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ZAKHORIUM
PTEN

The oldest biblical text outside the Bible

Date

699BCE

seventh or sixth century BCEapproximate date

Two silver amulets with blessings nearly identical to Numbers 6 show that biblical material was already being written down in the seventh or sixth century BCE.

Art and cultureReligious history31.7689°N 35.2254°E
550 BCE
500 BCE
450 BCE
400 BCE
350 BCE
Becoming the People of the Book: each bar is an event of the period; this one is in coral.

Sourced narrative

Each block is a verifiable statement. The number opens the cited page; amber or coral blocks flag tradition or contested interpretation.

3 statements

01The amulets

A burial site at Ketef Hinnom, just south of Jerusalem, yielded two tiny silver amulets engraved with priestly blessings nearly the same as Numbers 6:24 and 25. They date from the 600s or 500s BCE and, as the earliest known appearance of a biblical text beyond the Bible, show that such material was starting to be put in writing. Without the Hebrew Bible itself, nothing in the inscriptional record would lead us to guess that ancient Judah had so varied and sophisticated a literature. Who wrote it, when and why has occupied scholars for roughly three centuries, producing countless hypotheses; the authors point to a few basic points of consensus.

Context

The alphabet was easy enough that scribes were not its only users: there is also unofficial writing, produced by individuals for themselves, such as pious graffiti, tomb inscriptions and even a plea for help from someone trying to recover a confiscated cloak.

§ 01Geography

Where it happened

Gazetteer coordinates (Pleiades for ancient places; Natural Earth and Wikidata for modern ones) over modern physical geography (Natural Earth). Coastlines and the Dead Sea have changed since antiquity.
▮ loading geography

§ 02Museum

Objects and images

Each item states whether it is an ancient object, a modern photograph or a later artistic interpretation.

§ 04Network

Connections

§ 05Bibliography

Further reading

  • Michael Coogan, The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006).

    Introduction to the contents of the Hebrew Bible · recommended in Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 60

§ 06Apparatus

Sources on this page

  1. 01Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 41; Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 41inspect
  2. 02Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 41; Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 41inspect
  3. 03Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 41inspect
  • Documented evidenceAttested by contemporary evidence: texts, inscriptions, coins, papyri or archaeology.
  • Scholarly reconstructionHistorians' inference from indirect evidence.
  • Tradition or narrativeA literary, traditional or religious account; significant in itself, but not independently verified.
  • Contested interpretationScholars explicitly disagree; see the positions in the debate.
  • Illustrative reconstructionA hypothesis or visual scheme to guide reading; not a historical claim.