BMCR: Ulrich et al, "Continuity and Discontinuity in Early Christian Apologetics"

BMCR REVIEW:

Jörg Ulrich, Anders-Christian Jacobsen, Maijastina Kahlos (ed.), Continuity and Discontinuity in Early Christian Apologetics. Early Christianity in the Context of Antiquity 5. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2009. Pp. 130. ISBN 9783631579763. $33.95.

Reviewed by E. J. Hutchinson, Hillsdale College (ehutchinson@hillsdale.edu)

Table of Contents

Continuity and Discontinuity in Early Christian Apologetics is a collection of seven essays presented in a workshop organized by German, Finnish, and Danish scholars at the Fifteenth International Conference on Patristic Studies at Oxford in 2007. The goal of the editors in publishing the papers is "to reach a larger audience and…to further the discussion" (3) of early Christian apologetics. The papers cover the second to the fifth centuries and include analysis of both Latin and Greek apologists (a category which is defined—rightly, in my view—rather broadly).

[...]

These apologetics were aimed, of course, at both contemporary pagans and contemporary Jews.

At the Biblioteca Ambrosiana

AT THE BIBLIOTECA AMBROSIANA, MILAN

Click on the images to see a larger version.

Codex Ambrosianus B.21, the earliest complete Syriac Bible (background here, with images from a photolithographic facsimile), open to 2 Baruch. This is the actual manuscript, on display for the Enoch Seminar yesterday.


Liv Ingeborg Lied

L->R: Gianantonio Borgonovo (Ambrosian Library), Liv Ingeborg Lied, Ted Erho, Bob Kraft, Jim Davila


Codex Ambrosianus B. 21, open to the beginning of the biblical book of Ezra (red ink)


Codex Ambrosianus B. 21, colophons page (notes of its transmission history at the end of the codex)

UPDATE (30 June): One more:

The beginning of 4 Ezra (red ink, middle of page, below the blank spot)
UPDATE (1 July): More on the Sixth Enoch Seminar here.

UPDATE (2 July): Another photo:


2 Baruch 21:1, the prayer of Baruch (red ink)
Note (4 July): I have corrected two text attributions above after having a chance to look more closely at the texts.

BMCR: O'Loughlin, "The Didache"

BMCR REVIEW:

Thomas O'Loughlin, The Didache: A Window on the Earliest Christians. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2010. Pp. xvii, 185. ISBN 9780801045394. $24.99 (pb).

Reviewed by Vincent Hunink, Radboud University Nijmegen (v.hunink@let.ru.nl)

Ever since its discovery in 1873, the Early Christian Greek text known as the Didache has stirred controversy on numerous points. Is this an authentic document from the earliest times of Christianity or a later forger? Does it confirm modern theological views, whether Catholic or Protestant, or threaten to undermine them? Does the text represent early Christians at large or merely a minority limited in time and place?

Some of these issues seem to have been settled by now: scholars generally agree that the text is authentic and must be considered very early. Doctrinal debates, however, remain very much alive.

[...]

City events today and manuscript

WE'RE HEADING INTO MILAN today for city events and to see that manuscript at the Ambrosian Library.

Another fake metal codex photo?

FAKE METAL CODICES WATCH: Looks like another photo and some more plates gossip. (HT Thomas Verenna.)

Background here.

Garber, "The Jewish Jesus" at Bible and Interpretation

ESSAY AT BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION:

The Jewish Jesus
Revelation, Reflection, Reclamation

(Purdue University Press: 2011)

Part I: Introduction
Part II: The Jewish Jesus: A Partisan’s
Imagination

My Jewish reading of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels puts him in history and not in divinity. The Jesus of different Christologies could never find support in Judaism, since the God-man of the “hypostatic union” is foreign to Judaism’s teaching on absolute monotheism. As the promised Messiah, he did not meet the conditions which the prophetic-rabbinic tradition associated with the coming of the Messiah. Indeed, there was no harmony, freedom, peace and unity in the land of Israel—signs of the messianic age—and enmity and strife abounded everywhere. Not a false but failed Redeemer of the Jews, as witnessed by the words of the “King of the Jews” at the cross: Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani (“My God, my God, why have You forsaken me”)?


By Zev Garber
Professor Emeritus and Chair of Jewish Studies,
Los Angeles Valley College
June 2011

Follow the link to download the PDF file.

A review of the book is noted here.

More Hekhalot exegesis from Jared Calaway

MORE HEKHALOT EXEGESIS from Jared Calaway: Daily Hekhalot: Hekhalot Zutarti §420b (Burning the Hands).

In Milan

IN MILAN. More later.

Conference: Ancient Jewish Texts and the ‘Literary’

CONFERENCE:

From Karolien Vermeulen (Karolien.Vermeulen@ugent.be):
===========================================

Ancient Jewish Texts and the ‘Literary’
14,15 March 2012
Institute of Jewish Studies (University of Antwerp)

The Institute of Jewish Studies (University of Antwerp) in collaboration with Ghent University is happy to announce an international seminar on Ancient Jewish Texts and the ‘Literary.’ The aim is to bring together scholars working on various ancient Jewish
texts and their distinct textual – often called literary - features. The goal is to exchange ideas on the ‘literary’ in these works and stimulate future research and collaboration.

Invited keynote speakers:
Prof. Dr. Scott Noegel, University of Washington (United States of America) (confirmed)
Prof. Dr. Ellen Van Wolde, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen (Netherlands)
Prof. Dr. Wilfred Watson, Newcastle University (United Kingdom)
Prof. Dr. Robert Gordon, Cambridge University (United Kingdom)


Since the 60s and 70s of the previous century the form and exact wording of ancient Jewish texts has been the focus of attention of a literary approach within biblical/Jewish studies. This subfield relies on the insights of narratology on the one hand and rhetoric on the other. Resulting from this approach any research involving the creative use of language, e.g. in the Hebrew Bible, is considered literary.

In recent years this term has increasingly been questioned as being a presupposition rather than the result of research. ‘Literary’ therefore should be understood as the common though not necessarily apt umbrella term for all studies focusing on the form of ancient texts. Contributors are encouraged to interpret the term either in defense of literariness or against it.

We invite participants from all related fields: Jewish studies, biblical studies, ancient Near Eastern studies, classical studies, literary studies, and stylistics. Possible approaches include among others analyses of the Hebrew Bible, its old translations, early commentaries and retellings, as long as they can be considered ancient (i.e., pre-medieval) and Jewish (i.e., written by Jews or in a Jewish setting).

Proposals up to 300 words can be submitted no later than July 31 2011, to Karolien Vermeulen (karolien.vermeulen@ua.ac.be or karolien.vermeulen@ugent.be).

(From the Agade list.)

Sixth Enoch Seminar

I'M OFF TO MILAN for the Sixth Enoch Seminar. I'm not giving a paper myself, but I am responding to one by Hindy Najman. But since her paper is not yet published, I'm not going to post my response here. I should note, though, for James McGrath's attention in particular, that my response makes considerable use of the series Lost.

I am looking forward very much not only to the many excellent papers, but also to the opportunity to get a direct look at manuscript Codex Ambrosianus B.21. And to the weather in Milan.

I will probably have some Internet access and will do some blogging if I can. I have also pre-posted some items. There will be something new each day, so do keep coming by this week. I expect to be back in St. Andrews on Thursday evening.

More on the fake metal codices from Daniel McClellan

FAKE METAL CODICES WATCH: Daniel O. McClellan has More Jordan Lead Codices Photos and Info, from someone who claims to be Ilan Shibli. Lots of interesting new information, none of which gives us any reason to think the codices are genuine. Daniel comments:

That the images on these plates are modern productions is, in my opinion, pretty much beyond dispute. Dr. Northover’s analysis supports an ancient provenance for the lead, but as others have pointed out, and as he stated in a note to me, there is quite a bit of ancient lead lying around, and the composition of the lead does not necessarily indicate the antiquity of the codices.

He also notes that Mr. Elkington is offering photos for sale and Russian site has some good preview images. Note especially this scroll image, which is the first decent image of one of the lead scrolls I have seen. I allowed the possibility here that the scrolls could be something different from the main cache and could conceivably even be genuine. But this photo shows this scroll to have a menorah like the ones on the plates of the main cache (Elkington notes this too in his rambling, odd "report" to which Daniel links), which means it is probably fake too.

Background here and follow the many links back.

Ophel excavation controversy

OPHEL EXCAVATION CONTROVERSY:

Politics get mixed up with archaeology in dispute over Solomon's Silwan wall

The excavations near the Temple Mount's eastern wall in an area known as the Ophel continued on and off for decades.

By Nir Hasson Tags: Jerusalem Palestinians (Haaretz)

An archaeological site dedicated in Jerusalem this week consists of a section of an ancient wall built by King Solomon in the 10th century B.C.E., says the archaeologist who dug up the wall. Other archaeologists, however, disagree with the date and implications and object to what they call the political use of archaeology.

Dr. Eilat Mazar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who dug up the site, hopes opening it to the public will be a turning point in the debate about whether David and Solomon's Kingdom of Israel existed or not.

[...]

Mazar, Israel Finkelstein, and Yoni Mizrachi weigh in.

I'm not an archaeologist and don't really have a horse in this race. But if I were, I think my normal caution would keep me from saying a whole lot about Solomon until we find a royal inscription at the site which mentions him. Then again, I suppose that's the epigrapher in me talking.

(HT Joseph Lauer).

Background here.

SBL session on the future of biblical studies

AN SBL SESSION ON The Future of Biblical Studies: What Research Still Needs to Be Done? has been organized by Patrick George McCullough for the November meetings in San Francisco.

Good question! Reception history is very big right now. And there is a surprising amount of basic textual criticism that still needs to be done, although this involves very technical work. Some of it involves working with Armenian or Ethiopic or the like, but there's quite a lot of work still to do on the Greek Septuagint. And as for cognate fields dear to my heart, the Dead Sea Scrolls are fully published, but critical analysis of them still has a long way to go, and many Old Testament Pseudepigrapha and New Testament Apocrypha still cry out for good critical editions, let alone further study.

I'm sure there's much more, but that's what occurs to me off the top of my head.

Duane Smith on Jerusalem/Salem.

DUANE SMITH challenges the view that Jerusalem was once called "Salem." And he has some interesting philology on his side.

This in reference to yesterday's story involving the recently discovered Jerusalem cuneiform tablet.

UPDATE (6/24/11): John Hobbins: Jerusalem was called Salem. Well it was!

Hebrew and the NT scholar

KEVIN BROWN reflects on John Byron's post on Hebrew and the New Testament Scholar. Kudos to John for keeping his Hebrew up. Now, guys, what about Aramaic?

CAL back online

THE COMPREHENSIVE ARAMAIC LEXICON is back online. The site was hacked some time ago.

Denial of Jewish history by former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem

JEWISH-TEMPLE (ETC.) DENIAL WATCH: The former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem is currently indulging in wholesale denial of Jewish history in Palestine, evidently in response to the recent opening of the Walls Around Jerusalem National Park:

Not one stone found relating to Jerusalem’s alleged Jewish history

Chairman of the Suprerme Islamic Council in Jerusalem Dr. Ekrima Sabri has declared that after twenty-five years of digging, archaeologists are unanimous that not a single stone has been found related to Jerusalem’s alleged Jewish history.

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Chairman of the Suprerme Islamic Council in Jerusalem Dr. Ekrima Sabri has declared that after twenty-five years of digging, archaeologists are unanimous that not a single stone has been found related to Jerusalem’s alleged Jewish history.

Sheikh Sabri said Israel’s opening of a Biblical park south of Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem was only a further attempt to erase the Arab-Islamic identity of the region, Sabri said.

Israeli authorities have been building the Biblical park atop the Umayyad palaces in Jerusalem. But Sabri said that archaeologists agree that the stones along the southern wall of Al-Aqsa Mosque are remains of the Umayyad palaces, proving that the entire area is an Islamic endowment.

“We do not recognize any change to the status of Jerusalem, and we reserve our religious, historic, geographic, and cultural heritage in the city, no matter how long or how many generations succeed,” Sabri said.

[...]

More on Dr. Ekrima Sabri here and here and links.

I have responded to these bogus historical claims here and here and often elsewhere in PaleoJudaica.

Cross-file under "Junk History."

UPDATE (6/24/11): Todd Bolin has some trenchant commentary.

Conference: Family and Kinship in the Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature

CONFERENCE (starts on 27 June): Family and Kinship in the Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature, in Palermo, Italy. Papers on the Old Testament Apocrypha, Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, and the Dead Sea Scrolls.

SBL 2011 preliminary program book now available

THE PRELIMINARY PROGRAM BOOK for the November meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in San Francisco is now available in searchable format.

(Via kata ta biblia.)

New archaeological displays in Jerusalem

NEW ARCHAEOLOGICAL DISPLAYS IN JERUSALEM:

First Temple period archeological site unveiled in J'lem

By MELANIE LIDMAN
06/21/2011 17:25

Scholars believe area is the Water Gate mentioned in the Bible; activists denounce site's focus on Israeli history only.

A large complex of ruins from the First Temple period called the Ophel City Walls Site was inaugurated on Tuesday in the Walls Around Jerusalem National Park, showcasing one of the most complete excavations from the First Temple period and the area believed to be the Water Gate mentioned in the Bible.

The site, which was uncovered by Hebrew University’s Dr. Eilat Mazar, contains mikvaot (ritual baths), store rooms, a watchtower, and royal buildings, where archeologists found dozens of large clay pots of various sizes.

[...]

Also on Tuesday, a fragment of the earliest written document ever discovered in Jerusalem was unveiled. The two-centimeter fragment was discovered by Mazar’s team in the area, and dates from the late Bronze Age. Experts believe that the fragment, written in Akkadian cuneiform script, seems to be a copy of a letter sent from the city to an Egyptian King, when the city was still called Salem. The fragment was unveiled at its permanent exhibit in the Davidson Center.

[...]

More on that cuneiform fragment and the Ophel excavation here and here and links.

Also, Arutz Sheva has video of the Ophel Wall site at New: Walk Through the Digs Under the Old City. For that hoard of 264 gold coins, also excavated in Jerusalem (but not at the Ophel site), see here and links.

UPDATE (23 June): The former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem has a predictable response, plus Duane Smith raises a philological challenge to the comment above on the name "Salem" for Jerusalem.

Ed Cook on the structure of the Hebrew verbal system

ED COOK has posted one of his rare philology posts: Notes on the Structure of the Hebrew Verbal System . Keep 'em coming, Ed.

SOTS Booklist 2011

IN THE MAIL:

Deborah W. Rook (ed.) with C. A. Strine, Society for Old Testament Study Book List 2010 (London: Sage, 2011)

More Hekhalot exegesis from Jared Calaway

MORE HEKHALOT EXEGESIS from Jared Calaway. Once I get a few other things out of the way, I hope by early July, I should be able to turn my attention back to my translation of the Hekhalot texts. Then I may be able to join in sometimes.

Claremont Coptic Encyclopedia

AWOL: Open Access Encyclopedia: Claremont Coptic Encyclopedia. Looks like a very useful resource.

New book: Morgenstern, "Studies in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic ..."

NEW BOOK:

Studies in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic Based Upon Early Eastern Manuscripts

by Matthew Morgenstern
Harvard Semitic Studies - HSS 62

Eisenbrauns, 2011

List Price: $44.95
Your Price: $41.80
You save: $3.15


This book is the first wide-ranging study of the grammar of the Babylonian Aramaic used in the Talmud and post-Talmudic Babylonian literature (henceforth: Rabbinic Babylonian Aramaic) to be published in English in a century. The book takes as its starting point the long-recognized problem of the corrupt nature of the later textual witnesses of Babylonian Rabbinic literature and seeks both to establish criteria for the identification of accurate textual witnesses and describe the grammar of Rabbinic Babylonian Aramaic. The book is both programmatic and descriptive: it lays the foundations for future research into the dialect while clarifying numerous points of grammar, many of which have not been discussed systematically in the available scholarly literature.

Following a critical survey of the currently available scholarly tools, the book considers the rôle of the Yemenite textual and reading traditions in the study of Rabbinic Babylonian Aramaic. While some previous authorities have regarded this tradition as a primary source for grammatical study of the dialect, by comparing the data of the earliest manuscripts to the forms employed in the Yemenite traditions, the present book demonstrates that the Yemenite traditions have been subject to secondary changes. Accordingly, it is concluded here that only the early eastern manuscripts preserve the dialect in its original form.

The next chapter considers the problem of linguistic variation within the corpus. It is well established that the Talmudic literature employs a wide range of alternative grammatical forms. Several explanations have been proposed for this phenomenon. Some authorities have suggested that it arises from dialectal differences, while others have proposed that it represents the use of different literary registers. An alternative explanation is that the language was altered during the course of textual transmission. This study shows that none of these explanations can account for the wide extent of the phenomenon, which is found in the best textual witnesses and in ostensibly uniform contexts. It is argued that all of proposed explanations may partially account for the interchanges but, ultimately, the lack of a literary standard leads to the use of different forms.

Syntax is often regarded as being one of the linguistic areas least affected by textual transmission. However, the early manuscripts show that Rabbinic Babylonian Aramaic employs a defined series of syntactic structures to mark the direct object. This clearly defined complimentary distribution is lost in the later textual witnesses, which use the structures interchangeably. It is thus shown that, for syntactic study, too, only a small group of textual witnesses can be regarded as reliable.

Product Details

Publisher: Eisenbrauns
Publication date: 2011
Bibliographic info: xx + 289 pages
Language(s): English


Cover: Cloth
Trim Size: 6 x 9 inches
ISBN: 1-57506-938-5
ISBN13: 978-1-57506-938-8

Cross-file under "Aramaic Watch."

Conference on Targums & Second Temple Period

CONFERENCE: The Targums in light of Traditions of the Second Temple Period; 27-28 June, University of Strasbourg.

Cross-file under "Aramaic Watch."

An English-to-Akkadian dictionary

THERE'S NOW AN ENGLISH-TO-AKKADIAN DICTIONARY:

An English to Akkadian Companion to the Assyrian Dictionaries
[9781934309360]

By Mark E. Cohen

This reference book is an English-to-Akkadian dictionary of the Assyrian and Babylonian language, based on the entries in the three published Akkadian dictionaries: "The University of Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, " "A Concise Dictionary of Akkadian," and the "Assyrian-English-Assyrian Dictionary." Entries are organized also by synonym and category.

Pages: 250

Price: $50.00

This will be handy for your Akkadian composition course.

(Via the Agade list.)

UPDATE (20 June): Pete Bekins comments at balshanut. I think I have that older English-Akkadian index somewhere in my files too.

Ancient graffiti in Israel

ARAMAIC WATCH: Aramaic is "the little black dress of Semitic languages."

Archaeologists Unscramble Ancient Graffiti In Israel

by Jacki Lyden (NPR)

June 19, 2011

Aramaic is the lingua franca of the ancient Middle East, the linguistic root of modern day Hebrew and Arabic.

"Once you understand Aramaic," says Karen Stern, "you can read anything. You can read Hebrew, you can read Phoenician. I always call it the little black dress of Semitic languages."

Stern, 35, is an archaeologist and an assistant professor in the history department at Brooklyn College. Her passion is the tomb graffiti of the ancient Jews in what was then Roman Palestine. Graffiti has been "published, but sort of disregarded," she says. "Whereas I think it is intimate, vocal and spontaneous, and adds to the historical record."

In this, Stern seems to be supported by scholars: She is completing a yearlong fellowship at the W.F. Albright Institute for Archaeological Research in Jerusalem.

[...]

Nitpick: Aramaic is cognate with Hebrew and Arabic but is not ancestral to either. It is a linguistic branch on the same tree, not the root.

On Prof. Stern's work at the site of Beth She'arim:

Listening To The Dead

It's in the Cave of Coffins that Stern points to two inscriptions in ancient Greek. They are tiny and clustered near niches once holding oil lamps.

One says, "Take courage, Holy Parents of Pharcitae, udes adonitas — no one is immortal." Stern explains that the dead who are being brought into the catacombs shouldn't feel that they are weak just because they've passed on.

She reads aloud the other inscription: "Good luck on your resurrection."

"Of course, resurrection is not in the Jewish tradition," says Emma Maayan Fanar, a professor of Byzantine art at the University of Haifa, who has teamed up with Stern. "It's very uncommon."

Tiny menorahs are scattered as engravings throughout the tomb, a symbol of the Temple in Jerusalem and a symbol of the endurance of the Jewish faith.

There are magical spells in Greek. There are also curses in Aramaic that threaten a bad fate to the tomb robber. Those seem to have been ignored, as only the graffiti and heavy stone coffins are left.

In the dark, the effect — particularly in these tiny messages — is to hear the dead speaking. It's peaceful, but lively. One gets the sense of a giant Facebook page of the ancient world.

Read it all. This is important work. Only rarely to we get to hear the voices of the regular people of antiquity, since most of what was passed down in writing was produced by the elite.

(Via Tom Verenna on Facebook.)

UPDATE (20 June): Jared Calaway brings in the zombies.

Also, in an e-mail, Joseph Lauer comments: "As some reader's comments following the article noted, the following sentence is not accurate: 'Of course, resurrection is not in the Jewish tradition,' says Emma Maayan Fanar, a professor of Byzantine art at the University of Haifa, who has teamed up with Stern. 'It's very uncommon.'" Perhaps it's uncommon in Jewish graffiti of the period; I don't know. But it is certainly a widespread idea in Jewish literature of the Hellenistic and Roman periods.

Targuman interviewed by Chronicle of Higher Education

DEAN CHRISTIAN BRADY, a.k.a. Targuman (cited in immediately preceding post) is interviewed by the Chronicle of Higher Education about his use of blogging and Facebook:

'It's Not Schizophrenic'

Christian Brady, an associate professor of classics and ancient Mediterranean studies and Jewish studies at Pennsylvania State University, has split his social-media identity, as Ms. Feal does. "It's not schizophrenic and it's not to hide anything," he said. Both of his Twitter feeds are public, and he expects that someone who searches for his name on Google will quickly find both his personal feed, @targuman, and the one he uses for his role as dean of the university's Schreyer Honors College, @shcdean.

Deciding which account to post to is a matter of considering his audience, he says. Those looking to hear from the honors-college dean may have no interest in his research into Targums (ancient Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible), or in his collection of comic books. "I wouldn't call them multiple identities, but views or perspectives on yourself," is how he puts it.

Though Facebook was born only a few years ago, Mr. Brady says scholars have long made adjustments in their public personae: "If you're writing an op-ed piece for the local newspaper, you're going to use a different tone than if you're writing for a journal in your discipline."

A lot of my Facebook posts are just notices of interesting PaleoJudaica posts. Others note ancient history or technology items not directly relevant to PaleoJudaica. Most of the rest have to do with zombies. But then the article does point out that zombies can be a problem on Facebook.

Targuman posts translation of Targum Ruth

TARGUMAN has posted a draft of his new translation of the Targum to Ruth.

Leptis Magna used as archaeological shield by Gaddafi

PHOENICIAN AND PUNIC WATCH: Col. Gaddafi is reported to be using at least one archaeological site as a shield for armaments:

A petty tyrant hides behind the relics of a magnificent civilisation

Historian Bettany Hughes worries for the future of Leptis Magna, as Colonel Gaddafi moves his tanks among the treasures.

By Bettany Hughes (The Telegraph)

7:00AM BST 18 Jun 2011

... Rebel forces in Libya reported this week that Colonel Gaddafi is using the site as an archaeological shield. Missiles, launchers and troops are, they say, snuggled among columns, corridors and archways. Nato forces – in Gaddafi’s reckoning – won’t bomb them, or his men. Clever. They won’t. But if Gaddafi is holding explosives in this World Heritage Site, a single stray cigarette butt could kick start a sequence that sends it all up in smoke.

The loss of Leptis would be unthinkable. Founded by Phoenician traders in the Bronze Age, the city-complex has been a theatre of power and pleasure, of indulgence and intellect for more than 3,000 years. It is one of the best-preserved ancient sites in the Mediterranean. Ruled by Carthage for centuries, the Romans quickly conquered it. Recent discoveries include an eye-wateringly exquisite series of Roman-period mosaics, where warriors hound animals and a spent gladiator lords it over the corpse of his sparring partner. It was a local boy, Septimius Severus, who in the 2nd century AD really made Leptis roar, rebuilding the forum and the port – as Roman emperor he promoted the city to the premier league. Leptis is a megalithic incarnation of this region’s high-octane, personality-driven history.

[...]

Aerial bombardment of the site with water balloons filled with refined liquid putrescine would clear it pretty quickly of people, and then the weaponry wouldn't matter much. The ruins wouldn't mind. No one ever listens to me about these things.

A little daily Hekhalot is good for you

A LITTLE DAILY HEKHALOT is good for you and helps keep the dangerous angels at bay. I hope Jared Calaway makes this a series. With MOTP volume one out of the way, I begin a year of research leave soon in which I aim to finish my translation of the Hekhalot literature.

More on the completion of the CAD

MORE ON THE COMPLETION OF THE CHICAGO ASSYRIAN DICTIONARY from Chuck Jones at the Oriental Institute blog.

Background here.

El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron coming to the West

ARCHANGEL METATRON WATCH: El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron is being released in North America on 26 July and in Europe on 9 September. This demo review has a detailed description and lots of images. I can't play the video here, but it may work where you are.

Background here.

Reveiw of Garber, "The Jewish Jesus"

BOOK REVIEW:

Jesus for Jews

By Eve Levavi Feinstein (Jewish Ideas Daily)

That Jesus lived and died a Jew would hardly be regarded as news by most educated Jews and Christians today. Still, while the historical Jesus is ever-elusive, the figure of Jesus, for Jews, has become more accessible. The pronounced decline of Christian anti-Semitism in our day has allowed for more freedom to discuss not only the tortuous and changing relationship of Jews to the Church, but also to its founder and the central figure of its concern: namely, Jesus.

The past half-decade has seen a spate of books on the topic written by Jews, with titles like The Misunderstood Jew and From Rebel to Rabbi. In 2007, the Christian scholar Peter Schafer published a challenging study on the place of Jesus in the Talmud. The newest entry in the field is a collection of essays edited by Zev Garber, The Jewish Jesus: Revelation, Reflection, Reclamation.

While the collection is composed in part of papers presented at a 2009 symposium, the word "reclamation" is a tip-off that the editor's interest in the subject is not merely academic. The Church's task, as represented in this volume, is to foster a more positive and respectful relationship with those who, according to the book's dedication, "practice the faith of Jesus." For Jews, acknowledgment of Jesus' Jewishness opens the door to a deeper and more constructive relationship with those who, in turn, "believe by faith in Jesus." In short, reflection on the Jewishness of Jesus promises to serve as the basis for enhanced Jewish-Christian dialogue.

[...]

Antiquities looters caught

BUSTED:

Antiquities Robbers Caught Red Handed

by Hebrew site (Arutz Sheva)

The Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Theft in the Antiquities Authority has staged a successful operation in which Arab antiquities robbers were caught red-handed while digging at an archaeological site, where they were attempting to plunder archaeological findings.

[...]

The action was taken following a severe wave of theft digs in the area of the Elah Valley near Beit Shemesh. According to archaeologist Alon Klein, who commanded the operation, the gang had been digging in at least three other sites that all contain Jewish artifacts from the 2nd Temple, up to 70 C.E. and Bar-Kochba Rebellion, ca. 132 C.E. periods.

[...]

Quotations from Lost Books in the Hebrew Bible

HERE'S MY HANDOUT for my keynote paper at the St Andrews Graduate Conference, being presented even as this post appears:

QUOTATIONS FROM LOST BOOKS IN THE HEBREW BIBLE

Lost Books Cited in the Pentateuch

• The Book of the Wars of YHWH plus a work song (Num 21:14-18a)
  
• Excerpt from an Amorite Victory Song (Num 21:27-39)
  
  Lost Books Cited in The Deuteronomistic History
  
• The Book of the Righteous (The Book of Jashar) or The Book of the Song (Josh 10:12-13a; 2 Sam 1:17-27; 1 Kgs 8:12-13 MT // 1 Kgs 8:53a LXX)
  
• A book on the conduct of the kingship (1 Sam 10:25)
  
• The sapiential works of Solomon (1 Kgs 5:12-13 [Evv 4:32-33])
  
• The Book of the Acts of Solomon (1 Kgs 11:41)
  
• The Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel (1 Kgs 14:19; 15:31; 16:5, 14, 20, 27; 22:39; 2 Kgs 1:18; 10:34; 13:8, 12; 14:15, 28; 15:11, 15, 21, 26, 31)
  
• The Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah (1 Kgs 14:29; 15:7a, 23a; 22:46; 2 Kgs 8:23; 12:20 [Evv 12:19]; 14:18; 15:6, 36; 16:19; 20:20; 21:17, 25; 23:28; 24:5)
  
  Lost Books Cited in 1-2 Chronicles
  
• The Book of the Kings of Israel and Judah (2 Chr 27:7; 35:26-27; 36:8a)
  
• The Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel (2 Chr 16:11; 25:26; 28:26; 32:32)
  
• The Book of the Kings of Israel (1 Chr 9:1a; 2 Chr 20:34)
  
• The Midrash of the Book of Kings (2 Chr 24:27a)
  
• The Acts of the Kings of Israel (2 Chr 33:18)
  
  
• The Acts of Samuel the Seer, The Acts of Nathan the Prophet, and The Acts of Gad the Visionary (1 Chr 29:29-30)
  
• The Acts of Nathan the Prophet, The Prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite, and The Visions of Jeddo the Visionary Concerning Jeroboam Son of Nebat (2 Chr 9:29)
  
• The Acts of Shemiah the Prophet and Iddo the Visionary for Enrollment by Genealogy (2 Chr 12:15a)
  
• The Midrash of the Prophet Iddo (2 Chr 13:22)
  
• The Acts of Uzziah (2 Chr 26:22)
  
• The Words of the Visionaries (2 Chr 33:19)
  
  The Chronicler's sources as a single digest of The Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel and The Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?
  
  
• The Book of the Chronicles of King David (1 Chr 27:23-24)
  
• King David's plan from YHWH for the Temple (1 Chr 28:19)
  
• Writings of David and Solomon on the divisions of the Levites (2 Chr 35:4)
  
  
• The Laments of Jeremiah and the singers over King Josiah (2 Chr 35:25)

Just to get you thinking. You will have to wait until Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures volume one comes out to read the full article.

Test results on the new Jordan metal codices

FAKE METAL CODICES WATCH: News from the Jordan Times:

Tests support 'Jordan texts' authenticity

By Taylor Luck

AMMAN - Preliminary lab results indicate that a collection of metal books unearthed in northern Jordan may indeed represent the earliest Christian texts ever discovered, according to experts.

According to the Department of Antiquities (DoA), initial carbon tests to determine the authenticity of lead-sealed metal books billed as the greatest find in biblical archaeology since the Dead Sea scrolls have been “encouraging”.

“We really believe that we have evidence from this analysis to prove that these materials are authentic,” DoA Director Ziad Saad told The Jordan Times.

The tests, carried out at the Royal Scientific Society labs, indicate that the texts may date back to the early first century AD, at a time when Christians took refuge from persecution on the east bank of the Jordan River.

The codices, which were retrieved by Jordanian security services from the black market last month, are believed to be part of a greater cache of 70 lead-sealed books allegedly uncovered in Jordan and smuggled across the River Jordan into Israel.

[...]

Efforts to repatriate the texts from Israel are pending the final results of the carbon dating, currently being carried out at the University of New Mexico, the Getty Conservation Institute and Sheffield University.

This needs to be taken apart piece by piece.

1. The claim is that the new metal codices in the hands of the Jordanian Government are part of the same cache as those announced back in March. I take them at their word, but no proof has yet been advanced.

2. What's this about "carbon tests" and "carbon dating" on metal plates? Carbon-14 dating is applied to organic material. Is there organic material, such as leather scroll, associated with these plates? Or, more likely, has someone made a careless mistake here?

3. Assuming the latter, it appears that the current tests indicate that the metal of the plates is ancient. It has been known for a long time that the fake metal codices may be made of genuinely ancient metal. The first report, on 3 March, in the Jewish Chronicle (cf. here), reported this:

Undeterred, Mr Feather instead cites the findings of Peter Northover, a metals analyst at Oxford University. Conducting tests on two samples of metal from one book, Dr Northover concluded that their composition was "consistent with a range of ancient lead," and that it was clear from the surface corrosion that the book was "not a recent production".

The IAA remains unconvinced, arguing that the metal could have been taken from an ancient coffin while the messages could have been fabricated later.

This test was done privately and has not been published. The IAA has replied adequately: such ancient metal is available and could be used for such forgeries, so the new test does not tell us anything very interesting.

4. As has been noted here and elsewhere many times, one of the codices in the original cache is a clumsy, transparent fake. Some of the other codices in this cache have their own problems that cast serious doubt on their authenticity and most or all of them have stylistic and iconographic features that tie them closely to each other and to the obvious fake codex. In other words, at least most of them are fakes, although quite possibly fakes inscribed in the modern period on ancient metal.

5. If the current reports that these new codices are from the same cache is correct (and aside from this vague assertion we have been told nothing else about them), all indicators are that they are fakes too.

6. I have summarized the case against the authenticity of the first set of metal codices here. It is telling that no one defending the authenticity of these texts has made any effort to reply to these problems. Mr. Elkington did make the ridiculous assertion that Dr. Thonemann was not qualified to comment because he is a Greek classicist rather than a biblical scholar. In case you're wondering, Greek classicists are generally considered qualified to comment on (purportedly) ancient Greek texts. Also, biblical scholars mainly take interest in texts that have some clear connection with the Bible, which these metal codices do not. Oh, and Mr. Elkington also said that the photographs are not very good. And whose fault is that? In any case, the forged Greek text is entirely readable, despite the forger's poor knowledge of Greek.

So, to sum up, the fake metal codices are still fake (see the first link in point 6 above for nuancing), and if the new discoveries are part of the same cache, it is likely that they are fakes as well, albeit fakes inscribed on ancient metal.

Recent background here, here, and here and follow those links.

UPDATE: Tom Verenna fills out the point about C-14 dating. His link to "Jona" is here. He also notes that Jim West and Robert Deutsch have new photographs that raise further doubts about the authenticity of the plates.

At St Andrews Graduate Conference

I'M AT THE 1ST ST ANDREWS CONFERENCE FOR BIBLICAL AND EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES today and tomorrow. Probably won't have much time for blogging.

News on the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project

NEWS ON THE MORE OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA PROJECT: I am very happy to announce that the first volume of texts edited for the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project has been sent to the publisher (Eerdmans) and we anticipate its publication within the next year. Below is a flier being circulated at the conference tomorrow which gives some additional details, and below that is a list of the table of contents of the volume.

A second volume is underway, but it will be some time before it comes out.


THE MORE OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA PROJECT
The More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha project at the University of St. Andrews (http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/divinity/rt/moreoldtestamentpseudepigrapha/) has assembled an international team of scholars to translate a new collection of Old Testament pseudepigrapha. The project is headed by Professor James R. Davila and Professor Emeritus Richard Bauckham, with Dr. Alexander Panayotov as co-editor. The "Old Testament pseudepigrapha," as the term is now commonly used, are ancient books that claim to be written by a character in the Old Testament or set in the same time period as the Old Testament and recount narratives related to it, but which do not belong to the Jewish, Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant biblical canons. The Project is publishing two new volumes of pseudepigrapha, most of which were not included in the massive two-volume collection edited by James H. Charlesworth or the important collection edited by H. F. D. Sparks, both published in the 1980s. (The few overlaps are cases where we have significant new manuscript data or we believe that a text requires a new treatment for other reasons.)

Our new corpus consists of about 100 documents, about two-thirds of which are complete and the rest are fragments or quotations. They include apocalypses—angelic revelations to prophets and sages such as Elijah, Ezra, and Daniel; magical, oracular, exorcistic and mantic works attributed to prophets and sages such as Moses, David, Solomon, the Sibyl, and Jeremiah; songs and poetry attributed to Old Testament characters, especially David; "rewritten scripture" that retells stories known from the Old Testament from the fall of Adam and Eve to the deaths of the Maccabean martyrs; legends and tales set in the Old Testament period and usually, although not always, involving Old Testament characters such as Enoch, Melchizedek, Levi, and even the antediluvian giants; and various other obscure and intriguing works, including a legendary account of the hiding places of the Temple treasures, lost pre-exilic oracles of the seer Balaam, and a legend of how all human knowledge was preserved in the Great Pyramid during the Flood. The first volume of texts is now in press with Eerdmans and is slated to be published by mid-2012 under the title Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures.

The Old Testament pseudepigrapha are an important and much neglected part of the biblical tradition. The earliest were written down at the same time and in the same geographic area as the Hebrew Bible, and some are even cited therein. They continued to be composed and copied throughout antiquity and the Middle Ages and, indeed, new pseudepigrapha are still being written in the modern era. The corpus being published in these two volumes adds a great many texts to those already known from the earlier collections and together with them provides the reader with virtually all known surviving pseudepigrapha written before the rise of Islam. Some of these compositions provide us with fascinating background material to the New Testament. Others are a rich source of information on the reception history of the Hebrew Bible by Jews, Christians, and pagans through late antiquity. They frequently give us different perspectives from those found in writings of the same period which later acquired an authoritative status in Judaism (the rabbinic literature) and Christianity (the patristic literature). Together they present us with the sacred legends and spiritual reflections of numerous long-dead authors whose works were lost, neglected, or suppressed for many centuries. By making these documents available in excellent English translations and authoritative but accessible introductions we aim both to promote more scholarly study of them and to bring them to the attention of the vast lay audience who appreciate such treasures.


Table of contents of volume one:

Preface
James H. Charlesworth

Introduction
Richard Bauckham and James R. Davila

Abbreviations

I. TEXTS ORDERED ACCORDING TO BIBLICAL CHRONOLOGY

Adam Octipartite/Septipartite
Grant Macaskill with Eamon Greenwood

The Life of Adam and Eve (Coptic Fragments)
Simon J. Gathercole

The Book of the Covenant
James VanderKam

The Apocryphon of Seth
Alexander Toepel

The Book of Noah
Martha Himmelfarb

The Apocryphon of Eber
James VanderKam

The Dispute over Abraham
Richard Bauckham

The Inquiry of Abraham
Richard Bauckham

The Story of Melchizedek
with the Melchizedek Legend from the Chronicon Paschale
Pierluigi Piovanelli

The Syriac History of Joseph
Kristian S. Heal

Aramaic Levi
James R. Davila

Midrash Vayissa‘u
Martha Himmelfarb

The Testament of Job (Coptic Fragments)
Gesa Schenke

The Tiburtine Sibyl (Greek)
Rieuwerd Buitenwerf

The Eighth Book of Moses
Todd E. Klutz

The Balaam Text from Tell Deir ‘Allā
Edward M. Cook

Eldad and Modad
Richard Bauckham

Songs of David
G. W. Lorein and E. Van Staalduine-Sulman

The Aramaic Song of the Lamb (Dialogue between David and Goliath)
C. T. R. Hayward

Exorcistic Psalms of David and Solomon
Gideon Bohak

The Selendromion of David and Solomon
Pablo A. Torijano

The Hygromancy of Solomon
Pablo A. Torijano

Questions of the Queen of Sheba and Answers by King Solomon
Vahan S. Hovhanessian and Sebastian P. Brock

The Nine and a Half Tribes
Richard Bauckham

The Heartless Rich Man and the Precious Stone
William Adler

Jeremiah's Prophecy to Pashhur
Darrell D. Hannah

The Apocryphon of Ezekiel
Benjamin G. Wright III

The Treatise of the Vessels (Massekhet Kelim)
James R. Davila

The Seventh Vision of Daniel
Sergio La Porta

A Danielic Pseudepigraphon Paraphrased by Papias
Basil Lourié

The Relics of Zechariah and the Boy Buried at His Feet
William Adler

Sefer Zerubbabel: The Prophetic Vision of Zerubbabel ben Shealtiel
John C. Reeves

Fifth Ezra
Theodore A. Bergren

Sixth Ezra
Theodore A. Bergren

The Latin Vision of Ezra
Richard Bauckham

II. THEMATIC TEXTS

The Cave of Treasures
Alexander Toepel

Palaea Historica ("The Old Testament History")
William Adler

Quotations from Lost Books in the Hebrew Bible
with an Excursus on Quotations from Lost Books in the New Testament
James R. Davila

Hebrew Visions of Hell and Paradise
Helen Spurling

Origen's Hexapla online

ORIGEN'S HEXAPLA, or what was left of it in 1875, is online:

Origenis Hexaplorum quae supersunt
sive, Veterum interpretum Graecorum in totum Vetus Testamentum fragmenta. Post Flaminium Nogilium, Drusium, et Montefalconium, adhibita etiam versione syro-hexaplari, concinnavit, emendavit, et multis partibus auxit Fridericus Field.
Published 1875 by E typographeo Clarendoniano in Oxonii .

Table of Contents
I. Prolegomena. Genesis-Esther.
II. Jobus-Malachias. Auctarium et indices.

(HT James Harding on FB.)

The Hexapla Institute is currently working on a new edition of the Hexapla which contains material discovered after Fields's time.

James McGrath: Harmonizing Judas with Doctor Who

JAMES MCGRATH is Harmonizing Judas With Doctor Who and he has tagged me on Facebook to participate. I'm pretty busy with two conferences in the next fortnight, but I'll see if inspiration strikes me.

Duane Smith on the philology of the serpent's craftiness

DUANE SMITH looks at the philology of the serpent's craftiness over at Abnormal Interests:

ערום In Old Greek And Even Older Greek

Targum Onkelos for Genesis 3:1a Reads Something

Sex in the OT Pseudepigrapha

WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THIS? Tablet Magazine has a reviewlet of a new book on sex in the Old Testament pseudepigrapha:

Modern ideas about Jews’ and women’s sexuality can be complex and strange, but some of the images that circulated in antiquity were downright bizarre. William Loader demonstrates this in The Pseudepigrapha on Sexuality (Eerdmans, March), the third installation in his vast five-volume project “exploring attitudes toward sexuality in Judaism and Christianity during the Greco-Roman era.” In The Testament of Solomon, a pseudepigraphical text believed to have been composed sometime in the first four centuries of the common era, the notoriously polygamous Jewish monarch encounters a group of demons. One of them, named Onoskelis, is “a female demon of mixed form, a human woman with the legs of an ass,” who gleefully explains, “Sometimes I strangle men; sometimes I pervert them from their true natures.” Just imagine how much more trouble Weiner might have gotten himself into if she were still around.

The BBC on the CAD

THE COMPLETION OF THE CHICAGO ASSYRIAN DICTIONARY is celebrated by the BBC:

Dictionary of dead language complete after 90 years

By Cordelia Hebblethwaite BBC News

Five volumes of 21 volumes of the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary. Photo by Jason Smith The first volumes of the dictionary were published in the 1950s

A dictionary of the extinct language of ancient Mesopotamia has been completed after 90 years of work.

Assyrian and Babylonian - dialects of the language collectively known as Akkadian - have not been spoken for almost 2,000 years.

"This is a heroic and significant moment in history," beamed Dr Irving Finkel of the British Museum's Middle East department.

As a young man in the 1970s Dr Finkel dedicated three years of his life to The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary Project which is based at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.

That makes him something of a spring chicken in the life story of this project, which began in 1921.

[...]

Background here. More on Dr. Finkel here.

Photo: Samaritans Celebrate The Festival Of Shavuot In The West Bank

PHOTO: Samaritans Celebrate The Festival Of Shavuot In The West Bank.

A Byzantine-era building at Acre

A BYZANTINE-ERA BUILDING AT ACRE:

Archaeologists unearth Acre church from the Byzantine Period

Discovery of public structure in north Israel city is breakthrough, first time Christian structure has been unearthed in Acre, a city said to have been highly influential in early years of Christianity.

By Jack Khoury (Haaretz)

The headline pretty much says it. But an earlier IAA press release was more cautious about calling it a church.

BMCR: Mason, Josephus, Judea, and Christian Origins

BMCR REVIEW:

Steve Mason, Josephus, Judea, and Christian Origins: Methods and Categories. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2009. Pp. xx, 443. ISBN 9781598562545. $34.95.

Reviewed by Livia Capponi, Newcastle University (livia.capponi@ncl.ac.uk)

This book collects various papers that were previously published in not easily accessible places. These papers have been rearranged by Mason in three parts, the first on the interpretation and historical use of Josephus, the second on Judean society, and the third on Christian origins and the Gospels. The concern for method and categories is present throughout the book. It is a lucid reappraisal of the earlier scholarship on these subjects, and its clarity and lucidity make it an extremely useful tool for both students and scholars in ancient history.

[...]

Happy 30th to Raiders of the Lost Ark

RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK turns 30 today. In honor of the anniversary, Brian Mciver gives us Raiders of the Lost Archives - 30 things you didn't know about Indiana Jones. Note that number 7 has missing bits of number 14 in it.

UPDATE: The original cinema trailer for Raiders is here. And here's another Indiana Jones tidbit: Archaeology's Tech Revolution Since Indiana Jones. Cross-file under "Technology Watch" and take the part about the 17 pyramids with a grain of salt.

St Andrews Conference on Authoritative Texts and Reception History

CONFERENCE REMINDER: The 1st St Andrews Graduate Conference for Biblical and Early Christian Studies: Authoritative Texts and Reception History: Aspects and Approaches is on Wednesday and Thursday of this coming week at the Divinity School of the University of St Andrews. Follow the link for the schedule. I am one of the plenary speakers, as are Professor Kristin De Troyer, Professor N. T. Wright, and Dr. Mark Elliott.

Rufina the archisynagogos

RUFINA THE ARCHISYNAGOGOS:

His/Her Story: A woman 'head of the synagogue'

By RENÉE LEVINE MELAMMED (Jerusalem Post)
06/10/2011 16:55

As it turns out, the evidence available about women in the Greco-Roman Diaspora is distinctive and, at times, quite difficult to interpret.

Jews living in the Greco-Roman Diaspora in the period known as late antiquity (second/third centuries until the fall of the Empire in the fifth century) had experiences that differed considerably from those in the Land of Israel. This held true for women as well as men. As it turns out, the evidence available about women is distinctive and, at times, quite difficult to interpret.

One Greek inscription in particular has long attracted the attention of scholars in the field. This inscription is from Smyrna (modern-day Izmir), located in Asia Minor (modern Turkey), and was commissioned in the second or third century by a woman named Rufina.

While the name Rufina is Latin, the dedicator immediately identified herself by the Greek term Ioudaia. This term is unusual in inscriptions otherwise thought to be Jewish, and suggests that it was important for Rufina. It may even suggest that she wasn’t born Jewish, but converted at some point in her life. The second detail recorded was that she was the archisynagogos, the head (or possibly the president) of the synagogue.

[...]

PA researcher: Crusader first to say "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem"

CAN'T MAKE IT UP:

PA: "If I Forget Thee, Oh Jerusalem" First Said by Crusader

by Gavriel Queenann (Arutz Sheva)

Continuing its policy of denying Jerusalem's Jewish heritage the Palestinian Authority publicized the claims of an Arab researcher that the well-known ancient Hebrew psalm, "If I forget three, Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill," is not Jewish at all, the Israeli research institute Palestininian Media Watch reports.

Instead, Dr. Hayel Sanduqa insists the words were uttered by a Christian Crusader, and have only recently been "borrowed" by Jews and "falsified in the name of Zionism."

[...]

The quotation is, of course, from Psalm 137:5 and dates roughly to the time of the Babylonian exile in the sixth century BCE.

The following are the words of Palestinian researcher Dr. Hayel Sanduqa on PA TV, claiming that the Hebrew Bible's psalm was actually first said by a Crusader:

"[The Israelis] have acted to change Jerusalem's character. Even the expression (Psalm 137:5) 'If I forget thee, oh Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill. May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth, if I do not remember thee.'

"This statement, said by the Frankish [Crusader] ruler of Acre shortly before he left, was borrowed by the Zionist movement, which falsified it in the name of Zionism," Sanduqa said. [PA TV (Fatah), June 2, 2011 -Ed].

Here's the video of the phone conversation. The context of the conversation is not given, but I have a hard time imagining how any context could make the claim less ridiculous.



Apart from this story, there's not much from Google on Dr. Hayel Sanduqa, but this 2008 PNN article refers to him as "the researcher of colonial affairs in Jerusalem."

CNN on the CAD

CNN ON THE CHICAGO ASSYRIAN DICTIONARY: What a Babylonian laundry list says about you. Despite the lame title, the article is quite upbeat.

Background here and links.

Pullman, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ

IN THE MAIL:

Philip Pullman, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ (Edinburgh: Canongate, 2010)

This was sent unsolicited, but maybe I'll get around to reading it. It looks kind of interesting. Earlier coverage is here.

Jared Calaway's dissertation is online

JARED CALAWAY: My Dissertation is Online! The dissertation is "Heavenly Sabbath, Heavenly Sanctuary: The Transformation of Priestly Sacred Space and Sacred Time in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and the Epistle to the Hebrews." Follow the link for the abstract and a link to the ProQuest document.

(Via Polumeros kai Polutropos.)

Roland Boer against "Reception History"

ROLAND BOER has an essay Against “Reception History” posted at Bible and Interpretation.

He makes some fair points, but there is a straw man in his argument as well. Historical-critical exegesis is not entirely unbiased and it cannot produce "one 'right' meaning" of the text, or even one original meaning. However, it does make a serious effort to look at the text the way the original author might have intended it or the original audience might have received it, drawing on philology, archaeology, and the like. This effort provides a narrower range of meanings than is found in the full history of interpretation to the present. Whether this range of meaning is somehow more primary than other, later ones, I leave to others to argue. Roland makes an interesting case against that view. But that range is valuable in itself as, for example, a resource for historians of the biblical period. Yes, the historical-critical method has its own limitations and biases, which constantly need to be interrogated by other methods and perspectives, but how interesting is this point really? It has been made endlessly already, and it applies to those other methods just as much. The hermeneutical spiral is a process, not a conclusion, but that doesn't mean no progress is possible in it. If every method is dismissed because it has inherent limitations, we stray from an asymptotic groping toward truth to a Gödelian infinite loop of prolegomena.

UPDATE (12 June): Chris Heard comments on the essay at the Blackwell Bible Commentaries website.

KJB@400: The Jerusalem Post on the KJB

KJB@400 WATCH: The Jerusalem Post on the King James Bible:

Sacred words, well spoken!

06/09/2011 22:25 By EMANUEL MFOUKOU AND MEREDITH HOLBROOK

Marking 400 years of the King James Bible.

CAD completion again

THE COMPLETION OF THE CHICAGO ASSYRIAN DICTIONARY is celebrated in another article:

Dictionary of Akkadian Language Links Modern Civilization with Ancient Origins

Greg Flakus | Houston, Texas June 09, 2011

“Better late than never” might be the motto scholars could apply to the completion of a comprehensive dictionary of a language that has not been spoken for more than 2,000 years. It took nearly a century, but scholars at the University of Chicago say they have now completed the definitive dictionary of Akkadian, which was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia during the time when the first civilizations began to flourish there.

[...]

Background here and links.

Real Gnostics: The Bogomils

BUT HERE ARE SOME REAL GNOSTICS:

Bulgaria, Bogomils and Italy

Author: Maria Guineva
Society | June 2, 2011, Thursday (Novinite.com)

Bogomislims (Bogomilstvo), often called the Bulgarian heresy, is a social and religious teaching, which appeared in Bulgaria during the first half of the 10th century.

Contemporary historians and scientists characterize Bogomilism as a dualistic teaching and an anti-feudal, reformative movement, born in the bosom of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, quickly spreading across Bulgarian lands during the tumultuous times in the eve of the Byzantine invasion of the country. Its roots can be found in the dualistic gnostic and the mass deportations of Armenians and Syrians from Byzantine.

[...]

A long, interesting article on the Bogomils and their influence. Not mentioned is that the Bogomils seem to have been involved to some degree with the transmission of the Slavonic Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. See the comments in Grant Macaskill's online essay, The Slavonic Pseudepigrapha: An Introduction.

Additional background here and follow the links.

Anthony Weiner, Gnostic?

A NEW TAKE ON GNOSTICISM from Christianity Today:

Anthony Weiner, Gnostic

The embroiled congressman's defense that sexting is not adultery reveals a mind-body dualism long resisted by Christian tradition.

I don't know that Gnosticism applies here: Karen Swallow Prior is the one who seems to me to be taking a decidedly Platonist position - the virtual world is as real as the physical. But more to the point, as she does imply in passing, if Jesus said that just looking is adultery (Matt 5:28), it's hard to imagine him thinking that sexting isn't.

I never expected to write the word "sexting" in this blog.

Anniversary of Nero's suicide

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY: On This Day in Ancient History - Nero's Suicide. But watch out for Nero redivivus imposters.

UPDATE: No, really, watch out.

Who’s Afraid of Abishag?

LEONARD GREENSPOON: WHO'S AFRAID OF ABISHAG? I am astonished that there are so many media references to her.

Conference in honor of Daniel Sperber

A CONFERENCE IN HONOR OF DANIEL SPERBER is being held next week at Bar-Ilan University.

And he knows Aramaic too ...

AND HE KNOWS ARAMAIC TOO:

The Renaissance Man: How to Become a Scientist Over and Over Again [Video]

By Ed Yong | Jun 8, 2011 07:57 AM | 2 (Scientific American)

Erez Lieberman Aiden is a talkative, witty fellow who will bend your ear on any number of intellectual topics. Just don’t ask him what he does. "This is actually the most difficult question that I run into on a regular basis," he says. "I really don’t have anything for that."

It is easy to understand why. Aiden is a scientist, yes, but while most of his peers stay within a specific field – say, neuroscience or genetics – Aiden crosses them with almost casual abandon. His research has taken him across molecular biology, linguistics, physics, engineering and mathematics. He was the man behind last year's "culturomics" study, where he looked at the evolution of human culture through the lens of four per cent of all the books ever published. Before that, he solved the three-dimensional structure of the human genome, studied the mathematics of verbs, and invented an insole called the iShoe that can diagnose balance problems in elderly people. "I guess I just view myself as a scientist," he says.

His approach stands in stark contrast to the standard scientific career: find an area of interest and become increasingly knowledgeable about it. Instead of branching out from a central speciality, Aiden is interested in ‘interdisciplinary’ problems that cross the boundaries of different disciplines. His approach is nomadic. He moves about, searching for ideas that will pique his curiosity, extend his horizons, and hopefully make a big impact. "I don't view myself as a practitioner of a particular skill or method," he tells me. "I’m constantly looking at what’s the most interesting problem that I could possibly work on. I really try to figure out what sort of scientist I need to be in order to solve the problem I'm interested in solving."

It’s a philosophy that has paid dividends. At just 31 years of age, Aiden has a joint lab at MIT and Harvard. In 2010, he won the prestigious $30,000 MIT-Lemenson prize, awarded to people who show "exceptional innovation and a portfolio of inventiveness". He has seven publications to his name, six of which appeared the world’s top two journals - Nature and Science. His friend and colleague Jean-Baptiste Michel says, "He's truly one of a kind. I just wonder about what discipline he will get a Nobel Prize in!"

[...]

Here's the Aramaic part:

"It turns out you can’t work everything out from first principles, because it seems like a lot of things have happened and I didn’t know anything about the universe before I was born in 1980," he says dryly. "So I thought I have to go and understand that stuff." To do that, he spent a year at New York’s Yeshiva University studying for a Masters in History. He took classes going back in time from the present day, reading forward from ancient history (he can now read Aramaic), and stopping when the two streams met in the 17th century.

I think the Aramaic was key to his success.

More opera at Masada

MORE OPERA AT MASADA:

Israeli desert opera festival becomes a 'tradition'

Success of last year's Nabucco performance at Masada historical site leads organizers to hold encore performance – this year with Verdi's Aida

Background on last year's performance here.

Museum of Tolerance update

MUSEUM OF TOLERANCE UPDATE:

Jerusalem approves revised plan for contested Museum of Tolerance site

The controversial project by the Simon Wiesenthal Center is located on a medieval Muslim cemetery, which opponents say defeats the museum's goal of building tolerance.

By Nir Hasson (Haaretz)

After a two-year delay the Jerusalem municipal planning committee approved on Monday the plan to build the Museum of Tolerance in the city center.

[...]

This is about a change in the building design, not a change in the location.

Background here and here and links.

News on the Nephilim and the Rephaim

ZOMBIES TOO: The Nephilim Are Not Coming … They Are Already Here.

Good news for the Nephilim, but for the Rephaim maybe not so much: The second death of the Rephaim: Job 13.4 not really a reference to Rephaim after all.

Irish bog Psalter now on display in Dublin

THE IRISH BOG PSALTER is now on display in Dublin:

Public gets first look at ancient book of psalms

By Grainne Cunningham (Independent.ie)

Wednesday June 08 2011

AFTER hundreds of years lying in a muddy bog, one of the country's most important antiquities went on public display for the first time yesterday.

The Fadden More Psalter, a book of psalms as old as the Book of Kells, was found by turf cutters in a Tipperary bog in 2006.

Conservationists have spent the past five years painstakingly preserving the vellum pages and leather cover and the psalter, which dates from 800AD, now sits centre stage at a new exhibition in the National Museum in Dublin.

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Background here and here and follow the links.

UCLA acquires Ethiopic manuscripts

ETHIOPIC MANUSCRIPT NEWS:

UCLA Library acquires Ethiopic manuscripts collection

By Dawn Setzer June 06, 2011 Category: Arts & Humanities, Campus News

The UCLA Library has acquired the largest private collection of Ethiopic manuscripts and scrolls in the U.S., given by Gerald and Barbara Weiner. Together with the library's existing collections, this gift makes the UCLA Library the leading repository for Ethiopic manuscripts in North America.

A classical Semitic language, Ethiopic is used as the liturgical language of the Christian church in Ethiopia.

Dating from the 18th to the 21st centuries, the collection of 137 bound manuscripts and 102 scrolls is particularly rich in elaborately illustrated liturgical texts. Highlights include a late 19th/early 20th-century version of the Gospels containing 78 miniatures; a 19th-century "lives of the saints" with 40 miniatures; a 20th-century compilation of a table blessing and miracles performed by Jesus with 37 miniatures; and a 20th-century collection of prayers with an image of John the Evangelist and 26 miniatures.

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An important collection, although so far no word of Enochiana or other Old Testament pseudepigrapha in it.

Top five religious mysteries?

MY HEART SANK when I saw this headline:

Top five religious mysteries
As yet another theory emerges as to the origins of the Turin Shroud, here are the top five religious mysteries.

By Nick Squires, Rome (The Telegraph)

9:00PM BST 07 Jun 2011

What an odd collection, and how odd to think that a list mainly of lost, legendary, and/or fake relics somehow constitute the "top five religious mysteries." The exception to my generalization is the Dead Sea Scrolls, which are a mystery in the sense that, although most scholars accept that they come from the Essenes, there is a good deal of debate about what exactly that means.

For the Ark of the Covenant, start here and follow the links. I have posted less on the other relics, but see here for the Holy Grail; here for the True Cross and here for Simcha Jacobovici's True Cross nails; and here for another face-cloth of Christ. And this post covers a few of these relics as well.

I suppose I should just be glad that the fake metal codices didn't make the list.

Shroud of Turn "creation of a Renaissance artist"?

JUST WHAT WE NEED, a new Shroud of Turin theory:

Turin Shroud 'the creation of a Renaissance artist'

The Turin Shroud is neither an authentic cloth in which Christ's body was wrapped nor a medieval forgery, but the creation of early Renaissance artist Giotto, according to new book by an Italian art historian.

By Nick Squires, Rome (The Telegraph)

9:00PM BST 07 Jun 2011

Luciano Buso claims to have found Giotto di Bondone's signature hidden in the 14ft-long, sepia-coloured burial cloth, as well as the number 15.

The historian believes that the number is a reference to 1315, and that the artist was commissioned in that year to come up with an exact copy of the relic because the original was badly damaged after centuries of being hawked around the Holy Land and Europe.

Mr Buso, who has laid out his controversial thesis in a new book, said the idea that the existing shroud was created in 1315 agrees with modern carbon dating tests which dated the fabric to the early 14th century.

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My reaction to the news was similar to that of Professor Barberis:

However, Prof Bruno Barberis, the director of the Shroud of Turin Museum, was highly sceptical of the theory.

"Firstly, physical and chemical tests have shown that the shroud is not a painting.

"Secondly, there's a long list of scholars who have enlarged images of the shroud and seen all sorts of things that don't exist – a crown of thorns, words in Aramaic and Greek and Latin. "It's like looking at the moon and thinking you can see eyes, a nose and a mouth."

That said, Mr Buso has published his theory in a book, so at least there is something for specialists to interact with. I don't know how technical the book is; if it is a popular publication it might not be of much use. But I will keep an open mind for now, with the caveat that when I hear that someone thinks they have found writing etc. on the shroud which everyone else has missed, my bogometer starts flashing.

Shroud of Turin background here and links.

CAD meets NYT

THE COMPLETION OF THE CHICAGO ASSYRIAN DICTIONARY is celebrated in the New York Times:

After 90 Years, a Dictionary of an Ancient World

Ninety years in the making, the 21-volume dictionary of the language of ancient Mesopotamia and its Babylonian and Assyrian dialects, unspoken for 2,000 years but preserved on clay tablets and in stone inscriptions deciphered over the last two centuries, has finally been completed by scholars at the University of Chicago.

[...]

At a conference on Monday, historians, archaeologists and specialists in ancient Semitic languages assessed the significance of the comprehensive dictionary, which Gil Stein, director of the university’s Oriental Institute, said “is an indispensable research tool for any scholar anywhere who seeks to explore the written record of the Mesopotamian civilization.”

[...]

I'm glad someone has finally raised the issue of the dated title.

Background here.

Ancient Buddhist Aramaic

ARAMAIC WATCH: Aramaic was also used by ancient Indian Buddhists:

A glimpse of Gandhara Buddhist heritage

Tue, 2011-06-07 01:17 — editor

By Janaka Perera (Asian Tribune)

The exhibition in Sri Lanka of Sacred Relics of the Buddha and other Buddhist artifacts from Pakistan during this Poson season (June) should widen the horizon of ordinary Buddhists here on the great Gandhara Buddhist civilization.

Although many of them are aware of the Buddhist heritage of other Asian Buddhist countries, not many Sri Lankans – even of they have heard of the name Gandhara – know where exactly it is and that it was seat of Buddhist civilization in the Indian subcontinent.

[...]

The museum’s six galleries present the material subject wise. Among the exhibits is a complete stupa from the Buddhist monastery of Mohra Moradu, stucco sculptures from Mohra Moradan, big stucco Buddha heads, relic caskets, a sleeping Buddha from Bhamala monastery and an Aramaic inscription of Emperor Piyadasi Asoka (Dharmasoka).

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My emphasis. N. S. Gill has more on Asoka/Ashoka here.

Magdala Stone replica going to Denver

MAGDALA CENTER GALA UPDATE:

Replica of Magdala Stone, Vital to Jewish and Christian History, to visit Denver

* June 6th, 2011 12:20 pm MT

Kurt Matthies

* Denver Spiritual Perspectives Examiner

Denver, CO – The Israeli Antiquities Authority has sent an exact replica of a 2,000 year-old coffee-table-sized to Denver, an engraved stone depicting the oldest carved menorah ever discovered. This replica will be unveiled at The Galilee Gala, a benefit being held June 8, 2011 at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science for the Magdala Center. This is the first time the Stone replica has been outside of Israel, and thereby, this is the first opportunity for viewing in the US.

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Unless the replica is made of styrofoam, it's going to be heavy to ship.

Background here.

Happy Shavuot

THE FESTIVAL OF SHAVUOT (Weeks, Pentecost) begins this evening at sundown. Best wishes to all celebrating.

More here.

UPDATE: Studying Torah all night on Shavuot. Cool.

Large grant for Persepolis Fortification Archive Project

THE PERSEPOLIS FORTIFICATION ARCHIVE PROJECT has received a large grant:

PARSA CF Awards $370,000 to Museums and Institutions for Preserving and Advancing Persian Arts

(Payvand)

As a part of its Mehrgan 2010 Grant Cycle and its steadfast commitment to preserving and promoting Persian arts and culture, PARSA Community Foundation is pleased to announce four grants to major museums and institutions to further expand and grow their stellar programs.

The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, which is the recipient of two previous PARSA CF grants, has been awarded a $200,000 grant for their important work on capturing, recording, and distributing the information from the famous tablets of the Persepolis Fortification Archive (PFA). The archive is comprised of some 30,000 clay tablets and fragments found in 1933 by the Oriental Institute archeologists, examining and clearing the ruins of Persepolis palaces of kings Darius and Xerxes and their successors, near Shiraz.

The tablets contain close to 20,000 original texts in cuneiform and Elamite language, Aramaic script and language, and seal impressions, and are currently on loan from Iran at the Oriental Institute.

PFA is the largest and most consequential single source of information on the Achaemenid Persian Empire at its zenith. It provides a very important portal into the languages, art, society, administration, history, geography and religion in the heart of the Persian Empire in the time of Darius I, around 500 BC. It has fundamentally transformed every aspect of modern research on Achaemenid history and culture.

The PFA Project at the Oriental Institute is responsible for carefully cleaning these important ancient tablets, taking high resolution digital imagery of the texts on the tablets, exploring various technologies for the best imaging of the tablets such as 3D, laser, and CT scanning), and recording the texts and impressions. An editorial team within the group reviews and prepares editions of the texts, and all of the tablets, texts and impressions are carefully cataloged for publication and archiving. At this point more than 8000 tablets are completed, resulting in almost 40 Terabytes of data, and the team expects to grow the collection to approximately 11,000 over the next two years.

The tablets have been subject to a long legal battle where plaintiffs suing the Iranian government are asking for the ancient tablets as compensation. With the fate of the archive hanging in balance, the PFA Project has been under pressure to clean, scan, and record as many tablets as possible and as fast as possible. The grant from PARSA CF helped the PFA Project during an urgent time, since the project was in critical need for servers and other resources. An appellate court ruling a while later at the end of March came out with favorable result for the PFA, although the battle still continues.

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Congratulations to the Oriental Institute and to the other institutions that also received awards.

Background on the Persepolis Fortifications Archive Project and the attendant legal controvery noted above is here. The project has a blog here.

Cross-file under "Aramaic Watch."

Lectio Difficilior 1/2011

LECTIO DIFFICILIOR: European Electronic Journal for Feminist Exegesis 1/2011 has just been published. TOC:

* Dalia Marx: Women and Priests: Encounters and dangers as reflected in I Sam 2:22
* Susanne Plietzsch: Verführung zur Tora: das Konzept idealer Weiblichkeit in der rabbinischen Überlieferung zu Rabbi Akiba und seiner Frau
* Karen Strand Winslow: For Moses Had Indeed Married a Cushite Woman": The LORD's Prophet Married Well

(Via the Agade list.)

Rabbinics resources at Tyndale Tech

TYNDALE TECH, by David Instone-Brewer, has a new online rabbinics resource up: www. RabbinicTraditions.com Legal Texts before 500 CE in Mishnah, Tosephta, Babylonian & Jerusalem Talmuds.

He also has links to other rabbinics resources, including his new online book, at Rabbinic Texts to Read and Search. Most of these cost money to use properly.