The Philistines were and are still located to the West of Egypt all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. The Israelites were located between Egypt and The Philistines and in the story of Samson he was visited a Coastal city in his story.

That False.

You nailed it! That has been my theory for years. If one looks at the dates of Troy and the returning kings, princes, soldiers, and all who were shipwrecked or killed or deceived when they got home. I believe they settled on the mainland. The skeletons that they have found average 5 inches taller than the average middle easterner.In the Oddessy it even talks about the time they battled with Egypt at the Nile. And the Greek dark ages were a large part of this mystery. Somehow the Phoneticians must have been allies, because they are never mentioned much, but we do know those were the two sea superpowers. But your the first I've heard that had my same theory.

vin russo Thanks for the kind words. The recent reports of excavations of the Philistine cities of Gath, Ekron etc. show that they were Mycenaean Greeks. The pottery styles etc. all point to it. Which begs the question, how much was Greek thought, art, philosophy etc. influenced by the subjugation of these Greeks by David, Solomon and the rest...

@@JRandallS that might be the dumbest thing I've ever read.

@@moodist1er Here are some references (lectures at the Chicago Oriental Institute) that might fill in the blanks for you - 1) Fall of Troy around 1177 - kzfaq.info/get/bejne/mLiTqJCq2NXHiGg.html 2) Excavations of the Philistine city of Gath reveal their Mycenaean origin and their arrival in the time frame that is correct for item 1, - kzfaq.info/get/bejne/f6eKg62D2crOnZ8.html 3) This video which also places the arrival of the Philistines in the correct time frame for item 1, and shows the Mycenaean cultural connections. 4) Inscription excavated at the Philistine city of Ekron identifies the king, and builder of the temple by name and as "The Greek" go to :56 minutes. He dedicates the temple to a Greek goddess "Gaea" of "Delphi" the Greek city or holy place where Greeks went to receive the oracles direction. 5) The dna of the pigs in Canaan changed from asian to european when the Greek/Philistines arrive. 6) The type of plaster, hydraulic plaster, that cured underwater, arrived with the Greek/Philistines. It was a known technology of the Greeks and was later adopted by the Romans. kzfaq.info/get/bejne/hLBza7JyzdOVlmg.html There is a lot more if you look for it. The Philistines were Greeks, they arrived at the correct time for the end of the Trojan war. They stayed in contact with Mycenaean art and the civilization of the Greeks.

​ John S An interesting idea, thanks for writing it out. I'd just add a few tweaks with some info that I'm sure you'd find interesting as well. While it's tempting to read the Trojan war literally, if you look into Hittite records of the period we see a messy picture. One where Wilusa (Troy) was being fought over by local warlords politically tied to the Aegean world against local supplicants appointed by the Hittite government. Archeologically there's no evidence for any Greece-wide coalition of city states as said in the Iliad. While the Hittite king does write to a figure he calls the "King of Ahhiyawa" (The Aegeans), this was likely a diplomatic turn of phrase. Because he was trying to get the Aegean king's help in dealing with a notable local warlord who threatened taking Wilusa for himself. This warlord was related to this Aegean king, so the Hittite king was trying to pull some strings basically. In these Hittite-language records, Piyamaradu is the name of that warlord and Alaksandu is the name of the previously Hittite-appointed governor-king of Wilusa. Another local name would've been Priya or Priyamudu. These names resemble Priam and Alexandros (another name for Paris). Archeologically, the site was sacked a few times during this period as well, so tying a single sack to this story is also not possible. In the end, this evidence points me towards thinking that elements of geopolitics and perhaps names too were written into the story by Homer; but it was made more interesting and spectacular by making a hypothetical "King of Achaeans". War stories such as this were popular literature in the bronze age Near East and its surroundings (and into the iron age) and they were historical fiction first and foremost. In reality, the situation was much more local: individual warlords making claims on running the city and taking power from Aegean or Hittite connections. Where the Sea Peoples came from is, as this video notes, more strongly tied to the Peloponnese than I'd realized. Most people think that they bopped around, acquiring their culture as they bumped into or absorbed Mycenaeans...but this video points to the important piece of information that specifically here in southern Canaan the architectural culture of their leadership was tied to the Peloponnese. That region of Greece was already honed in warfare as their military culture had conquered the Minoans on Crete a few generations earlier ca. 1400 BCE. In Eric Cline's book "1177", the entirety of the coastal Levant was settled by these Mycenaeanized Sea Peoples: being coastal Syria, Beirut, and Israel-Palestine now. So while it's interesting to note that the tribe of Peleset had perhaps Peloponnesian leadership, the amount of Sea Peoples who came over was much much more than simply the collected remnants of one city or army. Source - www.salimbeti.com/micenei/war.htm

Leon Levy Expedition to Ashkelon 😊

vikings. gauls. celts. friesians. i believe.

Yes exactly. Just because they were cultured doesn't make their practices less evil.

37Dionysos Israel isn't a real place until after Rome invented it.

All this history, striving and dreaming, leads to the ultimate culmination of western civilization: The United States of America!

@@eplurbispablum You seem to have missed the USA being the oldest democracy in existence (the only one in 1776). And the oldest system of government in existence (not counting the odd principality). And maybe you missed all those Nobel Prizes? Jazz, Rock & Roll, Hip Hop, Hollywood? Internet, microchips, Moon landing? It's a long list of cultural and technological dominance. If all that doesn't persuade you, then wait until about 2030 when the Singularity kicks in. It'll originate in the US since we have such a big lead. And the nature of Super-AI is that it prevents any competition--China has no chance of copying it. You feel better now? I knew you would!

That's because the Bible never has anything good to say about the other peoples. Hate literature.