and authorship are uncertain…”[186]  It is clear that “references felt to be offensive were toned down or abridged, and we have, of course, no way of knowing how many were excised altogether.”[187] Halbertal said:  “Ordinarily, canonical texts do not merely record traditions of a given period.  They select and censor in order to create an authoritative body out of contending candidates.”[188]  We do not know what was contained in these other texts and whether they might have been more authentic than the present canon.

In fact, it is believed that much of the literature of Ancient Israel had been lost when the Jews were carried captive into Babylon.  The Talmud attributes Ezra with reestablishing the law.[189]  Some sources suggest that the entire Hebrew Bible had been lost and Ezra was required to restore it by revelation.[190]  By doing so, Ezra brought “unity to the Jewish people scattered”[191] from their homeland.  These facts do not even take into account that the existent records are strictly southern-based Judahic texts.  We have “hardly any direct evidence”[192] of the practices of the Northern Kingdom.

In addition, the Hebrew Bible was formed very late in antiquity and “the exact form of the Jewish canon was not fixed until the first or second century C. E.”[193]    Patai noted:  “While undoubtedly based on ancient oral tradition, some of it reaching back into the Mosaic period, or even as far as the patriarchal age, the Biblical accounts are preserved in relatively late reworkings and are therefore not contemporary, in a strict sense of the word, with the events they describe.”[194]  Therefore, the present canon may not be accurate portrayals of the earlier time period.[195]

            Third, we must differentiate between the popular religion and the official, institutionalized religion.  It is important to note that “it is always easier to assess official or public religion than to learn what people really believe or how they act.”[196]  Also, we “must distinguish between what people actually do and what people say they do.”[197]  Since the Hebrew Bible tends to focus on “those with power and the events they instigated…,”[198] we learn about “national events, leading individuals, political institutions, and ‘high culture.’”[199]  While some women are mentioned in the Bible, there is serious doubt as to whether these prominent females can be seen “as representative of their gender.”[200] 

Few scholars believe that the view of history presented in the Bible fully reflects the daily lives of the general population.  Certainly, a great variety of beliefs were to be found among the general population of Ancient Israel.  Undoubtedly, some Hebrews worshipped the pagan gods[201] and what the Bible denounces “in cultic matters was, in fact, the religious practice”[202] of many Israelites.  For much of the Biblical period, monotheism “remained a demand rather than a fact.”[203]  Other Hebrews undoubtedly succumbed to "the besetting tendency in Israel to what is sometimes described as practical atheism, the denial that God concerns himself with human affairs, however real he may actually be.”[204] 

            Fourth, we must remember that the material we have are “ancient sources, written in languages different from our own, with their own distinctive conventions and thought patterns.”[205]  It’s quite possible that the ancient readers simply understood the text much differently from us.

            Fifth, the text “…depends on historians’ constructions or images of it…”[206]  History, or what actually happened, is always a subjective matter based on the personal interpretations and biases of the historian.  Meyers said:  “Also the language is highly selective, sometimes including apparently trivial or mundane matters, or omitting facts and personalities of great political or social importance.”[207]  We must always remember that the text includes what was important to the recording historian, not what is important to us today.  In fact, in the case of the later editors, it contains what was important to them, not necessarily what was important to the original historian.

            Sixth, it is “beyond question that there is very little correlation between the biblical portrait of the past and the nonbiblical [archaeological] evidence…”[208]  The society of Ancient Israel as discovered by archaeology and modern literary analysis is a very different world than that portrayed by the text.  For example, “the old consensus (if there ever was one) regarding Israel’s entry into Canaan, as the book of Joshua claims, has been largely abandoned because the archaeological record has not corroborated a literal interpretation…”[209]

Given the combination of the above factors, it is clear that even if the texts are partly accurate in what they describe, they probably do not give a complete and accurate portrayal of life in ancient Israel.  It should be noted that some people believe that recounting accurate history was never the intent of the Biblical authors. Lemche said:

“We must conclude, however, not that the biblical authors were unsuccessful historians but that they were not at all interested in providing anything like a historical report of the past.  They wrote for other reasons, and they used history as the vehicle for their message.”[210]

Instead of “concerning themselves with historical actualities, the narrators [of the Bible] are determined to tell lively and engaging stories.”[211]

            Since these stories were “inextricably linked to the life experience of the Hebrew author,”[212] they were able to provide relevance to the entire community.   Other people believe “the ancient storytellers viewed their stories as history, recounting the actual lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as well as the early Israelite generations.”[213]  Their accuracy in detailing historical information is simply lessened by the previously mentioned factors.

            The importance of whether the Bible is real history really depends upon one’s world view.  For Judaism, “history is central to Jewish belief.”[214]  The Jewish God is not an abstract principle unconcerned in human affairs.  The Jewish God is intimately connected with his people throughout history. Kohler said:  “For the religious consciousness, God is not to be demonstrated by argument, but is a fact of inner and outer experience.”[215]  It is “God’s acts in history, rather than His role as Creator, are predominate in Biblical thought.”[216]  The Lord is “the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac…”[217]  He is “the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery…”[218]  The Hebrew Bible consistently identifies God with real people and events and “portrays Him as intimately involved with His creation, particularly human beings, and caring deeply about how they conduct their lives and what kind of social order they create on earth.”[219]  Jews define their “faith not in cosmological but in historical terms.”[220]  Therefore, whether the Bible is true history or not has a special impact on Judaism as compared to the historical authenticity of the holy books of some other religions.

            Within the Jewish community, there has been a wide divergence of belief regarding the importance of whether the Bible is ‘real’ history.  Some Orthodox Traditionalists believe for the Torah to serve as a book of “guidance”[221] for the community of faith, then every word must be true.  In fact, not only do they believe every word must be true, but there are secret teachings hidden within the very structure and language of the text.[222] According to Gershom Scholem, the rabbis of tradition believed that: 

“Truth is given once and for all, and it is laid down with precision.  Fundamentally truth merely needs to be transmitted.  The originality of the exploring scholar has two aspects.  In his spontaneity, he develops and explains all that was transmitted at Sinai, no matter whether it was always known or whether it was forgotten and had to be rediscovered.” [223]

In other words, “the commentators do not invent something new; they discover what the Divine Author had always intended.”[224]  On the other hand, many Reformers believe that the text can be incomplete and even contain incorrect information, yet still offer positive contributions.  Davies noted: “As an explanation of what is, or was, or can be, ‘real,’ history is in no way intrinsically superior to religion or science.”[225]  However, Jewish views cannot be neatly divided into two or three camps as there are a myriad of opinions on this issue.  Regardless, even the most fundamentalist Jewish view of Torah takes into account that the Written Torah is incomplete unaccompanied by the Oral Torah, or Tradition.  Therefore, they are not as hard pressed by modern Biblical scholarship as Protestants who depend upon “the principle of sola scriptura.”[226]