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Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet'

A folded lead piece said to read 'Cursed, cursed, cursed... by YHW'

Conquest & Judges · inscription, jewelry / amulet · Disputed · found 2019

Found 2019 — Scott Stripling (Associates for Biblical Research), wet-sifting Zertal's excavation dump piles

Where Mount Ebal altar site, dump piles (West Bank (Palestinian Territories))

Dates from c. 1400–1200 BCE (claimed); undated by context · Late Bronze II – Iron I (claimed) · Conquest / early Judges

Now at Held by the excavators (ABR) pending disposition; not on museum display

How Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet' was found

Recovered in December 2019 from soil Zertal had discarded in the 1980s, so it has no stratigraphic context. Announced at a press conference in March 2022; published in Heritage Science in May 2023 with readings by Gershon Galil and Pieter van der Veen based on X-ray tomography of the folded interior.

What it is

A folded lead tablet about 2 by 2 cm. The publishers claim to see roughly 40 proto-alphabetic letters inside, reading a curse formula that names the deity YHW, which would make it the oldest Hebrew inscription and the oldest use of the divine name in the land.

Why it matters for the Bible

If the reading were correct it would place written Hebrew and the name of YHVH on Mount Ebal, the mountain of curses in Devarim 27, centuries earlier than any other evidence. But several teams of epigraphers (Vainstub, Ahituv, Rollston and others, 2023) examined the same scans and report they cannot see letters at all, only scratches and casting marks. The tablet also has no find context. As it stands, the claim is rejected by most specialists; readers should treat it as unproven.

Disputed: Published reading is rejected by most epigraphers, who see no clear letters on the scans. Provenance is from a discarded dump, so the date is not secured by context.

The Hebrew word: ah-ROOR

אָרוּר

אָרוּר is pronounced ah-ROOR and means cursed (Strong's H779).

Places

Events

Curses pronounced from Mount Ebal (Deuteronomy 27:13-26)

Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet' in Scripture

Deuteronomy 11:29 First mention of Mount Ebal in Scripture.

Deuteronomy 27:13-15 The tribes on Ebal pronounce 'cursed' twelve times; the claimed text repeats 'cursed' in a similar formula.

Joshua 8:34 Yehoshua read 'the blessing and the curse' at Ebal; the tablet is offered as a physical trace of such a curse text.

Questions people ask

What is Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet'?
A folded lead tablet about 2 by 2 cm. The publishers claim to see roughly 40 proto-alphabetic letters inside, reading a curse formula that names the deity YHW, which would make it the oldest Hebrew inscription and the oldest use of the divine name in the land.

When was Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet' discovered?
It was found in 2019 by Scott Stripling (Associates for Biblical Research), wet-sifting Zertal's excavation dump piles, at Mount Ebal altar site, dump piles.

Where is Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet' today?
Held by the excavators (ABR) pending disposition; not on museum display.

Which Bible verses does Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet' relate to?
Deuteronomy 11:29, Deuteronomy 27:13-15, Joshua 8:34.

Is Mount Ebal Lead 'Curse Tablet' authentic?
Published reading is rejected by most epigraphers, who see no clear letters on the scans. Provenance is from a discarded dump, so the date is not secured by context.

Related discoveries

Sources

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