National Geographic: Riddles of the Bible - Second Season

Once upon a time, a small boy slew a giant...

and saved his people.

The Bible says he went on to conquer Jerusalem,

and give the wandering lsraelites a home.

His son, Solomon the Wise, built them a temple,

put the Arc Of The Covenant in it and filled their coffers with wealth.

David and Solomon made lsrael a nation.

Were they historical figures or mere legends?

After 3,000 years, can any trace of these Biblical giants survive?

From lsrael to Egypt, from Syria to Jordan,

follow the intriguing trail of evidence

in search of the lost kings of lsrael.

lt's a story familiar to most of us.

The ultimate saga of the underdog.

3,000 years ago, in the dusty valley of Gath,

the inexperienced army of the lsraelites stood face to face against the mighty Philistine army.

For hundreds of years, the story of the lsraelites had been one of sorrow and wandering,

slavery and flight into wilderness.

But that was about to change.

The battle-hardened Philistine warriors were ready to wreak havoc.

Their ten-foot champion, Goliath,

called for a single combat to decide the battle.

No-one dared step forward...

until a young boy took up his slingshot,

a stone...and his courage...

..and fired.

He stunned the giant.

And when Goliath fell to the ground,

David triumphantly cut off Goliath's head with his own sword.

lt was David who went on to conquer Jerusalem and give the Jews a home at last.

200 years of wandering and fighting since the exodus were over.

According to the Bible, his son Solomon was no less extraordinary.

He famously showed his wisdom when two mothers appeared before him,

each claiming the same baby as hers.

Solomon ordered a knife to be pointed at the baby.

One of the women pleaded with him to spare the child, even if the other got the baby.

Solomon judged her to be the real mother.

He strengthened his father's kingdom,

built the legendary temple...

..and made it the centrepiece of the Jewish religion.

Without David and Solomon, there would be no Jewish land.

David and SoIomon are very important figures in IsraeIite history.

EspeciaIIy David. He pIays such an important roIe in the Iater traditions...

..of Judah and IsraeI and, much Iater, even Christian traditions.

David is revered not just by the Jewish people.

Jesus traces himself back to King David through his mother Mary.

And Muslims revere David and Solomon as holy prophets.

The legends of David and Solomon run like golden threads

through the texts of three monotheistic religions.

So the question of whether they lived or not is no small matter to millions of people today.

Sceptics have dismissed the stories asjust that.. stories.

To begin an investigation into the reality of David and Solomon,

one first has to know when exactly they might have lived.

Fortunately, on this matter, there is a great deal of scholarly consensus.

If David and SoIomon had existed, it wouId have been in the tenth century BCE.

This is something that every schoIar agrees upon.

Everything eIse they argue about. But if they Iived, it wouId have been the tenth century BCE.

Archaeologists have been digging for more than 1 00 years in Jerusalem,

searching for any solid evidence from the tenth century, however small,

that David and Solomon actually existed.

When we are asked, we archaeoIogists, what have we found from the tenth century BC -

that is, the days of David and SoIomon in JerusaIem -

I have to be honest: very, very IittIe.

But lack of physical evidence is not proof

that David and Solomon were merely mythological figures.

One of the reasons why archaeologists have come up empty-handed

is because this ancient city is the epicentre

of one of the world's most brutal and long-standing land disputes.

Any quest to seek out the past gets caught up in the politics of the present.

But that's not the only problem.

Jerusalem is one of the cradles of civilisation, continuously occupied for thousands of years.

Razed and rebuilt many times.

Can we really expect to find any clues to David and Solomon

in a city that has had so many makeovers since their time?

There is one place in this amazing city that has been relatively untouched.

And it is underground.

Here in the oldest part of the city, known as the City of David,

archaeologist Ronny Reich may have found an intriguing confirmation

of a Biblical story of David.

According to the book of Samuel,

David used an ancient tunnel or gutter system to lay siege to the city of Jerusalem,

which was ruled by his enemies.. the Jebusites.

''And David said on that day, Whosoever getteth up to the gutter,

and smiteth the Jebusites, he shaII be chief and captain.''

If indeed David has captured JerusaIem as the OId Testament teIIs us,

then there was a huge fortification for him to overcome.

And there were underground rock cuts, tunneIs,

which he couId take advantage of...

and find himseIf into the city in a cIandestine way...

and capture it by surprise.

But until recently, the only tunnel archaeologists had found was from a much later period.

You see here, coming out from the rock,

from beIow me, are the waters of the Spring Gihon -

of the bibIicaI spring Gihon.

Today it fIows into that tunneI, which is Hezekiah's TunneI.

800BC.

800BC. Too recent.

As was King Hezekiah - a descendent of King David who built this tunnel

to channel water into the city.

For decades, archaeologists knew only of this tunnel.

But Ronny Reich recently discovered a more ancient tunnel not far from here.

The find caught the attention of archaeologists and Biblical scholars.

You can see it's rock cut by man...

from surface, down.

And covered with huge bouIders.

This is 800BC,

whereas this one is 1 800BC.

Shards of pottery found among these huge boulders

helped Ronny establish that this tunnel dated to around 1,800BC.

So it existed here well before David.

Could this be the tunnel that David used to capture Jerusalem and make it his capital?

The BibIicaI story teIIs us how David captured the city

but we're not exactIy sure what exactIy went on.

The word that is used may be described as a water tunneI.

It couId aIso be a grappIing hook. It couId aIso be a scaIing Iadder.

We reaIIy don't know the situation.

If we know the meaning of the ancient Hebrew word,

and if Ronny Reich has discovered the proper set of tunneIs,

then we might be abIe to say that the Hebrew BibIicaI account is correct.

But there are so many ifs invoIved that we reaIIy don't know what we can and can't say.

The search for David in his own city

has revealed a tunnel that might tell us of his clever tactics,

but little else about David himself.

lt turns out that the best evidence we have for David comes not from his city or his people,

but from his arch enemies.

David, the Bible says, was a superb military ruler.

After establishing his kingdom with its capital in Jerusalem,

David led the lsraelites from one victory to another

in battles against his mighty neighbours..

the Moabites, the Edomites,

the Ammonites and the Aramaeans.

With this conquered land, he established the Davidic Empire

that extended over both sides of the Jordan River,

as far as the Mediterranean Sea,

paving the way for his son Solomon to inherit a strong empire,

in which, for the first time, it was safe to build the holy temple...

..and finally house the holiest of holy relics.

The Arc Of The Covenant.

And the greatest testament to David's importance

and, as yet, the most tangible clue that David was a real human made of flesh and blood,

comes from an enemy king who records a victory over David's descendants

on a piece of stone called the Tel Dan Stele.

The TeI Dan SteIe is a monumentaI stone inscription...

..incised with Ietters. It is written in Aramaic.

Put up by an Aramaic king, who cIaims that he has...

conquered 70 cities.

And he is setting up this particuIar steIe to commemorate this occasion.

One of the conquests, he claims, shook Biblical archaeology to its core.

The six Ietters say ''Beth David''.

There's the beth and the yodh,

the tav, the daIeth,

the vav and then again the daIeth. Beth David.

These words, Beth David, when translated into English, read House of David.

This is the first time the House of David, or even the name David,

has been found on a non-Biblical source.

For all those who'd been searching for evidence of David's existence,

these six letters were the ultimate find.

lt was clear that David was no mere tribal leader.

He was the founder of a nation that lived on long after his own death.

The discovery of the TeI Dan SteIe in 1 993 and 1 994

was probabIy the singIe most important discovery reIated to David

that's ever been found, because it's the first mention of David

or the House of David outside the BibIe that we've got.

It shows that David, or a House of David, did exist.

So perhaps, as the Bible says,

David was a great king who led his people to victory in battle,

making his kingdom both large and great.

Great enough that his descendants attracted the attention of an enemy king.

More fragments of David's story can be put together

from evidence left behind by his other enemies.

And the Philistines, one of his biggest rivals, are proving to be a rich cache of information.

ln fact, David's first victory, even before he became king,

was against the Philistine giant, Goliath of Gath.

Based on both archaeological evidence and historical sources,

archaeologists like Aren Maeir

have determined that this mound is the remains of the city of Gath.

We're now standing on TeII es-Safi

which is a Iarge ancient mound, which is identified as Gath of the PhiIistine.

Gath was one of the biggest of the Philistine cities

and the Bible mentions it specifically.

To have found Gath is a huge boost

for archaeologists looking for evidence of Biblical stories from the time of David.

The tenth century BC.

We have very, very impressive evidence of the PhiIistine Gath

from the tweIfth, eIeventh, tenth and ninth century.

Then there is a very substantiaI destruction IeveI in which the entire city is destroyed.

Although David is not credited with the destruction of the city,

the Bible simply stops mentioning Gath around this time.

Archaeologists previously had no explanation

for why Gath had dropped off the Biblical radar screen.

But now they know.

Gath was no longer mentioned because it no longer existed.

A Philistine city destroyed at the time of David's conquests, hometown of Goliath.

ls this the proof that David existed?

lt's not enough for some archaeologists.

Since we found the cities, incIuding Gath,

maybe we couId argue that David existed as weII.

AIternativeIy, one couId take the opposing view that the peopIe writing the BibIe

knew the historicaI context, were abIe to write the story with convincing detaiIs,

and simpIy pIace David into the story.