Saltow lecture on the Inscriptions in Israel/Palestine Project

VIDEO: Inscriptions of Israel/Palestine: Presentation (Michael Satlow). For more on this project, see here and links.

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Tunisian synagogue mosaics

DECORATIVE ART: Jewish mosaics from Roman Tunisia at the Brooklyn Museum (Mary Harrsch, Roman Times Blog). Nice photos. The synagogue was in Naro (present-day Hammam Lif).

I note an exhibition of these mosaics back in 2008. See here and links. For more on Tunisian Jewish antiquities, see here and links.

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Reviewlet of Steinsaltz, Reference Guide to the Talmud

TIMES OF ISRAEL BLOGS: An indispensable guide to the Talmud (Israel Drazin).

The recently deceased scholar Rabbi Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz who authored sixty books and hundreds of articles is the author of the 549 page book “Reference Guide to the Talmud: The Indispensable Talmud Study Aid.” It is one of five new books published by Maggid Books. ...

Cross-file under Talmud Watch and New Book.

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Gelardini, Deciphering the Worlds of Hebrews (Brill)

NEW BOOK FROM BRILL:

Deciphering the Worlds of Hebrews

Collected Essays

Series: Novum Testamentum, Supplements, Volume: 184

Author: Gabriella Gelardini

In the collection entitled Deciphering the Worlds of Hebrews Gabriella Gelardini gathers fifteen essays written in the last fifteen years, twelve of which are in English and three in German. Arranged in three parts (the world of, behind, and in front of Hebrews’s text), her articles deal with such topics as structure and intertext, sin and faith, atonement and cult, as well as space and resistance.

She reads Hebrews no longer as the enigmatic and homeless outsider within the New Testament corpus, as the “Melchizedekian being without genealogy”; rather, she reads Hebrews as one whose origin has finally been rediscovered, namely in Second Temple Judaism.

Prices from (excl. VAT): €99.00 / $119.00

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Publication Date: 22 Apr 2021
Copyright Date: 01 Jan 2021

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Where is Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai really buried?

EVIDENCE LACKING: Is Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai really buried at Meron? It’s complicated. On one hand some rock cut burials dating back to the time of the Mishna are present in Meron. On the other, no archaeological evidence linking them to the Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai was ever found (Rossella Tercatin, Jerusalem Post).

Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai (Yohai), who flourished during the early second-century, is the traditional (but pseudepigraphic) author of the Zohar (cf. here, here, and here). For more on his traditional tomb in Meron, see here and links (cf. here). His Yahrzeit (death anniversary) is traditionally commemorated on Lag B'Omer. This year the festivities at Mount Meron were marred by a tragic accident.

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Review of Oetjen (ed.), New perspectives in Seleucid history, archaeology and numismatics

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: New perspectives in Seleucid history, archaeology and numismatics.

Roland Oetjen, New perspectives in Seleucid history, archaeology and numismatics: studies in honor of Getzel M. Cohen. Beiträge zur Altertumskunde, Band 355. Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2019. Pp. xvii, 814. ISBN 9783110283785 €129,95.

Review by
Rebecca Dodd, Glasgow. Rebecca.dodd@alexandria-research.org

Several of the articles in this large (40 article) collection pertain directly to ancient Judaism. Others are of background interest.

For more on the Seleucid era and its importance for biblical and ancient Jewish studies, start here and follow the many links.

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Solomon's story supplemented?

DR. GUY DARSHAN: As Solomon Builds the Temple, God Warns “Follow My Laws” in MT Not LXX (TheTorah.com).

The description of Solomon building and dedicating the Temple in the Masoretic Text (MT) of 1 Kings 6 and 8 differ from their parallels in the Septuagint (LXX). These expansions are written in Pentateuchal language, uncharacteristic of Kings, and reflect the attempt of a later scribe(s) to make these scenes cohere with Priestly theology and style, especially of Leviticus 26.

It's always nice when the Septuagint and redaction criticism agree.

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Israel Museum Studies in Archaeology

THE AWOL BLOG: Open Access Journal: The Israel Museum Studies in Archaeology. This journal has lots of articles of interest for ancient Judaism. These include articles on material culture and also on the Ashkar London fragment of Exodus.

However, at the moment, some of the PDF links in the AWOL post don't work. But if you go to the journal's website, you can download the articles from there.

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More on the half-face lamp

DEDICATORY METALWORK: 2,000-year-old oil lamp shaped like a grotesque face found in City of David. Archaeologists say the bronze item, unusual because it is only half of a lamp, was put in foundation of Roman-era building on Jerusalem’s famed Pilgrimage Road for good fortune (Michael Bachner, Times of Israel). This article has some new details not found in yesterday's article, including a date for the object (late first to early second century CE) and more information on its iconography. There are also new photos and a video.

The Daily Mail also has good coverage and more photos: That's one ugly genie! 2000-year-old oil lamp 'shaped like a grotesque face' and used as a ritual offering is discovered buried in the foundations of a building on Jerusalem's Pilgrimage Road (Stacy Liberatore).

Background here.

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Quantative-networking rabbinics?

TALMUD WATCH: The Rabbinic Network. (Michael Satlow, Tablet Magazine).

This is a lucid introduction to Professor Satlow's longstanding Rabbinic Citation Network Project, on which more here and here. But it also is an informative account of the current state of academic rabbinic studies and especially Babylonian Talmud studies overall. For another essay on the latter from a few years ago, see here.

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Alleged provenance of post-2002 Dead Sea Scrolls-like fragments

THE LYING PEN OF SCRIBES BLOG: “American Priest, later serving in Switzerland”: On Provenance (Årstein Justnes and Ludvik A. Kjeldsberg).

Most of the post-2002 Dead Sea Scrolls-like fragments come with stories. The following list presents information that we have been able to gather about their alleged provenance.

The list is organized chronologically, starting with the first frgs surfacing in 2002–3 and ending with frgs that have been “launched” recently.

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Review of Elitzur, Places in the Parasha – Biblical Geography

HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY: Where did the Red Sea split? Diagnosing biblical geography’s meaning. The answer can be found in Places in the Parasha – Biblical Geography and its Meaning, a fascinating book by Prof. Yoel Elitzur (Alan Rosenbaum, Jerusalem Post). I haven't seen the book. My comments are based on what this article reports.

On the headline question:

In a section titled “The Sea of Suf,” Elitzur writes about the Israelites’ crossing of the Red Sea after leaving Egypt. He takes issue with those who claim that the term “Red Sea” is a misspelling of the English translation of Yam Suf ­­– “Reed Sea.” While most modern scholars identify its location as one of the two Bitter Lakes, which are today part of the Suez Canal, Elitzur writes that the entire Gulf of Suez, which encompasses the Red Sea, is the correct location of the “Sea of Suf,” as it is termed in the text.

No one thinks that "Red Sea" is a misspelling of "Reed Sea." Red Sea comes from the Greek translation of the phrase yam suf in the Septuagint. The literal meaning of yam suf is "Reed Sea."

I don't know the latest on this question, but the Oxford Bible Atlas (mine is an old 1974 edition) suggests that in the Exodus story yam suf may have been "the southern extension of Lake Menzaleh" (p. 58) which is on the northern coast of Egypt. The "bitter lakes" are further south, north of the Gulf of Suez.

The OBA also says that in later biblical usage (e.g. 1 Kings 9:26) yam suf referred to the Gulf of Aqabah (the extension of the Red Sea on the other side of the Sinai).

Linguistically, writes Elitzur, the Hebrew word “suf” refers to the sedge or papyrus. This freshwater plant grows on the banks of the Nile and is also found on the shores of the Bitter Lakes and in the Northern Sinai Peninsula. By contrast, the Red Sea is a salty sea that does not have such vegetation. Nevertheless, he writes, “In every place where the information found in the Tanach is clear, the biblical Sea of Suf is the Red Sea. Etymological speculations in scientific reconstructions of miraculous events cannot simply brush away hard data.”

The "Sea of Reeds" was the name of body of water where reeds didn't grow? Maybe. I would have to see the argument in greater detail.

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Fortunate funny face found in a foundation

HALF A FACE, ACTUALLY: ‘Lucky’ Bronze Oil Lamp Uncovered in City of David’s Pilgrimage Road Excavations (Jewish Press).

A rare bronze oil lamp, in the shape of a grotesque face cut in half, was recently discovered in excavations conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority in the City of David National Park.

IAA archaeologists Ari Levy and Dr. Yuval Baruch believe that the lamp, which was discovered in the foundations of a building built on the pilgrimage road, was intentionally deposited to bring good fortune to the building’s residents.

[...]

To be clear, they found the complete lamp. It was intentionally fabricated as half a face.

Ancient bronze lamps are rare. I have blogged about only one other. It was excavated at the late-antique Um el-Kanatir synagogue in the Golan. Coincidentally (or not, I don't know), it too was in the shape of a funny face.

The synagogue was a basilica, the standard Roman-influenced design for public buildings at that time. There were balconies, supported by pillars, around three sides of the inner space, and a central nave some 40 feet high. The diggers found Byzantine coins under the floor, left there when the building was constructed, perhaps for good luck. They found household implements, agricultural tools, and a bizarre, beautiful Aladdin-style bronze lamp shaped like the head of a satyr; the flame would have flickered from the tip of his beard.

My emphasis.

Also worth mentioning: the funny-faced faucet at Sepphoris.

For more on the Jerusalem Pilgrimage Road / Pilgrims' Path, see here and links.

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Dissertation on ancient Jewish domestic labor & marital obligation

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Dissertation Spotlight | Domestic Labor and Marital Obligations in the Ancient Jewish Household (Pratima Gopalakrishnan).

How does a household function? Who owes what to whom, and how did people conceive of their relationships to one another? How did the realities of work in an agricultural society shape these relationships? My dissertation, “Domestic Labor and Marital Obligations in the Ancient Jewish Household,” asks these questions of rabbinic texts. It argues that rabbinic texts view domestic labor arrangements as inherently subject to variation rather than as static obligations.

[...]

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Solomon's shipping empire disputed

NOT A SHIPPING MAGNATE AFTER ALL? King Solomon's mines in Spain? Not likely, experts say (Owen Jarus, Live Science).

A maritime archaeologist has put forward a bold theory — that King Solomon, a king of Israel who controlled a vast amount of wealth according to the Hebrew Bible, financed Phoenician mining expeditions to Spain. However, archaeologists and historians not involved with the researcher's work are skeptical.

Sean Kingsley, director of the Wreck Watch consultancy company, published his theory recently in Wreckwatch Magazine, a publication that he edits, putting forward several arguments to support this idea. His arguments range from Phoenician mining operations along rivers, to biblical names at areas associated with mining, to passages in the Hebrew Bible that seem to link Solomon to both the seafaring Phoenicians and a potential Spanish city known for its mineral wealth in the Hebrew Bible.

[...]

It seems the first round goes to the skeptics. But Dr. Kingsley is still planning to publish an article and a book on his hypothesis. Well see. The subject is outside my expertise and I have no opinion one way or the other.

Background here. Cross-file under marine (maritime, underwater) archaeology.

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Petrantoni, Corpus of Nabataean Aramaic-Greek Inscriptions (open access)

THE AWOL BLOG: Corpus of Nabataean Aramaic-Greek Inscriptions

Giuseppe Petrantoni Università degli Studi di Enna “Kore”, Italia

A new open-access book. Cross-file under Nabatean (Nabataean) Watch.

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A prolific scribe at Qumran?

SCRIBE OR STYLE? Dead Sea Scrolls: Mysterious scribe wrote eight diverse scrolls, scholars find (Rossella Tercatin, Jerusalem Post).

“The main purpose of my work has been using artificial intelligence, an extraction algorithm and statistical analyses to test 51 manuscripts which share a particular handwriting style.”

The article is based on an interview with Gronigen PhD student Gemma Hayes. The algorithms she uses reportedly can distinguish individual scribes who use the same scribal style. Her research also adds support to the dating of "scribe G-QS001" to the late first century BCE or ealy first century CE by paleography and carbon dating. The scribe consistently used the Qumran Scribal Practice, which is a spelling style somewhat different from that of Masoretic Hebrew. And she says that the appearance of the scribe's work in two different caves at Qumran may suggest that the scribe was resident at Qumran.

In an e-mail, Joseph Lauer provided links to videos of Ms. Hayes's presentation last month, mentioned in the article, as well as another presentation by her and Maruf A. Dhali in 2020.

For more on the The Hands that Wrote the Bible Project at Groningen University, see here. Follow the links there for more algorithm news. Cross-file unde Algorithm Watch.

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Methuselah and Resurrection Genomics

NYU PRESS RELEASE: Scientists Successfully Sequenced the Genome of Previously Extinct Date Palms. This study marks the first time researchers have sequenced the genomes of plants from ancient germinated seeds. (SciTechDaily). This release gives a good overview of the study.

You can read the open-access underlying article at the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA website:

The genomes of ancient date palms germinated from 2,000 y old seeds

Muriel Gros-Balthazard, Jonathan M. Flowers, Khaled M. Hazzouri, Sylvie Ferrand, Frédérique Aberlenc, Sarah Sallon, and Michael D. Purugganan

PNAS May 11, 2021 118 (19) e2025337118; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2025337118
Edited by Douglas E. Soltis, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, and approved March 17, 2021 (received for review December 11, 2020)

Significance

Resurrection genomics is an alternative to ancient DNA approaches in studying the genetics and evolution of past and possibly extinct populations. By reviving biological material such as germinating ancient seeds from archaeological and paleontological sites, or historical collections, one can study genomes of lost populations. We applied this approach by sequencing the genomes of seven Judean date palms (Phoenix dactylifera) that were germinated from ∼2,000 y old seeds recovered in the Southern Levant. Using this genomic data, we were able to document that introgressive hybridization of the wild Cretan palm Phoenix theophrasti into date palms had occurred in the Eastern Mediterranean by ∼2,200 y ago and examine the evolution of date palm populations in this pivotal region two millennia ago.

For more on Methuselah (the famous resurrected date palm from Masada), his siblings, and another recent study on them by some of the same researchers, see here and links.

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A Holy Fire crowd this year

IN THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHER (HOLY SEPULCHRE): Vaccinated faithful throng Jerusalem church for Holy Fire (AP/SF Gate). The Holy Fire ceremony happens on the night before Orthodox Easter. This year that was last Saturday. (Happy Easter to all who celebrated!)

For more on the ceremony, see here and links. As this article notes, last year the church was nearly empty due to pandemic restrictions.

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Review of Cobb, Slavery, Gender, Truth, and Power in Luke-Acts ...

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Book Note I Slavery, Gender, Truth, and Power in Luke-Acts and Other Ancient Narratives (Kelsi Morrison-Atkins).

Christy Cobb, Slavery, Gender, Truth, and Power in Luke-Acts and Other Ancient Narratives (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave MacMillan, 2019)

The other narratives are Chariton's Greek novel Callirhoe and the apocryphal Acts of Andrew.

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Biblical Studies Carnival 182

RUBÉN DE RUS: Biblical Studies Carnival 182-April 2021.

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Geniza Greek glosses on the Talmud

GENIZA FRAGMENT OF THE MONTH (APRIL 2021): Five Greek Glosses to Bava Metzia 93b: T-S F2(1).164 (Julia Krivoruchko).

Medieval Greek-speaking scholars are mostly known as those who obliged R. Sherira and R. Hay, the Pumbedita Gaons, with translations of unfamiliar Greek loanwords. Yet beyond and behind this semi-anecdotal evidence there existed a culture of Talmud study, of which the glosses of T-S F2(1).164 are first-hand evidence.

Past posts noting Cairo Geniza Fragments of the Month in the Cambridge University Library's Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit are here and links.

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The Good Samaritan Parable

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Understanding the Good Samaritan Parable. Who were the Samaritans? This brief essay summarizes a 2015 BAR article by Amy-Jill Levine. The article itself is behind the subscription wall.

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Joffe on the Mellaart forgery accusations

THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST TODAY: My Meeting with Mellaart or, Dutch Cigars and the Case of the Missing Wall Paintings. Alex Joffe has a characteristically original take on the late James Mellaart and the accusations of academic fraud associated with him. Excerpt:

But as far as the long Beyköy inscription goes, Zangger and Woudhizen cautiously believed it to be real, but were crestfallen to find no evidence for the inscription’s existence outside of the wildly shifting accounts in Mellaart’s own files. It was, in the words of a former Mellaart student, a specialist in Luwian, “a gigantic fantasy.” At the same time, however, the text itself (known only from Mellaart’s drawings) appears to be so correct linguistically and historically that it might actually be real.

Here the questions are compounded geometrically. How could someone master an especially difficult and obscure extinct language to fake an especially long inscription using correct as well as idiosyncratic grammar, data such as place names, and even phrases that were not yet known to scholars? Did Mellaart take something ‘real’ and then inexplicably fake a backstory? How do we separate the inscription from the man? And if two of the world’s leading specialists think that it might be ‘real’ how are the rest of us to judge? There is no object to verify for market and only the tiniest cadre of specialists who can even evaluate the data. What is real anyway?

"What is real anyway?" may turn out to be the key question of the twenty-first century.

PaleoJudaica posts on the controversy over Mellaart's work are here and here. For more on the Oxford missing-papyri scandal, the Gospel of Jesus' Wife, and the (probably mostly fake) post-2002 Dead Sea Scroll-like fragments (all three alluded to in passing in the essay), follow the links.

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Online Enoch Seminar on Apocalypticism (23-27 May, 2021)

ZOOM CONFERENCE:

11th Enoch Seminar Meeting – Apocalypticism: History, Method, and Reception

Online – 23-27 May, 2021

Chairs: Loren Stuckenbruck, Kelley Coblentz Bautch, Gabriele Boccaccini

Secretary: Joshua Scott

To mark the 200th anniversary of the first “full” English translation of the “book of Enoch” by Richard Laurence (1821), the 20th anniversary of the Enoch Seminar, the LMU Munich Congress on Apocalypticism in Antiquity has assembled 120 scholars and colleagues from around the world to address a much debated question that remains relevant for today. Since the famous 1979 Uppsala Congress on Apocalypticism in the Mediterranean World and the Near East (ed. David Hellholm; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1983) and the publication of the Semeia volume 14 entitled Apocalypse: The Morphology of a Genre (ed. John J. Collins; Missoula: Society of Biblical Literature, 1979), the scholarly world has undergone significant shifts in methods of approach, access to sources, and widening participation. These changes now offer the opportunity to assess whether terms such as “apocalyptic,” “apocalypticism,” and “apocalypse” can be meaningfully applied to multiple ideologies and writings preserved through sources from the ancient world. The lectures, presentations, and responses each fall into one or more of the following seven areas (with the number of talks, including responses, within each in parentheses):

(1) Apocalypses, Method, and Reception (21)
(2) Apocalypses in the Ancient Mediterranean Context (9)
(3) Hebrew Bible and Near Eastern Context (9)
(4) Second Temple Judaism and Christian Origins (25)
(5) Christianity in Late Antiquity (17)
(6) Judaism in Late Antiquity (9)
(7) Islam in Late Antiquity (9)

In addition, in several panel sessions, both junior and senior scholars shall reflect on the legacies left by past scholarship, discuss recent developments, and suggest paths that may be taken by future research.

Registration

The Enoch Seminar is proud to host this unprecedented event and welcomes the interested public to seven keynote lectures, while inviting registering academics to join the conversations opened up in the conference sessions.

Follow the link above for the (very) full conference program. The registration link is here. The event is free, but the organizers encourage a $20 donation.

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Numhauser, Hispanojewish Archaeology (2 vols.) (Brill)

NEW BOOK FROM BRILL:

Hispanojewish Archaeology (2 vols.)

The Jews of Hispania in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages through Their Material Remains

Series: The Brill Reference Library of Judaism, Volume: 66

Author: Alexander Bar-Magen Numhauser

In Hispanojewish Archaeology, Alexander Bar-Magen Numhauser provides the first book-length archaeological exploration of the Jewish presence in late antique and early medieval Hispania. Using epigraphic, numismatic, architectural, and other archaeological remains, this volume describes the multiple cultural expressions of a vibrant Jewish community that emerged as part of the Mediterranean Diaspora, becoming part of the wider Hispanian society. Part of this review includes a detailed examination of the Ilici (Elche, Spain) basilical building, interpreted by previous scholars as both a church and a synagogue, using published and hitherto unpublished material of its decades-long excavation. From the archaeological remains of this Hispanojewish presence a new picture emerges, challenging the traditional premises of the archaeological research on the late antique western Mediterranean.

Prices from (excl. VAT): €367.00 / $441.00

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Availability: Published
ISBN: 978-90-04-41991-9
Publication Date: 22 Apr 2021
Copyright Date: 01 Jan 2021

For more on the Elche building, see here.

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Backfish, Hebrew Wordplay and Septuagint Translation Technique in the Fourth Book of the Psalter (T&T Clark)

NEW BOOK FROM BLOOMSBURY/T&T CLARK:

Hebrew Wordplay and Septuagint Translation Technique in the Fourth Book of the Psalter

By: Elizabeth H. P. Backfish

Published: 03-25-2021
Format: Paperback
Edition: 1st
Extent: 200
ISBN: 9780567700353
Imprint: T&T Clark
Series: Texts and Versions of the Hebrew Bible, The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies
Dimensions: 6 1/8" x 9 1/4"
List price: $39.95
Online price: $35.96
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About Hebrew Wordplay and Septuagint Translation Technique in the Fourth Book of the Psalter

This volume examines numerous Hebrew wordplays not identified and discussed in previous research, and the technique of the Septuagint translators, by offering another criterion of evaluation – essentially, their concern about the style of translating Hebrew into Greek. Elizabeth Backfish's study analyzes seventy-four wordplays employed by the Hebrew poets of Psalms 90-106, and how the Septuagint renders Hebrew wordplay in Greek.

Backfish estimates that the Septuagint translators were able to render 31% of the Hebrew semantic and phonetic wordplays (twenty-four total), most of which required some sort of transformation, or change, to the text in order to function in Greek. After providing a thorough summary of research methods on wordplay, definitions and research methodology, Backfish summarizes all examples of wordplay within the Fourth Psalter, and concludes with examples of the wordplay's replication, similar rendition or textual variation in the Septuagint. Emphasising the creativity and ingenuity of the Septuagint translators' work in passages that commentators often too quickly identify as the results of scribal error or a variant Vorlage from the Masoretic text, Backfish shows how the aptitude and flexibility displayed in the translation technique also contributes to conversations in modern translation studies.

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