Biblical Archaeology Review

This date cannot be precisely stated since the various proposed chronologies differ by a margin of some ten years.

Arad was an important fortified Israelite city in the Negev where numerous ostraca were found on several levels of the six-times rebuilt citadel.

Detailed scholarly analyses of this important ostracon will soon be published by A. Lemaire and H. Vermusée, and independently by Y. Naveh and O. Goldwasser.

Hieratic script is a cursive form of ancient Egyptian writing.

An ostracon (plural: ostraca) is an inscribed potsherd.

A pithos (plural: pithoi) is a particularly large storage jar.

A “tel” or “tell” is an artificial mound formed by accumulated remains. “Tel” is the spelling used with Hebrew site names; “tell” is the spelling used with Arabic site names.

This genealogy probably contained 14 generations. In Hebrew each letter has a numerical value. The numerical value of David (DVD) is 14. Brown hypothesizes Matthew picked up and developed this idea so that in his genealogy of Jesus, there are 14 generations from Abraham to David, 14 generations from David to the Babylonian Exile, and 14 generations from the Babylonian exile to Jesus (Matthew 1:17). In this way Matthew tied his whole genealogy together.

Kergyma is the Greek term for “proclamation.” In Biblical scholarship it is a technical term for the content of the Christian proclamation about Jesus.