Customer Reviews

The Invention of Ancient Israel: The Silencing of Palestinian History

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Historical research is usually not the search for pure data, but the search for legitimacy. Professor Whitelam protests, in his refined manner, the use of history "to validate modern political stances."

This book is about the politicization of history. It does not intentionally engage in politics outside of the author's academic discipline. However, the subject matter cannot help but appear more broadly political in our time, when Israel's affairs loom so large in American government and media discussions. The title does inspire reactions in people with strong political feelings, some of whom very obviously do not read the book before making negative (even acerbic and wildly digressing) comments in order to discourage others from reading it.

Prof. Whitelam does not deny that Hebrew settlements existed in ancient times; rather he demonstrates in detailed examples that in some ways the archaeological record has been misinterpreted, or frankly shoe-horned, to fit literal Bible passages. The primary offenders have been European Christian archaeologists and historians via whom "political and religious attitudes of modern scholarship conspire to obscure the ancient politics of the past."

There is no hatred of Israel or Israelis evident anywhere in the book. The tone is consistently unemotional and scholarly. The author did not set out to write about ancient Israel per se but about ancient Palestine, whose history has been ignored and silenced because of the pressure to preserve "an ancient Israel conceived and presented as the taproot of Western civilization."

I must add that Whitelam does not single out Palestine as a unique or special case of the politicization of history. Consider this quote: "European nation states from the Industrial Revolution onwards constructed national histories to justify and idealize their positions in the world. This is particularly true of Great Britain [whose] antiquarians and politicians found vivid illustrations of the people's unique 'national character' that explained and justified Great Britain's unique position in the world."

On nearly every page I found both -

- valuable data, such as a discussion of Pharaoh Merneptah's stele, which has the earliest mention of Israel outside of the Bible; and

- invaluable insights, such as the revelation that "supposed rational results of Western scholarship have been part of a complex network of ideas and associations which are tied to relationships of power."

I recommend reading The Invention of Ancient Israel with a copy of the Old Testament handy for reference. Also, as you can imagine with an academic work that has a 15-page bibliography, a good dictionary will be vital to handle the vocabulary. I like the Merriam-Webster Collegiate, in paperback or electronic form.

Employing a Foucauldian geneology of history, Whitelam finally exposed the reproduction of truths biblical scholars have resorted to in an attempt to bestow legitimacy on their cause. Although, I read the book in Arabic, I felt compelled to comment on the original version and commend Whitelam's systematic and scientific methodology in exposing the myths that shroud the existence of the Zionist movement. Whitelam clearly draws a lot from Said's efforts in Orientalism furthuring the need to situate biblical discourse in the context of imperialism and colonial discourses. It is enough to remember that Israeli historians themsevles are beginning to question the body of 'knowledge' that was created during the course of the 20th century especially in light of the archeological discoveries that have failed to lend credence to the claim an ancient Israeli kingdom existedin the West Bank. In fact, all discoveries so far are corroborating the version of history that stipulates the existence of an Arab and Philistine socieities at the end of the Iron age and the early Bronze agg. The old testement itself contains many contradictions in relation to the manufactured history of the Zionists which served as the main source for biblical reconstructions of history.

Keith Whitelam's construction is first rate. He provides a patient, disciplined, and thoroughly competent survey of the available evidence regarding the historicity and ethnological extraction of the modern populace of Israel. Though this book has aroused ire in the minds of some Zionists, the evidence cited by Whitelam is actually very mundane and thoroughly cognizable to those of us who are competent in the field. Those who have read Arthur Koestler's excellent works on the Medieval eradication of Jewry will find themselves on very familiar ground here. Definitely worth reading.

This is one of the very few objective accounts one can find in the western world about the history of Palestine. The Creation of the so-called "Ancient Israel" is really but a Western literary idea. The Arabic historical reality of Palestine is confirmed in this fascinating Book. The conclusion of the book is that the Now-Israel is just a Myth which is enforced on the rest of the world through Western domination. A must read for any student of history and anyone who search for truth.

Poor Withelam. Some reviews posted here on this book exactly prove the Whitelam theory. I think none of the reviewers, who commented on ideas based on theology and politics, have succeeded in understanding the author.

First, Withelam and other new scholars (revisionist but also eminent) in southern Syrian history, e.g. Palestinian, have shown how political unity and central state power have never been reached in this area in ages prior to 3rd BC. Later, in late 20th century, Israeli scholars and archeologists showed that this unity was never reached in what is known and called the Unified Kingdom, according to history (and not according to prayers made by believers). :)

Second, Whitelam and Thomas L. Thompson have shown why this central state over Phoenicia and southern Syria has never been reached. Please review them to understand this point again. In order to face Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian attacks, a coalition of these city-states was formed as proven by literary documents (Persian, Assyrian, and Egyptian).

Third, another point that Whitelam has focused upon in his studies is 'what' and 'how' other scholars up till the 1970's have studied this topic, and he provided real scientific criticism on their works. He simply included himself among this same old class of scholars and explained how he dared to change his views and cross the bridge from history-theology to history-real facts.

Israel, Judea, Samaria, Yezdrael, Shekem , Hasor, Saidon, Tyr , Byblos, etc. those city-states never made a unity in Syria as has been done in Egypt or old Iraq. Guess why? Simply because it never snows in Iraq and Egypt while it does in Lebanon! A joke that explains a lot.

This was fully explained by new revisionists including Whitelam in his book.

His Book is difficult to read, but also important to read for those interested in knowing truth about Bible and Scholars of the bible. Still i beleive this book is among the best in this domain.

Withelam's target was not to deny a theological idea or other people's beliefs related to their God, but rather to explain how things have been studied in a way to hide historical realities confronted to religious beliefs, where focusing on theology and politics and world's interests has lead history out of its natural track.

Again, poor Whitelam! He is not well understood. I think his book is among the best in this domain. With his book one can also review in detail a multitude of methodologies, bibliographical, and archeological works related to Palestine.

Assumptions previously made are retrieved later. Regardless of his ideas, his book can also be a source to study a multitude of theory and anthology for studying Ancient Palestine (Sorry, Ancient Israel).

Passages of the Quran, as one reviewer used it to prove a historical fact concerning Palestine, show again how Withelam was right. By the way, the holy Quran always distinguished between Sons of Israel and Jews. Sons of Israel in the Quran are tribes like Quraish, People of Lot, and People of Umran and Midyan, while Judaism is a religious sect as the Nazarenes [Nasarah] (Chritians).
...

Whitelam states from the outset that he is not attempting to write a history of Palestine: there was, he says, too much data for him to survey and, moreover, the historiography of Palestine is, in general, so suffused with `Zionism' , conscious or not, to make an attempt at Palestinian historiography impossible.

These are too mutually exclusive assertions. Surely there cannot be too much data (except for Whitelam's limited ability to process)?

It turns out that Whitelam's definition of `Zionism' means an over reliance on the Hebrew tradition.

This is a problematic assertion. Until recently, the Hebrew tradition, along with an ancient Greek text on the Canaanites, was simply almost the entirety of knowledge about ancient Palestine.

This, says, Whitelam, has `silenced' Palestinian history.

However, what most Palestinian Arab Muslims and Christians have believed about ancient Palestine, is what their respective Islamic and Christian traditions tell them. These are both entirely derived, second or third hand, from the Hebrew. Since Whitelam fails to address these authentic Palestinian Arab Christian and Islamic traditions, he could be accused of `silencing', or censoring them himself -as inconducive to his political agenda.

The Hebrew tradition may not be history by 21st century standards (what ancient text or narrative is?), but it remains not only the oldest indigenous Palestinian narrative written by ancient Palestinians about ancient Palestine in an ancient Palestinian dialect, but the only indigenous Palestinian narrative written by ancient Palestinians about ancient Palestine in an ancient Palestinian dialect that has survived.

Moreover, there is no question there was an ancient Israel and Judah, nor David or his successors.

Exodus may be greatly exaggerated, but the context of Habiru slaves escaping from Egypt into Canaan is known from ancient records.

In any case, Whitelam addresses none of these issues from an archaeological or historical perspective.

He merely concerns himself with unmasking `Zionism' in ancient Palestinian historiography.

Even Israel Finkelstein, who is responsible for a greatly revised history of ancient Israel, is too `Zionist' for him.

Whitelam refers to Canaanites as `Palestinians', but not Jews or Israelites, despite the fact that current historiography sees a large Canaanite component to ancient Israel (Hebrew, for instance, is the only surviving spoken member of Canaanite Semitic -in that sense the Hebrew tradition is the only indigenous `Palestinian' Canaanite tradition that has survived).

This surely is a retrojection of his own political concerns into the past. The Hebrew bible antedates modern political Zionism and the Jewish state of Israel by several thousand years.

Whitelam's `antiBible' does not predate the birth of modern Palestinian nationalism and its western supporters.

Moreover, the reason Palestine is the most excavated place in history, and consequently, why we know so much about it, is because of the Hebrew tradition, not despite it.

This tradition has inspired Christians to dig for their spiritual, Jews their spiritual and ethnic origins.

Whitelam presupposes this is de fact illegitimate, despite the fact that the data-that-is-too-extensive-for-him-to-process-to-write-a Palestinian-history has largely been recovered by Israeli Jews.

Israeli archaeologists have found the first Philistine (the origin of the term `Palestine)inscription. Since it tells us nothing the bible does not, Whitelam's colleague, Niels Peter Lemche suspected it fake!

The reports of the demise of ancient Israel have been greatly exaggerated. True, there are some asynchronisms with the conventional chronology, and our picture, as was intended, greatly nuancd. But they are scarcely disastrous. A monumental Jerusalem, for instance, cannot be found at the precise time of Solomon dated conventionally. But it exists mere decades before. The chronology may be wrong.

Moreover, there is over a milliennium of 'Palestinian' Israelite and Jewish history, documented texually and artifactually, ensuing.

In any case, Whitelam addresses none of these issues as he says he is not writing a history.

Curiously, though professing to write an apology for modern Palestinian Arab nationalist ancient historiography, not once does Whitelam discuss the origin of the term `Palestine', not its place in such an enterprise.

`Syria Palaestina' was created following the Roman suppression of the second Jewish revolt to erase all national Jewish existence for ever -in modern parlance `ethnic cleansing'.

The term 'Palestine', when used of previous periods, is thus a convenient geographical metaphor.

Whitelam, however, uses it in a blatantly revisionist nationalist manner.

`Palaestina' means of the `Plistim', or 'Philistines', the original European colonials in `Palestine'.

But Whitelam has been saying for most of his book that ancient Israel is a `European invention': he is hardly going to suggest that the eponymous ancestors of the Palestinians were themselves Europeans.

Whitelam attempts to label ancient Israel as a work of `orientalism', a patronising European, essentially imperialist or colonialist invention or construct.

This is extraordinary. If the ancient Israelites and Jews were not themselves `orientals', and the Plistim, Philistines, `Palestinians', Europeans, then what were they?

The Hebrew text is an `oriental' indigenous product of Palestine (before, in fact, it was Palestine).

The same can scarcely be said of `The invention of ancient Israel: the silencing of Palestinian history'.

I always wanted to know the History of Palestine from a different perspective than the classical biblical perspective, that already we know, which is the strictly Jewish narrative that we have heir through Christianity. I am sure that the peoples that have inhabited Palestine are culturally so rich or richer than the Jewish People. However we have been deprived, regrettably, of the necessary information to know them. This by the fact of have known only what the biblical writers, narrating the Jewish History, have transmitted us through religions. This book is an opportunity of widening the knowledge and to remove me from the perspective traditionally accepted, but not necessarily real.

I've taught parts of this book in a course Gender, Race and Knowledge that examines the connections between politics and epistemology in the construction of the Middle East. Students were excited about the chapters they read and the way Whitelam described why, how and for whom Western academic constructions of ancient Israel mattered. An excellent book to teach for those interested in the politics of official knowledge.

Dr Whitelam has written a very powerful book. The basic argument is thus. The Europe, America and Israel have needed to control the concept of an alien Israel injected in the Eastern Mediterranean as a tap root of their own civilization. This alienation is required as a means to denigrate the indigenous culture and set Israel apart from inhabitants of the region, to give Israel and by extension Western Judeo Christianity a virgin birth. The way to do this is first to accept the Hebrew testament as an accurate record of the past, ignoring any logical anomalies in the text, the fact that the Old Testament is a written much later than the time it claims to record, and that it is written as the history and in glorification of one tribe. Second western academia ignores the history of non Old Testament Palestine and attempts to fit the archeological evidence into the story, ignoring that which is inconvenient. They also choose to disregard non written evidence, which in essence would mean the disregarding of the majority of the human story. It is the volume of the archeological evidence that is making it harder to continue to maintain the pretense at scholarship. In a memorable example, scholars compare urban lowland settlements to poor hilltop settlement and claim the difference in sophistication is due to the presence of an Israel portrayed as coming from outside Palestine. This book should be read in conjunction with Edward Said's Orientalism, to which Dr. Whitelam refers. He shows how the study of ancient Israel is again another of the orientalist constructs that deny indigenous cultures their voice in order to silence their claim to equality.

Many of the reviewers who object to the book seem not to have read it or to be projecting their own prejudices on to the work. Reviewers such as Seth J. Frantzman seem to fall exactly into the tap that Dr Whitelam points out modern scholars of Palestine fall into, projecting the history of the present Zionist enterprise in to the distance past. Whitelaw does not claim that the Palestinians were Arab or Muslim, or that there was no Israel in Palestine, only that there is little real evidence of a an all powerful Israeli state and that if it did exist it was just a minor state, one of many and that it was definitely an indigenous construct.

Whitelam has prepared a sorely needed work... Critics of Whitelam assert he is insensitive to current ...politics of the area. ...Whitelam provides the reader with a valued list of published materials useful for reseachers. I randomly checked on some of his citations and they are given within the context in which the original authors wrote. Hopefully this work ...will encourage a new generation of scholars to honestly explore historical, literary and archaeological data...