A theologian claims archaeological finds in Jordan are proof the biblical city of Sodom really existed.
Scientists previously found evidence that the ancient city of Tall el-Hammam in the southern Jordan Valley was destroyed in a catastrophic event.
And Dr John Bergsma, a Professor of Theology at Ohio’s Franciscan University, suggests such an event mirrors what is in the Bible.
About 3,600 years ago the city of Tall el-Hammam was thriving – significantly larger and more powerful than Jerusalem or Jericho.
But almost overnight it was gone.
The absence of any arrowheads or other signs of a siege in the ruins suggested that whatever destroyed Tall el-Hammam and its neighbour, it wasn’t a military attack.
Steven Collins, the principal archaeologist at Tall el-Hammam, told Dr Bergsma about some of the astonishing findings.
He discovered pieces of pottery discovered on the site had been covered in Trinitite.
Trinitite, Dr Bergsma explained, is “that glass layer that you get when you set off an atomic bomb in the desert and it melts the sand”.
Dr Bergsma continued: “They also started to find human remains.
“Human skeletons that are complete up until about halfway up the backbone and then there’s just a scorch mark and there’s nothing on the top of the body…
Steven Collins likened the devastation to the Tunguska Event of 1908, when a massive asteroid slammed into the Earth’s atmosphere over Siberia, causing widespread devastation.
He continued: “The proposed airburst was larger than the 1908 explosion over Tunguska, Russia, where a 50-metre-wide bolide detonated with 1,000 times more energy than the Hiroshima atomic bomb.”
The airburst also appeared to have produced large amounts of salt, according to James Kennett, emeritus professor of earth science at the University of California.
It calls to mind the story of Lot’s wife being turned to salt after the destruction of Sodom.
www.dailystar.co.uk/news/weird-news/ancient-city-destroyed-atomic-blast-30914371