Transcription
Hello everybody. Uh, welcome to Expedition Bible. I'm Joel Kramer. Um, today I want to cover a very interesting subject. The Bible talks about giants and the descendants of giants having lived in the biblical land in ancient times. And so, is there anything that's been found in the archaeological record that uh, provides evidence for these historical giants?
Uh, in this video, we're going to look at a discovery that was made in Israel of a horde of giant metal weapons. This huge spearhead that is 66 cm long was found right here where I'm standing. So in this aerial footage you see in the background the Mediterranean Sea, you see the town of Kafar Monash and then you see the agricultural field where in 1962 this horde of giant metal weapons was discovered.
Okay, I am in the field uh near uh the Moshave Kafar Monache. And right here is where the um report uh that came out in 1963 says that um the the horde of metal objects including tools and weapons and including these four massive spearheads. Uh, according to that report, they give a map there and uh this is the exact location of where that horde was found all the way back in 1962. Um, a local farmer was expanding his fil field. He was plowing new ground and exposed all these metal objects.
Scholars debate about when these uh four spearheads date to. Um, you'll see dates for them anywhere from about 4,300 years ago to 5,000 years ago or even older. Several of the tools and weapons from this discovery are currently on display in the Israel Museum.
So, I'm here in the Israel Museum and uh just up here is the horde of tools and uh and weapons made of copper that were found at Monache. And here we have the most impressive part of this collection, which are these four giant spearheads. The largest one there upside down. This is the largest spearhead ever found in the land of the Bible. Of course, it's back behind me in the display so it doesn't look so impressive.
So, what I'll do is I'll I'll cut the size of it out of uh cardboard just to give you an understanding of how huge it actually is. In 1963, after the study of this horde of weapons that were found in Monache, the uh official journal article came out um describing this. And so in this journal article, they uh they give the drawings of the four spearheads that were found and then they give their dimensions. So, what I did is I just took those dimensions and a piece of cardboard and cut out uh those dimensions because um when they're back in a case and back behind me when I'm talking in the Israel Museum, you you they look very small and so this will give you a better perspective of just how big they are.
This is the smallest of the four spearheads found at Monach. uh it's uh 13 inches long. And so uh it it is considered in the journal article as a huge spearhead. And so I went around the Israel Museum comparing the size of the smallest spearhead to the other spearheads that were displayed elsewhere. And many of the other spearheads were about this much smaller uh than this one. Quite a bit smaller.
Here is on display um more spearheads from the Bronze Age. These are typical spearheads. You know, they look maybe 6 in long, 7 8 in long at the most. And so this already is considered a huge spearhead. Two more uh spearheads that are are within a half inch of each other were also found. And you can see the difference in size. However, the largest spearhead that was found in the Monache Horde is this one. Now, again, I just took the length of it from the drawing, 66 cm. That's 26 in. And you just see how massive this spearhead is. Uh, there is another spearhead that's only six uh cm smaller than this one that was found at Megiddo. So, these aren't the only giant spearheads that have been found. Uh, but this is the largest one that's been found in the land of the Bible and it's just absolutely massive.
So when you're looking at this horde of spearheads, then you start to realize what they're writing in this uh in this article and how true it is. Like for example, um the authors of the article say of these spearheads that they're the most remarkable group among the Monache finds and they describe them as massive because that's what they are. Uh, we have a parallel of uh these spearheads in the biblical text. If we go to uh 2 Samuel 21:16, we're introduced to this warrior and we're given his name. His name is Ishbi Benob. And then he's described specifically as one of the descendants of the giants whose spear weighed 300 shekels of bronze. Isn't that interesting? We're not given uh his size and his weight, but we're given the weight of his spear. and it's talking about his entire spear.
Now, if we take this uh the largest of the spear heads at Monach, uh this spear head alone, just the head is 5 lb. But when it says 7 lb in the Bible, it's talking about also the entire spear. So, you got to put the shaft on this. Imagine how big that shaft, that pole must have been on a spear this big. It would have been much taller than a man. It would have weighed at least two pounds. It would have weighed probably much more than that. This is probably a bigger spear, a heavier spear than the one that's described in 2 Samuel 21:16.
This article is uh is the authors write this. The spearheads bear signs of use, especially the heaviest, which is bent in one spot and worn in several places along the edges. Okay. So, they're saying that that these spears bear the evidence that they were used as spears. Uh, despite them writing this, a little later in the article, they say uh they write this spears were used in war and fighting. In the case of the Monach spears, however, their unusual size and weight would appear to be an obstacle rather than an aid to anyone carrying them. We would like to suggest that these heavy spears may have been used in yet another way. And uh so they go on to suggest that these were decorative in nature. They were used as decorations. Now why? Because well because they're too big to have been used by a normalsized warrior. Okay?
Now you have to keep in mind that um most scholars are secular, including the authors of this article. They don't believe in giants. They don't believe that giants existed and that they're historical. And therefore, they have to give another explanation for why these massive spearheads were found. And so, they must be decorative. Keep in mind that earlier they had said, and especially the biggest one had evidence for being used as a spearhead. This interpretation has to do with worldview. If you uh don't believe in uh if you believe giants are fairy tale uh beings, then you're not going to interpret this as evidence of giants uh because you don't believe in them.
Um, however for those of us who do believe in the Bible and its historicity then we know that giants existed in the ancient past and when we find giant weapons then uh we using the Bible we would interpret them certainly I would to be evidence for what the Bible is describing in these descendants of giants.
Now also in the article that's uh very interesting is this. The authors wrote a remarkable feature of the Monache horde were the small thin riged copper plates of which about 800 were found. We suggest that these plates are scales of armor. This also has a parallel in the Bible. If we just flip back from 2 Samuel to 1st Samuel chapter uh 17 then we have the account of Goliath the most famous of all the biblical giants in uh verse 4 of 1st Samuel 17 uh we are introduced to Goliath of Gath. In verse five, it says what? That Goliath of Gath was armed with a coat of male and that the weight of the coat was 5,000 shekels of bronze. This is about 125 lbs.
So, we have archaeologically found at Monache this pile of 800 scales of body armor. And then we have body armor of a giant described in the biblical text. Now very interestingly the authors go on in the article to say this. The only parallel for the Monache scales was found at Tel Gath where identical copper scales also forming a package were uncovered in the area of the city wall. Isn't that amazing? The only other place that body armor like the body armor found at Monache has been found is Telgath, the hometown of Goliath, who is the giant in the Bible whose body armor is described for us and were given its weight.
Um, the uh the interpretation of the authors of the article are very similar uh with the body armor as with the spearheads. They say this. They say the great number of scales found would point to several coats of male being hidden in the Monache horde. What they're saying is it looks like this is one coat of armor, but it's way too many scales uh to be just one coat of armor. Therefore, there must be several different coats hidden within this pile of 800 scales.
Now, that's one interpretation if you don't believe in giants. However, if you do believe in historical giants uh because they're described in the Bible, then uh this could be the coat of uh armor for a single individual who of course would be uh a giant or a descendant of the giant.
So, in conclusion, here are the facts. We have uh we have archaeological discovery at Monache of these massive metal spearheads and body armor. We have a parallel of the huge spearhead found also at Mc Megiddo. Uh, we also have a parallel of the body armor found at Monache, found at Telgath. We have a match. Uh, that's why I interpret this as evidence for biblical giants because what's been found in the ground is comparable to what's described in the Bible as the weapons of these descendants of giants.
Uh, of course, um, a secular, uh, archaeologist, a secular interpretation is, uh, going to not consider this evidence for giants. And so, in their case, they interpreted as must, there must be several coats of armor amongst these 800 scales. And uh, and these giant spearheads must be decorative. You can make up your own mind. You can uh, weigh the evidence yourself. As for me, I see this as a correlation between the biblical text and what was found in the ground. And I believe that this is evidence to support the existence of these biblical giants. [Music]