Review of Rosenblum, The Jewish Dietary Laws in the Ancient World

H-JUDAIC: Garroway on Rosenblum, 'The Jewish Dietary Laws in the Ancient World.'

Author: Jordan Rosenblum
Reviewer: Joshua Garroway

Jordan Rosenblum. The Jewish Dietary Laws in the Ancient World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016. xiii + 193 pp. $99.99 (cloth), ISBN 978-1-107-09034-7.

Reviewed by Joshua Garroway (Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion, Los Angeles) Published on H-Judaic (June, 2018) Commissioned by Katja Vehlow (University of South Carolina)

Jordan Rosenblum’s second book-length treatment of Jewish food culture in antiquity comes on the heels of his successful 2010 offering, Food and Identity in Early Rabbinic Judaism. The present volume is less triumphant, in my view, but nonetheless will prove valuable in certain settings.

[...]

I noted a review of Jordan Rosenblum's earlier book, Food and Identity in Early Rabbinic Judaism, here. This is the first time I've specifically noted his 2016 book, but I did link to an essay by him here which was inspired by the book.

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How many bronze platings on the altar?

SOME MORE REDACTION CRITICISM: The Bronze Plating of the Altar: Numbers Versus Exodus (Dr. Rabbi David Frankel, TheTorah.com).

After Korah’s failed rebellion, God commands Elazar to plate the altar with the bronze firepans of the two hundred and fifty tribal leaders (Num 17). But didn’t Bezalel already plate the altar in bronze as God commanded when it was first built (Exod 27 and 38)?

One interesting thing about this essay is that it finds a redactional seam within one of the traditional Pentateuchal sources (P), not just between the sources.

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Paris Philo codex online

VARIANT READINGS: Paris Philo Codex (sort of?) Online (Brent Nongbri).The link to the images were down, but they are now back up. This codex is one of our earliest sources for works of Philo of Alexandria

Background here.

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Bible Animals

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Bible Animals: From Hyenas to Hippos Lions and crocodiles and monkeys, oh my! (Rabbi Dr. Natan Slifkin).

If you were asked to name a book that mentions lions, cheetahs, crocodiles, hippos and hyenas, your thoughts might turn to Tarzan or some other such exotic tale. Bears, jackals, monkeys and panthers are the domain of The Jungle Book. Yet all these animals are also found in the Bible.

[...]

You'd be surprised what's in the Bible.

Rabbi Dr. Slifkin, a.k.a. "the Zoo Rabbi," is curator of the Biblical Museum of Natural History in Beit Shemesh, Israel. Past PaleoJudaica posts on him and the Museum are here and links.

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Report on CJH event on Goodman's A History of Judaism

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: A History of Judaism: Goodman, Reed, and Magid at the Center for Jewish History (Erez DeGolan).

On April 18, 2018, the Center for Jewish History (CJH) in New York hosted a public event in celebration of the A History of Judaism. About 40 people, academics and not, came to hear Goodman discussing his work, with a response from Annette Yoshiko Reed and Shaul Magid. The thoughtful remarks of the three and the unusual character of A History of Judaism more broadly, stimulated contemplations on the spacious, if seldom thought of, gap between academic knowledge production and its ‘public’ dissemination. In what follows I discuss the highlights of the CJH’s event and the questions it raised.

With thoughtful commentary.

Past PaleoJudaica posts on Martin Goodman's book A History of Judaism are here, here, and here.

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Review of Tugendhaft, Baal and the Politics of Poetry

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Aaron Tugendhaft, Baal and the Politics of Poetry. The Ancient Word 1. London; New York: Routledge, 2017. Pp. 166. ISBN 9781138063624. $140.00. Reviewed by Aren M. Wilson-Wright, Universität Zürich​ (aren.wilson-wright@uzh.ch).

Baal and the Politics of Poetry is a revised version of Aaron Tugendhaft’s 2012 New York University dissertation. In it, Tugendhaft argues that the Baal Cycle—an epic poem from Ugarit depicting Baal’s struggle for political dominance against Yamm (sea) and Mot (death)—represents a meditation on kingship and its limitations, rather than an unabashed celebration of royal power as usually assumed. Tugendhaft develops this argument over the course of six chapters as well as the introduction and conclusion.

[...]

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More on that tiny royal (?) head

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: An Iron Age Royal at Abel Beth Maacah? Highly crafted figurine may depict a dignitary, elite person, or even a king (Robin Ngo).

Background here.

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Barthélemy's Critique textuelle de l’ancien Testament online

THE ETC BLOG: Critique textuelle de l’ancien Testament for Free Download (John Meade). For you, special deal!

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Virtual archaeology in the Talmud

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Archaeology Without Ruins. In this week’s ‘Daf Yomi,’ ancient Talmudic rabbis look for the First and Second Temples without stones or relics to guide them.

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

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More on the latest archaeological destruction on the Temple Mount

THE TEMPLE MOUNT SIFTING PROJECT BLOG: Update: Waqf Uses Ramadan to Violate Antiquities Law. Excerpt:

In 2018, this should not be a problem. Taking advantage of the limited police, and ban of all non-Muslims from the Temple Mount because of Ramadan, these archaeologically rich mounds of earth have been irreconcilably damaged. This is a clear violation of the law, a violation of basic morality and respect, and an absolute destruction of the heritage of Jews as well as Christians and Muslims. This constitutes a decade’s worth of regression in the level of enforcement of the antiquities law on the Temple Mount and needs to go viral so that the world can see what the real status quo is on the Temple Mount.

Please share this information and communicate it to the media and government officials. Make this story go viral.

You should read it all.

Background here.

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Review of Kiel, Sexuality in the Babylonian Talmud

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Book Note | Sexuality in the Babylonian Talmud (Noah Bickart).

Yishai Kiel’s new book Sexuality in the Babylonian Talmud analyzes Talmudic texts that deal explicitly with sex in order to situate rabbinic society at the crossroads of a number of late-antique cultures. Through convincing close readings of Jewish material alongside compelling parallels in Greek, Syriac, and Pahlavi texts, Kiel illustrates how Babylonian rabbis used the language of sexuality to negotiate their Iranian context, their Palestinian heritage, and the myriad of concomitant challenges posed by western and eastern Christian thought. This book is highly recommended for scholars and students of rabbinics, early Christianity, and Iranology, especially for those who are interested in the history of sexuality.

[...]

I noted the publication of the book here and an article by the author on the same topic here.

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The Gamla synagogue

ARCHAEOLOGY AND HISTORY: The 2,000-year-old synagogue at Gamla, the oldest yet found in Israel (Ticia Verveer, Times of Israel Blogs).

Archaeological excavations proved that Josephus was very precise in his description, which is remarkable, seldom do literary sources and archaeological data complement each other in such a way. The more than 2,000 basalt ballista stones and 1,600 iron arrowheads that were found are a sorrowful reminder of the aggression off the Romans. Within the settlement a concentration of several dozen ballista stones was discovered. Probably, the defenders gathered the ballista stones that had fallen on the city and hurled them back at the Romans the following day.

The most exciting discovery of the excavation, and the reason why I am here, is a large public building, with benches intended for public gatherings, the amazing remains of an ancient synagogue, the oldest yet found in Israel.

An impressive photo essay by an archaeologist working at the site.

Some past PaleoJudaica posts on the site of Gamla, its archaeology, and its history, are collected here.

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A 1 Samuel LXX manuscript in the Green Collection

AT THE VARIANT READINGS BLOG, Brent Nongbri has been following up indications that the Green Collection includes a fragmentary Greek manuscript of 1 Samuel (possibly containing nine chapters).

The Green Collection 1 Samuel Papyrus and Mummy Cartonnage. Incidentally, per Scott Carroll's quoted comment, this is not "the earliest text of 1 Samuel in the world." Among the Dead Sea Scrolls, 4QSamuel^b (4Q52) is dated by Cross to c. 250 BCE and 4QSamuel^a (4Q51) and 4QSamuel^c (4Q53) to the first century BCE. This Greek papyrus seems to be from the early third century CE (or later? - See the second post below). That is still very early. It may be the earliest surviving papyrus copy or Greek copy or both. I don't know.

1 Samuel and the Green Collection’s “Cartonnage”

There are lots of unanswered questions about this manuscript.

For the Samuel manuscripts from Cave 4 Qumran, see Frank Moore Cross et al., Qumran Cave 4 XII 1-2 Samuel. Discoveries in the Judaean Desert XVII. Oxford, Clarendon, 2005.

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The Russians may excavate Palmyra

PALMYRA WATCH: Russian archaeologists eyeing excavations in Palmyra after restoration of Tadmor. Russian experts have already submitted proposals on restoring the Temple of Baal Shamin, one of the main relics of the place.

KRASNODAR, June 9. /TASS/. Russian archaeologists hope to continue archaeological excavations in ancient Palmyra after rehabilitation of the Syrian city of Tadmor, on the territory of which the historical marvel is located, a leading Russian expert said on Friday.

Dr. Natalya Solovyova, a Deputy Director of the St. Petersburg-based Institute for the History of Material Culture said this on the sidelines of the festival titled ‘Russia’s Antique Heritage’ in the southern city of Krasnodar where she did a public presentation of the 3D model of Palmyrene monuments.

"We hope we’ll manage to do some archaeological excavations there because our Institute made an arrangement on them with the Syrian government in spring 2015, several days before the start of combat actions [in the Palmyra area]," Dr. Solovyova said. "We didn’t sign the documents then, however, because armed fighting began."

[...]

For many other past posts on Palmyra, its history, the ancient Aramaic dialect spoken there (Palmyrene), and the city's tragic reversals of fortune, now trending for the better, start here and follow the links.

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Repatriating Ethiopic manuscripts?

ETHIOPIC WATCH: British Exhibitions of Ethiopian Manuscripts Prompt Questions About Repatriation. Exhibitions at British cultural institutions have lately underscored the artistic output of Ethiopian scribes, and in the process, have also renewed questions around whether museums that have benefitted from acts of imperialism and colonialism should now return looted objects (Sarah E. Bond, Hyperallergic).

A recent display at the British Library, African Scribes: Manuscript Culture of Ethiopia put the institution’s impressive collection of Ethiopic manuscripts on display. Online, the library has also highlighted efforts to digitize these ancient works and make them accessible to the public. Exhibitions at the British Library and other cultural institutions within Britain have worked to underscore the artistic output of Ethiopian scribes and the literature connected to the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church. In the process, these special exhibitions have also renewed questions of provenance and the issue of whether museums that have benefitted from acts of imperialism and colonialism should now return looted objects — even centuries after the fact.

[...]

I don't have a view on the merits of repatriating these particular artifacts, because I don't know enough about the local situation. But my general position is that antiquities and cultural artifacts are the heritage of humanity, not just of the descendants of their culture of origin. They should be kept where they are safest.

I noted a recent article that discusses the importance of the Ethiopic Church for the transmission of the Book of 1 Enoch here. Also, back in 2004-2005, the Ethiopic manuscripts taken (i.e., looted) by Britain after the Battle of Maqdala were in the news. See here, here, and here.

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Korah and the fire-pans

REDACTION CRITICISM: Why the Fire-Pans Were Used to Plate the Altar (Dr. Rabbi David Frankel, TheTorah.com).

After the two hundred and fifty tribal leaders, led by Korah, were burnt, God tells Elazar to use the fire-pans to plate the altar to remind Israel that only priests may offer incense (Num 17:5). But is this the original reason for the plating? A redaction-critical analysis shows that the story once had a different purpose in mind.

Could be.

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More on the supposed lost Jobar Synagogue scrolls

ANOTHER UPDATE: Jewish artifacts disappear from Damascus in fog of Syria war. Jewish artifacts, including ancient parchment torahs from one of the world's oldest synagogues, have gone missing from the Syrian capital amid the tumult of ongoing civil war (AP). That synagogue is, of course, the synagogue of Jobar. Earlier this year I noted reports that ancient artifacts, notably Torah scrolls, had been removed from the Jobar Synagogue during the war. The posts are here and here. Some of the reports claimed the removals were connected with "terrorist groups" and/or Israeli and Turkish intelligence and/or (indirectly) the Syrian Army. None of the reports seemed especially credible, although they could not be disproved either.

Now this AP report weighs in with much more detail from "activist sources." The artifacts were taken by rebels for safe keeping, but some artifacts (notably Torah scrolls written on gazelle hides) have since disappeared. Some of the missing artifacts may have surfaced in Turkey. Some of the missing artifacts, it is claimed, may themselves have been fakes. Again, an Israeli connection is hinted at.

This is a convoluted story that is very short of verification. I emphasize that I take no position on whether any of it is true. But I am keeping an eye on it to see if anything develops from it.

For what it's worth, there have been many reports over the years of artifacts being seized by the authorities in Turkey. Some of these artifacts have turned out to be obvious fakes or relatively recent objects that were not as important as the initial reports claimed. I collected links to these stories in this post last October. There was a report on December of a 700-year-old Torah scroll being seized in Turkey, but this turned out to be bogus.

Perhaps of more interest is a report from April of 2017 that Turkish authorities seized a "gold-plated" Torah scroll written on gazelle skin. This Torah (I think it was the same one) was also reported to be 1,500 years old. I explained my reasons for some skepticism of the stories at the links.

The Jobar scrolls were supposed to be on gazelle skins too and some of them seem to stored in a silver receptacle at some point. But those are very tenuous possible links to the scroll in Turkey.

In short, right now we have a bunch of unverified stories. Maybe some of them are real and, if so, maybe some of the real ones are connected. We'll just have to see if any verification turns up. Watch this space.

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Unsifted dirt disturbed on the Temple Mount

THE TEMPLE MOUNT SIFTING PROJECT BLOG: More Archaeological Destruction on the Temple Mount and Damage to Dirt Mounds that Should be Sifted.

Now, under the auspices of the last days of the month of Ramadan, when the Temple Mount is closed to none-Muslim visitors and the police presence is limited, over than a thousand people carried out excavation work, stone clearance and the creation of terraces in these piles of earth!

This is a clear violation of the High Court’s order and shows – this constitutes decade’s worth of regression in the level of enforcement of the antiquities law on the Temple Mount.

This blog is run by credible archaeologists and I would take the report seriously. It doesn't sound good.

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Index of online books on Classics and ancient Judaism

THE AWOL BLOG: CLASSICSINDEX: Links to Online Books (Google Books, Archive.org, etc.) FOR THE STUDY OF GREEK AND ROMAN CLASSICS, EARLY JUDAISM, AND CHRISTIANITY. There are lots of good things here. Note in particular the section on "JUDAISM [2ND TEMPLE : RABBINIC]."

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Who Wrote the Torah?

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS (REALLY): Who Wrote the Torah? Textual, Historical, Sociological, and Ideological Cornerstones of the Formation of the Pentateuch (Konrad Schmid, Institute for Advanced Study).

Who wrote the Torah? In light of more than two hundred years of scholarship and of the ongoing disputes on that question,[1] the most precise answer to this question still is: We don’t know. The tradition claims it was Moses, but the Torah itself says otherwise. Only small portions within the Torah are traced back to him, but not nearly the whole Torah: Exodus 17:14 (Battle against Amalek); 24:4 (Covenant Code); 34:28 (Ten Commandments); Numbers 33:2 (Wandering Stations); Deuteronomy 31:9 (Deuteronomic Law); and 31:22 (Song of Moses). Despite all disagreement in current scholarship, however, the situation in Pentateuchal research is far from desperate, and there are indeed some basic statements that can be made regarding the formation of the Torah. This is what this contribution is about. It is structured in the following three parts: the textual evidence of the Pentateuch; the socio-historical conditions for the development of the Pentateuch, and “Ideologies” or “Theologies” of the Pentateuch in their historical contexts.

[...]

HT AJR.

This essay is a very good account of the state of the question by a prominent specialist in the area. It moves from first principles to cautious and circumscribed conclusions. Nevertheless, some of it would be disputed by other specialists. It touches here and there on the traditional JEDP sources, mostly in the notes. But its main interests are elsewhere. That's all to the good.

This is the first time I have seen anyone claim that the Ketef Hinnom silver amulets (containing the text of the priestly blessing in Numbers 6:24-26) could be from as late as the second century B.C.E.

For some more thoughts on the origins of the Pentateuch, see here and links, and here, here, and here.

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Hebrew acronyms

PHILOLOGOS: Where Do Hebrew Acronyms Come From? Medieval and modern Hebrew are unusually rich in abbreviations, but in a manner that is the reverse of English (Mosaic Magazine).

Clearly, then, acronyms were first developed by ancient Greek and Latin stenographers and, though known to the rabbis of the Talmud, adopted by Hebrew only in a subsequent age. The fact that they are found in abundance in ancient midrashic texts like Genesis Rabbah, whose composition is contemporaneous with the Talmud’s, does not prove otherwise. ...

Acronyms are one of the banes of working with medieval Hebrew manuscripts. And it scarcely helps when the text of the manuscript is also full of copyist errors. It can be hard to tell whether you're dealing with a corrupt and meaningless word, an obscure technical term, or an acronym.

Incidentally, the best source I have found for deciphering Hebrew acronyms is Dalman's old German dictionary of Rabbinic Hebrew and Aramaic. The full reference is Gustav H. Dalman, Aramäisch-Neuhebräisches Handwörterbuch zu Targum, Talmud und Midrasch. The original publication was in Göttingen in 1938. The reprint edition I have on my bookshelf is by Olms in 1987. At the end it has a 120-page lexicon of abbreviations. You will find pretty much everything there.

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Arabic amulet excavated near Temple Mount

APOTROPAIC ARTIFACT: 1,000 Year Old Clay Amulet with Arabic Blessing Discovered in City of David (JNi.Media).

The tiny amulet constitutes direct testimony of the everyday life in Jerusalem during the early Islamic period. At this time, it is unclear whether it was intentionally placed underneath the flooring during construction or whether the tiny object was carried by a man named Kareem and lost. It seems that it was an amulet whose inscription – praising God, was supposed to bring blessing to its bearer.

This is from a little later that PaleoJudaica's usual period of interest. But it is too cool not to mention.

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Bibliographia Manichaica Selecta

BIBLIOGRAPHIA IRANICA: Bibliographia Manichaica Selecta: Selected Works for Manichaean Studies. Notice of a new book: Šokrī-Fūmešī, Moḥammad. 1397 [2018]. ketābšenāsī-ye moṭāleʿāt-e mānavī: šenāḫt-e możuʿī-ye manabeʿ-o maʾāḫeẕ [Bibliographia Manichaica Selecta. Selected Works for Manichaean Studies]. Teheran: Ṭahūrī.

It looks as though it is in both Persian and English.

Cross-file under Manichean (Manichaean) Watch.

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Report on DSS at 70 conference

PROF. LAWRENCE H. SCHIFFMAN: THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS AT 70. EXCITING NEW DEVELOPMENTS POINT TOWARD FUTURE PROGRESS.

The field of Dead Sea Scrolls is never without important new developments. At the recent conference, “The Dead Sea Scrolls at Seventy: Clear a Path in the Wilderness,” there was exciting news about the ongoing development of technological tools for reading and identifying the remaining small scraps or wads (several layers of fragments stuck together) that did not find their place in the amazing jigsaw puzzle that had to be assembled to decipher the scrolls.

The announcement was made by Pnina Shor, curator of the Dead Sea Scrolls for the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), at a public session conducted in Hebrew at which I had the honor of being a speaker. The conference was organized by the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls of the Hebrew University, the IAA, the Israel Museum, New York University, and the University of Vienna — all major players in scrolls research.

This is the opening of Professor Schiffman's recent article in the Jewish Tribune. Follow the link for a full reprint.

I noted the story of the newly deciphered Dead Sea Scrolls fragments announced at this conference here and here

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More on the Oklahoma bullae exhibition

STILL MORE: Why the world premiere of precious biblical artifacts is in quiet Oklahoma. Through August 19, a select few in the middle of America's vast Bible Belt can see rare First Temple objects -- that most may only ever see online (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel). This is a wide-ranging and informative article. The most interesting part to me was the background on the relationship of Armstrong College with the Mazar family and their archaeological work in Jerusalem. Excerpt:

An unlikely 50-year partnership

Mazar takes the podium at the posh King David Hotel on Sunday evening, addressing a crowd well beyond its walls.

“This is a celebration day for all our friends and especially for the lovers of Israel and the Bible,” she says, before quickly outlining the greatest hits of the 5,000 years of Jerusalem’s history. She touches on a clear record of the name of “Yerushalem” on Egyptian papyrus from 4,000 years ago and King Herod’s renovation and expansion of Solomon’s Temple 2,000 years ago.

And then she turns to another historic event: The decades-old partnership between the Mazar family and this group of Sabbath-observant Christians.

“Exactly 50 years, right after the unification of Jerusalem, in February 1968, Prof. Benjamin Mazar, my grandfather, started archaeological excavations on behalf of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem right at the foot of the walls of that 2,000-year-old Temple Mount compound. At the end of that year, Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong, the founder of the Ambassador Cultural Foundation, became the most significant financial supporter of the excavations,” said Mazar.

And please permit me one niggle:

“We teach the Bible, from Genesis to Revelations,” says [Gerald] Flurry, “and a lot comes from the Hebrew Bible.”

I am absolutely certain that Mr. Flurry said "Revelation," not "Revelations." That is not a mistake he would have made. Amanda, you do great work, but you and your fellow journalists need to make an effort to get this detail right. It matters to many of your readers who share your interests.

For background on the Armstrong College exhibition, as well as on the bullae of Hezekiah and Isaiah, start here and follow the links.

UPDATE (20 June): I see that the error noted above has been corrected. Thanks, Amanda. Much appreciated.

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Bridegroom of blood

THAT'S IN THE BIBLE: The Bible Says What? God tried to kill Moses. Rabbi Aaron Goldstein reflects on a controversial subject in the Torah (Jewish News/Times of Israel). You'd be surprised what's in the Bible.

The reference is to Exodus 4:24-26. No one knows what it means. It's not even clear who is doing what. Did YHWH try to kill Moses or his son? Did Zipporah touch Moses or her son or YHWH with the foreskin? And the big question for what everyone does is: Why?

The interpretation in this essay has the merit of being original.

For more on Zipporah, see here (immediately preceding post).

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Moses' Kushite wife

DR. ELAD FILLER: Moses and the Kushite Woman: Classic Interpretations and Philo’s Allegory (TheTorah.com).

Ancient interpreters debated the identify of Moses’ Kushite wife and the nature of Miriam and Aaron’s complaint. Philo allegorizes her as an eye’s perfect focus, reflecting Moses’ direct perception of God. Reading this together with Philo’s allegorical understanding of Zipporah as a “bird” with direct access to heaven highlights the greatness of Moses’ wife as the fourth matriarch of Israel.

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More on the Hezekiah-Isaiah bullae exhibition

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: On View: Seals of Isaiah and King Hezekiah Discovered. Bible and archaeology news (Robin Ngo). More on the Armstrong College exhibition in Edmond, Oklahoma. More on that here and links

For some archaeological background on the reign of King Hezekiah, see this other recent BHD essay: Hezekiah’s Religious Reform—In the Bible and Archaeology. What was King Hezekiah’s reform like on the ground? (David Rafael Moulis).

Excerpt:

Despite what the Bible says in 2 Kings 23, cultic changes during Hezekiah’s reign were absolute and left nothing to be centralized by King Josiah at the end of the seventh century. Indeed, only one phase of Judahite religious reform is visible in archaeological record, and that one is Hezekiah’s.

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More on formerly "first-century Mark" and related matters

VARIANT READINGS: “First Century” Mark and “Second Century” Romans and “Second Century” Hebrews and “Second Century” 1 Corinthians. Brent Nongbri collects and discusses what we currently know about the background of the early Mark fragment from Oxyrhynchus and also about some other supposedly early New Testament fragments in the Green Collection. Dr. Nongbri links to an ETC post by Elijah Hixton. And James McGrath has a recent roundup post here.

The story is becoming complicated and I can't say I have the details in my head clearly. But the main question at present seems to be, was the Mark fragment ever for sale, and if so, by whom? Dr. Nongbri has another questions about the other fragments:

So, now a question for the people associated with the Green Collection and the Museum of the Bible: Do we have any provenance information on these pieces? They have a similar character to the Oxyrhynchus Mark fragment, and they seem to have become a part of the Green Collection at about the same time as the Oxyrhynchus Mark fragment was alleged to have been for sale. It would be most illuminating if the Green Collection or the Museum of the Bible would provide detailed acquisition information about these pieces.

Background on the Mark fragment is here and links. A post on the announcement about the Romans fragment is here. And a related post on supposedly early New Testament fragments is here.

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Review of the Museum of the Bible

THE LATEST: Museum of the Bible finds big audience in bustling D.C. (The Washington Times). It's bee a while since we've seen a review. Here's a new one.

Thousands of people have come from far and wide — sometimes two by two — to visit the red-brick, ark-shaped building in Southwest.

The Museum of the Bible, on the 400 block of 4th Street SW, has received nearly 603,000 visitors (about 100,000 a month) since its 2-ton, 40-foot-tall bronze doors opened in November.

[...]

I will flag a couple of new details. First, an upcoming exhibition:

Next month, the museum will open new exhibits, including one focuses on women’s roles in artifact collecting.

Women comprise the majority of the museum’s visitors, and the “Noblewomen and the Bible” exhibit will tell the story of women from Germany’s House of Stolberg who amassed a collection of manuscripts and books, many of which were stolen by the Soviets during World War II. Some stolen artifacts have since been recovered.

Second, survey results:

According to post-visit surveys, more than 90 percent of the Museum of the Bible’s visitors have rated their experience as excellent or good, and most would recommend the experience to a friend or family member.

They seem to be pleasing their target audience.

Past PaleoJudaica posts on the Museum of the Bible and the controversies around it are here and links. And past posts on the repatriation of those improperly acquired (by Hobby Lobby, not the Museum of the Bible) looted cuneiform tablets are here and links.

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Review of Chrubasik and King (eds.), Hellenism and the Local Communities of the Eastern Mediterranean

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Boris Chrubasik, Daniel King (ed.), Hellenism and the Local Communities of the Eastern Mediterranean. 400 BCE—250 CE. Oxford; London: Oxford University Press, 2017. Pp. xxii, 232. ISBN 9780198805663. $85.00. Reviewed by Peter Talloen, University of Leuven (peter.talloen@kuleuven.be).

As stated in the introduction by Chrubasik and King, the book focusses on the ways in which the relationship between local communities and Greek culture was negotiated in key areas of the Hellenistic world: Asia Minor, the Levant, Egypt, and Mesopotamia. The center stage is held by the non-Greek communities of those areas who refashioned and reshaped what they deemed to be Greek cultural forms to suit their own needs and interests. By studying different regions with different local interpretations of Greek culture, the volume aims to sketch a more nuanced cultural history of the Eastern Mediterranean. According to the editors, this focus on local interpretations of Greek cultural forms should also raise the question whether the historiographical terms Hellenism and Hellenization to describe these processes are still useful labels for the cultural processes at play in this time period—similar to questions raised about the usefulness of the term ‘Romanization’.5 The volume not only has a broad geographical scope but also a wide chronological one. The editors do not adhere to the traditional chronological boundaries of the Hellenistic period, 323—31 BCE, as they consider the interaction between Greek and non-Greek cultures not restricted to this period. The overview starts in 400 BCE, the beginning of a period of intensification of non-Greek engagement with Greek cultural forms especially in Asia Minor, as demonstrated by several contributions. Similarly, the editors rightly argue that engagement with Greek culture did not cease with the battle of Actium. Yet, why 250 CE was chosen as the end date is not clarified. Surely, Greek cultural influence did not come to an end in the middle of the 3rd century CE.

Ancient Judaism receives plenty of attention in the book. There is also coverage of Palmyra, Dura-Europos, Babylon, Egypt, and Asia Minor.

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Pig bones and archaeology

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: You Are What You Eat: The Israelite Diet and Archaeology. Pig bones as an ethnic marker? (Marek Dospěl). Apparently it's complicated. Welcome to trying to integrate archaeology with texts.

As usual, this essay (itself informative) is a teaser for a BAR article that is behind the subscription wall: Lidar Sapir-Hen, “Pigs as an Ethnic Marker? You Are What You Eat,” November/December 2016.

Cross-file under Osteology.

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Penn Report on the Scribes of the Cairo Geniza Project

AN ARMY OF PALEOGRAPHERS: Reclaiming a fragmented history. Digital humanities scholars are orchestrating an epic crowdsourcing effort to sort and transcribe handwriting on thousands of documents discarded hundreds of years ago, known as the Cairo Geniza (Penn Today).

Known as the Cairo Geniza, the 350,000 fragments of paper and parchment can be anything from the most holy religious manuscripts to the most mundane legal forms, holding endless opportunities to learn about medieval life in the Middle East.

Penn Libraries, which holds about 650 of the fragments, is coordinating with universities and other institutions in the public crowdsourced project, Scribes of the Cairo Geniza.

Progress so far:

The first phase, launched on August 8, 2017, was designed to sort a first batch of digitized fragments as either Hebrew or Arabic, or in some cases both, as well as to determine whether the scripts were written in an informal or formal style. It included more than 30,000 fragments from the Jewish Theological Seminary through the Princeton Geniza Project and the 650-plus from the Penn Libraries collection.

That first phase ended May 19, and the more than 30,000 fragments that were successfully sorted are now the foundation for the second phase.

The second phase, which begins later this month, invites the public to participate in deciphering and transcribing the sorted fragments.

“Luckily for us the research community in first classification were incredible,” Blickhan says. “The results of the first phase are impressive.”

While there is some skepticism in the academic community about the public contributing to such a scholarly pursuit, Allen and Eckstein say that the work by the public so far has exceeded their expectations. The public has consistently agreed whether texts were Arabic or Hebrew, formal or informal.

For past PaleoJudaica posts on the Scribes of the Cairo Geniza Project, see here and links. This is the most detailed report I have seen on it. The combination of crowdsourcing and digitization looks to be very powerful.

For many other past posts on the Cairo Geniza, see here, here, here, and here, and follow the links.

Past "An Army of" posts are here and links, and here, here, and here.

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Review of Capone (ed.), Cristiani, Ebrei e pagani

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Alessandro Capone (ed.), Cristiani, Ebrei e pagani: il dibattito sulla Sacra Scrittura tra III e VI secolo = Christians, Jews and Heathens: The Debate on the Holy Scripture between the Third and Sixth Century. Judaïsme ancien et origines du christianisme, 12​. Turnhout: Brepols, 2017. Pp. 276. ISBN 9782503575568. €90,00 (pb). Reviewed by Geert Lernout, University of Antwerp (geert.lernout@uantwerpen.be).

Like so many volumes these days, this book is one of the outputs of a large collaborative project, this time on pagan-Jewish-Christian polemics and homiletics in the Latin fourth to sixth centuries.1 The topic is timely in the context of the renewed interest in Late Antiquity in general and in pagan-Christian polemics in particular.

[...]

For some past PaleoJudaica post on Porphyry, see here and links.

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Syriac workshop at Frankfurt

SYRIAC WATCH: Workshop: Textual Criticism and Scholarly Editing of Syriac Sources (James McGrath, Religion Prof Blog).

The Forschungsstelle für Aramäische Studien at Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main and its director, Prof. Dr Dorothea Weltecke, are glad to announce the upcoming seminar “Textual Criticism and Scholarly Editing of Syriac Sources: Ongoing Projects, Current Issues and Methods in Practice”, an international workshop on ecdotical methods and approaches in textual criticism of Syriac and Garshuni texts organized by Dr Simone Isacco Maria Pratelli and funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.

[...]

The workshop takes place on 8-9 July 2018. Follow the link for further particulars.

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13th Mainz Colloquium on ancient Hebrew

AIA ANNOUNCEMENT: MICAH 13th Mainz International Colloquium on Ancient Hebrew (& Cognate Languages).

Friday, November 2, 2018 to Sunday, November 4, 2018
Location:

Germany

Website:
https://www.micah.hebraistik.uni-mainz.de/micah2018/

"The 13th Mainz International Colloquium on Ancient Hebrew (MICAH) 2018 will meet November 2–4. (Friday-Sunday) at Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, Germany.

As always, topics of the MICAH meeting cover grammar and linguistics of Ancient and Classical Hebrew (Epigraphic and Biblical Hebrew, Qumran and related Hebrew, and Ben Sira) as well as studies of older or contemporary adjacent Semitic languages and epigraphy, as for instance Ugaritic, Phoenician-Punic, Old and Imperial Aramaic and Early Syriac, or Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite and the like in phonetics, lexic, morphology and syntax. Topics on non-Semitic but contact languages (e.g. Philistine, Luwian) and general linguistics in connection with these languages will also considered welcome.

[...]

For some reason this only just came up in my search regime. The call for papers came to an end on 31 May, but it should still be possible to attend without a presentation. Follow the links for details.

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More on the Tiberias cave-tomb

ARCHAEOLOGY: Builders Accidentally Discover Roman-era Catacomb of Rich Jewish Family in Northern Israel. The names on the ossuaries found in the 2000-year-old Tiberian catacomb are in Greek but all that proves is that the Jews in Galilee were multicultural, archaeologists say (Ruth Schuster, Haaretz). I noted this story yesterday, but this article has new information.

First, the burials were in ossuaries, which points to it being a Jewish tomb.

Second is the matter of the names on the ossuaries:

More information will have to await proper excavation, which has not begun yet, Alexandre stresses. But meanwhile it can be said that the archaeologists also found the names of the dead, carved onto the ossuaries in Greek.

The multicultural Jews of Tiberias

Jewish names in Greek on graves in the Holy Land? Absolutely. It was very much the practice. Half the graves in ancient Jerusalem from the same era are also inscribed in Greek, Aviam says. Other inscriptions found in Tiberias itself, linked to Jews from the 3rd century, were in Greek too.

“It just means that the people buried in the cave had been people who knew Greek. It doesn’t speak to their Judaism but to their internationality, their multiculturalism,” Aviam explains. “They would have had cultural ties with Greek-speaking people. Jews could keep their mitzvot and write on their graves in Greek.”

Third is this anomaly:

But if the Jewish burial cave in Tiberias dates to the 1st or even the early 2nd century, there’s a snag. At least according to the Jewish-Roman historian Josephus, Tiberias wasn’t supposed to have Jews yet.

See the article for discussion.

Background here.

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The Talmud visualizing the Temple

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Mapping the Temple. Daf Yomi: Talmudic rabbis, as distant from the original animal sacrifices as we are from the Civil War, try to piece together a layout that matches the Torah.

So it is strange to reflect that, by the time the Mishna was compiled around the year 200 C.E., no living person had witnessed a Temple sacrifice. Yehuda HaNasi was roughly as distant from the destruction of the Temple as we are from the American Civil War; and the amoraim, the rabbis of the Gemara, lived hundreds of years later. They were all trying to mentally reconstruct a series of long-vanished rituals that they knew about only from the Torah and from some scraps of oral tradition. Crucially, they had no diagrams, which would have helped enormously in figuring out the exact dimensions and placement of the altar, the courtyard, and the other parts of the Temple complex.

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

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The Hebrew University Bible Project

THE AWOL BLOG: Hebrew University Bible Project (HUBP) מפעל המקרא Publications Online. I have mentioned this project and its journal, Textus, from time to time. This AWOL post gives a good, comprehensive collection of links.

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

Syriac Menander

READING ACTS: The Sentences of the Syriac Menander. 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.

Byzantine-era winepresses excavated at Sepphoris

ARCHAEOLOGY: Unique Byzantine-era winepresses unearthed in roofed water cistern in Tzippori. The only examples of their kind discovered to date, they are a testament to a flourishing wine trade in the interfaith city (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel).

Tzippori was home to a flourishing mixed pagan, Christian and Jewish community during the 4th-7th centuries CE. In the third century CE, it was the seat of Rabbi Yehuda Hanasi, aka Judah the Prince, where he began compiling the Mishnah. There is no iconography on the wine presses and, according to National Parks Authority archaeologist Dr. Zvika Tzuk, in such a heterogeneous society, it would be impossible to know who made the wine at these two presses.

However, he told The Times of Israel, based on an obscure Jewish law practiced during the Shmita year (every seventh year in the agricultural calendar when the fields are meant to “rest”), the size of the smaller wine press could be an indication that it was used by Jews of the era.

On his e-mail list, Joseph Lauer has asked for more information about this "obscure Jewish law." I don't know the answer, but if you can help, please drop me a note.

For past PaleoJudaica posts about discoveries at the site of Tzipori/Tzippori/Zippori/Sepphoris, see here and links (cf. here and here).

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Ancient cave-tomb found at Tiberias

ARCHAEOLOGY: Ancient Burial Complex Exposed in Works on New Tiberias Neighborhood (JNi.Media).

The rock-hewn cave comprised an entrance hall decorated with colored plaster, a central room with several burial niches, decorated ceramic and stone ossuaries (burial chambers), and a small inner chamber. Carved stone doors stood at the entrances into the rooms. In one of the chambers, Greek inscriptions were engraved with the names of the interred. These inscriptions will be studied by specialists.

The cave was probably robbed in antiquity.

There are some good photos at the link.

Herod Antipas unintentionally built Tiberias over a Jewish cemetery, so the city is well known (or infamous) for its ancient burials. Past posts on Tiberias and its cemetery are here and links.

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More on Pseudo-Phocylides

READING ACTS: Pseudo-Phocylides on Hard Work. 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. And there is more on Pseudo-Phocylides at that link.

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

Bullae of Hezekiah and Isaiah exhibited at Armstrong College

NOW RUNNING: Come Meet Isaiah and King Hezekiah! Archaeological evidence of these two biblical giants is coming to Armstrong Auditorium (Brad MacDonald, The Trumpet).

Beginning Sunday, June 10, the Armstrong International Cultural Foundation (the humanitarian arm of the organization that publishes the Trumpet magazine) will host a three-month archaeological exhibit in the lobby of Armstrong Auditorium. We have titled the exhibit “Seals of Isaiah and King Hezekiah Discovered,” after the stars of the show: two clay seal impressions (bullae) of King Hezekiah and Isaiah.

[...]

While the stars of the show are the seals of King Hezekiah and Isaiah, the supporting cast is also exciting. Among the artifacts on loan from the Israel Antiquity Authority are iron arrowheads used in the Assyrian siege of Lachish, silver bullion, and royal Judean clay vessels. Featured Assyrian history will include replicas of the wall reliefs of Lachish, the Azekah inscription, and the famous Annals of Sennacherib Prism (aka Taylor Prism).

[...]

The Isaiah of the seal may or may not be the biblical prophet. The exhibition has an openly-expressed agenda, which you can take or leave as you please. Armstrong College has a close relationship with Israeli archaeologist Eilat Mazar and her Ophel excavation in Jerusalem. The exhibition includes many interesting artifacts and sounds worth seeing.

Background here and links. Armstrong College had another exhibition of biblical-era inscribed bullae (seal impressions) in 2011.

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

The Mishnah on heresy

DR. DAVID M. GROSSBERG: Is there a Doctrine of Heresy in Rabbinic Literature? (TheGemara.com).

M. Sanhedrin 10:1 is considered to be the most important statement of rabbinic heresiology in tannaitic literature. However, a close examination of this text’s development suggests that it is not a straightforward expression of c. 200 C.E. rabbinic doctrine at all, but a reworked tradition from an earlier sectarian milieu.

Last year I noted Dr. Grossberg's new book, Heresy and the Formation of the Rabbinic Community (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017) here.

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More on MEIS in Ferrara, Italy

STILL A WORK IN PROGRESS: A former prison for Jews unlocks their ancient Italian history (Vicky Hallett, Washington Post rprt.).

So there's no denying that Jews have been in Italy for a very, very long time. It's the most ancient community of Jews in the Western world, one that has withstood centuries of sorrow and tsoris while producing some of the nation's most important thinkers and writers.

And it's a topic that's the center of attention at the National Museum of Italian Judaism and the Shoah. (In Italian, that's Museo Nazionale dell'Ebraismo Italiano e della Shoah, or MEIS for short.)

To explain the mission of MEIS, director Simonetta Della Seta poses a question: How is this museum different from all other Jewish museums?

I noted the opening of MEIS last December here. This article provides a lot more information about it.

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

A tiny statue of a biblical king?

FIGURINE: A Face from the Bible May Appear in This Tiny Sculpture (Owen Jarus, Live Science). Maybe. At any rate, he was somebody important.

Given the long stretch of time during which the sculpture could have been created and the fact that control of Abel Beth Maacah changed throughout this period, the sculpture could depict numerous kings, [Professor Robert] Mullins [of Azuza Pacific University] said. Three possibilities are King Ahab of Israel, King Hazael of Aram-Damascus and King Ethbaal of Tyre, but there are many other candidates, he said.

The fragment is currently on display in the Israel Museum.

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How Tyrian purple was made

PHOENICIAN WATCH: This is how the Phoenicians produced the Tyrian purple dye (Grace H., The 961). With video.

Murex shell dye was used by the Phoenicians, and also by the Israelites for the tekhelet dye.

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BHD on Papyrus Amherst 63

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Israelite Psalms in an Egyptian Papyrus? Papyrus Amherst 63 up close (Karel van der Toorn). As usual, this is a teaser for a BAR article behind the subscription wall: Karel van der Toorn, “Egyptian Papyrus Sheds New Light on Jewish History.” But it does include full translations of the three Israelite psalms.

Professor van der Toorn has recently published an edition of Papyrus Amherst 63.

Past PaleoJudaica posts on this remarkable manuscript, which contains Aramaic documents written in the late-Egyptian Demotic script, are here and links

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

Hebron in the Bible and archaeology

PROF. DAVID BEN SHLOMO: The Ancient City of Hebron (TheTorah.com).

Hebron plays a central role in many biblical stories. It was the prominent city in the Judean highlands, with large fortifications in the Early Bronze, Middle Bronze, and Iron Ages. During the Second Temple period, Hebron was occupied by the Idumeans. Recent archaeological excavations have uncovered large mikvaot (ritual baths), indicating that the inhabitants embraced Judaism.

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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.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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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