Ancient tablet provides proof of Bible's Old Testament Truths
Pastor Dale Morgan
Ancient tablet provides proof of Bible's Old Testament Truths*
By Nigel Reynolds, Arts Correspondent
Last Updated: 2:28am BST 11/07/2007
The sound of unbridled joy seldom breaks the quiet of the British
Museum's great Arched Room, which holds its collection of 130,000
Assyrian cuneiform tablets, dating back 5,000 years.
A fragment of cuneiform - Tiny tablet provides proof for Old Testament
This fragment is a receipt for payment made by a figure in the Old Testament
But Michael Jursa, a visiting professor from Vienna, let out such a cry
last Thursday. He had made what has been called the most important find
in Biblical archaeology for 100 years, a discovery that supports the
view that the historical books of the Old Testament are based on fact.
Searching for Babylonian financial accounts among the tablets, Prof
Jursa suddenly came across a name he half remembered -
Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, described there in a hand 2,500 years old, as "the
chief eunuch" of Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon.
Prof Jursa, an Assyriologist, checked the Old Testament and there in
chapter 39 of the Book of Jeremiah, he found, spelled differently, the
same name - Nebo-Sarsekim.
Nebo-Sarsekim, according to Jeremiah, was Nebuchadnezzar II's "chief
officer" and was with him at the siege of Jerusalem in 587 BC, when the
Babylonians overran the city.
The small tablet, the size of "a packet of 10 cigarettes" according to
Irving Finkel, a British Museum expert, is a bill of receipt
acknowledging Nabu-sharrussu-ukin's payment of 0.75 kg of gold to a
temple in Babylon.
The tablet is dated to the 10th year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II,
595BC, 12 years before the siege of Jerusalem.
Evidence from non-Biblical sources of people named in the Bible is not
unknown, but Nabu-sharrussu-ukin would have been a relatively
insignificant figure.
"This is a fantastic discovery, a world-class find," Dr Finkel said
yesterday. "If Nebo-Sarsekim existed, which other lesser figures in the
Old Testament existed? A throwaway detail in the Old Testament turns out
to be accurate and true. I think that it means that the whole of the
narrative [of Jeremiah] takes on a new kind of power."
Cuneiform is the oldest known form of writing and was commonly used in
the Middle East between 3,200 BC and the second century AD. It was
created by pressing a wedge-shaped instrument, usually a cut reed, into
moist clay.
The full translation of the tablet reads: (Regarding) 1.5 minas (0.75
kg) of gold, the property of Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, the chief eunuch,
which he sent via Arad-Banitu the eunuch to [the temple] Esangila:
Arad-Banitu has delivered [it] to Esangila. In the presence of Bel-usat,
son of Alpaya, the royal bodyguard, [and of] Nadin, son of
Marduk-zer-ibni. Month XI, day 18, year 10 [of] Nebuchadnezzar, king of
Babylon.