Moabite Stone: "House of David"

The Moabite Stone, a tablet of writings from about 840 BC, has recently been shown to reference the "House of David." The writing is from a Moabite King, Mesha, talking about conquering Israel. The pertinent reference in the Old Testament is 2 Kings chapter 3. Click here for a full article in the Times of Israel. The Moabite Stone is at the Louvre in Paris.

The Moabites are first mentioned in Genesis 19:30-38. Moab is the son of Lot's eldest daughter (and of Lot himself; it's quite a story).

The stone is written in ancient ("paleo") Hebrew. Click here for a chart that shows characters for letters from pictograms to Hebrew. See the column in the middle of the sheet labeled "Paleo-Hebrew 1100-550BC."


Above is a portion of the stone highlighting the phrase "house of David." Remember, it reads left to right, has no vowels, and contains two words: "house" (bt) and "David" (dvd). The first letter (on the right) is b, followed by t, d, v, and d. From the article referenced above.


Similar to the first image, here's a portion of the stone highlighting the word "Israel" (in the blue box). The first letter (on the right) is i, followed by s, r, a, and l. Credit this article in the Jerusalem Post.