Taylor Swift meets p-s-e-u-d-e-p-i-g-r-a-p-h-a

I KEEP SAYING YOU GOTTA KNOW THESE THINGS: Spelling Bee's Dr. Bailly quotes Taylor Swift (Nick Schwartz, USA Today).

Scripps National Spelling Bee pronouncer Jacques Bailly surprised 11-year-old Abhijay Kodali with his example sentence for the word pseudepigrapha by launching into Taylor Swift's 'Shake It Off."

"Pseudepigrapha is a plural noun. It means spurious words purporting to originate from biblical characters, as in 'Jasmine realized the speaker was spouting pseudepigrapha as soon as he quoted Moses saying 'Haters gonna hate hate hate hate hate, baby. I'm just gonna shake shake shake shake shake. Shake it off.'"

Abhijay Kodali spelled the word correctly. But another contestant won the competition with the correct spelling of ... wait for it ... "koinonia."

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On Pseudo-Phocylides

READING ACTS: Doing Justice in Pseudo-Phocylides. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series have been noted here and links. The material in his current post is mostly new.

For more on Pseudo-Phocylides, including some of my own thoughts and also mention of another post by Phil, see here.

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More on that C-14 dating recalibration

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: Upstart carbon dating study could force rewrite of Holy Land’s biblical timeline. Cornell University prof shows how archaeologists' data could be skewed by decades -- potentially disproving the narrative of David and Solomon's United Monarchy (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel). I noted the Cornell study earlier this week and suggested that the proposed variation would usually not make much of a difference for biblical Israel and the Second-Temple-era, although sometimes it might. This article discusses one of the times it might:

If the paper’s findings are borne out, the historical timeline of the Holy Land would need to be rewritten.

Through a faulty calibration scale, the study argues, organic carbon-14 evidence linking archaeological sites to the Israelite period may have been given false early dates. This new proposed calculations would cause their “biblical” ties to be much less certain.

To be precise, the study’s findings indicate a discrepancy of only a few decades — but that is just dramatic enough to dispel much C-14-based “evidence” of a potential Davidic United Monarchy.

The first author of the paper, Professor Sturt Manning, explains:

“If you only have radiocarbon but have a good set of data and a known archaeological sequence (e.g. stratified layers at an archaeological site) then you can hope to get within a few decades or so – so high-precision dating,” he writes.

And here is the big catch: “If you have nothing but a few radiocarbon dates, then you are more looking at ca. 50-100 years or so precision,” he writes.

During the particularly sensitive early Iron Age in Israel, such a broad 50- to 100-year time frame can mean the difference between one archaeological or biblical era and another.

Do read the whole article. It's early days yet and the results of the study - which are based on analysis of early-modern materials - need to be replicated and extended to earlier periods. But the results may be significant for the chronology of first-Temple Israel and the question of the historicity of the United Monarchy.

Also, note the post on this study by Brent Nongbri at the Variant Readings Blog. He flags another recent study that gave similar results for material from early-modern Egypt.

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Review of Zissos (ed.), A Companion to the Flavian Age of Imperial Rome

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Andrew Zissos (ed.), A Companion to the Flavian Age of Imperial Rome. Blackwell companions to the ancient world. Chichester; Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016. Pp. xxi, 602. ISBN 9781444336009. $195.00. Reviewed by Lorenza Bennardo, University of Toronto (lorenza.bennardo@utoronto.ca).

Due to their historical and cultural density, the 27 years between 69 C.E. and Domitian’s assassination (96 C.E.) have claimed increasing scholarly attention in recent decades. However, precisely because the dynasty founded by Vespasian only ruled for a relatively short period, the very concept of a clearly defined (and clearly definable) “Flavian age” can be legitimately questioned. The volume edited by Zissos successfully demonstrates not only that the idea of a “Flavian age” is historically and culturally viable, but also that this age represents a crucial phase in the longer continuum of the early imperial history of Rome. Moreover, while it is true that our knowledge of Flavian Rome mainly derives from contemporary literary sources, this companion has the merit of moving beyond the focus on Flavian literature to “examine the Flavian age in a broader and more inclusive sense” (p. 2). Overall, the volume provides us with the economic, political, religious and cultural coordinates of a complex multicultural world, where the negotiation of racial identities plays an important role and where a new balance in the relationship between center and periphery begins to emerge.

[...]

There is a chapter on Flavian Judea. And Josephus comes up as well.

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Allegorical and magical manna

PROF. JOEL HECKER: Manna and Mystical Eating (TheTorah.com).

Ancient interpreters contemplated the substance of manna, a food that traverses the chasm between divine and mundane realms, falling from heaven to be consumed on earth. In kabbalistic thought, the Zohar presents manna as granting the desert generation an embodied experience of knowledge of God; such an opportunity is available to mystics in everyday eating and through birkat ha-mazon (Grace after Meals).

For some Talmudic exegesis on manna, see here.

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Reading Coptic in London in July

ALIN SUCIU: 5-day Reading Coptic Course in London. The course takes place on 2-6 July. It is on "early texts," including the works of the fourth/fifth-century abbot of the White Monastery, Shenoute, and one of the Nag Hammadi gospels.

Cross file under Coptic Watch.

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School kids excavate Byzantine-era coin at Kilodia

NUMISMATICS: Students on archaeology program unearth a 1,700-year-old coin.

JNS.org – Students from schools in the Lev Hasharon Regional Council helping on an archaeological dig on the Sharon plain have unearthed an ancient coin dating back to the year 300 C.E., among other finds.

[...]

I can find no other information about the coin. From the photo its surface looks almost completely abraded to me. I'm impressed that specialists could identify it.

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Multispectral imaging at Duke

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: Incredible 'Harry Potter' camera can reveal hidden texts on ancient parchment (Mollie Cahillane, Daily Mail).
• An imaging technique at Duke Libraries can make decayed texts visible again
• Multispectral imaging (MSI) captures images under different colors of light
• MSI shows details that are usually invisible to humans or a standard camera
• Particularly useful for historians, archivists, and conservators to fight decay

Examples include recovery of a crest on a manuscript of Pliny's Natural History and the recovery of illegible text on a page of a Hebrew manuscript containing Deuteronomy 4.

Some past PaleoJudaica posts on manuscripts and multispectral imaging are collected here.

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The Egypt Exploration Society on the Oxyrhynchus Mark fragment

LARRY HURTADO: Further Comment on the Mark Fragment and the Rumors. Professor Hurtado links to an updated statement by the Egypt Exploration Society on the no-longer-first-century Mark fragment. It gives some helpful information on the story behind the fragment.

Background here and links.

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4 Maccabees reprised

PHIL LONG'S OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA SERIES continues at his Reading Acts Blog. There are three new posts on 4 Maccabees. These are all reposts from from 2017. Other posts in his current summer OTP series have been noted here and links.

What is Fourth Maccabees?

Fourth Maccabees and a Rational Faith

Fourth Maccabees and the Fourth Philosophy

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Kurshan and Tigay win Jewish literature prize

CONGRATULATIONS TO BOTH: Ilana Kurshan wins $100,000 Jewish Literature Sami Rohr Prize. American immigrant to Israel wins Jewish literature prize for memoir highlighting effect of Talmud study on her life (JTA via Arutz Sheva).

Ilana Kurshan has won the 2018 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature for her book “If All the Seas Were Ink: A Memoir.”

Ms. Kurshan won first prize. For more on her book, see here and links. Chanan Tigay was one of three third-place finalists and he won $5,000.

Tigay, whose book “The Lost Book of Moses: The Hunt For The World’s Oldest Bible” is about the mystery surrounding a Dead Sea Scroll, is a former reporter for JTA.

The book is about the Shapira scroll, which is not exactly a Dead Sea Scroll. For more on his book, see here and links.

It's good to see this recognition of these two important books.

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On Philip Davies

THE BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION: Philip Davies (1945-2018).

By Thomas L. Thompson
Professor Emeritus
University of Copenhagen
May 2018

The death of my most dear friend Philip Davies on Friday, May 31, by cancer is a great loss to our entire field. He was not only a scholar of great talent and integrity, who interested himself in all that touched biblical studies. He was also ever a scholar of astonishing originality and discipline, whose impact on the field was immeasurable, not least because of the clarity of his arguments and his ability to focus on the rhetorical center of an issue. Who would have dreamt that such a simple distinction as that between the “biblical Israel”, the “ancient Israel” constructed by historians and the “Israel of the past”, which no longer exists, could have provoked a decade-long debate among biblical scholars, archaeologists, historians and theologians as Philip did in his 1992 essay, In Search of Ancient Israel?

[...]

A personal memoir. The Bible and Interpretation website currently also has a list of the essays they published by Professor Davies. Scroll down to "Remembering Philip Davies 1945-2018."

Background here.

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The Nephilim

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Who Are the Nephilim? The mysterious beings of Genesis 6 (Ellen White). This essay collects the biblical information on the Nephilim and related matters. It does not go into the connections with the Enochic literature.

The Nephilim have appeared fairly often at PaleoJudaica, much of the time in less credible contexts than above. For many past posts see here and links, and here, here, here, here, and here.

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Denver DSS rotation in progress

HAPPENING NOW: ‘Once In A Lifetime’ Display Of Dead Sea Scrolls To Be Replaced Soon (Karen Morfitt).

DENVER (CBS4) – The Denver Museum of Nature and Science is in the middle of replacing 10 Dead Sea Scrolls currently on display with 10 new ones.

[...]

With video. Background on the Denver exhibition is here and links. That link also gives more on Pnina Shor, who is overseeing the rotation.

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Archaeological survey by mole rat?

FAUNAL-ASSISTED ARCHAEOLOGY: Blind, bucktoothed mole-rats just might be archaeologists’ new best friends. Israeli researchers propose a revolutionary new methodology in the field: Analyzing the mounds of dirt created by the mightily ugly, burrowing Nannospalax ehrenbergi (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel).

You could call them the ultimate excavators: Bulldozing dirt that’s 10 times their body weight, they can survive underground in thin oxygen, they work for literally peanuts, and, being remarkably resistant to cancer, they don’t even take sick days.

A team of Israeli archaeologists proposes that Middle East blind mole-rats, with their massive numbers and burrowing skills, be systematically harnessed for cheap labor. And in fact, analysis of their molehills just may constitute a revolution in archaeological best practices.

Instead of taking hours — or even days and weeks — to complete complicated and time-consuming surveys in search of hidden ancient sites, the Bar-Ilan University researchers propose systematically studying dirt from molehills, or other rodent dirt piles, to more efficiently and cheaply ascertain loci of human activity from the past.

[...]

This article is a follow-up to an earlier one on the archaeological use of mole-rat mounds at Tel ‘Eton. For more on faunal-assisted archaeology, see the links there.The proposal is to formalize the use of rodent mounds as part of archaeological surveys.

Commendably, the author resisted the temptation to include a joke about making mountains out of molehills.

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On the transmission of Jewish magic books

MAGIC AND MYSTICISM: ‘TOO HOLY TO PRINT’: THE FORBIDDEN BOOKS OF JEWISH MAGIC. Books fraught with danger—curses, secrets, marvelous cures, diviners, demons—caused political intrigue and censorship (J.H. Chajes, Tablet Magazine). This is a really interesting article on the transmission of Jewish magical works and practical Kabbalah from the Middle Ages to the present. It also touches on the hekhalot literate and the pulsa de-nura cursing rite. Although the material covered is medieval and later, some of it has older roots. For example a good part of the medieval magical work Sefer Raziel is based on the Talmudic-era magical tractate Sefer HaRazim. Regular readers will recall that I am currently finishing up a new English translation of the latter work.

The dateline of this article is February 2014. Apparently I didn't see it then. I did note a lecture series by the author a couple of years ago.

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The Talmud on inferential exegesis

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Myth and Meaning. In this week’s ‘Daf Yomi’ Talmud study, the ancient rabbis take personal ownership of their Torah interpretations, as they map the spaces that separate the holy from the mundane.

In this week’s Daf Yomi reading, in Zevachim 48a, the Gemara introduced a concept that helps to illuminate the worldview of the rabbis. A certain teaching, we read, “is dear to the tanna”: he has a special attachment to a particular point of law. And the reason is that this point is “derived through interpretation”: that is, it is not stated explicitly in the Torah, but has to be worked out by the rabbis themselves. Evidently, the rabbis had a particular fondness for laws that they had to figure out on their own, and liked to teach such laws first, because they were “dear.” I found this a moving idea, since it shows how the rabbis invested their feelings (and their egos) in what might seem like an abstract or technical process of legal reasoning. A tanna who solved a problem must have felt a certain pride of ownership in it, the way a mathematician might feel about an especially difficult proof.

[...]

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

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Is C-14 dating miscalibrated for the southern Levant?

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: New radiocarbon cycle research may alter history (Daniel Aloi, Cornell Chronicle).

Archaeologist Sturt Manning and colleagues have revealed variations in the radiocarbon cycle at certain periods of time, affecting frequently cited standards used in archaeological and historical research relevant to the southern Levant region (Israel, southern Jordan and Egypt). These variations, or offsets, of up to 20 years in the calibration of precise radiocarbon dating could be related to climatic conditions.

For ancient Israel and Second Temple Judaism, twenty years one way or another usually won't make a significant difference for historical purposes. But sometimes it might. And for ancient Egypt, whose chronology is known more precisely, it could make a difference more often.

Another recent story dealing with a different effort to recalibrate radiocarbon dating was noted here. [UPDATE: bad link now corrected. Sorry about that!]

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Maggen on the conservation of the DSS etc.

LECTURE: Dead Sea Scrolls’ Conservation To Be Discussed in Santa Fe (Tom Trowbridge, KSFR FM).

As part of its year-long series, “Celebrating Israel at 70; A cultural perspective” Temple Beth Shalom in Santa Fe is offering a presentation titled, “Survival Against All Odds; The Conservation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and other Artifacts.” It takes place at eight-pm. The presenter is Michael Maggen, who is the head of the Paper and Parchment Conservation Laboratory at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.

KSFR’s Tom Trowbridge spoke recently with Maggen.

If you missed the lecture, do listen to the audio interview. Maggen discussed the Dead Sea Scrolls and he gave a preview of the lecture, which involved the Genesis Apocryphon and the Aleppo Codex.

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The Baram Synagogue

ANCIENT ARCHITECTURE: Israeli attractions: Baram Synagogue. Close to the Lebanese border in the upper Galilee lies Baram National Park, home to the Baram synagogue, evidence of the continuous Jewish presence in Israel from ancient times to the present day (Ron Traub, Jewish News Syndicate). Nicely diagrammed.

Past PaleoJudaica posts on the Baram Synagogue are here and here.

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More on 3 Maccabees

PHIL LONG'S OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA SERIES continues apace at his Reading Acts Blog. There are three new posts on 3 Maccabees. I believe these are all reposts from from 2017. Other posts in his current summer OTP series have been noted here and links.

Third Maccabees 2 – Have Mercy on the Downcast

Third Maccabees 3-6 – The Incident with the Elephants

Apostasy in Third Maccabees

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Biblical Studies Carnival 147

5 MINUTE BIBLE: May 2018: Biblical Studies Carnival 147 (Tim Bulkeley). With special attention this month to videos and podcasts.

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The pagan-themed synagogue mosaic at Hammat Tiberias

ATLAS OBSCURA: Zodiac Mosaic of Hammat Tiberias. The mosaic floor of a 4th-century synagogue features a pagan zodiac wheel alongside traditional images of a Torah ark and menorahs (Joel Cusumano).

What turns heads is the rest of the mosaic. In the center panel sits a magnificent zodiac wheel, featuring, among other pagan images, depictions of naked humans—including a conspicuously uncircumcised Libra. The wheel encircles a haloed Helios, the Greek sun god, mounted atop his chariot. Women representing each of the four seasons sit to the corners of the zodiac, with the accompanying Hebrew inscription of the names of the seasons.

A nice photo essay.

I have discussed the cultural background of this synagogue mosaic (and other similar ones) here. More recently, another zodiac mosaic featuring Helios in his chariot was found in the Huqoq Synagogue.

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Paleo-Hebrew DSS

THE AWOL BLOG: Paleo-Hebrew Dead Sea Scrolls. This website looks like a really useful resource for the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls written in the Paleo-Hebrew script.

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On Kuntillet ‘Ajrud and YHWH's Asherah

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Puzzling Finds from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud. A drawing of God labeled “Yahweh and his Asherah” or the Egyptian god Bes? Regular readers will be well familiar with the remarkable finds from this site, but this brief essay gives a convenient summary and it has links to other essays that fill that out.

The final report mentioned in the essay was published in 2012:

Meshel, Ze'ev, Kuntillet Ajrud (Horvat Teman): An Iron Age II Religious Site on the Judah-Sinai Border, ed. Liora Freud (Jerusalem, Israel Exploration Society, 2012).

Past PaleoJudaica posts on Kuntillet ‘Ajrud (Kuntillet Ajrud) and its finds are collected here.

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York NT Apocrypha course

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA WATCH: Over at his Apocryphicity Blog, Dr. Tony Burke has been posting updates on his 2018 course on the New Testament Apocrypha at York University. The ten weeks of the course are now completed. Due to circumstances he explains there, much of it was taught by video. You can watch the videos if you want to. You can also read the summary posts on each week's lecture. This is the course description from the syllabus:

The New Testament Apocrypha—or better: non-canonical early Christian literature—has had a great impact on western culture despite attempts by mainstream Christianity to suppress it. Stories and ideas from these texts appear in literature, art, church doctrine, and even modern fiction such as Dan Brown’s The DaVinci Code. This course is designed to introduce students to a wide range of non-canonical Christian texts—from gospels, to acts of individual apostles, letters, and apocalypses. The goals will be to understand each text’s place in the development of Christian thought and to observe their use in modern scholarship. Particular emphasis will be placed on the work of the so-called “new school” in New Testament Studies that claims some of these texts may predate, and therefore may have influenced, the canonical gospels.

Good stuff.

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Philip R. Davies 1945-2018

SAD NEWS: I have received a number of reports that Professor Emeritus Philip R. Davies passed away last Thursday 31 May. He was Professor of Biblical Studies at the University of Sheffield until his retirement some years ago. He kept active in the field after retirement and kept up an internet presence too. His Wikipedia page is here. His Sheffield University page is here. And his Academia.edu page is here.

Philip was well known for his out-of-the-box thinking and I learned a lot from him, especially on how to think about the Dead Sea Scrolls. His doctoral dissertation on the War Scroll influenced how I looked at that work, and you can see some of how I used it in my teaching in this online lecture on the War Scroll for my Dead Sea Scrolls class. I also drew on his ideas about the Pesharim and on utopianism and Qumran sectarianism.

I knew Philip for many years and we kept in touch off and on. Our last e-mail exchange was last summer, when we talked about the lead codices and the merits of Islay whiskies. He also appeared from time to time in PaleoJudaica posts. I see that a few years ago I commented, "Davies is usually controversial and always interesting." I think that is a fitting epitaph.

Requiescat in pace.

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More on the Abba tomb skeleton (crucifixion)

OSTEOLOGIST JOE ZIAS e-mails the following:

Professor Pat Smith is correct, along with others, that there is no evidence for crucifixion in the Abba tomb, moreover we asked experts totally unaware of the controversy as to the sex of the skeleton with signs of trauma, all concurred that we are talking about an elderly female.

Following Dr. Haas tragic accident, the material in question was transferred to my lab in the Israel Antiquities Authority and I can state with a high level of confidence that no evidence whatsoever for crucifixion was present.

This in reference to my recent post on the new (apparently) crucified skeleton from Rome. I mentioned the Abba tomb skeleton as another one, possibly of Mattathiah son of Judah, which had been argued to have been crucified. I discussed that in more detail here. But from what Dr. Zias says above, the expert consensus is otherwise.

That leaves us with Yohanan's certainly crucified skeleton and the new one from Rome, which may also have been crucified.

I am grateful to Joe Lauer for putting out a call for clarification and to Joe Zias for contacting us with the updated information.

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On the Mishnah

MY JEWISH LEARNING: Why The Mishnah Is the Best Jewish Book You’ve Never Read. This almost 2,000-year-old text flies under the radar -- but it's immensely important to Jewish life (LEX ROFES AND MJL ADMIN). This is a good introduction to the Mishnah, aimed at the complete novice. It also has some links at the end for further study.

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Hydrogel

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: Tape Is Ruining Priceless Art. This New Gel Can Fix It. The common trick to fix a tear has plagued art conservators, but chemists are developing newer and safer methods to restore old art (Sarah Gibbens, National Geographic).

Unwitting conservators of the past used standard sticky tape to try and hold together famous but fragile treasures, such as the Dead Sea scrolls and drawings by filmmaker Federico Fellini. The trouble is that, in addition to ruining the aesthetic integrity of a piece of art, the adhesive on tape can cause discoloration over time. Certain types of tape can even bleed past where they were placed and alter the visual appearance of the work.

Modern art restorers have traditionally used solvents and intense humidity to loosen tape, methods that can damage the piece or present a toxic hazard for restorers. Now, a team of chemists from the University of Florence has developed a new treatment for the sticky affliction that's safe for humans and doesn't damage the art.

The method starts with hydrogel, a type of gel with high water content used in a variety of common objects, from plastics to pills. The hydrogel used by the Italian researchers was between 95 and 98 percent water. The other five to two percent is made of intersperced nano-sized droplets of organic solvents.

Good. In past posts I have flagged the longstanding problem of the use of scotch tape in the early, primitive efforts to conserve the Dead Sea Scrolls. See here, here, and here. I hope this new technology helps to solve the problem.

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Machiela on charity in the Aramaic DSS

VIDEO LECTURE: Charity as a Theme in the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls, Dr. Daniel Machiela. I don't have time to watch this through right now, but the author and title are very promising, and AJR says it's "terrific." Enjoy!

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A Judeo-Arabic translation of the Mishnah

GENIZA FRAGMENT OF THE MONTH (MAY 2018): Mishnah with Judeo-Arabic Translation: T-S E1.124 (David J. Wasserstein).

These are not the only fragments of Judeo-Arabic versions of Mishnaic tractates, but they all come from a single manuscript and for that reason may have much more to tell us than we might learn from isolated fragments of other manuscripts. On the basis of the pages we have, we can do much to re-construct the shape and appearance of the original manuscript. We can also compute that the entire Mishnah, with its translation, in this single manuscript must have filled nearly 6,000 pages, making for an enormous and, in view of the thickness of the paper, unwieldy, multi-volume copy of the text.

Past PaleoJudaica posts on Judeo-Arabic are here and links. Past posts noting Cairo Geniza Fragments of the Month in the Cambridge University Library's Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit are there and here links.

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The serpent and the Goddess?

THE BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION:

Eden, the Tree of Life and the Wisdom of the Serpent

The essential plot can be understood, not as a struggle between God and the Devil, but as a conflict involving the dynamic, royal, masculine God of the heavens and the primordial Mother Goddess who for millennia had been worshipped as the Mistress of the earth. To be sure, the story is told from the point of view of the former. The serpent is reduced to being the subtlest of the creatures that the Lord God had made. The Goddess is not even mentioned by name, though she is there, as the tree of life, for that is how she was so often depicted among the ancient Canaanites. Indeed, because she was represented in tree form, it is not surprising that Yahweh declared that the tree and its fruit were taboo.

By Jay Williams
Professor Emeritus
Hamilton College
May 2018

Well, maybe. As I read this essay I was thinking about the author's comment early on:

The problem, however, is that the story has too many loose ends, too many confusing subtleties to be so easily unraveled and explained. If it is to be understood as an account of why humans are all sinful, why does the word “sin” never appear in the story?

I think the same objection applies to the author's thesis. If the Goddess is so important in this story, why is she never mentioned directly?

Be that as it may, it's an interesting reading. Toward the end, the essay seems to turn into a manifesto for the revival of Goddess worship. Perhaps that could work for some circles in the twenty-first century.

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On Petra and the Nabataeans

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Solving the Enigma of Petra and the Nabataeans. Who were the Nabataeans? (Glenn J. Corbett). This essay is a very good, brief but detailed, introduction to the subject. As usual, it includes links to relevant Biblical Archaeology Review articles that are behind the subscription wall.

Cross file under Nabatean Watch (Nabataean Watch).

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Another crucified skeleton?

OSTEOLOGY: How Jesus died: Extremely rare evidence of Roman crucifixion uncovered in Italy. Although attested to in scores of historical writings, this skeleton is only the second example providing tangible archaeological proof of the cruel method of capital punishment (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel).

A lesion on the foot of a 2,000-year-old skeleton discovered in a Roman burial site in northern Italy appears to constitute rare tangible evidence of execution by crucifixion, according to an interdisciplinary team of Italian researchers.

Although broadly attested to in historical writings — including the New Testament — it is only the second known archaeological proof of the particularly cruel form of capital punishment practiced by the Romans against criminals, as well as revolutionaries such as Jesus.

[...]

The skeleton shows signs of violence that are consistent with crucifixion, but the evidence is apparently not conclusive. The other, certain, crucified skeleton mentioned in the headline above, is that of one Yehohanan ben Hagkol, on which more here and links.

Also, not mentioned in the article, it has been argued that another skeleton, apparently of one Mattathiah son of Judah, was also crucified. I noted that story several years ago here. I have heard nothing more about it since.

Other past posts on this horrific ancient method of execution are here and links and here.

Also worth mentioning is the recent discussion of the crucifixion gem, which gives one of the earliest artistic depictions of the crucifixion of Jesus.

UPDATE (2 June): It seems that third skeleton mentioned above was not crucified and is not of a man. Details here.

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Iran lists Sabean Mandaic script as a cultural heritage

MANDEAN (MANDAEAN) WATCH: Sabian Mandean Script Listed as Cultural Heritage (Iran Financial Tribune). I don't often have praise for the Iranian Government, but in this they have done a good thing. I commend them.

For review: the Mandeans (Mandaeans) are a Middle Eastern Gnostic religious group coming from an Aramaic-speaking background and with an Aramaic liturgy. They believe that John the Baptist was their founder. Their movement can be traced back to late antiquity and perhaps even to the early centuries CE. The term Sabian (Sabean, Sabaean) is often applied to them, but I am not sure of its exact import.

For past PaleoJudaica posts on the Sabean Mandeans start here and links (also here) and follow the links. And there are many other posts on the Mandeans in general. You can find those in the archives. Oh, and James McGrath, call your office.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

Review of Niehoff, Philo of Alexandria

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Maren R. Niehoff, Philo of Alexandria: An Intellectual Biography. New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 2018. Pp. xi, 323. ISBN 9780300175233. $38.00. Reviewed by Gretchen Reydams-Schils, University of Notre Dame (reydams-schils.1@nd.edu).

Only every once in a while (and not that often in one scholarly generation) a book comes along that not only changes fundamentally the perspective on its chosen topic, but, through its novel methodology, will have major repercussions for other fields of scholarship as well. Maren Niehoff’s intellectual biography of Philo of Alexandria is such a work.

[...]

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On 3 Maccabees

READING ACTS: What is Third Maccabees? Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series have been noted here and links.

Phil published a series of posts on 3 Maccabees back in 2017. It appears that he is reprinting them now (or at least this one). There may be revisions as well, but I don't have access to the full text of the earlier posts. He has taken them down.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

The menorah in the Bible

ICONOGRAPHY AND EXEGESIS: Why the Menorah Is the Most Enduring of All Jewish Symbols. Unlike the case with nearly every other Tabernacle fixture, the function of the menorah does not cease when the Jewish people no longer possess a Temple (Sarah Rindner, Mosaic Magazine).

At the beginning of this week’s Torah reading of B’ha’alotkha (Numbers 8-12), the Bible gives instructions for the daily kindling of the menorah.

The menorah has long occupied a prominent place in the Jewish imagination. From the time of its placement in the inner courtyard of the Tabernacle in the desert and later of the Temple in Jerusalem, to its rekindling after the Maccabees’ defeat of the Seleucids, to its central position on the Arch of Titus in Rome, to its modern repurposing as the emblem of Jewish revival by the state of Israel, few Jewish symbols have been as familiar or as evocative.

And yet the Bible leaves unstated the significance of the menorah and its seven branches, its importance to the Temple, or its meaning and purpose with respect to the relationship between God and His chosen nation and perhaps beyond. On these matters, an examination of five key scriptural passages can shed light.

[...]

For many past PaleoJudaica posts on ancient menorahs and representations of menorahs, see here and links and here.

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More on the Oxyrhynchus Mark fragment

VARIANT READINGS: Some Observations on the “Provisional Dating” of P.Oxy. 83.5345. Brent Nongbri discusses the initial cataloguing of the Mark fragment (incorrectly) as dating to the first century and the confusing results in recent years. Dr. Nongbri is doing an excellent job of pulling back the curtain to show the inner workings of the discovery, cataloguing, and publication of the Oxyrhynchus papyri over the last century.

Background on that Mark fragment is here and links.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

Elisheva's Diary

NEW NOVEL: Elisheva's Diary. The ancient city of Dan in the northern Galilee has generations of stories to tell. In this fast-moving novel, they are brought to life in a story of family love, intrigue and loyalty, then and now (Rochel Sylvetsky, Arutz Sheva).

The ancient city of Dan is located in a beautiful and lush valley in Israel's northern Galilee region. Visiting the area today especially in early spring, is to stop to gaze in wonder at nature's paintbrush splashing light and color with gorgeous abandon.

Dr. Richard D. Small has brought that once vibrant city and its still verdant environs to life, writing a compelling book published by Touchpoint Press and available at Google Books, that juxtaposes life in Israel during the first century B.C.E. with the Israel of today. He does it by means of a fast moving plot in which a young Arab, Musa, digging at the archaeological excavations of ancient Dan discovers an urn containing the diary of Elisheva, who lived in Dan during the Second Temple period reign of Hasmonean Queen Shlomzion.

[...]

If only. Maybe someday.

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On the Words of Ahiqar

READING ACTS: The Words of Ahiqar. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series have been noted here and links.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

The Melammu Newsletter

THE AWOL BLOG: Open Access Journal: Melammu Newsletter.

The main purpose of the Melammu Project is to investigate the continuity, transformation, and diffusion of Mesopotamian and Ancient Near Eastern culture from the third millennium BCE through the ancient world until Islamic times and after."

The work of the project is often of direct or indirect relevance to ancient Judaism. Its newsletter has recently gone online. The main link given in the AWOL post is dead at the moment. But this one works.

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Exhibition on the ancient priestly vestment dye

MATERIAL CULTURE: Linking ancient snails to an Israeli flag in space, a common thread. The elusive dye used to create the biblical blue, 'techelet,' in the Ancient Near East is spotlighted in a new Bible Lands Museum exhibit, 'Out of the Blue' (Marissa Newman, Times of Israel).

It was the color of the sea, the sky, the divine sapphire-hewn Throne of Glory, according to the Tannaite sage Rabbi Meir. It was a color used in the Jewish temples, the hue of its high priests’ robes, and the shade of the blue tassel that the Bible commands be affixed to one’s garments.

But starting in the seventh century CE, the source of the natural dye to produce the biblical tekhelet [blue] — as well as its royal purple counterpart, argaman — faded from history for hundreds of years.

Long sought by Jews to revive the ancient practice of wearing a fringe of techelet, the revered colors were also the subject of other Ancient Near East cultures’ fascination and ritual worship and the source of a hugely prosperous ancient dyeing industry, according to a new exhibit at Jerusalem’s Bible Lands Museum, “Out of the Blue,” which is set to open on June 1.

[...]

Past posts on the tekhelet dye, its ancient uses, and modern efforts to recreate it, are here and follow the links.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

The Beit She'arim Necropolis

ATLAS OBSCURA: Beit She'arim Necropolis. A sprawling ancient Jewish cemetery with over 30 rock-hewn burial caves.

The Roman destruction of Jerusalem’s Second Temple in 70 CE scattered the Jewish people out into the empire, from the Greek islands to as far as modern-day Spain and Portugal. Following this cataclysmic event, Jerusalem’s great assembly of the Sanhedrin, a sort of Supreme Court of the Jewish nation, migrated north to the Galilean city of Bet She’arim.

A nice photo essay, as we have come to expect from Atlas Obscura.

For past PaleoJudaica posts on Beit She'arim (Beith Shearim) see here and links.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

More looting arrests in West Bank

APPREHENDED: LOOTERS ARRESTED FOR ILLEGAL DIGGING AT WEST BANK ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE. Authorities stopped the criminals at an archaeological site south of the Peduel settlement in the West Bank (Jerusalem Post).

During a joint patrol with the Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria’s archeology unit, authorities stopped the criminals at an archaeological site south of the Peduel settlement in the West Bank. The criminals were found on site with digging equipment and taken in for questioning by security authorities. Previous excavations at the site uncovered a large monastery and a church with ornate mosaics, among other finds, the unit said.

Sadly, many such stories continue to come up. See here and links, as well as here, here, here, and here.

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Pnina Shor to speak at Denver DSS exhibition

PUBLIC LECTURE: Dead Sea Scrolls Leader to Speak in Denver. Dead Sea Scrolls 70 Years Later with Pnina Shor, Israel Antiquities Authority (Boulder Jewish News).

Monday, June 4, 7:00 pm
BMH-BJ Congregation, Fisher Hall
560 S Monaco Pkwy, Denver, CO
Free Admission

The speaker:

Since its inception in 2010, Pnina Shor has been the head of the Dead Sea Scrolls unit of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). In this role, she oversees the curatorship, conservation and preservation, exhibition and digitization of the IAA’s more than 20,000 scrolls. ...

Background on the Denver Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition is here and follow the links.

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The Denver DSS exhibition

EXHIBITION REVIEW: Dead Sea Scrolls: From the lowest place on Earth to 'the mile high city' (Jessi Satin, i24 News).

Fast forward 72 years. Twenty of these scrolls, and more than 600 artifacts have traveled almost 7,000 miles to Denver, Colorado for a special six-month long exhibition at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.

The exhibition, which holds the largest collection of artifacts from the Holy Land to arrive in the United States, aims to tell the story of the ancient Israelites who wrote the scrolls, as well as the larger story of the development of the Middle East, and of the religious traditions that shaped western civilization.

The headline alone makes this article worth a link. But it's also a nice and detailed review of the whole exhibition, which includes more than just Dead Sea Scrolls.

Background here and links

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

Mor Gabriel title deeds returned to Syriac Christian community

MODERN SYRIAC WATCH: Syriac Christians hail return of churches and monasteries (Daily Sabah).

Spreading title deeds on a coffee table, leaders of the Syriac Christian community in southeastern Turkey enthusiastically spoke about how they settled a controversial issue regarding the return of their properties. In 2014, ownership of churches, monasteries and cemeteries belonging to the ancient community were transferred to the state after Mardin, the southeastern city where they are located, was designated as the "greater city municipality." The community fought for their return but faced bureaucratic red-tape and a lengthy legal process. Finally, they were formally handed title deeds yesterday, crediting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for helping them to settle the issue.

Properties were returned to the Foundation of Mor Gabriel Monastery that represents the small community concentrated mainly in Mardin. ....

I have been following the fortunes of the ancient and historic Mor Gabriel Monastery for some time, with emphasis in the last several years on disputed land seizures by the Turkish Government. I am not sure whether all the problems are resolved yet, but this latest report seems to count as good news.

Background here and links.

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On Eldad and Modad

READING ACTS: Eldad and Modad. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series have been noted here and links.

As for the lost book of Eldad and Modad, it gets even more interesting. There is a good case that this work is quoted (as scripture!) in the New Testament in the Epistle of James 4:5. Richard Bauckham makes the case in MOPT1. I'm away from my desk at the moment, but I will post the full reference when I have the volume in hand.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

Digital Syriac Corpus

THE AWOL BLOG: Digital Syriac Corpus. This project has been in progress for a long time, but it has only recently started publishing its work online. It looks very promising. Cross-file under Syriac Watch.

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Some "Oxyrhynchus papyri" are not from Oxyrhynchus

VARIANT READINGS: The Oxyrhynchus Papyri of Dubious Provenance and Editorial Choice (Brent Nongbri). Excerpt:

But, to bring it back to my original point: If there are such unpublished pieces, the majority of which probably have certain Oxyrhynchite provenance, why are editors choosing to publish pieces of dubious provenance in The Oxyrhynchus Papyri series? I’m genuinely curious.

It's a good question. The questions about the no-longer-first-century Mark fragment just published in the series are helping to draw attention to it.

Dr. Nongbri has been posting a lot lately on the Oxyrhynchus papyri, so go have a look at his blog.

Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.

Moss and Baden on the no-longer-first-century Mark fragment

CANDIDA MOSS AND JOEL BADEN: Was One of World’s Oldest Bible Passages Found in a Garbage Dump? On Thursday, the Oxford-based Oxyrhynchus Society announced the discovery of a second-century piece of the Gospel of Mark from a dig in an Egyptian garbage dump (The Daily Beast).

Yesterday, the Egyptian Exploration Society, the nonprofit organization that acts as curators of the Oxford-based Oxyrhynchus Society, announced a new discovery: a late second- or early third-century CE fragment of the first chapter of the Gospel of Mark, just published in The Oxyrhynchus Papryi Volume 83 (2018), edited by distinguished Oxford academics Daniela Colomo and Dirk Obbink. In what must be the archetypical example of the expression “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” this pile of ancient refuse has produced one of the oldest fragments of the oldest Gospel story (Mark is believed by scholars to be the earliest Gospel.) This makes it a substantial and significant discovery for those interested in the history of Christianity, the evidence of the dating of the books of the Bible, and the history of book-making. But it also comes with a substantial mystery surrounding its origins, its dating, and its potential connection to the ubiquitous Green family, the owners of Hobby Lobby and the founders of the Museum of the Bible.

This story is labyrinthine but worth trying to follow. As usual, Professors Moss and Baden lay out the evidence as clearly as possible.

Background on this early (but not first-century) Mark fragment is here and links.

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On Queen Helena of Adiabene

DR. MALKA SIMKOVICH: Queen Helena of Adiabene and Her Sons in Midrash and History (TheTorah.com).

Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews, tells the story of Queen Helena of Adiabene and her sons Kings Izates II and Monobazus II, and how they converted to Judaism in the mid-first century C.E. Rabbinic literature preserves several anecdotes about this family. However, the rabbis knew little about them, and grappled with their insider/outsider status.

Regular PaleoJudaica readers are well acquainted with the intriguing figure of Queen Helena of Adiabene. This essay collects and evaluates the accounts and legends about her.

For past posts on Queen Helena and Adiabene, start here and follow the links.

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On the History of the Rechabites

READING ACTS: History of the Rechabites. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series were noted here and links.

I have argued for a long time that the History of the Rechabites (which is embedded in the Story of Zosimus) is a Christian composition. For specific, see my 2003 conference papers: "Is the Story of Zosimus Really a Jewish Composition?" and "The Rechabites in Patristic and Parabiblical Literature." Phil mentions Chris Knights, who also wrote on this work. He and I corresponded on the subject here and here, also in 2003. Several years ago Dr. Knights published an article revising his position in agreement with mine.

Another project on this text was noted here.

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"First-Century Mark" is not first century

THAT FRAGMENT OF THE GOSPEL OF MARK that was rumored to date to the first century has now been published in a volume of Oxyrhynchus papyri. The editors date it to the late second or early third century. That's still pretty early for a New Testament manuscript, but first century it is not. The story of the fragment is complicated. For details see the two recent posts at the Evangelical Textual Criticism Blog:

“First-Century Mark,” Published at Last? [Updated] (Elijah Hixson)

Dan Wallace responds on (formerly) ‘First-century Mark’ (Peter Gurry)

I noted the announcement of the existence of this Mark manuscript here. I was skeptical of the first-century date then and I remained skeptical all along. (See here and follow the links back.) Looks like I was right. Again.

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Esler on taking 1 Enoch seriously

THE BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION:

Taking 1 Enoch Seriously

In the light of these conclusions, the Enochic scribes emerge not as temple scribes (indeed, there are clear signs of tension and conflict in the text between them and the temple establishment), but as scribes who played their part in the wider social and political ambit of Judea. We can imagine them as active across the whole range of commercial and legal work that Judean scribes undertook for private clients, as well as perhaps drafting documents for the Seleucid and then Hasmonean and even Roman administrations of Judea.

See Also: God's Court and Courtiers in the Book of the Watchers: Re-Interpreting Heaven in 1 Enoch 1–36 (Cascade Books, 2017).

By Philip F. Esler
The University of Gloucestershire
Cheltenham, UK
(pesler@glos.ac.uk)
Cheltenham, UK
May 2018

I noted the publication of Professor Esler's new book here. On the subject of the term "Jew" vs. Ioudaios, on which we disagree, see here and here.

This essay gives some rich cultural background to the Ethiopic version of the book of 1 Enoch (the only complete surviving version). It is well worth a read.

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On Jannes and Jambres

READING ACTS: Jannes and Jambres. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series were noted here and links.

There are new fragments of Jannes and Jambres in an Ethiopic translation and also in Greek. And there is a new manuscript in Coptic with material related to the story of Jannes and Jambres. We hope to have translations of all these in volume 2 of Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures (MOTP2).

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A recycled Phoenician ship

PHOENICIAN WATCH: 'Phoenician Ship' made of plastic bottles sails from Byblos to Beirut Port (Lebanese National News Agency).

In his word marking the event, [Mayor of Jbeil Wissam] Zaarour described the initiative as "an environmental symbol because the boat is made of 50,000 plastic bottles aimed at raising awareness about the dangers of this type of waste, in addition to its cultural symbolism by embodying the Phoenician vessels that were used for trade and export of Lebanese Cedar wood through the Jbeil coast."

Regular readers will be reminded of two other reconstructed Phoenician ships, the Good Ship Phoenicia and the Good Ship Ma’agan Michael II. And there was brief mention of a third one here. But this one has its own special charm.

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Stern on ancient Jewish graffiti

ATLAS OBSCURA: The Wit and Wisdom of Ancient Jewish Graffiti. Researchers in the field have uncovered related messages ranging from “Lasius is a pervert” to “Good luck in your resurrection” (Eve Kahn).

Carving the letters and images “required time, diligence, steadfastness, and a degree of pain tolerance,” Karen B. Stern, an assistant professor at Brooklyn College, observes in her new book, Writing on the Wall: Graffiti and the Forgotten Jews of Antiquity. As the graffiti artists hammered away at doorways, pillars or cliffs, she writes, “powders and fragments would cover one’s face and fill one’s lungs with dust; hardened dirt, rock, and plaster could push back and split fingernails; and carving implements, including metal nails, blades, and stones, surely drew blood when the lighting faded or surfaces grew unwieldy.”

A brief review of Dr. Stern's new book.

PaleoJudaica has been following Dr. Stern's work for some time. For past posts, see here and links. This is the first I've heard of her new book. The full reference is Karen B. Stern, Writing on the Wall. Graffiti and the Forgotten Jews of Antiquity (Princeton University Press, 2018). The publisher's description:

Few direct clues exist to the everyday lives and beliefs of ordinary Jews in antiquity. Prevailing perspectives on ancient Jewish life have been shaped largely by the voices of intellectual and social elites, preserved in the writings of Philo and Josephus and the rabbinic texts of the Mishnah and Talmud. Commissioned art, architecture, and formal inscriptions displayed on tombs and synagogues equally reflect the sensibilities of their influential patrons. The perspectives and sentiments of nonelite Jews, by contrast, have mostly disappeared from the historical record. Focusing on these forgotten Jews of antiquity, Writing on the Wall takes an unprecedented look at the vernacular inscriptions and drawings they left behind and sheds new light on the richness of their quotidian lives.

Just like their neighbors throughout the eastern and southern Mediterranean, Mesopotamia, Arabia, and Egypt, ancient Jews scribbled and drew graffiti everyplace--in and around markets, hippodromes, theaters, pagan temples, open cliffs, sanctuaries, and even inside burial caves and synagogues. Karen Stern reveals what these markings tell us about the men and women who made them, people whose lives, beliefs, and behaviors eluded commemoration in grand literary and architectural works. Making compelling analogies with modern graffiti practices, she documents the overlooked connections between Jews and their neighbors, showing how popular Jewish practices of prayer, mortuary commemoration, commerce, and civic engagement regularly crossed ethnic and religious boundaries.

Illustrated throughout with examples of ancient graffiti, Writing on the Wall provides a tantalizingly intimate glimpse into the cultural worlds of forgotten populations living at the crossroads of Judaism, Christianity, paganism, and earliest Islam.

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The two rabbis and the disrespectful donkey

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: The Uppity Donkey and the Distraught Rabbi: Critical Animal Studies and the Talmud (Beth Berkowitz).

This story about two rabbis and their donkeys opens a number of lines of inquiry for late antiquity. What were the everyday interactions of human beings with animals and how did those interactions shape both human and animal lives? What mediating roles did animals play in human politics? What were the mechanisms by which people tried to control animals and how did they justify those mechanisms? Finally, and in my view most intriguingly, how were late ancients onto themselves when it came to animals? In other words, what insights did late ancient people have into the problems and paradoxes of their relationship to other species?

This is the latest essay in the AJR Animal Forum.

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Habakkuk 3 and ANE myth

FOR SHAVUOT: Habakkuk’s Mythological Depiction of YHWH (Prof. Marvin A. Sweeney, TheTorah.com).

Habakkuk 3 is framed as a lament, in which the psalmist asks God to save him and his people from danger. The core of the psalm is a divine theophany, in which YHWH is described as coming from afar to battle his enemies in classic ANE mythological fashion.

When I was a doctoral student, a few of us read early biblical Hebrew poetry with Frank Moore Cross for a semester, including Habakkuk 3. On the basis of the grammar and content, Cross regarded it to be an early poem reused in the book of Habakkuk. That seemed convincing to me at the time.

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On The Ladder of Jacob

READING ACTS: The Ladder of Jacob. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Past posts in the series were noted here and here and links.

The Ladder of Jacob survives complete only in Old Church Slavonic. But the prayer of Jacob from The Ladder of Jacob also survives in Hebrew from the Cairo Geniza. The Hebrew may be the original or it may be translated from a Greek original

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New DSS coming to the Denver exhibition

ROTATION: 10 MORE DEAD SEA SCROLLS ARE COMING TO DENVER (Cara Chancellor, 303 Magazine).

In March, The Dead Sea Scrolls came to The Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Named one of the greatest archaeological finds of the 20th century, these manuscripts were written between 150 B.C. and 70 A.D., making parts of the collection more than 2,000 years old. They are some of the oldest remaining documents of written human history and now 10 more are coming to Denver. The 10 new scrolls will be here in early June to replace those currently on display and like the first round, the second will feature one scroll never before seen by the public.

[...]

Follow the link for the full list of new scrolls. They arrive on 11 June.

Background on the Denver Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition is here and links.

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How many kinds of giants?

REMNANT OF GIANTS: Matthew Goff on the Three Successive Generations of Giants (Deane Galbraith).

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Moses and the Torah in Nehemiah 9

FOR SHAVUOT: Nehemiah 9: The First Historical Survey in the Bible to Mention Sinai and Torah (Professor Hava Shalom-Guy, TheTorah.com).

The revelation at Sinai emerged as central to Israel’s story in the Persian period. No biblical text outside the Torah mentions it until its unique inclusion in the historical prologue of the Levites’ prayer in Nehemiah 9:13-14. A later scribe redacted the Sinai verses to further include a reference to the Torah of Moses.

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Cyril and Methodius Day 2018 (again!)

SLAVONIC PHILOLOGY: Day of Slavic Writing and Culture (Ukrinform).

Every year on May 24, all Slavic countries commemorate Saints Cyril and Methodius, as well as the Day of Slavic Writing and Culture. In Ukraine, the holiday was established in accordance with a presidential decree of September 17, 2004, on the day of commemoration of Equal-to-the-Apostles Cyril and Methodius – representatives of the Enlightenment, who played a prominent role in the development and formation of Slavic writing and culture, patrons of Europe.

[...]

The work of Saints Cyril and Methodius is actually celebrated on three different days in different Slavic countries: 14 February, 24 May (today), and 5 July. More on that here. That post also has links with more information on Cyril and Methodius, their alphabet, and Slavonic Old Testament pseudepigrapha (i.e., why PaleoJudaica is interested). Also, in that post I neglected to include the Ukraine among today's celebrants. I have corrected that omission with the first link above.

Happy celebration to all those celebrating.

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Left-handers in the Bible

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Left-Handed People in the Bible. Is there a genetic link to Benjamite lefties?

The Hebrew Bible mentions left-handed people on three occasions: the story of Ehud’s assassination of the Moabite king (Judges 3:12–30), the 700 Benjamites who could use the sling with deadly accuracy (Judges 20:16) and the two-dozen ambidextrous warriors who came to support David in Hebron (1 Chronicles 12:2). All of these stories of left-handed people in the Bible appear in military contexts, and, curiously, all involve members of the tribe of Benjamin.

[...]

As usual, this essay is an (interesting) summary of a BAR article that is behind the subscription wall: Boyd Seevers and Joanna Klein, Biblical Views: “Left-Handed Sons of Right-Handers,” from 2013.

In Ferniehirst Castle in Scotland there is a left-handed (i.e., upwards counter-clockwise) spiral staircase. The story is that in the early 1500s Sir Andrew Kerr had it built because he himself was left-handed and he trained his follows to swordfight left-handed. The layout of the staircase made it easier for them to defend the castle entrance from above. I have found mixed views on whether it would have made an attack from below harder or easier for right-handers.

There is also mixed evidence on whether left-handedness ran in the Kerr Clan. It doesn't seem to today.

I have seen the staircase myself, but I don't know how much else of the story is true. For some commentary and links, see here.

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Ghosts of Roman coin minting

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: Greenland ice cores track Roman lead pollution in year-by-year detail. Studying the ice cores may help reconstruct fluctuations in the ancient economy (Kiona N. Smith, Ars Technica).

Lead pollution could provide a proxy for the general state of the Roman economy, but historians would need a detailed record of changes in pollution levels from year to year. That was found 2,500 miles away in the ice sheets of Northern Greenland. Paleoclimatologist Joe McConnell of the Desert Research Institute and his colleagues turned to a 423-meter-long ice core taken by the Northern Greenland Ice Core Project.

The core records nearly 2,000 years of annual ice buildup, from 1100 BCE to 800 CE. Each layer records slightly less than a year’s worth of accumulated ice, which traps other material, like lead from mines and foundries in Europe. McConnell and his colleagues say they’ve dated the layers with an uncertainty of just one or two years, making it easy to compare lead pollution with historical events.

The Punic Wars provide one example of this correlation:

McConnell and his colleagues saw a characteristic pattern around wars throughout Roman history. When conflict came to a mining region, as it did during the three Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage, it disrupted life and work in the region. That shows up as a year or two of slightly cleaner ice in Greenland, since Europe was producing less lead pollution.

At the outbreak of the first Punic War in 264 BCE, for instance, the amount of lead in the Greenland ice layers dropped abruptly. But production ramped up again closer to the final years of the war, as Carthage minted more silver coins to pay its mercenary forces.

Cross-file under Punic Watch and Numismatics (Sort Of).

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Talmud manuscripts

TALMUD WATCH: Surviving Manuscripts of the Talmud: An Overview (Dr. Menachem Katz, TheGemara.com).

What we know about the surviving manuscripts, and how they contribute to Talmud study

HT AJR. For more on the long oral transmission of the Babylonian Talmud, see here. For more on the Hachi Garsinan Talmud project, see here and here.

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The Kingdom of Aksum

HISTORY: The Kingdom of Aksum – Africa’s lost Empire. The Aksumite Empire was an ancient kingdom that existed in Ethiopia from 100 CE to 940 CE. Centred on the city of Axum in Ethiopia, the nation grew from the proto-Aksumite Iron Age period around 400 BCE to its height around the 1st century CE (Heritage Daily).

This is a nice capsule history of the Ethiopian Kingdom of Aksum (Axum). For past PaleoJudaica posts involving Aksum, start here and follow the links. In particular, this post and this one give background on why Aksum is of interest for ancient Judaism.

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Ammon, Moab and Edom

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Who Were the Ammonites, Moabites and Edomites in the Bible? Ancient Israel’s neighbors east of the Jordan (Megan Sauter).

The kingdoms of Ammon, Moab and Edom fought with the Israelites and the Judahites over territory. The Bible presents things from the Israelites’ and Judahites’ point of view, and archaeological discoveries help show us the other side. By looking at what these ancient peoples wrote and left behind, we are able to better understand their perspective. We now have a fuller picture of their kings, gods and daily life.

This essay is a taster for a 2016 BAR article by Joel S. Burnett: “Ammon, Moab and Edom: Gods and Kingdoms East of the Jordan.” You need a paid subscription to read the full article, but the BHD essay gives a nice brief overview of the topic.

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On the Lives of the Prophets

READING ACTS: The Lives of the Prophets. Another installment in Phil Long's current summer series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha.

I don't doubt that the Lives of the Prophets contains some Jewish traditions. But there's a good case that the best context for it is the world of late-antique Byzantine Christianity. See David Satran, Biblical Prophets in Byzantine Palestine. Reassessing the Lives of the Prophets (SVTP 11; Brill, 1994).

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Moses and Zoroaster as authors

DR. YISHAI KEIL: How the Concept of Mosaic Authorship Developed (TheTorah.com).

In the Persian period, the Torah, which is made up of various law collections, was ascribed to Moses as revealed by YHWH. A parallel development was taking place in Achaemenid Persia that sheds light on this process: The sacred texts called the Avesta, that contain the law​​ (dāta) and tradition (daēnā) of Zoroastrianism​, were being collectively ascribed to Zarathustra (Zoroaster) as revealed by Ahuramazdā.

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Satlow on the field of Judaism in late antiquity

MICHAEL SATLOW: Jews and Judaism in Late Antiquity: Taking Stock. Professor Satlow has been a major figure in the field for a long time and he is well placed to give us an overview of its development over the last generation.

HT AJR.

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Very busy

I AM GOING TO BE VERY BUSY FOR THE NEXT COUPLE OF WEEKS. Nevertheless, I expect to blog daily, at pretty much the usual volume. Sometimes it may be later in the day.

Do keep visiting as usual. There is plenty of good blogginess coming!

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The Sifting Project has found some cool coins

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: 5 rare Jewish coins discovered by Temple Mount project. Coins, minted by autonomous Jewish province of the First Persian Empire in late 4th century BC, attested to existence of commercial, administrative life in and around Second Temple and Temple Mount; 'These were the first coins ever minted by Jews,' says project's co-director, adding pilgrims would convert their tithes into these coins. (Itzchak Tessler, Ynet News).

The "Project" is, of course, the Temple Mount Sifting Project, on which more here and oh so many links.

This article has lots of background on the YHD coins, including that they apparently have been used as partial inspiration for the design of the new Israeli shekel. Cross-file under Numismatics.

The Temple Mount Sifting Project is still looking for funding!

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Was the Priestly writer anti-Temple?

DR HACHAM ISAAC S. D. SASSOON:The Tabernacle: A Post-Exilic Polemic Against Rebuilding the Temple (TheTorah.com).

The Priestly Torah discusses the Tabernacle at extraordinary length, emphasizing its portability. Nothing in P ever says this structure was meant to be temporary. P’s Tabernacle was not foreshadowing the Temple, but was a polemic against Haggai and Zechariah’s agitation to build the Second Temple.

Surprisingly, P never tells the Israelites to build a Temple when they reach the Promised Land.

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4 Baruch

READING ACTS: What is Fourth Baruch? Another in Phil Long's current summer series of blog posts on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha.

For past posts in this series over the last couple of years, see here and links.

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The royal wedding had a Coptic connection

COPTIC WATCH: Coptic Orthodox Archbishop of London gives prayer at UK's royal wedding. Anba Angaelos is the first Coptic Orthodox Archbishop of London, having served as General Bishop of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the United Kingdom since 1999 (Ahram Online). Sadly, the prayer was not in Coptic.

But never mind. Congratulations and all best wishes to the newlywed royal couple.

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The vision of Ezekiel

EZEKIEL CHAPTER ONE, the Merkavah vision of Ezekiel, is the haftarah (reading from the prophets) for the first day of Shavuot (which started yesterday at sundown). This chapter is the foundation for both Jewish and Christian mysticism and its traditions have also been influential on Islamic mysticism. For some comment on the influence of the passage on Jewish tradition, see Why Read Ezekiel on Shavuot? Tradition connects the prophet's vision to the revelation at Sinai by Michael Fishbane at My Jewish Learning.

In Christian mysticism, Ezekiel's vision was to a large degree mediated through the work of Pseudo-Dionysius the Aeropagite, a late-antique Neoplatonist philosopher and mystic. For more on those traditions, see the Wikipedia article on Christian angelology.

And for more on Ezekiel's Merkavah vision, see here and here and links.

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Judges in Pseudo-Philo

READING ACTS: The Book of Judges in Pseudo-Philo (LAB) (Phil Long). Phil's opening post on this book was noted here. His series on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha continues.

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Why does the Torah come in five books?

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Why Is the Torah Divided into Five Books? (Dr. Elaine Goodfriend, TheTorah.com).

The division of the Torah into five books is not mentioned anywhere in the Bible, yet this division may be ancient and inherent. Already in Second Temple times, Philo speaks of it, and by the early first millenium C.E., the Torah became known by the Greek name, Pentateuch, literally, “five scrolls.” Is this division due to practical, thematic, or symbolic considerations?

Fun fact: the first recorded person to use the term "Pentateuch" for the Torah of Moses was a Gnostic Christian. He said that Moses only wrote part of it.

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Archaeology and Virtual Reality

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Virtual Reality in Archaeology. Visualizing antiquity through modern lenses (Abby VanderHart). Past posts on Lithodomos and similar technologies are here and links. And here's an older post on the prospect of such technologies — a prospect that today is partially realized.

Cross-file under Technology Watch.

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