Free Republic

“King David and King Solomon lived merry, merry lives, With many, many concubines and many, many wives. But when old age crept after them, with many, many qualms, King Solomon wrote the Proverbs and King David wrote the Psalms.” There are several versions of this anonymous rhyme, but the problem, some biblical archaeologists argue, is that there is little evidence that either king existed: archaeological remains have been assigned to their reigns on the basis of cryptic verses in the Old Testament, and then used to “prove” the date of similar buildings at other sites. Until 15 years ago, Professor...

According to the so-called high chronology, the transition occurred around 1000 or 980 B.C.E. It is generally recognized that David conquered Jerusalem in about 1000 B.C.E. According to the low chronology, the transition to Iron Age IIa occurred around 920-900 B.C.E. Other opinions place the transition somewhere between the two -- in about 950 B.C. The date is important because the date you choose will determine whether David and Solomon reigned in the archaeologically poor and archaeologically poorly documented Iron I or in the comparatively rich and richly documented Iron IIa. However, the differences in data between the various schools...

More on The King of Salomon Stone Tablet Three days ago we published "Temple of Salomon Re-Confirmed" Prof. Nadav Neeman, is a historian who recently wrote a book that is based on the assumption, that the book of Kings was written many years after the events described in it, and that the author of the book was forced to rely on sources predating the period in which he lived, in order to be able to reconstruct events that took place before his time. He commented to us that the Jehoash inscription is written in ancient Phoenician script on a black...

A group of Republican leaders including the vice-chair of the Republican National Committee say they will try in January to pass a resolution accusing President George Bush and congressional Republican leaders of embracing "socialist" policies. Pretty blunt. (having some trouble accessing the website since it was put up on Drudge Report)

That night God appeared to Solomon and said to him, "Ask for whatever you want me to give you"...Give me wisdom and knowledge, that I may lead this people, for who is able to govern this great people of yours? 2 Chronicles 1:7,10 This is truly an amazing passage of Scripture. It gives us great insight into how God thinks. Solomon could have asked for anything at all. Granted, he was king over Israel and he could have commanded any material or societal whim he desired. But he had all of that. He wanted something that was lasting and meaningful....

Mon Jan 14 2007 14:24:11 ET WASHINGTON, DC - The Washington Times today announced the appointment of John F. Solomon as executive editor to succeed Wesley Pruden, who is retiring after 25 years in The Washington Times newsroom. Solomon brings to the newsroom's leadership over two decades of journalism experience, with a strong background in investigative reporting and managing interactive digital content. "John Solomon's appointment is a great step forward for The Washington Times, and is good news for our readers, staff and advertisers," said Thomas P. McDevitt, president of The Washington Times. "He is a working journalist, innovative manager,...

Yale Law to allow military recruiters By JOHN CHRISTOFFERSEN, Associated Press Writer 40 minutes ago Yale Law School will end its policy of not working with military recruiters following a court ruling this week that jeopardized about $300 million in federal funding, school officials said Wednesday. Yale and other universities had objected to the Pentagon's "don't ask, don't tell" policy that allows gay men and women to serve in the military only if they keep their sexual orientation to themselves. Yale Law School had refused to assist military recruiters because the Pentagon wouldn't sign a nondiscrimination pledge. The 2nd U.S....

Last update - 09:58 28/08/2007 At Galilee site, solving a mystery from the time of Solomon By Jack Khoury A wooden sign stands at the entrance to the dirt road leading to the Segev Forest in the Western Galilee, inscribed with the symbol of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). Beneath it in fading green letters is the name "Rosh Zayit Ruin." Without perusing the entrance to the dirt road carefully, you might not see the weed-covered sign, and not realize that this is the entrance to a very special archaeological site. Only an all-terrain vehicle can reach the place because...

Tsunami victims hunt for food By Nick Squires in Sydney Last Updated: 1:33am BST 04/04/2007 Video: Devastation of the Solomon Islands (Click on site to see) Desperate survivors of the tsunami that hit the Solomon Islands scavenged for food and drinking water yesterday as authorities said the number of deaths had reached 28 and was likely to rise. A day after a powerful earthquake unleashed a 16ft wall of water on the western part of the South Pacific country, up to 25 aftershocks hit the region. Scientists said that more tsunamis could follow. The tremors spread further fear among the...

Dozens feared dead in Solomon Islands tsunami Staff and agencies Monday April 2, 2007 Guardian Unlimited (UK) Dozens of people were feared dead today in the Solomon Islands after an undersea earthquake caused a powerful tsunami to sweep across the low-lying South Pacific nation. The quake, and a series of aftershocks, prompted a tsunami alert across much of the Pacific region, with beaches closed and ferries cancelled as far away as Sydney amid fears of a disaster on the scale of the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004, which killed more than 250,000 people. Although the alert elsewhere was scaled...

Israeli government authorities are building a ramp to allow non-Muslims to reach the enormous platform atop the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The old access ramp was condemned as unsafe and torn down several years ago. The interim ramp that replaced it was designed for short-term service only. (Muslims control the Temple Mount and therefore have their own private access routes.) The new ramp is controversial. Some ramp must be built or non-Muslims will have no way to reach the Mount; but leading Israeli archaeologists say that the ramp under construction is badly placed and ought to be someplace else. This...

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld should withhold federal funds from a California college given the failure of the college to ensure the safe presence of military recruiters on campus, the Secretary was advised by a public interest law firm in a letter released today. According to news reports, military recruiters were forced to flee yesterday from a University of California Santa Cruz job fair because of a raucous mob. Mountain States Legal Foundation advised Rumsfeld that the college’s actions violate the Solomon Amendment, which requires that colleges permit military recruiters on campus or lose all federal funds. UC Santa Cruz...

CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS'S UNANIMOUS opinion for the Supreme Court in Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Individual Rights, upholding the constitutionality of the Solomon Amendment against challenge by a coalition of law schools and law faculties, decisively resolved the essential legal issues presented by the case. The 8-0 decision (Justice Alito did not participate) made matters crystal clear: Congress, without infringing law schools' and law professors' First Amendment rights of speech and association, may condition federal funding to universities on law schools' granting access to military recruiters equal to that provided other employers. The Solomon Amendment leaves law schools...

Law schools that challenged the Solomon Amendment, a federal law passed in 1994 that eliminates federal funding to universities that deny equal access to military recruiters, tried to hide behind noble motives. The Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, for example, claimed that its support of academic freedom and nondiscrimination required law schools to bar military recruiters from campus because of the military's discriminatory "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays.This week, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the lawsuit unanimously. As the opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts noted, the Solomon Amendment doesn't, in any way, limit universities' rights...

This is an excellent book that is both a detailed military history and a historical apologetics book. The authors' foundational point is that the military campaigns of the OT are so detailed that they couldn't have been fabricated and are not fables like some skeptics and liberal scholars would like us to believe. The authors do an incredible job at drawing out details from the English and Hebrew texts. This coupled with their own knowledge and experience in warfare, they paint a detailed picture of the Israeli campaigns. They also make many comparisons to later battles, leaders and campaigns in...

U.S. allows Muslim 'fox in the henhouse' Guest panelist threatened America, openly supported terror groups Posted: March 20, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern Editor's note: WorldNetDaily is pleased to have a content-sharing agreement with Insight magazine, the bold Washington publication not afraid to ruffle establishment feathers. Subscribe to Insight at WorldNetDaily's online store and save 71 percent off the cover price. By Kenneth R. Timmerman © 2004 Insight/News World Communications Inc. The congressionally funded United States Institute of Peace hosted an event yesterday in Washington on reforming Islam, with a guest panelist who has threatened the United States and openly supported...

December 6th, 2005 National Day of Counter-Recruitment December 6, 2005, is the day that the Supreme Court decides whether or not the Soloman Act, which requires schools to allow recruiters on campus, or lose federal funding. Armed Forces Recruiting Stations may be targeted for anti-military demonstrations. Anti-military protestors are planning to demonstrate at the Library Mall, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, at 2 PM. They will then proceed to the Armed Forces Recruitment Center on University Square or the ROTC office. Also demonstrations to take place on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court. Counter demonstrations by those in support...

WHEN NAVY JUDGE ADVOCATE GENERAL RECRUITER Brian Whitaker visited Yale Law School in October 2003 to meet with students interested in serving as Navy lawyers, his reaction must have been something like that of the man who was tarred and feathered and ridden out of town on a rail; if it weren't for the honor of the thing, he'd probably rather have passed on it. Virtually all Yale law students had signed a petition vowing that they would not meet with Whitaker or other JAG recruiters. The petition was publicly displayed inside the law school as part of a protest...

Hearing about the great wisdom of Solomon, the queen of Sheba went to Jerusalem to see if he was really as wise as people had been telling her. She tested Solomon with difficult questions, and finally concluded that Solomon was even wiser than she had been told - so wise that he just might have the answer to a question that was really troubling her. "We have in our kingdom a difficult case, King Solomon. We have a helpless woman we just can't decide what to do with. For 15 years, she has been able to do almost nothing for...

"Please, Lord," I groused plaintively last week as I stood a few yards from where Terri Schiavo lay dying because a gaggle of public officials had decided her life was not worth living. "Please don't let one more person tell me how 'complex' this whole case has become." If I heard the "complexity" response once, I think I heard it a hundred times. Worst of all, I probably even thought it a few times myself. But the Terri Schiavo case is "complex" only in the sense that any of our sinful behavior is complicated. Sometimes, it is true, we weave...

Judaism considers it the holiest place on earth. Muslims say it's the third holiest. Christianity reveres the spot as being of great historic importance. But if someone prays there, if he or she is not Muslim, the worshiper will be immediately arrested. Welcome to the Temple Mount. The Temple Mount is the large area directly behind the Western Wall in Jerusalem. It is the site of Judaism's first and second Temples, the primary area of worship for the Jewish faith and the location in which Gods "shekhina," or presence, is thought by Jews to reside. The area is about the...

The name Goliath, like Achish, is not Semitic, but rather Anatolian (McCarter 1980, 291, Mitchell 1967, 415; Wainwright 1959, 79). Not all agree though; the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (2:524) proposes that Goliath may have been a remnant of one of the aboriginal groups of giants of Palestine who now were in the employ of the Philistines. [1. Naveh (1985, 9, 13 n. 14) states that Ikausu, the name of the king of Ekron in the seventh century b.c., is a non-Semitic name that can be associated with that of the Achish of Gath in David's time. The name in...

Posted on Sat, Sep. 04, 2004 King Solomon’s name lingers at ‘Armageddon’ digging site By Bill Broadway Washington PostGeorge Washington University student Sarah Loyer, left, and Mariana Litvin, a student from Buenos Aires, Argentina, excavate a portion of what is called Solomon’s Palace in Megiddo, Israel. Five George Washington University students and their archaeology professor went to Armageddon this summer, not to search for clues to a cosmic battle yet to come between good and evil, but to seek understanding of civilizations past. One of the most important issues they addressed was whether a palace attributed to King Solomon in...

HERO’S BURIAL: Gen. John MacDonald, official representative of the US army, hands over the American flag to Helen Therriem, mother of Fil-American US army specialist Solomon Bangayan (inset) who was killed in action in Iraq earlier this month. Bangayan was given the Bronze Star, Purple Heart and the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal as he was buried in his hometown of Sudipen in La Union yesterday.

Oct. 13, 2003 (Supreme Court of Israel:) Ultra-nationalists barred from Temple Mount By ETGAR LEFKOVITS Acting on police recommendations, the Supreme Court on Monday barred the leader of the fringe Temple Mount Faithful group, and the head of another small ultra-nationalist organization, from ascending the Temple Mount on Monday morning. The high court rejected an appeal by Gershon Solomon, and Yehuda Etzion to enter the ancient compound, after police warned that visits by either men could lead to bloodshed at the bitterly contested holy site. The Temple Mount was reopened to non-Muslims two months ago, after nearly three years when...

20 facts which dramatically illustrate how history has been totally distorted for political and propaganda purposes in the present Middle East crisis. Unfortunately, for the most part, the world’s news media lets this information pass them by without critical analysis or incorporating it into their own editorial thrust, which often goes against Israel. 1. Nationhood and Jerusalem. Israel became a nation in 1312 B.C, 2,000 years before the rise of Islam. 2. Arab refugees in Israel began identifying themselves as part of a Palestinian people in 1967, two decades after the establishment of the modern State of Israel. 3. Since...

Science & Technology 5/5/03 Article of Faith A stone tablet could be a relic of King Solomon's temple--or a clever forgery By Betsy Carpenter Solomon's Temple was the glory of Jerusalem after its completion in the 10th century B.C. Fronted by colossal bronze columns, it was said to be built of hewn limestone. The nave was lined with fragrant cedar and held a massive golden table and altar. In an inner sanctuary guarded by gilded olive-wood doors, even the walls glistened with gold. The sole remaining testimony to this wondrous temple is the biblical account--and now, perhaps, a dark slab...

Powerful earthquake hits Solomon Islands A powerful earthquake has hit the Solomon Islands. There are no immediate reports of injuries after the quake, which hit between the impoverished South Malaita and Makira regions. The US Geological Survey said the 7.2 magnitude quake struck 120 miles east-northeast of Bougainville island, 20 miles under the earth's surface. Honolulu's Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre said the tremor could have created a tsunami, or giant wave, and has issued alerts for the island nations of Nauru, New Caledonia, the Marshall Islands and Fiji. The Tsunami Warning Centre also put Samoa, New Zealand, American Samoa, Guam,...

THE scene is straight from The Maltese Falcon. A secret hotel rendezvous, and a Jewish messenger and his silent Arab accomplice waiting while the learned Israeli academic peers at a black stone tablet. Written in stone: the tablet has been carbon-dated at 2,300 years old but doubts remain about its true origins This was how it began a year and a half ago, the first sighting of what is either a state-of-the-art hoax or an ancient Hebrew inscription — more than 2,000 years old — confirming the Biblical account of Solomon’s temple. The fragment, 31cm x 24cm x 7cm of...

Solomon Islanders survive cyclone unscathed By Kathy Marks in Sydney 05 January 2003 Inhabitants of two remote South Pacific islands in the Solomons chain appear to have survived a massive cyclone unscathed, but they face an uncertain future, with villages and crops destroyed and their government ill-equipped to help them rebuild their lives. A week after Cyclone Zoe pounded the volcanic outcrop of Tikopia with high winds and huge waves, islanders told a New Zealand cameraman who landed there by helicopter that the entire population of more than 1,000 people had escaped by fleeing to mountain shelters, their traditional hideouts....

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada author Clive Douglas Campbell and Phoenix, Arizona, USA publisher Selah Publishing Group are pleased to announce the release of Messiah: 2030. Nobody knows the day and hour of the Second Coming, but the following years are on the front cover: Messiah: 2030 Cluny: 1030 Jesus: 30 David: 970 Abraham: 1970 Noah: 2970 Adam: 3970 Messiah: 2030 claims the Bible prophesies a sixth Arab-Israeli war will be over in 2003 and include the following: --the Palestinians will be deported to Jordan --Israel will go to war with Jordan, possess Jordanian land east of the Jordan River and King...

The "compassionate" president could use a little compassion himself right now. While George W. Bush masterfully rose to the occasion after Sept. 11 in launching America's war on terrorism, he's not faring as well on his quick and steep learning curve about the Israeli-Palestinian war. The former Texas governor wasn't fully prepared for the historical details, moral ambiguities, and diplomatic nuances of America's longest, thorniest foreign dilemma. He's suddenly discovered that all the differences and contradictions in American society about Israel and the Palestinians are reflected among his closest security advisers. He's faltered in his off-the-cuff comments on the...