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February 11, 2007
A Note on an Abnormal Interest
Chris O'Brien at Northstate Science has a second post on "apologetics archaeology" in which he offers further reflections on Syro-Palestinian archaeology. He again makes several important points and tells of a couple of his own experiences in a very instructive way. I am very sympathetic to Chris' points in this recent post. I guess I need to write something meaningful on this topic too, but right now I'm just too worn out from bringing our library back into the house from the garage where it was being stored while our new carpet was installed, to be very coherent. What a pain.
One thing that I will note is that, except for those who work directly in the field (and not all of them) plus a very small group of interested laypersons, a high percentage of the talk in this area is just that, "talk," with not the slightest reference to the real issues in all of their complexity. Today I will contribute a little to that "talk." Discounting those whose main interest is selling magazines, the world of Syro-Palestinian archaeology seems to divide into two larger camps of unequal size and one much smaller camp. The smaller camp contains those professionals who struggle with the difficult evidence and develop interesting and useful, even testable, hypotheses that advance the field. Dever, Mazar, Gitin, Finkelstein, and Herzog, as well as many other professional archaeologists and a very few laypersons, are part of this group. In what follows, I write in generalities. One can find exceptional cases everywhere.
Myriads of folks who deeply desire that the conclusions of the archaeologists support either their religious or their political perspectives, sometimes both, make up the larger of the other two groups. Perhaps they need to have their religious or political beliefs confirmed; perhaps they hope that archaeology will provide a "scientific" basis for evangelism. Perhaps they fear the loss of faith in themselves or others if archaeology does not support their beliefs. Many identify this group with Biblical fundamentalism and while it includes most fundamentalists, it is in reality much larger than that. One of the hallmarks of this group is their almost universal failure to acknowledge controversy among experts and to suppress or more commonly massage evidence that is not supporting of their position.
The second of the two larger groups hopes that archaeology does not confirm the historicity of the Bible. There are many differing and often opposing motivations for this view: fear of some form of idolatry; fear of misuse of archaeological evidence to support political agendas; hope that archaeology will prove the Bible wrong with sufficient authority to also prove all or some religious beliefs wrong; a desire to separate western theology from its historical roots. I find all of these positions as equally wrong headed as fundamentalist religious positions. Members of this group will often acknowledge legitimate controversy but tend to fixate on evidence or individual archaeologists that seem most supportive of their own non-archaeological positions. They also often promote low probability explanations of evidence where the highest probability explanation does not suit the cause. Neither this group nor the one outlined in the previous paragraph seems much interested in proposing testable hypotheses or in having their own hypothesis tested.
I will note that classical archaeologists occasionally debate their finding and their hypotheses in strong and sometimes derisive tones. But in general, none of them thinks their immortal soul or anyone else's depends on the outcome of these debates. Their honor or prestige may be on the line but not their religious beliefs. It is on the issue of religious belief that much of the talk, but little of the real archaeology, rests. My goal as a secularist with a strong (abnormal) interest in the field of Syro-Palestinian archaeology is to discuss the issues as if little or nothing were at stake. Shocking little really is. I think that a dedicated interest in this area of human inquiry should be as abnormal as is the same level of interest in any other branch of archaeology. I'm not claiming that the larger public shouldn't have an interest in Syro-Palestinian archaeology. I am claiming that they shouldn't have an opinion.
PS One subject that needs to be discussed more than it is, is how archaeological research of all kinds is funded. There are dragons and monsters in these waters.
Posted by Duane Smith at February 11, 2007 4:26 PM | Read more on Archaeology |
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