ScienceNews: A superheated blast from the skies obliterated cities and farming settlements north of the Dead Sea around 3,700 years ago, preliminary findings suggest.
Radiocarbon dating and unearthed minerals that instantly crystallized at high temperatures indicate that a massive airburst caused by a meteor that exploded in the atmosphere instantaneously destroyed civilization in a 25-kilometer-wide circular plain called Middle Ghor, said archaeologist Phillip Silvia. The event also pushed a bubbling brine of Dead Sea salts over once-fertile farmland, Silvia and his colleagues suspect.
People did not return to the region for 600 to 700 years, said Silvia, of Trinity Southwest University in Albuquerque. He reported these findings at the annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research on November 17.
Excavations at five large Middle Ghor sites, in what’s now Jordan, indicate that all were continuously occupied for at least 2,500 years until a sudden, collective collapse toward the end of the Bronze Age. Ground surveys have located 120 additional, smaller settlements in the region that the researchers suspect were also exposed to extreme, collapse-inducing heat and wind. An estimated 40,000 to 65,000 people inhabited Middle Ghor when the cosmic calamity hit, Silvia said.
The most comprehensive evidence of destruction caused by a low-altitude meteor explosion comes from the Bronze Age city of Tall el-Hammam, where a team that includes Silvia has been excavating for the last 13 years. Radiocarbon dating indicates that the mud-brick walls of nearly all structures suddenly disappeared around 3,700 years ago, leaving only stone foundations.
What’s more, the outer layers of many pieces of pottery from [the] same time period show signs of having melted into glass. Zircon crystals in those glassy coats formed within one second at extremely high temperatures, perhaps as hot as the surface of the sun, Silvia said.
High-force winds created tiny, spherical mineral grains that apparently rained down on Tall el-Hammam, he said. The research team has identified these minuscule bits of rock on pottery fragments at the site.
Examples exist of exploding space rocks that have wreaked havoc on Earth (SN: 5/13/17, p. 12). An apparent meteor blast over a sparsely populated Siberian region in 1908, known as the Tunguska event, killed no one but flattened 2,000 square kilometers of forest. And a meteor explosion over Chelyabinsk, Russia, in 2013 injured more than 1,600 people, mainly due to broken glass from windows that were blown out.
Our Comment: Much about this area is unknown. Whether this is the exact site of Sodom and Gomorrah or not, if an exploding meteor could destroy this whole region, one can easily see how such a meteor could have been God’s instrument to destroy the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and their surrounding towns and villages.
Prophetic Link: “But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed.” Luke 17:29:30.
Comments
GEORGE MEYER
Tuesday November 27th, 2018 at 07:24 PMWhy do we need to impose something like an exploding meteor on the text?? Can’t we just accept GOD’s Word as fire and brimstone and be done with it?
admin
Tuesday November 27th, 2018 at 11:12 PMThink a little more deeply, my friend. The details of this do not reflect the views of Keep the Faith. The point of our briefing is that science has just identified the possibility that the biblical record could be true! Whether it was by a meteor (and that is a possibility, similar to the biblical record where God prepared a great fish for Jonah, He could have prepared a great meteor for Sodom and Gomorrah), or by direct fire and brimstone, the amazing part is that science is now saying something happened in ancient times to destroy these cities, which does confirm the biblical record. They don’t have the details right or the age right, but they’ve just opened up that possibility that maybe Genesis was right after all. This briefing was the actual text of a news article. If we just react without thinking about what is being said, we lose the best and most important part. Science keeps bumping into the Genesis record! –Pr. Hal
GEORGE MEYER
Wednesday November 28th, 2018 at 02:07 PMDo you imply by your tired comment that I do not think these things through?????????? I do not need human science to confirm for me that GOD’s Word is the unfailing truth on all things. If GOD says it in Scripture – then it is the truth – period. I have no need of modern science with all its flaws to reinforce GOD’s word for me.
Perhaps you should examine your depth of faith in HIS Word and not require mankind’s science to uphold the Word of GOD for you.
GM
admin
Thursday November 29th, 2018 at 12:10 AMHi George,
Perhaps the point of our briefing was not clear enough. Perhaps I misunderstood your depth of understanding of these things. The briefing makes it clear that science keeps bumping into God and creation. They can’t avoid it. Whether it was a meteor or some other phenomena doesn’t undo the problem that these scientists face. But they keep trying to divert the truth into other scientific explanations. Having said that, however, if God could make a special whale for Jonah, he could certainly create a special meteor for S&G. Nevertheless, you are right that we certainly don’t need science to accept the truth of God about the fact that S&G were destroyed. Exactly how is a matter that we will have to wait until eternity to finally determine. The entire article, except our comment, was sourced from publicly available sources. “Be kindly affectioned one to another.” Blessings, Pr. Hal
GEORGE MEYER
Friday November 30th, 2018 at 07:51 PMI do not disagree with your basic tenet, Hal that GOD can appoint anything HE wishes to accomplish whatever miraculous event HE so desires. My point, was only that I do not NEED science to prove GOD’s miracles to me – I take HIS Word for fact and truth and I think that is where you and I got off track
I am certain that there are many who need the assurance of “science” to help them with their weak faith.
I do not need that assurance – I have GOD’s Word for that.
So – keep up the good work, Good Brother. You are making a difference for the LORD.
~GM~
D Burt
Saturday December 1st, 2018 at 03:53 AMMe thinks George has some anger issues perhaps?
Roymond
Monday February 25th, 2019 at 04:47 AMSure sounds like it. Most Christians would react to this the same way as when archaeologists discovered the porch and pool where Jesus healed the crippled man — that it’s great when the stones themselves “cry out” and point to Jesus.