William G. Dever

American archaeologist and Bible scholar

William Gwinn Dever (born November 27, 1933, Louisville, Kentucky) is an American archaeologist, scholar, historian, semiticist, and theologian. He is an active scholar of the Old Testament, and historian, specialized in the history of the Ancient Near East and the ancient kingdoms of Israel and Judah in biblical times. He was Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Arizona in Tucson from 1975 to 2002. He is a Distinguished Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at Lycoming College in Pennsylvania.

Dever earned his B. A. from Milligan College in 1955, an M. A. from Butler University in 1959, and a B. D. from the Christian Theological Seminary in 1959. He received his PhD from Harvard University in 1966. He describes himself as "an unreconstructed traditionalist by temperament and training."

Dever was director of the Harvard Semitic Museum–Hebrew Union College excavations at Gezer in 1966–1971, 1984, and 1990; director of the dig at Khirbet el Kôm and Jebel Qacaqir (West Bank) 1967–1971; principal investigator at Tell el Hayyat excavations (Jordan) 1981–1985, and assistant director, University of Arizona Expedition to Idalion, Cyprus, 1991, among other excavations.

He used his background in Near Eastern field archaeology to argue, in Did God Have a Wife? Archaeology and Folk Religion in Ancient Israel (2005), for the persistence of the veneration of Asherah in the everyday religion of 'ordinary people' in ancient Israel and Judah. Discussing extensive archaeological evidence from a range of Israelite sites, largely dated between the 12th and the 8th centuries BCE, Dever argued that this folk religion, with its local altars and cultic objects, amulets and votive offerings, was representative of the outlook of the majority of the population, and that the Jerusalem centred 'book religion' of the Deuteronomist circle set out in the Hebrew Bible was only ever the preserve of an elite, a 'largely impractical' religious ideal. Dever's views on the worship of Asherah are based to a significant extent on inscriptions at Khirbet el Qom and Kuntillet Ajrud (though see also his discussion of the significance of a cultic stand from Taanach), as well as thousands of Asherah figurines that archaeologists have found in various Israel locations, including a dump near the First Temple (a dump he attributes to Josiah's iconoclastic reform efforts). His views on worship of the goddess as expressed in this book have been criticised by some. On his methodological approach more generally, Francesca Stavrakopoulou has suggested that his use of the term 'folk religion' 'ultimately endorses the old stereotype of 'popular' or 'folk' religion as the simplistic practices of rural communities', so perpetuating existing 'derogatory assumptions' that more recent discourses on the topic have sought to counter. Others, however, praise Dever's contributions to understanding the history of Israel and Judah in the Iron Age.

Dever joined the faculty at Lycoming College in autumn 2008. He was appointed Distinguished Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology.

A 2013 lecture by Dever on the Exodus is available on YouTube. He argues for existence of a historical Israel in the Iron Age, contrary to "revisionists" and "minimalists" such as Niels Peter Lemche. He concludes, however, in this lecture that in the much greater part the Exodus is a myth or "pseudo history," and that the early Israelites were mostly indigenous Canaanites, while stating that a group of a few thousand migrants from Egypt probably joined Israel in the 13th century BCE or later. A 2013 lecture by Dever on whether God had a wife (Asherah) is available on YouTube. In this lecture, he characterizes the Bible as a selective version of Israelite religion told by a right wing clique of elites, and he argues that the majority of ordinary people were not monotheistic Yahwists and they venerated the "Great Goddess Asherah." He concludes by equating Asherah with the Shekhinah in subsequent Judaism. A similar 2014 lecture by Dever at Emory is available on YouTube.

Dever is the son of an evangelical pastor, was raised as an evangelical Christian, and became an evangelical preacher as well. He later rejected Christianity and converted to Reform Judaism, and an irreligious non theist. He is married to Pamela Gaber, professor of Old Testament and Judaic Studies at Lycoming College.