Mysteries of the Global Flood Revealed!

In a culture where writing on the Bible will always be too secular for some people and too prone to apologetics for others, published works in biblical history might seek to more carefully emulate Caesar’s wife, avoiding even the appearance of (fideistic) impropriety.

Yesterday, I called attention to an infelicitous phrase in King and Stager’s Life in Biblical Israel (Westminster/John Knox Press, 2001). Writing about a Pre-Pottery Neolithic olive processing site on the sea floor off modern ʿAtlit (that’s south of Haifa, or south of Mount Carmel), King and Stager had written that the site was

…inundated in the mid-sixth millennium, probably by a world-wide flood.

The paragraph referenced Ehud Galili, “Prehistoric Site on the Sea Floor,” New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land, 1:120-122. There, I find this ’graph (emphasis mine):

About twenty thousand years ago, the last Ice Age reached its peak. Soon afterward, the melting ice caused a rise in sea level that resulted in a significant reduction of coastal plains throughout the world. By the beginning of the Holocene, however, in about 8000 BCE, the Mediterranean was about 30 m lower than its present self.

In other words:

1. About 20,000 years ago, the most recent glaciation event (not an “ice age,” which are longer, such that we may well still be between glaciation events in a single Ice Age) peaked, with sea levels rising between then and now (on average, that is, with relatively short term accelerations and decelerations set aside).


2. By 10,000 years ago (around 8,000 BCE), waters had risen nearly, but not yet, to a then-coastal site settled by folks who press olives.


3. By about 7500 years ago (ca. 5500 BCE), waters had risen enough that the increasingly-sodden coastal site was abandoned, though not necessarily precipitously (King and Stager will note that no olives are left unprocessed at the site). Today, it is under water.

In King and Stager, this 15,000+ year rising of sea levels, with coastal sites gradually shifting landward, is collapsed into a “world-wide flood” that “inundates” the site “in the mid-sixth millennium.”

This choice of words obviously, and unfortunately, evokes the biblical story of an instantaneous and cataclysmic global flood (Gen 6–8). This evocation is equally damaging for biblical studies, whether the audience is those who read Gen 1–11 as history, or those who suspect with dismay that all biblical historians will do so.

This confusion, about whether the biblical narrative is being uncritically accepted, is compounded by a habit that King and Stager share with other biblical historians, whereby biblical narrative episodes are presented in language that presupposes their historicity. For just one example, (page 109),

The terebinth…gave its name to the Valley of Elah, where David slew Goliath (1 Sam. 17:19).

Not, “where David is said to have slain Goliath,” but “where David slew Goliath.” It is as if a writer on ancient Greece were to say, “Troy archaeological level VIIa is topped with a destruction layer, including burn marks to the walls outside of which Achilles slew Hector.”

This writerly habit could be explored further in another post. Here, I simply offer it as the kind of thing that makes it hard to know what to do with a cursory reference to “a world wide flood” in an academic, peer-reviewed work on the history of ancient Israel.

What would you say, reader? Do I make too big a deal over nothing? Or, in the context of larger conversations about isolating the fideistic from the evidentiary in biblical studies, does every molehill deserve scrutiny?

[Mysteries of the Global Flood Revealed! was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/03/10. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

A Pious Scribal Addition?

This sentence, in King and Stager’s Life in Biblical Israel* (page 96), made me do a double-take (brackets represent my own clarifying additions):

Evidence for a wild olive processing site from the [Pre-Pottery Neolithic period] has been found on the sea floor at Maritime ʿAtlit south of Haifa, inundated in the mid-sixth millennium [B.C.], probably by a world-wide flood, after the olives had been processed.

“…probably by a world-wide flood…”?

The sentence concludes with a footnote (Ehud Galili, “Prehistoric Site on the Sea Floor,” New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land, 1:120-122), but is not a block quote. We have this resource in our library, so I will check it out, but by their formatting, King and Stager seem to be at least taking ownership of the claim, if not outright producing it.

Did somebody go and demonstrate a mid-sixth-millennium global inundation without telling me? Or is there some other reading of the text that eludes me?

(Perhaps this is a case for the Lenzi Files.)

[Later: See also the follow-up post on this topic.]

(*) Why would Westminster/John Knox choose not to have persistent links to their own books on their web site, instead of out-linking to Cokesbury? Even if sales are through Cokesbury, why not at least keep information about the book in the publisher’s site? Talk about rushing customers out the door.

[A Pious Scribal Addition? was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/03/09. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Bread-making in the Ancient Near East

This is a request for resources. I plan to begin some research into bread-making in ancient Israel and in the ancient Near East. I will focus on bread production in the home, but am casting a wide net here at the beginning. So, I will even be looking into biblical grain offerings.

A live-yeast bread maker myself, I have from time to time essayed some early experiments in naan-type leavened flat loaves and in unleavened flat breads. I also have my eye on the kinds of sticky, wet doughs possibly suggested by the “queen of heaven” bread-molds and other terra cotta molds.

Without discounting the explanatory value of evidence from common-era societies, I mean to limit myself to primary evidence from Egypt, the Levant, and Mesopotamia, in the Bronze and Iron ages; perhaps, too, the Achaemenid  period around Judea.

Are there are resources you think I should take special care to find? Anything I might fruitfully keep in mind as I get started?

[Bread-making in the Ancient Near East was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2020/03/08. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Who's Reading Context of Scripture?

If you visited the last Biblical Studies Carnival, then you’ll know that Joseph is reading Hallo and Younger’s The Context of Scripture (3 vols; Brill, 1997) in a year, and so am I. Charles Halton had come up with the reading schedule at New Year’s, but one could join in any time.

Is anyone else reading CoS in a year, and posting about it occasionally? If so, please let me know. I don’t want to miss out on any posts.

[Who's Reading Context of Scripture? was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/03/04. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Dressing Like A Professor

A good friend of mine tells me about a seminar in which an uncomfortable, even heated, exchange arose over “dressing like a professor.”

For my part, I used to dress informally when teaching. In short order, I realized that:

• I look younger than many of my students;


• I am younger than many of my students;


• Many of my students don’t respect the au-tho-ri-tah of some kid in jeans. Even in jeans and a sweater. Even in sunglasses.

So, pretty early on, I learned that I have to “suit up.”



Except for my tennies. And except for examination days, when according to custom so long-standing as to amount to superstition on my part, I make a point of dressing down.

Besides, in the immortal words of Joey “the lips” Fagan, “All the Motown brothers wore suits. You play better in your suit.”

[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_tOW2TWmtY"] (update: now blocked by user)

Of course—the devil is always in the details—there are still the finer points, especially for women (after all, why should this be an area where professional women don’t live in a perpetual double-bind)? Must a prof be dowdy? Is it possible to be too hip? Or even too (gasp) “feminine” (that is, shaped vaguely like a human female)?

So, for your part: what does it mean for you to “dress like a professor”? To what extent may a professor “embrace her/his inner fashionista (or fashionisto)”?

[Dressing Like A Professor was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/03/03. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Biblical Studies Carnival LI

I dub this month’s Biblical Studies Carnival to be the “Blogroll Amnesty Edition,” because it embodies in part God's preferential option (on February 3rd, anyway) for the smaller blogs. I had asked that contributors give special consideration to the smaller blogs in this carnival, and several did. So, to the small fry linked herein: happy hit counts to us!

In accordance with venerable tradition (i.e., Duane did it), I am offering this Carnival in two parts. The first part is “Your Carnival,” and includes posts nominated to the carnival. The second part is “My Carnival,” and includes posts that I rounded up on my own. Again, “My Carnival,” in the spirit of February’s “Blogroll Amnesty Day,” will comprise mostly (but not only) posts from blogs that are sub-Top 50.

Your Carnival:

Old Testament and Suchlike:

The bloggers (in the persons of Darrell Pursiful and Tsalampouni Ekaterini) called our attention to Richard Hess on personal names in Gen 1–11.

Suzanne at Suzanne’s Bookshelf looks at Gen 3:16 ("and thy desire shall be to thy husband," KJV), specifically the meaning of the woman's desire.

Busybody Loren Rosson looks at Israelite/Judaean land ethics in the context of Philip Esler’s review (PDF) of Ellen Davis' Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

Claude Mariottini takes a closer look at the Song of Solomon, including Song 1:5 (“I am black and/but beautiful”).

David Stark at NTinterpretation is engaged with Martin Abegg on the meaning of “works of the Torah” for the Qumran community.

The New Testament and Suchlike:

Cynthia R. Nielsen at Per Caritatem has written a well thought piece on Eschatological Developments Within the Pauline Corpus.

Stephen Carlson at Hypotyposeis looks at the translation of σαρξ in Galatians 3:3.

On NT pod, Mark Goodacre lays out some of his case against the hypothetical Q source.

The Pistis Christou debate is alive and well at James Gregory’s All Things Ephesians, as he reviews a portion of Bird and Sprinkle’s The Faith of Jesus Christ: Exegetical, Biblical, and Theological Studies (Milton Keynes, U.K., and Peabody, Mass.: Paternoster and Hendrickson, 2009).

As a part of his series on Foucault at Political Jesus, Rod of Alexandria defends deconstruction and looks at the concept of Pauline “authorship.” See, too, the response by J.K. Gayle at Aristotle’s Feminist Subject.

(I have taken the “mythicism” conversation out of the NT section and given it its own area: see further below.)

Teaching and Writing:

Karyn at Boulders2Bits writes a thorough pre-publication review, with excerpts, of Jo Ann Hackett’s A Basic Introduction to Biblical Hebrew (with CD) (Hendrickson, 2010). How much would you pay for Karyn’s review? Don’t answer! There’s more! She has also reviewed Bordreuil and Pardee’s A Manual of Ugaritic (Eisenbrauns, 2009).

Alan Lenzi at Feeling Finite asks, “When Should Editors Step In and Say ‘Not on My Watch,’” concerning William Barrick’s review of Hill, Andrew E., and John H. Walton, A Survey of the Old Testament. What ideas about the history of ancient Israel or the composition history of biblical texts is an academic journal obliged to entertain? What ideas is it obliged to dismiss as unsupportable?

(Late breaker: the question is raised anew in Alan’s space in response to another RBL review, this time Bruce Waltke’s review of Michael Fox’s Proverbs 10–31: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary [Yale University Press, 2009]. What is the role of confessional assertions about the Bible in peer-reviewed review articles representing the Society of Biblical Literature?)

ZOMG! Mythicism! And Stuff!

The Big Conversation of the month, though, had to have been that started and maintained by James McGrath on the subject of "mythicism," or the claim that the person Jesus Christ never existed in history. In a month-long dialogue spawning thousands of comments and dozens of responsive posts elsewhere, James found himself in a polygonal conversation with (caution: overlapping categories ahead) mythicists, creationists, atheists, and his fellow bibliobloggers.

I’ll offer links to James’ posts, then to some of the responses that I found. There is just no way for me to be comprehensive about this, but I figure that 1) if you were in the conversation, you will have caught what I’ve missed, and 2) if you are new to the conversation, this is more than enough to get you immersed.

Here is James, with the titles often paraphrased. If you would rather see all these on one page (albeit in reverse order), just search for “mythicism” on James’ blog. Here we go: mythicist misunderstanding (Feb 6), the discussion spreads (Feb 8), microexistence v. macroexistence (Feb 9), accusations and assumptions (Feb 9), more creationist parallels (Feb 10), creationism and ID (Feb 11), death of mythical messiah (Feb 11), Tacitus on mythicism (Feb 12), publishing on historical Jesus (Feb 14), YECs are like mythicists (Feb 14), yet more mythicist/creationist parallels (Feb 16), unreasonable faith and Jesus’s existence (Feb 17), not all atheists are mythicists (Feb 18), is there evidence for mythicism (Feb 19), mythicism and John the Baptist (Feb 20), mythunderstanding the criteria of authenticity (Feb 21), mythicism and historicism as theories (Feb 22), mythicism and paradigm shifts (Feb 23), at long last I understand mythicism (Feb 24), mything links (Feb 27).

Mid-month, Mike Koke at the Golden Rule took time to gather the links to date and offered a response with reference to 1 Thess 2:14-15, and also with reference to an earlier “historicity of Jesus” post of his own.

Neil Godfrey at Vridar was a steady interlocutor, arguing for the validity of questioning the historicity of Jesus (Feb 4), against misunderstandings on the part of historicists (Feb 9), and against circular arguments on Jesus’s historicity (Feb 11). (The dates should help you cross reference to James’ posts listed above.)

John Hobbins at Ancient Hebrew Poetry offered some considered judgments on the analogy from King Arthur (Feb 9) and on whether Albert Schweitzer can be called a mythicist (Feb 13).

Undoubtedly I have only scratched the surface on this topic. I assure you that I have left no-one out intentionally. I invite readers (and writers) to supplement my links to the “mythicism” conversation in the comments to this carnival.




My Carnival:

Technology:

Tim Bulkeley at SansBlogue wants to know what biblical scholars could do with an online information visualization tool.

Language, Linguistics, and Translation:

Peter Bekins of בלשנות literally had the audience drooling over linguistics at the Midwest SBL.

Crescat Graffiti blesses us with three great words that sound great together: Hieroglyphic…sex…graffiti.

In the “No, no, you can’t do that!” department, Doug “Clayboy” Chaplin alerts us to Preachers! Using! Greek! Claptrap detectors out, everyone.

(Oh, and speaking of claptrap, Jason at Εις Δοξαν reminds us that we can never, never get tired of the comedic preaching stylings of Steven Anderson.)

Tim at SansBlogue is reading Seth Sanders’ The Invention of Hebrew (University of Illinois Press, 2009). Join him for first impressions, the introduction, the first and last ’graphs, chapter one, and chapter two.

On the perennially favored topic of apologetic translation, David Ker at Better Bibles engages a post by Daniel Kirk at Storied Theology on theological manipulation in a translation of Gal 5:6.

Timothy at Catholic Bibles wants to hear you state your case for your favorite Bible translation (h/t to Qohelet at the Bible Critic).

Inscriptions and ancient texts:

Steve Wiggins of Sects and Violence in the Ancient World sees only “escapees from Flatland” (awesome literary ref there, Steve) in a bit of iconography claimed to represent Yahweh and his Asherah.

With a work in the hands of the printers, Alan Lenzi of Feeling Finite is now “off and running” on Reading Akkadian Prayers.

Speaking of reading Akkadian poetry: Beware of abnormal side effects! Duane is having Crazy Thoughts About Blindness and Reading Clay Tablets.

At כל־האדם, Joseph has continued to read The Context of Scripture. Here at Anumma, I have tried to do my part. We’re reading CoS in a year at the January 1st invitation of Charles Halton at Awilum.

Old Testament:

Paavo at מה יתרון has been working through Perdue on empire in Proverbs and in Job.

In response to Julia O’Brian’s piece in The Bible and Interpretation, “Biblical Scholarship and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,” Phil Sumpter at Narrative and Ontology has been reflecting on Biblical Scholarship and the State of Israel, and on ethnic Israel and Esther.

Qohelet’s church accidentally made a comedic case against (or for?) lectio continua. Or, at least against randomized selections from Deuteronomy.

Genesis and Stuff:

Thomas Verenna is one of several who observed Darwin Day on their Bible-related blogs.

Steve Wiggins finds that the scientific fact of evolution is, in the United States at least, still Out of Reach.

At כל־האדם, Joseph Kelly reacts to Strimple’s Historical Adam essay, calling it on the fallacious “argument from abbhorent consequences.” (It is fortuitous, then, that a related lecture came to Joseph from Princeton Theological Seminary.)

At Biblia Hebraica, Doug Mangum follows up on Joseph’s post, with  a related word on the similarly fallacious “argument from the NT.”

Nijay Gupta offers recommendations for reading on Genesis and theology.

New Testament:

Wright on Paul, now made easy! See N.T. Wright for Everyone: The Apostle Paul, by Nijay Gupta.

Qohelet (The Bible Critic) endorsed the “analogy from Arthur” that was offered by Eric Reitan beginning with a comment to the historical Jesus discussion. (Above, as a respondent in the “mythicism” section, John Hobbins also weighs in on Arthur).

Also relating to the Historical Jesus, Phil Harland (Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean) continued his podcast series on Studying the Historical Jesus with parts two and three.

At NT/History Blog, Bill Heroman is thinking on “Synagogue” in James 2:3.

Little help now! Patrick McCullough at kata ta biblia is looking for assistance on NT manuscript preservation as reception history, and also needs a good title for an SBL session (not a paper, a session).

Conclusion:

Well, I’m about wiped out. Don’t delay to begin nominating posts to the next Biblical Studies Carnival (instructions for nominating at that link). I will edit this preliminary information upon confirmation, but unofficial rumor has it that the redoubtable Jim West will take next month’s Carnival into his own strong hand and outstretched arm. [That’s a ’firm.]

Thanks for the opportunity to steer the ship this month, and I hope that everyone who enjoyed the Carnival will consider hosting when they may.

[Biblical Studies Carnival LI was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/03/01. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

A Wiki Bible (at כל־האדם)

I will write more substantively on this later on, but for now, just take a look at Joseph’s post and its comment thread.

Short version of my response: I very much like the idea of a Bible translation that is subject to the Wiki’s ways.

This Week in COS: Hebat of Uda and the Shema

Charles Halton has provided a schedule for reading Hallo and Younger’s The Context of Scripture in a year. Grab a schedule and join in any time.

We have just left the Hittite archival documents behind for a while and gotten back into the Egyptian canonical stuff as well as the Hebrew letters from Lachish. As a kind of “parting gift,” the Hittite docs yielded a votive record—that is, a record of gifts given to the gods in fulfillment of a vow—containing a nice point of contact with my usual introductory teaching on Josiah’s reform in 7th Century Judah.

Dream of the queen. In my dream Hebat asked for a necklace with sun-disks and lapis lazuli. We inquired further by oracle, and it was determined that (this Hebat was) the Hebat of Uda. [COS III:36}

“Uda” is a place name, presumably a city in which [there was] a shrine to the goddess Hebat. Other cities would also have shrines to the same goddess, and in some sense, the “Hebats” of different shrines are held to be distinct. For the queen, it makes a difference whether she is expected to offer her gift to “the Hebat of Uda” or to some other Hebat.

While the COS makes no such cross reference as this, the same kind of distinction may well be implied in the 8th Century Hebrew inscriptions of Kuntillet Ajrud, which offers blessings in the name of “YHWH of Samaria” and “YHWH of Teman.” If so, then Josiah’s 7th Century centralization of the Yahwistic cult into Jerusalem would have found resistance among those who feared offending distinct “YHWHs” among the several shrines of the Judean countryside. This theology reflected in such epithets as “Hebat of Uda,” “YHWH of Samaria,” and “YHWH of Teman, would be the likely foil for the biblical Shema, read (arguably most naturally) as “Hear, O Israel: YHWH our God is one YHWH!” (שמע ישראל יהוה אלהנו יהוה אחד).

Have you added your own cross-references to COS lately?

[This Week in COS: Hebat of Uda and the Shema was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/02/18. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Why We Love the Top 50 Bibliobloggers

What do I love about the Top 50 Bibliobloggers?

5. They know who they are.

4. They support academic blogging on the Bible by nominating posts to the Biblical Studies Carnival.

3. They honor the spirit of Blogroll Amnesty Day by linking “down,” where possible, to blogs that are smaller than theirs.

2. They support academic blogging on the Bible by nominating posts to the Biblical Studies Carnival.

1. They know who they are.

The upcoming, February-edition Biblical Studies Carnival will be hosted here in the first few days of March. See the previous BSC over at Duane’s. Nominate posts for the next so it can be as good as the last!

[Why We Love the Top 50 Bibliobloggers was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2020/02/16. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

This Week in COS: It Wasn't My Fault!

You’ll recall that Charles Halton has invited folks to read the Context of Scripture in a year. Joseph at כל־האדם is also reading along.

For pure joy of reading, I’ve got to go back to last Sunday’s text: “The Case Against Ura-Tarh̬unta and His Father Ukkura” (3.33). The context is the reign of the Hittite king H̬attušili III (mid-late 13th century BCE), and the text involves declarations of innocence, made under oath. The defendants are accused of embezzling items entrusted to them by the queen for distribution, gifting, or trade.

The two principal excuses seem to be, “But I only stole the old ones,” and “It died: not my fault!”

In the “But I only stole the old ones” department, the following is typical:

And whenever they bring here new bits and snaffles, I have been accepting the new ones for the service of the crown, but of the old ones I have been taking for myself as many as I liked. (§5).

Translation: Yes, I pilfered an Epson printer, but they had already been replaced by the new all-in-one scanning jobs! I’m not sure, but the oath the defendants are made to take in §25 seem to reflect a ruling on this saying, more or less, Don’t do it again.

My favorite excuse, though, is the “It died: not my fault” defense. Some examples:

I also took for myself two mules, which died while in my possession.…

I had hitched up three mules belonging to the palace, and they died.…

I took for myself three cows…and drove them to my house, where they died.…

Of the asses which I had charge of, I took for myself nothing. Five asses died, and I replaced them from my house. (Ensuing lines: well, I haven’t yet, but I will.)…

The mules that they mention died.

Anyone ever see Miller’s Crossing? Remember when Tom keeps betting on horses that lose or get injured?

Lazarre's Man: Hey, horses got knees?
Tom: I don’t know... fetlocks
Lazarre's Man: Well if I was a horse, I’d be down on my fetlocks praying you don't bet on me.

If I was a Hittite mule, horse, or cow, I’d be down on my fetlocks praying that Ura-Tarh̬unta and his father Ukkura are not given charge of me.

[This Week in COS: It Wasn't My Fault! was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/02/12. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Darwin's Eve Mythicism with McGrath

James has been writing on “mythicism” lately (the conviction that there is no historical figure behind the New Testament depictions of Jesus; the idea is that several contemporary myths coalesced into a single invented figure).

The “-ism” is important, the suffix implying that this perspective is not a matter of reasoned argument but of dogmatic adherence. For this reason, James’s comparison to Creationsm is apt: James means to say that reasoned argument fails both creationists and mythicists, and that they appeal instead to fallacious lines of argument. Notice, in this regard, the epithet that creationists use for the theory of natural selection as the main vehicle for the fact of evolution: “darwinism.” In this way, creationists seek to suggest that there are two equally valid “isms” from which to choose, when in fact the one arises from public reasoned argument, demonstrates extraordinary explanatory power, finds support from evidence in virtually every field of science, and (most importantly) is inherently provisional pending new discoveries…while the other is held not provisionally but absolutely, resting not on an evidentiary foundation but rather the privileging a particular interpretation of a limited number of biblical proof-texts.

Tomorrow is Darwin Day. Celebrate with a trip over to Exploring Our Matrix.

Reminder to Biblioblogging Top 50 and the Lower 50s Alike

Remember that the 51st Biblical Studies Carnival will be hosted here. During this month February, while you are reading blog posts anywhere on biblical studies, nominate your favorites to the Carnival so I can include them (on linked page, scroll down to “Submitting Entries”).

February 3rd was Blogroll Amnesty Day, in which bloggers “link down” to smaller blogs instead of “up” to the A-list blogs. In the spirit of Blogroll Amnesty Day:

1. You Big Dogs in biblioblogging—you know who you are—could keep an eye toward reading and linking to the Littler Dogs where you may.


2. You Little Dogs in biblioblogging: remember that when anybody nominates posts during February, I will find opportunity to link to the nominator’s own content before the Carnival. It’s not like car keys under your seat, but you don’t pay taxes and insurance on my humble linky love, either.

Eighteen nominating days left: vote early, and vote often.

[Reminder to Biblioblogging Top 50 and the Lower 50s Alike was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/02/10. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Delta A Team Rocket Hebrew SEALS Force 5 in Black, P.I.

Biblical Hebrew is an elective for my students, and of those who take it at all, most work it into their last year of study. In recent years, though, I have had an unusually high percentage of second-year students, and even first-year folk, learning Hebrew.

This means that they can bring their mad skillz into the advanced-level Bible courses they take later in their course of study. These are English-language courses—that is, there is not a Hebrew prereq—but the professors can be really good about finding ways for these few Hebrew-reading students to stretch their fledgling wings.

This term, my former and current Hebrew students have infiltrated courses in Jonah/Ruth, in Job, and in Judges. Like sleeper agents, they move among their classmates unseen. Like yeast, they quietly transform the unleavened dough of the English-language exegesis course. They are behind the system; beyond it: the Black Ops of biblical interpretation. They are everywhere and nowhere, ubiquitous and invisible, getting into place and preparing to blow your mind.

It's kind of cool, is my point. Anybody else teaching biblical languages as an elective? Do your students normally get the opportunity to use it while still in their degree program?

[Delta A Team Rocket Hebrew SEALS Force 5 in Black, P.I. was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/02/09. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Is it Just Me?

Or do you hear the strains of a modern Qohelet in the weary workplace recollections of a dime-store Cassandra? (Eff-Bomb Alert: grown-up language for grown-ups.)

Creating a Biblical Persona

[Reminder: nominate posts to me for the upcoming Biblical Studies Carnival.]

In my online course, “Literature of Ancient Israel,” I have a discussion forum reserved for student questions addressed to one “Hananiah Ben-Ishbaal,” a 1000 year old Israelite whose life spans the history of the people Israel. Students may ask Ben-Ishbaal about his daily life, his memories of the history of his people, and about his responses to particular biblical texts.

As I recall, credit Credit for the idea goes to Daniel Ulrich at Bethany Theological Seminary. Since Professor Ulrich teaches New Testament, the persona of his creation is of course a man of normal life span, living in the First Century C.E. Professor Ulrich discussed his practice while presenting to the section, “Academic Teaching and Biblical Studies” at the 2009 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature. For my purposes, if a single “persona” is to span our Hebrew Bible curriculum, then I need to take some poetic license and allow “Ben-Ishbaal” the not-uncommon narrative fiction of unnaturally long life.

I have only begun answering student questions, but the decision-making process is already intriguing. For example:

• Is Ben-Ishbaal’s family priestly or lay?


• In what periods is his life agricultural, or urbanized?


• Is he literate (in literary sense) or no? To what degree is he exposed to biblical texts and traditions, and by what means?


• Is he close to power, or far from it?


• How “orthodox” is Ben-Ishbaal, from the perspective of the final form of the Hebrew Bible? For example, how late into Israel’s history does he assume the existence of gods other than Yahweh? How does he view divine activity in history (e.g., the fall of Jerusalem) and in his own life (e.g., in personal tragedy or blessings)?


• By what epithets does he call the god of Israel, and at what periods in history?


• What is his family life: when was he married, and to how many women (concurrently or serially), and what has become of his descendents?


• Other questions?

What other questions would you add to this list, in sketching out a character like “Hananiah Ben-Ishbaal”? How would you, personally and as an instructor, choose to answer some of these questions in your creation of this character? Why?

[Creating a Biblical Persona was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/02/05. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

This Week in Context of Scripture

[Reminder: support Blogroll Amnesty and the Biblical Studies Carnival by nominating posts this month.]

As you may know, Charles Halton had published a reading schedule for Hallo and Younger’s The Context of Scripture (three volumes; Leiden: Brill, 2003). This week, we have been into Hittite archival documents. Two things have my attention: the scribal “postscripts” in the letters from the king to one Kaššu (a provincial leader dealing with local harassment; 3:13-29), and the letters between the royalty of Hatti, Egypt, and Babylon (the superpowers of the day; 3:30-31).

A charming feature of the king’s letters to his subordinate Kaššu is the “postscripts” that the king’s scribe writes to his counterparts serving out in the provincial center, whom he calls his “dear brother[s].” The king’s scribe reassures the provincial scribes about the well-being of their families, so we can see that the provincial scribe has left his family in the monarch’s city (Hattusa?). I wonder if this was common practice, and if it reflects a relative danger or discomfort in the provincial center. In the last of the letters to Kaššu, the scribe writes his postscript, not to another scribe, but to the three military men for whose ears the king has written the body of the letter. Since one regular scribal assignment was to accompany campaigns (see, e.g., 3.2, the Egyptian “craft of the scribe” letter), a picture of profession-crossing cameradarie begins to suggest itself.

The letters between royalty (3:30-31) offer an accessible illustration of the “parity” relationship as I describe it to my students when they learn “covenant.” In 3:30, the queen of Egypt repeatedly calls her counterpart in Hatti “my sister,” acknowledges inquiries concerning her health and well-being, and offers such “greeting-gifts” as, here, twelve linen garments and a gold necklace.

It’s never too late to begin reading COS in a year: just pick up where we are, and follow through to the same point next year. The pace is generally easy, and the rewards steady. Thanks again, Charles!

Blogroll Amnesty and the Next Biblical Studies Carnival

It must be kismet. Today is Blogroll Amnesty Day, and what is more, I find that Duane informs me that I am hosting next month’s Biblical Studies Carnival: in other words, this be the month in which I collect nominations for said Carnival.

So, in the spirit of Blogroll Amnesty Day, in which Wee Little Blogs get the attention they deserve—and, might as well face it, all biblical studies blogs are Wee Little Blogs scurrying ant-like on the smooth, concave, mobian surface of teh intertubes—I will reward nominators throughout the month of February by providing links to their own content.

That’s right: send me a nomination for the upcoming Carnival, and I will go to your site, find something link-worthy, and link to it in a post here. Literally scores of eyeballs will be drawn to your site (or, as you like to think of it, The Hardest Working Site in Blog Business).

Bonus offer: for those who nominate posts more than once during the month, I will do my best to find legitimate cause to festoon my link with high-value search term context words like “Tea Party,” “Lady Gaga,” “iPad,” and “DADT.”

Run and see the current Carnival at Duane’s, and also go see the instructions for nominating posts.

Blogroll Amnesty means linking to the smaller blogs. Send me anything at all you find Carnival-worthy, but let’s keep a special eye on the little folk. Have fun, and keep ’em coming.

[Addendum: you big ol’ biblioblogs can support Blogroll Amnesty Day and the Biblical Studies Carnival even further simply by linking to this post: Thanks!]

Carnival. Noun. (2)...

…“An exciting or riotous mixture of something.”

That about sums it up. Yes, yes, yes: the latest Biblical Studies Carnival is up! Go see it at Duane’s.

I may be hosting the upcoming Biblical Studies Carnival right here at Anumma: announcement coming when I get a ’firm.

"The Story" (Zondervan): Reading the Bible?

As a kind of resolution for 2010, our rector has decided that we’ll be reading the Bible this year (I pause here for jokes about the Episcopal Church and knowing nods; better now? okay). The initial vehicle will be a ten-week reading group, working through The Story: Read the Bible as One Seamless Story from Beginning to End (revised edition; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2008). Amazon/Publisher

I should say right away that, on balance, I am excited that we’re pushing Bible and finding ways to encourage familiarity with it. This church happens to have racked up some pretty staggering accomplishments in outreach, in community service, in local and international charity, and (less quantitatively but not less noticeably) in growing a community marked by a joyous mutual love. A more solid biblical foundation can only strengthen the kind of theological thinking that already drives the congregation.

Now for the gripes.

The Story starts with the TNIV as a base text. Put positively: at least it’s not a paraphrastic, expansionistic re-telling of the biblical text tending toward commentary (like at least one prominent translation I could name). Put negatively: I didn’t have any use for the NIV, and the TNIV doesn’t do anything to change that assessment. I believe strongly in the educational value of underscoring, rather than denying, tensions among the biblical texts. Harmonizing translations interfere with that project of teaching and learning, so I normally avoid them except for illustrations of the problems I associate with the harmonizing project. Overall, then: could be worse.

In terms of “Seamless Story from Beginning to End”: obviously the editors have had to decide on a timeline. Decisions made here are predictable: early patriarchs and exodus; Isa 40–66 as predictive prophecy; Solomon as pious but ultimately satyric author of Proverbs (but not, apparently, Ecclesiastes. Hey, where the heck is Ecclesiastes? Holy mo…where’s Job!? I guess there’s no room for the “dissenting wisdom” in The Story). And so on.

Where The Story skips or summarizes parts of the Bible, their stated plan is to put such summaries in italics, so that this editorial material can be distinguished from the biblical text itself. A couple of observations:

• That transitional material can run to heavy-handedness (for Noah’s generation, life had become “one big party”? How do you get that from the biblical text’s description of “wickedness” and an inclination toward “evil”?).

• The book inserts plenty of non-biblical commentary that is not set into italics. For example, this piece, that follows Gen 15:16 (“it was credited to him as righteousness”):

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.

Similarly, after Gen 22:

Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a matter of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.

The perspicacious reader will observe that Paul of Tarsus has been set amok here, and that a brand of Pauline hermeneutic is shamelessly passing itself off as Hebrew Bible.

All this said: our rector is fully aware of the strengths and shortcomings of any attempt to abridge and narrativize the Bible, and she has invited the congregation up front to argue, wrestle, denounce, and question (which I’ve no doubt they will do). So, on balance, again, it’s a project that I can totally get behind and get excited about.

Anybody out there already have experience with The Story? Any stories about The Story?

RIP J.D. Salinger

I have gone back and forth on drafts for this post, mainly to justify its inclusion in a blog about “Hebrew Bible and Higher Education.” Let’s keep it simple, starting with the simple and plaintive fact that some of the most joyful reading hours of my life I continue to owe to Salinger. Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters and Franny and Zooey have ever been part of my essential, more or less annual, reading.

On Bible: his characters, especially the nearly omnipresent Glass family, seek God as incessantly, as devotedly, as intelligently, and with as much pleasure and sacrifice, as any of the holiest creatures I have had the pleasure to know.

On education: what could I add to the words of Buddy Glass, on the twenty-four young ladies (not one of whom, he is led to discover, “is not as much my sister as Boo Boo or Franny”) awaiting him, essays in hand, in room 307:

They may shine with the misinformation of the ages, but they shine.

Until raised in glory, let him rest clothed in the gratitude of all who are transformed by his art.