A new study by Prof. Avraham Faust of Bar-Ilan University's Department of General History presents intriguing new evidence that may shed light on one of the most debated questions in the study of Israelite religion: did King Hezekiah's religious reforms actually occur, and did they transform religious practices throughout the Kingdom of Judah?
Published in the Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology , the study focuses on an unusual discovery at Tel 'Eton in the Judean Lowlands, a large cultic standing stone, or massebah, measuring approximately 1.4 meters (4.6 feet) in height and weighing about 750 kilograms (1,650 pounds). Once prominently displayed inside in a large residence, the stone was later carefully laid on its side and incorporated into a specially constructed stone platform.
According to Faust, the treatment of the stone may reflect broader religious changes that took place in Judah in the late eighth century BCE, possibly during the reign of King Hezekiah.
A Long-Standing Historical Debate
The biblical accounts describe Hezekiah as implementing sweeping religious reforms, including the elimination of local places of worship and the centralization of religious activity in Jerusalem. For decades, scholars have debated whether these reforms occurred as described or whether the biblical texts reflect a later ideological perspective.
Most archaeological discussions of Hezekiah's reforms have focused on public cultic sites and installations, including the temple at Arad, the dismantled altar at Beersheba, and a few other ritual settings discovered throughout Judah. While these sites have yielded important evidence, their interpretation remains contested.
Faust's study introduces a different type of evidence -- one that may reveal how religious change affected everyday life beyond official places of worship.
A Stone at the Heart of an Important Building
The standing stone was discovered during excavations at Tel 'Eton, a site identified as an important Judean settlement during the First Temple period. It was found in a large residence known as "Building 101," often referred to as the Governor's Residency, which was excavated over the course of ten excavation seasons.
In the building's earliest phase, the stone stood in the largest room, directly opposite the entrance. Its prominent location ensured that it would have been visible to anyone entering the structure or standing in the adjacent courtyard.
Because the stone served no obvious architectural or practical purpose, and because similar standing stones are widely known from ritual contexts throughout the ancient Near East, the excavators believe it functioned as a cultic object associated with religious activity.
"The location of the stone suggests that it played an important role in the lives of the building's occupants," Faust explains.
Canceled, But Not Desecrated
At a later stage, however, the stone's role changed dramatically. Rather than continuing to display it, the residents laid the standing stone on its side and incorporated it into a stone platform built around it. Significantly, researchers found no evidence that the stone had been intentionally damaged. It was not smashed into pieces or otherwise desecrated.
According to Faust, this distinction may be important. "Those responsible for changing religious practices may have wished to eliminate the stone's ritual function, and perhaps wanted the old ritual objects desecrated, but the people who carried out the change seem to have treated it with respect," he says. "They removed it from use without destroying it, effectively neutralizing its cultic significance while preserving the object itself."
Rare Evidence of Religious Change in the Domestic Sphere
The discovery is particularly noteworthy because evidence for religious reform is usually sought in temples, shrines, and public cultic installations. The number of such settings, however, is quite limited, and because the evidence is not always unequivocal, the debates continue.
The novelty of the new study lies not only in providing additional evidence for religious changes in the late eighth century BCE, apparently during the reign of Hezekiah, but also in drawing attention to domestic cult practices. According to Faust, such evidence is rarely identified archaeologically because ordinary households attract far less scholarly attention than temples. Moreover, when a cult was abandoned, portable ritual objects could simply be removed, leaving little or no archaeological trace.
Connected to Hezekiah's Reforms?
The standing stone was incorporated into the platform sometime before the destruction of Tel 'Eton by the Assyrian Empire at the end of the eighth century BCE, a date that broadly coincides with the reign of King Hezekiah.
While the study does not claim definitive proof that the stone was decommissioned as a direct result of Hezekiah's reforms, Faust argues that the find aligns well with other archaeological evidence from the same period.
Taken together, these discoveries strengthen the possibility that significant religious changes were taking place throughout Judah, affecting both public worship and domestic religious practices.
A New Piece of the Puzzle
Faust emphasizes that understanding religious development in ancient Judah requires looking beyond temples and official cultic centers. Administrative buildings, residences, and other non-ritual spaces may preserve important evidence for how religious life evolved and changed over time.
The standing stone buried at Tel 'Eton more than 2,700 years ago does not resolve the debate over Hezekiah's reforms. Yet by documenting the careful decommissioning of a long-venerated cultic object, the discovery offers a rare window into a period of profound religious change and provides a valuable new piece of evidence in one of biblical archaeology's most enduring debates.
