Did a meteor destroy Sodom and Gomorrah? Explore the archaeological evidence from Tall el-Hammam, the airburst theory, and how science interacts with the biblical account of divine judgment.
Quick Summary
The Bible describes the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah as a divine judgment involving "sulfur and fire" from heaven (Genesis 19:24). While Scripture focuses on the theological cause, some scientists and archaeologists propose that a meteor airburst (similar to the Tunguska event) over the site of Tall el-Hammam could offer a physical explanation for the catastrophe. However, this theory remains debated and is not definitively proven.
The destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah is described in Genesis 19:23–25 as a sudden and overwhelming event involving fire and devastation. The text states that the cities were consumed by what came “from the LORD out of heaven,” but it does not explain the physical mechanism by which this judgment occurred.
Scripture is primarily concerned with the moral and theological meaning of the event, not with providing a scientific report. This leaves open the question of whether the destruction was carried out through direct supernatural action or through natural processes directed by God.
In biblical thought, these two possibilities are not opposites. God is repeatedly shown to work both through extraordinary interventions and through ordinary forces of nature. A natural process does not exclude divine intention.
Explaining how something happened does not remove the question of why it happened or who governed it. For this reason, scientific investigation into possible physical causes does not weaken the biblical account but can exist alongside it.
schoolTheological & Historical Analysis
Frequently Asked Questions
Scholarly examination of the primary theological, historical, and biblical inquiries addressed in this guide.
How does Genesis 19 describe the catastrophic destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah?
In Genesis 19:24–25, the biblical text describes a sudden, overwhelming divine judgment: "Then the LORD rained down sulfur and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the LORD out of heaven. Thus He overthrew those cities and the entire plain, destroying all who lived in the cities—and also the vegetation in the land." The Hebrew terms gafrit va'esh ("sulfur and fire" or "burning sulfur") depict a supernatural incinerating rain that devastated the cities of the Jordan Valley plain (Kikkar). Scripture explicitly attributes this cataclysm to the sovereign moral wrath of Yahweh in response to grievous, systemic wickedness, violence, and unrepentant perversion (Genesis 18:20–21; Ezekiel 16:49–50).
The question of location and the archaeological problem
The Bible does not give a precise geographical description of where Sodom was located. Passages such as Genesis 10:19 and Genesis 13:1–12 place it generally in the region near the Dead Sea, but no coordinates or unmistakable landmarks are provided. As a result, any proposed site remains tentative.
One location that has received attention is Tall el-Hammam in modern Jordan, northeast of the Dead Sea. Archaeological excavations there reveal that an ancient city was violently destroyed and abandoned for centuries. Layers of ash, melted materials, and signs of extreme heat suggest a sudden catastrophic event.
These findings existed long before any connection was made with the biblical Sodom. The proposal that Tall el-Hammam could be Sodom is therefore a secondary interpretation rather than the original motivation for excavation.
However, identification is far from certain. Some scholars point out that the date of the destruction layer at Tall el-Hammam, often placed around 1650 BC, does not align easily with traditional biblical chronologies that situate Abraham earlier.
Others argue that the site could represent another city entirely, one of many in the region that suffered violent destruction in antiquity. The biblical text itself does not provide enough information to resolve this debate conclusively.
Because of this uncertainty, it is methodologically sound to separate two questions: whether Tall el-Hammam is Sodom and what kind of event destroyed the city found there. Neither answer automatically settles the other.
Was a meteor involved?
The meteor or atmospheric airburst hypothesis is based on physical features found at Tall el-Hammam. These include evidence of extremely high temperatures, shock effects on building materials, and unusual concentrations of salt in the surrounding soil. Similar effects are known from modern observations of meteor airbursts, such as the Tunguska event in 1908.
In this model, a cosmic object explodes in the atmosphere before striking the ground, releasing immense heat and pressure across a wide area.
Such an event could explain the sudden destruction of a large settlement and the long-term uninhabitability of the surrounding land. It also aligns with the biblical description of a catastrophe involving fire and total ruin.
At the same time, this hypothesis is not proven. Other explanations remain plausible. Military destruction using fire and siege techniques can also produce widespread burning. Earthquakes combined with the release and ignition of underground gases have long been proposed as a possible cause of the event described in Genesis. The region sits along a major fault line, making seismic activity a realistic possibility.
Each explanation accounts for some of the evidence but not all of it perfectly. This is typical in archaeology, where conclusions are built on probabilities rather than certainties. The meteor theory is therefore best understood as one possible scenario rather than a definitive solution.
From a theological perspective, even if a meteor were involved, it would not redefine the event as “non-miraculous.” In Scripture, God frequently uses natural forces to carry out judgment or deliverance.
The plagues in Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, and storms at sea are all examples where natural phenomena are presented as instruments of divine purpose.
What matters in Genesis 19 is not the precise physics of destruction but the moral and spiritual meaning: Sodom’s fall is portrayed as a response to profound corruption and injustice. Whether the mechanism was geological, cosmic, or directly supernatural does not alter that message.
At present, there is no confirmed location for Sodom and no verified explanation for how it was destroyed. Archaeology offers possibilities, not final answers. The biblical account remains historically grounded but intentionally restrained in technical detail.
That restraint is consistent with the Bible’s aim, which is not to satisfy scientific curiosity but to communicate theological truth and moral accountability.
What is the "cosmic airburst" hypothesis regarding Tall el-Hammam, and how does it relate to Sodom?
A team of archaeologists and scientists led by Steven Collins and Phillip Silvia (published in Nature Scientific Reports in 2021) excavated Tall el-Hammam in the southern Jordan Valley north of the Dead Sea. They documented a distinct, five-foot-thick terminal destruction layer dating to the Middle Bronze Age II (c. 1650 BC) characterized by high-temperature thermal destruction: pottery shards melted into glass (trinitite-like vitrification), shocked quartz, bubbled mud bricks, and elevated concentrations of platinum and iridium. They hypothesized that a low-altitude cosmic meteor airburst—resembling the 1908 Tunguska event but far more energetic—detonated over the plain, generating an immense thermal flash and supersonic blast wave that instantly incinerated the city. While contested by some geologists, many argue this event provided the physical mechanism for the biblical catastrophe of Sodom.
Does identifying a natural or cosmic mechanism diminish the miraculous character of divine judgment?
Not at all. In classical Christian dogmatics, theologians distinguish between primary causation (causa prima) and secondary causation (causae secundae). God, as sovereign Creator and Lord of Providence, regularly employs natural elements, cosmic bodies, and meteorological phenomena as instruments of His covenant purpose and moral justice (e.g., the east wind parting the Red Sea in Exodus 14:21, or hail in Joshua 10:11). Whether Yahweh employed a directed cosmic airburst, a seismically triggered ignition of underground bituminous petroleum and sulfur reserves along the Dead Sea fault line, or an immediate ex-nihilo miracle, the essential theological reality remains unchanged: it was a deliberate, precisely timed, and morally calculated act of divine judgment executing holy wrath against entrenched sin.
How does the New Testament utilize the destruction of Sodom as an eschatological type?
Throughout the New Testament, Sodom is never treated as a mythological fable or mere natural accident, but as an historical, paradigmatic archetype (hypodeigma) of final divine judgment: Jesus invokes Sodom in Luke 17:28–30 to illustrate the sudden arrival of the day of the Son of Man; in 2 Peter 2:6, Peter affirms that God "condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by turning them to ashes, making them an example to what is going to happen to the ungodly"; and Jude 7 declares that Sodom and Gomorrah "serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire." The historical overthrow of Sodom stands as an enduring warning that God’s patience has a boundary, foreshadowing the final cosmic judgment.
