William G. Dever

William G. Dever (born November 27, 1933, Louisville, Kentucky) is an American archaeologist, specialising in the history of Israel and the Near East in Biblical times. He was Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Arizona in Tucson from 1975 to 2002. He is a Distinguished Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at Lycoming College in Pennsylvania.

Dever received his BA from Milligan College in 1955, an MA from Butler University in 1959, and a BD from Christian Theological Seminary in 1959. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1966.

Dever was Director of the Harvard Semitic Museum-Hebrew Union College Excavations at Gezer in 1966–71, 1984 and 1990; Director of the dig at Khirbet el-Kôm and Jebel Qa^caqir (West Bank) 1967–71; Principal Investigator at Tell el-Hayyat excavations (Jordan) 1981–85, and Assistant Director, University of Arizona Expedition to Idalion, Cyprus, 1991, among other excavations.

He used his background in Near Eastern field archaeology to argue, in Did God Have a Wife? Archaeology and Folk Religion in Ancient Israel (2005), for the persistence of the veneration of Asherah in the everyday religion of 'ordinary people' in ancient Israel and Judah. Discussing extensive archaeological evidence from a range of Israelite sites, largely dated between the 12th and the 8th centuries BC, Dever argued that this 'folk' religion, with its local altars and cultic objects, amulets and votive offerings, was representative of the outlook of the majority of the population, and that the Jerusalem-centred 'book religion' of the Deuteronomist circle set out in the Hebrew Bible was only ever the preserve of an elite, a 'largely impractical' religious ideal.

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