I. INTRODUCTIONOn the side of the former view, biblical archaeologists such as Bryant Wood argue that the Exodus must have occurred in the middle of t

e importance of Hazor’s contribution to the debate on the timing of the Exodus cannot be underestimated, as “Hazor provides the only possible evidence for an Israelite conquest of Canaan in the late 13th century” BC.[5]The initial Israelite conquest of Canaan under Joshua included three cities that were destroyed and put to the torch: Hazor (Josh 11:10–11), Jericho (Josh 6:21–24), and Ai (Josh 8:18–19).[6] Hazor—strategically located on the Great Trunk Road, which is the main commercial highway that cut through Canaan and was part of the principal military route throughout the Late Bronze Age (1550–1200 BC)—thus is at the center of the debate over the timing of the Exodus, since it was both destroyed by Joshua and destroyed in the 13th century BC. The biblical text requires that the former is true, while archaeology requires that the latter is true. The matter that will be discussed here, however, is whether these destructions are distinct or one and the same. This study may go a long way toward determining whether or not the Exodus and Conquest transpired in the 13th century BC.II. THE DESTROYER OF THE FINAL BRONZE AGE CITY1. The Destroyer’s Nationality. Ancient Hazor consisted of a large, rectangular lower city (170 acres) and a bottle-shaped upper city (30 acres), essentially an elongated mound called a tel, which rises about 40 m. above the surrounding plain.[7] Yigael Yadin, the archaeologist who excavated at Hazor from 1955–1958 and 1968–1969, documented the great conflagration that accompanied the total destruction of the final Late Bronze Age city, which he believed to have occurred by ca. 1233 BC.[8] Evidence of this destruction consists of layers of ashes, burnt wooden beams, cracked basaltic slabs, mutilated basaltic statues, and fallen walls. Yadin’s findings in the lower city confirm that public structures such as the Orthostats Temple and the Stelae Temple were violently destroyed, while the renewed excavations in the upper city—under current excavator Amnon Ben-Tor—corroborate the existence of a fierce conflagration that also is mostly limited to public buildings. This includes both the monumental cultic edifices and the administrative palatial buildings, all of which served as the foci of religious and civil power and wealth at the height of Canaanite Hazor in the 13th century BC.[9]Seemingly, the smaller-scale domestic and cultic buildings in the lower city were not similarly burned or violently destroyed, though the campaign did include the decapitation of basaltic statues of gods and kings, and probably also the smashing of ritual vessels found in the temples.[10] The intentional nature of the desecration of these statues and vessels is clear: “This was a systematic annihilation campaign, against the very physical symbols of the royal ideology and its loci of ritual legitimation.”[11] This desecratory destruction is normally attributed to the Israelites, as argued by both Yadin and Ben-Tor.[12] Kitchen agrees, declaring “that neither the Egyptians, Canaanites nor Sea Peoples destroyed LB Hazor—the early Hebrews remain a feasible option.”[13] Moreover, Yadin went as far as to make a connection between this particular destruction and the text of Joshua 11: “This destruction is doubtless to be ascribed to the Israelite tribes, as related in the Book of Joshua.”[14]In Sharon Zuckerman’s wonderful article that whets the appetite of all those awaiting the disclosure of Canaanite Hazor’s cuneiform archive(s), she challenges the notion that the Israelites were the actual culprits behind the destruction of the final Canaanite city of the Late Bronze Age, arguing that an internal revolt instead led to the city’s annihilation.[15] This long-time senior staff member at the Hazor excavations suggests that Hazorite rulers and elites enforced a dominant ideology, which the populace contested, resisted, and ultimately revolted against due to the political and religious impositions. While she notes that the other of the two possible explanations for the destruction is military conquest, she completely rules out this option because “there is no archaeological evidence of warfare, such as human victims or weapons, anywhere in the site.”[16] Zuckerman’s theory aside, most maximalistic archaeologists and conservative biblical scholars attribute this destruction to the Israelites, mainly due to the “intentional desecration of shrines and cultic objects,” including decapitation and the severing of the hands of the cultic figures and idols, which is considered “a practice unique to Israel.”[17]2. The Destroyer’s Identity. Citing Judges 4:24, Wood argues that the Israelites destroyed the Hazor of this era under the leadership of Deborah and Barak.[18] However, Hoffmeier refuses to assign this Israelite destruction to Deborah and Barak, objecting that Wood invented an attack on Hazor not claimed in the text (Judg 4). Hoffmeier states, “[T]he text is absolutely silent regarding any military action against Hazor itself,” so “there is no basis to believe that the destruction of the final LB IIB (late 13th century) city was caused by Deborah[’s] and Barak’s triumph over Jabin and Sisera.”[19] Hoffmeier correctly observes that the text does not expressly state that these Israelites destroyed the city, but his argument from silence cannot prove that Hazor was not destroyed during the judgeships of Deborah and Barak. The biblical author used the verb karath (Judg 4:24), which features the hiphil stem, implying a complete cutting off. Thus the demise of Jabin was decisive and final.The Israelites “went harder and harder against Jabin” until they killed him, meaning that they grew stronger and stronger in relation to Hazor, until they were able to defeat its king. Yet could the mere killing of the king who controlled this entire region be seen as a victory that would earn its way onto the pages of Judges? Certainly the Israelites’ fight was not a personal vendetta against the king himself, as a man, but rather against the city of Hazor and its influence in northern Canaan. In truth, exterminating Hazor’s king alone would be a hollow and meaningless victory for the agents of God’s wrath (Deut 7:1–2). As mentioned already, archaeology reveals that the very peak of Hazor’s might throughout the entire Canaanite era was achieved at this time, which is confirmed by the epigraphical evidence from the Amarna Letters, in which Hazor’s king is the only Canaanite ruler referred to as a king in letters written to the Egyptian pharaoh.[20] Considering Hazor’s exalted status in Canaan from the middle of the 14th century BC through the second third of the 13th century BC, a period of over 100 years, Hazor represented the most imposing national threat to the Israelites in the Promised Land.The strength of Jabin’s army and that of the lesser vassal-cities of the surrounding area was what the Israelites finally overcame, resulting in the king’s death.



Hoffmeier fails to recognize the main issue in the Conquest
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