Have the first Israelite sites built after Exodus been found?

[Moses]

      
Have the first Israelite sites built after Exodus been found?

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1076836.html
A Haifa University archaeologist on Thursday said he has unearthed structures in the shape of human feet believed to have been erected by the Israelites upon their initial entry to the Land of Canaan.

Prof. Adam Zertal said that the large compounds discovered in the Jordan Valley were "the first sites to have been built by the Israelites upon entering Canaan and manifest the biblical notion of claiming ownership of the land by setting feet on it."
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Since 1990, five sites shaped like human feet have been excavated in the Jordan Valley. All five date back to the early Iron Age (12th to 13th centuries B.C.E.), and their shapes indicate that they were used as communal gathering places.

Zertal said that the foot-shaped sites were used during ceremonies following the Israelites' entry into the Land of Canaan. He added that the concept of the Jewish pilgrimage to Jerusalem on three major holidays (known as "aliya la'regel" or ascending on foot) also originates from the foot-shaped sites in the Jordan Valley and Mount Ebal.

[pedjazoo]

Interesting article. Is there any OT support for this? As far as I know in the book of Joshua only altars (i.e. altars of uncut stone) are mentioned. Also, Joshua 8 mentiones an altar built on Mount Ebal. Is there any chance Zertel's foot shaped sites are actually Joshua's altars?!

[Moses]

 pedjazoo you ask interesting question.

I can't find anything direct in the bible.
I do find it interesting the correlation of the 3 regalim. the 3 pilgrimages.

It also can be a foot print of Anakim the Giants?

More research is needed.

[Irishman]

I have to admit a certain head-scratching urge when I wonder why they would jump to the connection to the Israelites with no more evidence than that.

Odd.

[eliyahu hanavi]

Read the article, but found no substance whatsoever. Nothing was presented that would lead any reasonable person to make the grand leap that was made in the article. I give it a "thumbs down". Cheers!

[eccles]

What footprints? What sites?
If I may expand the topic to include the Exodus, there has never been found any material evidence of an Exodus from Egypt by Archaeologists who have been digging in the Sinai since 1920. There is certainly no sign that 2 million Hebrews wandered the Sinai Desert for 40 years.

There are no accounts of such an event by the Egyptians and they kept excellent accounts of major events. A scribe accompanied Pharoah and his army during the Battle of Kadesh. His account is carved in the walls of the Temple of Karnak.

This "footprimt discovery" sounds to me like someone having preconceived ideas and trying to match "footprint like shapes" to his "theory" Remember the late Ron Wyatt trying to find Noah's Ark. He was not a professional archaeologist and was funded by the members of the fundamentalist church he belonged to. He claimed nautral rock shapes were Noah's Ark. His idea was debunked.

[Elijah]

In the late 1800s, there are many archeological theories that debunked the existance of cities  until such cities were discovered. Now the 1890s are alot further back far than a mere 69-year old Australian man who some how is now lucky enough to type on a computer keyboard (from a typewriter invented in my nowhere town of Kenosha that he feels couldnt possibly know the rest of the world down under). And since these theories go back much further than him, I wonder how he can come in, and now harass all my fellow current members who have been here 1-2 years and start all over saying prove the Exodus, prove the Flood, prove the Abram & Moses. So the example of the late 1890s which soon discovered the cities they once claimed didnt exist, does it mean nothing exists until our new member says so?

I do not believe everything my fellow members here beleive or submit, but I submit their right to discuss it, beyond those who come in, and say no-no didnt exist, every one knows, never been proved. That is exactly what the Bible is all about, examples of all those around the world who say different, just as Cain said different than Abel, Eve different than Adam, Esau different than Jacob etc. I see no need to create new modern wars over differences, when the facts of the ancient Bible are still current wars of differences. I dont expect anyone to be civilized, but dont we all get tired of those who come in to rehash in the exact footprints others have before them. If you prove Mr.B wrong, does that mean Mr.C can come in with Mr.B's papers and present the whole same thing over again and win just because he is not Mr.B ?

Does not the Haifa University mean anything in Australia?
Are we to ignore member Pedjazoo's quoting Joshua the book and regard it as myth? This topic thread was of getting into Canaan by leaving Sinai, not what evidence is left behind in Sinai to prove their existance as 2 million. In Sinai all Israel dwelled in tents, how deep do you dig for that? I dont think 30 members of BAS should be compared to Ron Wyatt. Ron Wyatt didnt video the wood on Ararat in Dec 2002. If you wish to keep video, download Real Player and it will give you a download button on every webpage for any video that isnt security locked.

[Irishman]

Don't take this the wrong way, because I mean no offense. I'm just trying to understand your writing.

Is English your first language?

[Elijah]

No English is not my first language. Though born in the states to speak English, I grew up knowing that the language of truth comes first above the choice of words or clarity others feel you should have. I have a mother who never apologized because if she misunderstood your words, and struck you down for it, then it was your fault you were not clear to her in the words as you should have said it. The blame went on the speaker  not the listener. If this is how it should be, then my Lord Jesus confuses me because I could swear he taught us all that they the world will look to find fault in your words. And I also see that in Moses, raised between Egypt and Israel he couldnt speak to either without offending them. Lord I do not have the way with words so please give me my brother to speak to Pharaoh, um okay Pharaoh before you execute us for what Moses said to you, this is what my brother Moses means when he says this. I fully understand this. And it is also one of my pet pieves when WatchTower is no different from other quick-wit evangelicals coming up with lame answers like saying Moses had a lip deformity or speech impediment. BUZZ - WRONG He knew his thoughts were knowledge from two worlds that made him rejected by both. Ask any child of mixed race who swears all the blacks say he is white, and all the whites say he is black. I understand rejection, not for me, but for anyone in these shoes. That's how I know the christ is here in flesh again and rejected again. It is simply a repeat of three things that happen everyday - a prediction, a rejection, and a suffered consequence. And the blame goes on the man who spoke in riddles, yeh right.

Once any knowledge gets deep enough that others do not understand it, then no one knows if this deep stuff is true or not. So it then becomes faith that saves or faith that kills. In either case (true teacher or false teacher) the teacher becomes god to some and a nutcase to others.
The good will receive the same torched fire upon them that others do light upon bad elements that they wish to weed out in protection of the family.
This is why Jesus said forgive them my God because they know not what they are doing at his death, but he NEVER said that while preaching. Instead, he said YOU TRY TO KILL ME.

[notalent]

No English is not my first language. Though born in the states to speak English, I grew up knowing that the language of truth comes first above the choice of words or clarity others feel you should have. I have a mother who never apologized because if she misunderstood your words, and struck you down for it, then it was your fault you were not clear to her in the words as you should have said it. The blame went on the speaker  not the listener. If this is how it should be, then my Lord Jesus confuses me because I could swear he taught us all that they the world will look to find fault in your words.

1) Your poor composition and poor grammar are obstacles to mutual understanding. 

2) Even apart from #1, Your explication of calendars is almost completely incomprehensible.  One might as well give a lecture on mainframe computers using all the arcane language of that science, knowing full well that nobody would understand a word of it.

And now, you attempt to make these defects a virtue by implying that one should not bother to learn to write well, because that will only make it easier for people to attack your words.   Write sloppy grammar and sloppy composition as a D grade-school student.  In addition, add arcane language of calendars and celestial jargon to further confuse/amaze the natives, who are already put off by the amateur grade-school composition.  Then claim all of it speaks for Jehovah.

Sorry, I don't thinks so.  Believe it or not, the prophets of old were good writers (or their scribes were at least).  Their books are literary art of the first stamp.  All their works were written, and explicable, in the vernacular of extant canonical literature available at the time.  Even the Apostle's and their associate's writings are grammatically correct works, and of high literary standard, making no external references beyond common knowledge and accepted canonical writings.  (For some illumination on this, I highly recommend, Mark As Story, by David Rhoads.)

A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver. --Proverbs 25:11

[Elijah]

You chastice as if you think I choose where my skills are, and I have seen those with excellent verbal skills go down at Kingdom Halls, not when they started teahcing pyrmaids were built before the Flood by angels, nor when they started teaching the darkness upon the death of Jesus was a solar eclipse of the sun on a day of full moon, but when they got caught with a second wife, another JW, whose husband was not one. Then he said to his nephew the elder that polygamy is scriptural (King David /Solomon) not to mention ignoring Jesus having any say in the matter.

Sir, you do wise to take lessons from Mose who for many posts asked me step by step questions to clarify, he began to see my thinking pattern, proven to me by his next questions that followed. You either wish to learn the calendars or you dont. YOu either wish to learn the astronomy or you dont. But there are many men who can calculate a comet orbit form measures in their telescope, and do not even know that Jupiter orbits 7 times in 83 Julian years to the date. Yet Abram knew it in 1943 BC. They didnt ask Abram to join the Pharaoh did they. Hmm I dont think they did, it isnt recorded that they did.

[notalent]

You chastice as if you think I choose where my skills are, and

My skills used to be as bad as yours, but I made extra effort to improve.  So if one has a desire to speak for God, one had better start giving of his best to the master and start seeking excellence in the communication department.  What good are "discoveries" if one can't communicate them with coherent English sentences?  One might as well be speaking in tongues with no interpreter.  It's less than no good making excuses based on the deeds of well-spoken sinners.  The Biblical authors didn't -- not even the Galilean rubes known as the disciples -- so one is not left with an excuse.

[Elijah]

Well at the risk of being JW Michael J and saying quit picking on me. It doesnt mean I havent been all my life. Unlike Michael I realize I have to adapt, or to conform without compromising my conscience. Unfortunately my conscience has been tricked and compromised so that I am a person who teeters on wishing I was dead, or the whole world too. But, might I say that I have no doubt that his brothers picked on him as much as mine did, and like my brothers then deny it. Yet there are moments they act like they protected me by telling others not to pick on me. My oldest brother like Jermaine saying leave Ricky alone. Yet my oldest brother struck me more than other siblings and once I had to run into a strangers house begging for the cops while my brother dragged me out by the ankles across their kitchen floor. Only thing that saved me was a 12 year old boy and his viscious german shepherd on my back, while the boys grandpa stood in the garage baffled.
     This was littel Ricky that slurred in 1st grade and had to go every day to the office for speech lessons. Then in 9th grade I get to read for a JW book study as an excellent reader, next thing you know he had me pray while I tried to say no I cant... a week later he blames me for not saying I wasnt baptized. Yes the blame is always my fault, and thats why on Sunday if I raised my hand for one of my awesome profound answers to the WatchTower study article, they never knew my heart pounded in fear of all of them, pounding so hard i could feel my ribs bruised, and it would slow down if i put my hand down, and beat hard if i put my hand up... absolute total fear on how perfect i am suppose to phrase everything i say.

Care to comment on the life and times of Esau hates Jacob at the Sunday morn Kingdom Tent ! Truth is, as much as i love music and love to dance, my thriller wasnt the music industry but revelation i received in 1983.

[notalent]

Truth is, as much as i love music and love to dance, my thriller wasnt the music industry but revelation i received in 1983.

I'm sure, but that revelation will forever remain a mystery to everyone else because the power to convey such ideas coherently has not been cultivated.  The result is that one cannot legitimately play the "they're picking on me unjustly" card. 

There are books on composition, and there are adult education courses at community college.  Truth be told, one wouldn't write at this level for the President of the United States, the Queen of England or Marie Osmond.  How much more should one seek to elevate his level for the Creator of the Universe.  If one wants to be the teller of hidden knowledge and the revealer of mysteries, then one had better acquire an A game in the writing department, or nobody of any importance is going to send him to write so much as a grocery list.