A Mysterious Tease

Introduction II

[Ebal, six of thirty]

The controversies surrounding a recent archaeological find should matter to you. This post presents a taste of why.

Note

This sixth post about the Mt. Ebal Curse Tablet aims to pique your interest in the story.

If you have accessed this post from other than captivatingtwists.com and wish to start the journey from the beginning, click here.

Otherwise, continue below.

When prominent experts allege that a series of photographs challenge long-established precepts of world history, while others claim, “There is nothing to see here!”, you might think, “Show me the photos! Decide myself, I will!”¹

Photos of a defixio, a curse tablet found in Israel in 2019, present such a quandary. Since the tablet could not be opened without crumbling, an archaeologist employed tomographic scanning to peer inside. Reportedly, this revealed proto-alphabetic script, a claim that, given the archaeological context, potentially challenges long-held scholarly understandings of world history.

When, however, the archaeologist publicly released photos of the scans, some experts denied that they showed anything of significance.

My goal here is two-fold. I want to assist you in reaching a well-informed understanding of the tablet. Further, I hope to encourage you to act on what you learn.

But beware! Conversing intelligently about the photos requires more than a mere viewing. To most, other than a few specialized experts, they appear utterly mysterious.²

Yet, lay persons with some assistance can make well-considered observations regarding them.

To do so, they need three things. First, they need the history. Then they need an opportunity for efficient study. Lastly, and most importantly, they need enthusiasm, that is, enthusiasm for the history and for probing the evidence.

Below, I relate the history.

Furthermore, I guide an efficient online study of the photos.

But what about the enthusiasm? 

Possibly viewing a 30-second video might spark something. It shows, of all things, a technological process being applied to a piece of metal.

Wow! How thought-provoking and intriguing can that be?

Well, take a look at the video below.

Glance momentarily at its millimeter ticker in the top left corner. When it gets to .20 mm, focus particularly on the object’s top right. 

Alternatively, watch the red bar on the right graph. When it approaches the major breach, focus on your screen’s top right.

It also helps to move your cursor over the top right and click. This expands the image.

Click here. ³

Now just watch.

Did you see anything?

Maybe you perceived only happenstance cracks, dents, and scratches on a very old piece of lead.

But, what about a stick man, a mace, some crossed hockey sticks? Maybe you detected some squiggly lines, a bent arm with an open hand, and a couple of ox skulls?

A canon of human history may hang upon which of these assessments is correct.

Regardless of what you saw, this viewing likely raises questions like:

• What is the story here?
• How could that story impact history?
• Why should I or others care?

This memorandum seeks to prepare you for these and other issues.

Hopefully, at its end, you can more confidently engage these inquiries:

• Whether there is anything to see here?; and
• If so, so what?”

Now another question: What reading of the video’s millimeter ticker most colors your present impression about the Curse Tablet? What did you see or fail to see then?

Let me know your response in the comment section below.

Thank you for engaging this topic with me thus far!

Our next post, the first of our review of the Curse Tablet’s history, I entitle: “The Paradigm”.

I look forward to continuing with you there.

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Next Post: “The Paradigm“

1. Melanie Lidman, Academic article on controversial 3,200-year old ‘curse tablet’ fails to sway experts, The Times of Israel,14 May 2023, paragraph 37,  https://www.timesofisrael.com/academic-article-on-controversial-3200-year-old-curse-tablet-fails-to-sway-experts/, (7 October 2024).
   and
   Sean McDowell, Oldest Hebrew Writing? Mt. Ebal Curse Tablet (Revisited) m.youtube.com>watch, (33:59), 11 May 2023. ↩︎
2. Id. 4:51 and 30:54; and
   Melanie Lidman, Academic article on controversial 3,200-year old ‘curse tablet’ fails to sway experts, The Times of Israel, 14 May 2023, paragraph 15,  https://www.timesofisrael.com/academic-article-on-controversial-3200-year-old-curse-tablet-fails-to-sway-experts/, (7 October 2024).  ↩︎
3. Scott Stripling, “You are Cursed by the God YHW,” an early Hebrew inscription from Mt. Ebal,  Heritage Science, 12 May 2023,  Supplementary Information, Additional file 1, https://heritagesciencejournal.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s40494-023-00920-9#Fig7, (7 October 2023). ↩︎