Thursday, October 01, 2020

The rabbi's tomb, the court case, and the children's book

ANCIENT ARCHITECTURE AND CHILDREN'S LITERATURE: A missing rabbi, an empty tomb and a caper with the Angel of Death, now for kids. The mysterious tale of 3rd century rabbi Yehoshua Ben Levi is recounted in a new book from illustrator Avi Katz, with help from an American poet and a rogue dig in the Galilee (Jessica Steinberg, Times of Israel).

I followed the controvery and court case over R. Yehoshua Ben Levi's tomb at the time. See here, here, here, and here. I never heard the outcome of the case. I'm glad that it seems to have been resolved amicably.

For notice of a scholarly article on R. Yehoshua, see here. For commentary on some of the Talmudic stories about him, see here, here, and here. As noted in that last post, you can read a couple of versions of a story about him in Helen Spurling's excellent translation of "Hebrew Visions of Hell and Paradise" in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures volume 1 (MOTP1).

Cross-file under Epigraphy and Aramaic Watch.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.