The destruction of Sodom (Doré)
When you look for the ruins of Sodom and Gomorrah, the obvious book to ignore is the Bible. Just like evangelical explorers looking for Noah’s Ark investigate everything except for the text that helps to identify the location of the object they’re looking for, searchers for Sodom and Gomorrah simply forget to read.
Here‘s a pretty shocking article that Russia and Jordan have signed an agreement to search the bottom of the Dead Sea for the remains of the Biblical cities of Sodom and Gomorrah”. The project apparently receives state support from Jordan, after Israel had already sent out a submarine. Unfortunately, wherever the remains of the destroyed cities were seen in Antiquity, they were not at the bottom of the Dead Sea. The Bible is quite explicit:
Sodom and Gomorrah — covered with thornbushes (Zephaniah 2.9)
If there are thornbushes, Zephaniah must have seen the ruins on the land. Looking for the remains of the destroyed cities in the sea is just stupid. QED.
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And the Glomar Challenger was given out as a private enterprise doing oceanography; now we know that it was a cover for (useful) super-secret U. S. Navy work. Who knows what Russia and Jordan will be doing under the Dead Sea with this specious excuse; preparing Armageddon maybe.
“According to the report, a Russian company has agreed to conduct the search in cooperation with Jordanian authorities, picking up all costs – in exchange for exclusive rights to film a documentary of the search.”
Judging from this bit, the operation doesn’t pretend much. If they can subsidize the survey… I wonder if these folks would reject a call from an archeology-minded institution [or simple a person with suitable credentials and curiosity] to tag along their photo shoots? My hunch is that a private inquiry would have better chances. Even if successful, it will probably end up being an exercise in frustration with terribly uncertain perspective, but… they do have some nice gear at hand. And probably some doze of pliable curiosity.
Just a thought. I am not aware of their operational arrangements. Using resources from [deluded, secretive, oddly motivated…] private organizations for bona fide research is somewhat familiar, if from far-away fields.