Eilat Mazar went on her first archaeological dig when she was 11 years old. Accompanying her grandfather, the illustrious archaeologist Benjamin Mazar, the young Mazar found herself excavating on the Temple Mount site just after the Six-Day War.

Eilat Mazar’s next 50 years of life would be filled with discoveries. Referred to as the “queen of Jerusalem arachaeology,” Mazar unearthed palace remains, clay seals, and a wall all with a common origin: they are thought to be directly correlated to biblical figures.

The palace? It’s believed to have been King David’s.
The wall? Historians believe Nehemiah built it.
The seals? Two of them are inscribed with the names of Jeremiah’s captors, another with the name of King Hezekiah.

Mazar describe herself as nonreligious, but she immersed herself in the Bible, convinced that it described “genuine historical reality.”

Maybe it’s the virtual, often disembodied lives we’ve all been forced to live in the year past, but there’s something about that word—genuine—that seems deeply heartening. Hazar, who passed away at the age of 64 last week, saw authenticity and reality in her discoveries. She felt confident of a throughline extending all the way from the pages of Scripture to the sites she excavated.

When we aren’t sure how to uncover the truth in a world full of smoke and mirrors, may we remember that the ground we walk on and the Bible we read tie us to the “genuine historical reality” that is the faithfulness and authenticity of the One, True, and Living God.