ANOTHER REVIEW OF THE PARIS EXHIBITION, this one by Gunilla K. Knutsson in Ranskan Uutiset.com:

"Livres de Parole. Torah, Bible, Coran"

An Intellectual, Esthetic and Emotional Experience

During these times of renewed saber-rattling in the name of God, every Christian, Jewish and Muslim extremist should be required to spend a day at the exhibition "Livres de parole. Torah, Bible et Coran", which is showing at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France (BNF) in Paris until the end of April. Considering that religious fundamentalism again is playing a geopolitical role - in the West as well as in the East - the BNF curators took a brave initiative when they put together a show which traces the history of the three monotheistic religions from their common cradle in Mesopotamia (i.e. modern Iraq) to the present. They have managed to steer away from any potential invitation to polemics, however, by taking a strictly historical and bibliographic approach to the texts and objects on display.

[...]

DA VINCI CODE TRIAL UPDATE:

Da Vinci case has no hope, says publisher

By Katy Papineau and Salome Wagaine, Times Online, and PA News

The publisher of both books involved in The Da Vinci Code copyright case told the High Court today that he thought the two claimants were “in danger of making fools of themselves.”

[...]

I'd say it's quite a few years too late for them to be worrying about that.

GOSPEL OF JUDAS BOOKS: Mark Goodacre has publication information on two books that the National Geographic Society is publishing on the Coptic Gospel of Judas in April. I shall have to order them for our library.

ARAMAIC HIP-HOP:

The brains behind Modular Moods and many of the hottest parties in and around New York is DJ Handler. He collaborates with non-electronic musicians and creates textural fusions. His references include Ashkenazic cantorial music, traditional Yemenite melodies and hip-hop; he spins a mix of Baile Funk and Afro Beat blended with ’80s freestyle and hip-hop. MC Y-LOVE (born Yitz Jordan) is a black convert to the Bostener sect of Chassidus (the mystical branch of Orthodox Judaism). He creates seamless polyglot rhymes in English, Arabic, Yiddish and Hebrew. Y-Love is also reviving Aramaic, the ancient language of Jewish law.

TECHNOLOGY WATCH:

Mass spectrometer helps in tyrian purple research (Laboratory Talk)

Researchers at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, are using a mass spectrometer from Applied Biosystems to investigate the composition of tyrian purple. This is one of the oldest and most prestigious dyes in the ancient world, and is produced exclusively by hypobranchial gland secretions from different molluscan species. Some 12,000 molluscs were needed to produce enough dye to determine 6,6'dibromoindigo as the major structure of the dye, early in the twentieth century.

[...]

DA VINCI CODE TRIAL UPDATE:

Dan Brown grilled in Da Vinci Code copyright case
Tue Mar 14, 2006 2:24 PM GMT167

By Mike Collett-White

LONDON (Reuters) - The lawyer representing two historians who accuse Dan Brown of copying their work in his best-seller "The Da Vinci Code" said on Tuesday he suspected the author had lied in his evidence.

The 41-year-old Brown, in the witness box for the second day, was forced to defend his assertion that he had not read "The Holy Blood, and the Holy Grail" when he came up with the idea for his religious thriller.

Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, co-authors of the 1982 Holy Blood book who are suing Brown's British publisher Random House, say he lifted their ideas wholesale.

Part of Brown's defence has been to say that he had already written the synopsis for The Da Vinci Code, one of the most successful novels ever with sales of around 40 million copies, before he became familiar with the Holy Blood book.

Actually it speaks well for Brown that he originally ignored such a piece of obvious drivel. That said, the sources he did use don't sound all that promising:

When [prosecution lawyer] Rayner James pointed out that the Holy Blood book was referred to as "essential reading" in another work Brown used for his research before writing his synopsis, he replied:

"I had everything I needed for that synopsis. I'm in a synopsis phase. I'm looking at the big picture, not the details."

And, surprisingly, orthography is playing a part in the trial:

The court heard discussions on the difference between British and U.S. punctuation and spelling, as Brown sought to prove documents attributed to his wife were not her work.

Again Blythe emerged as a key partner in Brown's phenomenal success, researching and suggesting plot ideas as he wrote.

There's more on that in this article:

'Da Vinci' documents could hold key

By César G. Soriano, USA TODAY

LONDON — Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown spent a grueling second day on the witness stand here Tuesday, defending his book against charges of copyright infringement. But the person at the heart of the case was not even in court: his wife, Blythe.

[...]

Blythe Brown "is passionate about art and secret history and was enjoying educating herself and being involved in the research," the author wrote in a 69-page witness statement.

Her research has become a primary focus in the suit brought by Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, two of the three authors of Holy Blood, Holy Grail. Their attorney, Jonathan Rayner James, grilled Brown about his wife's research methods Tuesday, charging she cobbled together unattributed material from several sources, including Holy Blood, Holy Grail, and used them to create documents that became the synopsis for The Da Vinci Code.

Brown, sounding testy, repeatedly denied that his wife created the documents, noting that one contained British spellings and punctuation.

[...]

I wonder what on earth this is all about. Did the prosecution introduce documents attributed to her that are by somebody else? Someone British? Who? The mystery deepens ...

The case continues, as they say.

MORE ON THE TEMPLE SCROLL'S IMMINENT VISIT TO CLEVELAND:

Most Important Biblical Artifacts Ever Found -- Coming from Jerusalem to the U.S. for the 1st Time (Dakota Voice)


In Exhibition on Shared Roots of Christianity and Judaism Exhibition Will Showcase Jewish and Christian Treasures from the Israel Museum; Once in a Lifetime Opportunity to See the First and Only Presentation Outside of Israel of One of the Most Important Dead Sea Scrolls—the Temple Scroll


CLEVELAND, Mar. 13 -- The Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage will premiere a major exhibition on April 1, 2006 tracing the shared roots of Judaism and Christianity, bringing to the U.S. for the first time the most significant biblical artifacts ever found, including the Temple Scroll, one of the most important of the Dead Sea Scrolls, which is newly restored and has never before been displayed outside of Israel. Excavated in Israel over the last century, these one- of-a-kind Christian and Jewish archeological treasures come together for the first time to reveal a story of intertwined roots and shared heritage in a world premiere exhibition, "Cradle of Christianity: Treasures from the Holy Land."

[...]

The exhibition will include lots of other cool artifacts, such as the Caiaphas ossuary and the Pontius Pilate inscription.

JUSTIN DOMBROWSKI is blogging on the Babatha papyri.

HERE'S A LONG ARTICLE ON ANNE RICE and her Jesus book in the Chicago-Sun Times:

Rice: 'The doctor told me to say my goodbyes'

March 13, 2006

BY CATHLEEN FALSANI Religion Reporter

LA JOLLA, Calif. -- Johnny Depp would make a perfect Jesus. At least that's what Anne Rice thinks. And she has given it a lot of thought. "Definitely, Johnny Depp," she says decisively, casting, in her imagination, the hypothetical leading man of the television series she hopes to develop for HBO based on her latest novel, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, which chronicles Jesus' life. "I haven't told Johnny Depp yet, but wouldn't he be perfect?"

[...]

Well, she had better hurry. I like Johnny Depp too, but he's getting a little over the hill to play Jesus.

There's lots in the article and I don't have time to comment on it. But I leave you with this excerpt:

Rice is a fan of Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ" and says claims by critics that it is the "most violent film ever made" are ridiculous.

"I couldn't believe it. I thought, 'You haven't seen "The Last of the Mohicans"? You didn't get dragged to a Freddy Krueger movie by your 11-year-old son, like I did?' I was hiding under the seats while he's sitting there eating popcorn as Freddy murders people," she says, laughing. "The most violent movie ever made? Come on. Do kids really wake up in the middle of the night screaming that they're afraid of Roman soldiers?"

I still feel queasy when I remember The Last of the Mohicans.

UPDATE (15 March): But Joe Cathey liked it.

MORE DETAILS from the Jerusalem Post on the Solomonic-era ruins found at Kfar Kana in the Galilee:

Ancient city found at 'Kana of the Galilee'
By ETGAR LEFKOVITS

In a rare find, remnants of an ancient Israelite city that dates back three thousand years have been uncovered during excavations in the Israeli Arab village of Kfar Kana in the Lower Galilee, Israel's Antiquities Authority announced Monday.

The area, located north of Nazareth, is revered by Christians as the site where Jesus is said to have performed his first miracle.

The settlement being unearthed existed at the time of the United Kingdom of King Solomon and the Kingdom of Israel following the split between Israel and Judah, in the 10-9th centuries BCE.

[...]

Following the destruction the ancient Israelite city, the site was abandoned until its ruins were re-inhabited by Jewish settlers in the Early Roman period in the 1st century CE, Israel's top archaeological body said.

[...]

UPDATE: And even more details from the A.P. on the Roman-era remains:

Tunnels shed light on an ancient revolt
Archeologists in Israel say discovery dispels theory of `spontaneous' uprising against Rome

By Laura Resnick
Associated Press
Published March 14, 2006

JERUSALEM -- Underground chambers and tunnels used during a Jewish revolt against the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago have been uncovered in northern Israel, archeologists said Monday.

The Jews laid in supplies and were preparing to hide from the Romans during their revolt in 66-70, the experts said. The pits, linked by short tunnels, would have served as a concealed subterranean home.

Yardenna Alexandre of the Israel Antiquities Authority said the find shows the ancient Jews planned and prepared for the uprising, contrary to the common perception that the revolt began spontaneously.

[...]

DAN BROWN was in the witness stand yesterday in the Da Vinci Code trial. I have no great love for Brown, but I don't think the plagiarism case against him holds up. Here's a Telegraph article that covers yesterday's events:

I did not hijack book's plot, Dan Brown tells court
By Hugh Davies
(Filed: 14/03/2006)

The writer Dan Brown said he was astounded to be in court accused of stealing the ideas behind his runaway bestseller The Da Vinci Code.

Mr Brown, whose book helped him earn £45 million last year and the title of the world's highest paid author, insisted that claims that he had based The Da Vinci Code on decades of research by British-based writers were completely false.

[...]

But to defend him against the charge of copyright violation is not to defend him against the charge of cluelessness. This Times piece provides yet another example:

In an early novel a hero uses the words “without wax” as code for sincere, because “the English word evolved from the Spanish sin cera”, a term used by sculptors to describe works where they had not cheated by patching marble with wax. Sorry, Dan, “sincere” comes from the Latin sincerus, meaning “clean, pure or sound”. Next time, include the OED, in your “detailed research”.

BALASHON - HEBREW LANGUAGE DETECTIVE is a new blog on Hebrew and related languages:

An American in Israel investigates language - modern and classic Hebrew, slang, Yiddish, Aramaic, Yeshivish, and more - with an eye on etymology. I'm not a professional linguist, and will be using this blog to explore my own questions, and I welcome yours as well.

MORE ON SEIZING ANTIQUITIES from museums as compensation for terrorism:

New legal approach draws museums into fray in fight against terror
BY RON GROSSMAN
Chicago Tribune

CHICAGO - A Rhode Island lawyer has pioneered a new legal front in the war on terrorism, turning to the collections of major American museums to seek compensation for victims of Middle East suicide bombers.

Among the museums and institutions being pursued by David Strachman is the University of Chicago. He wants the university to surrender a treasure trove of ancient Persian artifacts to survivors of an attack staged by Hamas, the militant group that won the recent Palestinian elections.

The request was recently sustained by a federal magistrate in Chicago.

The reasoning was as straightforward as the implications are far-reaching: Supporters of terrorism should be punished. Hamas is partially financed by Iran. Therefore, Hamas' victims should be compensated by confiscating Iranian property, making Persian artifacts in American museums, such as University of Chicago's Oriental Institute, fair game for federal marshals and a moving truck.

[...]

Read it all. This is an extremely messy case on which I have already commented here. I have serious reservations about this approach for two reasons. First, although I'm all for holding the current Iranian regime responsible for its support of terrorism, it is not clear to me that seizing these antiquities from the University of Chicago would hurt the regime in any meaningful way. It sounds as though a lot of (all of?) the material was excavated long before the Khomeini revolution. It may belong to Iran in principle but their losing it would not have a practical financial effect on them. Second, these antiquities are not just Iran's heritage, they are the heritage of humanity's past, and they shouldn't end up as loot in private hands for any reason. They belong in a museum.

A SOLOMONIC-ERA TOWN? Arutz Sheva has a brief report to the effect that an "ancient Jewish" (i.e. Israelite) town from the time of Solomon has been located by the IAA under an Arab village in the Galilee. The same site is reported to preserve Roman-era Jewish material.

Ancient Jewish Town Discovered Under Arab Village

HAPPY PURIM (begins this evening at sundown) to my Jewish readers. The name "Purim" comes from the story of the casting of the "lot" in the book of Esther chapter 3.

GOOD COMMENTARY ON THE DA VINCI CODE TRIAL by Nick Cohen in The Observer:

Dan Brown has been called many things, but never 'my hero'. Until now

Nick Cohen
Sunday March 12, 2006
The Observer

You don't have to love the English language to disapprove of The Da Vinci Code. A passing respect for your mother tongue is enough to make you wince when Dan Brown takes a chainsaw to the old girl and slices her into clichés and easy-to-assemble sentences. Why millions of people have bought the literary equivalent of an Ikea flatpack is a riddle beyond Brown's power to solve. It is a page-turner, to be fair, with a mystery that pushes you past the arthritic dialogue of the stock characters.

[...]

True, but I think that's being a little hard on Ikea.

I agree with the following:

... David Hooper, a specialist in intellectual property, said the case was something new. The Holy Blood authors are not saying that Dan Brown had copied chunks of their work verbatim. Instead, they are suing him for taking some of their ideas, researching them, playing with them and turning them into a novel. If they win, Hooper believes a chill will go through cultural life as publishers face the next to impossible task of separating original thoughts from other people's thoughts.

Restricting free use of ideas is the spirit of the age. Firms have claimed copyright on plants and parts of the human genome because ideas are worth more than all other assets. The World Trade Organisation recognised this when it made international acceptance of intellectual property rights one of the central aims of the drive to globalisation in the Nineties.

I hate to be the one who has to say it, but Dan Brown needs to win. If he doesn't, free thought may be stifled in the name of protecting ideas.

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS LECTURE SERIES in Charlotte continues:

• "Journey Beyond Words," the weekly lecture series on the Dead Sea Scrolls, continues at 7 p.m. Tuesday when scholar Peter Flint explores "Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls" at Charlotte's First Presbyterian, 200 W. Trade St. For more on the series, tickets and the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit that continues drawing big crowds at Discovery Place in uptown Charlotte: (704) 372-6261 or www.discoverscrolls.org.

CONFERENCE REPORT from the Hellenic News of America:

AFGLC EDUCATIONAL FORUM AT USF ADDRESSES HELLENIC PAIDEIA AND CHALLENGES TO HIGHER EDUCATION

AFGLC EDUCATIONAL FORUM AT USF ADDRESSES HELLENIC PAIDEIA AND CHALLENGES TO HIGHER EDUCATION
Tampa, Florida
The Annual Educational Forum the American Foundation for Greek Language and Culture, was held on March 2-4, 2006 on the campus of the University of South Florida in Tampa. The central theme of the Forum was “Hellenic Paideia: Challenges to Higher Education.” As in 2005, the sponsors of this year Forum were George and Margo Behrakis of Boston. The Forum was free of charge and the public was invited to attend.

[...]

This paper in particular is of interest:

Dr. James F Strange is a Distinguished University Professor and Graduate Director of the Religious Studies at USF. Dr. Strange has initiated and directed major archaeological excavations, beginning in summer of 1982, at the once great city of Sepphoris, also known as Eirenopolis on its coins under Nero, which was rebuilt by the king Herod Antipas and made it his capital following the death of his father, Herod the Great, at about 4 B.C. Dr. Strange delivered on Saturday a stimulating lecture on "Hellenic Artifacts in Eirenopolis, "City of Peace", Near the Birthplace of Christ". In his talk he presented highlights of the excavations at Sepphoris, and the intriguing implications of his original observations from these excavations for New Testament Studies. The excavations at Sepphoris, revealed a vital and expanding city founded in the 2nd century BC. The city was marked by paved streets, public and private buildings, and an aqueduct the brought water three miles from ancient Abila. Sepphoris was designated the seat of the Galilean Sanhedrin the 55 BC and became the capitol city of Galilee in the same period. Herod the Great, who figures in the gospels, built a palace at Sepphoris. At the death of Herod the Great the city was destroyed and inherited by Herod Antipas, the third son of Herod the Great. Antipas built a theater in Greek style, first discovered by the University of Michigan excavations, but re-investigated by the University of South Expedition. Subsequent excavations revealed a villa in Greco-Roman style and a huge civil basilica at the intersection of the two main streets of the city. Other finds included coins, pottery sherds by the thousands, and important fragments of glass and metal. Sepphoris was a great Jewish intellectual center until Christianity became a legal religion during the fourth century CE. Pottery with Christian crosses embossed on the bases have turned up at Sepphoris, and the city gradually became important, receiving its first Christian Bishop in the fifth century AD. The Jewish presence remained strong until the seventh century AD.

THE DA VINCI CODE TRIAL continues to provide amusement:

Da Vinci Code challenger 'copies' (BBC)

A writer who accuses The Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown of copying has agreed at the High Court that he himself would "hijack" other people's words.

Co-author of The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail, Richard Leigh, was told in court ideas in his book were copied.

[...]

I'VE UPDATED the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha website, breaking the texts down into categories, deleting one or two that turned out not to be suitable, and adding a number of new ones that have turned up in recent months. This isn't the final version. There are some complete texts I'm still withholding from the list while we think about them, and I've got a great many short quotation fragments that we're still evaluating, but the list is now better organized and more accurate.

DA VINCI CODE TRIAL UPDATE:

Blessing of Da Vinci date error

By Alan Hamilton (The Times)

Dan Brown's mistake over the Crusades could prove a weapon in his defence against plagiarism

DAN BROWN got a date wrong in The Da Vinci Code. The error may well prove to his advantage.

According to him the Priory of Sion, alleged keeper of the secret of Christ’s wife and children, was founded in Jerusalem during the Second Crusade in the reign of Baldwin II. But according to the authors of The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail, who are suing Brown for stealing their plot, the Priory was founded in 1099 during the First Crusade, and Baldwin did not ascend the throne of the ancient city until 1118.

[...]

It should be most amusing to hear Dan Brown testify next week that he alone should get credit for all the mistakes in his book.

Also, there are these interesting statistics at the end of the article:

Sales of The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail, first published in 1982, have increased sevenfold since the hearing began last week — 3,000 copies — and a few days ago British sales of The Da Vinci Code passed 4 million to add to worldwide sales of 40 million.

Almost makes getting sued sound okay.

On a more serious note, the Catholic Church continues to gear up for the movie release with lots of multimedia material refuting The Da Vinci Code and defending the Catholic viewpoint. Zenit has a press release.

THE ARMENIAN ALPHABET had a birthday celebration at the New Library of Alexandria. Al Ahram has the story:

By the book
Eva Dadrian found more than words at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina's exhibition marking the 1,600th anniversary of the Armenian alphabet

---

Commemorating the 1,600th anniversary of the creation of the Armenian Alphabet the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, in cooperation with the Embassy of the Armenian Republic in Egypt, presented an exhibition of rare Armenian manuscripts in February. Inaugurated by Ambassador Taher Khalifa, Head of External Relations at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, and Rouben Karapetian, the Armenian Ambassador to Egypt, the exhibition was followed by a scientific conference entitled "Armenian-Egyptian Historical and Cultural Relations."

The exhibition offered a rare opportunity for visitors to see 19 Armenian manuscripts, eight originals and the rest facsimiles, from the Institute of Matenadaran, Yerevan. One of the oldest and richest libraries in the world, the Matenadaran, as the Armenian manuscript library in Yerevan, capital of Armenia, is known, is one of the world's leading repositories of ancient manuscripts. Its history dates back to the creation of the Armenian alphabet and its collection of over 18,000 manuscripts covers almost all areas of ancient and medieval Armenian culture and science, from history, geography, grammar, philosophy, law, medicine, mathematics, cosmography, alchemy-chemistry, to literature, chronology, art history, music and theatre. It houses manuscripts in Arabic, Persian, Greek, Syriac, Latin, Amharic (Ethiopian) and in some of the ancient languages of India and Japan.

[...]

Including, I dare say, many Old Testament pseudepigrapha manuscripts. Lots of pseudepigrapha were translated into Armenian.

HOT GNOSTICISM TOPICS are covered by Beliefnet:

Ask the Author: Gnosticism Hot Topics
Q&A: The Gospel of Mary, fringe sects, and grass eaters...our author replies.
By Richard L. Valantasis

Here's something I didn't know:

Which of the early Christian or Gnostic sects is the most interesting to you personally?

I am most fascinated by the Boskoi, the Grazers. They had a concrete plan to live in the Garden of Eden, and they carried it out despite all the social pressures to conform. They were radical "back to the earth" people who loved God and the world God made. We could use more of that today, given what we are doing to the physical world we live in.

THE "DEAD SEA SCROLLS OF BUDDHISM" are back in the news after having been carbon dated:

Buddhist scrolls may be missing link

March 9, 2006 - 8:29AM (Sydney Morning Herald)

Rare manuscripts dubbed the "dead sea scrolls of Buddhism" have been carbon dated to the first and fifth centuries AD by Australian scientists, and could be the missing link in Buddhist history, a local scholar says.

[...]

I know this has nothing to do with ancient Judaism, but it has "Dead Sea Scrolls" in it, so what the heck.

THE TRIAL CONTINUES:

French kings drawn into Da Vinci clash

By Alan Hamilton (The Times)

Copyright claimant wilts in the witness box as the books are subjected to a line-by-line comparison

ALTERNATELY sucking the end of his pen and toying with his luxuriant moustache, Mr Justice Peter Smith was engrossed in his paperback copy of The Da Vinci Code, thick with yellow page markers.

The judge had clearly acquainted himself thoroughly with the text of Dan Brown’s blockbusting novel during a six-day adjournment of the hearing in which the authors of a previous book are claiming infringement of copyright, alleging that Mr Brown stole much of his plot from them.

Yesterday’s proceedings in the High Court got down to line-by-line comparisons between DVC and The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail, published in 1982. ...

Grant Macaskill pointed me to the best line in today's article:

The arguments moved on to car chases, of which there is at least one in DVC and none in HBHG.

COPTIC GOSPEL OF JUDAS WATCH: The Christian Science Monitor explores the ethical implications of the National Geographic Society's connection with the publishing of this (looted) manuscript:

A gospel's rocky path from Egypt's desert to print

By G. Jeffrey MacDonald | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor

When the Gospel of Judas first surfaced in Geneva in 1983, scholars wondered if the mysterious text could trigger a reappraisal of history's most infamous traitor.

They never found out, however, because they couldn't afford the $3 million price tag on this second-century gnostic tale. Instead, the fragile pages vanished into private hands and set off on a 23-year, intercontinental journey through fist-pounding negotiations and even periods, reportedly, stuffed inside a Greek beauty's purse.

Now, at long last, the world is about to see the contents. The National Geographic Society last week reported it will publish a translation this spring, when "The Da Vinci Code" film is sure to rekindle interest in gnostic artifacts.

I don't recall hearing anything about "a Greek beauty's purse" before this. But at least that's not as strange as the story about the prostitute (two prostitutes?) who showed John Strugnell a microfilm of a (Qumran?) Enochic manuscript, which microfilm she had hidden in an even more unusual place. Strugnell did verify that something like this actually happened, but he seems to be saving the details for his memoirs.

Be that as it may, the key issues in this article come out here:

National Geographic doesn't deny Dr. Robinson's allegation that the text left Egypt without that country's required authorization. Still, the organization stands by its decision.

"Everyone involved believes the materials should be given to Egypt" after scholars finish translating them, says spokeswoman Mary Jeanne Jacobsen. "National Geographic has done its due diligence, and is working with an international team of experts on this artifact to save the manuscript before it turns to dust and is lost forever."

But others worry that those who publish "hot" manuscripts create a tragic incentive. "When you publish material that's the result of recent looting ... you're adding to the value of other pieces similar to it," says Patty Gerstenblith, an expert in culture heritage law at DePaul University Law School in Chicago. That entices others to hunt for treasure, she says, with hopes that even something later branded contraband could still yield a nice windfall.

[...]

This is the problem and I don't know of a good solution.

For the episode involving the Enochic manuscript, see Biblical Archaeology Review 20.4 (July-August 1994): 46-47.

PROFESSOR RON TAPPY is speaking on the Tel Zayit inscription this evening in Cleveland.

THE LATEST on the Da Vinci Code lawsuit:

Plot thickens in Da Vinci Code case
(The Scotsman)

An author who claims his theories on Christian heresies were copied in The Da Vinci Code (DVC) came face to face with the Grand Inquisitor.

The inquisitor took the shape of John Baldwin QC, the barrister representing publisher Random House which is being sued for copyright infringement.

And Michael Baigent, co-writer of The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail (HBHG), agreed in the witness box that some of the evidence in his statement to the High Court was "false".

[...]

Also, there are more details in this London Times article. Baigent's testimony was so lame it makes me wonder if he isn't deliberately throwing the case now that he's got his publicity.

THIS SOUNDS LIKE A STRANGE "DOCUMENTARY." My comments are interspersed.

It Began in Jerusalem
Tuesday, 7 March 2006, 10:44 am
Press Release: Maori TV
Tuesday March 7 2006
Publicity Release

It Began in Jerusalem

A two-part documentary series that traces the beginnings of Christianity, REVELATION, premieres on Maori Television this Sunday March 12 at 4.30 PM.

Acquired from Southern Star International for broadcast on Maori Television, the documentary series starts in the sixth century, 1000 years before the birth of Christ, when the Jews of Palestine were forced into slavery.

The sixth century (BCE, I assume) was not 1000 years before the birth of Jesus. It was the 500s. I'm not sure what the "forced into slavery" bit is about. The Babylonian exile maybe? But they were exiled, not enslaved.

From the mystery that surrounds the secretive burial and discovery in 1940 of the Dead Sea Scrolls to the formation of the Roman Empire, REVELATION examines the reign of terror that saw many Palestinian women commit suicide in mass protest.

The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947, not 1940. I don't know what the "reign of terror" and the suicidal "Palestinian" women are about and I don't feel inclined to speculate.

The documentary attempts to prise apart the beginnings of Christianity from its Judaic past to its church of all nations present.

[...]

Here, it seems, we come to the agenda of the film. However, the beginnings of Christianity are not prisable apart from it's Judaic past, so the attempt isn't likely to get very far. If this press release reflects the quality of the production and some producer actually paid good money to make it, they were ripped off.

A NEW JESUS MOVIE by an Egyptian producer is in the works:

Egyptian producer plans first Arab film on Jesus

Mar 6, 2006, 13:34 GMT (Deutsche Presse-Agentur)

Cairo - In the wake of global controversy over publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed, an Egyptian film producer has announced the first Arab-made film project detailing the life of Jesus Christ.

A central theme of the film, which is projected to cost far more than the average Egyptian production, will be the holy family's flight to Egypt, producer Mohammed Ashub told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa in Cairo on Monday.

[...]

MORE ON THE WIESENTHAL CENTER/MUSLIM CEMETERY CONTROVERSY:

Wiesenthal Center May Move Muslim Graves

By SARA TOTH, Associated Press Writer

Monday, March 6, 2006

(03-06) 11:15 PST JERUSALEM, Israel (AP) --

The Simon Wiesenthal Center may relocate Muslim graves discovered on the Jerusalem site of its planned tolerance museum in hopes of soothing Muslim anger, a spokesman said Monday.

[...]

This part doesn't seem to me to add up:

Durgham Saif, a lawyer for the human rights group Karameh, which is involved in the court case, said he did not know about the plans to relocate graves but said moving them would not satisfy the group's demands.

"We have criteria that there is no way to build anything on the cemetery," Saif said. "It's a holy matter."

But according to media reports a parking lot had already been built over the proposed site of the Wiesenthal Center in the 1980s. Plus a hotel was built over another area of the cemetery in the 1920s, approved by the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem at the time. That doesn't decide this case either way, but I don't find Durgham Saif's argument here persuasive.

MORE PYRAMIDS TOO? I've already noted the discovery of an intact tomb in the Egyptian Valley of the Kings, which it now seems contained seven coffins and which is not far from King Tut's tomb. That's impressive, but just wait. In an article in Egypt Today (via Archaeologica News), Zahi Hawass drops this teaser about another discovery:

“Some people put on perfume in the morning,” he says. “My perfume is the sand. If I don’t smell the sand every day, I will die. Egypt is still so rich. I made a discovery recently in Saqqara. I haven’t announced it yet, but it will show that you can still discover cachets and” He pauses, and it’s the long, dramatic pause for which he is famous on international television. “and even whole pyramids in Egypt.”

Stay tuned!

MY PAPER "The Hekhalot Literature and the Early Jewish Apocalypses" has been accepted by the Early Jewish and Christian Mysticism Group for the Society of Biblical Literature meeting in Washington D.C. in November. Here's the abstract:

This paper explores the relationship between the Hekhalot literature -- the pre-Kabbalistic corpus of mystical texts that give instructions on how to ascend (or "descend") to God's heavenly throne-chariot and to compel the angels to grant revelations -- and the verifiably Jewish apocalypses of the early centuries C.E. and earlier. The article views the Hekhalot literature from the heuristic social-scientific model of the practitioner (the "descender to the chariot") as "shaman/healer" and examines the apocalypses to determine which elements of this model already existed in the earlier period and whether these indicate a genetic relationship between the apocalyptic visionaries and the descenders to the chariot.

The social-scientific model is the one presented in my book, Descenders to the Chariot: The People Behind the Hekhalot Literature. You can read an early version of the thesis of the book in my 1994 SBLSP article, "The Hekhalot Literature and Shamanism."

RECENT CAVE EXCAVATIONS in the Dead Sea region have uncovered some important coins from the period of the Bar Kokhba revolt. I've probably covered this before, but I can't remember (and I'm unexpectedly in Edinburgh this weekend and kind of busy). This is a Netscape News report, found via last week's Explorator.

Amazing Find Near the Dead Sea

When Israeli archaeologists began excavating caves near the Dead Sea, they found a real treasure: nine rare silver coins that are believed to date back to a failed Jewish rebellion against the Romans in the second century A.D.
[...]

UPDATE (6 March): Yep, I had posts on it here and here almost three years ago.

FIRECRACKERS IN NAZARETH CHURCH:

Fireworks start melee at Nazareth shrine

AMY TEIBEL

Associated Press

NAZARETH, Israel -An Israeli couple, joined by a young woman reported to be their daughter, entered one of Christianity's holiest sites on Friday and set off a series of small explosions, sparking a riot that left six people wounded in this Arab town in northern Israel.

The family's motives were unclear, but police said they had been treated for psychiatric problems in the past and faced the possibility of losing custody of their children.

Although the attack did not appear to be nationalistic, it underscored the tensions between Israel's Jewish majority and its Arab minority. Israeli Arabs, who make up about 20 percent of the population, complain of systematic discrimination.

Police said the three entered the Basilica of the Annunciation Friday evening and set off firecrackers and other small explosives. Church officials said the site was unguarded, and witnesses said the explosives were hidden in a baby stroller.

[...]

The church is at the site where Christians believe the Angel Gabriel appeared before the Virgin Mary and foretold the birth of Jesus.

Nazareth, the boyhood town of Jesus, is inhabited by Christian and Muslim Arabs, and religious tensions have boiled over in the past, with the two sides in a dispute over attempts to build a mosque next to the church.

[...]

This was really playing with fire and it's fortunate that it didn't turn out even worse.

"LUSTY AND SURE-FOOTED": The Charlotte Observer has a detailed report on the choral performance inspired by the Dead Sea Scrolls:

Choral group pays homage to Scrolls

On the fringes of uptown's CIAA festivities, Carolina Voices tucked itself away in St. Peter's Episcopal Church: near in location, but far removed in spirit. The choral group paid homage to the Dead Sea Scrolls, a few of whose fragments were right next door in a show at Discovery Place.

[...]

MADONNA is rumored to be looking to invest in some prime Israeli real estate:

Old shack will give Madonna front-row seat for arrival of her Messiah
From Ian MacKinnon, in Jerusalem (The Times of London)

MADONNA is trying to buy a house overlooking the Sea of Galilee at the place where followers of her Kabbalist faith expect the Messiah to reappear to herald world peace.

Representatives of the 47-year-old US singer have been cold calling home-owners in the picturesque mountain retreat of Rosh Pina and offering to pay any price to secure a property on her behalf.

[...]

The story seems to have originated in the Hebrew publication Yedioth Ahronoth. Another article reports that:

Yedioth Ahronoth said that the owner of a 100-year-old, ramshackle five-bedroom villa overlooking the Sea of the Galilee had been recently contacted several times by representatives of the superstar with a view to selling his property.

According to the same source, Madonna wants to renovate the building into a center of study of mystical Jewish texts pored over by Kabbalah followers.

[...]

If the rumor is true, I imagine this will be good for tourism.

THE SITE OF THE MUSEUM OF TOLERANCE is associated with a gruesome ancient episode according to the Jerusalem Post:

Massacre at Mamilla
By GIL ZOHAR

Completely overlooked in the current media frenzy about building the Museum of Tolerance atop the millennium-old Ma'amun Allah Cemetery is the site's forgotten history as the killing field of 614.

In that year, nearly three centuries of prosperity under the Byzantine empire were shattered by Persia's Sassanid Shah Khosrau II, known as Parvez - the Victorious.

Local Jews together with their co-religionists in Babylonia allied with the Zoroastrian invaders to defeat the Christian rulers. Seeking revenge for generations of persecution, the Jews destroyed hundreds of churches and monasteries.

[...]

"Once Jerusalem was in Persian hands a terrible massacre of Christians took place, and the Jews are accused of having taken the lead in this massacre. It would not be surprising if the accusation were true, even though the fantastic stories told of Jewish revenge by Christian chroniclers are certainly exaggerated."

How many Christian prisoners of war were murdered by the Mamilla Pool? A precise number is of course now impossible to verify, but Israeli archaeologist Ronny Reich puts the tally at 60,000 before the Persian military stopped the carnage.

[...]

The quotation is from historian James Parkes.

SNOW AT ST. MARY'S COLLEGE:



I took this picture this morning. We don't get much snow in St. Andrews, but much of what we do get comes in the first half of March. According to tradition, the thorn tree on the left was planted by Mary Queen of Scots.

GILLES QUISPEL - 1916-2006

I am very sorry to relay the following news from Jack Sasson's Agade list:

From a subscriber to the biblical-studies@yahoogroups.com:
======================

Dutch newspapers are reporting the death yesterday of Gilles Quispel (May 30, 1916) the Gnostic scholar and emeritus professor of Early Christianity at Utrecht. He died of pneumonia, reportedly in an Egyptian hospital.

For information about him, see the Dutch Wikipedia, where his death is also reported.
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilles_Quispel.

Requiescat in pace.

Professor Quispel was almost 90 years old. And as I noted here recently, another renowned specialist in Gnosticism, R. McL. Wilson, just celebrated his 90th birthday. It seems that Gnosis is good not only for the soul, but also for the constitution.

UPDATE: J. P. van de Giessen has a long post about Quispel in Dutch at the Aantekeningen bij de Bijbel blog. (Via a comment at Hypotyposeis.)

THOUGHTS ON ANTIQUITY, Chris Weimer's blog, has moved. You can find it now here.

THE LIVRES DE PAROLE EXHIBITION in Paris is reviewed by David Tresilian in Al Ahram:

Canons of monotheism

David Tresilian reviews the exhibition Livres de Parole: Torah, Bible, Coran (Books of Speech: the Torah, the Bible and the Qur'an) at the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris


Torah, Bible and Qur'an : "In the long history of l'homo religiosus," writes the curator in the catalogue to the exhibition Livres de Parole: Torah, Bible, Coran (Books of Speech: the Torah, the Bible and the Qur'an) currently at the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris, "monotheism is a recent development, bringing about a veritable revolution in the relationship between the gods and man."

[...]

COPTIC GOSPEL OF JUDAS WATCH:

Expert doubts 'Gospel of Judas' revelation

By Richard N. Ostling, The Associated Press

NEW YORK — An expert on ancient Egyptian texts is predicting that the Gospel of Judas— a manuscript from early Christian times that's nearing release amid widespread interest from scholars — will be a dud in terms of learning anything new about Judas.

James M. Robinson, America's leading expert on such ancient religious texts from Egypt, predicts in a new book that the text won't offer any insights into the disciple who betrayed Jesus. His reason: While it's old, it's not old enough.

"Does it go back to Judas? No," Robinson told The Associated Press on Thursday.

[...]

I'm glad the press is getting this message out a little more clearly.

Robinson has not seen the text that National Geographic is working on, but assumes it is the same work assailed by Bishop Irenaeus of Lyons around A.D. 180.

Irenaeus said the writings came from a "Cainite" Gnostic sect that jousted against orthodox Christianity. He also accused the Cainites of lauding the biblical murderer Cain, the Sodomites and Judas, whom they regarded as the keeper of secret mysteries.

[...]

You can read the passage by Irenaeus at the Gospel of Judas page over at Peter Kirby's Early Christian Writings website. It remains to be seen whether Irenaeus' Gospel of Judas is the same as the Coptic one.

And here's a preview of Robinson's new book:

In The Secrets of Judas, a HarperSanFrancisco book on sale April 1, Robinson will describe secretive maneuvers in the United States, Switzerland, Greece and elsewhere over two decades to sell the "Judas" manuscript.

He writes that he was approached about purchasing a group of manuscripts in 1983 and arranged for colleague Stephen Emmel, now at the University of Muenster, Germany, to meet in Geneva with go-betweens for the owner.

Emmel got a glimpse of the text but didn't know it was the Gospel of Judas till years later. He was told the original asking price was $10 million but it could be obtained for $3 million, an impossibly high figure for the interested Americans.

From there, Robinson traces a twisted sales trail through years and continents to this year's impending release.

[...]

PHOENICIAN TEMPLE DISCOVERED:

Phoenician temple found in Sicily

Site believed to be 'unique', archaeologists say

(ANSA) - Palermo, February 28 - An ancient Phoenician temple unearthed in Sicily is "unique" in the West, the head of the Italian dig team claims .

"You have to go all the way to Amrit in Syria to find a similar one," said Lorenzo Nigro of the Rome University team .

[...]

Motya - whose name means "wool-spinning centre" - was founded in the 8th century BC, about a century after the foundation of the most famous Phoenician colony in the ancient world, Carthage in Tunisia .

[...]

DA VINCI CODE REVIEW: I finally got around to reading The Da Vinci Code last fall. (I borrowed Grant Macaskill's copy, which he had bought from a charity shop, so both of us avoided the defilement of giving Dan Brown money.) The book has been in the news a good bit lately because of both the lawsuit and the upcoming movie. I've finally finished this brief review, which is so late that it's timely again. Warning: there are some spoilers below.

The book is fun. The writing is lousy, but the plot is well constructed and Brown keeps you guessing and wanting to know what comes next. Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu are sympathetic characters and I usually wanted things to come out well for them (but see below). Intellectually the book is a couple of notches above, say, The Mummy movie, but it gets too full of itself with its bogus scholarly pretensions. In The Mummy, when Evelyn (Rachel Weitz) starts to blither about "Bambridge scholars" one can't help but cringe, but at least Rachel Weitz is good to look at, and we know anyway that before she gets out more than a few sentences brigands will come crashing through the door waving their scimitars and shooting the place up. (Then Evelyn will take a scimitar off of one of them and kill him with it. The bad guys will have machine guns and the good guys only revolvers, but nevertheless the baddies will miss completely and Evelyn's husband, Rick [Brendan Fraser], and her brother, Jonathan [John Hannah], will pick off numerous baddies. Also, at least once during the battle one or more goodies will leap through a glass window without getting a scratch.)

Unfortunately, Brown fails to follow this principle of administering his fake scholarship in small doses relieved by vigorous bouts of action. Rather, pages 304 to 367 or thereabouts consist of nonstop pseudo-intellectual drivel and well before I got to page 367 I was longing for Silas to burst in and shoot them all down so they would shut up.

Now in one sense, I don't hold this idiocy against Brown any more than I hold it against The Mummy. They're both just stories and even though both are badly done, they're lots of fun. I do hold against him the pretty explicit claim that the historical evidence he presents in the book is real. Notably, the opening page lists as "Fact" that "All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents and secret rituals in this novel are accurate." This just isn't so. He tries to get around this in the common questions page on his website, but not with great success:

HOW MUCH OF THIS NOVEL IS TRUE?
The Da Vinci Code is a novel and therefore a work of fiction. While the book's characters and their actions are obviously not real, the artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals depicted in this novel all exist (for example, Leonardo Da Vinci's paintings, the Gnostic Gospels, Hieros Gamos, etc.). These real elements are interpreted and debated by fictional characters. While it is my belief that some of the theories discussed by these characters may have merit, each individual reader must explore these characters' viewpoints and come to his or her own interpretations. My hope in writing this novel was that the story would serve as a catalyst and a springboard for people to discuss the important topics of faith, religion, and history.

BUT DOESN'T THE NOVEL'S "FACT" PAGE CLAIM THAT EVERY SINGLE WORD IN THIS NOVEL IS HISTORICAL FACT?
If you read the "FACT" page, you will see it clearly states that the documents, rituals, organization, artwork, and architecture in the novel all exist. The "FACT" page makes no statement whatsoever about any of the ancient theories discussed by fictional characters. Interpreting those ideas is left to the reader.

This isn't correct. For example, he has the Dead Sea Scrolls containing "Gnostic Gospels" and calls the Scrolls "Christian records" (p. 351). Kindly show me a Gnostic Gospel among the Dead Sea Scrolls.

I don't want to belabor the historical inaccuracies in the book here, since they've been covered very thoroughly many times elsewhere. But for more information see here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here.

The bad thing about the book is that many people will read it and think the ridiculous claims in it are true -- and Brown himself is partly to blame for this and he could have mitigated the problem instead of making it worse. The good thing is that it has gotten a lot of people interested in the Bible and in actual ancient Jewish and Christian history and that may lead some of them to learn more from reputable sources. Plus, it's an amusing read.

BIBLICAL STUDIES CARNIVAL III is out over at Rick Brannan's Ricoblog.

"THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAIL." The details are nearly all wrong, but somehow that doesn't seem to matter in this case. The London Times has an informative article:

Da Vinci judge turns back to page one
By Alan Hamilton

The devil is in the detail, and one reading of the two hefty books in question proves insufficient

DID Pepin the Fat assassinate King Dagobert II in AD679? Why did the Knights Templar fall out with the Priory of Sion in 1188? And was the Crucifixion a fake?

Early Christian history dominated the second day yesterday of the hearing in the High Court into whether the American author Dan Brown had infringed copyright by lifting ideas from a book published more than 20 years previously for his blockbusting fiction, The Da Vinci Code, written in 2003.

Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh are suing their publishers, Random House, for breach of copyright, saying that Brown took at least 15 core ideas from their non-fiction work, The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail, written in 1982. It was the turn of the defence yesterday to deny the claims and, as ever, the devil was in the detail.

[...]

My favorite bit was this:

At this stage Mr Justice Peter Smith interjected from the bench. “It’s not surprising, given what happened in 1187.” The court was briefly silenced. “The loss of the kingdom of Jerusalem, thanks to their stupid master,” the judge explained. Knowing nods all round.

Right. 1187. Of course. This judge seems to be the right man for the job.

(Heads up, Grant Macaskill.)

UPDATE: Also in the Times, Magnus Linklater sums up the situation nicely:

This then must be the dilemma for those who seek to defend their own versions of made-up history: they can only sue and win if they can demonstrate that their ideas are fictional, invented and therefore entirely their own property. If, on the other hand, they succeed in proving that their research is genuine, and their investigations firmly based, then they have made a signal contribution to history — a history that belongs to us all. Their revelations become as public as the secrets of the Enigma Code, the Suez pact, or the British presidency of the European Union.

Read it all.

THE LAST CATO -- Here we go again! Professor David Maltsberger of the Baptist University of the Américas e-mails a heads-up:

Be watching for the big splash surrounding "The Last Cato"
(http://www.thelastcato.com/) [out in March/April] a DaVinci Code knock-off that features a Vatican paleographer-nun, the Coptic archaeologist with whom she falls in love, and a high placed Swiss Guard with a dirty secret all plumbing the depths of the Staurofilakes (keepers of the True Cross) theft of holy relics by following the secrets hidden in Dante's "Purgatory".

Having just finished an advanced copy, while the storyline is on par with Brown's book as far as readability, the author's confusion over the relationships between classical, Koine, and Byzantine Greek is obvious. A few wild theological interpretations of NT theology and early church history will also no doubt create a wide array of "The Truth Behind the Last Cato" books. Too, when the key historical text of the Staurofilakes is found by our heroes in a basket of cast-off manuscripts ready to be burned at Santa Katrina a la Tischendorf, informed readers will chortle with delight. Assuming the horrific errors in Greek case endings are edited out in the final edition along with transliterated rather than translated geographic names from the Italian original, "The Last Cato" makes an enjoyable, although eye-rolling, late night read will pump new life into Dante's flea-bitten soul.

This is the first I've heard of it.

COPTIC GOSPEL OF JUDAS WATCH:

Theologians say Judas gospel adds little

ROME, Feb. 27 (UPI) -- Roman Catholic theologians say that the "Gospel of Judas," a version of Christ's life from the point of view of his betrayer, has no effect on theology.

[...]

But it's still cool.

SANLI URFA (known in antiquity as "Edessa"), the city that gave us the Syriac language, has its own newsletter, the Urfa Times. The current issue has a brief article on the city's history.

THE PIYYUT IS "IN" IN ISRAEL:

The Piyyut is Jewish Soul Music
Basmat Hazan Arnoff (Zeek)

Translated from the Hebrew by Stephen Hazan Arnoff

Reveal Yourself my Dearest, And spread over me Your canopy of peace. Let the earth shine with Your glory, Let us rejoice in You. Make haste, my Love, for the time has come; Show me Your favor as in the days of old.

(Excerpted from the traditional Shabbat liturgical prayer Yedid Nephesh by Eliezer Azikri, 16th-17th century)

My father is a professor of piyyut, Jewish liturgical poetry. For years my family and I joked with him that no more than maybe three and a half people had ever read any of his books. We liked to needle him that while all of his buddies in the academy got invited to all kinds of public events and lectures and were interviewed by the media, he had chosen such a bizarre field of study that no one would ask him to speak anywhere, except for, maybe, the ones that had absolutely no choice. Even us kids never made it very far past the dedications on the first page.


At an event three months ago celebrating the launch of the new website Invitation to Piyyut I understood that something had dramatically changed in how the Jewish community, at least in Israel, relates to this complex, beautiful and little-understood art form.

[...]

What is the piyyut?. The term is derived from the Greek word "poietes" meaning "creator." Using this definition the classical midrashic collection Leviticus Rabba honored 3rd century sages Rabbi Eleazar and Rabbi Shimon by calling them "poietes" – "creators." During the period of Late Antiquity and onward, as the much of Jewish poetic writing became related in some way to synagogue worship, the term piyyut came to mean a Jewish liturgical poem specifically. With the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language in the 19th century, the definition of piyyut received a more general meaning, namely any type of written expression in high, classical language. Sometimes the word piyyut even described any expression that was particularly moving or artistically profound. Contemporary proponents of piyyut tend to define it as liturgical poetry that is actually sung. Thus the word "paytan" – or one who "creates" a piyyut – refers both to the writer and/or composer of a piyyut as well as the actual singing performer of a piyyut.

[...]

THE LINE OF MENELIK is alive and well and one member of it is lecturing in Florida:

Member of Ethiopian royalty to speak on legacy of dynasty

Prince thought to be `seed of Messiah'

By Gregory Lewis
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Posted February 28 2006

The grandson of Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie I will speak at two South Florida universities this week.

His Imperial Highness Prince Ermias Sable-Selassie, president of the Ethiopian Crown Council, is one of the grandsons of the late Ethiopian emperor whom Rastafarians consider the Messiah.

The prince, 45, is a key spokesman for the Ethiopian Royal Family, now in exile.

[...]

Prince Ermias will speak today at Florida International University and on Thursday at the University of Miami. He will address "The Enduring Legacy of a Solomonic Dynasty in Ethiopia."

[...]

The legend of the origin of the Ethiopian royal dynasty is recounted in the Kebra Negast, the national epic of Ethiopia.

LATE FOR CHRISTMAS, but timed to coincide with the publication of his latest book, this article in the Wisconsin State Journal interviews New Testament scholar John Dominic Crossan:

Vetting the Jesus parable
JAY RATH
For the State Journal
Contact Jay Rath at daybreak@madison.com.

Jesus was not born in Bethlehem.

There was no manger, no star, no Wise Men. Mary was not a virgin.

But that doesn't mean it's not all true.

John Dominic Crossan, often called the premier expert on the words and life of the historical Jesus, says the truth of the Christmas story is spiritual, not necessarily factual.

[...]

Crossan is professor emeritus of Biblical Studies at DePaul University in Chicago. He is the author of many books, including "Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography" and "The Historical Jesus." Tuesday will see publication of "The Last Week: A Day by Day Account of Jesus' Last Week in Jerusalem," written with Marcus J. Borg. Crossan's "Jesus and Paul" will be published next fall.

[...]

Lots of interesting thoughts in this one.

MORE DA VINCI CODE STUFF -- Beliefnet has a FAQ on relevant matters:

Ancient Christianity: Quick Facts
Answers to questions raised by 'The Da Vinci Code'
By Marcie Lenk

The questions are:

• Was Jesus Married?
  Who was Mary Magdalene?
  
• What is Gnosticism?
  
• Were there other gospels not included in the Christian Bible?
  
• Why were these gospels not included?
  
• What is the feminine divine in Christianity?

You can also take a poll on " The depiction of Christianity in 'The Da Vinci Code.'"

YEAH, I get evenings like this too.

THE SBL PSEUDEPIGRAPHA SECTION will be devoting one of its sessions to issues raised in my book (see the ad to the right). Here's the call for papers:

Call For Papers: Up to four separate sessions will be sponsored in 2006. A thematic panel on 4 Ezra and a joint session with the new Religious Experience in Early Judaism & Christianity program unit have pre-arranged rosters of presenters. New paper proposals that treat methodological, historical, literary, or terminological issues surrounding the determination of the cultural provenance of parabiblical literature are especially encouraged, particularly those that interact with points raised in James R. Davila's recent *The Provenance of the Pseudepigrapha: Jewish, Christian, or Other?* (Leiden: Brill, 2005). New paper proposals devoted to the study of any aspect of Jewish pseudepigrapha are also welcome.

The deadline is 1 March, so it's not too late to have a go at me!

HAYIM TADMOR receives a long obituary in The Independent:

Hayim Tadmor

Historian of the Bible and Ancient Near East who established an international centre of Assyriology

Published: 27 February 2006

Hayim Frumstein (Hayim Tadmor), Assyriologist: born Harbin, China 18 November 1923; Professor, Department of Assyriology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem 1971-93; married 1953 Miriam Skura (one son, one daughter); died Jerusalem 11 December 2005.

Hayim Tadmor was until his retirement in 1993 Professor of Assyriology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the first holder of the post, in a department which he created. A man of enormously wide learning in bible and Ancient Near Eastern history, he stood in the first rank of Assyriologists of his day. Among his many publications, The Inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser III King of Assyria (1994) stands as a fitting memorial.

[...]

(Via the Agade list.)

OPUS DEI STRIKES BACK -- WITH A BLOG!

I'm not making this up: A priest from Opus Dei has set up a blog to respond to The Da Vinci Code:

Da Vinci Code & Opus Dei

That strikes me as rather more constructive than, say, rioting and carrying around signs calling for people to be beheaded. But that's just me, I guess.

(Via Observatório Bíblico.)

ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS (mostly fragments) have been recovered through a building project in an Egyptian monastery:

Ancient Manuscripts Found In Egyptian Monastery
Martin Bailey for The Art Newspaper (reprinted in Forbes)

A cache of manuscripts up to 1,500 years old has been discovered in a Coptic monastery in the Western Desert of Egypt. The find was made at Deir al-Surian, the Monastery of the Syrians, which already has one of the richest ancient libraries in Christendom. Set in the desert sands and virtually cut off from the outside world until recently, Deir al-Surian traces its roots back to the earliest period of Christian monasticism. Established in the 6th century, it was soon occupied by monks from Syria and Mesopotamia and is currently home to 200 Egyptian Copts.

[...]

A single completed manuscript and hundreds of fragments were found when reconstruction work was undertaken on the ancient tower, which is probably well over a millennium old. The library had originally been established there, since it was the most protected part of the monastery, but the first floor collapsed around five centuries ago, and a new wooden floor was simply inserted above. Recently the rubble of the earlier floor was removed during renovations, and curator Father Bigoul found a complete manuscript, embedded in a section of disused water pipe. (It is unclear if it was hidden there for safekeeping or got there by accident.) The parchment text has now been identified by Professor Lucas van Rompay of Duke University as a 9th-century Book of the Holy Hierothos.

A painstaking sifting of the rubble removed from the ancient tower also led to the discovery of around 600 fragments of early manuscripts. The earliest one identified, from around 500 A.D., is a single page from a hagiographical text, and this has now been linked with a manuscript in Russia. ...

It's not clear what other works might be contained in the fragments. The library itself is a treasure trove of Coptic, Arabic, Ethiopic, and Syriac manuscripts and the cataloguing and conserving of them has only just begun. Sounds like a likely place to find some Old Testament pseudepigrapha manuscripts. I hope so, anyway.

(Via Evangelical Textual Criticism.)

MORE ON THE DA VINCI CODE LAWSUIT, a story I noted briefly last October. The London Times has the latest in an article from yesterday:

The Times February 25, 2006

Author breaks code of silence
By Frances Gibb and Ben Hoyle
The reclusive writer of The Da Vinci Code is being forced to defend a copyright action that could scupper the release of a blockbuster film

THE fate of what is expected to be this year’s biggest film is hanging on the decision of a High Court judge.

The British release of The Da Vinci Code, due on May 19, could be delayed or even halted if a copyright claim by the authors of a non-fiction book, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, is upheld.

Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, who co-wrote the book 22 years ago, claim breach of copyright on the ground that the “architecture” or complex structure of their book — its essential theory — was plagiarised in Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code.

And next week the reclusive multimillionaire author will step out of the shadows into a courtroom. At stake is the vast fortune he has made from his worldwide cult hit and the millions more he will make from the eagerly awaited film.

Brown will be in London to defend his blend of conspiracy theory, sinister secret societies and thrilling adventure from the ground-breaking copyright claim whose significance could far outstrip its estimated £10 million worth.

He will be the key defence witness in an action brought against Random House, the parent publishers. The claim has the potential to set a precedent in copyright law, over the extent to which one author can draw on another’s ideas.

If the judge upholds the claim, Baigent and Leigh could seek an injunction preventing further infringement, affecting further sales of the book and delaying release of the film. Alternatively they could seek a share of profits.

[...]

Le me see if I have this straight. The author of a silly novel is being sued by the authors of a bogus "nonfiction" book because the author used their bogus ideas? It's true that rubbish writing is copyrighted, but rubbish ideas? I'm not a lawyer and I know even less about British copyright law that American, but I cannot see how this case can have any merit. Arrangements of words are copyrighted, but ideas (and one of Brown's characters even credits Baigent's and Leigh's book in the novel) are not. If you violate copyright when you cite someone else's work and use their ideas (but not their words) for your own work, then all scientists and scholars would be in trouble.

It would be interesting to hear Stephen Carlson's take on this one.

Interestingly, the print version of the article, which I have on my desk, adds a sentence that seems to have been deleted from the online version: "Cynics suggest that the claim has arisen from the book's huge success, which has also increased sales of The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail." The cynical viewpoint has a certain logic to it. If they're sure the free publicity will increase the sales of their worthless book, the authors may not care whether they will or lose the case.

UPDATE (27 February): Stephen Carlson replies on his blog Hypotyposeis and in a comment on The Busybody blog. He confirms that this lawsuit arises from a peculiarity in British copyright law.

Incidentally (cross-file under "It's a Small World"), Stephen mentions a similar (and unsuccessful) American lawsuit over the 1975 movie The Hindenburg. It happens that I was in that movie; I played the cabin boy. (I'm afraid that, although I did have a few spoken lines, I didn't make it onto the cast list, so you'll just have to trust me on this one. Or rent the movie and look for the kid calling "Cablegram for Mr. Edward Douglas.")

COPTIC GOSPEL OF JUDAS WATCH: The Tertullian Project website has a huge page on The Coptic Gospel of Judas (Iscariot). It collects lots of articles and has some photos and a copy of at least part of the Hedrick transcription and translation. There's a great deal of information there, not all of which is necessarily accurate. Keep in mind, for example, that it's now being claimed that some of Hedrick's pages are from a different text in the same codex.

(Via the Spero Forum weblog.)

THE DA VINCI CODE is "dissected" once again, this time by Mark Shea in an interview in Catholic Online. It's shooting at fish in a barrel, but unfortunately it's still necessary, especially with the movie coming out. And this is worth repeating:

His book is so laughably bad, its claims so easily and demonstrably false, the whole thing so silly, that debunking takes on a rather gleeful quality -- which is, I think, only fitting. The best cure for "The Da Vinci Code" is, in the end, hearty gales of well-informed laughter.

BOOK REVIEW:

Unlocking secrets of the past
By JEREMY WIMPFHEIMER (Jerusalem Post)

Jerusalem Talmud
Schottenstein Edition Talmud Yerushalmi - Tractate Berachos vol. 1
Mesorah Publications
$34.99

For centuries, folios of the Jerusalem Talmud languished in the backs of libraries acquiring dust and being opened only by leading rabbinic sages and Talmudic scholars. Mesorah Publications, whose English and Hebrew translations and elucidations of the Babylonian Talmud have been credited with enabling Talmud study among the masses, is now embarking on a similar effort for a more complex text - the Jerusalem Talmud.

[...]

Indeed, for Talmudists and students all over the world, one cannot overestimate the impact the Artscroll series has had upon Talmudic scholarship. The completion of the English elucidation of the Babylonian Talmud in 2005 resulted in more than 70,000 people around the world relying on Artscroll for their Talmud Study.

[...]

THE ADL HAS CHANGED ITS MIND:

ADL withdraws call for halting construction of J'lem museum
By Haaretz Service

The Anti-Defamation League has withdrawn its call for halting construction on the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem, saying the Wiesenthal Center was taking "adequate steps to deal respectfully" with Muslim graves discovered at the building site.

[...]

STEPHEN C. CARLSON is hot on the trail of another manuscript forgery. Go get 'em, Stephen!

THREE BOOKS ON KABBALAH are reviewed in the Times Literary Supplement:

Kabbala then and now
Jeremy Adler
Daniel C. Matt
THE ZOHAR
Pritzker edition
Volume One
500pp. 0 80474747 4.
Volume Two
496pp. 0 804 74868 3
Stanford University Press. $49.95 each; distributed in the UK by Eurospan. £29.95 each.
Arthur Green
A GUIDE TO THE ZOHAR
191pp. Stanford University Press. Paperback, $15.95.
0 8047 4908 6
Moshe Idel
KABBALAH AND EROS
371pp. Yale University Press. £25 (US $45).
0 300 10832 X

More than just a review, this is an essay on Kabbalah, its background, the history of modern scholarship on it, and the current state of the question. Merkavah mysticism and Hekhalot literature also get a mention:

This evocative, light-filled imagery and the vision of a heavenly throne in which it culminates gave rise to the most ancient form of Jewish mysticism, so-called merkabah or “throne” mysticism. The doctrine was apparently established by the period of the Second Temple, and the key documents concerning this journey of the soul stem from the period before the expansion of Islam: as in related traditions, upon performing sundry ascetic rites the mystic approaches the Divinity, in this case after a journey through His “seven Heavens” into the “seven palaces”, until he finally witnesses the manifestation of His glory on the “throne”. Unlike the literal truths in the Pentateuch, a text like Ezekiel that enshrines this mystery demands to be approached symbolically, a mode which could hardly differ more sharply from that required by the law. Thus, whereas the Talmudists interpret the Bible rationally, expounding the laws in a continuous dialectic by adducing other parts of the Bible as evidence, the mystics read the sacred Book the other way round: they begin with the visionary mode in Ezekiel and treat the earlier Books as symbolic. This enables them to search behind the literal truth.

This is basically right, although it's hard be sure exactly when the key documents took the form(s) that we have now. Some of the material clearly goes back at least to the fourth century, and many of the key ideas to the Second Temple period. But the texts continued to be heavily edited well into the Middle Ages and some of the material -- it's hard to say how much -- must be medieval. We're only in the early stages of understanding the history of the texts and their transmission. (I'm thinking about such matters a lot right now, since I'm writing the "Merkavah Mysticism" article for the New International Dictionary of the Bible. I also gave them the "Enoch, Third Book of" article earlier this month.)

Anyhow, this TLS piece is a very good brief introduction to Kabbalah. Read it all.

(Via the Agade list.)

A CONFERENCE ON COPTIC STUDIES near Sohag, Egypt, is covered by Jill Kamil in Al Ahram:

Desert fathers in the limelight
The Third Symposium on Coptic Studies that took place at the White Monastery of St Shenoude west of Sohag early this month cast light on the life and times of an extraordinary Upper Egyptian monk, says Jill Kamil

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS EXHIBITION IN CHARLOTTE is getting lots of good (and well done) press, especially from the Charlotte Observer. Here's another article on how much of an impression the exhibit made on the reporter:

You'll be moved by its magnificence

RICHARD MASCHAL
rmaschal@charlotteobserver.com

What got me was the inkwell.

I was in "The Dead Sea Scrolls" exhibit at Discovery Place but not yet at the Scroll Gallery, drinking in the artifacts, photographs and text panels interpreting these ancient biblical fragments, how they were discovered and what they mean.

And here was this pottery piece from Jerusalem, an inkwell. Like the scrolls, it is about 2,000 years old and similar to inkwells from Qumran, the Dead Sea community where the scrolls were found about 60 years ago.

A spark jumped between me and this small artifact. I could see evidence of the human hand -- the one that made its nicely curved handle and the one that used it to ink a reed pen and perhaps copy Holy Scripture.

[...]

MORE ON THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS CONCERT:

3:18 pm | Dead Sea Scrolls inspire 2 concerts (Charlotte Observer)

"Sing unto him a new song," Psalm 33 says. Carolina Voices will obey the biblical command by premiering two choral pieces by Charlotte composers in a tribute to the Dead Sea Scrolls. The concerts March 3 and 5 will focus on the Psalms -- one of the biblical books most represented in the scrolls, subject of a just-opened show at Discovery Place. ...

SPEAKING OF THE DA VINCI CODE, Catholic Online reports on "DaVinciOutreach.com" being "[l]aunched as the One-Stop Shop for Resources and Commentators Responding to Controversial Book and Movie Attacking the Catholic Faith." Fine, but the article has this odd comment:

“A simple Google search would have revealed to Academy Award-Winning director Ron Howard the myriad of factual errors in The Da Vinci Code. For example, the Dead Sea Scrolls are identified in the novel as Jewish documents, not Christian, and Brown cites the Vatican eleven centuries before it even existed,” said Matthew Pinto, president of Ascension Press, which is spearheading this outreach.

The general statement is true, but Mr. Pinto got his example backwards: the Dead Sea Scrolls are identified in the novel as Christian documents, whereas they are actually Jewish.

THE ISRAELI SUPREME COURT HAS RULED on the Museum of Tolerance and the Muslim Cemetery. The building has been halted but the archaeological work will continue. Evidently the Court has also appointed a mediator to work out a long-term resolution. Arutz Sheva has published a response from the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Excerpt:

The Simon Wiesenthal Center welcomes the decision of the Supreme Court of Israel to appoint former Chief Justice Meir Shamgar as the mediator for a 30-day period to help facilitate a resolution regarding the remains found on the construction site of the Center For Human Dignity - Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem.

INDIANA JONES 4 is now at the top of both Lucas's and Spielberg's to-do list. Here's a website for the film, but it doesn't have a great deal of information yet.

AN AGREEMENT HAS BEEN REACHED by a number of Mediterranean countries on standards for the protection of ancient mosaics:

ARCHAEOLOGY:MEDITERRANEAN COUNTRIES PAPER ON MOSAIC PROTECTION
(AGI) - Ragusa, Feb. 22 - Mediterranean countries have written a "paper" on the protection of ancient mosaics, which characterise a common cultural heritage. The document will be drawn up in Modica (Ragusa), where the international conference has begun this morning under the aegis of Unesco and will finish tomorrow. Delegations are present from Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, Israel, Jordan, Malta, France, Cyprus, and the Palestinian Authority and aims to reinforce cooperation in the field. ...

ALTERNATE HISTORY, The Da Vinci Code, the Muhammad cartoons, and caustic satire: David Aaronovich combines them all in an essay for the Times of London.

'Whoever insults the one true Church deserves to be killed.' (News report)

David Aaronovitch

“EUROPE MUST LEARN to live in and with the world, not to dominate it, nor to assume it is superior or more virtuous. Any continent that has inflicted such brutality on the world over a period of 200 years has not too much to be proud of, and much to be modest and humble about.” Martin Jacques, The Guardian, on the cartoons row.

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe . . .

From a Reuters report, Rome, some time around now

The Vatican has protested in “the strongest possible terms” against the publication in paperback of Dan Brown’s bestselling novel, The Da Vinci Code. Cardinal Loopi, of the Office of the Defence of the Faith, condemned the book for defaming Catholicism and, in its suggestion that Jesus Christ was married, of heresy. “We demand that the book be destroyed and that the author be punished,” said Loopi, “otherwise we cannot be held responsible for how Catholics throughout the world may react.”

And so on. I thought the funniest bit was the final paragraph:

And finally, the good news . . .

From hiding, somewhere in Pakistan, Dan Brown apologises to the Judaeo-Christian world for the publication of The Da Vinci Code, promises to donate the proceeds from all his books to any charity nominated for the purpose by Opus Dei and undertakes to become a monk in a silent order at a monastery atop a high mountain in the Apennines.

At least there's one journalist in Britain who has some guts.

MILESTONES IN BIBLICAL STUDIES: Stephen C. Carlson shows the importance of February 21st for the field.

MORE ON THE COPTIC GOSPEL OF JUDAS: Beliefnet has published the same article that appeared last week in the Winston-Salem Journal, but a longer version with more information about the current state of the manuscript's authentication. The extra part at the end reads:

James Robinson, a retired professor of Coptic studies at Claremont Graduate University and general editor of the English edition of the Nag Hammadi Library, vouched for the document's authenticity based on his experience in trying to purchase the codex as early as 1983.

"I don't know of any scholar who thinks this is fake," said Robinson, who is not involved in the National Geographic project.

Although Robinson has never seen the manuscript firsthand, he arranged a meeting in 1983 between Stephen Emmel, a Coptic scholar at the University of Muenster in Germany, and John Pedrios, a Greek dealer who was negotiating the sale of the manuscript.

In a report filed after the meeting, Emmel said he was able to authenticate the codex as a genuine fourth- or fifth-century manuscript. But he said the 30-minute meeting ran too short for him to detect whether it contained the gospel.

Reached by phone in Cairo, Emmel confirmed his report but declined to say whether the manuscript he saw decades ago is the forthcoming gospel.

"I can say that the thought never crossed my mind that it was anything but a genuine Coptic papyrus codex from the fourth or fifth century," he said.

So it seems that the manuscript was in circulation as early as 1983 and that at least one specialist got to examine the actual codex and concluded it was genuine. But I'd like to see a thorough authentication that goes beyond a 30-minute examination and which confirms all its contents.

DANIEL DRIVER has moved. His old blog, Figured Out, is no longer active, but it has been replaced with his new one, DRD Blog. Be sure to change your bookmark or RSS feed.

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS EXHIBITION in Charlotte has drawn a much larger crowd than was expected:

Learn more about Dead Sea Scrolls

(Charlotte Observer)

Tickets will be sold at the door tonight for a lecture on the Dead Sea Scrolls -- the sacred objects explored in the exhibit that drew 9,200 people to Discovery Place in its first three days.

[...]

That's double the 4,600 they were hoping for in those three days. I'm not surprised -- the Scrolls seem to generate endless public interest.

The article also notes that Shalom Paul of the Hebrew University will be lecturing in Charlotte on the Scrolls later today.

ANCHORS AWASH: Israel Today has an article on the ancient wooden anchors found recently in the Dead Sea:

Ancient Aweigh
The discovery of two well-preserved anchors on the receding shoreline of the Dead Sea is just the beginning of several archaeological possibilities, a main one being to find if a boat was once attached to either of them. “It is wishful thinking, but I hope to find what it was connected to,” Gideon Hadas, archaeologist and discoverer of the anchors, told israel today.

[...]

REHABILITATING JEZEBEL?

'The Jezebel Letters'

Monday, February 20, 2006 (The Register-Mail, IL)

MONMOUTH - Eleanor Ferris Beach, a lecturer in Monmouth College's department of philosophy and religious studies, has written a book on Jezebel, the much-maligned Israelite queen.

Beach's "The Jezebel Letters" combines her biblical scholarship with a fictionalized first-person account of the biblical character. In the process, she transforms the stereotype of the conniving Jezebel into a more historically-based portrayal of a powerful, literate woman.

[...]