Adam Zertal

Adam Zertal (Hebrew: אדם זרטל; 1936 – October 18, 2015) was an Israeli archaeologist and a tenured professor at the University of Haifa.

[1] Adam Zertal grew up in Ein Shemer, a kibbutz affiliated with the Hashomer Hatzair movement.

Zertal was severely wounded in the Yom Kippur War.

Although I had argued that the Bible was full of myths, I decided after my recovery to travel the land by foot to look for archeological evidence.”[2] Zertal claimed to have identified several sites he worked on as being connected to sites, events and characters from the narratives in the Hebrew Bible: Zertal's work was not without controversy, and, in particular, his claims about Mount Ebal, where he worked for nine years, never gained traction within the wider archaeological community.

[1] While many archeologists agree that the structure was a site of an early Israelite cultic activity, its identification with Joshua's altar is disputed.