William Gwinn Dever (born November 27, 1933, Louisville, Kentucky)[1] is an American archaeologist, Biblical scholar, historian, semiticist, and theologian.
Discussing extensive archaeological evidence from a range of Israelite sites, largely dated between the 12th and the 8th centuries BCE,[5] 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.
[6] 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[7]), 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).
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.
The Biblical narratives about Abraham, Moses, Joshua and Solomon probably reflect some historical memories of people and places, but the 'larger than life' portraits of the Bible are unrealistic and contradicted by the archaeological evidence.
"[17]Peter James was critical of Dever, accusing him of dismissing contrary evidence without argument and failing to engage with detail as against wider cultural context:"If Dever's attempts to link narrative biblical history and archaeology represent mainstream thinking (as he claims), then the field is indeed in deep trouble.
It is the kind of blind acceptance of traditional (unsubstantiated) 'synchronisms' espoused by Dever that has provided the very fuel for the minimalists’ criticisms.
"[18] Maximalist scholar Kenneth Kitchen criticized Dever for not supporting the historicity of the Pentateuch and of the Book of Joshua, but praised him for his defence of the Bible from the Book of Judges onward:"In his What Did the Biblical Writers Know and When Did They Know It?, we have a robust and very valuable reply to minimalists, ruthlessly exposing their suspect agendas and sham "scholarship", following on from his refutations of Finkelstein's archaeological revisionism.
[19]Dever also has a long and bitter feud with fellow archaeologist Israel Finkelstein, whom he has described as "idiosyncratic and doctrinaire" and "a magician and a showman", to which Finkelstein answered by calling Dever "a jealous academic parasite" and "a biblical literalist disguised as a liberal".
[25] He later rejected Christianity and converted to Reform Judaism,[25] although he now identifies as a secular humanist[26] and an irreligious non-theist.