For those who doubt that our myths influence interpretations of forensic evidence try this. It concerns the rebel stand at Masada against the Romans in 73 AD:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070623/ap_on_sc/israel_masada_revisited

From the article:

Ehud Netzer, a veteran Hebrew University archaeologist who participated in the 1960s dig and later oversaw restoration work there, questioned the new findings. Zias is "building a story on assumptions built on assumptions," he said.

I'm sorry, but I must point out that the original interpretation is also built "on assumptions built on assumptions". It will be interesting to follow any developments but I suspect the new interpretation will vanish without trace. There is too much mythology resting on the original interpretation. Again from the article:

"Along with other bodies found at Masada, the remains were recognized as those of Jewish heroes by Israel's government in 1969 and given a state burial, complete with Israeli soldiers carrying flag-draped coffins".

A lot of archeology has to do with interpretation and assumption -eg the discovery of Troy, which was a fabulous find, but just not Homer's city of Troy. We do tend to interpret things according to our beliefs and mores. Another fine example of hi-jacked mythology occurs with the Roman myth of Mithras, the god of their soldiers, (which was itself adopted from another source that I can't remember)! The stories of of Mithras' life, and especially his birth, mirror closely the stories of the birth and early life of Christ as described in the gospels of the New Testament.

Terry says:
I'm sorry, but I must point out that the original interpretation is also built "on assumptions built on assumptions". It will be interesting to follow any developments but I suspect the new interpretation will vanish without trace. There is too much mythology resting on the original interpretation.

I agree with this completely. Far too much depends on this boat remaining unrocked.

I recommended The Bible Unearthed, to a Christian friend of mine, and he had a hissy fit about it. Apparently, if you interpret evidence without the Bible, you're obviously biased against Christianity.

Since no evidence of 1,000,000 Hebrews wandering around Sinai for 40 years was ever found, "Sinai" is now being redefined as Saudi Arabia on one website he sent me.

That's a great book, co-written by an Israeli archeologist, Israel Finkelstein. He's also got another one, "David and Solomon". Deals with the lack of evidence for either. Comes to conclusions that make total sense. Are those conclusions widely available? You bet not. Both books make sense of the origin of biblical myths.

Soilguy wrote:

"Since no evidence of 1,000,000 Hebrews wandering around Sinai for 40 years was ever found, "Sinai" is now being redefined as Saudi Arabia on one website he sent me".

Yes. They can't even agree on what they actually agree on. And yet they criticise evolutionists for disagreeing with each other. Quite humourous really.

Cannot you all love one another? This, I find, is one of the bad fruits of our evolution, is that we have many disagreements between each other. One could presume that this is due to eons of survival of the fittest, in which we competed. And now, we still are in a seemingly competition with one another. We all think that our worldview or philosophy or religion is correct, and that those who don't agree with us are "irrational" or "impeding progress" or something of the sort. We all disagree with one another, I am sure that you are aware of that terrytnewzealand.
We must not be so dogmatic; both those who beleive in evolution or creationism, or anything for that matter. We must put aside our differences and realize that no matter what happened thousands or millions of years ago, we are all family. Perhaps from a common ancestor or from God's handiwork. Disagreement can only hinder us from making this world a greater place. We must rise above the ashes of which we are now given, in order to make a more perfect future. Not engage in archaic name-calling or anything of the sort.

Tim wrote:

"We all disagree with one another, I am sure that you are aware of that terrytnewzealand".

I certainly am. But the myths were obviously simply concocted for political reasons nearly three thousand years ago. My gripe is with those who use these myths for political purposes today. Unfortunately belief in the myths is so widespread in the West that they are very effective for that purpose.