2,700 year-old Hebrew clay inscription found in Jerusalem reveals first mention of Bethlehem outside the Bible

A tiny clay shard found in the City of David excavation site contains the first mention of Bethlehem, aside from the Bible itself, and it is written in Hebrew script.

Israeli archaeologist Eli Shukron announced in a statement, “This is the first time the name Bethlehem appears outside the Bible in an inscription from the First Temple period, which proves that Bethlehem was indeed a city in the Kingdom of Judah, and possibly also in earlier periods.”

A clay bulla of this sort, the imprint of an ancient seal, was used to identify the contents of a shipment giving details such as the date, contents, city and so on. The bulla measures just 1.5 cm (0.6 inches) across, and was found at the excavation site just outside the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) reported. According to the site Biblical Archaeology, the script on the shard reads:

Bishv’at

Bat Lechem 

[Lemel]ekh

The first word relates to the number seven, or seventh, Bat Lechem (Beit Lechem) is the Hebrew for Bethlehem, and the last word means “for the king.”

“It seems that in the seventh year of the reign of a king (it is unclear if the king referred to here is Hezekiah, Manasseh or Josiah), a shipment was dispatched from Bethlehem to the king in Jerusalem,” Shukron explained. 

“The bulla we found belongs to the group of “fiscal” bullae – administrative bullae used to seal tax shipments remitted to the taxation system of the Kingdom of Judah in the late eighth and seventh centuries BCE. The tax could have been paid in the form of silver or agricultural produce such as wine or wheat,” he added.

Bethlehem is approximately 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) south of Jerusalem. Today the town is under Palestinian authority following the Oslo Accords of 1993, and is home to between 25,000 and 30,000 people, both Christians and Muslims. 

In the Bible, Bethlehem is the place where Jacob’s wife, Rachel was buried, the place where Ruth met Boaz, and of course it is well-known in many Christmas carols as David’s city – the hometown of Israel’s iconic king. Bethlehem is even more famous as the birthplace of Yeshua (Jesus), a fact celebrated in several buildings and churches dedicated to Him in the area.

“Happy Christmas to all who celebrate,” posted terror survivor, Tal Hartuv on social media, “and remember, not only was Jesus and his family Jewish, but so was Bethlehem.”