3. Did the Destruction of Tall al-Hammam Give Rise to Two Biblical Stories?
Tall al-Hammam was instantly transformed into an inferno. Wood and clothes burst into flames, while pottery, bricks, swords, spears, and metal melted as air temperatures spiked about 3600 degrees Fahrenheit. A few moments later, the shockwave arrived. Winds whose speed exceeded 740 mph tore through the city and destroyed all in their path, sheared the top of the ruler’s four-story palace, and blew the wreckage into the next valley over. All in the city, an estimated 8000 people, and every animal, perished, mangled, ripped apart, broken, and burnt to ashes. The shockwave continued on, and a minute later, slammed into biblical Jericho about fourteen miles west of Tall al-Hammam, and brought down its walls. That could have been the inspiration between the Old Testament account of the blast that brought down Jericho’s walls. Scholars also believe that this ancient catastrophe gave rise to the biblical narrative about Sodom and Gomorrah.
