FAROUK HOSNI, the Egyptian Cultural Minister, did not get the director-generalship of UNESCO after all:

Egypt bitter about UNESCO vote
Egyptian Culture Minister Farouk Hosni, who has been accused of making anti-Semitic remarks, says 'there was a conspiracy against me' after losing a bid to lead the U.N. cultural organization. (Los Angeles Times)


Reporting from Cairo - Conspiracy theories hummed through Egypt's media and political elite Wednesday as Culture Minister Farouk Hosni returned home from Paris after facing accusations of anti-Semitism and losing a bitter fight to become the first Arab to lead the United Nations' cultural organization.

The 71-year-old abstract painter and ally of President Hosni Mubarak had carried the hopes of an Arab world seeking cultural prominence and closer ties with the West. But Hosni's bid to become director-general of the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization unraveled in part because of comments he made in 2008 in which he told parliament he would personally burn any Israeli books in Egypt's Alexandria library.

A hurried public relations campaign by Hosni and the Egyptian government muted some criticism, and when the 58-member UNESCO board met last week, Hosni led in the first round of voting. But in subsequent rounds his early supporters abandoned him as the United States and key European countries backed Bulgarian candidate Irina Bokova, who won the post in Tuesday's fifth round by a vote of 31 to 27.

Upon his return to Cairo on Wednesday, Hosni told reporters at the airport:

"It was clear by the end of the competition that there was a conspiracy against me. There are a group of the world's Jews who had a major influence in the elections who were a serious threat to Egypt taking this position."

[...]

Somehow I don't think that comment will do anything to assuage the doubts of his critics.

In recent weeks, Hosni apologized for his book-burning remark and his ministry announced that it would translate into Arabic novels by Israeli authors Amos Oz and David Grossman. The ministry also began restoration of the neglected Maimonides synagogue in Cairo's ancient Jewish quarter. By late August, it appeared that Hosni would win the UNESCO post.

[...]

Background here.

A RITUAL BATH from the Second Temple period has been excavated in Jerusalem. The IAA press release (temporary URL):

A large and Magnificent 2,000 Year Old Miqve was Exposed in the Western Wall Tunnels

A large and impressive ritual bath (miqve) from the end of the Second Temple period was recently uncovered in archaeological excavations the Israel Antiquities Authority is carrying out in the Western Wall tunnels, in cooperation with the Western Wall Heritage Foundation.

The miqve was discovered inside the western hall of a splendid structure that is located just c. 20 meters from the Western Wall. Parts of the building were discovered in the past and the Israel Antiquities Authority is currently exposing another one of the three halls inside it. It is one of the most magnificent structures from the Second Temple period ever to be uncovered.

The edifice is built of very delicately dressed ashlar stones and the architectural decoration in it is of the highest quality. From an architectural and artistic standpoint there are similarities between this structure and the three magnificent compounds that King Herod built on the Temple Mount, in the Cave of the Patriarchs and at Allonei Mamre, and from which we can conclude the great significance that this building had in the Second Temple period.

In his book The War of the Jews, Josephus Flavius writes there was a government administrative center that was situated at the foot of the Temple. Among the buildings he points out in this region were the council house and the “Xistus”- the ashlar bureau. According to the Talmud it was in this bureau that the Sanhedrin – the Jewish high court at the time of the Second Temple – would convene. It may be that the superb structure the Israel Antiquities Authority is presently uncovering belonged to one of these two buildings.

According to archaeologist Alexander Onn, director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, “It is interesting to see that in the middle of the first century CE they began making changes in this magnificent structure – at that time it was no longer used as a government administrative building and a large miqve was installed inside its western hall where there were c. 11 steps that descend to the immersion pool. It seems that the city of Jerusalem grew in this period and it became necessary to provide for the increased ritual bathing needs of the pilgrims who came to the Temple in large numbers, especially during the three pilgrimage festivals (Shlosha Regalim). Immersing oneself in the miqve and maintaining ritual purity were an inseparable part of the Jewish way of life in this period, and miqve’ot were absolutely essential, especially in the region of the Temple.”

The Western Wall Heritage Foundation acts to uncover the Jewish people’s past at the Western Wall, and the miqve is further evidence of the deep ties the Jewish people have with Jerusalem and the Temple.

Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz, the rabbi in charge of the Western Wall and the holy places, pointed out the cooperation between the Western Wall Heritage Foundation and the Israel Antiquities Authority which have joined together in order to discover the rich history of Jerusalem there, while strictly ensuring that no excavations approach the Temple Mount compound, contact with which is forbidden by Halachic law.

Photo (zip-)files can be downloaded here.

UPDATE (24 September): Bad link fixed. Sorry about that!

AN EXHIBITION ON EARLY WRITING at the University of Arizona has just opened: Writings Out of Time: The University of Arizona’s Cuneiform Collection. The lecture series includes lectured by Ronald S. Hendel and William Schniedewind on ancient Northwest Semitic and Israelite writing.

MARK GOODACRE is Celebrating the use of Internet Resources at Bible and Interpretation. As well he should.

CALL FOR PAPERS:

International Organization for Qumran Studies

Seventh Meeting

HELSINKI, FINLAND

AUGUST 2–4, 2010


Call for Papers


The Scrolls and Biblical Traditions

For the special topic of this seventh meeting of the IOQS, we invite papers that discuss any aspect of the transmission, use, or interpretation of biblical traditions in the Scrolls from the Judean Desert.

We therefore welcome papers ranging from studies of the biblical scrolls proper, on the relationship between scrolls and the versions, or on light shed by the scrolls on issues of scripture, authoritativeness, or canon, up to the use or interpretation, explicitly or implicitly, of biblical traditions in the so-called non-biblical scrolls.

Following the tradition of former IOQS meetings, proposals can be submitted by any scholar who is working on the topic, and papers that are directly related to the topic of the meeting are eligible for publication in a corresponding volume of the STDJ series. In addition, scholars working on other topics in the field of Qumran studies are encouraged as well to submit papers on their own particular research.

DATE
The seventh meeting of the IOQS will be held from August 2–4, 2010 in conjunction with the 20th Congress of IOSOT, the International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament, and other specialized congresses (IOTS, IOSCS, IOMS), to be held from August 1–6, 2010 in Helsinki. All information on these congresses, registration, accommodation, etc. can be found on www.helsinki.fi/teol/pro/iosot/index.htm. For the IOQS meeting click the Joint Congress Timetable at the right side of the page.

On Tuesday morning, August 3, a joint program of the IOSOT and IOQS is scheduled, including papers by Eileen Schuller, Sidnie White-Crawford, and Anneli Aejmelaeus.

PAPER PROPOSALS
If you are interested in participating and presenting a paper, please submit your proposal containing your name, name of academic institution, title of your proposed paper, and an abstract of no more than 250 words. For details on abstracts you may consult the guidelines for abstracts for the IOSOT.

Proposals should be submitted by email before February 14, 2010 to the secretary of the IOQS, Prof. Dr. Eibert Tigchelaar, eibert.tigchelaar@theo.kuleuven.be.



Eibert Tigchelaar
Research Professor Faculty of Theology
Editor Dead Sea Discoveries
Secretary Journal for the Study of Judaism
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven
Sint-Michielsstraat 6
B-3000 Leuven
Belgium

A FIRST-CENTURY C.E. AMPHITHEATER has been excavated near Tiberias:

The late Professor Izhar Hirschfeld and Yossi Stepansky, the archaeologists heading the excavation, initially stated the structure was from the 2nd or 3rd century C.E., but later quickly realized that they go all the way back to the beginning of the 1st century C.E., closer to the founding of Tiberias.

"The most interesting thing about the amphitheater is its Jewish context," said Hirshfeld at the time of the initial discovery. "Unlike Tzipori, which was a multicultural city, Tiberias was a Jewish city under Roman rule. The findings demonstrate the city's pluralistic nature and cultural openness, something uncommon in those days."

THE FINDER OF THE ALEXANDER GEMSTONE is profiled in the Annapolis Capital:

Annapolis native finds rare gemstone portrait of Alexander the Great
By HEATHER ROTH Staff Writer
Published 09/19/09

Megan Webb was looking for some extra credit and a way to learn more about ceramics when she signed up with the University of Washington Field School's excavation program at Tel Dor on the Mediterranean coast of Israel.

But during her five weeks as an amateur archaeologist, the Annapolis native made what may be the "find of the year."

"It's incredibly lucky apparently - beginner's luck," Webb laughed.

Sifting through the dirt and sand in a tight passage framed by three ancient walls, Webb found a small gemstone with the portrait of Alexander the Great painstakingly carved into it.

[...]

Well done, Megan!

Background here.

THE ROCK-A-BILLY MUSEUM in Jackson, Mississippi, has an exhibition on musical instruments in the Bible:

Rock-A-Billy Museum will host exhibit on Biblical instruments beginning Monday

By TRACIE SIMER
tsimer@jacksonsun.com
• September 19, 2009

Trumpets, harps, horns and drums all are modern-day instruments found in most orchestras. They also were found in ancient civilizations, including ancient Israel and the Roman Empire.

Instruments and music have been an important part of the Bible since the book of Genesis, said Henry Harrison, director of the International Rock-A-Billy Hall of Fame Museum in downtown Jackson.

The museum has a collection of religious instruments on display for two weeks. The first tours begin at 10:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Monday. The next stop for the exhibit is First United Methodist Church, also downtown, he said.

Harrison consulted many resources, including the Harvard Dictionary of Music, a Biblical concordance and various Web sites.

[...]

The collection sounds a bit ad hoc, in that it's based on English translations of terms we don't necessarily understand well, but interesting nonetheless.

THE NINE WEIRDEST THINGS AT YALE include:

2. Greco-Roman-Egyptian Magical Amulets

Venture to the third floor of Sterling Memorial Library and you may stumble across a succession of small rooms that contain Yale’s Babylonian Collection, the biggest collection of Mesopotamian objects in the United States.

But in a dusty drawer at the back of an office crammed with cuneiform tablets and maps of Mesopotamia, one can find 74 Greco-Roman-Egyptian Magical amulets left to Yale in 2005 by Dr. James H. Schwartz, a neurobiologist at Columbia University who also had an interest in numinology. The amulets are small stones or pieces of metal inscribed with text written in Greek letters, although the letters rarely say anything in classical Greek.

For some indication of what the amulets mean and what their significance might be, I visit John C. Darnell, the chair of Yale’s Egyptology Department, in his office on the third floor of the Hall of Graduate Studies.

“Primarily these are words of magical power; these can be names of gods and they can also be things that to us seem like nonsense,” explains Darnell. “These sorts of gems and magical incantations on papyri are the origins of words like ‘Abracadabra.’”

The engravings on the amulets are of Greek, Hebrew and Egyptian gods and demigods. Hecate, the Greek goddess of witchcraft, is featured prominently on some stones while others depict Yahweh, the Hebrew god.

“What’s really interesting about them is that people in the Greco-Roman world are taking these names from all over the Eastern Mediterranean and using them on these magical gems,” says Darnell. “We know sort of how they were used because there are magical papyri in Greek and in Demotic and some of these texts make specific reference to what you did with these amulets.”

Darnell proceeds to read from a translation of a magical papyrus that he has on hand:

“Take a lodestone and on it have carved a three face Hecate and after the carving is done, clean with natron and water and dip it in the blood of one who has died a violent death, then make a food offering to it and say the spell at the time of the ritual.”

Also featured on the stones is Abrasax, the Eastern Mediterranean god of Magic who Darnell believes traces his origins from the Ancient Egyptians. He shows an image of the tomb of Rameses II and explains that the double snake motif of Abrasax and that depicted on the tomb are one and the same.

“These things have a very, very old Egyptian pedigree,” he says. “They basically create a kind of magical God for the worshippers who doesn’t really exist in specific religions. It is the attempt to make a pantheistic god who is made up of all the great gods you can imagine.”

But do these stones do anything?

Darnell smiles and explains that Egyptian medicine was based not only on magic, but also on medical praxis. So the stones and the medicine went together – the stones provided psychological assurance and the medicine physical treatment.

But one should still be careful when touching the stones — a student in Darnell’s 2007 seminar “Egypt and Northeast Africa: A multidisciplinary approach” said the students were told to “be careful what they thought of” while handling the gems.


8. Dura Europos remains

In 1920, during the Arab Revolt, a British soldier digging a trench in what is now Syria chanced upon set of wall paintings that were marvelously preserved. This was the first time since the fall of the fort of Dura Europos to the Sassanid Empire in 256 or 257 A.D. that anyone had seen the remains of what was once a mighty Roman stronghold.

Due to unrest in the region, it was not until 1928 that extensive archaeological excavations could begin. Teams sponsored by Yale and the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres began to plunder the site and ship their findings back to Damascus, the United States and France. The excavations ended in 1937, by which time 12,000 pieces of clothing, weapons, wall paintings and other remains had found their way back to the Yale University Art Gallery.

Dura was an incredibly multicultural city and the findings certainly reflect that:

“It was a crossroads in the region — traders would go through, caravans would go through,” explains Lisa Brody ’91, the YUAG’s associate curator of ancient art. “What’s wonderful about the site for scholars is that it’s very well preserved, and that the archaeological remains reflect all of these different cultures interacting — especially, for example, the religions.”

The city of Dura had a Mithraic temple, an early Christian chapel and a synagogue, which were all sent back to Yale as complete as possible. Reconstructions of the whole Mithraic temple and Christian chapel’s baptistry were built in the 1980s and housed at the YUAG, but now the entirety of the collection is kept at an off-site storage facility in Hamden.

“We are in the process of evaluating the condition of the objects from the Dura excavation and beginning conservation treatment,” says Brody, who laments that students are not able to see the collection.

She said she hopes to organize a travelling exhibition of the objects starting in February 2011, before the space for the collection to be permanently housed and exhibited (including the reconstruction of the Mithraic temple, but not the baptistery, which will be digitally reconstructed) is completed in 2012.

Until then, interested parties can view the objects on ARTstor.com if they can’t charm their way into the off-site facility.

The other seven items are pretty interesting as well. Jack Sasson also flags 1. The Voynich Manuscript, 6. The Comparative Literature Library, and 9. Holy Land U.S.A. on the Agade list

ANOTHER REVIEW of the Dead Sea Scrolls Exhibition at the Royal Ontario Museum, this one by Deanna Henderson in The Strand, the student newspaper of the University of Toronto. Excerpt:

Just as the text of the scrolls remains relevant, so does the controversy around them. From geo-historical tensions to questions among scholars to the recent dispute of ownership between Palestine and Israel, debate seems to be synonymous with the scrolls. All of these debates are and will become part of the Dead Sea Scrolls' history. An aspect of history which may perhaps be incorporated in exhibits in the future, adding another layer to our understanding of the scrolls.

BEN HUR LIVE AT O2 opened last night in London. The BBC rounds up reviews. Most reviewers seemed to find it boring. The Aramaic and Latin may not have helped, alas.

Background here.

L IS FOR LILITH.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 5770! Rosh Hashanah begins this evening at sundown.

UPDATE (19 September): Ahoy Vey, Matey! In an important cosmic synchronicity, Rosh HaShanah coincides this year with Talk Like a Pirate Day.

ALEXANDER THE SEXY? I guess he would like that better than Alexander the itsy bitsy.

A DEAD SEA SCROLLS EXHIBITION is coming to St. Paul, Minnesota, in March. The exhibition website is here.

UPDATE: There's a more detailed Reuters article here. I can't find specifics of which scrolls will be on display apart from "three sets of five."

TECHNOLOGY WATCH:

New Genetic Research Indicates Jewish Priesthood Has Multiple Lineages

UA [University of Arizona] geneticist Michael Hammer and his colleages used a larger number of DNA markers to trace the ancient bloodline to more than one source.

By University Communications
September 16, 2009

Recent research on the Cohen Y chromosome indicates the Jewish priesthood, the Cohanim, was established by several unrelated male lines rather than a single male lineage dating to ancient Hebrew times.

The new research builds on a decade-old study of the Jewish priesthood that traced its patrilineal dynasty and seemed to substantiate the biblical story that Aaron, the first high priest (and brother of Moses), was one of a number of common male ancestors in the Cohanim lineage who lived some 3,200 years ago in the Near East.

[...]

Seems to me that there's an awfully big leap between the first paragraph and the second.

MORE ON THE APHRODITE FIGURINES discovered recently at Hippos (Sussita): At the time of the original annoucement I queried the dating of the figurines to 1500 years ago and asked if there was an Aphrodite cult that recently. This latest release indicates that the date is correct and there were still worshipers of Aphrodite at the time:

Figurines Of Aphrodite From Roman Empire Era Discovered In Hippos

ScienceDaily (Sep. 15, 2009) — An ancient treasure comprising three figurines of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, which was buried for over 1,500 years, was uncovered during the tenth season of excavations that are carried out by researchers of the Zinman Institute of Archaeology at the University of Haifa, headed by Prof. Arthur Segal and Dr. Michael Eisenberg.

"It is possible that during the fourth century [CE], when Christianity was gradually becoming the governing religion in the Roman Empire, there were still a number of inhabitants in Sussita who remained loyal to the goddess of love and therefore wished to hide and preserve these items," suggests Prof. Segal.

The hidden figurines were discovered when the researchers exposed a shop in the southeastern corner of the forum district of Sussita, which is the central area of the Roman city that was built in the second century BCE, existed through the Roman and Byzantine periods and destroyed in the great earthquake of 749 CE. According to the researchers, it was clear that the followers had wished to hide the figurines, as they were found complete. The clay pieces are 23 cm tall and represent the common model of the goddess of love known to the experts as Venus pudica, "the modest Venus." This name was given to the form due to its upright stature and the figure's covering her private parts with the palm of her hand – perhaps another reason for concealing them from the new religion that presided over the empire.

[...]

Also, this Bible and Interpretation article covers the same ground but has additional photos.

THE MINGANA COLLECTION at Birmingham University has a shiny new home in the refurbished Muirhead Tower, as reported by the Birmingham Post:

The university’s Special Collections will be based in the purpose-built Cadbury Research Library, bringing all the university’s collections under one roof including the famous Mingana collection of middle-eastern manuscripts.

The space has been designed to be fire and moisture protected and temperature controlled to protect the priceless collection, which consists mainly of Arabic and Syriac Middle Eastern manuscripts, a very small number of Hebrew/Jewish works, coins, seals and a few clay tablets.

The Collection was founded in Birmingham between 1925 and 1929 by Edward Cadbury who named it after its collector, Alphonse Mingana.

More on the Mingana Collection here.

THE ONLINE JOURNAL OF HEBREW SCRIPTURES has published a new article:

Oded Lipschits

Persian Period Finds from Jerusalem:
Facts and Interpretations

Abstract

The Babylonian, Persian and early Hellenistic periods are unique in the history of Judah. They represent a kind of "interlude" between two periods of greatness and political independence. This article discusses the archaeological finds from Jerusalem in the Persian and Early Hellenistic periods. It includes an assessment of the scope of the built-up area of the city, and an estimate of the city's population, on the basis of the archaeological data. This article's emphasis on the importance of the Ophel hill as the main built-up area in the Persian and Early Hellenistic period is unique in present archaeological and historical research of ancient Jerusalem.

A JOB IN JEWISH HISTORY at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.