Do the text tell the tel or do the Tel tell the text? Archaeology’s methods and thinking of those who do it

1.METHODOLOGICAL AND EPISTEMOLOGICAL DIRECTIONS AND CONSTRAINTS:

1.1 The selection of a norm in an anormative society:

---One of the biggest constraints that is laid upon the modern researcher is the epistemological tendencies in archaeological consensus of the burocratic club of archaeological academics.

---Like any of the other sciences they also assume that they are highly original in their focus or approach, not realizing that they are but the reflection of the decade they were schooled and trained in.

---This inability to criticize and analyze their own views in the light of earlier developments and their inability to postulate the future of their acclamations, leads to self-constructed "principles" that expect, no demand from the younger scientist to adhere.

---In a certain sense the perception of scientists as to what "true archaeology" is, led to an epistemology in the sciences, and the science of archaeology is no exception, that struggled with positivism for longer than half a century.

---The disruptive effects of the Second World War led to a shift in the paradigm of the sciences that affected also the "science" of archaeology.

---From a normativism hunted for and fought about in the pre-War era, the epistemology shifted now towards an anormativism and a relativism.

---The focus blurred with the increasing demand that everything is relative and non-prescriptive, and that eclecticism is the only method that will permit an accommodative approach to the "science of archaeology".

---Since facts are not "reality" any longer but only human observer's attempts to describe what is perceived as reality in a selective manner, the humanistic and rationalistic elements in the sciences received the ultimate focus.

---The sociology of archaeology and the hiarchy of the archaeological endeavor became more important than the objects found at the excavation.

--In the absence of any norm to abide or adhere to, the "science" is viewed as a mere "art" of the beholder.^[1]

---Archaeologists took great pride in the fact that there is not a Bible on the tel.^[2]

---The role of the Bible in archaeology also changed in the post-War period.

---Neo-orthodoxy's attempt to harmonize the criticism of revelation with the acceptance of revelation led to a denial of the reality of the one and paved the way to reconstruct the data of "human perceived encounter revelation" ad hoc as the circumstances of logic and availability of archaeological data demands.

---Since the neo-orthodox academics felt that the writers of the text of revelation only selected data that impressed them, human error included, it leaves the academic free to also select other data (seen as `extra' data) to bring the so-called "fuller picture" of the past. ---The Umwelt is then read into the text since it is placed on an equal par with the text.

---In an anormative society this is perfectly legitimate. ---Such is the postulates of nihilists, atheists and their admirers struggling to be theistic humanists.

1.2 Do the text tell the tel or do the tel tell the text?

---The dialectic issue of the relationship of the science of literature to the science of archaeology, received pertinent attention from scholars.

1.2.1 The Agnostic archaeologists focused on the artifacts as their prime source of information and are even willing to adjust the literature or "improve" its correctness.

1.2.2 The Biblical Apologetic archaeologists attempts to demand the prime function of the Bible as a source of information of the reality of the past and thus classify or arrange the artifacts according to the way they fit into the Biblical picture.

1.2.3 The Parochial Apologetic archaeologists attempts to uncover and identify nationalistic and ethnic history by focusing by way of publications and reconstruction archaeology for the sake of tourists, on the prime periods of their history.

---This last approach contains strong elements of "propaganda towards selfrealization".

---Since the focus is politically and military, the Bible is only used to serve the purpose of proving that militant endeavor.

---Admittedly, the Bible is abused and misused in all three categories of archaeological scientists, each who has his own hidden agenda that he/she is operating from or towards.

---It still remains a question as to what the function is of the Bible in its relationship to the tel?

1.3 Hermeneutical limitations of the text and methodological constraints of the tel:

Certain postulates can be considered as valuable and relevant for an investigation of this nature:

1.3.1 Whether one belongs to the school of neo-orthodoxy in typical theistic-humanistic fashion or whether one belongs to the phanerotic-theistic school of thinking, one fact remains, both the text and the tel are selected fragments of a past reality.

---The dialectical issue will be around the question as to how much of the reality is represented by either the one or the other.

---It is thus detrimental to the science of the past to ignore the one or the other.

---However, a view that the one or the other or both are only representing reality partially and that fiction and unavailability of data prevents the "full" understanding of reality contains elements of destruction of the science.

---The permeating question is then, if the text and tel represent only partial reality, does this give the scientist freedom to reconstruct his/her own perceived reality on an ad hoc basis.

---If this is the case, then admittedly archaeology is not a science but an art.

---It is the art of reconstructing not necessarily what happened in the past at the tel, but what the academic perceived as to have happened at the tel in the past.

---In such an endeavor of science, the survival of the concepts is done by manipulating the admirers of the "archaeological artist" into a consensus of admiration and expectancy for more similar concepts.

---Data are applied to fulfill its task in the archaeological politics and the power struggle, characterized by the dialectical nature of the archaeological endeavor.

---The consensus are not reached by quiet analysis but by emotive and evaluative attachments to the personality and other aspects of the archaeologist.

---In such a dialectical archaeological endeavor the admirers are merely selecting data and topics for investigation that will nullify the opposition or that will support the debating activist.

1.3.2 The data of the text is limited within chronological barriers that cannot be mechanically adapted or changed on an ad hoc basis.

---The data of archaeology awaits to be "allocated" or "allotted" to timeperiods.

---The chronology of the textual data is fixed and settled internally from within the text but the chronology of the archaeological data is assigned by the observer, as an outside attachment.

1.3.3 The data of the text will only coincide with the realities of the tel if the interpreter allows the text to speak forcefully from within.

---That is to say, a superimposition of artificial paradigms on the text from the outside will endanger interpretations of the artifacts and data of archaeology.

1.3.4 The Gestalt theory poses to be one of the major dilemmas in archaeological interpretation.

---The term "Gestalt" is a German word that means "form" or "organization".

---This theory is applied by the director of the excavation and his associates as a reaction against the Structuralistic theory of the volunteer and others.

---The Structuralistic theory of the volunteer means that the volunteer attempts to recognize the elements of the structure(s) and how these elements are associated with each other.

---The director and his associates operates from the Gestalt theory that implies that the reality of the past cannot be constructed from the association of individual elements of the composition.

---According to them, a structured meaningful unit only develops from the independent elements.

---This unit is called a Gestalt, which is more than the sum of its composite parts.

---They deny that the analysis of the isolated elements can be a true representation of the whole.

---In practical terms, it is the structural analysis of the volunteer on a first level interpretation that leads the supervisor to recognize and the director to sanction the interpretation.

---Due to the director's advantage of more than one dig, and his ability to be anywhere at an excavation at the same time, his Gestalt theorizing outwit that of the Structuralistic volunteer and Gestalt interpretation adapts, suppress and change Structuralistic interpretation.

---The hierarchical advantage of the Gestalt interpretation over the Structuralistic interpretation causes the individual volunteers to be aware of the "Gestalt theories" of the tel and this creates an expectancy that helps the Structuralistic volunteer to "recognize" what he/she expects. In most cases this process results in a hermeneutical circle where the theories of the director are continually sensitive in the mind of the volunteer, who discovers something that will support again the theories of the director.

---The internal fallacy of this theory is that its major criticism against the perception that the composite parts can tell a story lends itself to the illusion that the Gestalt interpretation is the "full" story.

---In reality, even after decades of excavation, only a fragment of the tel is exposed.

---The  full "Gestalt" is thus outside the scope of the interpreter.

---The dilemma in modern research is to superimpose the fragment onto the rest of the tel as if this is the full reality of the past.

---The Gestalt theorist then believes so strongly in this fragmented part of reality, that he/she is willing to deny realities claimed by the text but not found on the tel and even proceed further, namely, to adapt the text.

---The Gestalt theorist operates under the silent illusion that ten or more seasons entitled him/her to superimpose the fraction of exposed areas' results on the rest of the unexposed areas of the tel.

---Claims are made such as: "no destruction layer was found at the date indicated by the MT"; "the absence of a wall indicate that the redactors of the Biblical tradition composed their story in a time when the realities of the past was vague and imprecise".^[3]

1.3.5 Although both the tel and the text are under the constrains that they are "interpreted" and that human error can be possible in both, yet if one compares the amount of internal controls that can be enacted by the text to that of the tel it is clear that those of the text are more.

---Chronology is less vague in the text than it is in the tel.

---This means that generalizations like "Iron Age II ceramic" covers several centuries as opposed to the Biblical dating, sometimes as narrow as the very day of the event.