Avraham Faust has a study “The Archaeology of the Israelite Cult: Questioning the Consensus (hat tip to James Pate of James’ Ramblings for calling my attention to this article).
The consensus Faust is questioning is for the widespread distribution of worship buildings in the period of the monarchy:
. . .the view that the Israelites built temples and local shrines in almost every locale, and that beyond the household cult there also existed neighborhood and village shrines, town shrines, regional cultic centers, and central temples in the national capitals.
In other words, scholars have painted a picture of state sponsored worship existing all over the place until attempts by kings Hezekiah and Josiah to curtail this widespread use of “high places” and other outlying shrines.
The problem is that we have not been able to find evidence of buildings dedicated to such worship except at Arad and, possibly, at Dan. This is in contrast to finds outside of Israel, where pagan worship seemed to flourish even at the local level, as it also did in Bronze Age and early Iron Age Palestine and Israel.
We should have expected to find buildings and rooms dedicated to worship purposes in many places. But we did not. Faust recognizes that his questioning of the consensus is based on an argument from absence, but he thinks this is valid if you expected to find something and then did not. The apparent absence of worship centers throughout Israel and Judah during the monarchy requires an explanation.
But Faust doesn’t offer an explanation. He just calls upon scholars to rethink this aspect of life during this period.
He wants to consider just the archeological evidence, not the texts.
There must have been a worship building at Bethel We haven’t found it. Perhaps, in this case, absence actually confirms the text about Josiah having utterly demolished it (2 Kings 23:15).
Psalm 74:4-8 describes, I think, the utter destruction of one or more northern sanctuaries by the Assyrians.
Of course there was the temple at Jerusalem, but we can’t dig at that site.
So we know about these places from the text, but we haven’t found them in the archeological layers.
But it is the absence of other, more local buildings that is surprising.
I do not know the answer to Faust’s question. I just have one thought, for now. We have found the remains of city gates, city walls and public buildings. Texts often mention city gates even in smaller places. At Khirbet Qeiyafa Garfinkel says that he found three large shrine rooms in the structure. From the Wikipedia article:
In May 2012 archeologists announced the discovery of three large rooms that were likely used as cultic shrines. While the Canaanites and Philistines practiced their cults in separate temples and shrines, they did not have separate rooms within the buildings dedicated only to religious rituals. This may suggest that the rooms did not belong to these two cultures.
This is a little earlier than the period Faust is talking about. But is it possible that, rather than separate temples, Israelite palaces, fortresses and other public buildings had shrine rooms?
Note: beginning next week I plan to report on reading Jacob L. Wright’s David, King of Israel, and Caleb in Biblical Memory
theoutwardquest 