Archaeology - Proving the Truth of Scripture - Part 4 - The Kurkh Monolith

Proof that Israel existed 2,900 years ago.

One of the great arguments today is are the Jews a people trying to steal the land of Palestine from the Palestinian people, or has the land of Israel always belonged to the Jewish people? ​The Kurkh Monoliths are two Assyrian stelae from 852 BC and 879 BC that contain a description of the reigns of Ashurnasirpal II and his son Shalmaneser III. The Monoliths were discovered in 1861 by a British archaeologist John George Taylor, who was the British Consul-General stationed in the Ottoman Eyalet of Kurdistan, at a site called Kurkh, which is now known as Üçtepe Höyük, in the district of Bismil, in the province of Diyarbakir of Turkey. It wasn't carved by Jews; it was carved by the Assyrians—the most brutal, expansionist superpower of the Iron Age. They didn’t have a “pro-Israel” agenda. They were documenting the massive coalition of kings standing in their way at the Battle of Qarqar in 853 BCE. Etched in stone were the figures of “2,000 chariots and 10,000 soldiers of Ahab the Israelite.” This stone carving shows that Israel was a sovereign military powerhouse on this exact land in the Middle East. This stone is also archaeological proof that a Jewish Kingdom didn’t just exist, but it was influential enough to lead a regional defense against the greatest empire on Earth.

​​The Assyrians are dead. Their empire is dust. But the people of Ahab? They are in their homeland that history records was their land.