James R Kautz

Digger James R Kautz

When the aging archaeologist has dug his last flake of earth, will he be able to uphold his long-time vow to defend his Christian tradition? He has hoped to find archaeological proof of the biblical kingdom of David-but he has not considered the effect his quest will have on his faith. Paul Gartin is a respected archaeologist. Raised and educated in an environment steeped in fundamentalism and deeply conservative Christianity, his life comes to focus on a quest for archeological evidence supporting the biblical record. Gartin's odyssey takes him to the Middle East, where he encounters the Israel-Palestinian conflict and meets graduate student Martha Eichhorn, a beautiful and intelligent woman who challenges Paul's philosophy and traditional morality. Caught between conservative Christian ideology and scholars' hostility to the idea of biblical archaeology, Paul embarks on an audacious undertaking-to locate physical evidence of the kingdom of David at Khirbet Hamam in the south of Israel. A fundamentalist source that expects his findings to mesh with their beliefs-and has little patience for contradictory evidence-offers him financial support but Paul must decide what to do should his scholarly findings dispute his own faith and ideas of the authority of the Bible. The public seldom sees the struggle within the souls of theologians and religious leaders when they carefully examine the Bible in the light of science. Digger offers a deeply moving account of one man's struggle with faith, traditional religion, and his commitment to science.