JHS special issue on SF and the Bible

THE JOURNAL OF HEBREW SCRIPTURES (SPECIAL ISSUE): Frauke UHLENBRUCH (ed.), " 'Not in the Spaces We Know': An Exploration of Science Fiction and the Bible."

Abstract: The present issue is a collection of essays which were originally presented as conference papers at the “Science Fiction and the Bible” unit of the European Association of Biblical Studies in Leipzig (2013) and Vienna (2014). It includes an introduction by the editor, Frauke Uhlenbruch, as well as a response by James F. McGrath.

With contributions by Frauke Uhlenbruch, Francis Landy, Ian Wilson, Harold Torger Vedeler, Ryan Higgins and James F.McGrath.

I was going to call this to the attention of James McGrath but I see now, as I should have expected, that he is one of the contributors.

SBL 2016 report on Philo, Wisdom and Apocalypticism

PHILONICAL ET NEOTESTAMENTICA BLOG: Philo, Wisdom and Apocalypticism (Torrey Seland).

The SBL Annual Meeting is already an event of the past, some weeks have, in fact, gone by since I left San Antonio, heading back to Norway.

Nevertheless, as some other duties have kept me away from blog writing, I will post two pages here about two events I enjoyed very much. Hence this is not going to be about everything I enjoyed or experienced, but two selected events.

This post concerns the papers delivered at a seminar session on Wisdom and Apocalypticism, and focusing especially on Philo of Alexandria.

[...]

Palmyra as the rubble of pluralism

PALMYRA WATCH: The Rubble of Palmyra. ISIS did not merely blast apart old stones—it attacked the very foundations of pluralistic society (Leon Wieseltier, The Atlantic). A rambling and didactic, but sometimes interesting article. Two excerpts:

We call this the Ozymandian feeling, after Shelley’s stinging sonnet of 1818; but we might also call it the Palmyrene feeling, because it was articulated at greater length, and in inferior verse, by Shelley’s friend Thomas Love Peacock 12 years earlier, in a long poem called “Palmyra.” “Time asserts his empire over the ruins. ... This pomp of ruin presses on the heart…” Yet as the world contemplates the destruction of Palmyra—I mean its destruction in our day, on our watch—we must resist the customary romanticism. It induces an aesthetic passivity, which would go too nicely with the West’s political passivity.

You can read the full text of Thomas Love Peacock's poem "Palmyra" here.

A recent study describes the extraordinary variety of the “deities of the Palmyrene pantheon”: “Bel, Belti, Nebu, Nergal, and Nanai are of Babylonian origin; Balshammin and Belhammon seem to be from Phoenicia; Ishtar and Atargatis are Aramaean; Shadrafa and Elqonera are probably Canaanite; and Arab deities include Shamash, Allat, Abgal, Manawat, and a host of others.” The oasis was an oasis of differences. When one reads this catalog of coexisting divinities, one is reminded of the old Enlightenment argument, made against the exclusivist and bellicose tendencies of the monotheistic faiths, about the innate tolerance of a polytheistic universe. Where there is one God, there is one way. Where there are many gods, there are many ways. In Palmyra there were many gods and many ways. The Palmyrene spirit is precisely what theocrats seek to extirpate. In the West, we are all, perfectly or imperfectly, Palmyrenes.

Background on Palmyra, its history, the ancient Aramaic dialect spoken there (Palmyrene), and the city's tragic recent fate in the hands of ISIS is here with many, many links.

Interview with José Manuel Cañas Reíllo

WILLIAM ROSS: LXX SCHOLAR INTERVIEW: JOSÉ MANUEL CAÑAS REÍLLO (Septuaginta &C. Blog). He is working on the Göttingen Septuagint edition of the Book of Judges.

HT Jim West. Some past interviews of LXX scholars by William Ross are noted here and links.

Dr. Madhavi Nevader

CONGRATULATIONS TO DR. MADHAVI NEVADER, who has just accepted a permanent position at the Divinity School of the University of St. Andrews as Lecturer in Hebrew Bible. Dr. Nevader has been in a temporary post here for nearly three years. She is an excellent colleague and we are delighted to have her fully on board.

You can read about one of her recent papers in this post.

Another SBL review of Hayes, What’s Divine About Divine Law?

ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Divine Law: Nominalist/Realist or Rational/Irrational? (Jonathan Klawans, ).

“In 2016, the History of Rabbinic Literature SBL section hosted a review panel of Dr. Christine Hayes’ book, What’s Divine About Divine Law? Dr. Jonathan Klawans continues the forum in its new home at AJR.”

Chris Hayes’s book is a path-breaking, wide-ranging, exhaustive study of a topic of crucial importance for Jewish studies in particular, and for legal/philosophical studies in a broader sense. The reader of the volume is enriched by learning a great deal about legal philosophy, as well as biblical, Greek, and rabbinic understandings of law. The greatest strength of the book is its clever and convincing trace of certain threads from the Greeks, through Philo and Paul, with rabbis then charting their own course in reaction: the distinctiveness of which in the ancient world has been heretofore under-appreciated. Hayes convincingly establishes that the rabbinic discourse on law is self-consciously distinct, moving in the opposite direction from a great deal of prior Jewish literature (to say nothing of Greco-Roman). It does this by denying that divine law is rational, true, fixed, natural and/or unchanging—all the things that properly characterize a divine/natural law from a Greco-Roman perspective.

I could go on saying nice things… but what’s the point of that? Let me proceed from here by highlighting two distinctions used in the book, one of which may be over-used and the other under-used. The over-used dichotomy is between nominalist and realist approaches to law; the under-used dichotomy is between rational and irrational laws. After discussing these two matters a bit, I’d like to think more about those efforts to reduce “the Law” to one or two principles—usually rational ones.

[...]

Another review in the same session by Beth Berkowitz was published by AJR and was noted here. And follow the links there for earlier posts on Hayes's book.

Ancient wine press at Ashkelon

ARCHAEOLOGY: 2,100-year-old wine press unearthed at Ashkelon construction site (Yori Yalon, Israel HaYom).

Wine press was discovered during an archaeological survey of a site slated for a new elementary school • Excavation director Ilan Peretz: We now know farming existed here much earlier than we thought • Press to be preserved as part of schoolyard.

Looting arrests in the Galilee

CAUGHT IN THE ACT: Three looters busted plundering ancient tomb in Galilee. Suspects caught in the act robbing graves, disturbing interred remains near Roman-era Jewish site mentioned in Talmud (Ilan Ben Zion, Times of Israel).

The Israel Antiquities Authority busted a gang of thieves in the act of plundering an ancient tomb in northern Israel over the weekend, the organization said in a statement Wednesday.

The illegal excavation caused “serious damage to the archaeological layers and the interred.” Human remains buried in the cave, believed dating to the Roman period, were disturbed, an IAA spokeswoman said.

It was unclear whether the tomb was Jewish, but the cave is associated with Horbat Mishkena, a Jewish village during the Roman period known to archaeologists from surveys and rabbinic literature.

[...]

Rabbi Steinsaltz recovering from a stroke

HOSPITALIZED: Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, Noted Torah Scholar, Recovering from Stroke (Marcy Oster, The Forward).

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Talmudist and Torah scholar Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz is recovering after suffering a stroke a week ago.

[...]

Best wishes to him for a speedy and full recovery. Rabbi Steinsaltz has been mentioned often in PaleoJudaica, mostly regarding his Hebrew and English translations of the Talmud, on which more here and many links.

On King Herod the Great

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC: How King Herod Transformed the Holy Land. In the New Testament King Herod I is a villain, but the Herod of history was more complex, a consummate politician, ambitious builder, and master organizer who was able to balance the needs of the Judaean populace and the rulers of Rome (Antonio Piñero).

Few figures in history have had such a controversial reputation as King Herod I of Judaea. In the Christian tradition, Herod is the villain in the Christmas story. The Gospel of Matthew recounts how the king orders the death of all baby boys following the birth of Jesus, an event called the Massacre of the Innocents. Calling this king “great” hardly seems fitting, given that atrocity.

To many scholars, however, Herod’s honorific is deserved. The king of the Judaeans for the last part of the first century B.C. was a skilled administrator. He created magnificent public building works across Judaea, most notably the colossal reconstruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. Herod saved his people from famine in the mid-20s B.C. Although his reign was largely a time of peace and prosperity for Judaea, he was often treated with deep suspicion by his subjects.

[...]

He did develop the habit of killing people impulsively, especially those close to him. As the article later observes, this lends a certain plausibility to the story in Matthew, even though there is no historical evidence for it. But Herod also sponsored a prolific building program, with the result that a strikingly disproportionate number of ancient ruins surviving in Israel today are "Herodian."

Some past PaleoJudaica posts on Herod the Great and Herodium are here, here, here, here, here, and links. Cross-file under 'Tis the Season.

Sartre and Sartre, Palmyre

BRYN MAYR CLASSICAL REVIEW:

Annie Sartre, Maurice Sartre, Palmyre. Vérités et légendes. Paris: Perrin, 2016. Pp. 259. ISBN 9782262066154. €14.00 (pb).

Reviewed by Rubina Raja, Aarhus University (Rubina.Raja@cas.au.dk)

Preview

Palmyra has become a renewed focus of research in recent years due to interest in subjects outside the core regions of Rome and the Roman Empire; the massive destruction of Syria’s rich cultural heritage has also spurred a renewed interest in the site. Palmyra has also been in the spotlight due to the use of the site in Syrian state propaganda, and because it was a stronghold of the rebels and ISIS from May 2015 until spring 2016, when the city was recaptured by the Syrian state forces. The public beheading of the Director of Antiquities in Palmyra, Khaled al-As’ad, shook the world and the colleagues, who had known and worked with him for several decades. In the wake of this event several conferences and publications were dedicated to his memory and the book by Annie and Maurice Sartre is also to be seen as a product of the growing public and political attention given to the site. Much attention has been given to discussions about the potential reconstruction of the damaged and looted monuments. Since Palmyra is a World Heritage site, UNESCO has taken a particular interest in developing plans for the restoration of the unique oasis city, and scholars have begun to discuss the future of the site should the situation in Syria at some point allow for further work at the site.

Annie and Maurice Sartre's Palmyre is one of these studies, which on the one hand aims at giving the general public an insight and understanding of this unique site and on the other hand presents the potential pitfalls of massive reconstruction without detailed planning and involvement of the scholarly community. ...

Background on Palmyra is here (immediately preceding post) and links. Cross-file under Palmyra Watch.

Paris exhibition "Eternal Sites" (including Palmyra)

PALMYRA WATCH: As Palmyra falls, Paris heritage show looks to the future. Inaugurating an exhibit on endangered Middle Eastern heritage sites Tuesday, French President François Hollande called the show “a militant act”. But the curators are looking ahead to peace and reconstruction. (Leela JACINTO, France24).

These days, the city is being seized, liberated and seized again at such a dizzying pace, it’s hard to know what’s going on in the eastern Syrian desert city.

But now, in a museum thousands of miles away from the Syrian desert and a world apart from the ravages of war, the stones of this ancient city are telling a different story.

It’s a story that tends to get lost in the speed of modern life, with news cycles spinning out jihadist propaganda and politicians vowing to annihilate terrorists from the face of the earth.

A new show, "Eternal Sites: From Bamiyan to Palmyra," at the Grand Palais in Paris aims to highlight the indestructible legacy of endangered heritage sites. Inaugurated by Hollande and the UNESCO chief, Irina Bokova, on Tuesday, the free exhibition runs from December 14 to January 9.

Opening the show before a select audience Tuesday night, Hollande said the exhibit was dedicated to protecting world heritage. "This exhibition is a militant act for visitors who will come not because it’s free, but because they want to be actors, not just spectators, in protecting heritage," Hollande said.

[...]

Images of giant, sun-washed stone walls and crumbling mud bricks greet visitors as they enter three cavernous rooms at the Grand Palais. "Eternal Sites" offers viewers an immersive exploration of four inaccessible sites: Palmyra, the Crac de Chevaliers crusader castle, the Umayyad Mosque of Damascus, and Khorsabad, the ancient city in northern Iraq that was the capital of Assyrian King Sargon II, who ruled from 722 to 705 BC.

Meanwhile, I can find no certain news on the current situation in Palmyra, although there is a report that a counter-offensive by the Syrian Army is planned. And here's a statement from the Russian Government: Moscow: Fall of Palmyra is “Blow to the Entire Civilised Humankind” (Taha Abed alWahed, ASHARQ AL-AWSAT).

Background on Palmyra, its history, the ancient Aramaic dialect spoken there (Palmyrene), and the city's tragic recent fate in the hands of ISIS is here with many, many links.

SBL Pseudepigrapha Section 2017

LIV INGEBORG LIED: SBL Annual Meeting 2017 Pseudepigrapha CfP. The official call for papers opens on 19 December 2016. See the SBL website for more information. Cross-file under Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Watch.

Whose holy sites are the Western Wall tunnels?

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: Court Petition: Western Wall Tunnels a Holy Site for Christians, Muslims Too. Group of Israeli archaeologists say the tunnels run through, under, over and alongside religious sites holy to Judaism, Islam and Christianity (Nir Hasson, Haaretz).

The High Court of Justice has agreed to hear a petition asking why the Western Wall Tunnels have been declared a holy site for Jews and not for Muslims and Christians as well.

The petition was filed by Emek Shaveh, a group of archaeologists seeking to prevent the politicization of archaeology. It came after the Religious Services Ministry’s legal adviser, Hagay Avrahami, said in a letter the tunnels were governed by the regulations preserving Jewish holy sites because the entrance to them leads from the Western Wall Plaza.

This means that all the rules governing the Western Wall apply in the tunnels, as well as in the large spaces that have been discovered in recent years under homes in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City. The decision was made after a consultation with Israel’s chief rabbis, Avrahami said.

The petition states that these underground spaces, which have been excavated continuously since the early 1980s, also include structures holy to Christianity and Islam.

[...]

The point that the area has elements holy to Christianity and Islam is certainly correct, but it isn't clear to me what the practical issue is. Is there a process through the Religious Services Ministry that can declare sites holy to Christianity and Islam and was this neglected? What are the practical implications of the current declaration and what does Emek Shaveh want done about them? The answers to these questions may be obvious to those more familiar with these political structures in Israel, but they aren't obvious to me, and I wish the article had spelled them out more clearly.

Past posts on Emeq Shaveh's activities and its political perspective (which is not as objective as implied above) are here, here, here, here, and links. Some past PaleoJudaica posts on the tunnel excavations in Jerusalem are collected here.

Cross-file under Politics.

The Talmud on charging interest

THIS WEEK'S DAF YOMI COLUMN BY ADAM KIRSCH IN TABLET: Why the Talmud Allows Jews to Profit Off Gentiles. In this week’s ‘Daf Yomi’ Talmud study, focusing on religious duty over secular egalitarianism.

Tractate Bava Metzia centers on the concept of ownership: What does it mean, under Jewish law, to own a piece of property? And what happens when there is a dispute over ownership, or when one person takes possession of property that belongs to another? This kind of abuse can take several forms, ranging from straightforward theft to what the Talmud calls “exploitation”—a transaction in which one party takes illegal advantage of the other. But over the last two weeks, in Chapter Six of Bava Metzia, Daf Yomi readers have explored a different kind of crime against property—one that in our capitalist economy is not a crime at all. If it were, anyone who takes out a mortgage or a car loan, or who uses a credit card, would be guilty of it. This is the crime of lending or borrowing at interest, which is forbidden to Jews in Leviticus 25: “Do not take from him interest or increase, but fear your God, in order that your brother may live with you. You shall not give him money with interest, nor give him your food for increase.”

[...]

Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.

The first pictures of the ruins of Palmyra

PALMYRA WATCH: THE MYSTERY OF THE FIRST DRAWINGS OF PALMYRA: Part I: Who drew the first pictures of the ruins of Palmyra? AND Who drew this 'Curious Prospect' of Palmyra? (Zenobia Empress of the East Blog).

The current state of the site of Palmyra does not seem to be good. It appears that it has been fully recaptured by ISIS jihadists (see here for the story and follow the many links for background). There are many rumors about what is happening and what is to happen next, but I have not yet found solid information to which I think it is worth linking. Watch this space.

Meanwhile, Judith Weingarten takes us back to better times at Palmyra to solve a mystery from the early modern period.

Still another review of Fine, The Menorah

BOOK REVIEW: Scholar explores significance of menorah to Jews, Christians, Muslims (Eugene J. Fisher, Catholic News Service).

“The Menorah: From the Bible to Modern Times”
by Steven Fine.
Harvard University Press (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2016).
273 pp., $29.95.

Steven Fine, a professor of Jewish history at Yeshiva University in New York City, explores biblical, cultural and religious history through the lens of what he rightly calls in his conclusion “the oldest religious symbol in all of Western culture.”

[...]

Earlier reviews of the book are here and here.

Is El-Araj Bethsaida?

BIBLE PLACES BLOG: New Excavations at el-Araj, Possible Bethsaida (Todd Bolen). Todd thinks the identification would be premature.

War crimes prosecutions for captured jihadists?

ISIS WATCH: ISIS May Face War-Crime Charges for Destruction of Historic Sites (Owen Jarus, Live Science). This with reference to some suspected ISIS fighters who have surrendered during the Mosul campaign:

Because international law forbids the destruction of heritage sites, those who surrendered could face charges for war crimes, experts say. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) lists areas as World Heritage Sites for having special cultural or physical significance.

"These destructions may amount to a war crime, and UNESCO will do everything in its power to document the damage so that these attacks do not go unpunished," said Irina Bokova, director-general of UNESCO, said in a statement released on Nov 25, after Nimrud was recaptured.

That would be all to the good, but it would not surprise me if there were worse war crimes that captured jihadists could be prosecuted for.

Coin of the second year of the Great Revolt

NUMISMATICS: Minister Regev Presents 67 CE ‘Great Rebellion’ Coin at Cabinet Meeting (JNi.Media).

Culture and Sports Minister Miri Regev on Sunday presented at the start of the cabinet meeting a coin discovered by a team of her office about a month ago, as part of the preparation for the public revelation of the Pilgrims’ Road which was recently unearthed at the City of David. The presentation and the planned public event mark the coming jubilee of the liberation and unification of Jerusalem.

The coin bears on one side a vine leaf and the statement “Freedom of Zion.” On the opposite side it bears a standing cup and the statement “Second year of the great rebellion” – the year 67 CE.

[...]

Not quite. The coin reads "second year of" (שנת שתים) on one side and "the freedom of Zion" (חרת ציון) on the other. The word order seems a little odd, but I think that the two sides are intended to be read consecutively as a single phrase: "The second year of the freedom of Zion." It was indeed the second year of the so-called Great Rebellion or Great Revolt against Rome, but the coin itself does not use this term. (Follow the link above for a photo.)

This article is a little vague about the origin of the coin, but the Jerusalem Post has clearer coverage on that issue: ‘Free Zion’ coin minted 1,967 years ago unveiled (Herb Keinon).

The coin was uncovered during an excavation about a month ago of a recently uncovered road in Jerusalem. The excavation site will be opened to the public during Hanukka.

The recent UNESCO resolutions that play down the ancient Jewish connection with Jerusalem come in for some not-undeserved ridicule on the basis of this coin. As with the use of the Arch of Titus, at least this time the ancient origin of the artifact is not in question, unlike the case of the Jerusalem Papyrus. Cross-file under Politics.