The Trouble With the Violent Conquest Theory


     There are a number of significant problems with the violent
     conquest theory:

       1. The sites given the biggest press in Joshua for destruction,
          namely Jericho and Ai, cannot be fit into this scheme.
          Jericho doesn't fit because its end came at a much earlier
          time. Ai cannot because it had not been inhabited for a
          thousand years!
       2. The archaeology gives evidence for continuity in occupation
          for sites said in the Bible to have been destroyed.
       3. But the bigger problem is that the entire eastern
          Mediterranean was in an upheaval during the end of the Bronze
          Age. All that upheaval and destruction cannot be attributed
          to Joshua. Something larger is at work that brought economic
          and political collapse to the entire region. Joshua may be a
          construct or a faded memory of this period of disaster. But
          the processes are oversimplified in that book.
       4. In fact, the Egyptians or the Sea Peoples (raiders from the
          Greek areas) might be responsible for the destruction

          Study the Late Bronze and Iron Age data.
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