Birds of a feather

Here we have more “supporting characters”. The 'Eurasian Sparrowhawk' and 'Black Chested Sparrow Lark' both birds naturally native to Israel.

Samson's Home

Example from Judges 13:25, Samson grows up at Mahaneh Dan (the camp of Dan) between Zorah and Eshtaol. From the description and what we know of Israel's settlement patterns, it's not too hard to pin point where this is. My image includes that stunning landscape view visible from the place where Samson really lived.

Dissected panel

One panel taken as an example and focused in on to show the features included in the image and how they relate to the Bible and history.

How did Philistines look?

In this picture you can see how the Philistines were depicted by the people of the day. It is fascinating how accurate they are with reference to each other. All these are from the 12th century and contemporary with Samson and the later Judges.

The Egyptians fought them ~1175BC as they tried to invade Eqypt and engraved many of their soldiers in stone at Medinet Habu. The Egyptians called them Peleset, in a group they referred to as the “Sea People”. They are from Crete and Mycenae and the picture in the middle shows warriors of that culture depicted by themselves, from “the Warrior Vase”. The last one was carved on an ivory box from Cyprus, from where Philistines staged many of their sea faring attacks and raids.