TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: No news is good news.

Calm Prevails at Holy Site in Jerusalem

By ISABEL KERSHNER (NYT)
Published: February 17, 2007

JERUSALEM, Feb. 16 — Despite calls by Muslim religious figures for mass protests over Israel’s excavations near a site holy to Islam and Judaism, Jerusalem’s Old City was largely calm on Friday during and after noon prayers at Al Aksa Mosque.

The area immediately around the mosque was tense and eerily quiet. Dozens of Israeli police officers in riot gear stood on alert along a temporary wooden footbridge leading up to the mosque, which sits on the ancient man-made plateau known as the Noble Sanctuary to Muslims and the Temple Mount to Jews. After Friday Prayer last week, hundreds of police officers entered the religious compound and clashed with rioters who threw stones.

[...]

UPDATE: But the propaganda conflict continues. The ADL has a roundup of comments and cartoons from the Islamic world. The second cartoon portrays Israeli archaeologists as snakes eating at the foundations of al-Haram al-Sharif, and the third appears to portray them as a dalek.

I thought we didn't like inflammatory cartoons.

UPDATE: A few days ago the Jerusalem Post published a long Q&A session with archaeologist Eilat Mazar. It's very interesting and you should read it all.

Q&A on the Temple Mount with Dr. Eilat Mazar

Renowned archeologist Dr. Eilat Mazar of the Hebrew University and the Shalem Center answers readers' questions about the Mughrabi Gate dispute and the status of the Temple Mount in recent years. Of the hundreds of questions received, here are 20 which encompass the major issues at hand.

I'll just comment on two excerpts:

Saul Mishaan, Brooklyn, New York: I know that digging on the Temple Mount is a non-starter, but is there any research involving the use of aerial infrared photography or sonar to assist in determining the layout of the Second Temple compound?

Dr. Mazar: I know that research using these methods had been conducted from outside of the compound in order to trace hollow spaces. There were very interesting results, such as the finding that the ancient walls of the compound are very thick, and that behind them are many massive underground halls.

I didn't know this. It sounds important. I hope that as technology improves, more use of non-intrusive methods like this can fill out our knowledge of what is inside the Temple Mount.

Mary Ellen Marks Highland Lakes: Is it true that the Ark of the Covenant is buried under the mount?

Dr. Mazar: There is a very high probability that the most important ancient remains are inside the compound in the massive underground halls. This includes the Ark of the Covenant.

This is amazing, so much so that I wonder if Dr. Mazar has been misunderstood or misquoted. It is fantastically unlikely that the Ark of the Covenant is still buried under the Temple Mount. The Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar would have carted off all the major loot, and any artifacts of serious value left over would have been removed during the fifty years or so that the site lay in rubble during the exile. Anything that was missed would have been found and removed during the Herodian reconstruction of the Second Temple, which involved the rebuilding of the whole site. I'm sure there are lots of very interesting things still buried on the Temple Mount (interesting to archaeologists and historians), but the Ark of the Covenant is not one of them.

WHATEVER YOU THINK OF THE CANAANITES, there's this to be said for them:

Andresky: Muscat love: Ancient grape's ancestors can be found all over the world

(Northwest Herald)

Muscat is a grape that's hard to describe.

Almost every great wine region in the world has some of its vines. Surprisingly, it makes a wine that actually tastes like ripe grapes. Its musk-like smell is the root of part of its name, and most table raisins come from its vine. More than 250 variations of muscat exist today.

Muscat is an ancient grapevine. Many molecular archeologists consider it to be the progenitor to all domestic grapes. The bridge between wild grapes and domesticated ones can be roughly calculated to somewhere between 1000 to 800 B.C.

Back then, Phoenicians lived along the Mediterranean Sea in what is now Lebanon, Syria and Israel. As sea-farers, Phoenicians carried wine to many points past Gibraltar, such as Cornwall and the west coast of Africa. The Phoenicians and their ancestors, the Canaanites, were responsible for transmitting the alphabet, arts and a wine culture. Their wine was known as "grape of the bees." It had a peculiar musk aroma and was believed to be muscat.

[...]

ANOTHER METZGER OBITUARY: a brief one from the UPI.

UPDATE: And another, longer one from the LA Times:

Bruce Manning Metzger, 93; New Testament scholar helped edit, update Bible translations
By Mary Rourke, Times Staff Writer
February 16, 2007

Bruce Manning Metzger, a New Testament scholar and biblical translator who helped to edit several modern translations of the Bible, died Tuesday at the University Medical Center at Princeton, N.J. He was 93.

The cause was respiratory failure, his son John said Thursday.

Starting in the mid-1970s, Metzger served as chairman of a committee of about.Bible that is now used in a number of seminaries and schools of theology.

The translation, published in 1990, eliminated such archaic words as "thee" and "thou" and adjusted references to "man" where both men and women were indicated. The result was closer to current English usage than the older Revised Standard Version of the Bible, published in 1952.

[...]

Some of the adjustments aimed at preventing confusion with popular slang.

A line in Psalm 50 was changed from "I will accept no bull from your house" to "I will not accept a bull from your house."

Another line, in the second letter of Paul to the Corinthians, previously read, "Once I was stoned." Metzger's committee changed it to "Once I received a stoning."

Metzger's knowledge of ancient languages, including Ethiopic, Coptic and Aramaic as well as Greek and Hebrew, all of which are used in scripture studies, made him particularly valuable to the committee.

[...]

A TEMPLE MOUNT WEBCAM? Yep.

It's a good idea, but the setup doesn't seem to work for Apple systems. At least my iMac can't seem to access it. Typically, the A.P. article doesn't give the link, but this seems to be it.

UPDATE: The Boston Globe has an article that does include the URL correctly at the very end (plus with a botched link in the body of the article).

ARCHAEOLOGIST NELSON GLUECK died 37 years ago this week. David Hyman posts a tribute in the Jewish Standard. Excerpt:

I knew quite a lot about his archeological work and books before reading his biography, but I was astonished to learn about Glueck’s other side, the one I am afraid many Israelis are unaware of, that of leading America’s Reform movement .

Glueck was born and raised in Cincinnati. He studied and was ordained in America’s only Hebrew Union College in those days, in 1923. He then earned his doctrate in biblical theology from the University of Jena in Germany in 1927. He settled in Jerusalem immediately after his graduation. His first years in Jerusalem were enhanced by teaching at Albright’s American School of Oriental Studies. As a professor at this institute, Glueck traveled the Middle East on surveys and also participated in some major archeological excavations. After marrying Helen Iglauer in 1931 Glueck returned to Jerusalem, where he succeeded Albright as head of the American school. He dedicated the next two decades to Middle East research. This is when his world-famous achievements of excavating Tel El Chalif, exploring Transjordan, and surveying the Negev took place. His work and books granted him international fame and he established a reputation as one of the world’s leading biblical archeologists.

In 1947, Glueck was recalled to America to lead Hebrew Union College. He held this position until 1971. During these 25 years, Glueck led the college to many great achievements. He oversaw the merger with the New York-based Jewish Institute of Religion and expanded the Cincinnati-based institution to include schools in New York and Los Angeles. In Jerusalem, he founded and nurtured the School of Biblical and Archeological Studies (now known as the Jerusalem Hebrew Union College, on King David Street).

THE KABBALAH AND THE BIG BANG?

Jewish group demands apology from Georgia lawmaker

By GREG BLUESTEIN
Associated Press Writer

ATLANTA - A Jewish organization is demanding an apology from a Georgia legislator after a memo using his name claims that evolution was a myth propagated by an ancient Jewish sect.

The Anti-Defamation League sent a letter to state Rep. Ben Bridges Thursday chastising him for penning the "highly offensive" memo, which attributes the Big Bang theory to writings in the Kabbalah, a Jewish text.

Bridges has denied writing the dispatch, although one of his closest political allies, Marshall Hall, said the legislator gave him the approval to draft the memo.

[...]

I'm not sure that accusing the Kabbalah of being the source of cosmological theory is anti-Semitism: it's kind of a backhanded compliment, although that website certainly doesn't present it that way. In any case it is silly. I think it's better just to laugh at these people, not demand an apology.

"Indisputable evidence - long hidden but now available to everyone - demonstrates conclusively that so-called 'secular evolution science' is the Big Bang, 15-billion-year, alternate 'creation scenario' of the Pharisee Religion," the memo said. "This scenario is derived concept-for-concept from Rabbinic writings in the mystic 'holy book' Kabbala dating back at least two millennia."

Lots of errors here. Kabbalah is a general term for a huge corpus of mystical literature, the best know of which is the Zohar. The Pharisees were long gone by the time of the Kabbalah. Most of the Kabbalistic texts are from the twelfth-thirteen centuries C.E. or later, although Sefer Yetsirah is somewhat earlier and perhaps even from late antiquity. But the author of this quote seems to be taking the Zoharic claim of authorship in the second century CE at face value. Plus, of course, the Kabbalists, whatever their spiritual contribution, did not discover the Big Bang.

UPDATE (18 February): More here

A TARGUM SPURION is noted by Ed Cook at Ralph the Sacred River and a possible new Jesus apocryphon is noted by Tony Chartrand-Burke at Apocryphicity.

THE MANDAEAN EMERGENCY CAMPAIGN is highlighted by April DeConick on the Forbidden Gospels blog.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:

Discovery of mosaic halts work at Jerusalem walkway
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem (The Independent)
Published: 15 February 2007

The planned walkway at the centre of the furious dispute over Jerusalem's holiest site could be further delayed by the discovery of a Byzantine mosaic.

The geometric patterned fragment was exposed by archaeological workers yesterday at the bottom of an underground shaft where one of the walkway pillars is intended to go, as The Independent examined excavation work in the area.

"We have a real time discovery," reported Gideon Avni, director of excavations and surveys at the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Dr Avni said further excavations would now be needed to see whether the mosaic, probably from the fifth or sixth century AD, was part of a larger decorated room or house. He said it was too early to say whether the pillar would have to be moved. If the fragment turned out not to extend further, it could possibly be extracted and exhibited.

The discovery was the latest in a series of twists in the conflict over access through the Mugrabi Gate to the compound sacred to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif - noble sanctuary.

[...]

(Heads-up, David Stacey.)

BRUCE METZGER, requiescat in pace.

UPDATE: There is an obituary by Iain Torrance posted on the Hugoye list, one from the A.P (noted by Bob Kraft on the PSCO list), one in The Trentonian, and two from Christianity Today (here and, by Ben Witherington, here).

MORE ON THE BOOK OF NAMES: Karen Tintori and Jill Gregory ran across PaleoJudaica and have e-mailed the following:

We were researching current info on the Temple Mount on your site when we stumbled across the comments about THE BOOK OF NAMES. How fun!

We are the authors (and Jewish) and enjoyed reading the comments on your blog.

All of the Jewish content in the book is based on fact, and the manuscript was vetted by two rabbis to ensure accuracy. The gemstones on the High Priest's breastplate come directly from the Torah and the similarities between Kaballah [Kabbalah] and Tarot are also true.

The legend of the Lamed Vovniks indeed comes from the section of the Talmud Stephen Goranson mentions in his reply to your blog entry. Lamed Vovniks is the Yiddish term for the Tzadikim Nistarim, which is the Hebrew name for these 36 righteous souls of every generation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamed_Vav_Tzadikim)

The Gnoseos are indeed fictional -- we created them as an offshoot of the ancient Gnostics, since Gnosticism parallels Kaballah in some ways.

We loved researching this book and spent two years writing and researching it -- and a dozen years before that trying to figure out a way to identify the Lamed Vovniks, because their identities are known only to God, not even to themselves.

We are currently researching our next thriller for St. Martin's, which involves the Temple Mount.

Watch out Dan Brown.

TODD BOLEN has various thoughts on the Jerusalem Ramp and more.

JEWISH-TEMPLE DENIAL WATCH: Someone named Linda S. Heard, who is billed as "a British specialist writer on Middle East affairs," writes the following in an article entitled "Digging up religious hatreds" in Online Journal.com:

Why all the fuss about a bridge you might wonder. In truth, there is much more at issue. At the heart of the matter is Israel's belief that Solomon's Temple, destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, once stood in the same place as the Al Haram Al Sharif, known to the Jews as "The Temple Mount." The Romans were later to destroy the second Jewish Temple, built on the same spot.

Religious Jews dream of the day the temple will be rebuilt and the Sanhedrin, an assembly of Jewish judges, reconstituted.

Messianic Evangelical Christians also want the temple to be rebuilt as they believe this is a prerequisite to the �second coming� of Jesus.

In the absence of proof in the form of artifacts, Muslims refute any assertion that the Al Haram Al Sharif was built on the place where the Jewish temples once stood. In the late '80s, Jewish claims were bolstered by a tiny ivory carved pomegranate alleged to have originated from Solomon's Temple, but the museum where it was on display eventually admitted it was a fake.

Muslim suspicions that the Israeli government is using the new walkway as a pretext to dig for artifacts to support its contention are, therefore, understandable, as are their fears that Israel�s long-term goal is to demolish Muslim holy sites to make way for a new temple.

Ms. Heard has been listening to too much Palestinian propaganda. There is artifactual evidence for the Herodian Temple (notably, the Temple Mount platform itself, along epigraphic evidence) and the Second Temple is mentioned in contemporary texts. (See here for a review of the evidence for the Second and Herodian Temples.) The case for the First Temple is inferential and it is correct that no artifacts from it survive and that the inscription on the Ivory Pomegranate is a forgery, but nonetheless the evidence for the Temple's existence is compelling. (See comments here and here.) Regular readers will doubtless be sick of hearing about this, but I think it is important to answer these baseless statements whenever they turn up. Ms. Heard's piece confirms that this false propaganda, which unfortunately is widespread in the Islamic world, is spreading to the West.

UPDATE: More of the same from the same publication. An article by Nicola Nasser (" veteran Arab journalist based in Ramallah, West Bank of the Israeli-occupied territories") has the following:

Al-buraq is the Arab-Islamic name of Al Aqsa compound's western wall, which the Jews called the "Wailing Wall" before changing it to the "Western Wall (of the Temple Mount, a widely-spread claim that has yet to be vindicated by historical fact or archeological findings) after the creation of Israel in 1948.

The same piece appears in Aljazeerah.info, although the wording of this passage is slightly different.

WELL, I GUESS SHE HAD A GREAT PERSONALITY.

(Happy Valentine's Day.)

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH -- the National Geographic Society has a roundup:

Violence Sparked by Archaeological Projects in Jerusalem
Mati Milstein in Jerusalem
for National Geographic News
February 12, 2007

Archaeological excavations have incited violence at a Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews, Arabs, and Christians—the man-made plateau known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews and Christians as the Temple Mount.

But two other, more obscure archaeological projects have the potential to fan the flames even further.

[...]

UPDATE: Plus, an Egyptian MP carries the controversy to a new low:

Egypt MP says only n-bomb can stop Israeli digging

By Abdel-Sattar Hatita
REUTERS

11:30 a.m. February 12, 2007

CAIRO – Israeli excavations near Islam's third holiest shrine in Jerusalem sparked angry reactions on Monday from Egyptian parliament members, including one who said only a nuclear bomb would halt the Jewish state's activities.

The excavations, which Israel says aim to salvage artefacts before construction of a pedestrian bridge leading to the complex also sacred to Jews, have angered many Muslims who fear the work will harm the foundations of al-Aqsa mosque. Israel says the holy places will not be harmed.

'That cursed Israel is trying to destroy al-Aqsa mosque,' Mohamed el-Katatny of President Hosni Mubarak's National Democratic Party (NDP) told a heated parliament session held to discuss the Israeli digging.

'Nothing will work with Israel except for a nuclear bomb that wipes it out of existence,' he said.

[...]

Yep, that'll sure keep that mosque safe.

THE MANDAEANS, who have been mentioned often on PaleoJudaica (see especially here, here, here, here, and here), get some well-deserved attention from April DeConick and Stephen Carlson.

UPDATE (13 February): Bad link fixed.

IN THE MAIL:

Michael Sokoloff, A Dictionary of Jewish Babylonian Aramaic of the Talmudic and Geonic Periods (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 2002)

I ordered this at the SBL meetings in Washington D.C. last November at an obscene discount, and it finally arrived today by surface mail.

THE APOTHEOSIS OF THE LUBAVITCHER REBBE: For some of his followers, Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson is not just the Messiah, he's God incarnate.

The Lubavitcher Rebbe as a god
By Saul Sadka (Haaretz

"Joy to the world the Lord has come."

This misquote from Isaac Watts, along with a link to a Chabad Web site, appears on a billboard. Not a real billboard, but a Photoshopped one that appears on the Web site of a Chabad activist in the U.S.

Rabbi Ariel Sokolovsky is a Moldova-born Chabad rabbi in Portland, Oregon, and a more amiable soul would be hard to find.

Yet Sokolovsky maintains a blog he entitled "Rebbegod" and refers to Schneerson as "Rebbe-Almighty" among other adulatory sobriquets.

Drawing on rabbinical sources, he attempts to show that this is not as revolutionary as it sounds. He concedes that there are few people like him who will openly call the Rebbe God. He claims, however, that many people believe it, but do not say so openly for fear of scaring people away from Chabad altogether.

"The Rebbe and God are not the same thing exactly, but I do not object to people thinking that they are the same thing."

He recounts an incident in which he confronted his teacher - a senior Chabad rabbi from the former USSR - as to why he would not openly declare the Rebbe to be God. According to Sokolowsky, the senior rabbi jokingly warned him: "there can be many gods but only one Moshiach."

[...]

[The following are questions asked of students in Safed.]

How do they view the connection between Schneerson and God? "The Rebbe is not something different from God - the Rebbe is a part of God," says a British teenaged student.

Does this not 'idolize' Schneerson, in the literal sense? "We cannot connect to God directly - we need the Rebbe to take our prayers from here to there and to help us in this world. We are told by our rabbis that a great man is like God and the Rebbe was the greatest man ever. That is how we know he is the messiah, because how could life continue without him? No existence is possible without the Rebbe."

Would they go so far as to describe the Rebbe and God as one and the same, as some extreme Messianists have done? "No, some people have gone too far and described the Rebbe as the creator.

"They say that God was born in 1902 and is now 105 years old. You can pray to the Rebbe and he will answer, and he was around since the beginning of time. But you must be careful to pray only to the Rebbe as a spiritual entity and not the body that was born in 1902."

Does the Rebbe have a will of his own? What if the Rebbe and God disagree? "That is a ridiculous question! They are not separate in any way."

So the Rebbe is a part of God. "Yes, but it is more complex than that. There is no clear place where the Rebbe ends and God begins."

Does that mean the Rebbe is infinite omnipotent and omniscient? "Yes of course," an Argentine student says in Hebrew. "God chose to imbue this world with life through a body. So that's how we know the Rebbe can't have died, and that his actual physical body must be alive. The Rebbe is the conjunction of God and human. The Rebbe is God, but he is also physical."

[...]

For more on the movement see here and just keep following the links back.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:

Jerusalem mayor orders new walkway plans
2/12/2007, 12:24 a.m. CT
By MATTI FRIEDMAN
The Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) — The Jerusalem municipality will submit new plans for a walkway leading to a disputed holy compound, a City Hall spokesman said Monday, but work was scheduled to continue at the site.

The plans for the new walkway up to the compound known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount already were approved by City Hall, but Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski now will demand a longer and more transparent planning process that will allow residents to see the plans and submit protests, spokesman Gidi Schmerling said.

Tensions in the city have been high since last week, when Israel began work outside the compound. The new walkway is meant to replace an ancient earthen ramp that partially collapsed in a snowstorm three years ago.

Israel says the work, about 60 yards from the compound, will not hurt Muslim holy sites but the project has drawn fierce protests from Palestinians and Arab countries.

The new City Hall decision will have no effect on the work currently under way at the site, where archaeologists are carrying out an exploratory dig to ensure that no important remains are damaged when the walkway is built.

But Schmerling said it could delay construction, which was set to begin in about six months' time. The new walkway was originally expected to be completed within a year.

[...]

On Sunday, the Cabinet voted overwhelmingly to push ahead with the work. There were no objections to the decision, the government said in a statement, though three ministers abstained.

[...]

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:

Calm Prevails in Jerusalem on Day After Excavation Clashes

By STEVEN ERLANGER (New York Times)
Published: February 11, 2007

JERUSALEM, Feb. 10 — A few stone-throwing incidents occurred Saturday, but Jerusalem streets were largely quiet a day after the police clashed with Palestinians protesting Israeli construction work near the religious compound known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount.

Some tires were burned and rocks thrown at police officers in east Jerusalem, an area largely populated by Arabs, and some rocks were thrown at a bus full of Canadian tourists near the Mount of Olives, said a Jerusalem police spokesman, Inspector Micky Rosenfeld. “No one was injured, and as far as we are concerned, things are relatively calm and quiet,” Inspector Rosenfeld said. The police presence, he said, was down from 2,000 officers on Friday.

In Bethlehem, some 30 Palestinians were arrested Saturday after brief clashes with Israeli troops near Rachel’s Tomb, the police said.

[...]

“Whoever needed to be informed was informed,” Inspector Rosenfeld said. “Both security and Muslim leaders, the Waqf and Israeli Arabs leaders knew exactly what will take place and when.”

[...]

This in contrast to the claims that the Waqf had not been informed. The construction was suspended yesterday for the Sabbath, but is scheduled to continue today.

Also, Haaretz has a good editorial ("Digs, lies and the Mugrabi bridge") by Nadav Shragai connecting the current disturbances with the larger issue of Muslim Jewish-Temple denial, which PaleoJudaica has been covering for years. Excerpts (but read it all):

Still, one good thing did happen. The Mugrabi bridge plan exposes the great Muslim denial - the denial of the Jewish bond to Jerusalem, the Temple Mount and the Temple. Dr. Yitzhak Reiter described the whole story in his study, From Jerusalem to Mecca and Back - a must for anyone wishing to understand the roots of Muslim behavior, even in the Mugrabi bridge affair - but his work remained, regrettably, an academic study, failing to prompt an appropriate public relations campaign on Israel's part. Now the public is receiving another demonstration.

Who among us knows, for example, that the al-Aqsa Mosque, which according to contemporary studies was built some 1,400 years ago, is now claimed to have been built at the time of the world's creation, during the days of Adam or Abraham? And who is aware of the fact that increasing numbers of Muslim academics and religious leaders claim it existed even before Jesus and Moses and that Islam preceded Judaism in Jerusalem?

Today, thousands of Islamic rulings, publications and sources deny the Jewish roots in Jerusalem and its holy places. They claim that the Temple didn't even exist in Jerusalem but was located in Nablus or Yemen. An Islamic legal pronouncement (fatwa) on the Jerusalem Waqf (Muslim religious trust) Web site says King Solomon and King Herod did not build the Temple at all, but merely refurbished an existing structure that had been there from the days of Adam. Today, many Muslims call the Temple "the greatest fraud crime in history" and many Muslim adjudicators attach the world "so-called" to the word "temple."

[...]

It is therefore easy to understand why the Muslims are so afraid of archaeological digs, not only on the Temple Mount itself but also around it, although these digs also shed light on Jerusalem's Muslim history. Muslims fear these excavations, not because they physically endanger al-Aqsa's foundations, but because they undermine the tissue of lies proclaiming that the Jews have no valid historical roots in the city and its holy sites.

That is a very good point that needs to be made over and over again. (For the evidence for the existence of the First and Second Judean/Jewish Temples on the Temple Mount, see here and here.)

I find that analysis more persuasive than Uri Avnery's in Media Monitor's Network ("The Method in the Madness")

The Israeli government argues that the bridge is separate from the Temple Mount. The Muslims insist that the bridge is a part of it. Behind this tussle, there is a lurking Arab suspicion that the installation of the new bridge is just a cover for something else happening below the surface.

At the 2000 Camp David conference, the Israeli side made a weird-sounding proposal: to leave the area itself to the Muslims, but with Israeli sovereignty over everything beneath the surface. That reinforced the Muslim belief that the Israelis intended to dig beneath the Mount, in order to discover traces of the Jewish Temple that was destroyed by the Romans 1936 years ago. Some believed that the real intention was to cause the Islamic shrines to collapse, so a new Temple could be built in their place.

These suspicions are nurtured by the fact that most Israeli archaeologists have always been the loyal foot-soldiers of the official propaganda. Since the emergence of modern Zionism, they have been engaged in a desperate endeavor to "find" archaeological evidence for the historical truth of the stories of the Old Testament. Until now, they have gone empty-handed: there exists no archaeological proof for the exodus from Egypt, the conquest of Canaan and the kingdoms of Saul, David and Solomon. But in their eagerness to prove the unprovable (because in the opinion of the vast majority of archaeologists and historians outside Israel - and also some in Israel - the Old Testament stories are but sacred myths), the archaeologists have destroyed many strata of other periods.

But that is not the most important side of the present affair. One can argue to the end of days about the responsibility for the Mugrabi walkway or what it might be that the archaeologists are looking for. But it is impossible to doubt that this is a provocation: it was carried out like a surprise military operation, without consultation with the other side.

The accusation that Israeli archaeologists "have destroyed many strata of other periods" is bizarre. Archaeological excavation involves the "destruction" of the excavated parts of the site, which is why it is always accompanied by careful documentation of any strata excavated. This is elementary.

Enough for now.

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS EXHIBITION at Union Station in Kansas City opened last Thursday.

UPDATE: Also, some Dead Sea Scroll replicas are on display in Kirtland, Ohio.

MAKE FRIENDS FOR YOURSELVES OF THE MAMMON OF UNRIGHTEOUSNESS ...

Student wins iMac computer in spelling bee
By: Jacob Fullmer

USU's [Utah State University's] annual spelling bee was held Tuesday in the TSC Sunburst Lounge. The two finalists were Jordan Brimley and Tyler Pack.
USU's annual spelling bee was held Tuesday in the TSC Sunburst Lounge. The two finalists were Jordan Brimley and Tyler Pack.

You have the right to repeat the word. You have the right to hear the definition. Anything you spell can and will be used against you in this spelling bee.

Participants in this year's spelling bee were read their "spelling rights" and challenged by some of the English language's hardest tongue twisters and rule breakers.

[...]

A few students with backgrounds in ancient languages were expected to perform well. But some participants expressed frustration with the words they received. In the final round, some spellers received "mammonistic," a word with Aramaic origins, while others received "monopsony," deriving from Greek.

[...]

My emphasis

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: Here are some of the latest reports and editorials on the Mugrabi Gate-bridge excavation.

From the Chicago Tribune, widely reprinted:

Excavations incite clash between Israeli police, Palestinians

By Joel Greenberg

Chicago Tribune

(MCT)

JERUSALEM - Israeli riot police hurling stun grenades fought crowds of stone-throwing Palestinians outside Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third-holiest shrine, Friday in a clash triggered by Israeli excavations near the site that have drawn sharp condemnations across the Arab world.

The confrontation after Friday prayers, beamed live across the Middle East by satellite news channels, ended with no serious injuries, but it raised concerns that the protests could spread to the West Bank and Gaza Strip and inflame religious passions throughout the region.

The Israeli excavation, in preparation for construction of a new approach ramp for visitors to the hilltop compound known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount, has become the latest flashpoint of the struggle for the contested area - ground zero of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

[...]

King Abdullah of Jordan and archaeologist Meir Ben Dov are protesting too:

Abdullah decries Temple Mount action
By JPOST STAFF, JOSHUA BRANNON, AND NEWS AGENCIES

Jordan's King Abdullah II on Friday condemned what he called Israel's "violations" against protestors at Jerusalem's Temple Mount compound, and warned such practices would only enhance violence and place "obstacles" in the path of peace.

"Jordan will push ahead with Arab and Islamic contacts as well as on the international level to ensure that Israel halts such deeds, which only lead to the expansion of the violence cycle and places obstacles versus efforts aimed at re-launching the peace process," Abdullah told Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in a telephone conversation, a royal court statement said.

"The King expressed concerns over the dangerous Israeli escalation against the Islamic holy places and rejected all pretexts cited by Israel as a cover-up for its violations of al-Aksa Mosque," it added.

[...]

Meanwhile, in an interview with Israel Radio on Friday morning, archaeologist Meir Ben Dov, who headed previous excavation work at the Temple Mount site, said there was no need for the renovations to be carried out at the Mughrabi Gate and that the planned bridge was not required.

Ben Dov added that the excavations near the Temple Mount were illegal and that Israel had not received the required permits.

[...]

From U.P.I:

Analysis: Temple Mount clashes, again
By JOSHUA BRILLIANT
UPI Correspondent

JERUSALEM, Feb. 9 (UPI) -- Clashes at one of the world's holiest sites between stone-throwing Muslim demonstrators and Israeli policemen in heavy riot gear Friday ended with 30 injuries and fears it could be a harbinger of something far worse.

Most of the fighting was on a plaza the Jews call the Temple Mount, their holiest site, and the Muslims al-Aqsa, their third holiest site.

The dispute was over excavations the Israelis launched along a ramp leading to the plaza's southwestern Moors' Gate. Part of that ramp collapsed following an earthquake and snowstorms in 2004. The Israelis built a wooden bridge nearby and sought to replace it with something sturdier.

They launched "salvage excavations," an archaeological procedure designed "to prevent and minimize damage which could be caused to ancient remains as a result of the construction," the Israel Antiquities Authority said. These excavations will not extend to the Temple Mount's wall, the authority's spokeswoman Osnat Gouez said.

The Waqf that manages the al-Aqsa compound protested the excavations and Muslims repeated charges that Israel was threatening their mosques.

"No one moves a stone here without a political consideration," argued Arab Knesset Member Talab al-Sana. "The conspiracies regarding al-Aqsa have not ceased" and, "of course" Israel was digging under the mosques.

[...]

From Israel Insider:

Witness a big lie in the making!
By Moshe Kempinski February 9, 2007

If you follow the news carefully over the next couple of weeks you will be able to witness the careful and delicate work of creating a false new "reality". What began as an attempt to rebuild a damaged ramp leading to the Mughrabi gate has escalated into an international incident. The work is proceeding near a temporary walkway that replaces a centuries-old stairway which collapsed during storms in 2004. The Israeli authorities have explained that the renovations are needed to safeguard the ancient site and have told all the critics that there will be no structural damage to the ancient site or to the Temple Mount beside it.

Yet those facts will not deter the forces in the Arab world that are trying to diffuse and end the inter Palestinian warfare. ...

From Time Magazine:

Raiders of the Temple Mount
Friday, Feb. 09, 2007 By TIM MCGIRK/JERUSALEM

Amid the old city of Jerusalem and rising above it is the ancient site of Solomon's Temple and the point from which the Prophet Mohammed journeyed to Heaven. Holy to Jews and Muslims, it is as dangerous these days as a ticking atom bomb. Any readjustment of its ancient stones can detonate outrage among millions of faithful around the world. On Friday, Muslims in Jerusalem protested against Israeli excavation work next to al-Aqsa, one of Islam's holiest shrines, which sits atop the site. Around the world, Muslims declared a universal "day of anger," Israeli police stormed into the Muslim compound and fired stun grenades and rubber bullets at youths trying to hurl stones at Jewish worshippers at the Western Wall. Israeli police claim that 17 protesters and 15 police officers were injured in the clashes, but Palestinians say many more were hurt in skirmishes around the mosque grounds.

[...]

Muslims also say that the excavations will also be destroying chunks of their religious heritage, but Israeli archeologists and Palestinian workers on the site are clearing away every stone and pottery fragment with the precision of surgeons. Not that it matters. Throughout the Muslim world, the Israeli excavations adjacent to al-Aqsa are being portrayed as sacrilege, as another blow by Israel and, indirectly, by its ally America, against Islam. For the last three days, the story has topped headlines and news broadcasts throughout the Muslim world.

[...]

All this hostility could have been avoided, say Israeli experts, if the authorities had first sought clearance from the Waqf, the Islamic board which governs the al-Aqsa mosque. ...

Other articles are pouring in faster than I can keep track of them, but this should give you the general idea.

ADOLFO ROITMAN is lecturing in Florida:

Dead Sea Scrolls curator to speak of historic find

By MICHELLE JONES, [St. Petersburg] Times Staff Writer
Published February 10, 2007

TARPON SPRINGS

I* 1947 one of the most significant discoveries of the 20th century was made by three Bedouin boys playing in the caves above the Dead Sea in Israel. During their explorations they discovered a treasure, scrolls, dating from before A.D. 100.

Adolfo Roitman, curator of the Dead Sea Scrolls and director of Jerusalem's Israel Museum Shrine of the Book, will lecture locally on the religious significance of these scrolls to both Judaism and Christianity.

[...]

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:

Palestinian protesters storm key Jerusalem mosque

Times Online and agencies in Jerusalem

Clashes erupted today at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque compound - the Holy Land’s most contested religious site - between Palestinian stone throwers and Israeli police who fired off stun grenades.

Police officers and rioters were wounded, a police spokesman said, in troubles that flared after Muslim leaders called for a “day of anger” to protest against Israeli public works that they charge endangers the holy site.

Explosions from stun grenades, bursts of smoke and shouting could be heard at the esplanade of the compound, which is venerated by Muslims as the third holiest site in Islam, and by Jews as the Temple Mount. Reports suggested that as many as 300 protesters had holed up in the mosque.

[...]

Also, this BBC article has a diagram of the area (scroll down).

UPDATE: I just don't have the time and energy right now to keep track fully of developments in this situation. But here are two evaluative pieces noted by Joseph Lauer. The Jerusalem Post has an editorial entitled "Intimidation tactics". Excerpts:

What is Israel doing that has sparked such violent threats? Some years ago, the pedestrian ramp leading up to Jerusalem's Temple Mount fell apart. Now municipal authorities plan to build a permanent ramp to maintain access to this holy site, and are conducting, as required by law, an archeological salvage dig to make sure no artifacts are destroyed in the process.

All of this is completely outside the Temple Mount platform, and bears no relation or threat to that structure, let alone to the Aksa mosque. Why would Israel dream of undermining the Temple Mount, which is Judaism's holiest site? The claim that Israel is doing so is patently absurd, as anyone familiar with the area can immediately see.

So how can the Muslim world be awash in violent threats based on an entirely fabricated pretext? Must there not be something to it?

The answer is that Muslim indignation is taken as self-justifying, and the more violent it is, the more the Western victims of it tend to question themselves.

[...]

Radical Islamist intimidation tactics will continue to multiply if the West, including Israel, does not show minimal respect for itself and the truth. Western condemnation of extremist threats should be swift, universal, and unequivocal. This time the victim happens to be Israel; next time it could be anywhere else.

The second is a backgrounder by Paul Reynolds from the BBC: "In Jerusalem archaeology is politics." Excerpt:

An independent observer, Father Jerome Murphy-O'Connor, from the French institute the Ecole Biblique in East Jerusalem, said that the work was "completely routine".

"This work is not inside the Haram. It is outside, leading to the Moors' Gate. The earth ramp fell down and has to be replaced," Father Murphy-O'Connor, author of an Oxford University guide "The Holy Land", told me.

"I do not know why the Palestinians have chosen to make an issue out of this. It is a recognised Jewish area under the arrangements that prevail in the Old City.

"One can contrast this to the extensive excavations just round the corner in a Muslim area where huge pilgrim hostels from the 8th Century were revealed, with no protest. There has also been no protest over digs at the City of David nearby.

"There is absolutely no danger to the foundations of the al-Aqsa mosque since that is built on the huge Herodian blocks that are still there."

The reason for the protest does not really have much to do with archaeology in fact. It is a protest about presence. The Palestinians and the wider Muslim world have an objection to anything the Israelis do that touches on the Haram.

Such work is seen as symbolising a threat to Palestinian and Muslim identity and a rallying point for Palestinians to express their desire for their own space, their own state.

In this atmosphere, the arguments of the archaeological academics do not carry much force.

Both worth reading in full.

"WATCH OUT DAN BROWN":

Spiritual thriller flying off shelves

February 8, 2007
By Cathleen Falsani sun-times news group

A clandestine sect with evil plans to end the world. An ancient code. Secret saints. And the Kabbalah.

These are the key elements of "The Book of Names," a new spiritual thriller that has been flying off the shelves since its release last month.

The book, co-written by Chicago native Jill Gregory and her best friend/writing partner Karen Tintori, was released Jan. 9 with a first printing of 75,000 copies and already has gone into its second printing, Craig Libman, a publicist for St. Martin's Press, said.

'Watch out Dan Brown'

The foreign publishing rights for "The Book of Names" have been sold in 16 countries, and in Germany, where the book was published as "Das Buch der Namen" in December, it is No. 14 on the bestseller list and has sold more than 155,000 copies.

As the Economist newspaper in London put it in a headline that accompanied a glowing review of "The Book of Names": "Watch out Dan Brown."

[...]

The plot turns on a legend from the Talmud that says in every generation, the fate of the world rests in the hands of 36 righteous people known as lamed vovniks or "hidden ones." These people don't know they are one of the chosen, and neither does anyone else.

The lamed vovniks just go about their everyday lives, doing what is right and good and keeping the rest of the world from God's wrath.

In "The Book of Names," a (fictional) nefarious offshoot sect of the ancient Gnostic tradition known as the Gnoseos has learned the identities of 33 of 36 lamed vovniks and has set about assassinating them to hasten the end of the world.

Through plot murder-mystery-meets-mysticism plot twists, the book's hero, a political science professor named David Shepherd, uncovers the Gnoseos' plans and also realizes that his young stepdaughter is one of the remaining three lamed vovniks the Gnoseos - whose members include heads of state and other luminati - are systematically murdering.

With the help of Yael HarPaz, a fetching Israeli archeologist -Shepherd sets about saving his stepdaughter and the rest of the world by unraveling codes based on gematria, numerology applied to the Hebrew alphabet.

[...]

Sounds like fun, although it's probably also unbearably silly. Ther term lamed vovniks looks Yiddish rather than Talmudic, and I don't know where they come from, if from anywhere outside the imagination of the authors. There weren't any Gnostic groups called the "Gnoseos." The word is just the genitive case of the Greek word gnosis. But in terms of the Dan Brown comparison, the important think is that Gregory and Tintori seem not to be making any outlandish historical claims about their novel.

UPDATE: Stephen Goranson e-mails:

I don't know a lot about this, but the Talmud San. 97b has a statement that there must always be 36 righteous in the world who see the divine presence. Gershom Scholem has a fine essay translated from German in The Messianic Idea in Judaism and Other Essays on Jewish Spirituality, "The Tradition of the Thirty-Six Hidden Just Men." And an earlier novel to use this tradition is The Last of the Just, by Andre Schwartz-Bart.

The phrase "lamed-vav" is just the number 36 written in Hebrew letters. So that much seems to come from the Talmud.

UPDATE: Kate Lingley e-mails:

Another comment on your blog entry about "The Book of Names" -- This is not the first work of popular literature to be written on the theme of the 36 Just Men. Stephen Bilias' book "The Quest for the 36" is a work of speculative fiction from 1988. I bought it by chance back then and really enjoyed it. Far from "Da Vinci Code"-esque thrillers, it is a work of seriocomic speculative fiction, about a New York talent agent (to give you a sense of the humor of the thing, his name is Dexter Sinister) who is recruited to find the Lamed-vov. In the end it is surprisingly touching, actually. I found it delightful.

UPDATE (15 February): The authors respond.

THE OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA BLOG has now opened. I'll be posting the first lecture this afternoon.

THE INFANCY GOSPEL OF THOMAS MEETS YOUTUBE.

(Via Apocryphicity.)

COPTIC UNICODE FONTS GALORE!

UPDATE: And in case you still need to learn Coptic, there's this.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: More protests of the Mugrabi Gate excavation from Muslims, including from Iran:

Iran's supreme leader calls for retaliation againt Israel

(Irish Examiner)

The supreme leader of Iran has called on Islamic nations to retaliate against Israel over excavations being carried out near a hotly disputed holy site in Jerusalem.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei did not say what sort of response he intended, but he said the Islamic world should make Israel “regret” what it is doing.

Police today scuffled with an Israeli Islamic leader and several of his followers near the site where Muslims have been protesting against excavations and repairs.

Raed Salah, the fiery leader of the Islamic Movement in Israel, and six supporters were taken for questioning after “a brawl” with police guarding work near the hilltop compound known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary, home of the Al Aqsa mosque complex, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

It wasn’t clear whether charges would be brought, Rosenfeld said.

Three Palestinian youths were questioned on suspicion of throwing stones at an Israeli bus near the Old City, but there was no other trouble reported this morning, he added.

[...]

Prime Minister Olmert, however, has declined to interfere with the dig:

Olmert spurns bid to stop Jerusalem dig: paper
Thu Feb 8, 2007 2:11 AM EST17

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has spurned an appeal from his defense minister to halt excavation work near Jerusalem's most important holy site, the Haaretz daily said on Thursday.

Tensions have flared between Israel and the Palestinians over the start of an Israeli excavation near a compound housing al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, Islam's third holiest site.

Arab states have asked Israel to halt the work, which began on Tuesday, saying it could damage the mosque's foundations. Palestinians said a ceasefire in Gaza with the Jewish state might unravel if the work continued.

"A thorough examination of the matter would reveal that nothing about the work underway will harm anyone, and there is no truth in the contentions against the work," the newspaper quoted Olmert's office as saying in rejecting a written appeal from Defense Minister Amir Peretz.

[...]

Meanwhile, Israeli archaeologist Eilat Mazar criticizes the Waqf:

Archeologists: Waqf damaging Temple Mount remains

Senior archeologist says Waqf wants to turn whole of Temple Mount into exclusive mosque for Muslims

Yaakov Lappin
Published: 02.07.07, 15:51 / Israel News

As the structural work near the Temple Mount drew protests from around the Arab world, Israeli archeologists complained Wednesday that the government was not doing enough to protect Jewish artifacts from building work by the Muslim Waqf, which controls the Temple Mount.

"The Waqf has acted terribly, taking thousands of tons of artifacts from the First Temple, the Second Temple, as well as Muslim artifacts, and throwing them away," Dr Eilat Mazor, from the Hebrew University, told Ynetnews.

"They want to turn the whole of the Temple Mount into a mosque for Muslims only. They don't care about the artifacts or heritage on the site."

She added that there was a link between routine denials of the existence of the Jerusalem Temples by senior officials of the Palestinian Authority, and the way the Waqf was treating artifacts on the site.

[...]

UPDATE: Also (via Joseph Lauer), an editorial from Haaretz on Temple Mount Truths. Excerpt:

It is worth mentioning, for those who have forgotten and those who would like to make others forget, that the situation that prevails at the Temple Mount and the Western Wall plaza is based on a quite stable status quo that has been in place for 40 years. David Ben-Gurion described the situation in June 1967 by saying: "The Western Wall is for the Jews at the moment, and the Temple Mount is for the Muslims at the moment, and that is the reality we have to accept."

At the same time, Moshe Dayan determined that the Mugrabi Gate would remain in Israel's exclusive control, to prevent the Muslim authorities from having the ability to unilaterally close all the gates to the Temple Mount. The construction of the bridge from the Western Wall plaza to the Mugrabi Gate is therefore a crucial Israeli interest, which even the Waqf authorities do not deny, and it is part of the status quo.

The incitement against the construction of the bridge is a clear attempt to undercut the status quo. Therefore, it must not influence the authorities' decision to replace the temporary bridge. The activity of the security forces, which ensures that the work is carried out, deserves full support.

All the same, we must remember that the status quo applies not only to the Western Wall plaza, but also to the Temple Mount. For that reason, those who contemptuously reject the charge that the foundations of the Al-Aqsa Mosque are being damaged must also react with the same derision toward attempts by Jewish zealots to change the situation at the Temple Mount or incite against the Muslim Waqf. The situation in the Temple Mount area must be dealt with with sensitivity and intelligence - but also with resolution, to safeguard crucial Israeli interests that were determined two generations ago and retain their validity to this day.

UPDATE: See also the the updates to this post from a few days ago from people unhappy with the coverage by Haaretz. Todd Bolen's rule of thumb has a lot to be said for it.

A JEWISH MUSEUM IN CAIRO?

EGYPT: JEWISH MUSEUM COULD BE A FIRST IN ARAB WORLD

Cairo, 7 Feb. (AKI) - Egyptian foreign minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit has asked culture officials to review a project to build a Jewish history museum in Cairo, the capital of the mostly Muslim North African country. The director of Egypt's supreme council for antiquities Zaki Hawass has been tasked to look into the project, according to a report in the independent daily al-Masri al-Yom. The proposal for the museum, which includes the restoration of Jewish artifacts and other historical objects, was presented to Gheit by an "American Jewish rabbi", al-Masri al-Yom said without naming the rabbi.

Cairo's ancient Shaar Hasaimaim synagogue is the proposed site for the museum, while money for its construction as well as the restoration work could be raised through an international fund-raising campaign, the report said.

[...]

ADOLFO ROITMAN, curator of the Shrine of the Book, is interviewed about the Dead Sea Scrolls by the Canadian Jewish News.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: A Hebrew University professor thinks that the Temple compound did not overlap with the stone covered by the Dome of the Rock. Here's the full text of the press release:

Archaeological remains point to exact site of Second Temple, says HU professor February 07 2007

While scholars have put forth various assessments for the location of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, a Hebrew University of Jerusalem professor says that archaeological remains that have so far been ignored by scholars point to the exact location, which is in a spot that differs from prevailing opinion.

The location identified by Prof. Joseph Patrich of the Hebrew University Institute of Archaeology places the Temple and its corresponding courtyards, chambers and gates in a more southeasterly and diagonal frame of reference than have earlier scholars.

In spotting the Temple in this way, Patrich concludes that the rock, over which the Dome of the Rock mosque was built in the 7th century C.E. is outside the confines of the Temple. The rock is considered by Moslems to be the spot from which Muhammad ascended to heaven and for Jews the place at which the binding of Isaac took place.

Patrich basis his proposal on a study of a large underground cistern on the Temple Mount that was mapped by British engineer Sir Charles Wilson in 1866 on behalf of the Palestine Exploration Fund.

The giant cistern, 4.5 meters wide and 54 meters long, lay near the southeastern corner of the upper platform of the Temple Mount. It had a southeasterly orientation with branches extending north and south.

Examining the location and configuration of the cistern together with descriptions of the daily rite in the Temple and its surroundings found in the Mishna (the Rabbinic Oral Tradition compiled in the 3rd century C.E.), Patrich has demonstrated that this cistern is the only one found on the Temple Mount that can tie in with the Mishna text describing elements involved in the daily purification and sacrificial duties carried out by the priests on the altar in the Temple courtyard.

On this basis, he says, one can “reconstruct” the placement of the laver (a large basin) that was used by the priests for their ritual washing, with the water being drawn by a waterwheel mechanism from the cistern. After this purification, the priests ascended the nearby ramp to the sacrificial altar. By thus locating the laver, the water wheel, the ramp and the altar, one can then finally map, again in coordination with the Mishna, the alignment of the Temple itself and its gates and chambers.

All of these considerations have led Patrich to come up with a diagram of the Temple and its surroundings that place the Temple further to the east and south than earlier thought and at a southeasterly angle relative to the eastern wall of the Temple Mount, and not perpendicular to it, as earlier assumed. It is this placement which also leaves the rock in the Dome of the Rock outside of the Temple confines (see attached drawings and caption).

Prof. Patrich stressed that his research concerning the location of the Temple is strictly academic in nature, and that political connotations should not be attributed to it.

This drawing and accompanying text explain the theory further:

Drawing shows Prof. Patrich’s description of the location of the Temple compound (the rectangle defined by a solid line in the center of the drawing). The cistern upon which he basis his research is shown by a dotted line within the rectangle. The Dome of the Rock (octagonal structure) is seen in the lower left hand corner of the Temple compound. Note that given this alignment, the rock in the center of the Dome of the Rock is seen as outside the area of the Temple Compound (Drawing by Leen Ritmeyer)

UPDATE (8 February): The Jerusalem Post has picked up the story.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: Mugrabi Gate update:

Israel Begins Renovation Near Disputed Holy Site
Associated Press

JERUSALEM, Feb 6 - With dozens of policemen looking on, an Israeli bulldozer began work on an archaeological excavation next to the Holy Land's most explosive religious site Tuesday, drawing Palestinian protests and condemnations from the Arab world.

Muslims are angry at Israel's plan to build a new walkway up to the compound where Islamic tradition says Muhammad ascended to heaven and which Jews revere as the site of their two ancient temples. Israel says the project is needed to replace a centuries-old earthen ramp that partially collapsed in a snowstorm three years ago. Its assurances that the work would cause no harm to Islam's holy sites did little to soothe tensions.

Palestinian leaders harshly condemned the project, and Palestinians clashed with Israeli forces in several areas of Jerusalem and the West Bank. No injuries were reported.

"What is happening is an aggression," Mohammed Hussein, the top Muslim cleric in Jerusalem, told the Gaza Strip radio station of the Hamas militant movement. "We call on the Palestinian people to unite and unify the efforts to protect Jerusalem."

The small dig is 50 yards (meters) away from the walls of the hilltop compound in Jerusalem's Old City known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary. Palestinians and Israelis have clashed there in the past.

The dig is meant to ensure that no important artifacts are damaged by the walkway's construction, which is expected to be completed in eight months. Such exploratory digs are required by Israeli law in the ancient city.

"The construction of the bridge, located in its entirety outside the Temple Mount, has no impact on the Mount itself and certainly poses no danger to it," Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office said.

[...]

ARAMAIC STUDIES has published a new issue (4.2, July 2006 - requires a paid individual or institutional subscription to access). Bas ter Har Romney e-mails the Hugoye list with the following additional information:

Dear fellow list-members,

At the request of a number of colleagues I send you the Table of Contents of Aramaic Studies 4.2, which appeared recently. Abstracts are still accessible on http://as.sagepub.com, but please note that the journal will be published by Brill from now on. A full announcement will follow, but I can already give away that the journal will become cheaper (yes!).

Best wishes,
Bas Romeny

Edward M. Cook
The ‘Kaufman Effect’ in the Pseudo-Jonathan Targum

Thomas Finley
‘Upon this Rock’: Matthew 16.18 and the Aramaic Evidence

Peter J. Gentry
‘The Role of the "Three" in the Text History of the Septuagint’: II. Aspects of Interdependence of the Old Greek and the Three in Ecclesiastes

D.J.D. Kroeze and E. Van Staalduine-Sulman
A Giant among Bibles: ‘Erfurt 1’ or Cod. Or. Fol. 1210-1211 at the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

Jerome A. Lund
Observations on Some Biblical Citations in Ephrem's Commentary on Genesis

David C. Mitchell
Messiah bar Ephraim in the Targums

Jan-Wim Wesselius
Language Play in the Aramaic Letters from Hermopolis

Gillian Greenberg
Book Review: Corpus Linguistics and Textual History: A Computer-Assisted Interdisciplinary Approach to the Peshitta

Bibliography of the Aramaic Bible

Indexes of Aramaic Studies Volume 4

HUGOYE: Journal of Syriac Studies has just published its tenth-anniversary issue (10.1, Winter 2007). Table of contents (from George A. Kiraz on the Hugoye list:

PISCATAWAY, NJ, February 6, 2007�Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute (http://www.bethmardutho.org) celebrates its 15th anniversary and the 10th anniversary of its journal Hugoye by launching The Syriac Digital Library, known as project eBethArk�, online at http://www.bethmardutho.org/ebetharkelib, and publishing a special issue of its peer-reviewed academic periodical Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies (Vol. 10, No. 1).

The special issue contains invited articles which reflect on the past, present and future of Syriac studies. The contents are:

Introduction to the Commemorative Issue

Obituary: William L. Petersen (1950-2006)


Papers

The Contribution of Departed Syriacists, 1997-2006� by Sebastian P. Brock

Abstract: The 10th anniversary of Hugoye offers an opportunity to reflect briefly on the work of Syriacists who have died during these last ten years. Their contributions to the field of Syriac studies are considered under separate subject headings.


Syriac Studies: The Challenges of the Coming Decade by Lucas Van Rompay

Abstract: In response to an invitation by the General Editor, the paper reflects on the present state of Syriac studies as well as on the opportunities and challenges of the future. In addition to a brief discussion of the geographical changes in the worldwide presence of Syriac Christians and Syriac scholars, some suggestions are offered for work to be carried out in the coming years. The paper closes with some thoughts on the academic study of Syriac.


Forty Years of Syriac Computing by George A. Kiraz

Abstract: The term �Syriac computing� was coined in 1992 and took shape in 1995 when the First International Forum on Syriac Computing was held in conjunction with the Second Syriac Symposium in Washington DC. The term was applied to computer-related activities and projects which support Syriac studies. Syriac computing, however, began much earlier though on a small scale. On the 10th anniversary of Hugoye and the 15th anniversary of its parent Beth Mardutho whose contributions to Syriac computing is well know, this paper aims at outlining the history of Syriac computing, and giving some remarks for future considerations. Regarding personal computing, the paper mostly discusses the PC platform. The paper is arranged topically.


Publications and Book Reviews

Recent Books on Syriac Topics
By Sebastian P. Brock

Susan Ashbrook Harvey, Scenting Salvation. Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination
By Robert Doran

Jobst Reller and Martin Tamcke, eds. Trinit�ts- und Christusdogma. Ihre Bedeutung f�r Beten und Handeln der Kirche. Festschrift f�r Jouko Martikainen
By Cornelia B. Horn

Erbes, Johann E., The Peshitta and the Versions: A Study of the Peshitta Variants in Joshua 1-5 in Relation to Their Equivalents in the Ancient Versions
By Craig E. Morrison

Joel Thomas Walker, The legend of Mar Qardagh. Narrative and Christian heroism in late antique Iraq
By Andrew N. Palmer

Suha Rassam, Christianity in Iraq: Its Origins and Development to the Present Day
By Jan Witold Weryho


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Journal of Aramaic Studies

Beth Mardutho Amazon Associates

Journal of the Canadian Society of Syriac Studies

Gorgias Press

ASSIMILATED TO THE BLOGOSPHERE: Matthijs den Dulk, graduate student at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, has a new blog called NT Today, "A weblog on currents in the study of the New Testament and its world."

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: More on the Mugrabi Gate bridge:

Israel begins contentious work near disputed holy site in Jerusalem

Canadian Press
Published: Tuesday, February 06, 2007

JERUSALEM (AP) - Under heavy police guard, Israeli workers began a dig Tuesday at a centuries-old walkway that leads to a holy site disputed by Muslims and Jews, a spokesman said.

Palestinians warned this week that work just outside the site, known as the Noble Sanctuary for Muslims and the Temple Mount for Jews, would inflame already high tensions. Muslims fear that Israel is planning to damage the neighbouring hilltop compound, the third-holiest site in their religion.

Israel's Antiquities Authority said it is building a new pedestrian ramp leading up to the compound, which has been the scene of clashes in the past. The original earthen walkway was damaged in a snowstorm three years ago.

[...]

JAMES CROSSLEY'S BOOK is reviewed in The Chronicle of Higher Education. It requires a paid subscription to access it, but here's the abstract:

Why Early Christians Stopped Observing Jewish Codes

By DAVID GLENN

James G. Crossley, a lecturer in New Testament studies at the University of Sheffield, in England

Jesus of Nazareth obeyed kosher dietary rules and otherwise followed traditional Jewish codes of conduct — but within 20 years after his death, the Christian movement had jettisoned many of those laws. In Why Christianity Happened: A Sociohistorical Account of Christian Origins (26-50 CE) (Westminster John Knox Press), Mr. Crossley argues that that broad shift away from law observance was both a cause and an effect of the religion's rapid spread among Gentiles.

"THE LAST MAN WHO KNEW EVERYTHING" -- including Aramaic:

Scientist Young, international man of mystery
The Last Man Who Knew Everything Thomas Young, the Anonymous Genius Who Proved Newton Wrong and Deciphered the Rosetta Stone, Among Other Surprising Feats Andrew Robinson

By Michael Sims, Special to The [LA] Times

SO is the title of Andrew Robinson's new book hyperbole? Of course it is. We all know that no one person can encompass all knowledge, that people who aspire to are nothing more than "Jeopardy!" freaks. But now and then, someone comes along who seems to have received several people's share of curiosity and insight and talent. Thomas Jefferson might be a good example.

Nor are such fabulous beasts extinct: Consider the contemporary English polymath Jonathan Miller, who has excelled in comedy, medicine, the visual arts and television and opera direction.

Born in England in 1773, Young grew up a Quaker but by early adulthood had rejected most of the group's puritanical tenets. He was a child prodigy. All the evidence indicates that he was reading by age 2. Nor were these picture books about duckies; his family reported that by the venerable age of 4, he had twice read through the Bible. Soon he was studying botany, zoology, languages, mathematics. With superhero speed, he absorbed the Greek and Latin that dominated university curricula at the time and on his own branched off into Syriac, Chaldee, Hebrew and Samaritan.

[...]

"Chaldee" is an old term for Aramaic and "Samaritan" just means Hebrew as written by the Samaritans. Plus he nearly deciphered the Rosetta Stone. Not bad for a scientist.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:

Meshaal Warns Against Continued Excavations
06:14 Feb 05, '07 / 17 Shevat 5767 (Arutz Sheva)

(IsraelNN.com) Exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, in a televised speech from Damascus on Sunday, warned that continued excavation in the “Al Aksa” area would lead to a new popular uprising. He was referring to the excavation of a Roman-era road stretching from the ancient City of David to the Temple Mount. Water used for Temple ceremonies was drawn from the Shiloah spring at the base of the city.

[...]

UPDATE: And there's this from Ha'aretz:

City of David tunnel excavation proceeds without proper permit
By Meron Rapoport, Haaretz Correspondent

The excavation of a tunnel under Jerusalem's City of David has gone on for months without a license from the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), as required by law.

In addition, there is no operative plan for developing the site by the Israel Nature and National Parks Protection Authority (INNPPA), which legally administers the area.

Nevertheless, no steps are being taken against the two IAA archaeologists who violated their license; instead, they are being allowed to dig in an area extending another 100 meters, to "explore" the site.

The archaeologists, Professor Gabi Reich and Eli Shukrun, began the dig in the area of the village of Silwan a few months ago, following the discovery of part of a road that may have been Jerusalem's main street in the Second Temple era. The dig is being financed by Elad, an association that, inter alia, works to settle Jews in East Jerusalem.

[...]

This is a very sensitive region for a dig. Should it approach the Temple Mount wall, it will certainly elicit angry reactions from the Muslim Waqf (religious trust), which has repeatedly accused Israel of trying to excavate under the holy places on the mount.

Moreover, most of the excavation site is inhabited by Palestinians, and thus far, no effort has been made to get their permission, as required by law, for digging on and under their property.

But on top of all that, it recently emerged that the dig violates the terms of the license that the archaeologists received in January 2006, and has not been approved by the INNPPA.


[...]

Doesn't sound good.

UPDATE (6 February): Reader Menachem Brody e-mails:

This is a very sensitive region for a dig. Should it approach the Temple Mount wall, it will certainly elicit angry reactions from the Muslim Waqf (religious trust), which has repeatedly accused Israel of trying to excavate under the holy places on the mount.

I think you should sift a little more before reprinting potentially inflammable material.
(I am not objecting to the inaccuracy, but rather to the damage it causes.)
Enclosed map from another article in Ha'aretz this January 24 by Nadav Shragai.
Note that the site of the dig is at the extreme southern end of the City of David, adjacent to the pool, and if they would continue at their present rate northwards, the diggers will approach the southern side of the Old City wall (not the temple Mount) in another 10 or more years...

Thanks for that clarification. But it still sounds as though there are irregularities with this dig which are a cause for concern.

UPDATE (8 February): Todd Bolen says that I've been led astray.

BOOK REVIEW at Bryn Mawr Classical Review:

Leif Carlsson, Round Trips to Heaven: Otherworldly Travelers in Early Judaism and Christianity. Lund Studies in History of Religions, 19. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2004. Pp. 398. ISBN 91-22-02106-X. $99.50.

Reviewed by Thomas J. Kraus, Hilpoltstein (t.j.kraus@web.de)
Word count: 1686 words

This is the printed version of Leif Carlsson's dissertation prepared under the auspices of his adviser, Tord Olsson (Professor of Comparative Religion), at Lund University, Sweden. Carlsson (C.) addresses a common topic for the period between 200 B.C.E. to 200 C.E., one which is only partly correctly expressed by 'Round Trips to Heaven', because he also deals with other kinds of 'otherworldly' trips to locations that are often everything but heavenly. Basically, this monograph consists of two books in one volume: the first comprises heavenly journey texts that may be denominated as 'Old Testament Pseudepigraphy' (with the exception of 2Corinthians 12:1-5) according to the title of the classical two volumes edited by James H. Charlesworth and published in 1983, while the second is exclusively dedicated to 3Baruch ('A Journey into Death's Waiting Room') and could have formed a book on its own. Everybody who is interested in apocalyptic literature in general and in the specific motif of 'heavenly journeys' in particular will get a sound introduction to the most relevant texts. Profound knowledge in this field of research is not required, because the texts are presented in English only (except 2Corinthians and 3Baruch) and supplemented with introductory sections. Be that as it may and apart from some methodological inconsistencies, Carlsson's study is a significant contribution to the discussion of otherworldly trips in the Jewish and Christian literature of the period of time addressed.

[...]

The review also mentions the online Arbeitshilfen für das Studium der Pseudepigraphen, which I had not seen before. It looks pretty useful, but it seems not to have been updated since April of 2003 and so is getting out of date.

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS get lots of attention in the Kansas City Star today in advance of the exhibit at Union Station which opens on 8 February.

Scrolls a great marvel for Christians, Jews
By MORRIS B. MARGOLIES

From Feb. 13 through May 8, some of the original Dead Sea Scrolls will be on display at Union Station.

Kansas City should be immensely proud that it has qualified to exhibit these scrolls.

What importance can they have for us today, given that they’re 2,000 years old? That is the question put to me during and after some 20 lectures I have given on the subject in the past few months.

Within this brief space I shall try to summarize my response.

The response is pretty accurate but needs some corrections and nuancing.

Many of the parables of Jesus are contained in the religious writings of the scroll sect. The career of the group’s leader, whom they designated as the Teacher of Righteousness, eerily foreshadows the life and death of the founder of Christianity.

No, none of the parables of Jesus are found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. And anything beyond the most general of comparisons between Jesus and the Teacher of Righteousness as ancient Palestinian Jewish teachers moves quickly into fringe ideas.

The Dead Sea Scrolls Hebrew Bible had been written more than a thousand years before. A close comparison of this Essene text with the 9th-century Masoretic text reveals virtually an identical rendition.

Well, yes, some of the manuscripts are close to the Masoretic text and one or two are virtually identical, but a fair number of them have quite a few variations, often siding with variants known from the Septuagint Greek translation or the Samaritan Pentateuch. But these are only rarely matters of substance.

The Essenes had clearly broken away from the political and religious leadership of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. Their writings reveal a much more rigid observance of Jewish ritual than had prevailed in the Holy City.

They set up their own sheltered and exclusivist community at Qumran, just northwest of the Dead Sea. They wrote their biblical and sectarian scrolls with great diligence. When in 66 of the common era the fury of Roman power was aimed at a besieged Jerusalem, the Essenes hastened to hide their writings in the nearby Caves of Qumran, some 10 miles south of the Holy City.

Some version of the Essene hypothesis is probably right, but the degree to which the Qumran sectarians split from the Jerusalem Temple is far from clear. A serious split is implied by the Habakkuk Pesher. One can, but need not, read a split into the Community Rule. The Damascus Document assumes its readers will worship in the Temple, although perhaps not without reservation. And various liturgical texts (e.g., 4Q512) and calendrical texts give directions for worship in the Temple. The whole question of who used which calendar and where and when also figures into the problem. Relations with the Temple may have been better and worse over time; we really just don't know.

The second article:

Sacred texts on secular stage
Pages offer a peek at roots of faiths, and hope of profit for Union Station.

has lots of quotes from biblical and Qumran scholars.

The third:

Here’s how to see the scrolls

is self-explanatory and is of interest to those who plan to attend.

MORE ON THE BODMER PAPYRUS that has just been acquired by the Vatican, and on the Vatican Apostolic Library:

Gospel Papyrus Donated to Vatican

"It Has Not Yet Revealed All Its Secrets"

VATICAN CITY, FEB. 3, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of an article published last week in the semi-official Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, entitled "18 Centuries of History: The Bodmer Papyrus 14-15 (P75) Arrives in the Vatican Apostolic Library."

* * *

April 30, 1451: With a papal brief Pope Nicholas V establishes a library "pro communi doctorum virorum commodo" (to facilitate the research of scholars). Thus was born the present Vatican Apostolic Library.

November 22, 2006: the Bodmer Papyrus 14-15, donated to His Holiness Benedict XVI by the generosity of the Sally and Frank Hanna Family Foundation and the Solidarity Association (U.S.A.), as well as the Mater Verbi/Hanna Papyrus Trust, was given to the Vatican Apostolic Library.

During the five and a half centuries that separate these two dates, albeit through different vicissitudes, such as the losses caused by the lansquenets on the occasion of the sack of Rome (1527) or the transfer of the manuscripts to Paris in the Napoleonic age, the Vatican Apostolic Library remained faithful to the mandate it received to enrich, guard and preserve with all care the cultural treasures entrusted to it and to put them at the disposition of qualified scholars.

In the meantime, the initial thousand manuscripts by this time numbered 150,000; beside these were placed 300,000 coins and medals, as well as 100,000 stamps and an important collection of antique prints.

Among the famous monuments of culture deposited at present in the Vatican Library, mention can be made, in the classic line, of the palimsest of Cicero's De Republica (Vat. lat. 5757), of the Virgilio Vaticano (Vat. lat. 3225), of the Virgilio Romano (Vat. lat. 3867), of the Terenzio Vaticano (Vat. lat. 3868), of important manuscripts of Plato (Vat. gr. 1), of Pindar (Vat. gr. 1312) and of the Tavole Facili of Ptolemy (Vat. gr. 1291), not to mention Menander's most precious palimsest discovered a few years ago in Vast. sir. 623.

Numbered among the biblical manuscripts is the most ancient testimony known of the two letters of St. Peter (Papyrus Bodmer 8), the so-called "B codex," one of the two surviving Bibles of the 4th century (Vat. gr. 1209) and the "codex Claromontanus" (Vat. lat. 7223) or even one of the most ancient known paleo-Slavic manuscripts (Vat. gr. 2502).

[...]

And there's lots more on the papyrus itself, which is early and which contained both the Gospel of Luke and the Gospel of John.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: More fallout over those excavations.

Temple Mount closed to non-Muslims Sunday
By ETGAR LEFKOVITS Jerusalem Post)


The Temple Mount will be closed to non-Muslim visitors on Sunday and police will restrict the entry of Arabs for the day, after Islamic leaders accused Israel of carrying out an excavation at the holy site, police said.

The unusual weekday restrictions come after Muslim leaders calls on Arabs to visit the site en masse in response to Israeli excavation work near the Mughrabi Gate.

[...]

UPDATE: And still more:

Islamic scholars say Israel violating Aqsa mosque
Sat 3 Feb 2007 14:45:55 GMT

RIYADH, Feb 3 (Reuters) - A Saudi-based body of Islamic scholars on Saturday condemned Israeli archaeological work near the al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, saying it was a "blatant violation" of the shrine's sanctity.

"The most serious element is plans to excavate under the walls of the Aqsa Mosque and its underground tunnels," the Islamic Jurisprudence Academy said in a statement carried on Saudi state news agency SPA.

[...]

The charge has also been denied:

Shmuel Rabinowitz, Rabbi of the Western Wall and Jewish holy sites in Israel, said there were no plans to excavate under al-Haram al-Sharif, known to Jews as Temple Mount.

ENTER THE MESOPOTAMIAN UNDERWORLD ... IF YOU DARE!

(Via the Agade list.)

BIBLICAL STUDIES CARNIVAL XIV has been posted by Chris Weimer at Thoughts on Antiquity.

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:

Thousand-year-old pulpit rises from the ashes
From Stephen Farrell and David Sharrock in Jerusalem (Times of London)

Prayers at the al-Aqsa mosque, Islam’s third-holiest site, will have a special significance for Muslims today when an ornate pulpit destroyed by a deranged Christian tourist 37 years ago is finally returned to the place it has occupied for almost a millennium.

The pulpit, which was brought to Jerusalem from Aleppo, Syria, by Saladin after he drove the Crusaders out of the holy city in 1887, has taken years to reconstruct and is considered a jewel of sacred art.

Master craftsmen from Egypt, Turkey and Indonesia collaborated on the project under the guidance of a Saudi academic, Minwer al-Meheid. In spite of the pulpit’s near-total destruction in a fire which swept the al-Aqsa mosque, Dr al-Meheid was convinced that he could rebuild it to its original specifications, fashioned from 16,000 separate pieces.

[...]

For "1887" in the second paragraph read '1187."

“The story of the pulpit is of the liberation of Jerusalem during the Crusades,” said Adnan al-Husseini, director of the Waqf, the Islamic trust that administers the Sharif site. “Its restoration is a step towards freeing the mosque and Jerusalem from occupation.”

[...]

The pulpit was an important historic artifact and I'm glad it has been restored, but this isn't the most constructive spin for the Waqf to put on the story.

In spite of its rich and troubled history Dr al-Meheid sees no controversy over the artefact itself. “This minbar should be a message of peace. It signifies the place of the preacher who carried the word of God, which is the word of peace,” he said.

I think that's a better message.

STILL WAITING: The Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition in Kansas City starts on the 7th of February, and their arrival is presumably imminent:

Stage is set for Dead Sea Scrolls' arrival in KC
By: Barbara Bayer, Staff Writer February 02, 2007

After months of preparation, the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit will open next week at Kansas City's Union Station.

An Opening Festival, with a late-1940s Middle Eastern theme, takes place from 5:30 to 9:30 on Wednesday, Feb. 7. The exhibit itself opens to the general public on Thursday, Feb. 8, continuing through May 13.

This is the only time the scrolls will be exhibited in the Midwest. The next stop is San Diego. From there, Union Station officials believe the scrolls will return to Israel and stay there. As of Monday this week, more than 26,000 tickets had been pre-sold, according to Sarah Biles, director of communications. (For ticket information, see box, Page 7)

Linda Segebrecht, Dead Sea Scrolls project manager, said organizers expect big crowds.

"On Saturdays and Sundays, we could have up to 5,000 people each day. It is just amazing what ticket sales are," she said.

Union Station has been preparing for the exhibit since Jan. 7. Once the scrolls themselves arrive, a team of three Israel Antiquities Authority officials - Pnina Shor, head of the artifacts treatment and conservation department; Lena Libman, chief conservator of the scrolls; and Hava Katz, chief curator of national treasures - will finalize the setup of the exhibit.

[...]

For those are able to attend, there's lots of detailed information on the exhibit.