MYSTICAL POLITICS is a new weblog by academic Rebecca Lesses, another specialist in ancient Judaism. She blogs on early Jewish mysticism and modern politics. Really. Also about her cat, Zachary.

Kol HaKavod, Rebecca!

ALEXANDER THE NOT-SO-GREAT?

How great was Alexander? (UCBerkeleyNews)

By Kathleen Maclay, Media Relations | 12 June 2003

BERKELEY � Alexander the Great may not have been so great after all.

A University of California, Berkeley-led group of researchers is challenging the common history that credits the Macedonian king with initiating the spread of ancient Greek culture throughout the Middle East during his conquest of the region during the 4th century B.C.

Backed by a nearly $234,000 collaborative research grant from the Getty Foundation, the team over the next two years will try to document a thriving Hellenized culture in the city of Dor, Israel, at least 100 years before Alexander marched in.

The birth of the Hellenistic period, when Greek culture began to spread far beyond its native territory, has long been set around 334 B.C. to 323 B.C., when Alexander and his troops began their 20,000-mile conquest, thundering from Macedonia south through what is now Syria, Lebanon, Israel and Egypt. The troops then set off for Persia and India.

"Our hunch is that at Dor, Hellenization - the wholesale importation of Greek material culture - begins in the 5th century B.C. and goes into high gear around about 400 B.C. So, it precedes Alexander," said Andrew Stewart, a UC Berkeley professor of art history and classics in the College of Letters & Science. He also is the project's principal investigator.

"There is, as far as we can tell, no boost given to this process by Alexander's conquests," said Stewart. "So, immediately we are challenging the view that it was Alexander who principally spread Greek culture throughout the Middle East."

[�]

The researchers will investigate what has been uncovered that reflects the efforts of inhabitants of Dor in adopting Greek culture, resisting it, or combining it with their own to form something new. They will look at these interactions in terms of material culture at various levels of society, throughout time.

[�]

SYMPOSIUM ON RABBINIC LITERATURE AND THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS:

The Orion website has a page of past symposia associated with the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The most recent symposium was:

Eighth Orion International Symposium

RABBINICAL PERSPECTIVES: RABBINIC LITERATURE AND THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS

7-9 January, 2003 at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Mt. Scopus Campus

The page contains abstracts or full (unrevised prepublication) texts of papers for the conference. The papers with full texts are listed with their authors' names in capitals on the page. These are:

"Law, Authority and Writing"
Cana Werman

"Things of Specified Measure"
Ahron Shemesh

"Reconstructing Qumranic and Rabbinic Halakhic Worldviews: Dynamic Holiness vs. Static Holiness"
Eyal Regev

"Tannaitic Halakha and Qumran: A Re-Evaluation"
Joseph Baumgarten

Some of them require you to download Hebrew fonts before you can read them fully.

The full page of past Orion symposia leads to pages for each symposium which also have abstracts and prepublication versions of papers. Many of these have since been published.

You can also access a list of all the papers and abstracts on the Orion website.

THE LATEST ON THE "JOASH INSCRIPTION":

Tablet Is A Fake (Arutz Sheva)

The "Yehoash Tablet" is a forgery - at least according to a board of experts convened by the Antiquities Authority. The panel included archaeologists and ancient Hebrew script experts, whose findings will be published next week. [...]

ON GEMATRIA:

Games with Gematria
Llewellyn Journal

Is gematria a valid and useful technique for investigating anything, or is it nothing but mental exercise? If it is useful, can it apply to anything other than Hebrew scripture? Is it even taking things too far to apply it to the Aramaic of the Zohar? How about non-Hebraic names, such as Bill Jones or Aleister Crowley? How seriously should you take correspondences that you happen upon in your reading and investigations?

[...]

Not very.

New Age, but sensible and worth a read.

NEW BOOK REVIEWS from the Review of Biblical Literature:

Crown, Alan D.
Samaritan Scribes and Manuscripts

Goodblatt, David, Avital Pinnick and Daniel R. Schwartz, eds.
Historical Perspectives: From the Hasmoneans to Bar Kokhba in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated
Literature, 27-31 January, 1999

Gropp, Douglas M., Moshe J. Bernstein, Monica L. W. Brady, James H.
Charlesworth, Peter W. Flint, Stephen J. Pfann, Eileen Schuller, Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar and James C. Vanderkam
Wadi Daliyeh II: The Samaria Papyri from Wadi Daliyeh and Qumran Cave 4, XXVIII: Miscellanea, Part 2

Kr�ger, Thomas
Kohelet (Prediger)

Crossan, John, and Jonathan Reed
Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts

Bauckham, Richard
Gospel Women: Studies of the Named Women in the Gospels

NEW BOOK ON 2 BARUCH:

Rivka Nir, The Destruction of Jerusalem and the Idea of Redemption in the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch (Early Judaism and Its Literature, SBL and Brill: 2003) ISBN #1589830504

The Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch is a pseudepigraphic apocalyptic work ascribed to Baruch son of Neriah, the scribe of Jeremiah. Its overt content concerning the last days of the First Temple period disguises a description of the fall of the Second Temple in 70 C.E. Contrary to the general scholarly view, this book attempts to show that the internal structure and central ideas of II Baruch must be understood in a Christian context. This theological identity is reflected mainly in traditions which describe the destruction of Jerusalem and the three apocalyptic visions which depict the coming of the Messiah and the eschatological redemption. The author�s conclusion may shed light on the Christian character of other Pseudepigraphic and apocalyptic books.

How interesting! Thanks to Cynthia Edenburg for drawing it to my attention.

THE CURRENT ISSUE OF BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION: A Journal of Contemporary Approaches (requires paid institutional or personal subscription), vol 11.2, is devoted to the family in the NT period. Note the following articles of paleojudaic interest:

"Epsilon, upsilon, sigma, epsilon, beta, epsilon, iota, alpha: Roman Imperial Family Values and the Sexual Politics of 4 Maccabees and the Pastorals"
Mary R. D'Angelo

"Gender, Judaism, and Literature: Unwelcome Guests in Household Configurations"
Amy-Jill Levine

VENICE CONFERENCE ON JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN MESSIANISM:

This conference will immediately follow the July Venice conference on Enoch, to which I am going. Thanks to Gabriele Boccaccini for passing on this announcement.

IL MESSIA FRA MEMORIA E ATTESA

Convegno internazionale, Venezia 4-6 luglio 2003


Che sappiamo del Messia?Quanti sanno che "Cristo"�

� la traduzione greca della parola ebraica mashiach = "unto"?


Gli ebrei lo aspettano ancora e lo interpretano in vari modi:�

una persona? un'epoca di pace? un impegno umano o un dono divino?�

Un rabbino dell'800 diceva: "Il Messia non � venuto e non verr�, sta venendo".

I cristiani lo identificano con Ges� di Nazaret.�

Ma dove sono oggi i segni della sua presenza?�

� per questo che i cristiani aspettano la sua seconda venuta?

Gli studiosi hanno scoperto le radici del pensiero messianico�

in correnti poco note (Enoch, Qumran): sono solo studi eruditi�

o servono a capire davvero la figura del Messia?

Oggi, il Messia pu� essere ancora un nome per le nostre speranze?

Un gruppo internazionale di esperti (cristiani, ebrei e laici) affronter� questi temi al convegno di Venezia: TI ASPETTIAMO�
Se vuoi saperne di piu'clicca qui
http://www.biblia.org/mesmemoat.html




Dal 22 al 30 agosto 2003, a Fognano RV, due seminari estivi sullagiustizia sociale nella Bibbia


(Amos e Lettera di Giacomo).�
Per programma ed eventuale iscrizione clicca qui
http://www.biblia.org/seminest2003.html
Puoi divulgare questo messaggio ai tuoi amici in rete? Grazie!

By the way, the archive is back.

ARCHIVE PROBLEMS: Blogger is currently being upgraded, which, of course, means everything is going wrong. After it recovered from yesterday's outage, it deleted most of the PaleoJudaica archive. Presumably the archive still exists on the server somewhere, but the usual republishing fix isn't working. Bear with me; I'll keep trying.

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS AND OTHER HEBREW MSS PROJECT:

This site contains articles by Norman Golb of the University of Chicago on the Dead Sea Scrolls and related matters from the nineties and early naughties. I am not persuaded by Golb's theory that Qumran was a military fortress to which sectarian and non-sectarian literary archives from Jerusalem were brought during the first revolt against the Romans, but I find his work very stimulating and it has influenced my views in a number of areas. Here is the summary of a student paper on Golb's work from my 2001 Qumran course, and pasted below is my summary of the seminar discussion (from the majordomo archives, 30 April 2001).

NORMAN GOLB AND THE ARCHIVES OF JERUSALEM

We made list of Golb's strongest arguments, and there seemed to be a general consensus that his objections to the Essene hypothesis, or at least its traditional formulation, were more persuasive than his attempt to formulate a positive theory of his own. The strong arguments included:

* the very large number of scribal hands in the manuscripts;
* the lack of manuscripts that bear the normal physical characteristics of scribal autographs;
* the lack of documentary records (note that 4Q342-58 are probably texts of the Bar Kokhba period recovered from Nahal Hever, not Qumran texts);
* The large textual and redactional variations in the supposedly Essene foundation documents--actually, I believe Golb doesn't mention this, but it does support his theory inasmuch as it points away from the library being gathered by a single, well-defined group;
* the confusion in Pliny over whether the Essenes were still living at the mentioned site near the Dead Sea after the Roman conquest in CE 68-70;
* the finding of a copy of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (perhaps a sectarian text, but not certainly) at Masada;
* the debunked scriptorium in the Qumran ruins;
* the lack of explicit mention of celibacy in the sectarian texts and its incompatibility with most (all?) of them;
* the evidently allegorical interpretation of Isa 40:3 in 1QS 8.14-16, which weakens the supposed explicit mention of the group going out into the desert.

We noted, however, that his contention that the Qumran library was too varied in content to be a sectarian/Essene collection could be turned on its head, in that most of the caves had sectarian works in them and that there was a curious lack of texts that espoused obviously different viewpoints. Where, for example, are copies of works like 1 Maccabees?

AAAHHHHH! Blogger has been down since this morning and I've been having withdrawal pangs.

Here are some MORE COURSE SYLLABI:

Religion 326: Religion - Ancient Judaism
Professor Jack Lightstone
Concordia University
Includes a course syllabus, lecture outlines, and translated excerpts of rabbinic texts.

Religious Studies 3DD3/History 3DD3: The Jewish World in New Testament Times
Dr. Eileen Schuller
McMaster University

TH 9990, Dead Sea Scrolls
Professor George Brooke
University of Manchester

We have year-end examiners' meetings etc. for the next couple of days, but I'll try to slip in a post or two, Blogger etc. willing.

UPDATE (9 May): I've corrected the bad link to the Lightstone course.

SHOULD WE PUT THE GODS BACK INTO RELIGION?

Why Gods Should Matter in Social Science (Chronicle of Higher Education via the Arts and Letters Daily)

By RODNEY STARK

If it is hard to believe that conceptions of the Gods are ignored in most recently written histories, it is harder yet to understand why Gods were long ago banished from the social-scientific study of religion. But that is precisely why I have devoted two volumes to demonstrating the crucial role of the Gods in shaping history and civilization, and to resurrecting and reformulating a sociology of Gods.

[...]

Unconscious divine essences are unable to issue commandments or make moral judgments. Thus, conceptions of the supernatural are irrelevant to the moral order unless they are beings --�things having consciousness and desires. Put another way, only beings can desire moral conformity. Even that is not sufficient. Gods can lend sanctions to the moral order only if they are concerned about, informed about, and act on behalf of humans. Moreover, to promote virtue among humans, Gods must be virtuous --�they must favor good over evil. Finally, Gods will be effective in sustaining moral precepts, the greater their scope --�that is, the greater the diversity of their powers and the range of their influence. All-powerful, all-seeing Gods ruling the entire universe are the ultimate deterrent.

Two conclusions follow from this discussion. First, the effects of religiousness on individual morality are contingent on images of Gods as conscious, morally concerned beings; religiousness based on impersonal or amoral Gods will not influence moral choices. Second, participation in religious rites and rituals will have little or no independent effect on morality.

[...]

So then, let us finally be done with the claim that religion is all about ritual. Gods are the fundamental feature of religions. That holds even for Godless religions, their lack of Gods explaining the inability of such faiths to attract substantial followings. Moreover, it was not the "wisdom of the East" that gave rise to science, nor did Zen meditation turn people's hearts against slavery. By the same token, science was not the work of Western secularists or even deists; it was entirely the work of devout believers in an active, conscious, creator God. And it was faith in the goodness of that same God and in the mission of Jesus that led other devout Christians to end slavery, first in medieval Europe and then again in the New World.

In those ways at least, Western civilization really was God-given.

Rodney Stark is a professor of sociology and comparative religion at the University of Washington. This article is adapted from For the Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery, to be published this month by Princeton University Press. Copyright � 2003 by Rodney Stark.

Read it all. I have to say I was with him up to the last two paragraphs - making religion about ritual to the exclusion of the gods clearly does't work - but I think he goes off topic at the end and into areas that are less defensible. Devout believers in God have been as much a hindrance to science as a help and they did quite a lot to promote and preserve slavery before it was ended.

"THE LATEST INSTALLMENT ON THE "MINIMALIST" - "MAXIMALIST" DEBATE:

Philip Davies, "Final Comments on Minimalism" (Bible and Interpretation News)

Scroll to the bottom for links to earlier essays on the subject.

All I can say is that I hope that the public personal disagreements between the debaters really will stop here. These issues are important and deserve to be discussed purely on the merits of arguments and evidence.

"DEMI MOORE, Kabbalah recruiter"

Sign me up!

THE CURRENT ISSUE OF THE JOURNAL OF BIBLICAL LITERATURE includes the following articles (requires paid membership and password to access):


Dating the Teacher of Righteousness and the Floruit of His Movement
MICHAEL O. WISE

The Covenant of Circumcision (Genesis 17:9-14) and the Situational Antitheses in Galatians 3:28
TROY W MARTIN

Is There Halaka (the Noun) at Qumran?
JOHN P. MEIER

HAPPY SHAVUOT!

I'M OFF TO ABERDEEN first thing tomorrow morning for a Scottish University day-conference for postgraduates and staff in Divinity/Theology/Religious Studies. I'll try to do some blogging in the evening after I get back.

MORE ON THE BULGE IN THE TEMPLE MOUNT:

May. 29, 2003
8 trucks with construction materials permitted on Temple Mount to fix bulge (Jerusalem Post [requires registration] via Bible and Interpretation News)

By ETGAR LEFKOVITS


Eight trucks filled with construction materials were permitted to enter Jerusalem's Temple Mount early this week as part of the ongoing Jordanian repair work of the bulge on the southern wall of the Temple Mount, Jerusalem police said Thursday.

[�]

The renewed entry of heavy equipment into the historical-rich site without the presence of archaeologists was troubling to some.

"We are deeply concerned over reports of very large amounts of construction materials enter the temple mount without any archaeological supervision." said Hebrew University Professor, Dr. Eilat Mazar, a member of the Committee Against the Destruction of Antiquities on the Temple Mount.

"Let us hope that this is not a 'Solomons StablesTwo'," Mazar said, referring to the immense mosque constructed at the site, alongside the inner area of the bulge, under Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's tenure.

[�]

HERE'S THE TRANSCRIPT OF EUGENE VOLOKH'S Chronicle of Higher Education live colloquy on academic blogging, mentioned here a couple of days ago.

WAS JESUS GAY?

Doctoral candidate: Jesus was 'gay' (WorldNetDaily via Protocols)
Posted: May 28, 2003
5:00 p.m. Eastern


� 2003 WorldNetDaily.com

A doctoral candidate in Australia was paid $51,000 in public funds to research Jesus' sexuality, declaring unequivocally that the founder of Christianity was homosexual.

According to a report in the Adelaide Advertiser, Rollan McCleary, who himself is homosexual, earned $17,000 a year for three years to work on his thesis on homosexual spirituality. The grant came from the University of Queensland.

McCleary will be awarded his doctorate tomorrow and in the future hopes to make "gay spirituality" a separate academic discipline.

[�]

According to the Advertiser, he claims Jesus' astrological chart, clues in the Scriptures to which churches had been blind and accurate biblical translations all played a part in his conclusions.

[�]

McCleary says he is an Anglican and is described by the Advertiser as a "qualified reader of astrological charts."

I would really like to believe that this story has been distorted in its filtering through two news outlets. Would the University of Queensland really grant a doctorate for something like this? But let's just take what's described as it is in this article, without any assumption that someone in academics was really arguing it. And set aside the astrological nonsense. Specialists run up against things like this all the time. It's not that I could care less whether Jesus was a homosexual or not � actual information on his personal life would be extremely interesting, whatever it was. The thing that tells me the argument is bogus is that I know very well what our sources are about Jesus. It is extremely difficult and problematical to extract any useful information about him from them, let alone data about his sexual orientation. His culture regarded homosexuality officially as a capital offense, so presumably Jewish homosexuals in first-century Palestine would have been pretty discreet. But even if popular culture was more tolerant, as it may have been, there is nothing in our sources that tells us about his love life. We simply don't know things like that, nor will we ever unless unlooked-for new information comes to light.

UPDATE: Evidently Dr. McCleary's statement about Jesus being gay was a passing comment in a thesis on something else. His "astro-theology" website is no longer up, but here is the Google cache copy.

THE JUNE ISSUE OF BIBLE REVIEW IS OUT. Most of what's in the online version deals with matters earlier or later than usually covered in PaleoJudaica. There is, however, a brief article by the Jesuit professor who provided Mel Gibson with the Aramaic for his controversial, forthcoming, big-screen movie The Passion, followed by some comments by Leonard Greenspoon on the "writing on the wall" that Saddam neglected to read (same URL, scroll down). Also articles on the Egyptian name of Moses, the Christian tradition of the "harrowing of hell," a column by Ron Hendel on where to find Noah's Flood (seems like a heck of a thing to have lost in the first place), and a review of my former colleague Bernhard Lang's new book The Hebrew God. (On the last, would somebody please correct the spelling "Diety" on the main page?)

UPDATE (10 June): I just found out in a meeting today that although Bernhard Lang has returned to Paderborn, he will have the position of Honorary Professor at St. Andrews. So delete "former" above.

NEW BOOK REVIEWS from the Review of Biblical Literature:

Runia, David T. and Gregory E. Sterling, eds.
In the Spirit of Faith: Studies in Philo and Early Christianity in Honor of David Hay

Azevedo, Joaquim, ed.
A Simplified Coptic Dictionary (Sahidic Dialect)

Carson, D. A., Peter T. O'Brien and Mark A. Seifrid, eds.
Justification and Variegated Nomism: A Fresh Appraisal of Paul and Second Temple Judaism

The last has been reviewed twice before in RBL, by John Byron and Pamela Eisenbaum (same URL). Eisenbaum's is the most probing. Allow me to add a few comments of my own. I was disappointed that some of the authors made use of Pseudepigrapha texts as evidence for Judaism without being very critical about what they were using. I have written elsewhere about the problem of telling Jewish pseudepigraph transmitted by Christians from Christian compositions meant to look biblical (and the final draft of this paper is to be a chapter of a book I'm writing on the subject). Until recent years the tendency has been to treat Pseudepigrapha as Jewish as long as they don't contain obvious Christian elements (or as long as one can delete these elements as secondary redactions without too much difficulty). But this won't do. Rather, we should follow Bob Kraft in starting with the manuscripts in hand and moving backwards to earlier contexts only as required by the evidence. By these criteria, none of the texts used by Craig Evans in his essay count as reliably Jewish. Joseph and Aseneth may be, but I doubt very much that the Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah (suitably edited), the Life of Adam and Eve, or the Lives of the Prophets are. In any case, one should make a positive case for them before using them. Likewise, Robert A. Kugler uses the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs as evidence, although he acknowledges that the form we have is Christian and we don't know that there ever was a Jewish version of the Greek twelve testaments. I should be very hesitant to use it at all for these purposes. Ditto for the Testament of Job, which he also uses (it may be a Jewish work but there isn't really any positive evidence for this). I don't mean to single out this book and these writers. This problem is common among NT specialists writing about the Jewish background of the NT. Mark Elliott in his recent The Survivors of Israel: A Reconsideration of the Theology of Pre-Christian Judaism (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2000, does the same thing, using the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs as one of his major "Jewish" texts. This is one of my hobby-horses, so expect to hear more from me about it.

MORE ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXCAVATIONS IN ISRAEL FOR 2003 (Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs).

NELSON GLUECK would be 103 years old today:

1900 - Birth of Nelson Glueck, American Jewish archaeologist. Director of the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem between 1932 and 1947, he explored and dated over one-thousand ancient sites in Palestine and the Near East.

(CNSNews.com)

THE JERUSALEM PERSPECTIVE WEBSITE is a "Christian ministry" website based in Israel. A lot of it is aimed at a popular Evangelical audience, but it archives a collection of serious articles by academics as well. It requires a paid subscription to access its full archive of articles), but you can read some articles in full for free. Some of these include:

"Where is the Aramaic Bible at Qumran? Scripture Use in the Land of Israel?" Buth, Randall (on main page)

"To Bury Caiaphas, Not to Praise Him"
Flusser, David

"That Small-fry Herod Antipas, or When a Fox Is Not a Fox"
Buth, Randall

"Centurion and the Synagogue, The"
Safrai, Shmuel

"Jesus' Jewish Parents"
Safrai, Chana

"Jewish Laws of Purity in Jesus' Day"
Wilson, Marvin R.

"Pilgrimage in the Time of Jesus"
Safrai, Shmuel

"Place of Women in First-century Synagogues, The"
Safrai, Shmuel

"Priest of the Division of Abijah, A"
Safrai, Shmuel

In addition, the Jerusalem Perspective Pipeline is a monthly electronic newsletter with short articles, some of which are of interest. Past issues are available only to paid subscribers. The current issue includes:

Randall Buth, "Is 'Rabbouni' Aramaic or Hebrew? It Depends on Which Language You're Speaking!"

USER-FRIENDLY KABBALAH:

This is outside my usual range, but I feel like commenting on it.

What Is Kabbalah, Anyway? (Slate)
By Ed Finn
Posted Monday, June 2, 2003, at 1:39 PM PT

[�]

Kabbalists have been an accepted part of Jewish culture since the 12th century. Though their mystical beliefs, which focused on the individual's direct communion with God through solitary study, sometimes set them apart from their mainstream coreligionists, many Kabbalists were teachers and judges highly respected by all Jews. The emphasis on secret knowledge and mysticism have also long endeared the study of Kabbalah to occultists of other persuasions, kicking off a Kabbalist fad among gentiles in Renaissance Europe�and giving us words like "cabal." In the United States, Kabbalism made a comeback in the '60s, when it was championed by Philip Berg, an American former rabbi who began studying Kabbalah on a visit to Israel in 1962.

Under Berg's leadership, Kabbalah in America has greatly expanded, spawning centers around the country and recruiting celebrity faithful like Madonna and Monica Lewinsky. Berg's version of Kabbalah dispenses with the traditional requirements of an Orthodox lifestyle and the study of ancient texts. Where traditional Kabbalah emphasizes mysticism as a part of devoted Judaism, Berg's new movement focuses on personal improvement and spiritual happiness, targeted to "people of all faiths and no faiths." Berg's centers draw big crowds for meditation, classes, and philosophical study, and his Kabbalah portal offers Kabbalah 101, a class that takes the "once arcane wisdom of Kabbalah and offers it up as [a] user friendly, accessible, self-study program," for $19.95.

How does this new Kabbalah stack up against the old? Like traditionalists, Berg presents Kabbalah as a way to perceive the inherent order of the universe, the "unseen spiritual laws that govern our lives." The difference is that he simplifies these lessons to make them easily accessible; rather than requiring devotees to learn Hebrew, he publicizes his interpretations of ancient Kabbalist texts nationally in books and speaking engagements. Traditional scholars of the field are careful not to slam the new centers too hard, but the experts do argue that Madonna's new-age spiritualism has little in common with the traditional scholarly mysticism of Jewish Kabbalah.

I've been following this story for some time with interest and a little bemusement. I can't say I find anything particularly objectionable in it. It's true that Berg's new Kabbalah doesn't seem to have a great deal to do with the actual thirteenth-century Zohar and the like. But so what? How much did the Zohar have to do with the actual Simeon ben Yohai and the other second-century rabbis? Nothing, pretty much. It's also true that Berg is making money off it. But, again, so what? Moses de Leon and his friends were out to make a buck too, but they managed to come up with texts that have had enduring spiritual value for a lot of people. It's not for me, but if other people get something out of this new Kabbalah stuff, good for them.

NEW LINKS TO JOURNAL SITES:

I've added links to some more journals to the links section. These are available online by paid subscription (individual or institutional) only. Some of them allow nonsubscribers to access tables of contents. On the theory that being alerted to interesting articles will be of some use to you � if only to motivate you to go to the local research library and dig something important up - I will try to monitor these and post a notice of paleojudaically relevant articles in new issues as they come out. For starters, here are some items from the current issue of a few of them:

Dead Sea Discoveries

FROM LITERATURE TO SCRIPTURE: REFLECTIONS ON THE GROWTH OF A TEXT'S AUTHORITATIVENESS
Eugene Ulrich

AUTHORIZING INTERPRETATION IN POETIC COMPOSITIONS IN THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS AND LATER JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN TRADITIONS
Angela Y. Kim

INTERPRETATIVE AUTHORITY IN THE COMMUNITY RULE TRADITION
Charlotte Hempel

HEARING 4Q225: A CASE STUDY IN RECONSTRUCTING THE RELIGIOUS IMAGINATION OF THE QUMRAN COMMUNITY
Robert A. Kugler

HALAKHAH AT QUMRAN: GENRE AND AUTHORITY
Aharon Shemesh; Cana Werman

4QMMT, RABBI ISHMAEL, AND THE ORIGINS OF LEGAL MIDRASH
Azzan Yadin

RHETORIC AND HERMENEUTICS IN MIQSAT MA'ASE HA-TORAH (4QMMT): THE CASE OF THE BLESSINGS AND CURSES
Steven D. Fraade

Journal for the Study of Judaism

ACCESS TO THE SOURCE: CICERO, BEN SIRA, THE SEPTUAGINT AND THEIR AUDIENCES
Benjamin G. Wright III

EIN UNWETTER IN JERUSALEM Beobachtungen zu BJ 4:286-288
Peter H�ffken

REVERSAL, RECIDIVISM AND REWARD IN 3 MACCABEES: STRUCTURE AND PURPOSE
J. R. C. Cousland

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament

Darius in Place of Cyrus: The First Edition of Deutero-Isaiah (Isaiah 40.1-52.12) in 521 BCE
Rainer Albertz

Novum Testamentum

HOW SEPTUAGINTAL IS ISA. 5:1-7 IN MARK 12:1-9?
Craig A. Evans

Vetus Testamentum

THE DATE OF LXX
Frank Clancy

A TOMB IN IRAQ IS ASSIGNED TO THE PROPHET EZEKIEL:

"In Iraq, reverence for ancient tomb of a Jewish prophet" (Christian Science Monitor)

A Shiite Muslim worships at the tomb of Ezekiel, harking back to Iraq's shared heritage.

By Peter Ford

The bearded worshiper moved slowly round the shrine in his bare feet, uttering Muslim prayers and pausing every few steps to bend his head and kiss the golden cloth that covered the holy tomb.

The dome above him, though, bore the painted floral traces of a very un-Islamic past. And the script running around the walls also bore no relation to the flowing Arabic calligraphy that decorates most mosques in the Middle East.

It was in Hebrew. The body lying in the tomb that this devout Muslim was venerating is that of the prophet Ezekiel. And until just 50 years ago, the building sheltering it - first recorded by a 12th century Jewish pilgrim - was a synagogue.

[...]

There's more. Read it all.

UPDATE (3 June): Giorgio Francia, who is in Iraq, has said on Ioudaios-L that he will try to get us a photograph of the tomb and synagogue next week, roads permitting. I'll keep you posted.

"SCHOLAR BLOGGERS":

The Chronicle of Higher Education has an article about academics who blog:

"Scholars Who Blog
The soapbox of the digital age draws a crowd of academics"
(via The Volokh Conspiracy)

By DAVID GLENN

Is this a revolution in academic discourse, or is it CB radio?

[�]

Will the practice of blogging become near-universal in academe? Or is it, as the Invisible Adjunct sometimes imagines, "a temporary trend that will run its course"? Mr. Balkin notes that blogging, like many other phenomena on the World Wide Web, is organized according to a power law. That is, the most popular nodes, like Instapundit, tend to have 10 times more readers than blogs on the next tier, who in turn have 10 times more readers than the third tier. "Is that distribution going to stay fixed?" he asks. "The answer is that we don't know how fluid this economy will be. I would be amazed if in two years' time you went to look at the list of most popular blogs, that the list will be the same -- but it will probably still be organized as a power law."

[�]

Hmmm� I guess if Instapundit is first tier, by these critieria PaleoJudaica.com is about fifth tier. Oh well. If my loyal readers want this blog to continue in the long run (and I am planning on keeping it going at least in the short run), the best things you can do are, first, keep visiting; second, link to it on your web pages if you have them; and, third, tell your friends and colleagues about it and get them to visit and to link to it. It also doesn't hurt any to send me items of interest you run across on the Internet.

There will also be a live chat session with Eugene Volokh on academic weblogging on June 4 (1 p.m. Eastern Time).

A NUMBER OF JOURNALS only list contents or contents and abstracts online but these can still be useful, so I have linked to them in the journals section. Here are some articles listed in the most recent issues of some of them:

Revue Biblique

RB 2003 T.110-2 (pp. 167-177)

Claudine CAVALIER
Centre Paul-Albert F�vrier
UMR 6125 Textes et documents de la M�diterran�e antique et m�di�vale
MMSH, 5 Rue du Ch�teau-de-l'Horloge
BP 647
13094 Aix-en-Provence cedex 2
cavalierclau@wanadoo.fr
"Le "colophone' d�Esther"

The last verse of the Greek book of Esther in his most widespread form, traditionally called the �Colophon� of Esther, is of a particular interest. It relates the sending, by a priest and his son of a �Letter of the Phrurai�, from Palestine where it has been translated, to Egypt, under the reign of one Ptolemy. Is it a documentary text, giving reliable information on the history of the Greek book of Esther? The article tries to demonstrate that, on the contrary, it is a purely literary text, staging a symbolic history of the feast of Purim.

RB 2003 T.110-2 (pp. 178-196)

Christian GRAPPE
GDRI - Facult� de Th�ologie Protestante
Universit� Marc Bloch
F-67084 STRASBOURG
FRANCE
J�sus exorciste � la lumi�re des pratiques et des attentes de son temps.

Several Jewish documents from the time of Jesus can shed light on his practice as an exorcist. Some of them confirm that casting out demons had an eschatological purport, in the sense that they point to the emergence of the Kingdom of God. Other texts shed light on Jesus being acknowledged as the Son of David because of his exorcist activity, or they supply us with interesting parallels to this practice as it is described in the synoptic gospels.

RB 2003 T.110-2 (pp. 222-248)

Alessandro FALCETTA
Via Croce Rossa, 6
60027 OSIMO (AN)
ITALY
afalcetta@yahoo.com
The Logion of Matthew 11:5-6 par. from Qumran to Abgar

This article develops a proposal made by James Rendel Harris in his testimony studies. I consider the logion of Matthew 11:5-6 as belonging to a tradition which is attested in Jewish literature and continues with the Fathers. The texts taken into account are the Synoptics, 4QMessianic Apocalypse, 11QMelchizedek, Justin's First Apology and Dialogue with Trypho, Irenaeus' Adversus Haereses, the Slavonic addition after Flavius Josephus' Jewish War 1.369, and Abgar's letter to Jesus in The Teaching of Addai. A quick reference is made to Cicero's Laelius de Amicitia. This tradition is reconstructed by employing the source detecting criteria of testimony research. The main conclusions are two. Firstly, the logion is one stage of the life of a literary topos, the healings of the messiah, which crosses chronological and geographical barriers. Secondly, the hypothesis of the use of written testimony collections, though not enough to account for all the literary phenomena considered, is a powerful tool of research.


RB 2003 T.110-2 (pp. 249-256)

Chaim BEN-DAVID
Jordan Valley Academic College
Identifying Aia and Tharais to the east of the Dead Sea

On the edge of the surviving section of the Madaba Map, east of the Dead Sea, two villages are indicated, �Aia and Tharais. The sites are not mentioned in the Bible, have no connection with early Christianity and do not appear in any other historical sources. We suggest that they were marked on the Madaba map because they are located on the main Roman-Byzantine ascents that led up eastward from the Dead Sea to The Moabite plateau. Aia in the present-day village of Ai is at the top of the well-built known Roman road that ascends from the Zoar area to the Moabite plateau. We propose identifying Tharais with a site known as Medinat ar-Ras or it�s near vicinity. This is based on the discovery of a well-built Roman road ascending from Zoar directly eastwards to a height of 1300 meters over an aerial distance of 8 km.

Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha

Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha Vol. 13 No. 1 (April 2002)

The Testament of Abraham: Which Came First-Recension A or Recension B?
Jared W. Ludlow
Greeks, Eygptians and Jews in the Fragments of Artapanus
Erkki Koskenniemi
The Battle for Isaac: Exploring the Composition and Function of the Aqedah in the Book of Jubilees
Leroy Andrew Huizenga
Purity and Impurity i the Book of Jubilees
Liora Ravid

Journal of the American Oriental Society

LEO DEPUYDT, The Date of Death of Jesus of Nazareth

I hope to add links to more journals soon.

JEWS IN EARLY MEDIEVAL CHINA:

This is somewhat beyond my usual range, but it's too interesting to pass up.

"A blue-capped barbarian untangles a speech problem" (Christian Science Monitor)
By Edward Ordman

[...]

In 1986 I lectured in China, in Jinan and Shanghai. I came back very sympathetic to the problems of Chinese students who had tried to learn English in a country where it had not been taught for many years. That sympathy, and my very few words of spoken Chinese, led me to try to help some of the Chinese computer-science students at the University of Memphis in Tennessee. One requirement for a master's degree in computer science here is the delivery of a seminar in acceptable oral English.

[...]

And then I met XuXin. He was invited to come and speak by the university's Jewish Studies program. Professor Xu teaches English in China, and his friendship with an American Fulbright scholar teaching in China had led him to put together book published in the United States as "Legends of the Chinese Jews of Kaifeng" (with Beverly Friend, KTAV Publishing, 1995).

The book contains stories of a group of Jews who arrived in China via the Silk Road about AD 900. They explained to the first emperor of the Sung Dynasty that there was a war in their homeland; it was no longer a good place to live. Could they raise their families in China?

After some discussions I won't recount here (I recommend the book), the emperor agreed that the Jews could settle in China on two conditions: They had to adopt Chinese names, and they could not prohibit their children from intermarrying. (Someone had told him what had happened once before, in Egypt.)

The Jews thrived in Kaifeng. A cemetery there has Hebrew inscriptions dating from the 900s to the 1900s. They were first noticed by Westerners in the 1600s, when Christian missionaries reported the existence of Chinese Jews to the Vatican.

There was a great controversy in Europe at the time: How accurately had the old Bible texts been copied, over the centuries? The Jews had arrived in Kaifeng with a handwritten Torah (the first five books of the Bible), and it had been hand copied, as it wore out, for 700 years, without a chance to check it against another copy. The Vatican sent an expert to China to compare the Kaifeng Torah to Torah scrolls in Europe - and found it agreed, letter for letter!

Now that I don't believe for a minute. Scribal transmission of texts simply doesn't work that way. Of course it may well be that their text was quite close to the Masoretic Text, but at minimum there would be small differences in spelling and the odd corruption. In graduate school a Chinese roommate of mine was hoping to find Chinese translations of lost books like the Book of Giants along the Silk Road, although as far as I know, nothing ever came of it. I'd love to see a scholarly review of this book.

MORE ON THE SABAEAN MANDEANS IN IRAQ:

"Baghdad's Baptizers
Revering John the Baptist, these Iraqis sustain an ancient religion" (USNews.com)

[...]

Source of life. With John the Baptist as the Mandeans' most important teacher, baptism is, unsurprisingly, their most important rite. (The name Sabaean Mandean means one who is baptized and has knowledge of God.) Religious leaders must wash themselves three times in water to purify the body and soul before performing any religious rites. Weddings are also conducted almost entirely submerged in water. And followers must participate in several baptisms a year, usually in running water, which reflects their belief that living water is the source of life.

When they pray, Mandeans face north, using the North Star to orient themselves. This way, they believe they are facing God and the forces of light. Many of their beliefs center on purity, both in spirit and body. Religious leaders must marry only virgins and must be free from any kind of disease. Before a leader assumes the church's top position, other leaders trace his family history back seven generations to ensure his history is pure.

For the Mandeans in Baghdad today, life is still full of uncertainty. The annual Golden Day of Baptism celebration usually draws three times the number of people as this year, but gas shortages and security fears kept many away. And there are new concerns. Many are unsure whether Iraq's new government will carve out a place for them. "We are now getting afraid because maybe Islamic fanatics will take power," says Sheik Majid. "Maybe they will make us close this temple." Even after some two millenniums, their faith is carried on a day at a time.

Nice article. Read it all.

THE HIPPOS (SUSSITA) EXCAVATION (Hellenistic-Roman-Byzantine city excavation) is recruiting volunteers for the summer 2003 season (link via Archaeological Fieldwork Opportunities via Anita Cohen-Williams's archaeology blog).

NEW EVIDENCE ON THE DATE OF THE CRUCIFIXION?

"Star-gazers pinpoint the hour Jesus died" (Glasgow Herald)

DAVID MONTGOMERY

THEORIES on the exact date of Christ's death have been debated for centuries, but now two astronomers claim to have pinpointed it to the exact hour.

Liviu Mircea and Tiberiu Oproiu from the Astronomic Observatory Institute in Cluj, Romania, said yesterday that research carried out using a computer program checked against bible references showed that Christ died at 3pm on Friday, April 3, 33 AD, and rose again on Sunday, April 5 at 4am.

The starting point for the pair's calculations was the New Testament's noting that Jesus died on the day after the first night with a full moon following the vernal equinox.

Using data gathered on the stars between 26 and 35 AD they established that in those nine years, the first full moon after the vernal equinox was registered twice: Friday April 7, 30 AD and April 3, 33 AD.

The astronomers said they had been convinced that the date of the crucifixion had been 33 AD and not 30 AD, because records showed a solar eclipse, as depicted in the bible at the time of Jesus' crucifixion, occurred in Jerusalem in that year.

[...]

I'm not so sure that the gospels have in mind a naturalistic explanation for the darkness at the time of the crucifixion. Anyhow, it's stretching it to assume that a solar eclipse that happened in that year had anything to do with it. I have no idea how well based the other astronomical conclusions are. I blog, you decide.

MORE TECHNOLOGICAL TRIUMPHS:

Yesterday evening I hooked up our new printer, installed the softward on our eMac, and the thing actually works! And this morning my son and I assembled our new lawnmover and I spent the next few hours mowing and trimming the meadow lawn. I have a couple of things to blog on but I feel a nap coming on soon.

MORE JEWISH-TEMPLE DENIAL:

(bold font is my emphasis)

Qabbani says Jews praying at Al-Aqsa could start jihad (Daily Star, Lebanon)

Plans by Israel�s government to allow Jews to pray at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem �will, if put into effect, practically trigger a holy Islamic war jihad itself until the mosque and the city are liberated from Jewish occupation,� Grand Mufti Mohammed Rashid Qabbani said Thursday. He added in a statement that claims by Jews that their ancient temple existed where the mosque is �are unfounded.�

For the record, Solomon's Temple was built in the 10th century BCE, destroyed during the Babylonian invasion in 586/7 BCE, rebuilt around 520, then destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE. These are basic historical facts, supported by a vast amount of evidence, the contesting of which is on the level of Creationism or the Flat Earth Society.

The new Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority appears to have gone on record as doubting that there was a Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount, which is not a good sign.

MEMRI Special Report - No. 15
Abu Mazen: A Political Profile

[...]

Abu Mazen also rejected the Israeli claim that there had been a Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount, telling the Israeli-Arab weekly Kul Al-Arab:[51] "Anyone who wants to forget the past cannot come and claim that the [Jewish] temple is situated beneath the Haram. They demand that we forget what happened 50 years ago to the refugees � and I speak as a living, breathing refugee � while at the same time they claim that 2000 years ago they had a temple. I challenge the claim that this is so. But even if it is so, we do not accept it, because it is not logical for someone who wants peace in practice."

[...]

And related to this is a story I haven't heard much of in the last year or two, but here's a piece on it from the Bible and Interpretation website:

The Modern Destruction of the Temple Mount

There is no evidence of any kind to suggest that Moslems of Mohammed�s day recognized the Mount as anything other than a Jewish holy site.

By Richard Benkin, Ph.D.
Antiantisemitism@comcast.net
May 2003

How are we, as concerned laypersons and scholars, to regard the current Moslem actions at Jerusalem's Temple Mount? Although a mount of evidence provides strong bases for a Jewish connection to that holy site - in fact the oldest and most storied connection, official Arab Moslem policy contends that no such connection exists. While there is nothing new or noteworthy about hyperbole coming from the Arab world, what makes this different is that Moslem leaders have been engaged in ongoing efforts to change the situation "on the ground." Ominously for our civilization, the Mount's Moslem officials (Waqf), with backing from Mecca and elsewhere in the Moslem world, are attempting to destroy an archeological and biblical heritage and subvert the historical record in the service of transitory political goals.

[...]

��� The Waqf has proceeded on two fronts: one to de-Judaize the Mount and another to Islamicize it, although their actions often aim toward both at once. In a conscious attempt to make the Mount more hospitable to greater numbers of Moslem worshippers, the Waqf, in 1996, converted two Second Temple era structures into a new 1.5-acre mosque. The first was the Eastern Hulda Gate. This was one of the passageways used by ancient worshippers to access the Temple. The other structure is known as Solomon�s Stables. Located under the Mount�s current surface, it was used by ancient Temple priests to store vestments and other items. It also encompasses the area known as Jesus� Cradle, the site where the 40-day-old Jesus was presented in the Temple. This small room, only 32.5 square feet in area, is now used for Moslem prayer. In 1997, the Waqf built a second new mosque, destroying another ancient passageway, the Western Hulda, to do so. There is no accurate record of all the artifacts lost during the conversions, but we do know that the material removed for them dated back as far as the First Temple Period (1006-586 BCE).6 By the autumn of 1999, however, Waqf actions finally caused extensive concern and then protest action by many prominent Israeli archeologists and others. Over three days and nights in November, using heavy machinery to cut through the ancient Temple Mount wall, the Waqf opened a gaping hole, 18,000 square feet in area and 36 feet deep, for an �emergency exit� from the new mosques. In January, another hole, 1250 square meters in area and twelve meters deep, appeared north of Solomon�s Stables. And the destructive construction continued.

��� Without any archeological supervision, the Waqf used bulldozers and tractors on an ancient site never built to accommodate anything more than foot traffic. It removed and then paved over approximately 6,000 square meters of the ancient Temple Mount surface. Mount police also reported observing a Second Temple (516 BCE to 70 CE) era arched water channel being dismantled during this period. Temple artifacts were ripped from the Mount and, at first secretly, dumped in several places throughout Jerusalem, most prominently in the Kidron Valley just east of the city walls but also in El Azaria and the municipal city dump.

��� The material often was mixed intentionally with modern-day garbage in an attempt to cover up these actions. It sometimes made archeological examination difficult, if not impossible. Volunteers, however, from students to some of Israel�s most renowned archeologists, were able to recover many ancient artifacts that the Waqf sought to destroy. Moreover, they were able to identify the Mount�s distinguishable dusty gray soil, containing a variety of stones, from different ancient periods mixed with contemporary material.

[...]

Obviously, all these stories as well as the ones I cited a while ago under the rubric "junk archaeology" have a common basis in the current political debate about whether Jews (and others) should be allowed on the Temple Mount again. I'm not going to get into the political issues here; my interest is in the archaeology. (Today Ha'aretz has an article on the politics of the Temple Mount - again, via the Bible and Interpretation website.) As for Waqf's actions on the Temple Mount, I have had no involvement in this situation, don't know any of the principals, and can't vouch for the accuracy of any stories on it. But the basic facts do not seem to be contested. This website on The Temple Mount Archaeological Destruction collects some information on the Committee for the Prevention of Destruction of Antiquities on the Temple Mount. If anyone can point me to more documentation or more recent treatments, I'd be grateful.

Also, it doesn't seem out of place to point out that, given the � fully justified! � concern with the looting of antiquities in Iraq, this situation also merits some attention from the larger community of archaeologists and ancient historians.

UPDATE: The 16 May article from the Lebanon Daily Star (which I quoted in full) appears not to have been archived. But you can find the same quote from Grand Mufti Mohammed Rashid Qabbani here on the website of the Islamic Resistance Support Association.

STONE ON THE APOCRYPHA AND PSEUDEPIGRPHA

Here's an introductory essay by Michael E. Stone on The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha (June 2001, Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs)

HARRY DAVILA POTTER AND THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS!

To my vast regret, I wasn't feeling well a couple of weeks ago and I had to miss our annual St. Mary's College end-of-the-year dinner for staff and students. A staff roast is traditional and the roaster this year was our lovely, talented, and erudite colleague Dr. Louise Lawrence, who presented a retelling of the Harry Potter story with the teaching staff of St. Mary's as characters and with yours truly cast as Harry Potter. Here's a quotation from her epic poem:

Harry Davila Potter went to Hogwart's School
and tried to earnestly follow every rule
No matter e'er written in Hebrew or Greek
Potter would chant it week by week
Along with his friends, though at times lost and vexed
He persevered with the prophets and read lots of old texts

I'd better not quote any more, so as not to immortalize the, uh, libel of colleagues. But it's a great work of art, all about the noble crusade of Harry to save those old texts from oblivion. Thanks Louise!

THE WEBSITE FOR THE COMPREHENSIVE ARAMAIC LEXICON, a multivolume lexicon intended to include all Aramaic dialects from antiquity to the present, along with various scholarly spin-off projects, includes a CAL searchable database for both Aramaic and English words. It also has newsletters, bibliography, etc., but those sections seem not to have been updated for some years.

FELLOWSHIP ANNOUNCEMENTS:

The following has just been e-mailed to my now defunct Old Testament Pseudepigrapha list, so I'll take the liberty of posting it here.

**FELLOWSHIPS**

THE W.F. ALBRIGHT INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH (AIAR), JERUSALEM
(http://www.aiar.org)
2004-2005

Annual Professorship: $30,000 award.
The stipend is $14,200 plus $15,800 for room and half-board for appointee and spouse at the Institute. Open to post-doctoral scholars in Near Eastern archaeology, geography, history, and Biblical studies. U.S. citizens are eligible for entire award. Non-U.S. citizens may apply but, by U.S. law, are only eligible for non-governmental funds (totalling $15,000). Residence at the Institute is required. Appointment: 10 months. The professorship period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: October 17, 2003.

National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships: $40,000 award for 12 months ($60,000 to be available -- 1 & 1/2 awards) Open to scholars in the fields of ancient Near Eastern studies including archaeology, anthropology, geography, history, philology, epigraphy, Biblical studies, Islamic studies, religion, art history, literature, philosophy or related disciplines holding a Ph.D. (or equivalent) as of January 1, 2004, who are U.S. citizens (or alien residents residing in the United States for the last three years). Research project must have a clear humanities focus. Research period: four to twelve months (stipend varies with the duration of the fellowship -- maximum stipend is $40,000 for 12 months). Residence at the Institute is preferred. The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: October 17, 2003.

Ernest S. Frerichs Fellow and Program Coordinator: $19,000 award. The stipend is $10,900; remainder ($8,100) is for room and half-board at the Institute. Open to pre-doctoral students and post-doctoral scholars specializing in Near Eastern archaeology, geography, history and biblical studies. Recipient is expected to assist the Albright's Director in planning and implementing the Ernest S. Frerichs Program for Albright Fellows. Residence at the Institute is required. Research period: 10 months. The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: October 17, 2003.

George A. Barton Fellowship: $7,000 award. The stipend is $2,950; remainder ($4,050) is for room and half-board at the Institute. Open to seminarians, pre-doctoral students and recent Ph.D. recipients specializing in Near Eastern archaeology, geography, history, and biblical studies. Research period: 5 months. The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: October 17, 2003.

Samuel H. Kress Fellowship: $16,500 award. The stipend is $8,400; remainder ($8,100) is for room and half-board at the Institute. Dissertation research fellowship for students specializing in architecture, art history and archaeology. Applicants must be U.S. citizens, or North American citizens studying at U.S. universities. Residence at the Albright Institute is required. Research Period: 10 months. Research project must have a clear focus on art history or architecture. The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: October 17, 2003.

Samuel H. Kress Joint Athens-Jerusalem Fellowship: $15,000 award. A joint fellowship for research at the American School of Classical Studies in Athens and at the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem. The stipend is $7,250; remainder ($7,750) is for room and half-board at the two institutions. Pre-doctoral research fellowship for students specializing in art history, architecture, or archaeology who are U.S. citizens, or North American citizens studying at U.S. universities. Residence at the Albright Institute is required. Research period: 10 months (5 months in Athens, 5 months in Jerusalem). The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside Greece and Israel. Application deadline: October 24, 2003.

Educational and Cultural Affairs Fellowships (ECA):*
a. Junior Research Fellowships: $48,000 for three awards -- $16,000 each. The stipend is $7,900; remainder ($8,100) is for room and half-board at the Institute. Open to pre doctoral students and recent Ph.D. recipients in Near Eastern Studies who are U.S. citizens. Residence at the Institute is required. Research period: 10 or 5 months (stipend varies with the duration of the fellowship -- maximum stipend is $16,000 for 10 months) The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: October 17, 2003.
b. Associate Fellowships: Six senior and seven junior fellowship administrative fee awards Application deadline: April 16, 2004.

Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Fellowships: $34,500 for three awards ($11,500 each). The fellowships are open to Bulgarian, Czech, Estonian, Hungarian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Polish, Romanian, and Slovak scholars. Candidates should not be permanently resident outside the six countries concerned, and should have obtained a doctorate by the time the fellowship is awarded. Candidates must be reasonably fluent in English. Fellows are expected to reside at the Albright if room is available. Each fellowship is for three months, during one of the following periods: September 1, 2004 - November 30, 2004; December 1, 2004 - February 29, 2005; and March 1, 2005 - May 31, 2005. The research period should be continuous, without frequent trips outside the country. Application deadline: April 2, 2004.

W.F. Albright Associate Fellowships: No stipend.
Open to senior, post-doctoral, and pre-doctoral researchers. Administrative fee required. Application deadline: April 16, 2004.

Council of American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC) Fellowships for Advanced Multi-country Research:* Eight awards of up to $6,000 each, with an additional $3,000 for travel. Open to scholars pursuing research on broad questions of multi-country significance in the fields of humanities, social sciences, and related natural sciences in countries in the Near and Middle East and South Asia. Doctoral candidates and established scholars with US citizenship are eligible to apply as individuals or in teams. Preference will be given to candidates examining comparative and/or cross-regional questions requiring research in two or more countries. Application deadline: December 31, 2003. For information and application, write to: The Council of American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC), P.O. Box 37012, NHB-East Court CE-123, MRC 178, Washington D.C., 20013-7012. (tel: 202-842-8636; E-mail: caorc@caorc.si.edu; Web: http:/ /www.caorc.org).

*Award subject to availability of funds.

For further information and application forms visit the Albright's web site at: http://www.aiar.org

or contact
Dr. Jodi Magness
Department of Religious Studies
CB #3225
University of North Carolina
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3225, USA
Phone: (919) 962-3928
Fax: (919) 962-1567
E-mail: magness@email.unc.edu

THE LATEST ISSUE OF BIBLICA ONLINE has the following articles and notes of interest:

John Sietze BERGSMA, �The Jubilee: A Post-Exilic Priestly Attempt to Reclaim Lands?�, Vol. 84(2003) 225-246.

Abstract: The article examines the hypothesis that the jubilee legislation of Lev 25 was a post-exilic attempt on the part of returning Judean exiles - particularly the priests - to provide legal justification for the reclamation of their former lands. This hypothesis is found to be dubious because (1) the jubilee did not serve the interests of the socio-economic classes that were exiled, and (2) Lev 25 does not show signs of having been redacted with the post-exilic situation in mind. A comparison with Ezekiel's vision of restoration points out the differences between Lev 25 and actual priestly land legislation for the post-exilic period.

Claude LICHTERT, �R�cit et noms de Dieu dans le livre de Jonas�, Vol. 84(2003) 247-251.

Abstract: The problem of the different names of God in the book of Jonah is regulary discussed by researchers. There have been attempts to resolve this question through diachronic hypotheses (as part of literary criticism), as well as by synchronic hypotheses which attribute the choice of different names for God to semantic associations or to the structure of the story as a whole. This study offers an interpretation which considers the changes in the name for God as a function of the narrative. Thus, the very act of naming God comes from the story itself and through the interaction of its characters. The analysis offered here, after a brief study of each chapter of the book, shows that the double divine name ("YHWH God") is the term that brings out the positive or negative twists and turns in the narrative. In brief, Jonah makes his way through the story with different names for God, each indicating how God's relation with others is positivie or not.

Joseph A. FITZMYER, �And Lead Us Not into Temptation�, Vol. 84(2003) 259-278.

Abstract: The sixth petition of the "Our Father" has been translated in various ways across the centuries. This article discusses its literal meaning and the permissive paraphrases of it, explaining the sense of "temptation" and God's activity in "leading" into it, as well as the various subterfuges adopted to avoid the obvious meaning of the Greek formulation, including its supposed Aramaic substratum. It concludes with a pastoral explanation of the petition.

COINS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM:

I'm marking exams right now and I can feel my brain melting and starting to drip out my ears. So, for a distraction, I've been poking around on the British Museum's website. Here are some paleojudaic coins (photos and commentary) therein:

Bronze coin of Herod I 'the Great', king of Judaea

Bronze coin of Pontius Pilate, Procurator of Judaea

Silver shekel of the First Jewish Revolt from Rome

Silver shekel of the Second Jewish Revolt from Rome

IRAQI ANTIQUITIES WATCH: I haven't been blogging on Iraq lately, not because the antiquities problems have been resolved, nor because I am particularly pleased with the current situation, but because I've been busy and it hasn�t seemed worthwhile to spend time collecting news on it when other people are devoting whole sites to the issue. But I've now added a link to several such sites in the new links section to the right. I subscribe to the IraqCrisis list and have found it very helpful. The most comprehensive website is that of Francis Deblauwe, which is worth frequent visits. At present it appears that somewhere between thousands and tens-of-thousands of Iraqi antiquities were destroyed, damaged, or stolen during the war, but this is still a very rough guess. Even more worrying, there are reports that archaeological sites are being systematically looted by armed diggers (NYT via IraqCrisis list). But from now on, unless something really strikes my eye, I will leave it to these other sites to keep you informed about Iraq's antiquities.

NEW BOOK REVIEWS FROM REVIEW OF BIBLICAL LITERATURE:

Baltzer, Klaus
Peter Machinist, Editor
Margaret Kohl, Translator
Deutero-Isaiah: A Commentary on Isaiah 40-55

Barton, John
Joel and Obadiah: A Commentary

Briant, Pierre
Peter T. Daniels, Translator
From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire

Kohl, Margaret
Annette Steudel, Editor
Die Texte aus Qumran II: Hebr�isch / Aram�isch und Deutsch mit Masoretischer Punktation �bersetzung, Einf�hrung und Anmerkungen

MORE COURSE SYLLABI:

Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible
Professor: Daniel Falk
University of Oregon

The Intertestamental Period (NT/OT/CH 711) (PDF file)
Dr. David A. deSilva
Ashland Theological Seminary

JEWS AND GREEKS, JUDAISM AND HELLENISM
Shaye J.D. Cohen
Harvard University

UPDATED LINKS ETC.

Yesterday was a productive day.

I completely redid the links section to the right, breaking them down into categories and adding many, many new links. I intend to keep adding to them gradually as I find time and new material (for example, I've collected lots more course syllabi, which I'll post in small lots on the blog and add to the links in time).

Do have a look.

Also, thanks to some helpful advice from Glenn Reynolds, I have the PaleoJudaica.com archive up and running again. For now.

Plus my neighbor and I managed to get our broken microwave oven working again for the price of an 85 p. fuse rather than a �50 new oven.

All in all, a day of technological triumphs.

COPTIC DAVIDIC PSALTER NOT MISSING:

"Original David's psalms kept in Coptic museum" (Arabic News via Archaeologica News

The original copy of the Book of Psalms, which dates back to the 3rd
or 4th century AD is kept inside the Coptic Museum, said Zahi Hawas,
Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA).

In statements to MENA, Hawas dismissed the reports that the Psalms of
Prophet David were stolen from the Coptic Museum.

[...]

THE CIVIL RIGHT TO KLINGON AND ARAMAIC?

"Even Spock Would Be Amazed!"
By Paul M. Weyrich
CNSNews.com Commentary
May 19, 2003

I was never one for languages. But I set out to understand Klingon and I must say this is as difficult as Chinese.

[...]

Now why would I be interested in Klingon, which so far as I know, is spoken only in Star Trek episodes? Well, it seems that out in Oregon, the Multnomah County Department of Health Services actually advertised for a translator who can speak Klingon. Why? Well, believe it or not, one of the officials said they have to provide information in all the languages their clients speak.

And guess what? If there is anyone in Oregon who actually prefers to speak Klingon, Multnomah County is obligated to employ someone who can address them in their preferred language thanks to an Executive Order (E.O. 13166) signed by then-President Bill Clinton in August 2000. The news media paid it no notice because the order was issued during the time they were traveling to Los Angeles for the Democratic National Convention.

Multnomah County's solicitation did not escape attention, however. Eventually, the county health service backed off, calling it a mistake created by overzealousness.

[...]

Oh, by the way, I asked Boulet if my taxes were audited, could I have it done in ancient Aramaic since Jesus told us to render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and as a practicing Christian, it would be nice to have that done in the same language my Lord actually used? Boulet replied that that was "an open question."

[...]

Unemployed Aramaists take note.

NEW ARTICLES FROM TC:

TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism

The current volume is volume 8.

Emanuel Tov, "Electronic Resources Relevant to the Textual Criticism of Hebrew Scripture"

Abstract: Numerous electronic resources of interest to text critics are now available, both commercially and free on the Web. This article gives an overview of these resources, then provides a list of currently available tools that the author considers the most valuable.

With lots of useful links.

Peter M. Head, "Fragments of Six Newly Identified Greek Bible Manuscripts in a Cambridge Collection: A Preliminary Report"

Abstract: Vellum fragments of seven different manuscripts, six of them identified as portions of the Greek Bible (five NT, one OT), have recently come to light. The author presents a description of the manuscripts, including the biblical passages the first six contain. He offers a full transcription of the seventh fragment, an unidentified Christian text, perhaps a list of offices.

BOOK REVIEWS GALORE!

From the Review of Biblical Literature:

Briant, Pierre
Daniels, Peter T., translator
From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire

deSilva, David A.
Introducing the Apocrypha: Message, Context, and Significance

Pike, Dana M. and Andrew C. Skinner
Qumran Cave 4, XXIII: Unidentified Fragments

Court, John M. and Dan Cohn-Sherbok
Religious Diversity in the Graeco-Roman World: A Survey of Recent
Scholarship

Scarpat, Giuseppe
Parrhesia greca, parrhesia cristiana

Kalimi, Isaac
Early Jewish Exegesis and Theological Controversy: Studies in Scriptures in the Shadow of Internal and External Controversies

Also, some time ago I mentioned the review section of the Journal of Hebrew Scriptures, but I don't think I had time to list specific reviews. So here are some paleojudaic ones from the 2002-2003 volume:

C. L. Seow, Daniel
John J. Collins

Charlesworth, James H. et al., eds., The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, vol. 6B Pesharim, Other Commentaries, and Related Documents
James C. VanderKam

Bruce Chilton, Redeeming Time: The Wisdom of Ancient Jewish and Christian Festal Calendars
Kim Paffenroth

Anderson, Robert T. and Terry Giles, The Keepers: An Introduction to the History and Culture of the Samaritans
Ingrid Hjelm

Klaus Baltzer, Deutero-Isaiah: A Commentary on Isaiah 40-55
Aaron W. Park

Isaac Kalimi, The Book of Chronicles. Historical Writing and Literary Devices
Ehud Ben Zvi

Leda Ciraolo and Jonathan Seidel, eds., Magic and Divination in the Ancient World
Scott B. Noegel

Weitzman, M. P., The Syriac version of the Old Testament. An Introduction
Bruce Chilton

Francis I. Andersen, Habakkuk: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary
Marvin A. Sweeney

Thiede, C. P. The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Jewish Origins of Christianity
Rob Kugler

Gabrielle Boccaccini, Roots of Rabbinic Judaism: An Intellectual History, from Ezekiel to Daniel
Martin S. Jaffee

Dobbs-Allsopp, F. W., Lamentations
Michael S. Moore

Bruce K. Gardner, The Genesis Calendar: The Synchronistic Tradition in Genesis 1-11
Heidi M. Szpek

Donald E. Gowan, Daniel
Bill T. Arnold

"THE LUNATIC THAT STOLE ZIONISM"

An essay on Shimon Bar Kokhba by Yehiam Sorek (Ha'aretz via Archeologica News)

Sadly, Bar Kochva became a brand name, a national legend, which served national-Zionist goals. He was internalized and absorbed into the national bloodstream, took on the same sanctity as the other myths - and anyone that tries to pose questions about the commander of the revolt, his character and path, is perceived as a saboteur, a vandal. Will this national phase obscure the historical truth?

Read it all.

"THOU SHALT COMMIT ADULTERY" - NOT!

This isn�t very relevant to PaleoJudaica (although it is the P Decalogue) but it�s funny, so I�ll post it. It�s from a review by Christopher Hitchens in the New York Times of Adam Nicolson's God's Secretaries, on the making of the King James translation (via Arts and Letters Daily):

"'God's Secretaries': Blessed Are the Phrasemakers"

This work was refined and prepared in order to be heard and memorized, by a congregation still largely illiterate, and to be recalled in time of trouble or of need. Print was secondary: no doubt the audience of the later misprinted 1631 edition, when instructed by Exodus 20:14 that ''thou shalt commit adultery,'' understood that a ''not'' had been omitted at the press rather than in Sinai.

I wouldn't be so sure�

THE COMPLETE WORKS OF PHILO ARE ONLINE!

Torrey Seland has kindly pointed me to Peter Kirby's website, which gives the complete works of Philo in the old Yonge translation, which indeed is now in the public domain. David T. Runia has reviewed the Hendrickson edition of Yonge for Ioudiaos Review. (I remember being very annoyed by the high density of typographical errors in the Hendrickson edition - Philo deserves better proofreading!) You can find lots more on Philo online at Torrey Seland's Philo page.

SAMARITAN ARABIC - A SAMARITAN RESPONSE:

Reader Harold Clumeck has forwarded the following letter from Benyamim Tsedaka in response to the UPI article I linked to last week (sorry, the @*$%^^! Blogspot archive is down as usual) and Mr. Tsedaka has kindly given me permission to publish it here.

Dear Mr. Uwe Siemon-Netto
United Press International
tips@upi.com

Dear Mr. Siemon-Netto,

My friend, Mr. Harold Clumeck from San Rafael/California has forwarded me to your article of May 8, 2003.

I have to make some corrections to your positive attitude article.

The Samaritans divide in two centers, 350 in Holon/Israel and 310 in Kiryat Luza on Mount Gerizim. Most of the Samaritans speaking Arabic in a special dialect of the Syrian Palestinian dialect of the Arabic. But this is third dialect to their original Ancient Hebrew and Samaritan Aramaic that all of them learn in the ages 5-15 after school hours every day, and to the modern Hebrew that most of them speak as it is spoken in the State of Israel. I am speaking about the whole Israelite Samaritan people as one.

I had to make these corrections not to let the readers of your article to have the wrong impression that we are struggling to preserve a special Samaritan Arabic dialect. As far as I know it is only Syrian-Palestinian dialect with some different Samaritan Arabic idioms that spoken for the last 1200 years and never entered our ritual practices. It is naturally spoken but again it is only third to the Samaritan Hebrew and Samaritan Aramaic we have preserved proudly for thousands of years and we still use it in our prayers and many new composition.

Dr. Arnold Werner is my close friend. I am sorry to say that some of his words were taken in the wrong way. In the contrary I have followed him to the all Samaritan personalities he spoke with for his research and we both never found any difficulty of these personalities in speaking the different languages.

Scholars and readers of your article are welcomed to visit the organized Israelite-Samaritan web-sites www.mystae.com/samaritans.html and www.the-samaritans.com and learn more about our current rich cultural activities.

We are keeping our survival and our own struggle to keep our original languages, the Ancient Hebrew and the Samaritan Aramaic, that according to scholars have never changed since Second Temple period, it is part of our survival. Come to visit us and enjoy the Ancient languages by the Samaritans. At present times that languages spoken by tens and hundreds of million peoples close to be dying before the English language influence the way we preserve our original languages without change and other language influence considered to be a great achievement.

Yours,

Benyamim Tsedaka
Head of the A.B. - Institute of Samaritan Studies
Co-editor of A.B. - The Samaritan News

I�ve corresponded a little more with Mr. Tsedeka about this and I think his main point is that he considers Samaritan Hebrew and Samaritan Aramaic to be the real languages of his community, even though the community does use Palestinian Arabic and Modern Israeli Hebrew.

A DEAD SEA SCROLLS EXHIBIT IN GRAND RAPIDS:

I think I may have already blogged on this exhibit in Michigan but, just in case, here's some information. This is the museum's website on the exhibit, and here's a sound bite from it:

"The Dead Sea Scrolls" exhibition will include fragments of 12 different scrolls, including fragments from the books of Exodus and Psalms. There are also numerous artifacts from Qumran, the ancient Judaean settlement located near the caves where the scrolls were discovered, including ancient coins, leather sandals, a scroll storage jar, and a pottery inkwell believed to be connected with the writing of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

And here's an article from the Calvin College Spark with more information and links:

"Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition in Grand Rapids Michigan"

The exhibit runs from February to June.

FROM THE JUNK ARCHAEOLOGY FILE:

(extracts from "Middle East Research Institute Special Report � No. 16" [my (bold font) emphasis])

"The Think Tank of the Arab League:
The Zayed Centre for Coordination and Follow-Up (ZCCF)"

By: Steven Stalinsky

Since its founding in 1999, The Zayed Centre for Coordination and Follow-Up has hosted events and produced studies on a variety of issues. The Zayed Centre has dealt with the September 11th attacks, arguing that they were perpetrated by Americans and Israelis. It has discussed "[The] Factual Protocols of the Elders of Zion," and has hosted Holocaust deniers. Dr. Umayma Al-Jalahma, known for her article explaining how Jews use the blood of non-Jews for pastries for the Jewish holiday of Purim, was a recent lecturer at the Centre. A report today suggested that the SARS virus could be a product of "an American war against the world."

[�]

"Al Buraq Wall Not Wailing Wall" is the title of a report released by the Zayed Centre on December 20, 2001. [36] The Zayed Centre website's summary of the report states: "This study is released in line with the Centre's message to serve Arab causes and refute the false Zionist allegations in regard to Palestine� and shows the falsehood of the Zionist religious claims and anthropological fabrications. The study gives a historical account of the Jews from the days of the Temple of Solomon, which was destroyed in 586 B.C., through their persecution under Roman rule, to the occupation� The study also underlines that Al Aqsa Mosque was built more than a thousand years before Solomon, giving evidence that refutes the Zionist allegations that the Mosque was constructed on the ruins of Solomon's Temple� all of which demonstrate that the Zionist alleged rights to the [Wailing] Wall are simply baseless."

The claim that the Al Aqsa Mosque pre-dates Solomon's temple is preposterous, as is obvious to anyone who knows anything about the history and archaeology of the region.

On January 27, 2002, Dr. Hassan Ali Khater, editor-in-chief of the Al Quds Al-Sharif Encyclopedia, spoke at the Zayed Centre. [37] A summary of his lecture on the Zayed Centre website states: "Dr. Hassan Ali Khater� added that Israelis are falsifying history by inscribing Jewish inscriptions on rocks [and] then calling international experts to re-discover [them] as Jewish monuments."

All I can say about this one is that I don't believe it and, if people want to make a serious accusation like this, they need to name names and inscriptions and call on the international community of scholars to expose the fakes. Also, in another report on the same website, Dr. Hassan Ali Khater is quoted as denying that Solomon's temple ever existed:

"Muslim�s First Qibla in danger. A report prepared by ZCCF to commemorate arson of Al Aqsa Mosque"

Dr. Hassan Ali Khater, the chief editor of �Encyclopedia of Al Quds Al Shareef� commenting on Israeli designs of Judaization of Jerusalem said, �There are 15 Israeli concepts to occupy Jerusalem. The Mosque is in danger to collapse due to underground diggings and use of acids to dissolve rocks. Nobody knows the degree of damage caused to the structure due to Israeli obsession with the idea of building The Solomon Temple, the foundation stone of which was laid down in the glare of media a few months ago in spite of the historical facts that deny existence of any such temple.

My emphasis.

MORE COURSE SYLLABI:

RELS 3000: Jewish Apocrypha & Pseudepigrapha
RELS 3000: Rewriting the Book of Genesis
RELS 4107: Varieties of Early Judaism
Dr. John C. Reeves
University of North Carolina at Charlotte