The earthy side of the Bible
as 'dug up' by Robert Bornemann

The weather during archaeological digs in Israel? Frequently hot - 106 degrees.

Professor emeritus Robert Bornemann, lower right, with archaeological colleagues. Each expedition is closely supervised by experts.

The process? Digging delicately through layers of civilizations reflected one way or another in Scripture. The work is always closely monitored by archaeological experts.

And there are moments of genuine excitement, such as being the first one at a site to uncover an artifact made of metal --in this case a knife with a broken tip and a unique handle.

Professor Bornemann at Bethsaida dig site, summer 2000

Then there is the unique perspective one acquires about biblical history. That the City of Zion in David's time -- Jerusalem -- once occupied a plot smaller that the Seminary's campus, and that the sense of history one may discern from the Bible may not be factually supported by painstaking archaeological studies where that history unfolded.

Such has been the "down and dirty" side of the Rev. Dr. Robert Bornemann for the past 25 years - the side when he is literally digging into the Old Testament and Hebrew he has diligently taught about for more than 43 years. Seven years into his retirement Bornemann, the Seminary's Anna Burkhalter Professor Emeritus of Old Testament and Hebrew, still likes to get his hands dirty and encourage students like Phyllis-jane N. Stetser, a current seminarian who accompanied Bornemann to a dig site last year, to do exactly the same thing.

 

Phyllis-jane N. Stetser, a United Methodist seminarian from Pitman, NJ, found participating with Bornemann at Bethsaida a life-changing experience.

"You get an understanding of the course of history that is revolutionized from the origins you read about in the Bible through archaeology," Bornemann muses. His first archaeological experiences date back 25 years, sometimes in places no longer accessible because of situations in the modern Middle East. His most recent visit was last summer in what may have been known as Bethsaida. The artifacts uncovered date to the seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth centuries B.C.

"In archaeology you really uncover the traditions and backgrounds of many different groups of people in many different times, and you come to realize that the Bible presents a theological reconstruction of their history," Bornemann says.

"The emphasis on archaeology is not to prove that the Bible is either right or wrong," he says. "It's a study that makes Scripture come alive. It is the realization that God acts in the midst of the lives of ordinary, real people. Archaeology shows us the dynamics of how and the way people lived." Bornemann says that Scriptures don't present history in the usual linear sense. "The Bible is a theological history," he says. "It records how people experienced God within their lives, and how they understood the ways that God dealt with them through many different ages and circumstances. Study of the Bible and archaeology and geography make it clear that not everyone connected with Israel had the same experiences."

Bornemann says the land itself where the Bible unfolded "is barren and it can be unpleasant. But it gets hold of you. Many scholars and archeologists think of the Holy Land as a kind of fifth gospel."