BAS's 2021 archaeology top 10

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: 2021’s Top Ten Biblical Archaeology Stories. BHD's year in review: from new Dead Sea Scrolls to early Canaanite writing (Nathan Steinmeyer).

Again, PaleoJudaica noted all of these stories. You can find links for some of them in the 2021 archaeology roundup posts collected here.

For the revival of the debate over the Shapira scroll fragments, see here and links. For the discussion of King David's Judah, see here. For the passing of Hershel Shanks in 2021, see here, here, and here and links. For the new inscribed Lachish ostracon, see here. For the First-Temple-era weight that has been accused of cheating, see here and here. And I have mentioned the new manuscript of the Book of the Dead found in a funerary temple at Saqqara here.

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The underwater ecology of a Punic warship ram

MARINE ARCHAEOLOGY: More than 100 animal species are found living on the ancient ruins of a 2,000-year-old warship that sank during a battle between Romans and Carthaginians off the coast of Sicily (Stacy Liberatore, Daily Mail).

For more on the underwater archaeology of the Carthaginian defeat at the Aegates in the First Punic War, see here and here.

For many other posts on ancient shipwrecks, see here and links. Cross-file under Punic Watch and Marine (Maritime, Underwater) Archaeology.

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Review of Myers & Kline, A Hebrew Reader for the Psalms

WILLIAM A. ROSS: REVIEW: A NEW HEBREW READER FOR THE PSALMS.

It’s been a while since I did a book review, but I want to make sure to highlight a great new resource that is likely to interest my readers. Hendrickson Publishers has just produced A Hebrew Reader for the Psalms: 40 Beloved Texts, compiled and edited by Pete Myers and Jonathan G. Kline.

[...]

The volume was published by Hendrickson in 2021.

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Happy 2022!

HAPPY NEW YEAR from PaleoJudaica!

Best wishes again for a safe, healthy, and better new year. And do keep PaleoJudaica as a regular part of it.

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

The IAA's top-10 discoveries for 2021

THE FRIENDS OF THE ISRAEL ANTIQUITIES AUTHORITY: TOP IAA DISCOVERIES IN 2021.

PaleoJudaica has kept track of all of these stories. For the Solomonic-era purple cloth from the Timna Valley excavation, see here and here. For the lucky half-face lamp, whose other half turned up in Hungary, see here, here, and here. For the Arbel amulet, see here. For the unbreached wall in Jerusalem, see here, here, and here. For the intact chicken egg (eggshell, really), see here. And for the silver shekel found in Jerusalem, see here.

I have collect PaleoJudaica links for the other stories in in this post on Christianity Today's 2021 top-10 biblical archaeology list and in this top-10 archaeology list by the Greek Reporter. I also linked to an excellent list of lists by the Bible Place Blog here.

And that, my dear readers, is 2021 for PaleoJudaica. 2022 is nearly upon us. Celebrate well and safely tonight.

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Review of Lawler, Under Jerusalem

HISTORY OF ARCHAEOLOGY: 150 years of excavating Jerusalem: A rich layer cake. Book: Under Jerusalem by Andrew Lawler (RANDY ROSENTHAL, Jerusalem Post).

In Under Jerusalem, American author Andrew Lawler tells the story behind a century and a half of excavating the world’s most contested city, paying as much attention to the aboveground politics as to the subterranean discoveries. Part history, part journalism and part adventure story, the book is nearly as fun to read as exploring the underground passages it describes.

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Moses more than mortal?

DR. ALEXANDRIA FRISCH: A Not-Quite Mortal Moses (TheTorah.com).

Moses transformed into an angel, sat upon the divine throne, and was an instantiation of the Greek God, Hermes: These are some of the ways Second Temple authors reimagined Moses.

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An algorithm to index Judaism?

ALGORITHM WATCH: Science Ministry issues grant for historical Jewish texts algorithm. A Holon Institute of Technology (HIT) research team has received a grant to program an algorithm that will identify links from across Jewish source texts (Jerusalem Post).

I'm not sure exactly what this algorithm is supposed to do, but it sounds ambitious.

For PaleoJudaica posts on the application of algorithms to the study of antiquity, see here and here and follow the links.

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

Calderon nominated to head Jewish Agency

A NEW ROLE? Lapid nominates Ruth Calderon to head Jewish Agency (J-Wire).

Dr Calderon is an educator and Talmud scholar who holds a master’s degree and a doctorate in Talmud from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. From 2013-2015, she was a Knesset Member from the Yesh Atid Party, where she was Deputy Speaker, member of the education and state control committees, and Chairperson of the Lobby for Jewish Renewal.

For PaleoJudaica posts on Ruth Calderon and her wide-ranging work, see here and here and links.

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Neglected ancient burial caves in Jerusalem

UNHEEDED HERITAGE: Turning over in their graves. (Nadav Shragai, Israel HaYom).

Dozens of ancient heritage sites in Jerusalem, some located in the heart of residential neighborhoods, are suffering from long-term neglect. Doctoral student Yosef Speizer has submitted a list of 120 key sites to the city, and Mayor Moshe Leon says he plans to address the issue.

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Hadrian's Wall is turning 1900

COMMEMORATION: 1900 FESTIVAL: Join us as we celebrate 1900 years since the building of Hadrian’s Wall. 2022 will see hundreds of events and activities taking place in a yearlong festival across Hadrian’s Wall.

For PaleoJudaica posts on Hadrian's Wall, some with photos, see here and links. For posts on Vindolanda, an ancient Roman fort in Northumbria near the wall, see that post and links, plus here and here. Vindolanda is best known for the vast archive of Latin documentary tablets found there, sometimes known as the Dead Sea Scrolls of Britain.

In ancient Jewish tradition the Emperor Hadrian is mainly remembered for his role in the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 132-135 CE. Some posts on him are collected here. If you want an educated guess at what he looked like, see here. One of his outrages was the rebuilding of Jerusalem as a pagan city named after him: Aelia Capitolina.

I will keep an eye on the Wall commemorations in 2022 and will keep you posted on any interesting developments.

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Bible Places top 10 lists

THE BIBLE PLACES BLOG: Top 10 Discoveries in Biblical Archaeology in 2021 (Todd Bolen).

This top 10 list is my own, reflecting what I judge to be of greatest interest for biblical archaeology and history. I tend to attach greater significance to stories more closely related to the biblical lands and biblical time periods. Following the top 10, I have included several lists of noteworthy stories from Jerusalem, Israel, and elsewhere.

In addition, I’ve compiled lists of the top stories related to tourism, notable resources of 2021, and a review of some we lost this year. A final section provides links to other top 10 lists of 2021. I am of course greatly indebted to many, including the archaeologists who made the discoveries, the journalists who reported them, and many friends who sent links. In terms of archaeological discoveries, 2021 was a very good year.

This is an excellent array of lists.

For other 2021 top-ten archaeology lists, see here and here. At both posts I have linked to PaleoJudaica posts on many of the same stories.

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Jones, Translation and Style in the Old Greek Psalter (Brill)

NEW BOOK FROM BRILL:

Translation and Style in the Old Greek Psalter

What Pleases Israel's God

Series: Septuagint Commentary Series Septuagint Monograph Series

Author: Jennifer Brown Jones

While some describe the Greek Psalter as a “slavish” or “interlinear” translation with “dreadfully poor poetry,” how would its original audience have described it? Positioning the translation within the developing corpus of Jewish-Greek literature, Jones analyzes the Psalter’s style based on the textual models and literary strategies available to its translator. She demonstrates that the translator both respects the integrity of his source and displays a sensitivity to his translation’s performative aspects. By adopting recognizable and acceptable Jewish-Greek literary conventions, the translator ultimately creates a text that can function independently and be read aloud or performed in the Jewish-Greek community.

Copyright Year: 2022

Prices from (excl. VAT): €124.00 / $149.00

E-Book (PDF)
Availability: Published
ISBN: 978-90-04-47230-3
Publication Date: 15 Nov 2021

Hardback
Availability: Published
ISBN: 978-90-04-47125-2
Publication Date: 11 Nov 2021

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Late-antique synagogue excavated in Turkey

ANCIENT ARCHITECTURE: Excavations reveal ancient synagogue in Turkish town near tourist hotspot. Excavations reveal ancient synagogue in Turkish town near tourist hotspot of Antalya. Synagogue dates back to 7th century (David I. Klein, JTA via Arutz Sheva).

The synagogue was found recently in the town of Side, not far from the tourist hotspot of Antalya, in southern Turkey.

Among the remains was a plaque with a menorah motif and an inscription in Hebrew and Greek stating that it was donated by a father in honor of a son who passed away at a young age. The plaque ends with the Hebrew word “Shalom.”

In 2009 there was a report of the discovery of another synagogue, dating to the third century CE, in the same region. According to Acts 13:13-15, there was a Jewish community with a synagogue in Pisidian Antioch, near Pamphylia (in Antalya Province) in the first century CE.

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Looting picnic at Horvat Zaak?

APPREHENDED: Antiquities thieves busted plundering ancient cave in southern Judea. Seemingly innocent picnic revealed to be an antiquities robbery with five suspects from the Negev arrested (Israel HaYom).

A group of antiquities thieves were caught red-handed as they were allegedly plundering an ancient archaeological site in southern Judea, the Israel Antiquities Authority reported last week.

The robbers were digging at Horvat Zaak, an ancient Jewish village dating back to the Second Temple period.

[...]

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Apocryphal Christmas continued

SENTENTIAE ANTIQUAE: The Magi, Herod, and A Flight to Egypt.

Continuing the series of excerpts from the Gospel of James (the Protevangelium of James).

This story sounds more familiar. It is basically an imaginative retelling of Matthew chapter 2, with a cameo appearance of two charactes from Luke chapter 1 toward the end.

Cross-file under New Testament Apocrypha Watch and (still) 'Tis the Season.

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Stone, Armenian Apocrypha from Adam to Daniel (SBL)

NEW BOOK FROM SBL PRESS:

Armenian Apocrypha from Adam to Daniel
Michael E. Stone ISBN 9781628374162
Volume EJL 55
Status Available
Publication Date December 2021
Paperback $59.00
Hardback $79.00
eBook $59.00

This latest book by Michael E. Stone is the sixth volume in a series of translations from Armenian to English, which he began with the publication of Armenian Apocrypha Relating to Patriarchs and Prophets in 1982. His initial aim, to search unstudied Armenian manuscripts for works dating back to the Second Temple period, developed into a career-long search for reworkings of biblical traditions, stories, and persons in the Armenian tradition. In this collection Stone focuses on texts related to heaven and hell, angels and demons, and biblical figures from the Hebrew Bible and apocrypha. Texts, introductions, translations, annotations, and a critical apparatus make this collection a key resource for students and scholars of apocryphal and pseudepigraphical literature.

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Holladay, Hellenistic Jewish Literature and the New Testament (Mohr Siebeck)

NEW BOOK FROM MOHR SIEBECK: Carl R. Holladay. Hellenistic Jewish Literature and the New Testament. Collected Essays. Ed. by Jonathan M. Potter and Michael K.W. Suh. 2021. XXI, 714 pages. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 468. 189,00 € including VAT. cloth ISBN 978-3-16-154789-8>.

Published in English.
Like Philo and Josephus, as well as those who earlier produced the Septuagint and the Hellenistic Jewish fragmentary texts, the writers of the New Testament were Jews writing in Greek. They may have been articulating and promoting a particular form of Jewish messianism that eventually became a distinctive form of religious belief, but in the first and early second centuries, those Christ-followers who were writing in various genres operated with many of the same assumptions as their Jewish counterparts in the land of Israel and in other places such as Alexandria and Rome. This collection of essays, spanning the scholarly career of Carl R. Holladay, investigates the Hellenistic Jewish writings in their own contexts and explores how they illuminate the writings of the New Testament. Included are six new essays on such topics as Hellenistic Judaism, the Beatitudes, and Luke-Acts.

For more on Professor Holladay, see here.

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Porter, Johannine Social Identity Formation after the Fall of the Jerusalem Temple (Brill)

NEW BOOK FROM BRILL:

Johannine Social Identity Formation after the Fall of the Jerusalem Temple

Negotiating Identity in Crisis

Series: Biblical Interpretation Series, Volume: 194

Author: Christopher A. Porter

In Johannine Social Identity Formation after the Fall of the Jerusalem Temple Christopher Porter reads the Fourth Gospel through the lens of social identity theory as means of reconciling the social dislocation and trauma of the destruction of the Jerusalem temple. Analysing the Fourth Gospel in conversation with other temple-removed texts of Qumran, Philo, and Josephus the gospel’s intent to renegotiate cultic life without the temple can be seen. Through this analysis it is argued that the Fourth Gospel primarily functions as an intra-mural Jewish text, attempting to negotiate the formation of a Jesus-follower social identity in direct continuity with earlier Jewish shared social narratives. Finally, this work reviews the Johannine Community as an outcome of the Gospel identity formation.

Copyright Year: 2022

Prices from (excl. VAT): €106.00 / $128.00

E-Book (PDF)
Availability: Published
ISBN: 978-90-04-46982-2
Publication Date: 25 Oct 2021

Hardback
Availability: Published
ISBN: 978-90-04-46981-5
Publication Date: 28 Oct 2021

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Dumped ancient sarcophagus lid recovered at Ashkelon

DISCARDED DISCOVERY: Antiquities inspectors find 1,900-year-old sarcophagus lid in dump (Israel HaYom). HT the Bible Places Blog.

There was a similar episode in 2016, also at Ashkelon, involving an ancient sarcophagus found at a building site.

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Aramaic magic bowls in the Kyprianos Database

THE COPTIC MAGICAL PAPYRI BLOG: Kyprianos Update (22 December 2021). The Kiprianos Database now includes Aramaic incantation bowls. This seems to have been the case for a while, but I just noticed.

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Visit virtual Babylon

THE AWOL BLOG: Digital Model of Babylon.

I have a feeling this wrbsite will be useful when I next teach my upper division course on the Book of Daniel

Last spring I noted a recent book on Babylon by the owner of this site, Olof Pedersén (also via the AWOL Blog). Other posts on the history and archaeology of ancient Babylon are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

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