That's Just What I Needed Podcast - A Conversation with Biblical Archaeologist, Amanda Hope Haley

0:00I'm Christi Graham, host of On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse, and I recently interviewed one of our pilots whose plane was hijacked in Africa. I encouraged myself with that reality, that at some point this is going to end in two hours. It'll end good if I'm on the ground somewhere walking around with the testimony. It'll end great if he pulls the trigger for me. It will end great. That day, Jim, experienced the power of prayer and witnessed just how mighty the name of Jesus is. If you want to hear this full story, tune in at Samaritan's Purse.org-flashlisten. Americans have a big healthcare problem. Over 100 million U.S. citizens carry medical debt, but that's not the whole story. With health insurance, your out-of-pocket and monthly costs are way too high. You get surprise bills, denied claims, and poor customer service. That's a serious burden. As Christians, we don't have to pay for a broken system. Human healthcare ministries is an alternative to health insurance at half the cost.

1:02You can enroll at any time and join a proven faith-based solution that's both reliable and affordable. CHM isn't just health, it's financial and spiritual support when you need it most. Families across the country count on CHM to step in during their hardest moments. And it works. Stand up to health insurance with a low-cost biblical solution. From CHM today, by visiting CHministries.org-flash-wellness, that's CHministries.org-flash-wellness. This is Donna Jones, and you're listening to That's Just What I Needed. Hey, friend! If you've ever been in a conversation where you've walked away thinking, wow, that was just what I needed. You know how life-giving that can be. Well, that's what this podcast is all about. We're women who want to know, love, and follow God in our real lives.

2:04But sometimes wonder just how to do it. So each week, we'll talk about what following God looks like in the midst of daily demands and crazy cultural chaos. Because this isn't just what we need. It's actually exactly what we need. Hey, hey, my friend! I'm so glad you're here today. I have a very interesting episode for you. I'm just telling you, it's not like any you have ever heard before. So get ready, get ready, I'm just telling you, girl, I'm just telling you, get ready, I'm going to tell you a little bit about the guest and just a minute, but I wanted to leave a review of the lucky winner who has won Becky Keeves' new book, A Versa Day for the Ancius Soul. This is what M-M-H-717 wrote when she rated the podcast. This podcast touches my heart, it's practical and packed full of godly wisdom. I feel like each time I listen, I can't wait to talk about it or text it to a friend. Well, thank you so much for that kind review and I just can't tell you how much I appreciate

3:08it. And also, that is how the algorithm shows this podcast to other Christians that might be interested in finding a podcast. So if you have not rated or reviewed the podcast, would you do me a favor and just take two seconds to do that because it is so helpful in getting the podcast to a broader audience? Well, let me tell you a little bit about today's guest. Her name is Amanda Hope Haley and the reason I kind of laughed at the beginning when I said you've never heard of podcasts like this, it's because you've never met someone like this. I'm betting. Amanda is a, get this biblical archaeologist with her degree in Hebrew scripture and interpretation from Harvard University. Amanda is a lover of the Bible. She believes wholeheartedly that it is God's word. She loves God's people and she loves history and she speaks and writes as the red-haired archaeologist. So help me welcome today's guest, Amanda Hope Haley. Well, Amanda, welcome to the podcast.

4:11Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. I know we were talking so much before we even have record and which has been so fun. So I'm really excited for this conversation. You've written a ton of books, but you have a brand new book out called Stone Still Speak and when I actually a friend of mine told me about your fellow podcaster and she said she was so great and her background is really unique and then when I read about your background, Amanda, I was fascinated. I've never interviewed anyone like you. I've never really talked to anyone like you. So I'd love to learn. I love, I love the Bible. I love to learn. And so I'm super excited about what you're going to be sharing with us. But tell us a little bit about your background. So I grew up in the national area. That's something we just determined. We have in common, which is really fun. And I grew up in a Christian home in a pretty conservative denomination. And I would say when I was in high school, I wouldn't have put it this way at the time,

5:13but I would say it now as a woman in her 40s. I think maybe I felt a call to the ministry. I didn't know what to do with that because in the denomination I came out of women just don't do that kind of thing. There is no place for that. And so what ended up happening is I sort of pressed it down. I went to undergrad. I went to an undergraduate school called Rhodes College. It was a press deteriorated school in the infestinacy. And at that school, we were required to do four semesters of some type of religious studies. So I obviously went to the Christian route. One is to learn more about the Bible. And one of my first classes there was Biblical archaeology. I fell in love with it and it was really good at it. And my professor there, she was like, even my advisor at the time, she within a matter of weeks got me a full scholarship to go to Israel and dig. And this was in 2001 and sadly that ended up not coming to fruition because the second in Tafada was happening at the time there. But what ended up happening, I think, is I started to pursue Biblical studies academically because I felt like there wasn't a place for me to do that within the tradition which

6:16I grew up. And so here I was at Rhodes College. I have professors who were encouraging me to take Hebrew and Greek and Latin and French and German and all the languages that you have to take to do academic studies at the Bible. And they were themselves Harvard graduates. And they encouraged me to apply to Harvard, Divinity School. And so that's what I did. They wrote me beautiful recommendations. So I ended up going to Harvard and my master's degree is in Hebrew scripture and interpretation. That's what printed on the diploma. But what I like to say is practically speaking, my degree is in Biblical archaeology because all of my courses were in that and I studied under a man named Lawrence Stager. And within Biblical archaeology, he is one of the giants of the field of the 20th and 21st century. He sadly passed away a few years ago. But he did all of his excavations at that time. He spent 40 years almost digging at Ashkelon, which is a Philistine site. It's 10 kilometers north of Gaza City.

7:19It is right on the Mediterranean. And so that is where I ended up going and digging for the first time in 2004. And again, because of the people who were around me, because of the encouragement that I received. And of course, I think just the activity of being in the dirt and excavating things and learning more about at that time, the Canaanites. The level we were working on was older than the Philistine. So we're learning about the Canaanites at the time. And I mean, that just sucked me in and I absolutely loved it. And so as a result of those studies, I ended up encountering a lot of ideas, a lot of truths about the Bible, about scripture, about the history of the region that were in contrast to a lot of the traditions that I was taught when I was in church. For several years, especially when I was in undergrad, that was really challenging for me because I was hearing for the first time, you know, some of these ideas. It was being pointed out to me that there's two distinct creation stories in the Bible.

8:20And they don't agree what you have in Genesis 1. It's in a different order from what you get in Genesis 2 and 3. These sorts of things. And as someone who grew up in the church, I guess I knew that on some level, but those things have never been pointed out to me before. And so for several years, I had this time where I was learning about the Bible academically and yet I still had this faith. And I'm so thankful that from whatever reason, I gave me the fruit of a strong faith early in my life that I could be in dialogue with him and I could basically say, I don't get it. I don't understand. I've not come together. You know, my Sunday school teachers talked to me about how new wine was not alcoholic. And I know from a scientific perspective, I now know from an archaeological perspective from learning about vineyards and the way wine was cultivated and even excavating some of those areas myself that is physically impossible, that is biologically impossible, that is not with being described there. And even to say that wine was not alcoholic actually didn't even change as the message just being given the scripture.

9:20And so something like that, where ideas were in contradiction with each other, I had to just sort of throw it off and be like, okay, God, I believe in you. And it took time. And what I realized was where I, when you came to our contradictions, the contradictions weren't within the scripture itself. It wasn't that God was wrong or that the Bible was wrong. It was that all of these years of human interpretation, I, as someone who grew up in the church, I knew the interpretation better than I knew the test. And so archaeology for me, and even just broader biblical studies, was all about learning something new about scripture and about the ancient world that would reveal to me, this is what scripture says. This is what humans have said about it, these two things don't agree. And so let's lean into what scripture says. Let's figure out why the human said what they did and then let's decide if we agree with that or not. And so coming to the place where scripture is the highest authority there, within the ideas that we have created about it, those are secondary and tertiary, their things for

10:23us to talk about. In some cases, their traditions, even for us to respect, that they are not scripture. What we say is not scripture, only scripture is scripture. Okay. Wow. That is so fast. Well, first of all, the fact that your biblical archaeologist, in and of itself, is glow in my mind. But it's so fascinating that you have, you have articulated that some of the, just the story, you know, the Sunday school stories. And I'm assuming that nobody had nefarious reasons for kind of telling a Sunday school story in a way that wasn't exactly how the Bible says, you know, because you're doing it for kids and you're trying to make it understandable. But then what ends up happening to your point is that we know the story that we heard better than we know the actual text of scripture. And that's really important that we understand the scripture. Okay. So since you have learned a few things about what scripture actually says and then what you maybe have an earth to end some of your biblical archaeology and some of the Sunday

11:26school stories that we may have heard, give us an example or two of how those two may differ and then what we can learn from now. The Korean is the biggest example, I would say, and we could spend the entire podcast from this for sure is probably David and Goliath. And I like talking about David and Goliath because everything about Bible story telling gets swept up into this. In this story, we encounter textual inter-involution issues. We encounter what archaeologists call material culture. You have giant bones actually been found. No. But does the archaeology tell us that world we have looked like? And then we also get into interpretive issues as well. So all of this is packed into this one story. And so I'll rip off the band-aid and say, full stop, no matter what Amazon is showing you, no matter what YouTube is telling you, no matter how veggie tales portrayed it, Goliath

12:27was not a giant and your Bible does not say that he was. But this David and Goliath story has become so large in our culture, this idea that David was a gentle twin with a land flung around his shoulders, a man of a young man, even a twin of great peace who came and a miracle happened and he took out a giant, this is so big in our culture. We think about the David versus Goliath story, but that's not what Scripture says. And so the root of that confusion comes with the two versions of the Old Testament that we have. Let's look at Samuel. Let's just boil it down just there. Samuel, the translations that we have, and I say this from a place of knowledge as well. I said seven years actually doing Hebrew translation for a Bible that he not in 2014. There's two different ones. There is the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of Hebrew scriptures. And there is the Maseritic text, which is in Hebrew, but it is a thousand years newer

13:30than the Septuagint throughout the Old Testament in most of the places where these things disagree with one another, what people chose to do, what the scholars and translators chose to do was to follow the Hebrew. But there was always this question among translators, is more literally lost in translation from the original Hebrew that we don't have any of the original manuscripts that they're all lost, but was more lost going into the Greek or was more lost in that additional thousand years of copying? Because we sort of take for granted our access to documents and written word these days. You're getting burnt and the printing press, I mean, it really started there, but prior to that people are copying all these things. Well, so for literally thousands of years people have debated which one is it, which is right. And here with the liest fight, the Septuagint puts him at about six and a half feet tall, still very big guy, or the Maseritic text puts him at not height ten feet tall. That's what the translation say. So what we needed was a third, and this is where archaeology comes in and is so very,

14:32very helpful because in 1948, the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. The Dead Sea Scrolls, by and large and generalizing, are as old as the Septuagint, they're as old as that Greek translation, but they're still in Hebrew. And in almost every single place that the original two manuscripts disagree with one another, the Dead Sea Scrolls agrees with Septuagint. And so as of 1948, we've had the answer to this. We have known since 1948 that Goliath was six and a half feet tall and not ten feet tall. The idea has so permeated culture, and it took until the 1990s for the Dead Sea Scrolls to really be disseminated out into the public so that anybody could read them. That's a story in and of itself, it's a very good story, but really scholars have known, but it's not making its way in the Bibles. And I will even say when I was working on this Bible translation, we had this conversation, what are we going to do when we translate into English, which one are we going to follow? The publisher elected to go with the Maseritic text to go with the taller height because he said, I'll never forget this.

15:33I will not be able to sell a Bible where Goliath is known to giant. And so what happens is you have the Maseritic text translation in there. Everybody knows it's wrong. It gets footnoted, and then in your footnotes, it will say something to the effect of Greek LXX or Greek versions read six and a half feet tall. So you have that there, that is that textual element that's archeology working into it right there. Then you look at the text itself as a whole. We tend to chop it down into just that battle between David and Goliath. And as readers of the Bible, I think it is really important for us to consider the context not just of the history, which of course, you know, I love as an archeologist, but the context of the Bible around it. And prior to this one episode, you have David spending years being a shepherd. And he, when he goes to King Saul and tries to convince Saul that he needs to be the one to be the champion and get his Goliath. He gives his resume, and in his resume, he says to Saul, and we gloss over this.

16:33I've killed a lion with my bare hand. I've killed a bear with my bare hand. He spent years following these young animals around protecting them from predators. As a result of that, not only did he develop a quiet spirit, develop a relationship with God, which of course is critical to the story, but he also gained these skills. He was not a young tween, he was not a young man, he was not a weakling in any way. We know that because he killed lions and bears, because of what he does and the value of a law. And then critically, what happens immediately after that, he doesn't return to being a shepherd. Saul immediately makes him a general in the army. He immediately marry Saul's daughter. The whole story of David and Goliath needs to be seen as this one episode, this one critical point in David's development into the man after God's heart, into that first king who really, truly united all of the tribes together. It's just this one little bit here.

17:34And when you understand the story that way, that it was David who himself had spent years being prepared, physically and mentally and spiritually, versus Goliath, who, the way that he is described, he's a big guy, he's a Philistine. You look at the history. The history of the Philistines is becoming very well known, thanks to DNA evidence that of now coming out, a relief that you find in Egypt, all sorts of archeological work is helping us still under his blanks, but they were mycenaean warriors. The way his armor is described, the weight of it. Yes, it was heavy. It's because it was broad, but it was no heavier than, say, Henry VIII's armor was back then. He was strong. He was physically capable. He was chosen to be this champion, which was something that definitely happened in the ancient world. And you see that this was a battle that was critical for elevating David, but it wasn't a miracle. None of that language is used in the text. This isn't the story of God coming in and making something miraculous happen.

18:38This is the story of David's development, and I is a reader, and I hope anyone who reads that text can be inspired by it, because then this changes it. Now it's not, if I pray God will show up and you will not down giant, no, it's when I'm out in the wilderness with a bunch of dumb sheep or whatever your version of dumb sheep is, and I'm being attacked by predators who are terrifying and come at night or whatever that version looks like for you, God is using that time to prepare you. In those periods in the wilderness, that is part of your preparation. God chooses people to do work for him, who the world would never choose. Holding a look in for this guy, he was the youngest son. He was never going to be wealthy. He wasn't going to have any inheritance really from his family. Everybody overlooked him, including his own brothers, not even in the text there. He's a story of God choosing people and people who are after his own heart and preparing them so that they can do great things in his name. And so that's sort of my great example of everything there.

19:42We can look at the archaeology. We can understand the Philistines better. We can get that hell of background. And then also by taking that flawed translation out and seeing it as a young man who simply goes up against an aggressive warrior, then this becomes a story that actually applies to us in our lives. Wow, that is absolutely fascinating. And I love the point that you made about how applicable this can become because it's a story of David's development. And it's a story of David's heart because he said the battle belongs to the Lord. So he even understood, yes, I've been developed, yes, I kill the lion in the bear. But this uncircumcised Philistines can be like that to me. I mean, it's because he's to find the armies of the living God. So he had both the preparation physically and also the preparation spiritually, which is kind of to your point. So we're going to take a quick break. I've got some questions that I know are burning on our listeners' heart. So when we come back, I'm going to ask you those questions.

20:44I'm Kristi Graham, host of On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse. And I recently interviewed one of our pilots whose plane was hijacked in Africa. I encouraged myself with that reality. That at some point, this is going to end in two hours. It'll end good if I'm on the ground somewhere walking around with the testimony. It'll end great if he pulls the trigger for me. It will end great. That day, Jim, experienced the power of prayer and witnessed just how mighty the name of Jesus is. If you want to hear this full story, tune in at Samaritan's Purse.org-flashlisten. Americans have a big healthcare problem. Over 100 million U.S. citizens carry medical debt, but that's not the whole story. With health insurance, your out-of-pocket and monthly costs are way too high. You get surprise bills, denied claims, and poor customer service. That's a serious burden. As Christians, we don't have to pay for a broken system. Christian healthcare ministries is an alternative to health insurance at half the cost. You can enroll at any time and join a proven faith-based solution that's both reliable and

21:48affordable. CHM isn't just health. It's financial and spiritual support when you need it most. Families across the country count on CHM to step in during their hardest moments. And it works. Stand up to health insurance with a low-cost, biblical solution. Join CHM today by visiting CHministries.org-flash-wellness. That's CHministries.org-flash-wellness. Okay, so you just kind of blew your mind with the Goliath story. But I do want to ask you this. So if somebody's listening and they're like, oh, I don't know if I want to know this. Because I fear that it might hinder my faith. What would you say to that person? First off, I understand that fear. And I will say when I was in undergrad, I grew up in the church, a lot of my friends and undergrad grew up in the church. And I watched a lot of people in calmering some of this information and simply fall away from it.

22:49I had a professor at Harvard who was actually a visiting professor from Hebrew University. He was an orthodox Jew, but he made the point to us at one point that so many of the things that the world will throw up as being contradictions, so-called contradictions in Scripture aren't that. I know I mentioned at the beginning, there's two different stories of creation. In Genesis, they don't agree with one another. And the world may say to you, well, then that is obvious that all of this is fake. And he made the point, and I wouldn't even add to it, he made the point that if Scripture were the creation simply of, if it were the product of humans, then you wouldn't have those so-called contradictions in there, because we as humans would make us corrections. And I would even add to that, after spending 20 years in publishing any time, maybe I've worked with an author who had their own, maybe had two competing ideas in a book, and I would go to that person and say, look, you need to lean into one of these or the other. And so a human looking at Scripture would say, okay, we need to change the order of creation

23:55in one of these in Genesis. And these are some of the classic things that people will throw up as reasons to shake your faith. I think that that is actually evidence of God in there. And I can't tell you specifically why you have two different versions. I do talk about that some in this book, why might there be these two different versions of creation? I think both are necessary. I think both do different things. I think they tell us different things that show us different aspects of God. And we need both of those in order to understand God better. This Scripture, the way it came to us with all of the messy parts that we don't understand, there are, I think, intentional wonders built into the Scripture. And so when you encounter that, I think that is an invitation for us to lean into the Scripture even more and spend time there and really talk to God about that and say, I don't understand why are these two, well, which one is it? And the answer is both of those are in there for a reason.

24:57And God did not give us both of those stories to be like this perfect historical reflection of everything that happened during that. No, we have Scripture so that we get to know God better. He didn't give it to us so that we understand the exact mechanics of absolutely everything that he has done. He gave it to us so that we will have a deeper relationship with him. And that requires spending time in the text and leaning into the parts of the text that we're uncomfortable with when we go around and we need new people and you get to know someone. There comes a point in your relationship where you get past the surface stuff and you start talking about the hard things. That is how relationship develops. God wants us asking those questions. He wants us engaging with him on these things that we don't understand. And through that engagement, faith only grows because God shares it with the new places. Yeah. Okay. Give us an example because there's tension here. There's definitely tension here. So give us an example about how for you, there was some tension, but as you leaned in, it

26:02really strengthened your relationship with God. This doesn't come from the book. This is an outside example, but I would say Mary Magdalene. I grew up being told that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. I grew up being told that she was the sinner who washed Jesus' feet with her hair in week seven. The text does not say that. And I grew up being told that and the implication was because she was the evil one. And once I realized that first off, the text did not agree with what I had been told for all of those years, then I started to learn more about the ancient world and even for me going to Magdalene. Magdalene was discovered, I have been about 15 years ago, it was a complete fluke, a complete accident. When we go to Magdalene, that's the same story in and of itself that you go there and you see that it was a wealthy city. It's right on the sea of Galilee. It's a lot of its trade was very obviously in fish because you have fisheries and everything everywhere. But critically, there's the synagogue there with the soundation stone there and the Bible

27:06never tells us that Jesus went and preached in Magdalene, but he probably did because it's only like 10 minutes north of Kapanan. But you go and you see and you see where Mary Magdalene came from and then maybe you're able to understand a little bit better. The text doesn't tell us very much about her, but what it does tell us is that she came from there and that she was a woman of means somehow and that she was completely devoted to Jesus. She is the only figure in scripture, male or female who in all four gospels is present at the open to. She's the only one, not the apostles know if it's only her. And so learning more about her figure, that sort of what broke this whole thing open to me. That was what helped me to see the difference between what I had been told all of my life without the Bible and what the Bible actually says. And so my world had been telling me forever that women who get too big for their riches or sinners and should be quiet.

28:07But what scripture actually says is the woman who follows Jesus around and gives her her time and her treasure and everything that she has into understanding him better and developing that relationship better, that should actually be the goal. That is the woman who is not put down as a sufferer of the original seven deadly sins. No, that is the woman who gets to be present at the open to. That for me is probably the most personal story because it sort of craft everything open for me. That one new testament figure because like dated, never should have been keen according to human standards, mirroring Magdalene should not have had the history and the staying power that she does in the religious consciousness is another instance of in this case a woman because of her recognition of Jesus and because of the way that she behaved. She can actually be an inspiration to us today, even though I think our culture really going

29:08all the way back to Pope Gregory to great, even though our culture since him has is trying to make her into the exact opposite. Yeah. Okay, so let me ask you something because I always assumed because the scripture does say about Mary Magdalene that there were seven demons that had been cast from her. Yes, so that's what I'm assuming is that as people were retelling the story, they thought, okay, well, she must have been then a prostitute because of that particular aspect that is recorded in the scripture. Is that how that kind of came to be or do you know? I do know. I've done quite a bit of research on this actually and it goes back to Pope Gregory to great. So we're talking six century and during the six century, if you lived in the Western world, if you were Christian, you were Catholic. And during this time period, people were not literate. If they were literate, then they were literate in their own language. Very few people would have been able to read the Greek of the New Testament because the Bible had not been translated into the common languages yet. That is something that comes really with a promising reformation a thousand years later.

30:11And so for the average Christian who is out there, they learn based on what they are hearing in their churches, they learn based on what they are hearing that their Pope has said because the Pope is, of course, the mouthpiece of God. And they are learning based on what the artists around them are creating. Those artists who themselves cannot read the language have never been able to read the fertile crescent. They are even, even all of this imagery from the time, Mary Madeline, the classic oldest portraits of her, she's portrayed as a redhead. And I'm a redhead. She's portrayed as a redhead, which is a sign of simple Jezebel. Her, Ray had all of these classic women of the Bible who were at all rebellious, were always painted, almost always painted as redhead. So what happens is Pope Gregory de Grey is giving a homily actually on Luke 7. And Luke 7 is where at the end of it, the sinner, it's a woman, she's a sinner. It doesn't say textual sin, it doesn't say she's a prostitute, it simply says that she is a sinner. He's the one who washes Jesus' feet with her hair.

31:14She doesn't have a name, and this is a problem for Pope Gregory de Grey. He wants her to have a name. So he does what any of us would do, right? And he just keeps reading, and he goes to the next female name in the Bible, which happens to be Mary Madeline. Because the next thing that happens is Luke 8, Jesus passed out 7 demons. But Pope Gregory de Grey first off, he conflates the two. He makes Mary Madeline into that other woman. There's no reason to think that they are the same person. In fact, if you read the text, it's highly unlikely that they were. But then he goes even further. This is also where we get the origin of the idea of the 7 deadly sins. Because he is the one man who puts a name, he likes to name things. He wants the woman to have a name, he wants those demons to have a name. And this is where he decides that those demons are the 7 deadly sins. And he talks about all of them, but he harps on sexual sin. That's where it comes from. It gives this homily. He's the mouthpiece of God. Very few people have the ability to go to the original text and actually check him on this.

32:15And if they were going to check him on this, they wouldn't because mouthpiece of God. So he starts here. He makes what I would say are extremely critical and irresponsible errors in his presentation and interpretation of that text. Well, so he does it then, churches start talking about it. And basically it just becomes this rumor. And it grows. And it grows. And over time, Mary Magdalene wasn't just the woman with 7 demons, but she becomes this prostitute. And so, I mean, that's it. We're looking at essentially 1,500 years of gossip and that idea, a lot like David and Goliath, an idea gets so baked into our brains that when we go back into the spiritual and we read it ourselves, we put those ideas in there. Somebody has to point out to you that the text never says that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. Mary really needs to do that because otherwise you go in and you're reading about Mary Magdalene and you're supplying that for yourself. Because when I was growing up, you have your felt boards. And I remember my favorite character on the felt board was always Mary Magdalene because

33:17she had the prettiest clothes and she had like makeup all over her eyes. You can always appreciate it. She was like, look at her snits on her fingers. I don't know what that was all about. But I mean, you know, she was the woman wearing makeup. That kind of thing. From that young age, you get these images because before we are literate and that is true of adults 1,500 years ago who simply weren't literate and that is true of us as children until we ourselves become literate, you learn by stories and images. And so the stories and images get baked into your brain long before you're reading the text for yourself. And so it takes something like somebody pointing out this information or being in the archaeological field and going to the city of Gat and seeing the city where Goliath lived, Goliath and all of the other people and realizing what their architecture looked like and that there's no way that they were giants. But their architecture was different. Their city was large. You go and you see something else and when you see something physically, it will shake

34:18things up enough that you can go back into the scripture with new eyes. Hopefully. That's the goal. Right. And then understand things accurately, which is the point. Okay. Amanda, tell us how we can get a copy of your book or connect with you. So I'm Amanda Hope Haley. I'm on Facebook and Instagram. Facebook is where the good conversation happened. So people ask me questions and they do my best to respond at post-lot archaeology stuff. For the book, if you just go to stonesstillspeak.com, you can actually download the first chapter for free. I encourage you to do that. And then there's lots of links in there too so that you can purchase it from your favorite retailer. It's available everywhere, as we say. Okay. Great. We'll put that information in the show notes. Well, Amanda, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom, your insight. And you kind of blew my mind there a little bit with a couple of things, especially Goliath. I'm going to have to think about that one. But it is so interesting how archaeology opens our eyes to new things. But it also confirms that the scripture is, in fact, reliable in the word of God.

35:23I love the fact that you, you know, just so beautifully with your scientific background, your archaeological background, and your biblical background in your heart for Jesus. Just have woven all of this together. So thank you so much. Well, you're so welcome. They serve having me. Well, I know you learned a thing or two on this podcast. Probably even blew your mind because I know it blew mine with a couple of things. As a reminder, I would love to connect with you on social media. You'll find me at Donna A. Jones on Instagram or Donna Jones Speaker and author on Facebook. And I would love to come visit you to speak at your event or for your church women's retreat. In fact, I'm getting ready to go back to do a retreat this weekend. And I would love to visit your neck of the woods as well. You can find out about having me come speak for your church organization at Donna Jones.org. And as always, my friend, I can't wait to see you next time for that's just what I needed. Do you ever hear sayings make their way through the culture and the church that seem nice

36:29in theory, but are actually theologically problematic? My name is Shara Donahue and I'm the host of the Bible. Never said that. A podcast where we examine these popular sayings under the lens of biblical truth. We cover sayings like God won't give you more than you can handle. Time heals all wounds and follow your heart. We also spend time exploring how people use Bible verses out of context. If you want to grow and discernment and truth, join us and subscribe at lifeaudio.com. The historical Jesus podcast is the sweeping saga of the life and times of Galilean Jesus of Nazareth, as well as the faith, religion, and church founded to honor and disseminate his acts and teachings. Join me, Mark Vinet, on this fascinating journey through time, exploring the many great works of Christian theology, literature, architecture, music, and art inspired by the words and deeds of Jesus Christ.