Background on the Temple Mount Sifting Project is here (cf. here) and follow the many, many links.
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Saturday, September 12, 2020
The Sifting Project is a Trip Advisor top 10%
THE TEMPLE MOUNT SIFTING PROJECT: WE’RE IN THE TOP 10% OF ATTRACTIONS WORLDWIDE! The lack of international vistors in August seems to have been more than made up by Israeli visitors. That's good new, since things were looking grim at the end of July. It's also good to see the Sifting Project receiving this recognition.
Background on the Temple Mount Sifting Project is here (cf. here) and follow the many, many links.
Background on the Temple Mount Sifting Project is here (cf. here) and follow the many, many links.
The Sibylline Books and the Saecular Games
NUMISMATICS: Coins of the Ludi Saeculares and Rome’s Millennial Games (Steve Benner, CoinWeek).
To be clear, these Sibylline Oracles are the original Roman ones, which are almost entirely lost today. But they inspired derivative Sibylline Oracles composed by Christians and Jews. The latter have come up now and then at PaleoJudaica.
For past posts and background on the Sibylline Oracles, see here, here, here, and links. Cross-file under Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Watch and Punic Watch.
Even though the origins may go back as far as the fifth century BCE, the first celebration of the Saeculares games was in 249 BCE during the First Punic War. Due to a series of portents, the Sibylline books (a collection of oracular prophecies) were consulted, and it was decided by a group of priests called the quindecemviri that they should sacrifice to the underworld deities for three consecutive nights and hold games including chariot races. The Romans also had to swear to hold the Games every 100 years. As promised, the games were held again in 149 BCE during the Third Punic War. It was really at this time that the celebration became a regular centennial event.The Roman Ludi Saeculares (the decemcentennial celebrations of the anniversary of Rome's founding) were inspired by interpretation of the Sibylline Oracles during the Punic Wars. And some cool coins were minted to go with the celebrations.
To be clear, these Sibylline Oracles are the original Roman ones, which are almost entirely lost today. But they inspired derivative Sibylline Oracles composed by Christians and Jews. The latter have come up now and then at PaleoJudaica.
For past posts and background on the Sibylline Oracles, see here, here, here, and links. Cross-file under Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Watch and Punic Watch.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Sasanika
THE AWOL BLOG: Sasanika: Late Antique Near East Project.
The Sasanian (Sassanian) era is of considerable interest for the study of late-antique Judaism. This site looks like a useful resource. You can find many PaleoJudaica posts on the period in the archives. Some in the last few years are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
The Sasanian (Sassanian) era is of considerable interest for the study of late-antique Judaism. This site looks like a useful resource. You can find many PaleoJudaica posts on the period in the archives. Some in the last few years are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Steiner Festschrift - Biblical, Semitic and Jewish Studies
NEW BOOK FROM THE BIALIK INSTITUTE:
Semitic, Biblical and Jewish Studies
In Honor of Richard C. Steiner
Aron J. Koller, Mordechai Z. Cohen, Adina Moshavi (editors)
Publisher: Bialik Institute
Catalog number : 1111930
ISBN: 978-965-536-277-0
In collaboration with Michael Scharf Yeshiva University Press
Year Published: 2020
Pages: 434 English, 267 Hebrew
Cover: Hard
Language: English & Hebrew
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Friday, September 11, 2020
Gray on rabbinic charity
THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST TODAY: Charity (Tzedaqah) as a Late Antique Rabbinic Religious Idea (Alyssa M. Gray).
I noted the publication of Professor Gray's book, Charity in Rabbinic Judaism, here. And I have noted recent books on related topics here and here and links and here.
I noted the publication of Professor Gray's book, Charity in Rabbinic Judaism, here. And I have noted recent books on related topics here and here and links and here.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Magic Jesus?
BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Jesus Holding a Magic Wand? Supernatural Depictions of Jesus in Early Christian Art (Marek Dospěl). This essay is a summary of an article by Lee M. Jefferson in the current issue of BAR. The article is behind the subscription wall, but the essay is worth a read on its own.
There is more magic Jesus in the apocryphal traditions. For flying Jesus, see here and for shape-shifting Jesus, see here.
Cross-file under Iconography.
There is more magic Jesus in the apocryphal traditions. For flying Jesus, see here and for shape-shifting Jesus, see here.
Cross-file under Iconography.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Connecting Deuteronomy's deletion dots
PROFESSOR ALBERT L. BAUMGARTEN: Dots on Deuteronomy 29:28: A Polemical Response to Qumran’s Secret Laws (TheTorah.com).
“The secret things belong unto YHWH our God; but the things that are revealed belong unto us and to our children forever”—the verse has eleven dotted letters indicating erasure marks, but why? The answer lies in a controversial interpretation found in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Cuneiform tablet scans
THE AWOL BLOG: Cuneiform Tablet Collection at the Harvard Museum of the Ancient Near East (HMANE). (Formerly the Harvard Semitic Museum.)
These 3-D scans take some time to load, but they look very useful for puzzling out the 3-D cuneiform signs.
It looks like there is a lot of work to be done with this Harvard collection. One fun feature of it, is the Graeco-Babylonaica tablets: bilingual tablets containing lists of Akkadian or Sumerian words with Greek transliterations next to them. I couldn't find any of these in the scanned tablets, but I didn't look at anything like all of them.
These 3-D scans take some time to load, but they look very useful for puzzling out the 3-D cuneiform signs.
It looks like there is a lot of work to be done with this Harvard collection. One fun feature of it, is the Graeco-Babylonaica tablets: bilingual tablets containing lists of Akkadian or Sumerian words with Greek transliterations next to them. I couldn't find any of these in the scanned tablets, but I didn't look at anything like all of them.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Thursday, September 10, 2020
Handwriting at Arad revisited
FORENSIC EPIGRAPHY: TAU: Tel Arad texts show literacy in Kingdom of Judah was widespread. Researchers used state-of-the-art image processing and machine-learning technologies to analyze the texts, along with police forensic methods (HANNAH BROWN, Jerusalem Post).
You can read the technical PLOS ONE article that is the basis for the current story here.
I don't feel qualified to evaluate the technical elements of the study. I note that it made an effort to falsify the results:
As for the broader claims, as I said in 2016, we already have good indication that literacy was widespread in the kingdom of Judah c. 600 BCE. This study gives us no reason to think otherwise. The sample is still small, but it seems to offer some confirmation of that conclusion.
Stay tuned. Our tools for asking such questions continue to improve. Cross-file under Technology Watch.
In 2016, they decided that there were at least four different authors, possibly six, according to algorithms, statistical probability and textual evidence. Findings were published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.The 2016 study received a lot of attention. I blogged on it with my own comments here, here, and here, and I noted comments by George Athos here. More recently, the Arad ostraca have been in the news with the discovery of additional writing on the back of ostracon 16.
But they kept thinking of other ways to explore these questions, and the TAU researchers decided to compare the algorithmic methods, which have since been refined, to the forensic approach and invited [forensic handwriting specialist Yana] Gerber to join the team.
Using her forensic methods, Gerber found that the 18 texts were written by at least 12 distinct writers with varying degrees of certainty.
You can read the technical PLOS ONE article that is the basis for the current story here.
I don't feel qualified to evaluate the technical elements of the study. I note that it made an effort to falsify the results:
The second dataset, used to validate the two algorithms, contained handwriting samples collected from 18 present-day writers of modern Hebrew. This dataset allowed us to estimate the False Positive and False Negative rates for the algorithmic methods that we employed; it can be downloaded at [42]. It will be stressed that the modern Hebrew dataset was not used to train or calibrate the algorithm for its activation on the first, ancient Hebrew dataset (or vice versa). The purposes of the modern Hebrew dataset were algorithm verification and sanity check.The results of the "sanity check" were as follows:
Modern Hebrew script experimentA 95%+ success rate looks good. However, this cross-check seems only to have been applied to the algorithms. What about the human forensic analysis? It was the latter that found the larger number of writers for the Arad ostraca. Were her results cross-checked in a similar way? I could not find an answer to that question in the article, although I may have missed it.
The Modern Hebrew experiment yielded 4.76% False Positive and 2.66% False Negative error rates. These results demonstrate the soundness of our algorithmic sequence. In fact, taking into account the 0.1 threshold, the empirical error rates may indicate “conservativeness”of our p-values estimation.
As for the broader claims, as I said in 2016, we already have good indication that literacy was widespread in the kingdom of Judah c. 600 BCE. This study gives us no reason to think otherwise. The sample is still small, but it seems to offer some confirmation of that conclusion.
Stay tuned. Our tools for asking such questions continue to improve. Cross-file under Technology Watch.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Online memorial for Rabbi Steinsaltz
THE STEINSALTZ LEGACY: Prime Minister Netanyahu, actress Mayim Bialik speak at Rabbi Steinsaltz tribute. Event pays tribute to renowned Torah scholar Rabbi Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz a month after his passing (Arutz Sheva).
Background here and links.
Background here and links.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Marguerite Harl, 1919-2020
WILLIAM A. ROSS: REMEMBERING THE WORK OF MARGUERITE HARL († 30 AUGUST 2020).
It is with sadness and gratitude that the Septuagint scholarly community is commemorating the life and work of Professor Marguerite Harl, who passed away just over a week ago at the remarkable age of 101 in her hometown of Paris, France.Requiescat in pace.
[...]
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Brown et al. (ed.), Reading Other Peoples’ Texts
NEW BOOK FROM BLOOMSBURY/T&T CLARK:
Reading Other Peoples’ Texts
Social Identity and the Reception of Authoritative Traditions
Editor(s): Ken S. Brown, Alison L. Joseph, Brennan Breed
Published: 05-14-2020
Format: Hardback
Edition: 1st
Extent: 304
ISBN: 9780567687333
Imprint: T&T Clark
Series: Scriptural Traces, The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies
Dimensions: 6 1/8" x 9 1/4"
List price: $115.00
Online price: $103.50
Save $11.50 (10%)
About Reading Other Peoples’ Texts
This volume draws together eleven essays by scholars of the Hebrew Bible, New Testament, Greco-Roman religion and early Judaism, to address the ways that conceptions of identity and otherness shape the interpretation of biblical and other religiously authoritative texts.
The contributions explore how interpreters of scriptural texts regularly assume or assert an identification between their own communities and those described in the text, while ignoring the cultural, social, and religious differences between themselves and the text's earliest audiences. Comparing a range of examples, these essays address varying ways in which social identity has shaped the historical contexts, implied audiences, rhetorical shaping, redactional development, literary appropriation, and reception history of particular texts over time. Together, they open up new avenues for studying the relations between social identity, scriptural interpretation, and religious authority.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Wednesday, September 09, 2020
More on those Phoenician figurines
PHOENICIAN WATCH: Long-lost Phoenician figurines could reveal secrets to ancient cult. “They were wrapped in newspapers from the 70s and covered in these brittle plastic bags that crumbled as soon as you touched them” (Hannah Brown, Jerusalem Post).
This article gives some new information, especially about the history of the assemblage after its discovery.
Joseph Lauer has also provided a reference for the technical article behind this story: Shipwreck or Sunken Votives? The Shavei Zion Assemblage Revisited (Meir Edrey Adi Erlich Assaf Yasur‐Landau, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology).
It is behind a subscription wall, but I have been able to read it. It answers my question about whether the finds are of Phoenician origin (i.e, from the Levantine coast) or Punic origin (from Carthage and its satellites). The origins of the clay and the pottery forms show clearly that they are of Phoenician origin. That's interesting in that it provides new evidence for the worship of the goddess Tanit in Phoenicia. My understanding (but this is not my expertise) is that there was previously little evidence for that.
Background here. Cross-file under Marine (Maritime, Underwater) Archaeology and Not a Shipwreck.
This article gives some new information, especially about the history of the assemblage after its discovery.
Joseph Lauer has also provided a reference for the technical article behind this story: Shipwreck or Sunken Votives? The Shavei Zion Assemblage Revisited (Meir Edrey Adi Erlich Assaf Yasur‐Landau, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology).
It is behind a subscription wall, but I have been able to read it. It answers my question about whether the finds are of Phoenician origin (i.e, from the Levantine coast) or Punic origin (from Carthage and its satellites). The origins of the clay and the pottery forms show clearly that they are of Phoenician origin. That's interesting in that it provides new evidence for the worship of the goddess Tanit in Phoenicia. My understanding (but this is not my expertise) is that there was previously little evidence for that.
Background here. Cross-file under Marine (Maritime, Underwater) Archaeology and Not a Shipwreck.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Archaeology and the "Deal of the Century"
ARCHAEOLOGICAL POLITICS: The historic battle for Israel’s heritage. Hundreds of heritage and archaeology sites in Judea and Samaria are reportedly slated to be removed from Israeli control and transferred to the jurisdiction of the proposed Palestinian state (NAOMI LINDER KAHN, Jerusalem Post, Jerusalem Report).
Background here and links.
Background here and links.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
On ancient synagogues
BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Ancient Synagogues in Israel and the Diaspora. What is the meaning of “synagogue” in the Bible? (Megan Sauter). This BHD essay was first published in 2015, but I seem to have missed it then. It introduces a BAR article on the subject by Professor Rachel Hachlili, which is behind the subscription wall.
For some PaleoJudaica posts on ancient synagogues, see here and here and links.
For some PaleoJudaica posts on ancient synagogues, see here and here and links.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Hugoye 23.1
A NEW ISSUE: Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies 23.1 (2020). This is a high-quality, peer-review, open-access journal. Issue 22.1 (2019) was noted here (updated link here). And for more, follow the links from either of those links. Cross-file under Syriac Watch.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Tuesday, September 08, 2020
2020 Aramaic Enoch Conference
ONLINE CONFERENCE: 2020 Aramaic Enoch Conference.
From the Books of Enoch to Genesis Apocryphon:Attendance is free, but registration (at the link) is required. Registration is now open.
Aramaic Manuscripts of 1 Enoch and Related Aramaic Traditions from Qumran
October 20-22, 2020
International Conference on the Aramaic Manuscripts of 1 Enoch
organized by the Institute of Biblical Studies (KUL, Lublin, Poland)
in collaboration with the Enoch Seminar
- Chairs: Henryk Drawnel and Gabriele Boccaccini
- Secretary: Joshua Scott
The tentative schedule is there as well. Looks like an excellent lineup.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Unsung Qumran excavators
VARIANT READINGS: Two Unheralded Excavators of Cave 1 at Qumran: Ibrahim Asuli and Mohamed Mustafa. Brent Nongbri has been doing more photographic detective work.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
Review of Garroway, Growing Up in Ancient Israel
ANCIENT JEW REVIEW: Book Note I Growing Up in Ancient Israel: Children in Material Culture and Biblical Texts (Caralie Focht).
Kristine Henriksen Garroway, Growing Up in Ancient Israel: Children in Material Culture and Biblical Texts. Atlanta: SBL Press, 2018.For more on Professor Garroway's work on children in ancient Israel and the ancient Near East, see here and links. She has co-edited another book in the area in 2020, noted here.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
More on those Jerusalem architectual fragments
BIBLE HISTORY DAILY: Architectural Artifacts from First Temple Period Found. Rare architectural details of Proto-Aeolic style discovered on the Armon Hanatziv Promenade (Jonathan Laden). A good overview of the new discoveries, without a sensationalistic headline.
Background here.
Background here.
Visit PaleoJudaica daily for the latest news on ancient Judaism and the biblical world.
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