A Defixio?

The Mt. Ebal Curse Tablet

Facts

History V

[Post eleven of thirty-three]

What landed in Snyder’s tray was a defixio, an ancient curse tablet. ¹

In Snyder’s analysis, Stripling and many of their experienced associates concurred. Why? These they had often seen. From the Greco-Roman world, they are common archaeological finds. ²

Still, they also recognized the irony. ³ They found this in Deuteronomy’s “Mountain of Curses!” ⁴

Stripling also understood that this artifact posed a problem. Zertal dated the altar site from 1400 to 1250 B.C. He concluded this from careful pottery analysis. But Stripling knew that defixios dated to the Greek and Roman eras. ⁵ That is primarily Fourth Century B.C. onward. A curse tablet seemed inappropriate by around a millennium.

He, however, was aware of a precedent.

The Book of Job speaks of Job’s desire to write on lead with an iron pen (Job 19:24).

Many scholars consider that book the oldest biblical text. One reason is that it does not allude to the Law of Moses. ⁶

The defixio concept could have come from that or a similar ancient tradition. ⁷

Will new clues give insights? Find out in my next post.

Now, here are some questions. What was your earliest encounter with the idea of a defixio? What was the context?

Let me know in the comments.

Next post: “An Inscription!”

1. Associates for Biblical Research, “ABR Researchers Discover the Oldest Known Proto-Hebrew Inscription Ever Found”, biblicarchaeology.org/ current-events-list/, Youtube, (06:24), March 24, 2022. ↩︎
2. Associates for Biblical Research, YaHWeh Curse Tablet: A Tsunami from Mt. Ebal, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU5njOpRCHQ&t=85s, (27:18) 1 November 2024. ↩︎
3. Id. (27:57) ↩︎
4. Associates for Biblical Research, “ABR Researchers Discover the Oldest Known Proto-Hebrew Inscription Ever Found”, biblicarchaeology.org/ current-events-list/, Youtube, (11:15), March 24, 2022.(11:15) ↩︎
5. Associates for Biblical Research, YaHWeh Curse Tablet: A Tsunami from Mt. Ebal, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU5njOpRCHQ&t=85s, (28:16) 1 November 2024. ↩︎
6. Breaking News “Mount Ebal Curse Tablet Peer Review Complete”, Appian Media In Roads, May 12, 2023 (!0:20)  ↩︎
7. Associates for Biblical Research, YaHWeh Curse Tablet: A Tsunami from Mt. Ebal, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU5njOpRCHQ&t=85s, (28:43) 1 November 2024. ↩︎

To view the memorandum from the beginning, click here.

For the composite footnotes, click here.