First, if you believe that much of the Bible is made up, then you have to believe that the whole thing is made up. How can you differentiate? Now more to the main questions, from 1050-930 BC the Kingdom of Israel was together during the rein is King Saul through King Solomon. It was after Solomon that the Kingdom split into two regions. From 1 Samuel 8 through 1 Kings 10 is during the time of the United Kingdom of Israel, 1 Kings 11-12 is where 10 of the 12 tribes rebelled and the Kingdom was split. Hope this help.

There is no evidence except in the Bible, which tends to be inaccurate or misleading. For example, the Bible claims that Gezer had always belonged to Israel when there is no evidence of habitation by Hebrews until the 8th century and the same applies to Hazor and Megiddo, both of which seem to have worshipped other gods. Aso Sheshank appears not to have raided Judah, as claimed.

Stanley - the answer to your question is complicated, but premised on two basics, 1) Do you believe the Bible is historical? or 2) do you believe it is a narrative and poetry written after the fact. If interested, I suggest you read Bruce Feiler, Walking the Bible, or Israel Finkelstein The Bible Unearthed. In short, we have not found any archeological evidence to support David or Solomon or other issues in the Old Testament. In addition, we have little, if any, textual evidence outside the Bible to support the Old Testament. Good luck in your search. JMAC

Been there/done it-or read Finkestein at least

Honestly, my next paper is coming out soon on the subject. Most of the ground is covered. Before I publish (will do a preprint first) do you know if the Jeroboam/Sheshunk connection has any confirmation, anywhere outside of the Bible?

Ok, sorry didn't mean to be dismissive. I assume you are talking about Shoshenq I of Egypt otherwise known as Shishak of the Bible?

4 names employed-sheshonk/sheshak/and shoshenq/shoshonk-depends who you read.

still i will be publishing next week. The whole matter I hope has gone into in considerable depth but I'd still want to know the last concerning Jeroboam.

It's controversial, so it will be interesting to see which side you take. You do have the reliefs in Megiddo and Karnack. Good luck.

Thanks, James. I have, I hope, everything. I'm an historian, James, so obviously I take the part of History.

My paper on this has just been released as a Preprint.

I have I think looked at the matter thoroughly and although certainty cannot be obtained in this matters, there seems little realistic evidence for its existence. One problem has certainly been many historians looking over their shoulders at the Bible, and twisting things to fit Biblical stories. I avoided considering the Bible until all the evidence was in.

A few points that required serious investigation:

10th century urban activity at Shepelah, beside Judah and towards the coast, which Simon Schama in his recent book The Story of the Jews, suggests is evidence. He quotes an archaeologist on a dig there as saying: 'This is evidence of Iron Age 11A Judah.' 1050 to 925 BCE. "Not a great state, but a small one.'

Not that simple. There is no corresponding activity at Jerusalem. Therefore a solution to this activity is that cities and communities in Shepelah formed to fight off Philistine advance, and predated Judah, and possibly influenced its creation. Schama points to early 10 th century writing found in Judah, but it is not clearly Hebrew and looks if anything like a Phoenician attempt to construct a script for Hebrew. Another candidate for the emergence of Israel and Judah were the Phoenicians who were bringing skills into the area.

A substantial problem with an early creation of Israel and Judah is the lack of evidence for YHWH's worship until the 9th century and even then the god was worshiped alongside other gods until the Exile. In Manassa they worshiped goddesses, also El and probably Ba'al.