The Biblical Date and the Archaeological Question

The conquest of Jericho belongs to a precise and literal historical framework. The Exodus occurred in 1446 B.C.E.; Israel’s wilderness wandering lasted forty years; Joshua then led the nation across the Jordan in 1406 B.C.E., with Jericho as the first city devoted to destruction (ḥērem) as an offering to Jehovah (Joshua 1–6). This early-date chronology is grounded in the inspired record and coheres with the archaeological profile when interpreted with rigor and fairness. Even the basic outline of events—swift encirclement, a sudden collapse, total burning, and a ban on plunder—finds striking material parallels in the soil of Tell es-Sultan.

Fortifications at Tell Es-Sultan: What the Spades Revealed

Jericho in Joshua’s day was not a flimsy hamlet but a fortified stronghold. Excavations have revealed an engineered defensive system with multiple construction phases, including massive walls and gates protecting the city’s perimeter. These fortifications belong to the Bronze Age horizon associated with the biblical conquest and are documented in meticulous trench plans and stratigraphic profiles. Archaeologists also describe the broader complex of earthworks and walls as part of Jericho’s status as a formidable city-state—exactly the sort of firstfruits stronghold Jehovah ordered Israel to devote to Him at the outset of the campaign.

A key architectural element is the stone retaining or revetment wall at the base of the tell, against which a mudbrick superstructure and rampart were built. Later field photographs and locus notes show collapsed mudbrick piled up at the base of this retaining wall—tangible, visual evidence of a wall system that came down catastrophically.

The Fallen Walls—Collapsed Mudbrick at the Base of the Revetment

The biblical text states that the wall “fell down flat,” enabling Israel to go “up” into the city straight ahead (Joshua 6:20). The most natural material correlate is the broad scatter and draping of mudbrick debris outside the revetment, forming a ready-made ramp that would allow an attacking force to ascend the slope without siege ramps or battering engines. Field descriptions of collapsed brick accumulations precisely at the base of the revetment, rather than merely atop the crest, comport with such a scenario of outward failure. The broader excavation history has repeatedly noted “sudden destruction” of city-wall phases in the Late Bronze horizon, a point long recognized in the technical summaries of the Jericho expeditions.

Houses on the Wall and Rahab’s Rescue

Joshua 2 records that Rahab’s house abutted the city wall, with a window accessible to the exterior. Excavators documented domestic architecture directly adjacent to fortification lines at Jericho, including preserved wall-lines from the city destroyed in the conquest horizon. This pattern of houses pressed against the defenses provides a realistic, urban setting for Rahab’s residence and escape route, without any sensational claims of “finding Rahab’s house.” The archaeological context fits the text’s urban topography with sober exactness.

Destruction by Fire and a Seven-Day Siege

Jericho was not merely breached; it was burned. On the east side of the tell, the destruction stratum shows roughly a meter (about three feet) of burnt ash and debris. One excavator famously summarized, “The destruction was complete,” noting blackened floors, rooms choked with fallen, heavily burned bricks and timbers, and a sequence where collapse preceded the blaze in some rooms—exactly the kind of citywide conflagration the book of Joshua describes.

Equally decisive is the discovery—by both John Garstang and Kathleen Kenyon—of numerous storage jars filled with grain that were scorched in the fire. In antiquity, grain is consumed or looted. But at Jericho, it was left unplundered and burned, a precise archaeological signature of the ḥērem ban: the city and its goods were devoted to Jehovah, not to Israel’s larders. These sealed jars also witness to the brevity of the siege; stores remained full, matching Joshua’s week-long encirclement rather than a starve-out of months. Garstang described the same phenomenon during his campaign; the jars were “full of grain, burned but preserved,” underscoring a rapid capture and ban on plunder. Later excavations likewise reported abundant stored grain within domestic spaces consistent with a destruction shortly after the spring harvest and without a prolonged siege.

Garstang, Kenyon, and the Dating Debate

In the 1930s, John Garstang concluded that Jericho fell around 1400 B.C.E., aligning with the biblical timeline of the conquest immediately after 1406 B.C.E. He tied the collapsed walls and fierce conflagration to Joshua 6. Mid-century, Kathleen Kenyon re-examined the mound with refined stratigraphic methods and argued for a much earlier destruction (ca. 1550 B.C.E.), contending that Jericho lacked a fortification contemporaneous with Joshua. Her judgment catalyzed decades of skeptical insistence that the biblical narrative could not be historical in the plain sense.

The disagreement was never about whether Jericho was destroyed by catastrophic collapse and fire—that is firmly established—but about when. Even Kenyon’s field descriptions of the burn layer, and her own observation of collapsed bricks and charred timbers, match the biblical contours strikingly; her timetable was the stumbling point.

Bryant G. Wood’s Reassessment—Why 1400 B.C.E. Fits

Beginning in the 1980s, Dr. Bryant G. Wood subjected the pottery, stratigraphy, and small finds from Jericho’s destruction level to rigorous re-evaluation. He demonstrated that the ceramic assemblage—when properly identified and compared with secure Near Eastern typologies—belongs to the Late Bronze horizon around 1406 B.C.E., not to the earlier Middle Bronze destruction favored by Kenyon.

Wood drew attention to the three-foot ash layer containing diagnostic pottery, collapsed wall bricks, and blackened timbers—material he and others dated in the range that converges on the biblical year for Jericho’s fall. His argument rested on careful ceramic typology and cross-dating anchored in Egyptian chronology, which supplies a stable interregional yardstick for Late Bronze cultural phases. He also underscored the citywide presence of stored grain—again, a feature exquisitely consistent with a short, post-harvest siege and a covenant ban on plunder.

The methodological point is decisive: when one asks the right questions of the right strata with the right typologies, Jericho’s destruction belongs where Scripture places it. That conclusion has been recognized even in secular reportage and has pushed the scholarly conversation to reconsider assumptions that previously drove the “too-early destruction” claim.

Seismicity, Providence, and Timing

Multiple excavation reports note evidence consistent with earthquake activity in Jericho’s destruction horizon. This does not secularize the event; it simply illustrates how Jehovah may have executed judgment at the exact moment His people obeyed His command to shout. A quake precisely synchronized with Israel’s seventh-day obedience would be an instrument in His hand, not a rival explanation. Observers have long connected the text’s language about the wall “falling beneath itself” with seismic collapse; yet the theological center remains Jehovah’s action at His appointed time.

The Italian-Palestinian Jericho Expedition: Fresh Stratigraphy for the Late Bronze

Since 1997, the Italian-Palestinian Jericho Expedition has refined Jericho’s occupational sequence with advanced geophysical, digital, and environmental archaeology, improving resolution in the very periods of concern. Their fieldwork has identified Late Bronze II layers in multiple parts of the mound, despite later levelling that obscured some deposits. The team dates Jericho’s collapse within the 14th–13th centuries B.C.E., and Lorenzo Nigro has argued for continued settlement indicators in this horizon—finds that sit comfortably with the time of Israel’s incursion.

This ongoing work also exemplifies cutting-edge methods—geophysical survey, 3-D documentation, and calibrated chronometric techniques—that strengthen stratigraphic control and help situate Jericho’s fall precisely in the long arc of Canaan’s Late Bronze history.

The Ban (Ḥērem), Untouched Grain, and Covenant Obedience

Joshua’s command placed Jericho under the ban: it was to be devoted entirely to Jehovah, its valuables for His treasury, its life for His justice, its goods not for Israel’s enrichment. The burned-but-full grain jars en masse, left in place rather than looted, are an archaeological echo of that covenant obedience. Where one man, Achan, violated the ban and brought judgment at Ai, the physical city of Jericho testifies that Israel, as a whole, carried out the ḥērem as commanded.

Historical-Grammatical Integrity: Why the Early Date Is Compelling

A historical-grammatical reading of Joshua needs no scaffolding from critical reconstructions. It requires only sober attention to the text itself and honest engagement with the spade. The conquest began in 1406 B.C.E.; Jericho fell within days; the city was burned; its stores were left; and the wall collapsed in a way consistent with an outward failure down the slope of the tell. The record in the ground—the burn layer’s thickness, the collapsed mudbrick against the revetment, the jars full of grain—lines up cleanly with this reading.

Pottery, Egyptian Chronology, and the Reconstitution of the Horizon

Pottery is the archaeologist’s clock. At Jericho, the ceramic repertoire, when freed from mid-century assumptions and read alongside Egyptian anchored sequences, places the destruction in the Late Bronze transition right around the biblical year. This is precisely what Wood emphasized in his published reassessment: the pottery at issue was misread, and once corrected, the “too early” verdict dissolves. The correction does not rest on one sherd class or one locus; it arises from the convergence of ceramic, stratigraphic, and destruction-layer data, including the signature ash blanket and citywide burning.

Addressing Common Objections with the Data We Actually Have

Objection: “There is no Late Bronze city at Jericho.” Response: The Late Bronze deposits are present but complicated by later levelling; multiple expeditions—including the recent Italian-Palestinian team—have identified LB II traces in different sectors of the tell. The horizon exists; it simply requires professional caution and multi-method corroboration to isolate. Objection: “Kenyon found an earlier destruction; therefore Joshua is late fiction.” Response: Kenyon documented the character of the destruction in terms that mirror Joshua; her date is what is contested. Re-evaluation of ceramic diagnostics and broader synchronization with Egyptian chronology situate the destruction at the right end of the 15th century B.C.E., in harmony with the historical-grammatical reading.

Faith and Archaeology March in Step at Jericho

For all the noise, the core is simple: Jericho’s ruins bear the fingerprint of the biblical event. That is why Jericho remains a central case study in apologetics and in the discipline of biblical archaeology. Wood’s work has strengthened confidence in Scripture by showing that precise, conservative method clarifies the record rather than obscures it. His reassessment has also elevated the technical conversation—pottery typology, radiocarbon control, and stratigraphic integrity—inviting scholars to bring their best to the biblical text instead of imposing alien frameworks upon it.

Jericho in Ongoing Research and Discipleship

Jericho continues to be read, recorded, and taught in the academy and in the church. In classrooms, Wood’s analysis helps students see that Scripture and science are not enemies; they are complementary sources of truth when each is handled rightly. In the field, teams keep refining the Late Bronze horizon with better tools and tighter controls. In discipleship, Jericho stands as a reminder that Jehovah keeps His Word, topples human pride, and calls His people to uncompromising obedience.

What the Stones Cry Out at Jericho

Walk the sections: the revetment buried in brickfall; the rooms sealed in ash; the jars, still full, charred where they stood. The site reads like Joshua 6. The archaeology is not a rival to Scripture; it is a chorus to it. And taken together—fortification engineering, outward collapse, total burning, unplundered grain, Late Bronze ceramics synchronized with Egypt, and modern expedition refinements—the witness of Tell es-Sultan is that Jericho fell exactly when and how the inspired Word says it did, c. 1406 B.C.E.

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