Avigail Manekin-Bamberger, Seder Mazikin: Law and Magic in Late Antique Jewish Society (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2024). [Hebrew]Unmentioned in the review is that the more recently published incantation bowls (after Montgomery's publication) are mostly (entirely?) unprovenanced. Is it possible to forge one convincingly? It would be very difficult, but it would become easier as more of them are published. I discuss the issue further here.... Seder Mazikin is meticulously researched and generously written, such that both experts in the field and those who are just getting started will learn a tremendous amount about the [Babylonian Aramaic incantation] bowls, their legal dimensions, and their relationship to rabbinic sources. The book takes seriously the technical aspects of the bowls while drawing far-ranging conclusions about the social, intellectual, and material world in which they were produced....
I haven't read the book, but based on this review, I think I would agree with its conclusions. I wrote about the incantation bowls in my book Descenders to the Chariot (Brill 2001) and discussed the social background of their composers as non-rabbinic scribes on pp. 245-50. And I propose a specific connection with the Sar Torah hekhalot practitioners on pp. 276-77.
There are many PaleoJudaica posts on the Babylonian Aramaic incantation bowls. Start here and keep following the links, and see also here, here, here, here, here, and here.
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