Stephen, If you have bothered to read my article which is available on the
ANE list you will see that I answer several of your questions there.
I would remind you that Royal estates require workers who require pots,
clothes, shoes, etc etc much of which is manufactured in 'industrial'
suburbs.
David
----- Original Message -----
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <g-megillot@mcmaster.ca>
Sent: Wednesday, August 16, 2006 1:38 PM
Subject: Re: [Megillot] Qumran again: NYTimes misreporting, etc.
David, if, as you propose, Qumran could only be inhabited, early on,
seasonally,
when Magen and Peleg claim it was a 'fortress" that would be an oddly
ineffective one, would it not?
If it's easier to make cheap export-pottery elsewhere (as if that has been
shown, where what pottery went) why then make it at Qumran in a Rube
Goldberg
machine and then schlep it uphill?
You shift the demands of evidence, claiming archaeology (in your
apparently
narrow definition, contrary to normal English usage) cannot confirm nor
deny
Essenes historical presence (if I read you right). Yet magen, apparently,
in
BAR as well as in the error-laden Brown book, and as represented in NY
Times,
claim in effect to banish Essenes from the site, Yet you also wrote that
you
largely agree with them. Something does not add up.
Plus, if Qumran were such a strategic site, why was it uninhabited for,
well,
most of human history? No major battle is ever known to have happened
there.
Just one minor skirmish circa 68, Romans easily overcoming
recently-arrived
zealots. Where are the Hasmonean weapons? Soldier burials? Fortifications?
Royal inscriptions, ostraca, architecture, decorations....anything royal
whatsoever? It's mere declaration, not dirt archaeology. Josephus names
and
locates forts: none matching Qumran.
I think you skipped over that fact that archaeologists use texts, but,
some,
merely bracket out, for whatever reasons, certain selected passages. That
is
not-good methodology.
best
Stephen Goranson
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