With Letters of Light: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Early Jewish Apocalypticism, Magic, and Mysticism in Honor of Rachel Elior (Edited by Daphna Arbel and Andrei Orlov; Ekstasis: Religious Experience from Antiquity to the Middle Ages, 2; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2011; ISBN 978-3-11-022201-2; US$ 182.00).UPDATE: April De Conick has more on the book at her Forbidden Gospels blog.
This collection of essays is a tribute to Rachel Elior’s decades of teaching, scholarship and mentoring. If a Festschrift reflects the individuality of the honoree, then this volume offers insights into the scope of Rachel Elior’s interests and scholarly achievements in the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Jewish apocalypticism, magic, and mysticism from the Second Temple period to the later rabbinic and Hekhalot developments. The majority of articles included in the volume deal with Jewish and Christian apocalyptic and mystical texts constituting the core of experiential dimension of these religious traditions.
Contents of the volume:
Daphna Arbel and Andrei Orlov
Rachel Elior – An Appreciation from her Colleagues and
Students - 1-5
Frances Flannery
The Consideration of Religious Experience in the Work of
Rachel Elior - 6-10
I. Exegesis
Kelley Coblentz Bautch
Peter and the Patriarch: A Confluence of Traditions? - 13-27
Silviu N. Bunta
In Heaven or on Earth: A Misplaced Temple Question about
Ezekiel’s Visions - 28-44
James R. Davila
Scriptural Exegesis in the Treatise of the Vessels, a Legendary
Account of the Hiding of the Temple Treasures - 45-61
Dan Merkur
Cultivating Visions through Exegetical Meditations - 62-91
Sergey Minov
“Serpentine” Eve in Syriac Christian Literature of Late
Antiquity - 92-114
Annette Yoshiko Reed
From “Pre-Emptive Exegesis” to “Pre-Emptive Speculation”?
Ma‘aseh Bereshit in Genesis Rabbah and Pirqei deRabbi Eliezer - 115-132
Mark Verman
Earthly and Heavenly Jerusalem in Philo and Paul:
A Tale of Two Cities - 133-156
II. Ritual
Crispin Fletcher-Louis
The Book of Watchers and the Cycle of New Year Festivals - 159-168
Yuval Harari
A Different Spirituality or ‘Other’ Agents?: On the Study of
Magic in Rabbinic Literature - 169-195
Rebecca Lesses
“They Revealed Secrets to Their Wives”: The Transmission of
Magical Knowledge in 1 Enoch - 196-222
Jodi Magness
The Impurity of Oil and Spit among the Qumran Sectarians 223-231
Andrei Orlov
“The Likeness of Heaven”: The Kavod of Azazel in the
Apocalypse of Abraham - 232-253
Pieter W. van der Horst
Mystical Motifs in a Greek Synagogal Prayer? - 254-264
III. Transformation
Daphna Arbel
“A Chariot of Light Borne by Four Bright Eagles”:
Eve’s Vision of the Chariot in the Greek Life of Adam and Eve - 267-284
Joseph Dan
“Messianic Movements in the Period of the Crusades” - 285-298
April D. DeConick
Jesus Revealed: The Dynamics of Early Christian Mysticism - 299-324
Celia Deutsch
Aseneth: Ascetical Practice, Vision, and Transformation - 325-348
Naomi Janowitz
“You Are Gods”: Multiple Divine Beings in Late Antique
Jewish Theology - 349-364
Alan F. Segal
Transcribing Experience - 365-382
Thursday, February 10, 2011
With Letters of Light
NEW BOOK:
Wednesday, February 09, 2011
Richard Bauckham on lecture tour in USA
RICHARD BAUCKHAM is on a lecture tour in the United States through early March. Mark Goodacre notes his upcoming lectures at Duke here. Also, Ed Gallagher, who pointed out the lecture website to me, asks that I mention the two lectures at Heritage Christian University, in Florence, Alabama, on "Identity and Community in the Gospel of John" on Friday, 11 Feb. (9:30am and 1:00pm).
Colloquium on Secret Mark at York University
A COLLOQUIUM ON THE SECRET GOSPEL OF MARK is being held at York University in April. Phil Harland e-mails:
Tony Burke and I (Phil Harland) have been busy arranging a special colloquium on the Secret Gospel of Mark at York University (to be held Friday, April 29, 2011). We would like to invite scholars and students who are interested to attend. The public is also invited to the evening session.From the website:
For information and registration, go to:
http://www.tonyburke.ca/yorkchristianpocrypha/
Here is the information for the conference:
“Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery? The Secret Gospel of Mark in Debate”
April 29, 2011, York University (Vanier College)
Scholarly Discussion (9 am-5 pm) and Public Debate (7-9 pm)
Featuring: Scott Brown, University of Toronto; Tony Burke, York University; Bruce Chilton, Bard College; Craig Evans, Acadia Divinity College; Phil Harland, York University; Charles Hedrick, Missouri State U.; Peter Jeffery, U. of Notre Dame; Marvin Meyer, Chapman University; Allan Pantuck, U. of California; Pierluigi Piovanelli, U. of Ottawa; Hershel Shanks, Editor ofBiblical Archaeology Review
Scope and Objectives
In 1958, American Biblical scholar Morton Smith made an astounding discovery in the Mar Saba monastery in Jerusalem. Copied into the back of a 17th century book was a lost letter by Clement of Alexandria (ca. 150-215 CE) containing excerpts from a longer version of the Gospel of Mark. This Secret Gospel of Mark, as it became known, is now one of the most debated texts of the Christian Apocrypha. More than fifty years after its discovery, there is still no consensus on the issues of its authenticity. Was the letter truly written by Clement of Alexandria? Or by a medieval or even modern forger? Was the forger Morton Smith himself? The debate has heated up in recent years with the publication of Stephen Carlson’s The Gospel Hoax: Morton Smith’s Invention of Secret Mark (Waco, TX: Baylor, 2005) and several criticisms of Carlson’s work by other scholars. Unfortunately, there has been no effective venue for these scholars to share their views on the text and arrive closer to a resolution of the issue of its authenticity. It is hoped that some progress can be made by bringing these scholars together to present their latest work on the gospel to each other, to an audience of interested scholars, to a curious public, and ultimately to an even wider audience with the publication of the papers and summaries of the discussion that arises from their gathering.
Review of Halperin, Journal of a UFO Investigator
DAVID HALPERIN'S JOURNAL OF A UFO INVESTIGATOR is reviewed by Adam Sobsey in indyweek.com. Excerpt:
Those with knowledge of Jewish mysticism will probably find more resonances than the lay reader, for whom the book is less an allegory than a frantic phantasmagoria, scary and bewildering, full of unwanted transformations and disappearances and suffering, without a light at the end of what Danny calls a “tunnel that leads from death into life”—that is, adulthood, where the terrain is “jagged rocks.” Danny doesn’t want to stay trapped in the tunnel, of course, but nor does he want to emerge, plunge and be dashed on the rocks below. Welcome to adolescence.Background here.
James Kugel on cancer and religious belief
BIBLICAL SCHOLAR JAMES KUGEL has written a book on his experience with cancer and what he learned about human beliefs:
After cancer, biblical scholar James Kugel considers religious beliefThe article includes an interview with him about the book. I studied with Professor Kugel at Harvard University in the 1980s.
By Sue Fishkoff · February 7, 2011
PASADENA, Calif. (JTA) -- When Jewish biblical scholar James Kugel was diagnosed with a particularly aggressive form of cancer in 2000, he didn’t find religion.
The world-renowned academic and author of numerous books, including the acclaimed “How to Read the Bible,” already was a practicing Orthodox Jew.
Instead, Kugel used his own very sudden confrontation with mortality to explore the roots of religious belief in general.
The result, “In the Valley of the Shadow,” published this month by Free Press, is an examination of what happened to Kugel after his diagnosis and how it helped him understand why people believe what they do.
Now cancer-free, Kugel retired in 2003 after 20 years as the Harry M. Starr Professor of Classical and Modern Hebrew Literature at Harvard University. He lives with his wife in Jerusalem, and he serves as chair of the Institute for the History of the Jewish Bible at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan.
In his book, Kugel explains his theory of the “small self” versus the “big self.” The small self, a concept that has existed throughout most of human history, posits the individual as a finite piece of the network of the universe. By contrast, the big self, a concept common among Western people today, refers to those who view the world through the prism of their own all-encompassing presence.
[...]
Tuesday, February 08, 2011
The church in Laodicea?
THE CHURCH IN LAODICEA?
Two problems here. First, the excavated church is from the fourth century but these New Testament books were written in the first century. Is there any reason to think this building goes back that far? Second, the references in Colossians and Revelation are to a "church" (ekklesia) in the sense of a community of believers in Laodicea, not a building. We are actully told in Colossians 4:15 that this church met in the house of someone named Nympha.
It is, of course, of great archaeological and historical interest that a fourth-century church building has been found in the ruins of ancient Laodicea, but so far nothing about it seems significant for first-century Christianity or the New Testament.
Ancient church discovered in western TurkeyThe biblical references to a church in Laodicea are Colossians 4:15-16 and Revelation 3:14-22 (note: not "Revelations"). Also, the second-century heretical Christian leader Marcion evidently knew a manuscript tradition that made the NT letter of Paul(?) to the Ephesians a letter "to the saints who are in Laodicea." (The letter may have been a circular sent to multiple churches.)
Monday, January 31, 2011
ISTANBUL - [Hürriyet] Daily News with wires
An ancient church mentioned in the Bible has been discovered in western Turkey, according to the head of the excavation.
Culture and Tourism Minister Ertuğrul Günay visited the ancient city of Laodicea on Sunday in Denizli province and was briefed by Professor Celal Şimşek, head of the excavation team. The professor said they have discovered the Laodicea Church, one of the seven mentioned in the Bible. Şimşek said the church from the fourth century A.D. was found by underground radar search, a system they have tried this year for the first time. “The major part of the church, which is built on an area of 2,000 square meters, has kept its original [status].”
[...]
Two problems here. First, the excavated church is from the fourth century but these New Testament books were written in the first century. Is there any reason to think this building goes back that far? Second, the references in Colossians and Revelation are to a "church" (ekklesia) in the sense of a community of believers in Laodicea, not a building. We are actully told in Colossians 4:15 that this church met in the house of someone named Nympha.
It is, of course, of great archaeological and historical interest that a fourth-century church building has been found in the ruins of ancient Laodicea, but so far nothing about it seems significant for first-century Christianity or the New Testament.
Monday, February 07, 2011
Arutz Sheva: More Waqf digging on the Temple Mount
TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: More Waqf digging on the Temple Mount, according to Arutz Sheva. They have photos.
Digging on Temple Mount 'to Erase Traces of Jewish Altar'UPDATE (8 February): Todd Bolen is not buying the headline.
by Gil Ronen
Muslim religious authorities are concluding a clandestine eight-month dig on the Temple Mount that is intended to erase traces of the Jewish Temple's Altar, Temple activists charge.
The digs have been taking place under the Dome of the Chain, believed to have been built over 1300 years ago. For eight months, the dome - which has a diameter of 14 meters - has been surrounded by a metal fence and black cloth, which hide whatever activity has been going on there from outside inspection. The Muslim Waqf religious authority has claimed the activity is simply a refurbishing of the structure, but refuses adamantly to let Jews or tourists near.
[...]
Sunday, February 06, 2011
Review of Halperin, Journal of a UFO Investigator
DAVID HALPERIN'S JOURNAL OF A UFO INVESTIGATOR receives a fairly negative review by Adam Mansbach in the Boston Globe. It also includes some important spoilers, so read at your own risk.
More on the book here.
More on the book here.
Update from Zahi Hawass
ZAHI HAWASS has another update on Egyptian antiquities: The Sphinx is Sad. He says that the two mummies reportedly damaged in the Egyptian Museum were actually unidentified skulls that were stolen and then recovered without further damage. He also reports that the antiquities at Memphis and Saqqara, as well as various other sites are unharmed. His report on Saqqara is confirmed by a National Geographic article here, mostly based on the reporter's eyewitness testimony.
(HT Dorothy Lobel King on Facebook.)
UPDATE: Lee Rosenbaum has an anonymous report from a French Egyptologist which claims that Saqqara did suffer damage. (Via the Egyptology Blog, entry from 17:36 on Saturday.)
(HT Dorothy Lobel King on Facebook.)
UPDATE: Lee Rosenbaum has an anonymous report from a French Egyptologist which claims that Saqqara did suffer damage. (Via the Egyptology Blog, entry from 17:36 on Saturday.)
Friday, February 04, 2011
Coins found instead of guns
COINS FOUND instead of guns:
UPDATE (7 February): Joseph Lauer notes a Jerusalem Post article that has less confusing title: Police find 2nd Temple-era coins, jugs during arms raid. There are also photos of many of the items seized in the raid.
Police Weapons Search Yields Temple Coin StashIf I understand the story correctly, the headline is misleading. These were coins from the Second Temple era, not coins from the Temple itself.
by Gil Ronen (Arutz Sheva)
Detectives from the Nahariya police station searched a suspect's private home Thursday for suspected illegal weapons, but instead of guns, they found a large hoard of ancient coins dating to Second Temple times, as well as other assorted ancient artifacts.
The coins appear to have been collected from numerous sites over a long period of time.
[...]
UPDATE (7 February): Joseph Lauer notes a Jerusalem Post article that has less confusing title: Police find 2nd Temple-era coins, jugs during arms raid. There are also photos of many of the items seized in the raid.
Thursday, February 03, 2011
Byzantine church, plus possible tomb of Zechariah
A BYZANTINE CHURCH with a mosaic floor, possibly built over the remains of the traditional tomb of a prophet Zechariah, has been excavated in Israel. Here's the IAA press release from the IMFA website:
There were actually two prophets named Zechariah in the Bible. The first lived in the ninth century BCE and his martyrdom is described in 2 Chronicles 24:20-22:
There are traditional tombs of both Zechariahs in the vicinity of the Mount of Olives. The late-antique Old Testament Pseudepigraphon The Lives of the Prophets has legendary accounts of the lives, deaths, and burials of both as well. Unfortunately, no translation seems to be online. But you can find one in volume 2 of the Charlesworth Old Testament Pseudepigrapha volumes.
The IAA press release does not make clear which Zechariah's tomb may be at this site at Hirbet Madras. There has traditionally been some confusion between the two prophets; for example Matthew 23:35 conflates them.
Remember, at most this discovery means that Byzantine Christians built a church on some Jewish ruins that went back to the Second Temple Period, perhaps because they had a tradition that those ruins were of the tomb of a prophet Zechariah. We're a long way from any confidence that the ruins are actually of a tomb of a prophet by that name.
Still—and this is worth emphasizing—the discoveries are intrinsically important for what they can tell us about Byzantine Christianity and early Judaism, whether or not they have any real connection with a biblical character.
UPDATE (11 February): More here.
Byzantine church and mosaic floor uncovered at Hirbet MadrasFollow the link for photos of the site and the mosaic floor.
2 Feb 2011
A large and beautiful mosaic floor and a church were uncovered in excavations carried out by the Israel Antiquities Authority at Hirbet Madras in the Judean coastal plain. Various scholars who visited the site during the excavation proposed identifying the place as the residence and tomb of the prophet Zechariah.
In recent months an archaeological excavation was conducted at Hirbet Madras in the wake of an antiquities theft during which robbers attempted to breach and plunder an ancient underground complex.
Hirbet Madras is known as the site of a large, important Jewish community from the Second Temple period until its destruction during the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 135 CE. Among the remains at the site are those of buildings, caves, agricultural installations and extensive underground hiding tunnels. The site was identified by a number of scholars as the location of a major community.
Research of the site was begun in the late 19th century and continues until the present. In the 1980s, a lintel bearing a unique decoration was discovered at the site. Due to the similarity between it and an identical lintel from the Hirbet Nevoraya synagogue in the north of the country, Professor Amos Kloner and the late Dr. Zvi Ilan put forward the theory that an ancient Jewish synagogue is located nearby.
Recently, in the wake of the illicit excavations by antiquities robbers, the lintel was rediscovered by inspectors of the Israel Antiquities Authority Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Theft. Following the discovery, an excavation was carried out with the aim of revealing the secrets of the monumental building which the lintel belonged to. The excavation, on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, was directed by Amir Ganor and Alon Klein of the Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Theft.
A public building of impressive beauty dating to the Byzantine period, in which there are several construction phases, was exposed in the excavation. In the last two construction phases the building was used as a splendid church. However, based on the results of the excavation and as evidenced by the artifacts, it seems that this church is built inside a large public compound from the Second Temple period and the Bar Kokhba Revolt, which was used in the first construction phases of the compound.
The church, in its last phases, was built as a basilica, at the front of which is a large flagstone courtyard from which worshippers passed into an entry corridor. Through a shaped opening one enters into the nave where there were eight breathtaking marble columns that bore magnificent capitals which were specially imported from Turkey. At the end of the nave is a raised platform and on either side of the nave are two wide aisles.
All of the floors in the building were adorned with spectacular mosaic floors decorated with faunal and floral patterns and geometric designs that are extraordinarily well preserved. Located behind the platform are two rooms, one paved with a marble floor and the other that led to an underground tomb devoid of any finds. Branching out beneath the entire building is a subterranean hiding complex in which there are rooms, water installations, traps and store rooms. This complex belongs to the large building from the Second Temple period which the Byzantine church was built into. Among the artifacts discovered in the hiding complex are coins from the time of the Great Revolt (66-70 CE) and the Bar Kokhba Revolt (132-135 CE), stone vessels, lamps and various pottery vessels that are characteristic of the Jewish population from the community at that time.
As previously mentioned, researchers who visited the site are of the opinion that the site is the residence and tomb of the prophet Zechariah. Ancient Christian sources identified the burial place of the prophet Zechariah in the village of Zechariah, and noted that his place of burial was discovered in 415 CE. The researchers believe that in light of an analysis of the Christian sources, including the Madaba Map, the church at Hirbet Madras is a memorial church designed to mark the tomb of the prophet Zechariah. This issue will be examined and studied in the near future.
For the past month the Israel Antiquities Authority has been engaged in uncovering the magnificent structure, unraveling its secrets and preserving the mosaic floors. In the coming days the spectacular mosaics will be covered and the planning process will begin for the conservation of the site and its future presentation to the public, as one of the sites selected to be included within the framework of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's national heritage project.
There were actually two prophets named Zechariah in the Bible. The first lived in the ninth century BCE and his martyrdom is described in 2 Chronicles 24:20-22:
[20] Then the Spirit of God took possession of Zechari'ah the son of Jehoi'ada the priest; and he stood above the people, and said to them, "Thus says God, `Why do you transgress the commandments of the LORD, so that you cannot prosper? Because you have forsaken the LORD, he has forsaken you.'"The second Zechariah, son of Berechiah son of Iddo, lived in the late sixth century BCE, prophesied around 520, and left us the first eight chapters of the Book of Zechariah.
[21] But they conspired against him, and by command of the king they stoned him with stones in the court of the house of the LORD.
[22] Thus Jo'ash the king did not remember the kindness which Jehoi'ada, Zechari'ah's father, had shown him, but killed his son. And when he was dying, he said, "May the LORD see and avenge!"
[23] (RSV)
There are traditional tombs of both Zechariahs in the vicinity of the Mount of Olives. The late-antique Old Testament Pseudepigraphon The Lives of the Prophets has legendary accounts of the lives, deaths, and burials of both as well. Unfortunately, no translation seems to be online. But you can find one in volume 2 of the Charlesworth Old Testament Pseudepigrapha volumes.
The IAA press release does not make clear which Zechariah's tomb may be at this site at Hirbet Madras. There has traditionally been some confusion between the two prophets; for example Matthew 23:35 conflates them.
Remember, at most this discovery means that Byzantine Christians built a church on some Jewish ruins that went back to the Second Temple Period, perhaps because they had a tradition that those ruins were of the tomb of a prophet Zechariah. We're a long way from any confidence that the ruins are actually of a tomb of a prophet by that name.
Still—and this is worth emphasizing—the discoveries are intrinsically important for what they can tell us about Byzantine Christianity and early Judaism, whether or not they have any real connection with a biblical character.
UPDATE (11 February): More here.
Wednesday, February 02, 2011
Latest from Zahi Hawass
ZAHI HAWASS has posted another update on Egyptian antiquities. It's undated, but seems to come from yesterday morning. But other reports, such as this one from Arutz Sheva, indicate that the situation is worse than the optimistic picture he presents. I hope Dr. Hawass has the better information.
Remember, for the most up-to-date information on the state of Egyptian antiquities during this crisis, see Andie Byrnes's Egyptology Blog.
Remember, for the most up-to-date information on the state of Egyptian antiquities during this crisis, see Andie Byrnes's Egyptology Blog.
Congratulations to Eugene Ulrich
CONGRATULATIONS TO EUGENE ULRICH, who has received NEH funding for his work on the Dead Sea Scrolls:
Professors receive fellowshipsCongratulations also to the second Notre Dame recipient, Professor Thomas F. X. Noble, who received funding for his work on medieval perceptions of Rome.
By Tori Roeck (The Observer)
News Writer
Published: Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Updated: Wednesday, February 2, 2011 00:02
Two Notre Dame professors recently received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) to pursue their scholarly work next year, increasing the University's record number of NEH fellowships to 44 in the last 12 years.
Notre Dame has earned more NEH fellowships since 1999 than any other university in the country, according to a University press release. The University of Michigan earned 35 NEH fellowships and Harvard earned 26.
Notre Dame theology professor Eugene Ulrich received a fellowship this year in Ancient Languages to pursue his book, "The Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls," a compilation of his previous work on the topic.
"The Dead Sea Scrolls … open up a period that we had lost sight of, a period that had just been lost to history," Ulrich said. "Which is part of the period of the composition of the Scriptures."
Ulrich's career has been focused on exploring this era through the scrolls, and therefore gaining a greater appreciation for and understanding of the Biblical texts.
His work began as a graduate student at Harvard under Frank Cross, one of the two original American editors of the Dead Sea Scrolls. His dissertation became an analysis of one of the major scrolls.
"It was being in the right place at the right time," Ulrich said.
Ulrich's first NEH fellowship in 1977 enabled him to publish one of the scrolls, leading to a lifetime of research pertaining to these documents. When the other editor, Monsignor Patrick Skehan of Catholic University of America, died, he left his life's work to Ulrich because he was so impressed with his research.
"This coming year will be my 39th year of teaching here," Ulrich said, "and 21 of those years, I have had NEH funding. They were very interested in the publication of the scrolls."
Ulrich's upcoming work expands on a book he published last year, "The Biblical Qumran Scrolls: Transcriptions and Textual Variants," which includes all of the text from the Biblical Scrolls, but makes it more accessible.
"After going through scroll after scroll after scroll and seeing different surprises here, different surprises there, what I'm doing now is synthesizing all that and putting it into one monograph so that you can get in one book a clear explanation and description of how the Bible came to be the way it is," Ulrich said.
[...]
David Halperin interviewed about UFOs etc.
DAVID HALPERIN is interviewed in a UFO-related blog in the Sarasota Herald Tribune about his life experiences that led to his scholarly research on Ezekiel's merkavah, merkavah mysticism, and accounts of UFO abduction, as well as his recently published novel, Journal of a UFO Investigator. Excerpt:
As for the supposed Jerusalem UFO footage in the interview, forgive me, but it makes me think of the UFO abduction scene in The Life of Brian.
Before long, young Halperin was writing letters to USAF officers with Project Blue Book, conducting futile field investigations of local UFO reports, and feeling “like a perpetual outsider, like I was different and apart from everyone else.” The journey led him to explore his Jewish ethnicity, to the ancient Hebrew texts, particularly the Old Testament, where Ezekiel’s fabled wheels were preceded by a “whirlwind … coming out of the north, a great cloud with raging fire engulfing itself.” Remembers Halperin, “It struck me, as a little kid, as something exceedingly spooky.”Background here. His dissertation was actually about merkavah-related passages in the rabbinic texts and was published as his first book. The book on Ezekiel came later (see background link).
Halperin’s quest for clarity would produce a dissertation on the prophet Ezekiel. What followed was an adventure in the scholarship of religion and mythology, numerous trips to Israel — where he lived for more than two years — and ultimately a realization: “What UFOs were there for was to give me a mirror to work out my anxiety of my mother’s slow dying. And when belief lost its function, I gradually lost interest in UFOs. Once you lose faith in something that may be potentially important in these accounts, they nevertheless become extremely dull.”
So last month, all these decades later, Halperin produced his first novel, Journal of a UFO Investigator, a somewhat autobiographical fantasy which is receiving critical acclaim. But the irony of his conversion from “believer” to “skeptic” is not lost upon him.
As for the supposed Jerusalem UFO footage in the interview, forgive me, but it makes me think of the UFO abduction scene in The Life of Brian.
DSS conference in memory of Alan Crown
DEAD SEA SCROLLS CONFERENCE in Australia in honor of the late Alan Crown (from the Agade list):
From Shani Tzoref (s.tzoref@gmail.com):
================================
Department of Hebrew, Biblical, and Jewish Studies
Dead Sea Scrolls Conference in Memory of Emeritus Professor Alan Crown
CALL FOR PAPERS
November 1-2, 2011
In memory of the late Emeritus Professor Alan Crown, the University of Sydney is convening a conference on the Dead Sea Scrolls to be held November 1-2, 2011. The occasion will also mark the purchase of the facsimile edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls by Fisher Library, an acquisition that came about at the initiative of Emeritus Professor Crown. (See http://www.facsimile-editions.com/en/ds/)
Papers exploring any aspect of the Dead Sea Scrolls are welcome. Priority consideration will be given to papers that address those scrolls that are included in the facsimile edition, that is, the first 7 scrolls from Qumran Cave 1, currently at the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem, and the texts of Testimonia (4Q175), Pesher Isaiahb (4Q162), and Qohelet (4Q109)
Length of presentation: 30 minutes
Deadline for proposals: All abstracts and participation forms must arrive by 15 May via email as a Word document addressed to Associate Professor Ian Young ian.young@sydney.edu.au. Notification of acceptance of papers will be sent by email no later than 1 July 2011. Submissions must include author’s name, postal and email address, institutional affiliation, abstract of the paper to be presented and short biographical note. The abstract must be 200-300 words and the biographical note no more than 50 words.
This conference is being held in conjunction with the Symposium being held on 1 November 2011:
University of Sydney - Israel Research Partnership Forum:
Shared Challenges, Future Solutions
An exhibition of the facsimile edition and other rare items of Judaica held by the Fisher Library at the University of Sydney will be displayed in conjunction with the conference.
Postgraduate conference at the University of St Andrews
CONFERENCE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ST ANDREWS:
The four keynote speakers are Prof. Kristin De Troyer, Prof. N. T. Wright, Dr. Mark W. Elliott, and myself. I will be speaking about lost books quoted in the Bible. The call for papers is now open.The 1st St Andrews Graduate Conference for Biblical and Early Christian Studies: Authoritative Texts and Reception History.
15-16 June 2011
With an emphasis on textual reception history, the first St Andrews Graduate Conference for Biblical and Early Christian Studies is aimed at graduate students and early career scholars. Contributors are welcomed from the following fields of research: Old Testament / Hebrew Bible, Pseudepigrapha, Dead Sea Scrolls, New Testament and Early Christianity
January Biblioblog Top 50 and Top 10
THE BIBLIOBLOG TOP 50, with a separate top 10, has been published for January.
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Alex Joffe on Egypt and repatriation of antiquities
ALEX JOFFE on why recent events in Egypt show that repatriation of antiquities isn't always good idea:
UPDATE (via Dorothy Lobel King on FB): Lebanon Star: Looters pillage Egyptian antiquities warehouses.
Egypt's Antiquities Fall Victim to the MobVia Christopher Rollston on Facebook. Related post on another Joffe essay (about the Iraqi Jewish archive) here. I'll keep saying it: antiquities are the heritage of humanity and should be kept where they are safest and best cared for. Nationalist considerations are secondary.
By ALEX JOFFE (WSJ)
When Zahi Hawass, the secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, came to work at the Egyptian Museum on Saturday, he found that looters had broken in and beheaded two mummies—possibly Tutankhamun's grandparents—and looted the ticket booth. Reports indicate that middle-class Egyptians, the tourism police and later the military secured the museum. But now it appears that many other museum's and storehouses have been looted, along with archaeological sites. A vast, impoverished underclass seems less taken with either the nationalist narrative of Egyptian greatness that stretches back to the pharaohs, or the intrinsic value of antiquities for all humanity, and more intrigued by the possibility of gold and other loot. For his part, Mr. Hawass has now been appointed state minister for antiquities by President Hosni Mubarak.
These events make Mr. Hawass's quest to return all Egyptian objects to Egypt misguided or at least poorly timed. Last week he again demanded the return of the bust of Nefertiti from Berlin. The Rosetta Stone in the British Museum has long been on Mr. Hawass's wish list, along with the Zodiac Ceiling in the Louvre and statues in Boston's Museum of Fine Arts and museums in Hildesheim, Germany, and Turin, Italy. And a few weeks back he complained bitterly that the obelisk known as Cleopatra's Needle, a gift to the U.S. from the Khedive of Egypt that has graced Central Park since 1881, was in poor condition and might have to be reclaimed. He has made similar demands for the repatriation of Egyptian artifacts around the world, whether purchased, donated or stolen. But can Egypt even look after what it has? This question is now out in the open.
[...]
UPDATE (via Dorothy Lobel King on FB): Lebanon Star: Looters pillage Egyptian antiquities warehouses.
Talmud: The Back Story
TALMUD: THE BACK STORY is a popular overview of the current state of Talmudic studies, published in Jewish Ideas Daily by Yehudah Mirsky. It focuses on the work of Shamma Friedman, but also surveys the field more broadly. Excerpt from the conclusion:
(HT Shai Secunda)
UPDATE: Note also the two articles by Shamma Friedman which can be downloaded as pdf files from the "Relevant Links" box on the same page.
Though much of the work by Friedman and his students is perforce technical, its significance extends beyond academic confines and has already begun to reshape historical understandings. (Thus, Jeffrey Rubenstein has shown that Friedman and Halivni's efforts yield a more coherent picture of the evolution of the great Babylonian yeshivas.) Friedman's work has also come to be a reference point for numerous other studies of the talmudic text itself, and modified versions of it have been adopted for Talmud studies in Israeli schools.Read it all.
Steering a middle course between Orthodox stances that place the Talmud outside of history and a postmodern skepticism that argues against the ability to say anything about its history at all, Friedman's massive scholarship yields a complex picture: a picture of hosts of talmudic sages consciously and ceaselessly reinterpreting earlier traditions in order to achieve coherent teachings to guide them in the present.
This portrait of rabbinic culture begets, in turn, a powerful challenge. Modern intellectual integrity having yielded a restless scenario of fragmentary ancient texts being worked and reworked into the sources we have today, can we somehow put the pieces back together into a coherent and compelling story? And will that story reflect not only the work of the rabbinic interpreters but also the original texts and traditions, by now lost to us, that they were trying, through their editing, to maintain?
The answer is yes, but it will be a different story, in ways both stranger and more familiar: a story of internal ferment and spiritual survival in the face of profound uncertainty.
(HT Shai Secunda)
UPDATE: Note also the two articles by Shamma Friedman which can be downloaded as pdf files from the "Relevant Links" box on the same page.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Maaloula Seeking to Join World Heritage List
ARAMAIC WATCH:
Syria: Maaloula Seeking to Join World Heritage ListMore on Maaloula (Ma'aloula, Malula) here and follow the many links back. It seems that the Syrian government may be recovering from its massive spasm of lameness chronicled in the background links — although the Aramaic Institute is not mentioned explicitly.
By H. Zain (Global Arab Network)
Sunday, 30 January 2011 13:29
Syria (Damascus) - A Workshop on Restoration Project of the old city of Maaloula and expanding local participation was held in Maaloula city, 56 kms to the northeast of Damascus.
Governor of Damascus Countryside Zahed Haj Moussa said Maaloula restoration project comes in the framework of the government interest in this city because it possesses all components and potentials qualifying it to enter the World Heritage List.
[...]
Maaloula is one of the most important archeological, religious and tourists destinations in Syria where most of the sites date back to the Roman and Byzantine eras.
Maaloula in the Syriac language means the high place where the fresh air blows.
The city is distinguished by its unique architectural style as its houses were built on the versant of the mountain, and connected with each others through narrow alleys.
The Aramaic language, the language spoken by Jesus Christ, is still spoken by the Muslim and Christian inhabitants of the city along with the Arabic language.
Maaloula encompasses various monasteries such as Mar Sarkis and Mar Thecla which embraces the remains of St. Taqla (Thecla); daughter of one of Seleucid princes, and pupil of St. Paul.
[...]
Talmon obituary at SBL Forum
AN OBITUARY FOR SHEMARYAHU TALMON has been posted at the SBL Forum.
Shemaryahu Talmon (1920–2010)
by Jonathan Ben-Dov
Professor Shemaryahu Talmon, a renowned scholar, an acclaimed leader, and a beloved family man, passed away in the month of Tevet 5771 (December 2010) at the age of 90. He was Professor Emeritus of Bible at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, serving in the Bible department between the years 1957 and 1988, and a winner of the Israel Prize for Biblical Studies in 1997. Among his many scholarly and public achievements, one may count the establishment and management of the Hebrew University Bible Project, the editing of scrolls from Masada and Qumran, key publications in the field of the biblical text, literature, and calendar, as well as life-long involvement in Jewish-Christian dialogue, and active management of various academic bodies in Israel and abroad.
Several months before he passed away, a group of colleagues and friends assembled at the Hebrew University Bible Project to celebrate Shemaryahu’s ninetieth birthday. He acted like he always did, combining sharp academic rigor with a healthy sense of humor, sharing his old memories with a smile, occasionally inserting a witty sting at something from the old days. This memory will live on among his close friends and colleagues.
[...]
Zahi Hawas reports on Egyptian antiquities
ZAHI HAWASS, Secretary General, The Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt, reports on his blog on The Situation in Egyptian Antiquities Today. There is no time stamp, but it seems to have been posted on Sunday. Recap of the Cairo Museum story, plus reports of more looting. But many museums seem now to have secured their contents.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Nabatean inscription from 2000 BCE? No.
NABATEAN (NABATAEAN) WRITING on a basalt column excavated in Syria?
Via Explorator 13.41.
UPDATE (31 January): The Nabatean city of Bosra was in Syria in the vicinity of Daraa, which is further support for my understanding of the find.
Syria (Daraa) – A basaltic-stone column was discovered on Sunday during a project aimed at moving the archaeological and architecture items to the National Museum of Daraa.Any writing from 2000 BCE would be in cuneiform, not Nabatean, and would be an unusual and highly noteworthy find. The photo is terrible, but I don't see anything on it that looks like cuneiform. My guess is that SANA misunderstood and the column is 2000 years old and bears a Nabatean (alphabetic Aramaic) inscription.
The column's height is 1, 5 meters, standing on a square base.
Secretary of Daraa National Museum Ayham al-Zoubi told SANA that the column dates back to 2000 BC, and contains ornamentations and Nabataean writings.
[...]
Via Explorator 13.41.
UPDATE (31 January): The Nabatean city of Bosra was in Syria in the vicinity of Daraa, which is further support for my understanding of the find.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Current status of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo
EGYPT: I'm following the situation as closely as I can while needing to do other things. This AP article sums up just about everything I've been able to find about the status of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
Briefly: a major government building across the street from the museum was torched and, last I heard, was still burning. The museum itself has not, as far as I can find out, been damaged by the fire. Last night some young men among the protesters blocked the Museum entrance with a human chain until army forces could arrive and secure the building, which it seems they have now done. There was nevertheless some looting: at least two mummies were destroyed—no word on which ones. An AP reporter heard one of the protesters protecting the museum shout to the crowd "We are not like Baghdad." (The article has been updated and I can't find a link right now.) Those are some brave and praiseworthy young men.
I visited the Egyptian Museum in 1985. (Website currently down, courtesy of the Mubarak government.) The Tutankhamun treasures are the best known artifacts there, but there is much much more. For example, I recall seeing the Merneptah Stele and some Amarna letters.
The best source for up-to-date information on the situation in Egypt seems to be Al Jazeera, whose English website is live-streaming events from the scene as they happen.
I send the Egyptian people every good wish for success in their struggle for a free society.
UPDATE: This Flikr photostream has a photo of the human shields with arms linked surrounding the Museum. Click on the "Newer" button above the photo on the right for several pictures of the damage inside the museum. (Via Chuck Jones on Facebook.)
UPDATE (30 January): The latest report is that the heads of two mummies (again, no word on which ones) were torn off and ten small items were damaged, this by nine looters who were caught and arrested. The earlier report also said that the gift shop of the Museum was looted. Bad, but would have been much worse if not for the regular people who, at considerable risk to themselves, protected the museum.
UPDATE: Those ten damaged artifacts are starting to sound more important. (HT reader Joe Slater).
UPDATE: Continuously updated news on the fate of Egyptian museums and antiquities can be found at the Egyptology News blog. Via a supplement to this week's Explorator.
Briefly: a major government building across the street from the museum was torched and, last I heard, was still burning. The museum itself has not, as far as I can find out, been damaged by the fire. Last night some young men among the protesters blocked the Museum entrance with a human chain until army forces could arrive and secure the building, which it seems they have now done. There was nevertheless some looting: at least two mummies were destroyed—no word on which ones. An AP reporter heard one of the protesters protecting the museum shout to the crowd "We are not like Baghdad." (The article has been updated and I can't find a link right now.) Those are some brave and praiseworthy young men.
I visited the Egyptian Museum in 1985. (Website currently down, courtesy of the Mubarak government.) The Tutankhamun treasures are the best known artifacts there, but there is much much more. For example, I recall seeing the Merneptah Stele and some Amarna letters.
The best source for up-to-date information on the situation in Egypt seems to be Al Jazeera, whose English website is live-streaming events from the scene as they happen.
I send the Egyptian people every good wish for success in their struggle for a free society.
UPDATE: This Flikr photostream has a photo of the human shields with arms linked surrounding the Museum. Click on the "Newer" button above the photo on the right for several pictures of the damage inside the museum. (Via Chuck Jones on Facebook.)
UPDATE (30 January): The latest report is that the heads of two mummies (again, no word on which ones) were torn off and ten small items were damaged, this by nine looters who were caught and arrested. The earlier report also said that the gift shop of the Museum was looted. Bad, but would have been much worse if not for the regular people who, at considerable risk to themselves, protected the museum.
UPDATE: Those ten damaged artifacts are starting to sound more important. (HT reader Joe Slater).
UPDATE: Continuously updated news on the fate of Egyptian museums and antiquities can be found at the Egyptology News blog. Via a supplement to this week's Explorator.
Friday, January 28, 2011
David Halperin, Journal of a UFO Investigator
NEW NOVEL:
David Halperin wrote some of the most innovative and thought-provoking research on early Jewish (merkavah) mysticism published in the late twentieth century. His books include The Merkaba in Rabbinic Literature (1980), Faces of the Chariot: early Jewish responses to Ezekiel's vision (1988), and Seeking Ezekiel: text and psychology (1993). He has also published interesting work on the psychology behind UFO abduction experiences.
Crossing UFOs and sacred texts in a whodunitThis I must read.
By Jonathan Kirsch (JewishJournal.com)
Starting with its beguiling title, “Journal of a UFO Investigator” by David Halperin (Viking, $25.95) is an enchantment from beginning to end, a coming-of-age story that is also a kind of whodunit and, above all, an eerie adventure tale set in the subculture of flying saucers and space creatures.
Most intriguing of all, however, is the fact the David Halperin brings to his first novel everything he has learned about myth and legend over a long career as a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina. Halperin, for example, has written extensively about the visions of Ezekiel, whose description of fiery wheels has long been interpreted as an account of an early visitation by a spaceship.
The story that Halperin tells opens on the day in 1966 when 13-year-old Danny Shapiro reports a sighting to his friends and fellow adolescent “UFO investigators.” The search for a plausible explanation draws young Danny into a mysterious text, an even more mysterious death, and then into what appears to be a deadly pursuit across time and space. “Riddles chased mysteries, were chased by enigmas, around and around my brain,” is how young Danny explains it all to himself.
[...]
David Halperin wrote some of the most innovative and thought-provoking research on early Jewish (merkavah) mysticism published in the late twentieth century. His books include The Merkaba in Rabbinic Literature (1980), Faces of the Chariot: early Jewish responses to Ezekiel's vision (1988), and Seeking Ezekiel: text and psychology (1993). He has also published interesting work on the psychology behind UFO abduction experiences.
BC exhibit: Dura-Europos: Crossroads of Antiquity
EXHIBITION:
McMullen Museum Presents "Dura-Europos: Crossroads of Antiquity": Feb. 5 – June 5Follow the link for much more.
Treasures on Display, Excavated from Ancient Multicultural City,
Altered Understanding of Religious Practice in Late Antiquity
CHESTNUT HILL, MA (1-11) — The McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College is the exclusive venue for Dura-Europos: Crossroads of Antiquity, which showcases well-preserved Roman artifacts excavated in the 1920s and 1930s from the ancient city Dura-Europos, located in the desert of modern-day Syria high above the Euphrates River. Organized by the McMullen and the Yale University Art Gallery, it is on display from February 5 through June 5, 2011.
[...]
Symposium: Language in the Study of Ancient Judaism and Christianity
WILLIAM & MARY SYMPOSIUM:
Ad fontes: Language in the Study of Ancient Judaism and ChristianityDetails at the link
Starts: February 9, 2011 at 4:00 PM
Ends: February 9, 2011 at 6:00 PM
Location: Andrews 101 (Newman Lecture Hall)
Contact: Michael Daise
Summary
A symposium on the importance of ancient languages for the understanding of ancient Judaism and early Christianity, co-sponsored by the Reves Center for International Studies.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Leonard Greenspoon lecturing on Codex Sinaiticus
LEONARD GREENSPOON is lecturing on the Codex Sinaiticus in Omaha.
Jewish-Christian Encounters in the First Centuries CE at TU
SUMMER PROGRAM AT TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY:
(HT Shai Secunda)
For registration information follow the link above.Jewish-Christian Encounters
Tel Aviv University
Advanced Summer Program for the Study of
Jewish-Christian Encounters in the First Centuries CE
The Advanced Summer program for the Study of Jewish-Christian Encounters in the First Centuries CE, under the auspices of the Religious Studies program in Tel Aviv University, is a 6 week English-language program, designed for advanced students (M.A., M.Div., M.A.R, Ph.D., etc.) in ancient Judaism and early Christianity from the United States and Europe. With the guidance of its international academic board of renowned scholars, the program aims is to build bridges between these disciplines, and thus to facilitate interdisciplinary work.
The program will provide English-speaking students with basic scholarly skills in the Hebrew language and in rabbinic literature and culture. It will expose them to current scholarship and to leading Israeli scholars in these fields, as well as to various archeological sites.
The summer program will offer traditional classroom instruction as well as scholarly day tours to ancient Jewish and Christian sites. It will provide the equivalent of two American academic courses in the English language.
1. A Hebrew course. The course will be offered in two levels (depending on enrollment):1. Hebrew for beginners. Intended for students with no Hebrew background.2. An introductory course entitled "Jewish-Christian encounters". The course will employ philological, historical and philosophical tools to examine various texts, concepts, and cultural realia of Talmudic times in the land of Israel. The course will integrate visits to key locations in the Galilee and Jerusalem, as well as to various archeological digs, and will include a lecture series with leading scholars.
2. Readings in rabbinic literature. Intended for students with some background in Hebrew (biblical or modern).
In addition, a non-credit course entitled "Talmud and Theology" will examine Talmudic discussions that engage key theological themes, and explore their relevance for contemporary Jewish thought and practice.
(HT Shai Secunda)
More on China's new interest in Judaism
MORE ON CHINA'S NEW INTEREST IN JUDAISM:
The Chinese Discover Jews and Israel and Can’t Seem To Get EnoughRelated post here. This current article puts the earlier one in a less creepy context.
Chinese Scholars On a Visit to Israel Say Their People Want To Know ‘What the Jewish Nation Is All About’
By Nathan Jeffay (The Forward)
Published January 26, 2011, issue of February 04, 2011.
Tel Aviv — Back in 1991 Chen Yiyi was, as he puts it, a “bored” law student at Peking University. At the time, China was in the process of formalizing relations with Israel, and the Chinese Education Ministry and Israel’s Foreign Ministry selected his university as the site of China’s first Hebrew course taught by visiting Israeli teachers. When the class fell short of its eight-student enrollment target, Chen was persuaded to sign up to boost its numbers.
Little did Chen know at the time that he was embarking on a career in what would soon be a burgeoning field within Chinese academia: Jewish studies.
Chen, who is now director of Peking University’s Institute of Hebrew and Jewish Studies, teaches a Bible course at his school that is billed as a class in Tanach, using the Hebrew word for the Bible and drawing upon Jewish interpretations. Now in its eighth year, the class can accommodate a maximum of 200 students each session, but it regularly has 500 students sign up.
“People see it that the best students of the best university need to know about the cornerstones of other civilizations, and the cornerstone is Tanach,” Chen said.
Chen — whose accomplishments include translating the Israeli novelist A.B. Yehoshua into Chinese — was part of a delegation of 10 Chinese scholars of Jewish studies who visited Israel for a weeklong study tour in mid-January. The academics brought with them stories of their bursting-at-the-seams lecture halls and classes where Tanach, Hebrew and even Aramaic are studied, despite the fact that the field of Jewish studies essentially didn’t even exist in China 20 years ago.
[...]
In Song’s telling, the curiosity reflects “Judeophilia” rather than “Judeophobia.” As the Chinese nation has embarked on a process of economic and technological advancement, it looks upon Jews, another ancient people that seems to have excelled in this area while maintaining a distinctive identity, as a “model it can employ to modernize itself,” he explained.
Song said that Judaism is perceived by Chinese people as being part of the foundation of Western civilization. As a result, they see Judaism as synonymous with “Western,” and many take the view that to learn about the West, one should become familiar with Judaism.
Indeed, Song observed that Judaism is not just seen as Western, it is seen as the best of the West. In China, he said, many erroneously believe that John Rockefeller and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart were Jewish. “Everything that is successful, smart and rich is regarded as Jewish,” he said.
While the most popular Jewish subjects in China are those related to Jews in finance and contemporary Jewry, some Chinese want to go back to basics and learn about scripture. The study of the Bible has never been particularly popular in China, where the dominant faiths have been Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism, and where religion was repressed by the communist authorities. In today’s era of openness, however, it is the focus of much curiosity.
Since Christianity and Judaism are both regarded as foreign faiths, there is no reason that studying the Bible through the Christian tradition would necessarily seem more natural than through the Jewish tradition. And even among Chinese Christians there is an interest in studying Judaism. Many Jewish studies students are Christians who “think that they could do with understanding Judaism to understand Christianity,” Song said.
[...]
Jerusalem tunnel now open, Palestinians still unhappy
TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:
New Jerusalem tunnel will damage Temple Mount, Palestinians sayBackground here (immediately preceding post).
Despite Israeli claims to the contrary, parts of tunnel pass just meters from the Western Wall.
By Yair Ettinger and Nir Hasson (Haaretz)
The tunnel leading from the City of David in Silwan to beneath the walls of Jerusalem's Old City, excavated by the Israel Antiquities Authority and announced to media fanfare Sunday, is drawing fire from Palestinians who claim it will damage the Temple Mount.
Parts of the tunnel come within just a few meters of the Western Wall, contrary to Antiquities Authority claims yesterday, but officials stress that the religiously sensitive parts of the tunnel were not dug by the agency. They were dug out many years ago, and were merely reexposed by the project, they say.
Concerns about possible riots in East Jerusalem yesterday over the tunnel turned out to be unfounded, and the public debut of the Second-Temple era passageway went off without a hitch.
[...]
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
News on and around the Temple Mount
TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:
First, the Art Daily has a piece summarizing the recently completed work in and around the Old City, and near, but not on or under, the Temple Mount:
Second, what is this about?
First, the Art Daily has a piece summarizing the recently completed work in and around the Old City, and near, but not on or under, the Temple Mount:
Clearing Work Completed by Israel Antiquities Authority on a Second Temple Period Water ChannelBackground here. An earlier post on that paved road is here.
JERUSALEM.- Clearing work has been completed on a Second Temple Period water channel in excavations being conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority in the City of David located within the Jerusalem Walls National Park. The excavations are being run in conjunction with the Israel Nature & Parks Authority, under the auspices of Professor Ronny Reich and Eli Shukron from the Israel Antiquities Authority.
For the last seven years, researchers from the Israel Antiquities Authority have been involved in the removal of large amounts of debris that have accumulated in the largest water channel from the Second Temple period. The route of this channel follows that of the Tyropoeon Valley. The channel is located beneath the main paved and stepped road which traversed Jerusalem in those days. The road passed next to the Western Wall in the north and down to the Siloam Pool in the southern portion of the City of David. At no point, does the route of either the road or channel pass beneath the Temple Mount.
Two parts were uncovered and previously known:
* The northern part was discovered in 1867 by the British explorer Charles Warren beneath the ancient paved road next to “Robinson’s Arch”. This part, located in the Davidson Center Archeological Park, was explored again by Professor B. Mazar (1968-75), and Ronny Reich & Billig (1994-96).
* The southern part was discovered by the archaeologists Bliss & Dickey (1894-1897) next to the Siloam Pool at the southernmost tip of the City of David, approximately 600 meters south of the Davidson Center Archeological Park.
[...]
The central and monumental discovery made here is the paved road which lies above the water channel which was discovered. It is on this road that residents of Jerusalem and pilgrims walked in ancient times. Only a few individual sections of this road have been revealed throughout its route. However, now, the water channel that runs beneath it has been uncovered in its entirety (approximately 600 meters). “There is evidence from this channel that city leaders from two thousands years ago, took strides to ensure the welfare of the city’s residents and the pilgrims who visited. In ancient times the channel carried mainly rain water that collected in the city streets so as not to accumulate and inconvenience the public,” adds Professor Reich. Aspects of the channel point to the monumental investment that went into its construction. In the northern part it is carved into the bedrock and covered with an arched stone dome along its length, while further south it is built and covered with flat slabs of stone.
[...]
Second, what is this about?
Huge Jordanian Generators Sighted on Temple MountMore on the Waqf's illicit excavations on the Temple Mount here and here.
by Gil Ronen and Rachel Sylvetsky (Arutz Sheva)
Huge electricity generators donated by the government of Jordan were brought into the Temple Mount Tuesday. A group led by Likud's Moshe Feiglin documented the entry of the generators into the Mount.
Sources in the Jerusalem Municipality's Supervision Department told the Temple Heritage Fund that the municipality had not given permission to bring in the generators and that they were informed of the matter by Avi Roif, Commander of the Old City Police. The municipality sources were said to be outraged at Roif for allowing the generators' entry despite his not not being authorized to do so.
It is not clear to what use the generators will be put. The Wakf has in the past conducted unauthorized digging and construction activity on the Mount, apparently in order to obliterateany archaeological vestiges of Jewish presence there. The heavy generators themselves might damage the holy site and they might be used to illuminate and provide energy for projects about which Israel has not been informed.
[...]
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
New Jesus-apocryphon fragment
NEW JESUS-APOCRYPHON FRAGMENT: Alin Suciu reports on An Unknown “Apocryphal” Text From the White Monastery.
(Via What's New in Papyrology.)
(Via What's New in Papyrology.)
Alex Joffe on the Iraqi Jewish archive
IRAQI JEWISH ARCHIVE WATCH: Alex Joffe has an editorial on the fate of the Iraqi Jewish archive in Jewish Ideas Daily. Excerpt:
By what right should a society that barely tolerated and then expelled its Jews, and that loathes and forbids the presence of Jews now, be given 27 cases of Jewish documents and books? Saad Eskander, the director of the Iraq National Library and Archives, has stated one rationale: "Iraqis must know that we are a diverse people, with different traditions, different religions, and we need to accept this diversity . . . [and] that Baghdad was always multiethnic." A glance at the headlines from Iraq suggests that such noble aspirations are increasingly belied by reality.As I have said many times before, the standard should be that ancient artifacts are the heritage of humanity and they should be kept where they are safest and best cared for. I have commented on the case of the Iraqi Jewish archive (whose fate PaleoJudaica has been following closely since 2003) here, with links to earlier, more extensive comments. See also the case of the political and legal controversy over confiscating the Persepolis Fortification Archive as compensation for terrorism here and follow the links.
Besides, should the materials be returned to Iraq, what assurances are there that anyone, much less Jews, will have access to them? What assurances that the materials will be preserved at all? Countless artifacts from Israeli excavations in Sinai were returned to Egypt as part of the 1979 peace agreement. No one knows their fate, but rumors have long circulated that they were simply dumped alongside the road. Similar proposals have been made regarding artifacts, even demonstrably Jewish ones, excavated in the West Bank, which Israel is being urged to turn over to the Palestinian Authority as a confidence-building measure. Intellectuals, who in other settings deplore "politicization" of the past, are usually at the forefront of such seemingly therapeutic schemes.
Free societies, with their competing interests and concerns, do a mixed but on the whole creditable job of maintaining their pasts. Unfree societies, thanks to corruption and racism, typically do a very poor job, and when they do make an effort, as in Iraq under Saddam, it is in furtherance of the regime's dictatorial and repressive aims.
International refugee law provides for "non-refoulment": that is, refugees must not be returned to a situation where they would be put in jeopardy. Might a similar principle be considered for antiquities? Could it be asserted that unfree states forfeit their claims to antiquities, particularly those originating with minorities they have expunged or exterminated, and against whom they discriminate in the present? The legal dimensions remain to be explored; in the meantime, like many of the Jews who created it, the Iraqi Jewish Archive lingers in exile—so far, thankfully, in a free country.
Newly uncovered tunnel passes under Old City walls
TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH:
Newly uncovered tunnel passes under Old City walls(Via Joseph I. Lauer.) The story is also covered by The Israel Project here and the AFP here. Some past PaleoJudaica posts dealing with the tunnel project are here and here.
Silwan residents say dig damages homes.
By Nir Hasson (Haaretz)
The Israel Antiquities Authority has completed an archaeological dig of a tunnel that will enable visitors to cross under the walls of Jerusalem's Old City, not far from the Temple Mount.
The tunnel, which was uncovered during excavations conducted over the past few months, was formerly used for drainage and dates back to the Second Temple. It links the City of David in Silwan with the Archaeological Park & Davidson Center, which is located near the Western Wall.
The Antiquities Authority stressed that the newly uncovered tunnel does not come near the Temple Mount and that it has no plans to dig in that direction.
The digging had been going on for seven years and was delayed for about a year by order of the High Court of Justice, after Silwan residents filed a petition claiming the dig was damaging their homes.
In September 2009, Supreme Court Justice Edna Arbel rejected the petition and lifted the halt on the dig. Since then, work has been stepped up and in recent weeks the segment of the tunnel between the City of David and the Davidson Center was completed.
[...]
Monday, January 24, 2011
Eilat Mazar interviewed in The Trumpet
ISRAELI ARCHAEOLOGIST EILAT MAZAR is interviewed in a long piece in The Trumpet: Using the Bible as Her Guide. The Trumpet is a conservative Evangelical publication and the interview is framed accordingly. But the positions it attributes to Dr. Mazar do not seem inconsistent with what I've heard her say elsewhere. Excerpt:
On another note, this is pretty cool:
When David conquered the Jebusite city around 1000 b.c. he took up residence in the stronghold—the Jebusite fortress at the north end of the city. According to 2 Samuel 5:9, he then began to build up the area around Millo and inward. The New International Version says David “built up the area around it, from the supporting terraces inward.” So David set out to enlarge the city limits—first concentrating on a royal palace. The Bible says King David’s palace was partially built by workers sent to him by the Phoenician king of Tyre as a gesture of friendship (verse 11). “And David went on, and grew great, and the Lord God of hosts was with him” (verse 10).Past PaleoJudaica posts on her large stone structure in the City of David include this, this, and this. This is an interesting story and she is right to be pleased that she found a large tenth-century building where she thought there would be one. At the same time, this is a long way from our being able to assign the building to King David. We would need first to have full published reports of all the tenth century material excavated in the building, then to place the data fully into the context of what we know about the tenth century from elsewhere. And even then, quite likely the evidence would be inconclusive. Unless, that is, we actually find epigraphic data that ties the palace directly to David. A seal of a court official that mentions him or a lapidary royal inscription on one of the walls of the building would do nicely. But I'm not holding my breath.
Near the end of David’s palace construction, the Philistines attacked. And since the new palace may not have been reinforced strongly enough to withstand the Philistine assault, verse 17 says David went down to the citadel to barricade himself within the city walls until the conflict ended. This, Dr. Mazar theorized more than 10 years ago, indicates that David’s new palace stood on higher ground than the Jebusite fortress.
She published her theory in Biblical Archaeology Review in January 1997. Under the title, “Excavate King David’s Palace,” on a two-page artist’s rendering of the ancient City of David, Mazar drew an arrow pointing at the north end of the city, underneath the caption “it’s there.” She wrote, “Careful examination of the biblical text combined with sometimes unnoticed results of modern archaeological excavations in Jerusalem enable us, I believe, to locate the site of King David’s palace. Even more exciting, it is in an area that is now available for excavation. If some regard as too speculative the hypothesis I shall put forth in this article, my reply is simply this: Let us put it to the test in the way archaeologists always try to test their theories—by excavation.”
A decade later, excavation did exactly that. In 2005, just under the surface in the northern-most region of the City of David, she found what she calls the Large Stone Structure and labeled it King David’s palace.
On another note, this is pretty cool:
Although she may be the poster child of biblical archaeology today, Dr. Eilat Mazar isn’t the first to hold the Bible in such high esteem.I met the late Professor Mazar at the Ashkelon excavation in the late 1980s and I remember a conversation or two with him which went on very similar lines.
“There is nothing new about reading the Bible to see how much of the reality can be tangible. It is a whole school that started with Robinson and later on in force with Albright, of which my grandfather considered himself to be a follower and a student,” she says.
“My grandfather” is the late professor Dr. Benjamin Mazar, a leading Israeli archaeologist in his own right. He is best known for his massive excavation at the southwestern corner of the Temple Mount, which spanned the late ’60s and the ’70s. He also served as president of the Hebrew University between the years of 1953 and 1961.
[...]
Meanwhile, Dr. Mazar worked in the City of David excavations under the direction of Dr. Yigal Shiloh. Each day after the excavations, as she worked with her grandfather, he would ask her, “What’s new at the excavation?”
“What’s new? We just discussed all the new things yesterday, so what can be so new?” she would reply.
“No, no, no; what’s new?” the professor would ask again.
“He was expecting new and fresh thinking every single day. He really pushed me. On the one hand it was quite distressing, but on the other hand it pushed me to constantly be thinking every time that I am excavating,” Mazar recounts.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
The Epic of Gilgamesh on stage
THE EPIC OF GILGAMESH ON STAGE in Brooklyn, NY:
Theater Review (NYC): Immortal: The Gilgamesh VariationsEarlier stage productions are noted here and here.
Author: Jon Sobel — Published: Jan 22, 2011 at 8:07 pm (StageMage)
The wooden staircase you climb to get to the Bushwick Starr theater has more character than some entire plays. You're rewarded for the climb—through January 30, anyway—with a strenuous, rewarding journey through the ancient Sumerian-Akkadian Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the earliest works of literature in history. Sumerian legends told of a semi-divine hero-king, Gilgamesh, who tyrannized his subjects in the city of Uruk until they pleaded with the gods for help. In response they created Enkidu, a primitive man of great strength who lived in the forest with the beasts until being seduced by a temple harlot into coming to Uruk to be a companion to Gilgamesh.
[...]
But here they are, and a fine lot too. The Forge enlisted eleven playwrights to each adapt one of the eleven main tablets for the stage. Director Gabriel Shanks, together with a solid cast and a talented production team, stitched them together into a real theatrical epic. The shifts from one playwright's voice to the next can be heard, usually subtly but now and then joltingly. As the company presumably intended, these shifts add to the effectiveness of the episodic story, offering changes in tone (elegiac and hilarious, solemn and boisterous, cerebral and physical). The program's trendy reference to the production as a "remix" is going a bit far; though it takes liberties with details of characterization and setting, in outline it hews to the story as written, and properly so. Audiences aren't terribly familiar with the Epic of Gilgamesh, which therefore doesn't seem to call for radical reinterpretation. Much of the staging here feels as if it could have been transplanted from, say, Greek drama. I suspect, though, that on a second viewing, once familiar with the story, one would better appreciate the multiple creative points of view.
[...]
Talmud to be translated into Italian
TALMUD NEWS:
Talmud to be translated into Italian
January 21, 2011
(JTA) -- The Talmud will be translated for the first time into Italian thanks to an official collaboration between the Italian government and the Italian Jewish community.
A protocol launching "Project Talmud" was signed Friday in Rome by cabinet ministers, the president of Italy's National Research Council, the president of the umbrella Union of Italian Jewish Communities (UCEI) and Rome's chief rabbi.
[...]
Is Hershel Doomed to the Lake of Fire?
ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Is Hershel [Shanks] Doomed to the Lake of Fire? Adele Yarbro Collins says no.
Well he did ask.
UPDATE: Bad link now fixed.
Well he did ask.
UPDATE: Bad link now fixed.
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Zodiac mosaics in ancient synagogues
ZODIAC MOSAICS IN ANCIENT SYNAGOGUES in the land of Israel are collected and analyzed in an excellent BAR article by Walter Zanger. It has good photographs of the mosaics and takes the reader systematically through the sites. His conclusions are also, for the most part, spot-on. Excerpt:
You can read Sefer ha-Razim in English translation by Michael A. Morgan in Sepher Ha-Razim: The Book of the Mysteries (SBLTT 25/SBLPS 11; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1983). I am currently working on a translation based on much better manuscript evidence for volume two of the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project.
What have we found? We have found seven places in Israel where Jews put zodiac wheels, Helios, the four seasons, a panel of synagogue objects, and sometimes remembrance of righteous ancestors in mosaic on the floor of their synagogues. For the record, we have never found a zodiac in a Jewish context outside of Israel, and every zodiac found in Israel was in a synagogue.I do disagree with the last point ("it left no literature"). Anyone who has worked with the Talmudic-era Hebrew magical treatise Sefer ha-Razim (The Book of the Mysteries) will not be surprised at all by the zodiac symbolism or use of pagan gods in these synagogue mosaics. The Talmudic tradition is hostile to such magical and mystical traditions (although perhaps not quite as hostile as one might expect). But the hostility is consistently couched in a way that indicates that such traditions existed in Judaism were popular enough to require refutation. Sefer ha-Razim (on which more here and here) includes a fair amount of astrological symbolism, and some of the rites involve the making of images and even the invocation of the pagan god Helios. Yet the practitioners of these rites are clearly – in their way – religious Jews. It's hard to tell how they justified the pagan influences in their own minds. I suspect they thought along the lines of the pagan gods being angels under the control of the one true God, astrology just being one set of natural laws created by that God in his universe, and magic being a perfectly appropriate technology as long as it did not involve actually worshiping anyone but the true God. In this context, the synagogue mosaics preserve fairly mild uses of the same traditions.
That fact tells us what we already knew: that these zodiacs were certainly not just decorations or pretty pictures. Nor were they attempts at astrology (predicting the future) or astronomy. The Ark, candelabrum, shofar, etc. were put in synagogues (and on tombstones, lintels, doorposts and catacombs), the most serious of places for the Jewish community. And the inscriptions on the zodiacs themselves were invariably in Hebrew, even if the common languages of the day, Aramaic or Greek were added. That is, the zodiacs were important and meant something to the people who made them. The question is: What? It is time to suggest some conclusions.
The evidence indicates that we are in the presence of a mystical Hellenistic-Byzantine Jewish tradition, a tradition that Talmudic Judaism either ignored or suppressed,29 a tradition we would not know anything about (for it left no literature) were it not for the discovery of this artwork, these symbols.30 The mosaics are in fact the literature of the movement. We need to learn how to read them.
You can read Sefer ha-Razim in English translation by Michael A. Morgan in Sepher Ha-Razim: The Book of the Mysteries (SBLTT 25/SBLPS 11; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1983). I am currently working on a translation based on much better manuscript evidence for volume two of the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project.
Friday, January 21, 2011
IDF on Epiphany celebrations at traditional site of Jesus' baptism
THE IDF reports on the successful and safe Epiphany celebrations at the traditional site of Jesus' baptism:
Holy Water Runs DeepBackground here.
20 January 2011 , 12:38
Ten thousand Christian pilgrims dipped into the Jordan River near Jericho, at a site holy for both Jews and Christians. The event is part of the celebration of the Epiphany, which takes place every winter with the coordination of the Civil Administration and the help of the IDF and Israeli Police. The venue is subsidized by the Israeli government.
Robert Eisenman on the James Ossuary inscription
ROBERT EISENMAN has an essay on the James Ossuary inscription in the Huffington Post:
The James Ossuary has been discussed endlessly on PaleoJudaica. My most recent update on the Israel forgery trial is here.
'The James Ossuary' and Its AuthenticityI am highly skeptical of most of Professor Eisenman's theories, but I share his reservations about the authenticity of the "brother of Jesus" part of the James Ossuary inscription. And I like his hermeneutic of suspicion toward discoveries that are "too perfect":
Now that the extended 'trial' over "the James Ossuary" or "James Bone Box" in Israel is nearing its conclusion and all that remains to be announced is the verdict -- which in the present writer's mind is a foregone conclusion, no evaluation of data having had to take this long without basically a verdict of "unproven" as regards forgery being the outcome -- it is time to take stock of where we stand with regard to this "Box"; so that such a 'verdict' will not come as too much of a shock to those convinced of some suspiciousness connected with it and its sudden seemingly almost miraculous appearance or willy-nilly 'surfacing,' just when one might have expected it to.
[...]
My main objection to the ossuary, however as I said, is the nature of the inscription itself. I say this as someone who would be happy if an artifact of this type were true -- someone willing to be convinced, as I would like the burial place of James to be found. Afterall, being the author of a book on this 'James,' I would stand more to gain by its authenticity than many others. But this "Bone Box" is just too pat -- too perfect. In issues of antiquities verification, this is usually a clear warning sign.Larry Schiffman once articulated the "too perfect" principle as "The most exciting things are the things most likely to be forged."
[...]
Then there is 'the brother of Jesus' part, which was seemingly added and written in another, different hand. Almost no ancient source calls 'James' this. This is what we moderns have come to know him as or call him. Even Paul, our primary New Testament witness and source, refers to him 'James the brother of the Lord.' If the ossuary had said something like 'James the Zaddik' or 'James the Just One,' which is how all ancient sources referred to him -- including Hegesippus from the Second Century CE, Eusebius from the Fourth, and Jerome and Epiphanius in the Fifth -- then I would have more willingly credited it.
But to call him, not only by his paternal but also his fraternal name -- and this in an obvious addition -- this, I am unfamiliar with on any ossuary and, again, it appears to me to be directly pointed at us a later audience primarily composed of believers. This is what I mean by the formulation being 'too Perfect.' It is too pointed and just doesn't ring true -- to the modern ear, particularly that of the believer's, perhaps; but to the ancient? Perhaps a later pilgrim from the Fourth or Fifth Century CE might have described 'James' in this manner, but probably no one would have done so in his lifetime. Moreover, this is not what our paleographers are saying. As we saw above, they are dating it in 63 CE (sic)!
The James Ossuary has been discussed endlessly on PaleoJudaica. My most recent update on the Israel forgery trial is here.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Biblical Hebrew taught online by HU
BIBLICAL HEBREW TAUGHT ONLINE: Hebrew University and eTeacher Group Bring Ancient Language to Students around the World.
Bart Ehrman lecturing at UT
BART EHRMAN is lecturing at the University of Tennessee:
New Testament scholar to speak at UT
Renowned New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill will kick off the newly created David L. Dungan Memorial Lecture at 5 p.m. Thursday in the UC auditorium at UT.
Ehrman's lecture is titled "Does The New Testament Contain Forgeries? The Surprising Claims of Modern Scholars" and is presented by UT's Department of Religious Studies.
Ehrman's books on the New Testament and early Christianity include "Misquoting Jesus," "God's Problem," "Jesus, Interrupted," and "The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot." He is an expert on the New Testament manuscript tradition, the historical Jesus, the early Christian apocrypha and the apostolic fathers.
Following the presentation, Ehrman will participate in a Q-and-A session, and a reception will be held in the University Center Crest Room.
Minefields around Jesus' (traditional) baptism site
A POLITICAL MINEFIELD TOO:
Thousands march past minefield to reach Jesus' traditional baptism siteThat said, this at least hasn't put off the President of Russia:
By Aron Heller (CP) – 1 day ago
Just months before the official opening of one of Christianity's holiest sites to visitors, the area where John the Baptist is said to have baptized Jesus remains surrounded by thousands of landmines.
Israel says the sites visited by pilgrims and tourists in an area known as Qasr el-Yahud will be safe, but advocacy groups warn that crowds could be in danger.
On Tuesday, some 15,000 Christian pilgrims marched between two fenced-in minefields to reach the Epiphany ceremony led by the Greek Orthodox patriarch on the Jordan River, eight kilometres east of the oasis town of Jericho at the edge of the West Bank.
[...]
Medvedev visits baptism site of JesusUPDATE (21 January): More here.
Amman, January 20, Interfax - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has visited the site of the baptism of Christ on the Jordan River.
The tour around the holy place was conducted for the Russian head of state by Dia Madani, Director of the national park of the site of the baptism of Christ.
Medvedev visited the fountain of St. John the Baptist. Having carefully listened to the scholar's story, the president went down to the fountain to take several pictures.
Having taken a few pictures, he headed toward the baptism site of Christ.
After visiting the National Park, the president shared his impressions with journalists and then headed to the site where a house is being built for Russian pilgrims.
[...]
Philologos on "The Elephants of Khartoum"
PHILOLOGOS discusses a reader's question about The Elephants of Khartoum. Excerpt:
The city of Khartoum began as an army outpost established in 1821 by the Egyptian ruler Ibrahim Pasha, who chose for it the strategic point at which the White Nile, flowing northward from Lake Victoria, and the Blue Nile, flowing westward from the highlands of Ethiopia, join in one river. At their confluence is an island that, surveyed from the heights on the river’s banks, lacks only an eye to look exactly like the trunk of an elephant attached to the lower jaw and forehead. Called el-khartum, “the elephant’s trunk,” this gave Khartoum its name.
In Hebrew, the original meaning of ḥartom is a bird’s beak, and the word’s earliest textual appearance is in a discussion in the mishnaic tractate of Teharot. Yet since birds’ beaks and elephants’ trunks are anatomically analogous, khartum and ḥartom are clearly related, as they also are to Hebrew ḥotem and Arabic khatm, both meaning “nose.” And since the prow of a ship is, so to speak, its beak or nose, ḥartom in modern Hebrew came to mean a prow, from which its further extension to the nose cone of a rocket was but a small step.
This leaves us with Pharaoh’s “magicians,” as the King James Version of the Bible calls them. Lately, their antics in vying with Moses and Aaron at such tricks as turning staffs into snakes, described in the weekly Torah portions from the first chapters of the Book of Exodus, have been entertaining the synagogue-goers among us. In the Hebrew Bible, the term for them is ḥartumim, a word that always appears in the plural but whose form in the singular would indeed be, as Mr. Rabbie observes, ḥartom. Is this connected to elephant trunks, bird beaks and rocket cones?
I’m sorry to say it isn’t. The ḥartom of Exodus is a word, unrelated to any other in Hebrew, that comes from ancient Egyptian. ...
The Semitic Inscriptions Website
THE SEMITIC INSCRIPTIONS/INSCRIPTIONS SÉMITIQUES WEBSITE:
This website is a database of ancient texts written in Semitic languages and inscribed on various media: tablets, potteries, manuscripts, etc. It grants direct access to all kinds of information about these inscriptions: their origin, their age, their script... And of course, most importantly, the text itself, analyzed, translated, and annotated.Via AWOL.
John Hobbins on the new Ben Sira fragment
JOHN HOBBINS comments on the new Ben Sira Geniza fragment at the Ancient Hebrew Poetry blog.
Background here.
Background here.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
SBL guidelines on giving a better meeting presentation
SOME GUIDELINES on Giving a Better Meeting Presentation from the Society of Biblical Literature are available at the link. This has some good advice, but I would say to go ahead and be brave and use "is."
I posted some advice on the same subject some years ago here.
I posted some advice on the same subject some years ago here.
WSJ reviews Lod Mosaic exhibit at the Met
THE LOD MOSAIC EXHIBITION at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is reviewed in the WSJ:
A Dining Room's Feast for the EyesBackground here.
By JAMES GARDNER
New York
In 1996 a highway was being constructed in Lod, a town 10 miles southeast of Tel Aviv, when, as so often happens in those parts, the workers came upon an ancient and heretofore unknown archaeological site. Naturally all work stopped at once, a bevy of specialists, led by Dr. Miriam Avissar, was called in and, a few months later, a wonder was announced to the world.
The most conspicuous component of the excavations was a merchant's house from about A.D. 300. Discovered therein was the nearly intact mosaic floor of a dining room. Of several mosaics unearthed at the site, this is the one that now stands unveiled to the general public, for the first time anywhere, in the Leon Levy and Shelby White Court in the Metropolitan Museum's Greek and Roman Galleries. The Met is the first of four American venues to which the mosaic will travel before returning to Israel, where it will be the star of the not-yet-completed Shelby White and Leon Levy Lod Mosaic Center. At the Met, regrettably, it is accompanied by a video loop whose soundtrack, although informative, is likely to distract viewers who would prefer to contemplate the mosaics in silence.
[...]
Syriac taught at living languages center in Turkey
ARAMAIC WATCH: Syriac as a living language:
Living languages center founded in Diyarbakır
19 January 2011, Wednesday / TODAY’S ZAMAN WITH WIRES, İSTANBUL
A living languages center has been established at the Diyarbakır-based Dicle University, where Kurdish, Zaza, Syriac, Armenian and Arabic language courses will be offered.
After the establishment of a living languages institute at Mardin Artuklu University in late 2009, the second such institute has been opened at Dicle University. The center, which will begin operations after final approval by the Higher Education Board (YÖK), will provide elective Kurdish, Syriac, Zaza and Arabic courses. The center will also open language courses to local residents.
[...]
Sidnie White Crawford lecturing on DSS at Baylor
PROFESSOR SIDNIE WHITE CRAWFORD is lecturing at Baylor:
Baylor Department of Religion Welcomes Expert on Dead Sea Scrolls
Jan. 18, 2011
Follow us on Twitter: @BaylorUMediaCom
"What the Dead Sea Scrolls Teach Us About the Bible" will be the topic of a lecture by Dr. Sidnie White Crawford, Willa Cather professor and chair of classics and religious studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in Lincoln, Neb. at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 19 in Miller Chapel at the Tidwell Bible Building, 600 Speight Ave. on the Baylor campus.
The event, hosted by the Baylor department of religion, is free and open to the public.
Crawford received her bachelor's degree in 1981 from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas and her doctoral degree in 1988 from Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. Her areas of expertise include the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Hebrew Bible and Second Temple Judaism.
She is a member of the international publication team for the Dead Sea Scrolls and is responsible for editing 14 manuscripts from the Qumran collection. She has taught at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln since 2001 and is a general editor for the Oxford Hebrew Bible Project, which will result in an eclectic critical edition of every book of the Hebrew Bible. She is the volume editor for the Book of Deuteronomy.
For more information, visit www.baylor.edu/religion.
by Katy McDowall, student newswriter
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Peter Rabbit in ancient Galilean Aramaic
ARAMAIC WATCH: Peter Rabbit is being translated into ancient Galilean Aramaic. Really.
Cambridge exhibition on KJB@400
KJB@400 WATCH:
A masterpiece of biblical proportions
Home to more than seven million books, Cambridge University Library is to celebrate the most influential, most bought, most read and most widely disseminated English language book of them all – the King James Bible.
A five month long exhibition - Great and Manifold Blessings: The Making of the King James Bible - will feature a world-class display of biblical treasures when it opens to the public, for free, today (January 18, 2011).
Gathering together much of the source material that the original Cambridge translators used to begin their masterwork in the early seventeenth century, the exhibition includes William Tyndale's first pocket-sized smuggled editions of his own translations, Henry VIII's enormous Great Bible, a first edition of the Geneva or 'Breeches' Bible and also a very rare copy of the notorious 'Wicked Bible' of 1631 - featuring the misprint 'Thou shalt commit adultery'.
One of the University's greatest treasures, the Gutenberg Bible of 1455 - the first printed Bible of all - will also be on display, alongside two fourth-century leaves of St John's Gospel in Coptic, and an 11th-century psalter in Latin and Old English.
The University Library has been able to draw material for the exhibition from the Bible Society's unique library and archives, held in Cambridge since 1985, as well as from its own pre-eminent collections.
[...]
New Hebrew fragment of Ben Sira from Cairo Geniza
APOCRYPHA WATCH: A new Hebrew fragment of Ben Sira (Ecclesiasticus) has been discovered in the Cairo Geniza.
UPDATE (20 January): More here.
With the great progress made in the systematic investigation of the Genizah materials in the latter part of the twentieth and the beginning of the twenty-first centuries, the prospects of finding further Ben Sira fragments in the various collections have dwindled significantly. It is against the background of this fact that we must judge the excitement of the discovery of a new fragment in the Additional Series of the Taylor-Schechter Collection: T-S AS 118.78. Here one is reminded of a judgment offered over a decade ago by Stefan Reif: ‘There may be other Ben Sira items lurking among the smaller and less legible contents of some of the Additional Series binders’ (Reif 1997). It is, furthermore, particularly gratifying that this latest fragment bears the name of Schechter, whose life-work is so intimately connected with the discovery of the Genizah in general and the Hebrew Ben Sira in particular.Photo and transcription and more background at the link.
The new fragment belongs to ms D, which had been represented up till now by a single leaf from the collection of the Alliance Israélite Universelle in Paris: ID 1 (Lévi 1900). It contains the text of Ben Sira 7:18–8:18, all of which is also attested in ms A (7:20–21, 23–25; 8:7 are also attested in ms C). The overlap is fortunate, as the new fragment is in a very poor state of preservation, so that its numerous lacunae can be filled in from the parallel source. On the other hand, because of the existence of the parallel source, the new fragment does not add significant new text to what had previously been known of the Hebrew Ben Sira, though a few letters missing in ms A can now be filled in. However, its reading in 7:31 may well provide a clue to the solving of an old interpretive problem. (We hope to treat this matter in a later publication.) ...
UPDATE (20 January): More here.
Monday, January 17, 2011
New Greek edition of Infancy Gospel of Thomas
TONY BURKE'S new edition of the Greek text of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas should be coming out in the spring of this year.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)