Joseph
There are a lot of arguments about the historicity of the bible, particularly the earlier parts of the Old Testament. Apart from the young earth creationists (whose views I don’t hold very highly), many Christians believe that the Old Testament switches from myth to history at Genesis 12 when God calls Abram, and starts his work through the people Israel. A number of scholars are skeptical of this, and think that the OT snaps out of myth mode at the time of King David, or even later, towards the end of the Babylonian exile. To my unschooled ears, their arguments can sound like those of people discarding history in an attempt to not be labelled religious fundamentalists but hey, what do I know. However, before now, there really hasn’t been much archaeological evidence from before the time of King David, which is hardly surprising since the Israelites started off as a wandering tribe.
Then, this is revealed.
In Egypt, “coins” have been found bearing the name and face of “Joseph”. Do you remember the biblical Joseph, he of the technicolour dreamcoat, ruler in Egypt and great grandson of Abraham? How many rulers called Joseph were there in Egypt at that time? The coins are about the right vintage, so if this is accurate, it may well be new evidence for the historicity of the Old Testament, right back to Genesis, within 3 generations of Abraham.
Now how about that?!
Thanks to Custard for the link.
Um, why stop at Joseph. Hadn’t you heard they’d found Noah’s Ark in Turkey?
How do we know the “coins” (scarabs) are the right vintage? Does the newspaper article actually mention any dates? Nope, but it says they date from “the time when Joseph lived in Egypt” – so that’s ok then. (The Third dynasty is mentioned – though not in direct connection with the “coins”; but that’s far earlier than even Usher would have dated Joseph.) And the argument that if a “coin” says Joseph / Yusuf / whatsoever-Egyptian-hieroglyphs-are-being-assimilated-to-this-name then it must be “our” Joseph is as tenuous as the “Jesus ossuary”.
I don’t think I’d hold my breath for this “find” to be authenticated. The original article seems (to me) a fairly transparent piece of crankery intended to defend the historicity of the Koran. (“Dr Thabet” discovered these “coins” during his archaeological research on the Prophet Joseph.)