A Yazidi woman won the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize

YAZIDI WATCH: Nobel peace prize goes to campaigners against sexual violence. Gynaecologist Denis Mukwege and Yazidi campaigner Nadia Murad are jointly awarded (Jason Burke, The Guardian, 5 October 2018).

Murad said: “I share this award with all Yazidis, with all the Iraqis, Kurds and all the minorities and all survivors of sexual violence around the world.

As a survivor, I am grateful for this opportunity to draw international attention to the plight of the Yazidi people who have suffered unimaginable crimes since the genocide by Daesh (Isis).”

I am very surprised that this story didn't show up in my search feeds earlier, but better late than never. PaleoJudaica has been following the Yazidis — an Iraqi minority group that has a Gnosticism-themed religion with ancient roots — before, throughout, and after their brutal persecution by ISIS in 2014. I mentioned Nadia Murad and her lawyer, Amal Clooney, in 2016.

Belated congratulations to Ms. Murad (and to Dr. Mukwege) and to the Yazidi community.

For other posts on the Yazidis, start here and follow the links.

A recent article on them in the Jerusalem Post is here: THE PLIGHT OF THE YAZIDIS. Many Yazidis feel that the world has abandoned them to suffer alone (ANTHONY AVICE DU BUISSON).

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Festival of Ingathering: coming or going?

HARVEY N. BOCK: Is the Autumn Ingathering Festival at the Beginning, Middle, or End of the Year? (TheTorah.com).

The Feast of Ingathering is “at the tzet (צֵאת) of the year” (Exod 23:16). This phrase is generally translated as “the end of the year,” but a closer look at the meaning of the Hebrew verb in biblical Hebrew suggests it may mean the beginning.

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Review of the British Museum's Ashurbanipal exhibition

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: I Am Ashurbanipal at the British Museum. Exhibit: I Am Ashurbanipal, King of the World, King of Assyria (Cathleen Chopra-McGowan).

I Am Ashurbanipal, featured at the British Museum in London through February 24, 2019, is a magnificent exhibition. The display’s namesake would be proud.

[...]

Some past posts involving Ashurbanipal are here, here, and here.

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Exodus 22 and liability for watching other people's property

PROF. RABBI MARTIN LOCKSHIN: Does the Torah Differentiate between an Unpaid and a Paid Bailee? (TheTorah.com).

For the first nine hundred years after the writing of the Mishnah in the early third century, Jews thought that laws about bailees or custodians (שומרים) in the Mishnah and in the Talmud corresponded closely to the plain meaning (peshat) of the Torah. But in the Middle Ages, Rashbam challenged that assumption, proposing an understanding of the Torah that contradicted Jewish law.

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Jewish and Christian Books in the First Millennium at Notre Dame

THE ETC BLOG: Jewish and Christian Books in the First Millennium in Indiana (Peter Gurry).

David Lincicum, Hildegund Müller, and Jeremiah Coogan are running a working group at Notre Dame on Jewish and Christian Books. Jeremiah tells me the group is open to all comers and that if you RSVP soon enough, you may even get free lunch! What’s not to love? (Except the polar vortex sweeping Indy right now.) Here’s the info: ...

Follow the link.

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The Gospel of Thomas Resource Center

THE AWOL BLOG: The Gospel of Thomas Resource Center. A useful site by Michael W. Grondin. Cross-file under New Testament Apocrypha Watch.

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Common Bibles in the Cairo Geniza

GENIZA FRAGMENT OF THE MONTH (JANUARY 2019): The Uncommon Bible: T-S AS 44.35 (Ben Outhwaite).

It is unlikely that these Common Bibles preserve variant readings of great value to the recovery of pre-masoretic biblical traditions. Israel Yeivin, in his Introduction to the Tiberian Masorah (1980, as translated by the E. J. Revell) suggests ‘most are fragments of “vulgar” texts, some with Masorah, without accents, with many extra vowel letters, and so on…’ (Yeivin 1980, 30–31). But this does not diminish their value as cultural artefacts: they form a large body of evidence for ordinary Jewish engagement with the text of the Hebrew Bible in the Middle Ages.

Past posts noting Cairo Geniza Fragments of the Month in the Cambridge University Library's Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit are here and links. There was no fragment of the month for December 2018.

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Kim, The Firstborn Son in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity

NEW BOOK FROM BRILL:

The Firstborn Son in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity

A Study of Primogeniture and Christology

Series:
Biblical Interpretation Series, Volume: 171

Author: Kyu Seop Kim

Despite scholars’ ongoing historical and sociological investigations into the ancient family, the right and the status of the firstborn son have been rarely explored by NT scholars, and this topic has not attracted the careful attention that it deserves. This work offers a study of the meaning of the firstborn son in the New Testament paying specific attention to the concept of primogeniture in the Old Testament and Jewish literature. This study argues that primogeniture was a unique institution in Jewish society, and that the title of the firstborn son indicates his access to the promise of Israel, and is associated with the right of the inheritance (i.e., primogeniture) including the Land and the special status of Israel.

Publication Date: 28 January 2019
ISBN: 978-90-04-39494-0

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CFP: EABS 2019 LXX

WILLIAM ROSS: EABS 2019 CALL FOR PAPERS: SEPTUAGINT RESEARCH UNITS. The deadline for paper proposals is 28 February. There are a couple of units that deal with the Septuagint. Follow the link for details.

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Bulletin of the Asia Institute 28

BIBLIOGRAPHIA IRANICA: Bulletin of the Asia Institute. The current volume has a couple of articles of interest for ancient Judaism. Alas, it is not online as far as I know.

Shai Secunda, “‘Lost Property to the King!’: The Talmudic Laws of Lost Property in the Shadow of Sasanian Bureaucracy”

Siam Bhayro, “A Jewish Aramaic Magic Bowl Containing the Formula of Ḥanina ben Dosa, and the Problem of Psalm 24:8b in the Magic Bowls”

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A record page-view month for PaleoJudaica

IN JANUARY 2019, PaleoJudaica received 128,921 page-views, an all-time record. The previous record was 127,155 views in December 2016.

Many thanks to all my readers for your faithful support!

Please do keep coming back to PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world. And keep bringing your friends!

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

The Seleucid coins, Part 1

NUMISMATICS: CoinWeek Ancient Coin Series – The Seleucids and Their Coins: Part I (Mike Markowitz). Some of the Seleucids in this article are mentioned in the Book of Daniel, although not by name. Seleucid figures are in bold font in what follows.

Daniel 11:5 refers to the "king of the south" (Ptolemy I), one of whose officers would rule a realm greater than his. That officer is Seleucus I.

Daniel 11:6 recounts the episode in which Antiochus II ("the king of the north") married the daughter of Ptolemy II ("the daughter of the king of the south") Berenice/Berenike. But he later when back to his ex-wife Laodice/Laodike I, who then had him, Berenice, and their son assassinated. More on that sad story here.

Daniel 11:7-8 continues the story. Berenice's brother , Ptolemy III (the "branch from her roots") invaded the realm of Antiochus's successor, Seleucus II ("the king of the north," son of Laodice), captured the fortress of Seleucia, and killed Laodice, but he did not conquer the territory.

That takes us to the end of this article. For the first article in an earlier series by the same author about the coinage of the Ptolemaic dynasty, see here and links. It covers some of the same history as this article. And for more on Seleucid coinage, the Seleucid dynasty, and the latter's importance for biblical studies, see here and links.

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Review of D'Andrea, Bambini nel "limbo"

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Bruno D'Andrea, Bambini nel "limbo": dati e proposte interpretive sui tofet fenici e punici. Collection de l'École française de Rome, 552. Rome: École Française de Rome, 2018. Pp. xiv, 170; 31 p. of plates. ISBN 9782728313365. €27,00 (pb). Reviewed by Matthew M. McCarty, University of British Columbia (matthew.mccarty@ubc.ca).

If you are interested in the debated over whether (or perhaps to what degree) tophets at Carthage and elsewhere involved child sacrifice, read this review (which is in English) of a recent book on the subject.

For past posts on the question, see here and links. Cross-file under Punic Watch

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Another (p)review of "The Golem"

CINEMA: 'The Golem': Film Review (John DeFore, The Hollywood Reporter).

THE BOTTOM LINE
More serious-minded than it looks.

A Lithuanian woman creates a golem to defend her village in Doron and Yoav Paz's take on ancient Jewish lore.

It opens today.

I noted the movie as upcoming here. For many earlier posts on past and present manifestations of the Golem legend, start there and follow the links.

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Agrippa and the Apostles

NUMISMATICS SUPPLEMENT: Israeli Schoolkid Finds Ancient Coin from the King Who Jailed Peter and Killed James (Emily Jones, CBN News). I have already noted the report of the recent find of a coin of Herod Agrippa I here. But this article notes a New Testament connection that I don't recall seeing mentioned elsewhere:

Herod Agrippa is the King Herod named in Acts 12. According to Acts, King Agrippa persecuted the church in Jerusalem. He imprisoned Peter and had James killed.

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Kirsch on the Alter Bible

BOOK REVIEW: The Alter Bible. In a landmark new translation, Robert Alter revives the literary power of a Hebrew masterpiece (Adam Kirsch, Tablet Magazine).

... The classic Bible translations—Jerome’s, Luther’s, the King James, the Septuagint—were so influential for so long that, for most readers, they effectively replaced the original Hebrew, becoming sacred texts in their own right. Indeed, many readers of these versions probably didn’t know that the original was written in Hebrew at all. Alter’s Bible doesn’t seek that kind of canonical status; it is not out to replace the Hebrew Bible, but to engage in a dialogue with it. This is the most important way in which Alter’s Bible takes literature, and the reader, seriously—by inviting us into the translation process, acknowledging that every word involves choice and compromise.

This long review gives many examples of how Alter has rethought the whole process of biblical translation. Well worth reading.

Background here and links.

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"Governor" or "military commander?"

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Understanding an Ancient Israelite Military Title. “Governor of the city” or “commander of the fortress”?

A handful of ancient Israelite inscriptions feature an enigmatic title that has been variously translated as “governor of the city” and “commander of the fortress.” Who was this figure? In the article “Commander of the Fortress? Understanding an Ancient Israelite Military Title” by William M. Schniedewind, featured in the January/February 2019 issue of BAR, discover this figure’s importance and place in ancient Israelite and Judahite society.

[...]

As usual, the full BAR article is behind the subscription wall. But this BHD essay gives you the basic argument.

For the "City Governor" (?) bulla found recently in Jerusalem, see here, here, and here.

Because it is mentioned in the above essay and article, BHD also republishes an old (2012) essay on the site of Kuntillet ‘Ajrud: Puzzling Finds from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud. A drawing of God labeled “Yahweh and his Asherah” or the Egyptian god Bes?. It was also republished last June. See the latter post for past PaleoJudaica posts on Kuntillet ‘Ajrud. For the final report on that site which the essay mentions, see here.

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More on the Green Collection manuscripts

AT THE VARIANT READINGS BLOG, Brent Nongbri continues to parse out Scott Carroll's videos (etc.) to try to infer new information about the manuscripts in the Green Collection.

Sources and Destinations of Scott Carroll’s Papyri? Some tantalizing new details with lots of mysteries.

The Green Collection Mummy Masks: A Possible Source. Oxford University? Really? Anything is possible, but I would like to see some decisive verification.

Background here and links.

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Kellens, "Becoming Zarathustra"

BIBLIOGRAPHIA IRANICA: Becoming Zarathustra. Notice of a new article: Kellens, Jean. 2018. Becoming Zarathustra. In Hugh B. Urban & Greg Johnson (eds.), Irreverence and the sacred: Critical studies in the history of religions, 185–193. New York: Oxford University Press.

The article is available online. I can see it through my university account, but it looks like its behind the Oxford paywall.

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Patel on magical practices and discourses

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Dissertation Spotlight | Magical Practices and Discourses of Magic in Early Christian Traditions: Jesus, Peter, and Paul ( Shaily Patel).

When considering the term ‘magic’ and its cognates in such a vast corpus of evidence, both literary and “practical” it appears that no strict rule obtains for understanding magic and magicians. What one can say, however, is that there were individuals who considered themselves magicians and who did not necessarily believe their magic to be some evil obverse of proper Roman practice. This datum escapes purely polemical analyses of ancient magic which prioritize literary evidence. This is the inconvenient fact that must be considered or if we wish to grasp more fully how magic worked in the era of formative Christianity.

This is an important point.

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Dura Europos at Yale

YALE NEWS: Across disciplines, Yale forges rich ties to Middle East (Mike Cummings). Most of this article deals with modern matters that are not of direct interest to PaleoJudaica. But then there's this:

Two recent projects are improving access to Yale’s extensive and diverse collections of Islamic and Middle Eastern art, artifacts, books, and manuscripts. “Dura-Europos, Syria: Loss and Recovery from Antiquity to Modernity” is a digital project that draws on Yale’s collection of artifacts from the ancient city of Dura-Europos to allow people to explore an important archeological and cultural site made inaccessible by conflict. The project is a partnership between the council, faculty in the Departments of History of Art and Computer Science, and curators and conservators at the Yale University Art Gallery and the Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage at Yale’s West Campus.

“We’ve been thinking about ways we can intervene in Syria,” Rizvi said. “We don’t have a field site there but we have this incredible collection from Dura-Europos that is evidence of the site’s rich history as multi-cultural crossroads where temples existed alongside churches and synagogues. The project [shares] this amazing resource with the public and [makes] it available for research and teaching.”

I also noted Yale's Dura Europos collection nearly a decaded ago. But now they have this website. For other posts on Dura Europos, start here and follow the many links.

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Top ten archaeological discoveries relating to Hebrew Bible?

THE BIBLE ARCHAEOLOGY REPORT BLOG: Top Ten Discoveries in Biblical Archaeology Relating to the Old Testament (Bryan Windle). Overall this is a pretty good list, although I do not endorse some of the interpretations put on the finds. For example, it is a big stretch to use the Merneptah Stele as evidence for a fifteenth century B.C.E. Exodus. If there was an Exodus at all, archaeological evidence for it happening in the fifteenth century is sorely lacking. And not because no one has looked.

I also am surprised not to find any reference to the excavation of Ugarit in Syria and the recovery of the alphabetic cuneiform Ugaritic language and literature. Perhaps Ugaritic is excluded because it is not "directly related to biblical people (or people groups), places, or events" (his emphasis; although perhaps we need to have a conversation about Canaanites) nor "related to the composition of the Bible itself," at least for some values of that phrase. But any list of top archaeological discoveries relating to the Hebrew Bible that does not include Ugaritic is incomplete and the criteria for the list need to be rethought.

Ugaritic has given us an enormous amount of information about the history of ancient Hebrew and related languages and about the mythology and epic traditions that lie behind many stories in the Bible. In this context I would list it as second in importance only to the Dead Sea Scrolls.

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Unpacking the Magdala Stone

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: The Magdala Stone: The Jerusalem Temple Embodied. Carved stone block depicts symbols of the Jerusalem Temple (Jennifer Ristine).

The so-called Magdala Stone is a stone block carved with symbols of the Temple in Jerusalem, with the core of the Temple represented (the Hall, Sanctuary and the Holy of Holies). The stone measure 1.8 by 2 feet with a height of 1 foot. Found almost in the center of the synagogue, the Magdala Stone is believed to be a piece of ceremonial furniture on which the Torah and other sacred scrolls were placed. But is it simply a bimah (a traditional holder for the scrolls), or does it have some deeper significance?

For many past posts on the Magdala stone and the ancient city of Magdala, start here and follow the links.

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New Mosul archbishop was one of the Manuscripts Men

RECOGNITION: Iraq priest who saved Christian heritage ordained Mosul archbishop (AP). That priest is Father Najeeb Michaeel. For the story of his rescue of precious Syriac, Arabic, and other manuscripts from Isis in 2014, see here, here, here, and here.

Congratulations to Father Michaeel. Cross-file under Syriac Watch.

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Armenian Week at the BL

THIS IS ARMENIAN WEEK AT THE BRITISH LIBRARY'S HERITAGE MADE DIGITAL FEED. Go and have a look.

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More on that bearded figurine

THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST TODAY: The Bearded Figure Who Might be King (Naama Yahalom-Mack).

Figurines are not uncommon in the Southern Levant, but few can be plausibly suggested to be of kings. But Tel Abel Beth Maacah, a 35-acre site in northernmost Israel that was settled throughout the Bronze and Iron Ages, may have produced just such an image.

Could be. But it sounds as though iconography specialists aren't even sure what culture it comes from.

The ANE Today site also has a recent report on the Tel Abel Beth Maacah excavation, where the object was found.

Past posts on the figurine are here and here.

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24 centuries of Alexandria

THE AWOL BLOG: Hellenistic Alexandria: Celebrating 24 Centuries. This looks like an important (print and open access) publication. The TOC has a lot of interesting titles. But it is disappointing that none of them have anything to do with Alexandrian Judaism. That is quite a significant gap in coverage.

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Coin of Herod Agrippa I found by student

NUMISMATICS: Student Discovers Rare 2000-Year Old Coin near Shiloh (David Israel).

An ancient and rare coin from the time of King Agrippa I and the last days of the Second Temple was discovered by a student at Nachal Shiloh (Shiloh stream) in Samaria.

The student was on a school trip at Nachal Shiloh last week, when he found the ancient coin in the eastern part of the stream. The student approached the group’s tour guide, who in turn contacted the IDF’s Archeology unit at the Civil Administration, which dispatched an inspector to the site.

[...]

Well done!

Past posts on or involving Herod Agrippa I are here and links, here, here, and here.

UPDATE: I have deleted one of the background links, which actually refers to Agrippa II. Please pardon the error.

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Raiders of the lost Shivta finds

EXHIBITION: Remnants of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Shivta Were Long Believed Lost in a Fire. Then a Letter Surfaced. Objects from the Negev archaeology site, found through a 1938 letter from a customs clerk, are now on display at Haifa’s Hecht Museum (Nir Hasson, Haaretz premium).

Harris Dunscombe Colt sounds like a feckless archaeologist, even for the early twentieth century. If Indy had found out that Mr. Colt was selling artifacts from Shivta on the antiquities market, he would have grabbed him by the necktie and said, "They belong in a museum."

Fortunately Mr. Colt's fecklessness extended to forgetting a crate of precious small finds from Shivta on a dock at the Haifa Port. This article tells the story of how two intrepid archaeologists tracked them down last year, and so the finds ended up in this exhibition.

I have already mentioned the Shivta exhibition at the Hecht Museum here, but this article tells much more about its background. Follow the links for recent posts on the Shivta excavation and the many important discoveries there.

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2019 Gorgias Book Grant

H-JUDAIC HAS DETAILS: 2019 Gorgias Book Grant. Win $500 of Gorgias Press titles through the 2019 Gorgias Book Grant. For you, special deal! Maybe. If you are a postgraduate student working in a relevant area, it sounds worthwhile to apply.

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Doedens, The Sons of God in Genesis 6:1–4

FORTHCOMING BOOK FROM BRILL:

The Sons of God in Genesis 6:1–4

Analysis and History of Exegesis

Series:
Oudtestamentische Studiën, Old Testament Studies, Volume: 76

Author: J.J.T. Doedens

In The Sons of God in Genesis 6:1–4, Jaap Doedens offers an overview of the history of exegesis of the enigmatic text about the ‘sons of God’, the ‘daughters of men’, and the ‘giants’. First, he analyzes the text of Gen 6:1–4. Subsequently, he tracks the different exegetical proposals from the earliest exegesis until those of modern times. He further provides the reader with an evaluation of the meaning of the expression ‘sons of God’ in the Old Testament and the Ancient Near East. In the last chapter, he concentrates on the message and function of Gen 6:1–4. This volume comprehensively gathers ancient and modern exegetical attempts, providing the means for an ongoing dialogue about this essentially complex and elusive passage.

Publication Date: 25 April 2019
ISBN: 978-90-04-39590-9

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More on the latest Dead Sea caves expedition

OPERATION SCROLL: In the Qumran cliffs, an expedition digs up new Dead Sea Scroll caves. Winter excavation yields information on how an ascetic desert community lived and where it hid its precious sacred texts — and gives pointers for where to search next (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel). All that to say in a roundabout way that they didn't find any scrolls. So far.

Nevertheless:

A Bedouin huntsman and his dog, climbing on rocky mountainous cliffs above the Dead Sea, spotted a likely prey. The dog chased it into the mouth of a cave where inside, the Bedouin discovered jars containing scrolls with writing upon them. The find was reported to Jews living in Jerusalem, who mounted an expedition into the Judean Desert to retrieve them. They discovered many scrolls written in Hebrew script, including books of the Bible.

The year was 790 CE.

The events, recorded in a letter written by the East Syriac patriarch Timothy I in 800 CE, eerily anticipate the famous 1946 (re)discovery at Qumran of the trove of ancient sacred texts we now know as the Dead Sea Scrolls.

[...]

It is possible that Cave 52 is Timothy's cave. But if so, the monks cleared out all the scrolls more than 1200 years ago.

The article also has more information on Cave 53 and a couple of videos.

Background here and links. And for more on Timothy's letter and its story, see here.

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Again, on the Tomb of the Kings

THEOLOGICAL POLITICS: Diplomatic and religious issues complicate reopening of ancient Jerusalem tomb. A tour of the French-owned, Roman-era Tomb of the Kings in East Jerusalem, which has been closed since 2010 for renovations (Mike Smith, AP via Times of Israel). This story was also covered last month in a Haaretz premium article. But the current article is freely accessible.

Background on Queen Helena of Adiabene is here and links. And for past posts on Herod the Great, see here and links.

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Congratulations to the Septuaginta drawing winners

WILLIAM ROSS: ANNOUNCING THE WINNERS OF OUR GIVEAWAY. Since I posted on the drawing, I should let you know who won.

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Conflict over the Pilgrim's Road Project in Jerusalem

ARCHAEOLOGICAL POLITICS: Israel unearths a sacred Roman-era road in East Jerusalem, unsettling a Palestinian neighborhood (Ruth Eglash and Loveday Morris, Washington Post). Another controversy between Elad and Emek Shaveh. For more on both, see here and links.

A recent post on the Pilgrim's Road Project is here.

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What are the seraphim and their kin?

DR. RICHARD LEDERMAN: The Seraphim (TheTorah.com).

The image of YHWH accompanied by a heavenly retinue (צבאות) is ubiquitous in the Prophets and the Writings. Uniquely, in Isaiah’s call narrative, YHWH appears before the prophet accompanied by six-winged seraphim. What are these heavenly beings?

This essay is much broader than the title and abstract imply. It also deals with what I like to call the "throne vision oracles" in the Hebrew Bible by the prophets Isaiah, Micaiah, and Ezekiel (but Daniel 7 is missing). It covers not just seraphim, but also the title YHWH of Hosts, the four living creatures (chayot, hayyot), and the cherubim. And some related matters.

I noted Dr. Lederman's 2017 essay on the the flying serpent here. The forthcoming essay hinted at there seems to be this new one.

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Review essay on How Old is the Hebrew Bible?

THE BIBLE AND INTERPRETATION:

Can the Ages of Biblical Literature be Discerned Without Literary Analysis?

Review-Essay of Ronald Hendel and Jan Joosten.
How Old is the Hebrew Bible? A Linguistic, Textual, and Historical Study. (The Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library; New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 2018; xvi + 221).

Hendel and Joosten’s book is chock-full of insightful observations on a multitude of linguistic, textual, and cultural/historical phenomena, and they argue cogently that the best method for dating biblical writings should include all three of these data sources. Nonetheless, their answer to the question, "How Old is the Hebrew Bible?," is unoriginal because they do little more than offer a sophisticated repackaging of the traditional linguistic dating approach and results, and it is also unsatisfactory because they eschew literary criticism in the formulation of their model of consilience for determining the ages of biblical literature.

Ian Young
Associate Professor
Department of Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish Studies
University of Sydney

Robert Rezetko
Research Associate
Radboud University Nijmegen & University of Sydney
January 2019

Past posts on the book are here and here.

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Feasting in antiquity and at the eschaton

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: A Feast for the Senses … and the Soul (Dorothy Resig Willette). Lots of feasting from all over the ancient world.

This BHD essay was first published in 2013, but I missed it then.

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Loebolus

FOR YOU, SPECIAL DEAL: Loebolus. Many of the Loeb Classical Library volumes (277 at current count) are out of copyright and are available as pfds for free. They are collected at this site.

I mentioned Loebolus some years ago, but more than thirty volumes have been added since then, so another mention is in order.

HT the NSEA Blog.

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Reiser on "Imagery Techniques in Modern Jewish Mysticism" (plus MOTP2 update)

THE BOOK OF DOCTRINES AND OPINIONS BLOG: Interview with Daniel Reiser – Imagery Techniques in Modern Jewish Mysticism (Alan Brill).

Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira of Piacetzna (1889-1943), also known as the “Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto” left behind a series of books on educating teenagers and newly married men, a diary of his Holocaust sermons, and variety of visualization techniques that he used in his work to create a modern Chassidus in the 1920’s and 1930’s.

Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman emphasized the use of imagination and vision within Torah. We are to imagine the events in the weekly Torah study as if we are there and with vivid imagery, we imagine the Biblical stories in sermons, we use the vivid element of the midrash to teach and we are to engage in specific techniques of visualization to achieve closeness to God. We can even, if needed, image God for praying. This visionary quality is what gives his tragic Holocaust sermons delivered in the Warsaw ghetto such pathos. Daniel Reiser wrote his dissertation and subsequent book on these visionary meditations. The book was translated last year.

[...]

The book is Imagery Techniques in Modern Jewish Mysticism (De Gruyter, 2018). I have not yet read it, but I must do so

This may not seem like a topic of interest to PaleoJudaica, but it is. I am currently thinking a lot about the psychology of imagery and the imagination with reference to ancient Jewish, Christian, etc. visionary and magical literature. Human psychology hasn't changed in the last few thousand years. The techniques used by ancient visionaries seem to have a lot of overlap with those used by modern practitioners. I hope to be writing more about that in the future.

Meanwhile, today is the last day of my year of research leave. During that time I have made excellent progress on the editing of the second volume of texts for the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project (MOTP2). We have some distance to go, but we're getting there! And when we are done, you will see that it was worth the wait.

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More on Aramaic Week at the BL

HERITAGE MADE DIGITAL, of the British Library, has been continuing their Aramaic week, with tweets on Aramaic, Syriac, Garshuni, and even an Arabic translation of a Nabatean (Nabataean) work on agriculture. Good times!

You should go and have a look.

Background here. Crossfile under Aramaic Watch and Philology.

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More Scott Carroll manuscripts

VARIANT READINGS: Still More Greek and Coptic Papyri from Scott Carroll. Brent Nongbri surveys another of Scott Carroll's videos and highlights many biblical manuscripts (Greek, Coptic, Hebrew; NT/OT/HB) and some other things.

Background here, here, here, here, here, and here.

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More on the statues found at Beth Shean

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Heavy Rains Reveal Limestone Funerary Busts Near Beth Shean, Israel (Samuel DeWitt Pfister). This essay has lots of new information on the finds and their background.

Also for background, here is an earlier (2012) BHD essay that has just been republished: Beth Shean in the Bible and Archaeology. The story of the death of King Saul as told by archaeology and the Bible.

I posted on the original announcement of the discovery of the statuary busts at Beth Shean (Beit Shean) here.

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Ancient cistern emerges at Jerusalem playground.

ANCIENT ARCHITECTURE: Subterranean 1,500-year-old cistern complex found under Jerusalem playground. Antiquities Authority and municipality in talks whether to make the hidden water hole — half the size of an Olympic pool — a tourist site (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel).

Back in 2005, the Israel Antiquities Authority received word that at a Jerusalem neighborhood playground, the sand was being swallowed up into the earth. After initial testing by IAA archaeologist Dr. Yuval Baruch, it was discovered that the sand box was constructed directly above an ancient water cistern.

[...]

This opens like the beginning of a horror movie. I'm glad it was just a cistern. If you live in Jerusalem, I guess you have to get used to the earth opening up with ancient mysteries.

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(P)review of "The Golem"

GOLEM WATCH: The Golem. According to various online sources, the golem grew from ancient Jewish myths, the most common involving a 16th century rabbi who created it to protect Jews from anti-Semites (Bruce Kahn, Atlanta Jewish Times/Times of Israel).

This latest incarnation of the golem legend, filmed in English, is directed by Israel’s Paz brothers. Their extraordinary tale of good versus evil begs to be seen on a big screen. Beautifully filmed on location in Eastern Europe, the film has scary moments, but the focus on character and plot make it much more than a typical horror film.

The film is to be released next month. It is by the directors of JeruZalem.

Rotten Tomatoes, which gives it a "100% Want To See" rating, has trailers and some other pre-reviews. It looks promising.

Cross-file under Cinema. For many earlier posts on past and present manifestations of the Golem legend, start here and follow the links.

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Affect Theory and Acts

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: "What Has Affect Theory to do with Acts?": Testing Methodological Boundaries In Acts Scholarship (Teresa Calpino).

This is another paper presented in the review panel on Maia Kotrosits’s Rethinking Early Christian Identity: Affect, Violence, and Belonging (Fortress, 2015) at the 2018 Construction of Christian Identities SBL seminar. Background here and here.

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Upcoming LXX summer course at Trinity Western

THE ETC BLOG: Septuagint Summer Course at Trinity Western (Peter Gurry).

Also, William Ross has additional details at: 2019 SEPTUAGINT SUMMER COURSE AT TRINITY WESTERN UNIVERSITY.

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Ancient horse figurines found in Israel

EQUINE ARTIFACTS: Heavy Rains Unearth Ancient Horse Figurines in Northern Israel (David Israel, The Jewish Press).

The heavy rains of the past month have revealed two beautiful clay figurines of horses in northern Israel. The figurines were found by different citizens: one— from the time of the Kingdom of Israel (about 2,800 years old)—was found in the area of ​​Kfar Ruppin in the Beit Shean Valley; the other—dated to the Hellenistic period, some 2,200 years ago—near Tel Akko.

The figurines were handed over to the Israel Antiquities Authority, which will honor their finders with a certificate of good citizenship.

[...]

HT reader Yoel. Besides the heavy rain, porcupines or foxes may have contributed again with faunal-assisted archaeology.

As noted here, I found a horse figurine (well, the front half of one) at the Tel Dor excavation in the mid-1980s.

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Still looking for those new Dead Sea Scrolls

OPERATION SCROLL: Experts Racing Against Antiquities Robbers in Hunt for Dead Sea Scrolls. Recent finds have stirred fresh excitement and archaeologists are probing higher and deeper than before, as hundreds of caves remain unexcavated (Reuters via Haaretz).

This article has some rehashing of old news, but it does give some information about a "Cave 52b" that is new to me. It also interviews some people and expresses hope that the new, so far undiscovered, Dead Sea Scrolls may help clarify who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls and illuminate the text of the mysterious Copper Scroll. That would be nice.

It doesn't seem likely that any major scroll finds remain in the Dead Sea area, but I'm still glad they are looking. They may well find some small scroll fragments. And maybe more. Who knows?

Background on Operation Scroll is here and links. I have suggested a couple of other places to watch for new scroll fragments (the Timna Valley here and links; Megiddo here and links). But both are long shots.

Background on the "Jerusalem papyrus," which could well be a forgery, is here and links. And for many past PaleoJudaica posts on the Copper Scroll, start here (cf. here) and follow the links.

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Another review of Sanders, From Adapa to Enoch

REVIEWS OF BIBLICAL AND EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES:

2019.1.1 | Seth L. Sanders. From Adapa to Enoch: Scribal Culture and Religious Vision in Judea and Babylon. Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 167. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017. pp xiv + 280. ISBN 978-3-16-154456-9.

Reviewed by Ryan D. Schroeder, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver.

Excerpt:

Sanders’ From Adapa to Enoch is a must read for scholars of scribal culture(s) and will offer insights to specialists in fields as diverse as ancient cuneiform scholarship, West Semitic epigraphy, prophecy and divination, early Jewish apocalyptic literature, and the Aramaic and sectarian Dead Sea Scrolls.

Earlier reviews etc. of the book are noted here and links.

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Fake archaeology can be good

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Tel Achzib in Arkansas Is Fake—And Everybody Knows It! Learn about Harding University’s Biblical archaeology field school (Megan Sauter). As usual, this essay is a summary of a recent BAR article that is behind the subscription wall. But it gives you a taste of it.

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Aramaic Week at the BL

THIS IS ARAMAIC WEEK AT HERITAGE MADE DIGITAL WEBSITE of the British Library.

Yesterday they posted a Monday Mystery, a fourth-century manuscript from Egypt in Hebrew script. And they have retweeted another Aramaic mystery manuscript here.

Can you help? So far, the comments are uninformative.

They have also posted on a Syriac lectionary and on Aramaic Targums of Esther, the Pentateuch, and the Song of Songs. Plus some other books in Syriac and Aramaic.

The week is not over, so stay tuned. Cross-file under Aramaic Watch.

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Alter, Kafka, and the Bible

INTERVIEW: Robert Alter sets a new literary tone with his translation of the Hebrew Bible (John Hickey, Berkeley News).

There aren’t many stories surrounding the Bible that begin with Czech novelist of the fantastic Franz Kafka, but Robert Alter’s does.

[...]

The article includes a video clip in which Professor Alter discusses Kafka and the Bible. He also criticizes biblical scholars for trying to "disambiguate" the Hebrew Bible by translation.

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More on Scott Carroll's papyri

OVER AT VARIANT READINGS, Brent Nongbri continues to analyze Scott Carroll's videos to learn more about the papyri to which he has access or, in some cases, which he apparently himself owns:

Scott Carroll’s Classical Papyri

So again, these papyrus manuscripts of classical authors seem to be the property of Scott Carroll himself and not the Green Collection. This was news to me.

More of Scott Carroll’s Papyri?
More classical and biblical papyri.

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Catalogue of Rylands Greek papyri

THE AWOL BLOG: Catalogue of the Greek papyri in the John Rylands Library by John Rylands University Library of Manchester. It's a bit out of date (1911), but has lots of interesting material, including Old Testament and New Testament fragments.

I see that Brent Nongbri has also noted the catalogue here.

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Haaretz on Alter's translation of the Hebrew Bible

THAT CAN HAPPEN. How a Literature Professor Found Himself Translating the Entire Bible From Scratch. I kind of fell into it,’ says Robert Alter of his decades-long project of retranslating the Bible, ensuing from a request to write ‘about Genesis or Kafka’ (Elon Gilad, Haaretz premium).

Really? All the hundreds of different translations of the Hebrew Bible into English have something wrong? Including the celebrated translation published by the Jewish Publication Society in 1985? In his opinion, yes.

“The language of the Bible is quite beautiful – that is, both the narrative prose and the poetry are finely wrought literary artifacts,” Alter explains. “What I found was that none of the existing English versions, with the limited exception of the King James Version, does any justice to the literary artistry of the Hebrew.” The other translations fail to adequately convey – to the extent that any translation can – the power, subtlety and precision of the Hebrew, he says, and that was what he set out to accomplish.

Includes both positive and negative evaluations from biblical scholars.

Background here and links.

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An algorithm to restore archaeological artifacts

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: How This New Algorithm Is Helping Restore Archaeological Artefacts (Ambika Choudhury, Analytics India Magazine).

Since the 1960s researchers have been exploring ways to overcome these challenges. There are findings which suggest that in 1964, computational solver was introduced that could solve a nine-piece puzzle. While these were rudimentary efforts, researchers are now using state-of-the-art techniques based on natural images, colour matching, shape matching, and others to design algorithms and solve twisted puzzles in archaeology.

In a recent development, researchers at Technion and University of Haifa, Israel have proposed a new algorithm that is able to fix these issues with computer vision.

This isn't specifically about ancient Judaism, but the technology is potentially widely applicable to ancient decorative art. As before, the current algorithm is primitive and fallible, but algorithms can learn from experience. Give it some time and it may someday be able to outdo human archaeological art historians.

Cross-file under the Singularity is Near.

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Digital resources for ancient Judaism

MICHAEL SATLOW: Resources for the Digital Study of Jews and Judaism in Antiquity. It's a good list. How about adding a section on blogs?

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

Knoppers remembered by Notre Dame colleagues

MEMORIAL: Theology department remembers Gary N. Knoppers (Mary Steurer, The Notre Dame Observer).

{Department chair Timothy] Matovina said Professor Knoppers’ work will shape Notre Dame for years to come.

“He was only here five years, but already he was working with, doing some great work with graduate students who will carry on his legacy, because they’ll go off and be professors themselves with the formation and the training they had from Professor Knoppers,” he said. “But in the department, just his goodness, his community spirit will be his legacy and will be deeply missed.”

Background here and links.

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Tu B'Shevat 2019

TU B'SHEVAT, the New Year for Trees, begins tonight at sundown. Enjoy!

Last year's Tu B'Shevat post is here. Follow the links there for past posts of interest.

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More on Beit Shemesh and Route 38

ROADWORKS VS. ARCHAEOLOGY: ANCIENT CITY AROUSES CONTROVERSY IN BEIT SHEMESH. Archeological dig exposes conflicting interests with no simple solution (Meir Ekstein, Jerusalem Post).

The present plans for the road would decimate the site forever – a third destruction (churban shlishi) of a 2,700-year-old site. How does one weigh the immediate economic needs and those of the present community against the preservation of Jewish/Israeli history for generations? There are alternatives that would save the site entirely, such as building a tunnel underneath the excavations, building a bridge over the excavations or rerouting the road near Moshav Yishi. Each of these solutions poses problems, is expensive and will significantly delay the completion of the road. But they are not insurmountable. In contrast, this site is a non-renewable resource. Once destroyed, it will be gone forever.

This article advocates a particular position about the road controversy. For an earlier article that presented a wider range of views, see here. I take no position on the matter myself.

I was about to post this when I saw that Joseph I. Lauer had a new e-mail on the topic. He notes this article and also another from Haaretz Hebrew here, Google English translation at: An achievement for archaeologists: Route 38, which is supposed to cross Tel Bet Shemesh, will be reduced (Nir Hasson).

Netivei Israel agreed to significantly reduce the width of Highway 38, which crosses Tel Bet Shemesh, after archaeologists have warned that it may bury rare and unusual findings from the First Temple period that were discovered there. The Antiquities Authority claims that according to a summary reached a week ago between the IAA CEO and Netivei Israel's CEO, the width of the road will be reduced from 80 meters to 20 meters only. Israel's roads said the road plans were being re-examined in light of the findings, but did not confirm that the road would be reduced to a quarter of its planned area. Even in its narrow form, the road is expected to cause great damage to the findings.

[...]

That seems to represent some progress.

UPDATE (21 January): The article is now published on the Haaretz (premium) English site: Victory for Archaeologists: Planned Road Expansion Cut in Bid to Save Ancient Treasures. Route 38 will cut through a major 7th century BCE site. Roads company: Plans are being ‘reexamined.’

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Ben Wright interviewed on academic co-authorship

THE STECA BLOG: Co-authoring Academic Publications: A Conversation with Ben Wright (Elisa Uusimäki).

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Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (OSHB)

THE AWOL BLOG notes an open-source online resource for the Hebrew Bible:

Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (OSHB) version 2.0

unfoldingWord Hebrew Grammar

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Paul the cosmopolitan?

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Galatians 3:28—Neither Jew nor Greek, Slave nor Free, Male and Female. As published in Biblical Archaeology Review, January/February 2018. (Karin Neutel).

Seen in the light of first-century cosmopolitan ideals, Paul’s declaration of unity thus takes on a distinctly ancient form. It does not proclaim the equality of all people, regardless of their social positions, as is sometimes assumed by readers today. Rather, it envisages a social ideal of harmony and connection, where those factors in society that create division and conflict have been removed.

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Review of Engel, Gershom Scholem

H-JUDAIC BOOK REVIEW:

Amir Engel. Gershom Scholem: An Intellectual Biography. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017. xiv + 226 pp. $40.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-226-42863-5; ISBN 978-0-226-42877-2.

Reviewed by Jay Howard Geller (Case Western Reserve University)
Published on H-Judaic (January, 2019)
Commissioned by Barbara Krawcowicz (Norwegian University of Science and Technology)

Excerpt:

Engel has written a fascinating study of this nearly incomparable modern Jewish thinker. He has excavated the implicit, making explicit the lines of connection between Scholem’s life and his work. Yet, it should be noted that many Scholem scholars will not regard the ties as clear as Engel does. Some will protest (and already have) that Scholem’s thinking either eludes such neat correlations or requires a holistic approach. Moreover, Engel’s mix of chronological and thematic ordering does not always work. ...

I noted the publication of the book here. Follow the links there and see also here for other recent books about Scholem. And some other recent posts involving Scholem are here, here, and here.

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Never too late for Hebrew

AMEN, PREACH IT: It’s NEVER too late to learn Hebrew…. (Phillip Marshall, Biblical Languages Blog).

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Press on the "Finds Gone Astray" Exhibition

HYPERALLERGIC: In Jerusalem, a Museum’s Ethics Go Astray. The Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem recently unveiled a new exhibition, Finds Gone Astray, to great fanfare, but it has so many ethical and legal violations that it’s hard to know where to begin. Michael Press is not happy about this exhibition, on which more here and here.

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Did Moses sing?

THE BIBLE AND INTEPRETATION:

Did Moses Sing? Perspectives on Deuteronomy 32

Based on current knowledge of how scribes worked in the ancient Near East…[Nilsen] proposes that there were groups of scribes in Jerusalem that produced literature in the late sixth-early fifth century or so, amongst them one Deuteronomistic group and one Isaianic group. Texts could cross boundaries between the groups (cf. e.g. Isa 36-39 and 2 Kings 19-20). The poem in Deut 32 is so similar to Isaiah 1; 56-66 that it is probable that the Isaianic group was its author. The poem then crossed the boundary of scribal groups, and was inserted into what we now call Deuteronomy 32, where it took on the role of “the song of Moses.”

See Also: The Origins of Deuteronomy 32: Intertextuality, Memory, Identity (Peter Lang Inc., International Academic Publishers, 2018).

By Tina Dykesteen Nilsen
VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway
January 2019

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Affect Theory and Ancient Texts

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: The Codex of Feeling: Affect Theory and Ancient Texts (Donovan Schaefer).

It would seem I am the least qualified person in this forum about Maia Kotrosits’ book to speak to the quality of her Biblical scholarship, so this response will be dictated from a theory cave. ...

Now I know there is a thing called "Affect Theory." It sounds like a slippery, but promising, concept.

Further:

A nation is a tangle of forces fused by the force of affect. There is, then, no pure nation, but instead only a slapdash set of parameters for feeling a nation into existence. This is the milieu within which ancient texts are created, and understanding their affective dimension is the avenue Kotrosits proposes to discern how they make meaning. In particular, Kotrosits uses the affect approach to displace a binary frame of Christian vs Jewish identity in ancient sources. ...

This is another paper presented in the review panel on Maia Kotrosits’s Rethinking Early Christian Identity: Affect, Violence, and Belonging (Fortress, 2015) at the 2018 Construction of Christian Identities SBL seminar. Background here.

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Review of Sussman, Late Roman to Late Byzantine/Early Islamic Period Lamps in the Holy Land

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW: Varda Sussman, Late Roman to Late Byzantine/Early Islamic Period Lamps in the Holy Land: The Collection of the Israel Antiquities Authority. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2016. Pp. iv, 635. ISBN 9781784915704. £65.00. Reviewed by Daniel Schindler, Elon University (dschindler3@elon.edu).

This book has much to offer as a reference to the oil lamps of the Late Roman and Byzantine periods and for developing research questions with regard to regionalism and small finds. Sussman has produced a volume that will be a basis for further research; it is an indispensable addition for scholars studying the material culture of the Late Roman, Byzantine, and Early Islamic periods in ancient Palestine as there is no other oil lamp catalogue for these periods that is as comprehensive.

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BHD on the Jerusalem column inscription

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: First Person: A Little Jot on a Jerusalem Column. From the January/February 2019 Biblical Archaeology Review (Robert Cargill).

At first glance, the inscription appears rather benign. But to those of us who study Jerusalem, its history, and especially the text of the Hebrew Bible and who pay particularly close attention to the spelling of key words, this inscription carries far more linguistic weight than that of the stone itself.

I have also discussed the orthography and philology of the word "Jerusalem" in the inscription here. I go into somewhat more detail, but end up in more or less the same place.

Other posts on the Jerusalem column inscription are here and here.

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Hebrew forgeries from Arab countries

THE NATIONAL LIBRARY OF ISRAEL BLOG: A glimpse into the flourishing counterfeit industry of manuscripts from Arab countries (Hen Malul). The essay is in Hebrew, but you can read a very comprehensible Google English translation here (link now correct!). There are also many photos of fake manuscripts.

Hebrew letters that do not make up any sentence, prints on metals - and a Star of David everywhere: The National Library is flooded with appeals from "collectors" and antique dealers from Arab countries, who offer "historical manuscripts" that supposedly belonged to Jewish communities in Islamic countries.

The Jordanian lead codices (on which much more here and links) get a mention, although I don't see any clearly lead-codex-like artifact among the photographs.

I have been approached a few times in the last three weeks for help with supposed Hebrew writings. One message from the UAE included photos of a scroll that was obviously not very old.

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The Talmud is still big in South Korea

TALMUD WATCH: Talmud-inspired learning craze sweeps South Korea (Tim Alper, JTA).

“Koreans don’t have to emulate Jewish belief systems,” educational researcher Seol Dong-ju said, “but we do need to copy the way Jews teach their children.”

The result is dozens of private chavruta-themed academies, with busy branches in major cities throughout the country, catering to everyone from toddlers to adults. Some make use of Korean-language Talmudic texts, while others follow entirely secular curricula.

Kim Jung-wan, who directs one such academy — the Havruta Culture Association — explains that South Korea’s Jewish education quest is over 40 years old. It began in the mid-1970s, when Korean translations of Talmud-inspired stories by Rabbi Marvin Tokayer, an American military chaplain stationed in Japan, first arrived in Seoul bookstores.

Tokayer’s stories were a runaway success. The Talmud, the vast Hebrew and Aramic compendium of first millennium law and lore, effectively went viral in South Korea: In the decades since, hundreds of Korean versions of the Talmud have appeared, mostly deriving from English-language translations and commentaries. These range from picture story books for children to thicker, more ponderous volumes for adults.

Background here and here.

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Intersectionality and ancient "Judaism?"

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Engaging with Intersectionality and 1st-2nd c. "Judaism" (Shayna Sheinfeld).

In 2018, the Construction of Christian Identities SBL seminar organized a review panel on Maia Kotrosits’s Rethinking Early Christian Identity: Affect, Violence, and Belonging (Fortress, 2015).

To open this forum and as a member of the steering committee of the Construction of Christian Identities SBL seminar, I want to begin with some reflection on what the goals of this seminar have been in order to bring Kotrosits’s work into discussion with our larger aims.

[...]

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On ancient Greek

PHILOLOGY: Greek to Me. The Comma Queen on the pleasures of a different alphabet (Mary Norris, The New Yorker).

A few years ago, in the Frankfurt airport on the way home from Greece, I bought a copy of Virginia Woolf’s “The Common Reader,” which includes her essay “On Not Knowing Greek.” I already had the book at home, but I was impressed that anything by Woolf was considered airport reading. When I was about ten years old, my father, a pragmatic man, had refused to let me study Latin, and for some reason I assumed that “On Not Knowing Greek” was about how Woolf’s father, too, had prevented his daughter from studying a dead language. I pictured young Virginia Stephen sulking in a room of her own, an indecipherable alphabet streaming through her consciousness, while her father and her brother, downstairs in the library, feasted on Plato and Aristotle.

Well, apparently I had read only the title of the essay. Of course Virginia Woolf knew Greek. ...

Of course she did. Sean Connery also makes a cameo appearance.

This article is not specifically about ancient Judaism, but it is full of fun facts about ancient Greek. HT Philo scholar Ellen Birnbaum.

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Operation Scroll: still looking ...

THERE'S COMPETITION: The Race for the Next Dead Sea Scrolls, and Why We May Lose It Decades after first ancient Jewish texts were found at Qumran, hundreds of caves around the Dead Sea could yield more. But we have to hurry (Moshe Gilad, Haaretz premium).

The conversation with [Dr. Oren] Gutfeld takes place at the entrance to the cave. In the two excavation seasons conducted in Cave 53, many non-scroll objects have been found, some of them valuable, some from prehistoric times and from the Second Temple era.

I asked if somewhere inside he expects, every time he begins to explore a new cave, to find scrolls. He looks at me and considers for a moment. “We come to each new cave with zero expectations. We try to understand the daily lives of those who used it,” Gutfeld says – then admits, “Almost every night I dream of finding a scroll. If we get lucky and find even one written line, that would be the best.”

Albeit scroll-less, every day of digging in the Judean Desert caves reveals new things about the material culture of people of the “Yahad” community (the cult that operated here), he says. “Discovering a scroll would be the ultimate, but it’s just as important to find things that shed light on who they were.”

This is a good, thorough article that strikes a reasonable balance between coverage of the so-far imaginary scrolls that archaeologists hope to find and the actual material culture that they have been uncovering in the caves.

I hope they get some government funding to speed up the work. The danger is real that looters will get to any really important artifacts ahead of the archaeologists.

Read it all. If you aren't a subscriber, you need a free registration with Haaretz.

For more on the excavations in Cave 53a and 53b, as well as links to earlier posts on Operation Scroll, see here.

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What was in the ancient Israelites' pantry?

ARCHAEO-BOTANY: What Ancient Seeds Found in Archaeological Excavations in Israel Tell Us. Well-preserved seeds found in archaeological digs in Israel offer a singular glimpse into the lives of the people who were nourished by them thousands of years ago (Ronit Vered, Haaretz premium).

“What we’re doing as botanists or as archaeologists is to come to these people’s homes and check their pantry,” says Prof. Ehud Weiss, head of the Archaeological Botany Lab in the Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology at Bar Ilan University. “That home existed 2,000 or 6,000 years ago, but then, as now, our pantry says a lot about who we are. The food we eat reflects our socioeconomic situation and is indicative of the society we live in and relations with the environment. A central question in archaeology is: Who were the people whose cultural remnants we uncover?

“The information archaeological botany provides is fascinating, and relevant for understanding the human race. We are what we eat, and knowledge in our field has become so precise that we now have a high capability of classifying every plant we find in archaeological digs. With the aid of that information, it’s possible to reconstruct modes and customs of nutrition, economy, agriculture, religion and culture.”

Beer is involved. Ancient beer, that is. I don't know about modern.

Also, they are developing a digital database of seeds.

A few past posts on research on ancient seeds in Israel are here, here, here, and here.

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Ferguson on the Qumran Psalms manuscripts

THE ETC BLOG: Anthony Ferguson on Texts Preserving Psalms from Qumran (John Meade).

Last week, guest blogger, Anthony Ferguson, described his recently defended and completed dissertation on the 'Non-Aligned' Texts of Qumran and reported on its major conclusions. I asked Anthony to write another post on the texts preserving Psalms at Qumran, and he kindly obliged. Thank you, Anthony, for your labors, and we look forward to reading more of your work in these areas in the future.

Background of Dr. Ferguson's PhD thesis on "non-aligned" biblical Dead Sea Scrolls is here and here.

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The population of Jerusalem in antiquity

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Ancient Jerusalem: The Village, the Town, the City. As published in Biblical Archaeology Review, May/June 2016 (Hershel Shanks).

A new study of Jerusalem’s population in various periods has recently been published by one of Israel’s leading Jerusalem archaeologists, Hillel Geva of Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the Israel Exploration Society. Geva bases his estimates on “archaeological findings, rather than vague textual sources.” The result is what he calls a “minimalist view.”

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More from the Talmud on ritual animal slaughter

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Slaughtering With Intent. In this week’s ‘Daf Yomi,’ why a Jew may not sacrifice an animal in such a way that its blood flows into the ocean, and other rules protecting worshippers from the limits of paganism.

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

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Qasr Al-Yahud and Joshua's crossing?

JEWISH PILGRIMAGE MINEFIELD TOO: CROSSING THE JORDAN. A Christian pilgrimage site called Qasr al Yahud has started drawing Jewish visitors, attracted by its biblical history (Sara Toth Stub, Tablet Magazine). The site is thought by some to be where Jesus was baptized, so it has attracted Christian pilgrims since late antiquity.

There is no known historical or textual evidence of Jewish pilgrimage to the site in ancient times, in Talmudic times, or even during the Second Temple period, according to Rehav Rubin, a professor of geography who specializes in maps and pilgrimages of the Holy Land.

“Jews never came to Qasr al Yahud in the past centuries as pilgrims, it’s only something just from the last decade,” said Lior Chen, a graduate student in anthropology at Hebrew University who is completing a dissertation and fieldwork on the site. In his research Chen has found that motivations of the Jewish visitors range from interest in the Bible to politics to simply getting a close-up view of the border with Jordan, which is just a few meters across the water from Qasr al Yahud, demarcated by a rope running down the middle of the river.

Despite the lack of historical precedent, the site is becoming a pilgrimage site for Jews in commemoration of the biblical story of the Israelites' crossing of the Jordan under Joshua. This only started when the site reopened in 2011.

For background on Qasr Al-Yahud, its Christian pilgrimage tradition, and the ongoing de-mining project there, start here and follow the links.

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BHD on Machaerus

BIBLE HISTORY DAILY has published two essays on Machaerus, the reputed site of the execution of John the Baptist:

Machaerus: Beyond the Beheading of John the Baptist. Explore the site with reconstructions of the Herodian palace.

Anastylosis at Machaerus, Where John the Baptist was Beheaded. Restoration work gives archaeological context to Biblical scene (Megan Sauter).

I also noted the first one when it came out in 2015. As usual, both essays are summaries of BAR articles that are behind the subscription wall.

For past PaleoJudaica posts on Machaerus, start here and follow the links.

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Cahana-Blum, Wrestling with Archons

THE NSEA BLOG: NEW BOOK: WRESTLING WITH ARCHONS: GNOSTICISM AS A CRITICAL THEORY OF CULTURE.

Jonathan Cahana-Blum, Wrestling with Archons: Gnosticism as a Critical Theory of Culture. Lexington Books, 2018. Pages: 210 • Trim: 6 1/4 x 9

Follow the link for details.

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More on the Ark and Kiryat Yearim

ARCHAEOLOGY AND ... SPECULATION: Biblical site tied to Ark of the Covenant unearthed at convent in central Israel. Excavation uncovers a unique, monumental structure previously unknown in the region. Was it a shrine — or the site of David’s triumphant parade of the legendary ark? (Amanda Borschel-Dan, Times of Israel).

A massive 8th century BCE man-made platform discovered at a Catholic convent in central Israel may have served as an ancient shrine to the Ark of the Covenant, said leading Tel Aviv University archaeologist Israel Finkelstein. Unearthed at Kiriath-Jearim, the shrine gives potential new insight into the political machinations of the sibling kingdoms of Judah and Israel.

Remains of the monumental elevated podium have been unearthed on a Judean hilltop long associated with the location of biblical Kiriath-Jearim. According to the Hebrew Bible, the spot was the 20-year home of the legendary Ark of the Covenant until taken by King David and paraded to Jerusalem.

The joint expedition by Tel Aviv University and the College de France is not on the trail of the elusive ark, however. Indeed Finkelstein, the dig’s co-director, does not believe the Ark of the Covenant existed.

[...]

Okay, I think I have this straight. Professor Finkelstein thinks there wasn't an Ark of the Covenant; it's just a legend. Well, that could be right.

But he thinks that the legend was around in Northern Israel in the eighth century B.C.E. and that this big platform at the site of Kiryat Yearim (Kiriath Jearim) was a shrine built in commemoration of the legendary Ark in order to legitimate the place as a sacred site.

Now, two caveats. First, I haven't read the original report and I don't know if what he said is being reported with full nuance, although Ms. Borschel-Dan is generally very good about such things. Second, I'm not an archaeologist and I have no opinion about the archaeology of the site.

That said, I am very skeptical about the conclusions as reported. It's hard enough to formulate credible connections between the biblical narrative and archaeology. And these particular conclusions involve a lot of speculation that goes well beyond what the biblical texts say.

Call me when they excavate a plaque that says "This site is dedicated to the Ark of the Covenant."

Meanwhile, this is a really interesting excavation on its own archaeological terms. I am going to keep that separate from any speculation about how it may connect with the Bible or with a real or imaginary Ark of the Covenant.

Past posts on the excavation at Kiryat Yearim are here and links. And for many past posts on the Ark of the Covenant, follow the links from that same post.

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More ancient Aramaic found in Saudi Arabia

ARAMAIC WATCH: Hieroglyphic inscriptions discovered in Saudi Arabia (Egypt Today). Yes, I know what the headline says. And the discovery of an Egyptian Hieroglypic inscription of Ramses III in Saudi Arabia is important. But slipped in with that report is the following:

The Hieroglyphic inscription was found on a fixed rock, near the Tayma oasis. It bears a royal signature (a double cartouche) of King Ramesses III. Several additional Aramaic, Thamudic and Nabataea inscriptions, as well as ancient illustrations of cattle, ostriches and snakes were discovered. King Ramses III is the most famous ruler of the 20th Dynasty known by the Greeks as Rampsinitus. He followed his father Ramses II's reign to embark on massive construction projects.

(My bold-font emphasis.)

Thamudic is an ancient North Arabian dialect. Nabatean (Nabataean) is an Aramaic dialect used by speakers of Arabic in North Arabia. There's more on North Arabian and Nabatean here and links and here. And for more on Aramaic in ancient Arabia, see here and links.

I believe the Tayma oasis is the site where the last king of Babylon, Nabonidus, pursued his worship of the moon god Sin rather than running his kingdom. The story is alluded to in the Aramaic Prayer of Nabonidus in the Dead Sea Scrolls, on which more here.

There is no more information in the article about the content of the new Aramaic and Nabatean inscriptions.

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"The Polymorphous Pesah"

THE BIBLICAL REVIEW BLOG: Article on pesaḥ by Mira Balberg and Simeon Chavel (William Brown).The article is:

Mira Balberg and Simeon Chavel, “The Polymorphous Pesah: Ritual Between Origins and Reenactment,” in Journal of Ancient Judaism 8 (2017), 292-343.

William provides a summary and a link to the (long) full text at Academia.edu.

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