Muraoka, The Wisdom of Solomon in the Septuagint (Peeters, open access)

NEW BOOK FROM PEETERS:

The Wisdom of Solomon in the Septuagint

SERIES:
Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis, 304
AUTHOR:
Muraoka T.

PRICE: 85 euro
YEAR: 2024
ISBN: 9789042950863
PAGES: XII-228 p.

SUMMARY:
In spite of the traditional mention of king Solomon in the title of the book, Wisdom of Solomon can be dated to the middle of the first century BCE and was probably written by a Jewish author in Alexandria. As such it is one of the most valuable representatives of the genre known as sapiential literature, along with books such as Proverbs, Qoheleth, or Ben Sira. Wisdom of Solomon markedly differs from Proverbs and Ben Sira, the two principal representatives of the genre, in that instead of a series of unconnected sayings we have here a logical sequence, a consistent theology. Among the Septuagint writings, the level of Greek displayed in the book is extremely high. Our annotated English translation is based on the critical edition prepared by J. Ziegler (1962). Since the book’s two Syriac versions, i.e. Peshitta and Syrohexapla, demonstrate that in ancient times the document was read and studied extensively, the present study pays careful attention to them as well.

This book is published open access. It can be downloaded here.

In my 2005 book, The Provenance of the Pseudepigrapha, pp. 217-225, I made the case that the Wisdom of Solomon could just as well have been written by a gentile Christian in the second half of the first century CE. I wouldn't particularly press the idea, and no one else seems to have run with it, but I've not seen a rebuttal either. So I'd say it's still on the table. For an even wilder idea about the authorship of the Wisdom of Solomon, see here.

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Ancient Roman taxation practices

TWO RECENT DISCOVERIES have been generating some discussion of ancient Roman taxation practices in the Land of Israel. I have posted on both stories, but here are a couple of overviews:

Tax Administration in Roman Caesarea Philippi. What does a boundary stone say about Roman taxation? (Nathan Steinmeyer, Bible History Daily)

Strangely, despite several dozen such stones having been discovered, primarily in the hinterland of Caesarea Philippi, none have ever been found outside the Levant. However, since the tax reform of Diocletian and Maximian was an empire-wide reform, we might expect to find such stones all around the empire, not just in one particular region. Thus, the peculiar distribution of the stones has remained a problem for Roman and Levantine archaeologists.

Background on the inscribed boundary stone is here and here.

The Case of the Very Long Roman Legal Papyrus from the Judean Desert, Or, Do You Really Have to Pay Sales Tax on Slaves? (This Week in the Ancient Near East Podcast).

The publication of a really long Roman legal document from the Judean Desert has us wondering about crime. Is changing a location on a contract really forgery? How about a little light counterfeiting of silver coins? Ok fine, but there’s sales tax on slaves? That makes all this even worse.

Background on Manuscript P.Cotton is here and here.

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Archaeology and politics

DIGRESSION: For the most part I avoid politics, but some essays with various views on political matters pertaining to Israeli archaeology have been piling up. I'm taking this opportunity to note them for information, without further comment.

Academic Boycott Threatens Archaeological Research in Judea and Samaria (Elie Mischel, Israel365 News).

Opinion | For Israeli Politicians, Archaeology Is a Tool to Prove Jews Own This Land. A new bill to establish an administration to handle antiquities in the West Bank effectively means annexation (Moshe Gilad, Haaretz). Background on the bill is here.

IDF spokesperson to show archaeological proof of Jewish indigeneity to Israel in new book. IDF Maj. Doron Spielman summed up his book "When Stones Speak" thusly: The proof that we have pulled out of the ground shows without a doubt that Jews are indigenous to Jerusalem and Israel (Marion Fischel, Jerusalem Post). For more on the golden bell mentioned in the article, see here and links.

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

Gupta on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha

GOOD TO KNOW: Studying Early Judaism: The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. A Guide to Resources for New Testament Studies (Nijay K. Gupta, Studying Early Judaism Substack).

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

Ancient textual materiality

DR. MONIKA AMSLER: Of Jars, Scraps, and Scrolls: How Ancient Books Were Composed (TheTorah.com).

In biblical times, scraps of writing were stored together in jars, likely based on theme or topic, and these collections were combined and edited into our biblical books. Similarly, Talmudic pericopae began with collections of legal or wise sayings written on pitqi, “scraps,” and stored together in jars, or on a pinqas, wooden slats bound together.

The observations in this essay make good sense to me as applied to the books of the Hebrew Bible, one of my areas of expertise.

I am not a Talmud specialist, but I have heard from other Talmudists that the Babylonian Talmud was largely orally transmitted for a long time, perhaps until as late as the tenth century. (See here, here, and here, although, regrettably, the relevant essay links have evaporated.) Dr. Amsler's work summarized in this essay points to the situation being more complicated.

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AJR review panel on Gross, Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity, part 7

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Away with Autonomy (Simcha Gross).

To conclude this panel, I will briefly elaborate on the immediate historical intervention I aimed to make with the book before expanding upon its implications for the historiography of Jewish Studies, the study of the Sasanian Empire, and approaches to late antique empires more broadly.

I noted the earlier essays in the series here and links.

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

What do archaeology specialists do?

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Dig Scene Investigators. What do archaeology specialists do? (Nathan Steinmeyer).

Since the early years of archaeology, the discipline has gradually become more specialized, with archaeologists seeking to answer ever more minute and complex questions. But what are these specializations and how do they affect an excavation? To answer this question, BAR caught up with specialists to ask them what they do in the field.

These days archaeology has a great many of these specializations.

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

Appreciating 11Q5

THE ETC BLOG: Appreciating 11Q5: A Comparative Look at the Great Psalms Scroll (Anthony Ferguson).

11Q5 (11QPsa), known as the Great Psalms Scroll, is on display at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, CA. This exhibition has been made available by the Israelite [sic] Antiquities Authority and the sponsorship of The Lowell Milken Family Foundation. You can learn more about the exhibition here. I had the opportunity to visit the exhibit on Friday with my family and found it to be an enriching experience.

In this post, I’d like to discuss three (among many!) important features of this manuscript by way of comparing it to the more popular 1QIsaa. For a discussion on the textual nature of the manuscript, see my prior post here.

[...]

An interesting, rather technical discussion.

For more on the Reagan Library Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition, see here and here.

Material from 11Q5 was on display in Jerusalem in 2008 and in Toronto in 2009.

For more posts on the Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsa^a), see the links collected here.

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

"Who Were the Maccabees and What Did They Do?"

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Who Were the Maccabees and What Did They Do? Explore the rise of the Maccabees and the growth of their kingdom (Megan Sauter).

Who were the Maccabees, what did they do? From priests to kings, the Maccabees created an independent Jewish kingdom in the second century BCE. Their success was a testament to their zeal—and some significant external factors. The Book of 1 Maccabees tells the story of their rise, while archaeology places the story within a larger historical and political context. Andrea M. Berlin of Boston University analyzes both in her article, “The Rise of the Maccabees,” published in the Summer 2023 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review.

[...]

This essay summarizes the article, which is behind the subscription wall.

For many PaleoJudaica posts on the Maccabean Revolt, see here and links. For a couple of little-known ancient sources on the revolt, see here. That post also links to a post noting a revisionist view of the revolt. For another, see here.

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

Gaza archaeological exhibition in Paris

GAZA ARCHAEOLOGY: Paris exhibition brings Gaza's saved archaeological heritage back into the spotlight. In April, an exhibition will showcase some 100 'miraculously saved' artifacts that have been stored in Geneva since 2007 (Roxana Azimi, Le Monde).

HT Rogue Classicism. You can read part of this article for free. The rest is behind a paywall.

For more on this collection, which was on display in Geneva last year, see here and here.

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

AJR review panel on Gross, Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity, part 6

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: A Social and Political History of Jews in the Sasanian Empire (Seth Schwartz).

This is part of a 2024 Association for Jewish Studies panel celebrating the publication of Gross, Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity (Cambridge Press, 2024). Read the full forum here.

... But full solar eclipses, blue moons, and other signs and wonders do happen, with passing rarity. Simcha Gross’s book is that most unlikely occurrence: a first book that actually makes a big revisionist argument, in a structurally elegant and above all largely convincing way. I will not provide a full summary here, but would like to note some things that stood out for me. ...

Let me note some sections that I found especially impressive. Simcha attacks head-on the assumptions that have always informed historiography on Jews in Sasanian Babylonia—among them that the Jews had substantial group-wide autonomy because the empire was organized in corporations, and the king devolved authority onto the leaders of the constituent groups. ...

UPDATE: I noted the first five essays in the series here and links.

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

Palmyra report

PALMYRA WATCH: Report documents devastation of ancient city of Palmyra, a World Heritage Site, after the fall of the Assad regime (Spanish National Research Council, Phys.Org).

Palmyra is one of the most famous sites in Syria for its extraordinary heritage and archaeological remains. Inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1980, the city saw much of its heritage destroyed during the war. Following the liberation of Syria from the Assad regime on 8 December, a multidisciplinary team has carried out a field study in Palmyra to assess the current state of the archaeological monuments and the surrounding residential areas, comparing them with their condition before the start of the Syrian uprising in 2011. The report is an initiative of Palmyrene Voices of the NGO Heritage for Peace in collaboration with the CSIC's Milà i Fontanals Institution.

Also, another update on the condition of Palmyra and other Syrian antiquities sites (notably the "Dead Cities," of which there seem to be many):

Experts push to restore Syria’s war-torn heritage sites, including renowned Roman ruins at Palmyra (AP via Arab News)

For many PaleoJudaica posts on the ancient metropolis of Palmyra, its history and archaeology, the Aramaic dialect once spoken there (Palmyrene), and the city's tragic reversals of fortune, now hopefully once again trending for the better, start here and follow the links.

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

Late-antique love spells

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: The Power of Love. The peculiar spells of Roman love magic (Rangar Cline).

Despite the efforts of authorities, however, portions of magic books survive from antiquity. Most of the surviving texts were produced on papyrus in Roman Egypt between the third and fifth centuries CE, although the texts likely reflect earlier traditions, as fragments of papyri with magical texts have been found elsewhere. Among the binding spells these texts contain, some belong to a subcategory referred to as “love magic.” One such spell for binding a lover calls for the crafting of wax or clay figures of a man and a woman. ...

The Talmudic-era Hebrew magical tractate Sefer Ha-Razim (Sefer HaRazim) also includes a couple of erotic binding spells. No voodoo dolls were involved, though. See my discussion of the tractate here.

As I've mentioned before, my new English translation of Sefer Ha-Razim is coming out in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures, volume 2 (MOTP2) in April. Available now for preorder!

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

Chained woman buried near Jerusalem in 5th-century was an ascetic?

"EXTREME ASCETICISM": Woman buried with chains near Jerusalem shows first evidence of female asceticism in Byzantine era. Researchers found the remains of the ascetic individual bound in chains. Small metal plates and a tiny cross were found near the abdomen of the skeleton (Jerusalem Post).

During excavations at Khirbat el-Masani, a Byzantine monastery dating from 350 to 650 CE, several tombs were uncovered. Among these burials, researchers found a poorly preserved skeleton wrapped in heavy metal chains—a practice linked to extreme asceticism. Initially, the remains were assumed to belong to a male ascetic due to the traditional association of this type of penance with men. However, scientific analysis published in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports confirms the remains belonged to a woman.

To determine the sex of the individual, researchers employed peptide analysis on the enamel of the only remaining tooth, specifically the second premolar of the upper jaw. ...

Wow. This is the first I've heard of this interment practice for anyone, man or woman.

Cross-file under Technology Watch.

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AJR review panel on Gross, Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity, part 5

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Manichaean Precedents in Light of Gross, Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity (Jae H. Han).

This is part of a 2024 Association for Jewish Studies panel celebrating the publication of Gross, Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity (Cambridge Press, 2024). Read the full forum here.

... The larger question that I will try to answer in this presentation is where, if at all, the early Manichaeans fit within the immanent model of imperial power that Simcha has so carefully excavated in his book. ...

I noted the first four essays in the series here and links. [Internal reference now corrected.]

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

What Is the Judean Desert?

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: What Is the Judean Desert? A place of wandering and refuge (Nathan Steinmeyer). Good to know.

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

Mayfield & Barter (eds.), Ezekiel’s Sign-Acts (De Gruyter)

NEW BOOK FROM DE GRUYTER:

Ezekiel’s Sign-Acts
Methods and Interpretation

Edited by: Tyler D. Mayfield and Penelope Barter
Volume 562 in the series Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111521015

Institutional price £110.00

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter
Copyright year: 2025
Audience: Scholars in the field of theology, Old Testament/Hebrew Bible studies, Jewish studies. Pages
Front matter: 12
Main content: 228
Illustrations
Tables: 1
Keywords: Ezekiel; sign acts; Old Testament; Hebrew Bible.

eBook
Published: November 4, 2024
ISBN: 9783111521015

Hardcover
Published: November 4, 2024
ISBN: 9783111519739

About this book

The Ezekiel passages describing the instructions for, and dramatization of, divine messages (Ezekiel 3-5; 12; 24; 37) are among the most bizarre in the Hebrew Bible. The prophet is commanded to embody his message of judgment to Jerusalem, and these actions clarify the oracles they surround. Yet, these sign-acts are frequently overlooked within Ezekiel studies, which tend to focus on the book’s strange visions and controversial oracles. This volume addresses the growing diversity in approaches in Ezekiel studies by inviting international senior and junior scholars to focus on the texts concerning Ezekiel’s sign-acts. It aims to redirect scholarly attention to these often-ignored texts, which stand so central to understanding the nature of prophecy as well as the overall book of Ezekiel.

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