Babylon Rent-a-Wagon

Acts 7:4
"Then came he out of the land of the Chaldaeans, and dwelt in Charran: and from thence, when his father was dead, he removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell."

Today, people regularly travel a thousand miles in modern airliners. A thousand miles is a long day's drive, but it can be done. We would never think of walking or riding a horse that far.

It was out of this questionable sense of superiority that critics of the Bible rejected the accuracy of the Bible's record of Abram's travels. According to the Bible, when he lived in Ur, in Chaldea, God instructed him to travel where God would lead him. That trip took Abram from northern Mesopotamia to Haran. After the death of Abram's father, God finally led him on to Canaan. The total length of Abram's travels amounted to more than a thousand miles. Clearly, Abram could not have traveled that far so long ago, argued the critics.

Several years ago, a clay tablet was discovered in ancient Babylon that sheds some light on the critics' challenge. The tablet was a wagon rental contract. The contract forbids the wagon renter from taking the wagon as far as the lands of the Mediterranean coast. One archaeologist observed that this meant that travel over such great distances was so common that Babylon's rent-a-wagon outlet had to place mileage limitations in rental contracts.

Over the years, hundreds of challenges have been raised against the accuracy of the Bible. Yet, none of the Bible critics' words have stood the test of truth. The Bible – God's Word – has!

Notes: Wayne Jackson. 1991. "Archaeology and Abraham's Journey." Reasoning From Revelation, Vol. III, No. 11. Nov., p. 22. 
Photo: The Standard of Ur mosaic depicts peacetime, from the royal tombs of Ur.
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