Recent articles in JSIJ

RECENT ARTICLES IN JEWISH STUDIES, AN INTERNET JOURNAL:

Collective Punishment and the Redaction of the Sugya of Akhan's Sin in the Babylonian Talmud (In Hebrew)

This article analyzes the redactional considerations underlying the sugya about Akhan’s sin in B. San. 43b–44b. At first sight, the structure of the sugya seems problematic, since it does not follow the order of the biblical narrative. This is especially remarkable when this passage is compared to the parallel sugya in the Palestinian Talmud, where the biblical narrative sequence is preserved. An analysis of the Babylonian sugya reveals that the Babylonian editors chose to add homiletic material of both Palestinian and Babylonian origin, which interrupted the original narrative sequence. The central theme of this additional material is collective punishment, which already lies at the center of the biblical story. Thus, the desire to expand discussion of this theme was of great importance to the Babylonian editors, who gave it priority over the original sequence of the biblical narrative.

Dror Erlich, The Retributive Theory of Punishment in Ancient Rabbinic Discussions of Hell (In Hebrew)

Classical rabbinic texts espoused the notion that sinners are punished in hell. The concept of hell was discussed in ancient rabbinic literature from several perspectives, some technical (e.g., when hell was created, its size and structure) and others theological and ethical (e.g., who deserves to be punished there and why, does hell entail eternal damnation or only temporary suffering). This paper focuses on one such theological-ethical issue, namely, the justification for punishment in hell. The paper examines the relevant rabbinic sources from a philosophical perspective and aims to show that their discussions of hell are based on the principles of classical retributive theory of punishment, as opposed to the utilitarian theory of punishment.

Itay Marienberg-Milikowsky, “Exile Yourself to a Place of Torah”? Independence, Marginality and the Study of Torah in Rabbinic Depictions of R. Elazar ben Arakh (In Hebrew)

Most of the rabbinic sources dealing with R. Elazar Ben Arakh seem charged, although some appear neutral, and we may accordingly inquire as to whether they reflect more complex traces of meaning. This article concludes that contrary to accepted opinion, R. Elazar ben Arakh was not perceived as a representative of rabbinic creativity until a relatively late stage. The description of R. Elazar b. Arakh by his teacher, Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai, as a “welling spring” (ma‘ayan ha-mitgabber), does not reflect R. Elazar’s intellectual creativity, but rather his ability, and perhaps also his inclination, to disseminate his teachings in circles extending beyond those of the Rabbis. Based on a fresh reading of most of the rabbinic traditions dealing with R. Elazar ben Arakh, this article seeks to distinguish between the description of R. Elazar ben Arakh as “welling spring” and the history of creativity in Torah study throughout the ages.

Penniman, Lacte Christiano Educatus

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Dissertation Spotlight: John Penniman. Penniman, John David. Lacte Christiano Educatus: The Symbolic Power of Nourishment in Early Christianity. PhD Dissertation, Fordham University, 2015.

My dissertation argues that, for ancient Jews and Christians, nourishment symbolized a transformative process, a transfer of essential qualities and characteristics that could mold the one being fed into the likeness of the one doing the feeding.

Lundhaug and Jenott, The Monastic Origins of the Nag Hammadi Codices

PAULA J. TUTTY: The Nag Hammadi Codices were made by monks.

The question of who owned and produced the Nag Hammadi Codices is of major importance in helping us to understand their historical significance. In order to understand what they may have meant to those who read them, it is important to know who actually read them. Together with post-doctoral fellow in the NEWCONT-project Lance Jenott, [Professor Hugo] Lundhaug has just published a book dealing with this question, entitled The Monastic Origins of the Nag Hammadi Codices. Lundhaug and Jenott answer the question in their new book by thoroughly exploring the issues surrounding the discovery of the codices, their material aspects, and their status as fourth- and fifth-century books of Christian literature.

I haven't seen the book, but the arguments summarized here make a lot of sense to me. Second-century "Gnosticism" (i.e., expressions of the demiurgic myth) look to me to be internal developments within a faction of Christian theology rather than Jewish-Platonic mythology. (Background here and links.) I would not be surprised to see fourth-century Christian monks reading the texts with considerable interest. In any case, whatever the ultimate origins of the texts, we have the manuscripts that we have. It is important to try to understand the social context in which they were copied and read.

Zerubbabel's crown?

FROM This Day, January 13, In Jewish History by Mitchell A. Levin (Cleveland Jewish News). The first item:

519 BCE: Darius had “a crown made for Zerubbabel out of gold sent by Jews in Babylon.”

Evidently a reference to Zechariah 6:9-14:

9 And the word of the Lord came to me: 10 “Take from the exiles Heldai, Tobi′jah, and Jedai′ah, who have arrived from Babylon; and go the same day to the house of Josi′ah, the son of Zephani′ah. 11 Take from them silver and gold, and make a crown,[c] and set it upon the head of Joshua, the son of Jehoz′adak, the high priest; 12 and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, “Behold, the man whose name is the Branch: for he shall grow up in his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord. 13 It is he who shall build the temple of the Lord, and shall bear royal honor, and shall sit and rule upon his throne. And there shall be a priest by his throne, and peaceful understanding shall be between them both.”’ 14 And the crown[d] shall be in the temple of the Lord as a reminder to Heldai,[e] Tobi′jah, Jedai′ah, and Josi′ah[f] the son of Zephani′ah. (RSV)

The Hebrew text as it stands says that Joshua (the high priest, not the much earlier successor to Moses) is the one who is crowned, but the text seems to be in disarray. The two references to "crown" actually say "crowns" in Hebrew. The most likely explanation in my opinion is that the passage originally referred to the crowning of both Zerubbabel (as Davidic king) and Joshua (as Aaronid high priest). But something went wrong with Zerubbabel's career and he disappeared early on. As a result, his name was deleted from the passage. So, yes, it probably originally involved a crown for Zerubbabel.

This crown came from gold brought by Babylonian exiles, although there is no reference to the involvement of Darius.

The passage is not dated. I don't know where the dating to 13 January (i.e., 3 Shevat) comes from. Perhaps there was a rabbinic passage that filled out such details?

Abegg on the DSS Concordance

VIDEO: The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance with Martin Abegg (TWU Dead Sea Scrolls Institute). An informative meditation on an important recent publication and its implications for scholarship.

HT the IOQS page on Facebook.

More on that Temple Mount sewage tunnel

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: Muslims Carrying Out Unauthorized Excavations on Temple Mount Claim They Are Repairing Water Leakage (The Algemeiner).

The first link ("claimed") is now dead. Joseph Lauer (whose e-mail drew my attention to this article) notes the following:

It is from the https://www.facebook.com/Aqsai2014/ Facebook page and the URLs for the likely relevant pictures (followed by the offered caption translations) are:
https://www.facebook.com/Aqsai2014/photos/a.168831039829922.34748.155195894526770/1107190179327332/ [“Renovations and repairs in the yard of the Dome of the Rock”]
https://www.facebook.com/Aqsai2014/photos/a.168831039829922.34748.155195894526770/1107260809320269/ [many paragraphs, ending with “the work to repair the leak water channel will continue for 3 days” and a link to a 2:06-minute YouTube video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rsXeDI1_6k&feature=youtu.be, which is also at
https://www.facebook.com/Aqsai2014/videos/1107261175986899/?theater]

I do not know whether the claim about repairing water leakage is true or not. The past record of the Waqf's unauthorized digging on the Temple Mount does not encourage one to accept any such claim without verification. But even if it is true, it is irrelevant. Excavation at an archaeologically rich site like the Temple Mount is always to be undertaken under the supervision of archaeologists and only with any necessary salvage archaeology being done as needed. You don't just go and dig a big hole to fix a leak in a canal. Archaeological supervision and salvage under such circumstances is standard practice pretty much everywhere else and failure to follow that practice is simply uncivilized.

Background here.

The NT knew the OTA and OTP

WELL YES: The New Testament Writers Had the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha in their Heads (Dr. Michael S. Heiser).

I don't necessarily endorse every parallel advanced at the link given in the post, but the overall concept is sound. A couple of relevant posts are here and here.

HT James McGrath on Facebook. Cross-file under Old Testament Apocrypha Watch and Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Watch.

Images 7-8 (2015)

THE BRILL JOURNAL IMAGES has published two volumes in 2015: Images 7 and Images 8.

IMAGES invites scholarly articles on Jewish art and visual culture, ranging in time from Greco-Roman antiquity to the present day. Articles may concentrate on any geographical area in which Jewish participation had an impact, and any discipline, including architecture, painting, sculpture, treasury arts, book arts, graphics, textiles, photography and film, and other areas of the visual environment. In addition, IMAGES welcomes articles on historiography and theory, as well as textual studies that reflect on the themes of the journal.

Follow the links for the TOCs. Both volumes have reviews relevant to ancient Judaism.

Barclay interview

VIDEO: John Barclay Interviewed by Eerdmans (Mark Goodacre, NT Blog).

Professor Barclay's recent book, Paul and the Gift was noted here.

Dirk Smilde awards

CONGRATULATIONS TO BOTH: The Text Strikes Back: Presentation Dirk Smilde Fellowship.

On February 5th, the president of the University of Groningen, Sibrand Poppema, will present the Dirk Smilde Fellowship to Dr Benjamin G. Wright, Professor of the History of Christianity at Lehigh University, Pennsylvania. Dr Bärry Hartog will receive the Dirk Smilde Scholarship. If you would like to attend the ceremony please register in time, seating is limited!

Follow the link for more on the awards and this year's recipients.

Dura-Europos update

MICHAEL PEPPARD: Saving Syria: ISIS seeks to control the country’s future by destroying its Christian past. (America Magazine). Excerpt:

At first glance, the looting of small artifacts might seem to run counter to ISIS’s tendency toward destruction. This seeming contradiction invites us to reflect on their cynical and shortsighted strategy for dealing with the cultural patrimony of Syria. On the one hand, ISIS has been intentionally destroying monumental forms of cultural property that are not seen to fit within their very constricted notion of Syrian culture. They are trying to control the future narrative of Syrian culture by eliminating the diversity of its past.

Dura-Europos had been a perfect signal of such diversity, with religious structures dedicated to gods that were Greek, Roman, Sumerian, Parthian, Palmyrene and Judean in origin. The Roman era of the city also showed extensive linguistic diversity. Although the Greek language retained its cultural dominance and Latin became an administrative language, the remains exhibited Hebrew, various forms of Aramaic (including Palmyrene, Syriac and Hatrian, from eastern Mesopotamia), northern Arabic and Iranian (including Parthian and Middle Persian). In terms of religion, language and culture, Dura-Europos was thus exactly the kind of tolerant crossroads that is unwelcome under ISIS’s ideologically strict regime. If large monuments had remained, they almost certainly would have been destroyed.

On the other hand, ISIS has not been destroying the small artifacts discovered amid Dura’s innumerable looting pits. Rather, they seem to be organizing the monetization of portable cultural property—pottery, statuettes, reliefs, coins. In other words, an image of a Greek god on a monument needs to be destroyed with a hammer and broadcast around the world by video. But if an image of a god is found on a small statuette, ISIS regards it not as an idol but as currency. And quite a currency it has become: Western intelligence experts have estimated that antiquities are the second-largest source of revenue (after oil) for the regime.

Such inconsistency with regard to cultural property shows that ISIS is likely not concerned about the long-term benefits of Syria’s rich and diverse heritage. Yes, portable objects can bring short-term financial support, but sending them all abroad means most are never coming back. And though broadcasting the destruction of monuments and buildings may bring a short-term boost in recruitment to their ideology, it undermines one of the best sources of long-term revenue for Syria, which is tourism to its many famous sites.

HT AJR. Background on the assault of ISIS on the past and its caretakers is here with many links. And background on Dura-Europos, including its sad fate under ISIS, is here, again with many links.

David Bowie as Pilate

MARK GOODACRE: David Bowie as Pilate in Last Temptation of Christ. Good clip. Requiescat in pace.

Inscribing Talmudic divorce

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Talmudic Semiotics: I Write Your Name. In this week’s ‘Daf Yomi’ study, a premodern post-modern analysis of what exactly constitutes writing, in the physical act of making indelible marks on surfaces. Plus: Need to deliver a ‘get’ to your wife but out of paper? Talmud says: Write it on a slave!.

As we saw last week, the subject of Gittin is not just divorce, but specifically the get—the legal document by which a divorce is effected. According to the Bible, a husband can divorce his wife (but not vice versa) by writing “a scroll of severance” and giving it to her. In this week’s Daf Yomi reading, the rabbis raise a series of questions about how this scroll is to be written, and in the process they end up questioning the very nature of writing itself. What does it mean to write? Does it require the use of certain materials, or is the “idea” of a text independent of its physical makeup? If so, what kind of being does a text have? These are the very questions that continue to perplex literary theorists today.

[...]

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

JeruZalem opening soon

CINEMA: Award-winning horror film JeruZalem opens in cinemas January 20. From emerging Israeli directors, brothers Yoav and Doron Paz comes an acclaimed award-winning film JeruZalem, winner of the Audience Award and Best Editing at the recent 32nd Jerusalem International Film Festival (INQUIRER POP).

“JeruZalem” follows two American girls on vacation who meet an attractive student studying anthropology during their trip to Jerusalem. A trip planned to be their best vacation ever, the girls, Sarah (Danielle Jadelyn) and Rachel (Yael Grobglas, Israel’s budding scream queen) do the rounds of the tour with newfound friend Kevin in tow and partying hard in Jerusalem’s ancient sites. The trio unexpectedly find themselves in the midst of a religious conflict followed by a series of horrifying biblical apocalypse.

Inspired by a line from the Talmud that states “There are three gates to hell: one in the desert, one in the ocean and one in Jerusalem,” the movie unleashes a chain of demonic events that brought about terror as the three try to escape between ancient walls of the holy city.

[...]

There is a trailer at the link. The film is shot from the POV perspective of one of the characters. I noted the film-festival premier here, where there's more on the Talmudic background. The trailer also claims that the business about the three gates of hell is found in the book of Jeremiah. It isn't. No specific passage is given, so I don't know what they are thinking.

CFP: BAJS 2016

CALL FOR PAPERS: BAJS Conference 2016: The Texture of Jewish Tradition: Investigations in Textuality. At the University of Birmingham on 10-12 July 2016. The deadline for paper proposals is 15 February. Follow the link for further particulars.

Temple Mount sewage tunnel blocked with concrete

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: Awaqf Casting Concrete into Ancient Sewage Tunnel (Temple Mount Sifting Project Blog). This is not good. Ancient sewage tunnels and garbage dumps are often treasure troves of archaeological material culture.

HT Joseph Lauer. More on the damage done to the Temple Mount by the Waqf is here and here and links.

UPDATE (13 January): More here.

TC 20 (2015)

ETC BLOG: TC Journal Vol. 20 Packed with Articles and Reviews (Tommy Wasserman). Almost everything in this volume involves the New Testament or early Christianity, but TC also often has text-critical articles on the Hebrew Bible and the Septuagint.

SOTS website

THE SOCIETY FOR OLD TESTAMENT STUDY (SOTS) has a new website. The Society's winter meeting took place on 4-6 January at Durham University.

Flesher on the theology of the afterlife of Pentateuchal Targums

ACADEMIA.EDU: The Theology of the Afterlife in the Palestinian Targums to the Pentateuch: A Framework for Analysis. Paul V. M. Flesher, 1999. In: Approaches to Ancient Judaism: New Series, vol. 16, J. Neusner, ed. (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press), pp. 1-47.

Apion in the news

ELI KAVON: Apion: Intellectual and Anti-Semite (Past Imperfect Blog, Jerusalem Post).

The model for today’s Jew-hating intellectuals is Apion. A scholar of epic Greek poet Homer and the head of the greatest library of the ancient world in Alexandria, Apion’s attacks on Jews presage charges of ritual murder leveled against Jews in medieval Christendom and can fairly be compared to the Nazi propaganda of Der Sturmer and Julius Streicher. While none of his writings are extant, we know of Apion’s anti-Semitism from the great ancient Jewish historian Josephus. In Against Apion, written by Josephus decades after Apion died in 48 CE, the Jewish historian—unfairly labeled as the epitome of a traitor—defends Judaism against the attacks of Apion and his collaborator in his writings Chaeremon. ...

Whether and the degree to which Josephus was a "traitor" is a complicated problem that does not have an easy answer. But be that as it may, his works are one of our main sources for Judaism of the first century and he is our only source for the lost work of Apion.

Some related past posts are here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Dillon and Timotin (eds.), Platonic Theories of Prayer

NEW BOOK FROM BRILL:

Platonic Theories of Prayer

Edited by John Dillon, Trinity College Dublin, & Andrei Timotin, Romanian Academy - ISEES.
is a collection of ten essays on the topic of prayer in the later Platonic tradition. The volume originates from a panel on the topic held at the 2013 ISNS meeting in Cardiff, but is supplemented by a number of invited papers. Together they offer a comprehensive view of the various roles and levels of prayer characteristic of this period. The concept of prayer is shown to include not just formal petitionary or encomiastic prayer, but also theurgical practices and various states of meditation and ecstasy practised by such major figures as Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Proclus, Damascius or Dionysius the Areopagite.

Some related posts are here, here, here, and here.

Shokri-Foumeshi, Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns

BIBLIOGRAPHIA IRANICA: Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns. Notice of new book: Shokri-Foumeshi, Mohammad. 2015. Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns. Edition, Reconstruction and Commentary with a Codicological and Textological Approach Based on Manichaean Turfan Fragments in the Berlin Collection. (Religions and Denominations 155). Qom: The University of Religions and Denominations.

Cross-file under Manichean (Manichean) Watch.

Palidromes, part 2

SARAH E. BOND: Power of the Palindrome: Writing, Reading, and Wordplay (Part II). Dura-Europos and the Sator Square figure in this post. Part one was noted here nearly a year ago.

Review of Gundry, Peter: False Disciple and Apostate ...

LARRY HURTADO: The Apostle Peter: Damned Apostate?

In his most recent book, seasoned and respected New Testament scholar, Robert H. Gundry, presents the bold thesis that the Gospel of Matthew presents the Apostle Peter as an apostate who is irredeemably damned: Peter: False Disciple and Apostate according to Saint Matthew (Eerdmans, 2015; publisher’s online description here).

[...]

Hurtado is not persuaded.

Angst of a Greek teacher

PHILOLOGY: Beginning Greek, Again and Again (JAMES ROMM, NYT).

WHEN I moved my Beginning Greek course, last year, from the spring to fall semester, I did not reckon with the impact on my psyche of diminishing daylight. As the days grew shorter, my thoughts about the course grew darker. When the semester concluded, just before the winter solstice, those thoughts had also reached a nadir, giving way to the fear that I had failed, once again, in my 30-year quest to turn bright and eager undergraduates into readers, and lovers, of ancient Greek.

[...]

My experience of teaching introductory Biblical Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic has been very different from this and generally very positive. Perhaps I am just fortunate in having such good students.

The Inn at Lydda

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA WATCH: THE INN AT LYDDA, by John Wolfson, is playing at the Liverpool Playhouse this autumn:

John Wolfson’s play The Inn at Lydda will be performed in the Playhouse in September (Full dates TBC). John is Honorary Curator of Rare Books for the Globe, a playwright and author of William Shakespeare and the Short Story Collections. Based on a reference in the New Testament Apocrypha, the play follows Tiberius Caesar and a remarkable meeting with Jesus Christ in Judea. Having opened the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse in 2014, the Globe is now actively planning its very own library and archive on site, on London’s Bankside. John has generously agreed to bequeath to the Globe an important collection of rare and valuable volumes, including a First Folio and Quarto editions. Having these texts will cement the Globe’s reputation as the first point of reference for teaching, research and interpretation of Shakespeare in performance.

Additional details are here:

Based on a story in the New Testament Apocrypha (The Death of Pilate), written in 1997. The play follows the story of Tiberius Caesar who learns of a healer in Judea called Jesus. Being ill of a fistula, Caesar sets sail for the Holy Land to be healed, not realising that Jesus has been crucified a few days before. But as Caesar arrives in Judea some time between the Resurrection and the Ascension, a remarkable meeting between Caesar and Christ takes place.

Cross-file under "Theatre."

New online journal on the Jesus movement in its Jewish setting

LARRY HURTADO: New Online-Access Journal.

There is a recently-launched online and open-access journal that looks very promising, to judge from the most recent issue: Journal of the Jesus Movement in its Jewish Setting, From the First to the Seventh Century. ...

CFP: “The Dead Sea Scrolls and Hellenism”

CONFERENCE: “The Dead Sea Scrolls and Hellenism” Groningen – Leuven Encounters on the Dead Sea Scrolls. The conference takes place on 13-14 April 2016 in Groningen. The deadline for receipt of paper proposals is 15 February 2016. Follow the link for further particulars.

Ben Dov on the Watchers and Mesopotamian inscriptions

REMNANT OF GIANTS: Is the Watcher/Fallen Angel Myth a reinterpretation of Mesopotamian inscriptions?

Jonathan Ben-Dov (University of Haifa) has developed a very interesting theory about the origin of the early Jewish tradition of the Fallen Angels and Giants. He presented it at Boston College on November 20, 2013, in a paper entitled “Iconography and Myth: From Nebuchadnezzar to the Fallen Angels”.

[...]

Follow the link for the video. A past post on Ben Dov's theory is here.

Punic death metal

PUNIC WATCH: KATAKLYSM Frontman's EX DEO Project To Release 'The Immortal Wars' Album In February 2017 (Blabbermouth.net).

EX DEO, the reactivated Ancient Roman-themed arsenal fronted by KATAKLYSM singer Maurizio Iacono, will release its new studio album, "The Immortal Wars", in February 2017 via Napalm Records. The CD's main concept will deal with Punic Wars, a series of three wars fought between Rome and Carthage from 264 B.C. to 146 B.C. The epic legendary wars will come to life and bring the showdown between two of the greatest generals that ever walked the earth, Hannibal and Scipio Africanus, both of whom rewrote the rules of war and strategies. The album will also feature other unexplored subjects on Ancient Rome surely to raise the epic level to the maximum.

[...]

There's more on KATAKLYSM here.

Announcement: T. J. Lang

NEW APPOINTMENT AT THE FACULTY OF DIVINITY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ST ANDREWS:

The School of Divinity is delighted to announce the appointment of Dr T.J. Lang as Lecturer in New Testament, starting in August 2016.

Dr Lang comes to St Andrews from Durham University, where he was Lecturer in New Testament Studies. Dr Lang's PhD is in New Testament and Early Christianity from Duke University. He is the author of Mystery and the Making of a Christian Historical Consciousness: From Paul to the Second Century (de Gruyter, 2015) and articles published or forthcoming in journals such as Journal for the Study of the New Testament, Biblical Interpretation, Catholic Biblical Quarterly, Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft, Journal of Theological Studies, and New Testament Studies.

Dr Lang is interested in supervising PhD students in a range of areas related to the New Testament and early Christianity and is happy to discuss proposals with potential students. The focus of his research, however, has been on Paul and the reception history of Pauline traditions, the Synoptic Gospels and John, and second-century Christianity. His current research is on Paul’s conception of time and history and broader issues of Christian epistemology. We look forward to welcoming him here in the summer.

Very good news indeed.

Laser preservation

UNFORTUNATELY THIS DOESN'T INVOLVE RAY GUNS: Using Lasers to Preserve Antiquities Threatened by ISIS (STEPHEN FARRELL, NYT).

Cultural organizations are working with Iraqi and Syrian experts, drawing on local knowledge and providing equipment and training, to create digital records of endangered ancient sites.

Cross file under Technology Watch. Background here and here and links.

Review of Gager, Who Made Early Christianity?

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Gager, Who Made Early Christianity? (Brian Leport).

Past posts on the book are here and links.

What will happen to the Iraqi Jewish archive?

STILL IN LIMBO: Who should keep Iraqi Jewry’s archives, saved from Saddam, now on tour in US? The future of a unique collection, salvaged in a ‘Monuments Men-style’ rescue from a secret police HQ in Baghdad, 2003, is up for grabs (Rich Tenorio, Times of Israel).

The collection was waterlogged and damaged, and the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq placed an urgent call to the United States National Archives and Records Administration in Maryland. With permission from local officials, the treasures were soon airlifted to the US in a special rescue operation.

At a cost of $3 million, the collection of over 2,700 books and tens of thousands of documents dating from the 16th to the 20th centuries has been preserved, cataloged and digitized. Today, some are being shown in an exhibition touring the US until they are ultimately to be returned to the Iraqi National Archives in Baghdad.

“There is no date,” said US National Archives exhibit director Lisa Royse about the exact time the collection is to be returned to Iraq. “[For now] they are willing to let us extend the archive’s time in the US.”

[...]

A long article that covers the story in detail from its beginning to the present. And the following is noteworthy:

Several individuals who were present when the collection was discovered during the Iraq War, however, have voiced concern over what will happen once the tour ends.

The US tour is scheduled to end in the summer of 2016 and at some point following, the exhibition is planned to be shown at the Iraqi National Archives in Baghdad. “That’s its final venue,” exhibit director Royse said.

Some have called for a permanent destination outside Iraq — either in the US or Israel.

“To whom does it belong?” asked Rhode, who has grappled with this question ever since he navigated in waist-deep waters to rescue a floating Torah scroll in Iraq over a decade ago. “The answer, to me, is that it belongs to the people who used it, the Jews of Iraq… It belongs to them, not the Iraqi government.”

‘When you take over a country, you can’t steal its treasures’
Rhode and others believe the time is ripe to reexamine the terms of the agreement under which the artifacts arrived in the US.

[...]

It seems to me that the material ought to belong to the Jewish community, the Iraqi Jewish community,” Miller said, adding that there are more Iraqi Jews now in the US than in Baghdad.

Former Pentagon official Harold Rhode studies an artifact from the Jewish community of Iraq in the basement of Saddam Hussein's secret police headquarters on May 6, 2003, Baghdad, Iraq. (Courtesy: Richard Gonzales)
Former Pentagon official Harold Rhode studies an artifact from the Iraqi Jewish community cache on May 6, 2003, Baghdad, Iraq. (Courtesy: Richard Gonzales)

In Rhode’s opinion, the ideal destination for the collection is the Museum of Babylonian Jewry outside Tel Aviv. “It’s the only museum of Iraqi Jewish heritage that exists,” he said.

[...]

Background here, with links going back to the discovery of the archive in 2003. And I have given some of my own reflections on how to proceed at the links at the bottom of this post.

Good going, ancient Romans!

THE GOOD OLD DAYS: What Did the Ancient Romans Do for Us? They Gave Us Parasites. 'Clean' ancient Romans were crawling with worms, lice and fleas despite their baths, sewage systems and toilets, study proves (Ruth Schuster, Haaretz).

The people of ancient Rome were famed not only for their licentiousness but for their sanitation. Public baths were legion throughout the Roman Empire, and the Romans are also credited with introducing toilets and sewers to European towns some 2,000 years ago. Yet the Romans turn out to have been even more worm-infested than their unwashed peers, and also compared with earlier peoples, say archaeologists.

At least they probably smelled better, says Piers Mitchell of the Cambridge Archaeology and Anthropology Department.

The reasons for the pest infestations were apparently not that they didn’t know how to bathe, but they didn't realize the way they did it and other habits of theirs supported the life-cycle of parasites.

[...]

A review of Mitchell's book is noted here. Some past posts of related interest are here, here, here, and here. And, of course, there is this.

As I have said before, the ancients lived in a world whose casual degradation and brutality is hard for us to imagine.

More 2015 archaeology lists

BIBLE PLACES BLOG: Top Biblical Archaeology Discoveries of 2015 (Todd Bolen). The post includes the Christianity Today top 10 list and the Haaretz list, but also others that have not been noted by PaleoJudaica.

More on Schechter's centennial yahrzeit

CONFERENCE REPORT: Schechter kin observe scholar’s yahrtzeit. At Cambridge seminar, local rabbi is reminded of ancestor’s impact (Robert Wiener, NJJN Staff Writer).

A century after the death of Solomon Schechter, the Judaics scholar who revitalized Conservative Judaism, his descendants paid homage to his memory at Cambridge University in England.

Among them was his great-grandson, Rabbi John Schechter of Congregation B’nai Israel in Basking Ridge, who earned his ordination at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where Solomon Schechter served as president from 1902 to 1915.

Along with his wife, Cantor Erica Lippitz of Oheb Shalom Congregation in South Orange, John Schechter attended the second of two conferences observing his forebear’s 100th yahrtzeit.

The day-long gathering in England, held Nov. 22 at the Divinity School at St. John’s College, featured presentations on Solomon Schechter’s impact on the study of Jewish antiquity and on contemporary scholarship and religious thought. Arriving in the United States in 1902, Schechter transformed JTS into a locus for Jewish scholarship and rabbinic training.

For John Schechter and Lippitz, the highlight of the visit was examining some of the 193,000 sacred and secular texts and documents that the elder Schechter shipped to Cambridge from among the 300,000 items he famously explored in 1896-97 after their discovery in the Cairo Geniza.

[...]

Background here and links.

Neshech

HEBREW ETYMOLOGY: Bernie Sanders Takes a Bite out of Bible With Attack on 'Usury' (Aviya Kushner, The Forward).

Masters of magic?

YES. NEXT QUESTION? WERE CHRISTIANS, MUSLIMS AND JEWS MASTERS OF MAGIC? (ELISA MEYER, World Religion News). Some of them were. A few of them — and others — still are.

Background here and here. And on my last point see, for example, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Ten years of ETC

CELEBRATION: Happy New ETC Year! (Tommy Wasserman).

Welcome to a new year with the ETC blog and lots of textual criticism!

At the SBL meeting in Atlanta, we celebrated the 10-year anniversary of the blog at the annual ETC blogdinner, and the founding father Peter Williams held a speech looking back at the ten years and ahead into the future. Incidentally, we celebrated the 5-year anniversary at the SBL meeting 2010, held in Atlanta too.

We did not make much of the 10-year anniversary here on the blog, but I thought it would be nice to note a few things (better late than never):

[...]

Interview with Lawrence Schiffman

BERNARD STARR: Bible Expert's Surprising Findings About Jews and Judaism Revealed in the New Testament (HuffPo).

It's well known that Christianity sprang from a Jewish context. While there may be controversy about Jesus' Judaism vs. the traditional Judaism of the Sanhedrin, the ruling body of Judaism in the first century, there's no doubt that Jesus, his family, and followers were practicing Jews, as recorded in the New Testament.

Biblical scholar Lawrence H. Schiffman, Judge Abraham Lieberman Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies and Director of the Global Network for Advanced Research in Jewish Studies at New York University (NYU), takes this understanding to a new level. He identifies citations in the New Testament that others have glossed over without recognizing their unique significance. On March 26-27, 2015, at a conference at NYU, "Integrating Christianity and Judaism into the Study of the Ancient World," Professor Schiffman delivered a talk titled "The New Testament as a Source for the History of the Jews and Judaism."

I interviewed Professor Schiffman to gain further insight into his perspective on this fascinating subject.

The text of the interview follows. The conference was noted as upcoming here.

More on Rosh HaAyin

LIVESCIENCE: Photos: Ancient Farmhouse and Church Uncovered in Israel (Mindy Weisberger).

As the city of Rosh Ha-'Ayin in central Israel expands, excavation in preparation for new construction revealed ancient buildings in the surrounding area. Structures with colorful mosaic floors and dozens of rooms hint at how people may have lived and worked in centuries gone by.

Background here.

The Samaritans in Recent Research

THE BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION:

The Samaritans in Recent Research

We now know from the Dead Sea discoveries that texts similar to the Samaritan Pentateuch were circulating together with texts that foreshadow the Masoretic text and the Septuagint. No “sectarian” differences are present in these manuscripts, which means that the so-called pre-Samaritan texts were used side by side with the other versions. Thus, in its substance, the Pentateuch was common to Yahwistic Samarians and and Yahwistic Judeans long before the Samarian Yhwh worshipers parted company with the latter.

See Also: The Samaritans: A Profile (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2016).

By Reinhard Pummer
Department of Classics and Religious Studies
University of Ottawa
December 2015

PaleoJudaica has endless posts on both the ancient and the modern Samaritans. See, for example, here and here and follow the links. Or, for much more, run "Samaritans" through the search engine.

Helmut Koester, 1926-2016

SAD NEWS: Preeminent New Testament Scholar Helmut Koester Passes Away at 89 (Harvard Divinity School).

Helmut Koester, John H. Morison Professor of New Testament Studies and Winn Professor of Ecclesiastical History Emeritus, died on New Year’s Day, 2016, at age 89.

Koester was a leading scholar in the history of Christianity, New Testament exegesis and theology, the religions of the ancient Roman world, and archeology.

[...]

Requiescat in pace.

Burials at a construction site in Jerusalem

AGAIN, A GRAVE MATTER: Israel Nixes Excavation of Ancient Jerusalem Burial Site in Area Slated for Homes. Antiques Authority forced to leave site after Shas leader Arye Dery raised issue with Netanyahu, who ordered that work be stopped (Yair Ettinger, Haaretz).

Under pressure from the ultra-Orthodox Knesset factions, the Israel Antiquities Authority on Tuesday stopped its excavation of ancient burial caves in an area slated for a new residential neighborhood in south Jerusalem. The caves were discovered in the neighborhood of Gilo, in an area where 708 apartments are to be built, about half of them for ultra-Orthodox families.

[...]

The halakhic and financial issues are complex and contentious:

Out of the 708 apartments, 354 have been allocated to ultra-Orthodox associations. According to ultra-Orthodox sources, a compromise was suggested by which the developers would forego the apartments on the first floor and the buildings would be built on pillars, which is an acceptable solution under Jewish law. The developers reportedly agreed to the idea, on condition that they be compensated by the Construction Ministry. The Construction Ministry meanwhile has refused to compensate the developers.

According to officials familiar with the details, the antiquities authority decided to leave the site Tuesday due to Dery’s request from Netanyahu, which led to the latter ordering that work be stopped in an attempt to reach a compromise.

Past posts on similar situations are here, here, and here. And there's this. We're clearly dealing with some historically crowded real estate. And this seems relevant too.

Implications of Hezekiah's bulla

EPIGRAPHY: Hezekiah Seal Proves Ancient Jerusalem Was a Major Judahite Capital. Similar seal impressions had already been found – by thieves. This one uniquely found in situ proves King Hezekiah’s connection to the LMLK symbols and the existence of an advanced Judahite administration (Julia Fridman, Haaretz).

The uniqueness of the seal impression announced in December lies in its being a rare solid piece of evidence that Jerusalem housed a major Judahite royal administration. Almost all other seals and bullae from the Judahite era had been illegally dug up and sold by antiquities thieves, rendering them valueless to archaeologists because of their uncertain provenance and questionable authenticity.

Although, as the article observes, the iconography of the seal doesn't offer any great support to the biblical picture of Hezekiah as an anti-idolatry reformer.

Background here and links.

Encyclopedia Talmudit anniversary

EVENT: Encyclopedia Talmudit celebrates 70 years. Ceremony to mark one of the greatest contributions of modern society to the continuation of Jewish and halachic literature (Orli Harrari, Arutz Sheva).

A special ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of the publication of the Encyclopedia Talmudit will take place at the President’s Residence in Jerusalem on Monday.

Seventy years ago, Rabbi Meir Bar Ilan and Rabbi Shlomo Zevin created the Encyclopedia Talmudit. More than 1 million editions have been published and it comprises 1,300 entries. The encyclopedia is one of the more important publications in the Jewish tradition and even high-ranking judges have used it and quoted it while formulating their legal decisions.

Event organizers have stated that the encyclopedia is a work that is unlike any other in halachic literature in its explanation and summarization of the large body of knowledge of halachic literature from the time period of the Tanach until modern times.

[...]

More on the Encyclopedia Talmudit is here.

The Talmud says that God studies Torah

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Talmud: God Studies Torah, Too. From a single biblical verse about divorce is spun an edifice of legal wrangling, including a first discussion of what, geographically, constitutes ‘the Land of Israel.’ There's a lot going on in the current readings.

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

New Ethiopic program at Toronto

ETHIOPIC WATCH: Launch of Ethiopic Studies Program at the University of Toronto (Alpha Abebe, Tadias Magazine). They are still raising support for the program, but the University will be offering Ge'ez (Old Ethiopic) next year. That's a good start.

December Biblical Studies Carnival

JENNIFER GUO: Biblical Studies Carnival – December 2015. Goodbye 2015.

More on Eve and Adam's penis-bone

MARGINALIA REVIEW OF BOOKS: A Flaccid Interpretation of Eden – By Joseph Ryan Kelly. This is a review of Ziony Zevit's book, What Really Happened in the Garden of Eden?, which has recently been receiving some media attention. The attention focuses on Zevit's theory that, according to the Garden of Eden story, Eve was created from Adam's penis-bone rather than his rib. This review was published last March, but I did not note it at the time. It covers a range of things in the book, but gives considerable space to the question of that bone and the reviewer is not convinced by the theory. Excerpt:

Has Zevit pulled back the curtain on these early chapters of Genesis? While his use of philology and historical criticism forces us to reconsider interpretations often taken for granted, his approach does not produce confident conclusions. Does God really create Hawwa, Eve, out of Adam’s penile bone? Genesis 2:21 describes God removing one of Adam’s ribs or ṣelaot. To incorporate this detail into his interpretation, Zevit translates the term ṣela as “lateral bone.” Imagining the baculum as belonging to a category of lateral bones strikes me as a specious argument. But perhaps more pressing is the way this proposed etiology differs from other etiologies involving humans in the Hebrew Bible. Elsewhere, biblical texts use past events to explain cultural institutions or customs.

Worth reading in full. Background here.

Magic and that silver scroll

CANDIDA MOSS: When Christians, Muslims, and Jews Loved Magic. A silver scroll found in Jordan is a reminder of how big the market for ‘magic’ objects was in ancient Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. (The Daily Beast).

The newly discovered scroll may well suggest that Arabs in 8th century Jerash were adopting the religious practices of their Jewish, Christian, Greek, and Roman neighbors. But it also reminds us that one woman’s magic is another woman’s religion.

The discovery of this silver scroll was recently noted and commented on here.

The Study Quran

THE ANXIOUS BENCH: The Study Quran (John Turner).

Thus, I’m extremely pleased by the appearance of HarperOne’s The Study Quran, a project headed by Seyyed Nasr. One of my colleagues at George Mason, Maria Dakake, is one of the contributing editors.

The publication of The Study Quran is a landmark. It contains an original translation of the Quran, which is also very readable. It also contains an extensive scholarly apparatus, pointing readers to the ways that Quranic verses have been interpreted, especially during the first several centuries after the life of the Prophet Muhammad. This is enormously useful, as are the topical essays, which discuss everything from Sufism to Islamic art to “Death, Dying, and the Afterlife in the Quran.” The careful introductions to hadith sources at the back of the volume are also very helpful.

Unlike the Harper Collins Study Bible, at least as far as I can discern, The Study Quran is less concerned with introducing students to critical (i.e., non-Muslim or very progressive Muslim) scholarship on the Quran, so it is not an exact parallel. Nevertheless, I’m very grateful to have something to assign for my introductory students that will help them make better sense of the Qur’an and how Muslims have interpreted it.

I've been meaning to note this important publication for some time, so this is a good opportunity. I haven't yet seen it myself, but I'm looking forward to hearing more about it.

Daniel Matt reads the Idra Zuta

ZOHAR WATCH: Daniel Matt reads his Idra Zuta Zohar translation.

Near the very end of the Zohar on the Torah comes the remarkable section known as Idra Zuta (The Small Assembly). This dramatic narrative describes the last gathering of Rabbi Shim'on and the Companions before his death. Here the master reveals profound mysteries of divine being, and then departs from this world to unite ecstatically with the Divine Feminine, Shekhinah. ...

Background on the Zohar and on Daniel Matt's edition and translation of it is here with many, many links. The Shekhinah figures in that post as well.

More on Marshak, The Many Faces of Herod the Great

EUANGELION BLOG: A Great New Book About Herod the Great (Joel Willitts). A brief notice with additional references. I noted the book earlier here and here.

The state of the question on the Son of Man

REMNANT OF GIANTS: The assured results of Son of Man scholarship. Yep, that about sums it up.

'ezrah

YONA SABAR: Hebrew word of the week: Citizen - In Hebrew: EzraH. It means a "native-born" Israelite in biblical Hebrew.

Goff, "Ben Sira and the Giants"

RECENTLY UPLOADED TO ACADEMIA.EDU: "Ben Sira and the Giants of the Land: A Note on Ben Sira 16:7" (Matthew Goff, JBL 129, no. 4 (2010): 645–655).

In this short note I address the common claim that Sir 16:7 alludes to Gen6:1–4. I argue that understanding the verse in this way is not unreasonable but thatthis position needs to be qualified. The primary reference of the line is not the floodstory but archaic peoples of the land. Genesis 6 and early Jewish traditions that per-tain to this chapter influence Ben Sira’s description of archaic Canaanite rulers.

More on YU's Arch of Titus MOOC

ONLINE EDUCATION: YU Joins World of Online Education with Arch of Titus Class (Eitan Lipsky, The Commentator).

Although Chanukah has concluded, Yeshiva University is still trying to spread its light as far as it can. In early December, the university took a big step in expanding its global impact by releasing a course entitled, “Arch of Titus: Rome and the Menorah,” on Coursera, a company that works with top universities to make some of their courses available online as massive open online courses (known colloquially as MOOCs).

[...]

This Yeshiva University online course has already been noted here, but this article has additional background and information. Follow the latter link for lots more on the Arch of Titus, and see also here.

Jason, Repentance at Qumran

NEW BOOK FROM FORTRESS PRESS:

Repentance at Qumran: The Penitential Framework of Religious Experience in the Dead Sea Scrolls

Author: Mark A. Jason (Author)
Series: Emerging Scholars

Description
Mark A. Jason offers a detailed investigation of the place of repentance in the Dead Sea Scrolls, addressing a significant lacuna in Qumran scholarship. Normally, when the belief system of the community is examined, “repentance” is usually taken for granted or relegated to a peripheral position. By careful attention to key texts, Jason establishes the importance of repentance as a fundamental way of structuring and describing religious experience within the Qumran community. Repentance was important not only for entry into the community and covenant but also for daily governance and cultic activities, and even for authenticating understanding of the end times. Jason shows, then, that repentance was a central and decisive element in shaping that community’s identity and undergirded its religious experience from the start. Further, comparison with relevant texts from the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha shows that the Qumran community represented a distinctive penitential movement in Second Temple Judaism.

Paperback
ISBN: 9781451485301
Price: $59.00
Release date: February 1, 2015
Pages: 208
Width: 6
Height: 9
Emerging Scholars: Bible

Ebook
ISBN: 9781451494273
Price: $59.00

HT the IOQS Facebook page.

The Tiburtine Sibyl

ANCIENT ORIGINS: The Terrifying Doomsday Prophecy of the Tiburtine Sibyl (NATALIA KLIMCZAK). A pretty good essay on the ancient sibylline traditions, but it could be a little more lucid in places. As it says, the Sibyl was a legendary pagan Greek prophetess (or prophetesses). She was co-opted and multiplied by the Romans, still pagan, then adopted as a prophetess in Jewish tradition, then in turn by Christians. There are many ancient books of Sibylline Oracles, but these are all written by Jews or Christians. Nothing remains of the original Roman Sibylline Oracles except the odd quotation.

One important omission in this essay is information on where to read the various books of Sibylline Oracles in English translation. The bulk of them was translated with introduction by John Collins in volume one of Charlesworth's Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (Doubleday, 1983). (I don't have the page numbers handy.) The Tiburtine Sibyl has been translated into English with introduction recently by Rieuwerd Buitenwerf in volume one of Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures (ed. Bauckham, Davila, and Panayotov; Eerdmans, 2013), pp. 176-88. And another translation of the same work, this one by Stephen Shoemaker, is coming out in August of 2016 in volume one of New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures (ed. Tony Burke and Brent Landau). Enjoy.

The Cotton Genesis on display at the BM

HIGHLIGHT FROM EGYPT: FAITH AFTER THE PHARAOHS: Abraham and the Angels: The Cotton Genesis at the British Museum (British Library Medieval manuscripts blog).

The miniature of Abraham and the angels from the Cotton Genesis is one of the first items on display in the exhibition Egypt: faith after the pharaohs currently taking place at the British Museum. The Cotton Genesis is a landmark in the history of biblical illustration. Produced probably in Egypt during the 5th or 6th century, it contains a copy of the Book of Genesis written in Greek. This extensively illuminated codex once contained a sequence of over 300 illustrations, but tragically it was severely damaged in the fire of 1731 at Ashburnham House, where it was stored together with the rest of the library of Sir Robert Cotton. In the fierce heat of the fire, the parchment leaves shrank and were partly burned or charred. Despite its poor state of preservation, the Cotton Genesis remains an exceptional witness of early biblical illustration and of the highly accomplished technique of late antique book painting.

[...]

Background on the exhibition is here and links.

Journal of Late Antiquity 8.2 (2015)

THE JOURNAL OF LATE ANTIQUITY has a new issue out (8.2, 2015) devoted to Religion, Medicine, Disability, and Health in Late Antiquity. A couple of the articles deal with rabbinic Judaism.

The circumcision of Jesus

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: On the Eighth Day of Christmas… (Andrew Jacobs).

And the eight days were fulfilled for circumcising him, and he was called by the name Jesus, which he was called by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. - Luke 2:21

Since antiquity Christians have imagined Jesus as an infant, circumcised according to Jewish Law on the eighth day of his life: the paradigmatic mark of the Jewish covenant on the Christian savior's body. While modern Christians may derive an irenic interfaith message from this image, this sign had quite a different significance in the first Christian centuries.

[...]

Somewhat related posts are here and here.

Mor, Judean Hebrew

NEW BOOK FROM THE ACADEMY OF THE HEBREW LANGUAGE: Judean Hebrew: The Language of the Hebrew Documents from Judea Between the First and the Second Revolts, Uri Mor (in Hebrew).

HT the IOQS Facebook page.

Hillel and Shammai have their own streets

THE STREETS OF JERUSALEM: On Hillel Street (ELAINE ROSE GLICKMAN).

Hillel Street veers off from King George Street, running near Mamilla Cemetery, Independence Park, and the pedestrian mall known as Ben Yehuda. But my favorite thing about Hillel Street is the fact that it runs parallel to – wait for it – Shammai.

If this fact does not fill you with as much delight as it does me, that’s either because I need to get out more – or, to give myself the benefit of the doubt, perhaps because you have not been acquainted with the great stories of this sage. And just in case it’s the latter, please let me fill you in!

[...]

And so she does. As usual with these things, the rabbinic stories she re-tells about Hillel the Elder may often tell us more about the late antique rabbis and what they believed than correct details about the historical Hillel.

Some past posts on Hillel the Elder are here, here, here, and here.

Arava aqueduct

ARCHAEOLOGY: Roman Aqueduct Excavated in Arava Region. The discovery of an ancient aqueduct reinforces the theory that agriculture in the Arava dates back thousands of years. (JNi.Media).

An aqueduct which transported water into agricultural land was excavated at the “Biblical Tamar” site near Ein Hatzeva, a cooperative village in the central Arava valley. According to legend Tamar, which is mentioned as part of the southern border of the Promised Land, was built by King Solomon.

The ancient aqueduct is more than 1,000 years old, and it is possible that it was built as far back as the Roman period (63 BCE to 324 CE). It was discovered during archaeological excavations conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority at the Biblical Tamar site in the Arava in recent weeks. The aqueduct was initially uncovered during works by the Arava Drainage Authority to regulate the flow of the Hatzeva spring.

[...]

Glimpses of Jesus Through the Johannine Lens

THE BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION:

“Glimpses of Jesus Through the Johannine Lens—An Introduction and Overview of John, Jesus, and History, Volume 3”

This essay is a slightly expanded version of Paul Anderson, Felix Just, and Tom Thatcher. eds. John, Jesus, and History, Vol. 3: Glimpses of Jesus Through the Johannine Lens, scheduled for publication early in 2016 by SBL Press.

See Also: The John, Jesus, and History Project-New Glimpses of Jesus and a Bi-Optic Hypothesis.

By Paul N. Anderson
George Fox University
https://georgefox.academia.edu/PaulAnderson

By Jaime Clark-Soles
Associate Professor of New Testament
Southern Methodist University
December 2015

Sanders, Paul: The Apostle’s Life, Letters, and Thought

JESUS CREED BLOG: The New Perspective is Now Complete (Scot McKnight).

What we needed from Sanders was something more than the last sections of P&PJ and more than we got in his little book on Paul in the Past Masters series. I’m happy to announce we have that book now. To use the words of my father in law, it’s a “ming” (his term for something big and heavy). It’s got to be connected to the Ming dynasty but I don’t find this meaning in urban dictionaries. Anyway, E.P. Sanders now has a book called Paul: The Apostle’s Life, Letters, and Thought (Fortress, 2015). The book was pressed between our two front doors on Christmas Eve Day so it is my Christmas present.

It’s 862 pages, but the font is unusually large (nice for this reader’s eyes) and there’s plenty of white space and, even more, Sanders has great prose — he is crystal clear. He doesn’t care about the old perspective, new perspective and apocalyptic Paul debate. He simply lays out what he thinks Paul means in all his (authentic) letters, paragraph by paragraph. Which is, as the title of his post suggests, the completion of the new perspective on Judaism by forging an interpretation of Paul.

2016

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Have a great year and please keep visiting PaleoJudaica.

New Year's Eve

AS 2015 COMES TO AN END, PaleoJudaica has tallied up 1534 posts for the year, considerably more than any previous year since it began back in 2003. It has received something on the order of half a million page views in 2015. As usual, I will save my list of top posts of the year for the blogiversary notice in March.

I have been putting more effort into the blog and I hope you've been enjoying it. Thanks for visiting. I will do my best to keep up the pace and quality in the coming year.

A New Year's message from ...

ARCHANGEL METATRON WATCH: Getting Ready for the New Year: A message from Archangel Metatron.

Another 2015 Biblical Archaeology top ten

CHRISTIANITY TODAY: Biblical Archaeology’s Top Ten Discoveries of 2015. A glimpse at the important work that took place at excavations this year (Gordon Govier). This list overlaps considerably with the list published in Haaretz earlier this week, but is not quite the same and is more oriented to epigraphic discoveries. For the Haaretz list and background to the stories, see here. As for this one, background on the Horvat Kur mosaic is here and links; on the Davidic-era seal is here; on the Eshba'al (Ishba'al) seal from Khirbet Qeiyafa is here and links; on the new Lachish ostracon is here; and on the carbonized Leviticus scroll is here and links. I did not post on the Beit Shemesh idol head or the Iron Age gate at Gath.

Interview with Louis Feldman

THE JEWISH PRESS: On The Bookshelf (Elliot Resnick).

Professor Louis Feldman received his PhD from Harvard University in 1951 and recently retired after teaching Latin and Greek at Yeshiva University for close to 60 years. A proud Orthodox Jew, Feldman is considered the world’s expert on Josephus and is the author of such works as “Jew & Gentile in the Ancient World” and “Josephus’s Interpretation of the Bible.”

The interview follows.

Tzoref, Selavan (eds.), Eshel, Exploring the Dead Sea Scrolls

NEW BOOK FROM VANDENHOECK AND RUPRECHT:

Shani Tzoref, Barnea Levi Selavan (Hg.), Hanan Eshel
Exploring the Dead Sea Scrolls
Archaeology and Literature of the Qumran Caves
1. Auflage 2015
314 Seiten with 9 fig. gebunden
ISBN 978-3-525-55096-0
Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

Journal of Ancient Judaism. Supplements - Band 018

120,00 €
Bei Abnahme der Reihe: 110,00 €

Among the most prominent hallmarks of the late Prof. Hanan Eshel (1958–2010) were his generosity, passion, and integrative approach. The eighteen essays in this volume were selected by Prof. Eshel shortly before his untimely death, to be printed as a collection aimed at contextualizing the textual finds of the Dead Sea Scrolls within their archaeological settings and within the contours of contemporary scholarship.
The Qumran texts that stand at the center of these articles are correlated with archaeological and geographic information and with a variety of textual sources including epigraphic evidence and, especially, the Hebrew Bible, Josephus, and rabbinic texts. The essays are organized according to the provenance of the discovered material, with sections devoted to the Damascus Document and the scrolls from Caves 1, 3, 4, and 11, as well as a final more general chapter.
Half of the essays have been previously published in English, while the other half have been translated from Hebrew here for the first time. The book includes essays that have been co-authored with Esther Eshel, Shlomit Kendi-Harel, Zeev Safrai, and John Strugnell.

Discoveries at Rosh HaAyin

EXCAVATION: Farmhouse From First Temple Era, Byzantine Church Found in Central Israel. Vast 2,700-year old farmstead featured 24 rooms around a courtyard - and 1,500-year old church featured credit: 'Built under Theodosius the priest' (Ruth Schuster, Haaretz)

Was Eve made from Adam's penis-bone?

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: The Adam and Eve Story: Eve Came From Where? Somehow I missed this one when it came out last September. It seems that Professor Ziony Zevit published an article then in Biblical Archaeology Review asking “Was Eve Made from Adam’s Rib—or His Baculum?” (i.e., his penis-bone - which human males do not have). At the moment I don't have access to the BAR article, which is behind a subscription wall, but the BHD article summarizes it. The case also seems to have been argued in his 2013 book, What Really Happened in the Garden of Eden? (Yale University Press). For some reason the BAR article and the theory seem suddenly to be getting a lot of attention in the media. The Daily Mail reports in detail and notes the predictable outrage the notion is receiving from some BAR readers. And in Haaretz, Elon Gilad expresses considerable skepticism. (As noted here, he has already done some research on the general subject.)

I haven't seen the full argument, so I won't offer a view. I will say, first, that it seems to depend on the assumption that a removal of Adam's rib would have been taken as a etiological change such that all men subsequently would have been missing a rib. That's a reasonable reading, but it is open to debate. The story could have assumed that a rib was removed from Adam without it having any effect on his descendants, in which case his odd number of ribs would not have been an exegetical problem. Second, as Gilad observes at the end of his article, it is not clear how closely ancient Israelites attended to details of skeletal anatomy. Details of human anatomy only began to be studied systematically by the Alexandrian anatomists. But I concede that counting up how many ribs people have seems like an obvious thing to do.

Divine Sonship Symposium

CONFERENCE REMINDER: Son of God: Divine Sonship in Jewish and Christian Antiquity - The St Andrews Symposium for Biblical and Early Christian Studies. Noted earlier here. The symposium takes place on 6-8 June 2016 St Mary’s College, University of St Andrews. Garrick Allen has posted a flier here at Academia.edu. The call for papers is open until 15 February and the Early Bird registration fee is available until 29 February. Follow the links for further particulars

Exhibition on John Dee's library

REMINDER: Scholar, courtier, magician: the lost library of John Dee. Coming soon: An exhibition exploring one of Tudor England's most extraordinary and enigmatic figures. 18 January - 29 July 2016. More information on this exhibition at the Royal College of Physicians, Regent's Park, London, is here. You will also find links there to other posts about John Dee and about my own research on his angelic séances in relation to ancient Jewish visionary traditions. Related post here.

Interview with James K. Aitken

WILLIAM ROSS: LXX SCHOLAR INTERVIEW: DR. JAMES K. AITKEN

Today I have the pleasure of posting an interview with my doctoral supervisor, James K. Aitken, as a part of my ongoing series of LXX Scholar Interviews. Jim is lecturer in Hebrew, Old Testament, and Second Temple Studies at the University of Cambridge (and currently taking doctoral students). We have been working together since October 2014 and I have benefited immensely from his supervision, despite the various logistical problems we’ve had in the meantime!

As you will read about below, Jim is also quite active in the Septuagint guild and has contributed several key publications in the last few years. He brings a unique set of interests and expertise to the field and is in the midst of producing work that will certainly generate significant discussion within both Septuagint and Second Temple scholarly circles.

The interview follows.

Review of Olyan (ed.), Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible

THE BIBLICAL REVIEW: “Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible” edited by Saul M. Olyan (William Brown).

Saul M. Olyan (editor). Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible: New Perspectives. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2015, 190 pp., $74.00 (hardcover).

Excerpt:

I highly recommend Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible because it is exactly what it says it is: new perspective on the Hebrew Bible through a theme that is extremely underexplored, namely ritual violence. Students and scholars alike will find this volume valuable as it aids in moving forward scholarly studies into realms that have the potentials to shift the current ideas within scholarship. Without a doubt, this volume marks a major shift in how we read violence in the Hebrew Bible.

Reprinting Palmyra's arch

PALMYRA WATCH: Ancient arch of Palmyra which was destroyed by Isis will be recreated in Trafalgar Square and Times Square using the world's largest 3D printer (James Dunn, Daily Mail).

• Arch is the only remaining part of Temple of Bel, razed by Isis in August
  
• Institute of Digital Archaeology will recreate arch in London and New York
  
• Made in Shanghai, finished in Italy then built like Lego in Trafalgar Square
  
• On show for a week but Mayor Boris Johnson could consider keeping it
  
• See full news coverage on ISIS at www.dailymail.co.uk/isis

The 2,000-year-old arch of an ancient site destroyed by Isis is to be recreated in Trafalgar Square and Times Square as a 'call to action' over the militants' destruction of antiquities.

The famous arch is all that remains of the Temple of Bel in Syria, which was reduced to rubble by Isis militants in August, who murdered its curator and packed the site with explosives. But the 15-metre arch, which many fear will soon be destroyed, is to be recreated in London and New York, using the world's largest 3D printer.

[...]

Cross-file under "Techology Watch." Background on the whole sad story of Palmyra is here with many links.

That "Jesus was a Palestinian" meme again

IT'S SAD THAT THIS NEED TO BE NEWS: Australian Church Denies Belief That Jesus Was Palestinian (JTA).

Jesus was not Palestinian, a major church denomination in Australia said after the Executive Council of Australian Jewry challenged an article in a political publication in which the birthplace of Jesus Christ was named as Palestine.

[...]

In the article, Samah Sabawi and Bassam Dally wrote: “An official delegation representing our country in Israel has added fuel to the flames of extremism abroad by applauding proven human rights violators and insulting the living descendants of Christ in his home of birth in Palestine.”

[...]

Kudos to the Church for responding appropriately. Some related posts are collected here.

A graphic novel on the Maccabees?

KICKSTARTER: Maccabaeus: The War for Judea.

A graphic novel about the Hasmonean Revolt (the backstory to the Jewish festival of Hanukkah). Think "300" with yarmulkes.

Have a look and, if such things appeal to you, you can contribute. They have a long way yet to their goal and not a lot of time remaining.

No digging allowed in the walls of Tut's tomb

MORE FROM ZAHI HAWASS: Egyptian expert disputes new theory that Queen Nefertiti is in Tutankhamun's tomb. British expert's tomb theory 'baseless', says leading Egyptologist (Magdy Samaan, The Telegraph).

Nicholas Reeves, a British Egyptologist now at the University of Arizona, believes that he has found the answer. Last month, he announced that Queen Nefertiti's tomb probably lay behind one wall of King Tutankhamun's tomb.

But Zahi Hawass, a leading archaeologist and formerly Egypt’s minister of antiquities, told the Telegraph that Mr Reeves was peddling a “baseless” theory.

We already knew that, but now Dr. Hawass has gone on record that no damage to the tomb walls will be permitted to test Dr. Reeves's theory:

Mr Hawass promised that Mr Reeves would not be allowed to test his idea. "I will not allow - neither would any archaeologist allow - making a hole in Tutankhamun's tomb,” he said. “The tomb is very vulnerable; any hole may expose the paintings to complete collapse."

He believes that the question of where Nefertiti is buried can be resolved with DNA analysis and concludes:

These tests would reveal the truth, said Mr Hawass, and there was no point in pursuing Mr Reeves’s theory and risking damage to Tutankhamun’s tomb.

"There is nobody in Egypt - whether the minister of archaeology or anyone else - who can take the responsibility for making a scratch in Tutankhamun's tomb,” said Mr Hawass.

“So that is why I think that the idea was born dead."

Cross file under "Technology Watch." Additional background here, here, here, and here.

Ram statue excavated in Caesarea

ARCHAEOLOGY: Beautiful ancient ram statue unearthed near Byzantine church. Christmas Eve discovery in Caesarea excites archaeologists; beautiful sculpture was almost perfectly preserved (Arutz Sheva).

An impressive, nearly full-preserved ancient statue of a ram was discovered by archaeologists near an ancient church in Caesarea that dates to the Byzantine period.

The discovery was made last Thursday morning in an archaeological excavation the Israel Antiquities Authority is conducting in the Caesarea Harbor National Park, at the initiative of the Caesarea Development Corporation.

[...]

Nice piece. They're not sure yet whether it is of Byzantine-era or Roman-era origin and it sounds as though so far they are guessing about its purpose.

Award for the NYT

A WELL-DESERVED HONOR: HONEST REPORTING GIVES THE NEW YORK TIMES A 2015 DISHONEST REPORTING AWARD.

5. Most Unholy Row: New York Times

When the Palestinian Authority accused Israel of altering the status-quo arrangements on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, the New York Times weighed in with an article questioning whether the ancient Jewish Temples were located in the contested area. The Times ignored the consensus among leading historians that the Temple Mount was indeed the location (hence the current name “Temple Mount,”) for these structures, but seemed oblivious to the damage that the inaccurate article’s timing would cause.

[...]

HT Breaking Israel News. The PaleoJudaica coverage of the story is here and links.

Biblical Archaeology 2015

HAARETZ: Biblical Archaeology in 2015: King Hezekiah's Seal and Other Exciting Discoveries. And some maybes: Archaeologists think they may have found where Jesus lived in Nazareth and was tried in Jerusalem (Ruth Schuster).

Is the bible literally true? Are at least parts of it plausible? In digs throughout the region, biblical archaeology sets out to shed light on these questions. It is a difficult task made all the harder by the pull of our deepest wishes: Even artifacts found in situ, exactly where they had been left thousands of years ago, can be of controversial origin, let alone purpose.

[...]

Background on that New-Age gold object is here; on Ben Carson's Egypt gaffe is here; on the possible discovery of the Acra is here and links; on the Hezekiah bulla is here, here, and here; on the discovery of a first-century CE house (rather than "Jesus' house") in Nazareth is here; on the possible discovery of Herod's palace in Jerusalem is here and here; and on the possible discovery of Sodom is here. I didn't post about the stories on the Philistines mentioned in this article, but instead see this year's post Psychedelic Philistines.

UPDATE (31 December): Another list is noted here.

Circumcision

CANDIDA MOSS: Male Circumcision: What Would Jesus Do? On the eighth day of his life, before the Wise Men visited, Jesus was circumcised. What would he make of the debate raging today over male circumcision? (The Daily Beast). Excerpt:

It’s true that the Christmas story is more babe in a manger than bris in the synagogue, but as a Jewish male infant Jesus was circumcised and, chronologically speaking, on the eighth day—and thus before the appearance of any wise men from the east. And yet somehow with all the food, presents, and Santa-fetishizing, the circumcision of Jesus doesn’t get a look in. But as debate about the ethics of circumcising children rages on, perhaps it really should.

The only biblical evidence for Jesus’s circumcision comes from the infancy narrative found in the Gospel of Luke. On the eighth day, we are told, he was circumcised and officially given the name Jesus (although Gabriel had called it at the Anunciation).

Two thoughts.

First, it is interesting and entertaining to compare the debate about circumcision among first-century Jesus followers to the current debate about it, but they are really very different and I do not see that the first sheds any useful light on the modern discussion. The first-century issue was whether gentile followers of Jesus needed to keep the ritual law, particularly circumcision. The present debate is about hygienic matters and the right of patients to make informed decisions.

Second, we should be careful not to draw a moral equivalence between male circumcision and female "circumcision" (better, female genital mutilation). (Professor Moss mentions this position, but frames it hypothetically and refrains from endorsing it.) There is a debate on the costs and benefits of male circumcision and people of goodwill disagree about it. Female genital mutilation is a horrific and barbaric practice that inflicts serious damage on a woman's body and it cannot be justified. The two are not comparable.

Some posts about the present-day debate over male circumcision are here and links. And this debate is not about circumcision per se, but rather about a particular traditional method of circumcision (metzizah b’peh) that poses some significant health risks.

Jewish-Temple denial from an Egyptian newspaper

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: Egyptian paper claims Jewish Temple was never in Jerusalem. Article seeks to deny Jewish connection to ‘Al-Quds’, says Jews’ place of worship was actually a converted Egyptian building in the Galilee (LEE GANCMAN, Times of Israel). Here we go again.

An Egyptian newspaper claimed Wednesday that the Jewish First Temple was in actual fact an Egyptian temple that the Jews took over, and that it had never been located in Jerusalem at all.

Sprawling over almost a full page of the daily newspaper “al-Youm al-Saba’a,” the article presented an elaborate theory based partly on analyses of Jewish sources, with assistance from Dr. Iman Tayyeb, an Egyptian professor of Talmud and the Old Testament at the University of Assiut.

While Tayyeb conceded that the Jewish temple may have existed in a place called “Jerusalem,” she said that the city wasn’t located in the same place as Israel’s modern capital. Citing Jewish texts, she claimed it was unclear where the ancient temple stood, but that there was ample evidence that it could not have been at the Temple Mount.

[...]

I don't think I've heard this particular goofy "theory" before, but it seems there's always a new one. You can read about it in detail at the link. It has no basis in reality. Some other recent cases of Temple denial are here, here, and links. And there's more on that early-twentieth-century guide to the Temple Mount by the Supreme Muslim Council here, here, and here.

The AJS annual meeting

REPORT: Connecting the dots. Association for Jewish Studies convention offers food for thought (Larry Yudelson, Jewish Standard/Times of Israel).

If your idea of a good time is hearing someone explain at length the connections between the treasures of King Tut’s tomb and the biblical ark of the covenant, you should have been in Boston last week for the annual convention of the Association of Jewish Studies.

I was there. And yes, I had a blast.

[...]

The meeting was held in Boston on December 13-15. This is a long report by a well-informed nonspecialist on some papers on Rabbinic and Second Temple Judaism. Excerpt:

A key difference between academic Jewish studies — a field barely 200 years old — and traditional yeshiva studies is that academics look not just at what the texts (the Torah, the Talmud, the midrashim) say but asks: How did those texts fit into the broader picture of the Jewish community of that era? How much do they represent the reality of their era, as opposed to what the authors wanted to be true? How does other historical evidence mesh with those texts? And when were those texts written anyway?

The central problem in these lines of inquiry is there isn’t all that much other evidence. Like paleontologists deducing a species of dinosaur from the shape of a fossilized jawbone, academic Jewish scholars are trying to recreate a world from bits and pieces (and sometimes, in the case of the Dead Sea Scrolls, actual scraps of parchment). If you visualize pre-modern Jewish history as a timeline, then you might put 1500 B.C.E. on the far left — that’s about when the Bible dates the Exodus — and the invention of printing around 1500 C.E. on the right. For most of this period, scholars have occasional points of evidence, but there are huge gaps. Some of the points on the timeline are the traditional Jewish texts: biblical books, Mishna, Talmud, medieval responsa. Other points are archaeological evidence: ancient inscriptions, buildings, utensils, animal bones. (The latter show, among other things, whether the inhabitants of a certain place at a certain time did or did not eat pork.) Then there is the evidence of books and texts that didn’t become part of the Jewish tradition. Some of those were written but not preserved by Jews — this includes books kept as part of Christian editions of the Bible; writers like the first-century Jewish historian Josephus, who didn’t write in Hebrew, and those texts that happened to be preserved alongside Biblical scrolls in the dry caves of Qumran at the shores of the Dead Sea. And finally, there are those books written by non-Jews that give insight into Jewish histories, whether they are Christian church fathers describing their debates with Jews or Babylonian books from the time of the Talmudic sages.

Faced with three or four dots that more or less line up, the temptation is to connect them into a pretty picture. For a professor seeking renown and career advancement, that’s pretty mandatory. The danger, though, is that someone will discover a dot that was overlooked — and that shows the pretty picture didn’t capture all the dots; a theory that overlooked the evidence. So there is a tension between the desire to innovate and the fear of sticking out your not-yet-tenured neck.