Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.4
Einav Fleck
Abstract:This article identifies one type of conjunctive vav (“and”) addition in 1QIsaa that accounts for over one-third of the 241 vav additions in the scroll. In these cases, vav serves to resolve structurally ambiguous verses in the biblical text of Isaiah. In 84 percent of the cases, vav resolves the ambiguous verses in a manner that accords with well-known language processing strategies. It is therefore argued that processing strategies were operative during the copying of 1QIsaa. Notably, more than half of vav additions that accord with processing strategies result in a verse division that differs from the MT’s reading tradition as recorded in its cantillation system. These findings offer a new perspective on the readings that are generated by vav additions when compared to the MT and also allow us to predict in which contexts this type of vav is likely to be found in other unpunctuated ancient texts.
{"title":"Additions of Conjunctive Vav (“and”) in 1QIsaa: Evidence for the Role of Language Processing Strategies","authors":"Einav Fleck","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.4","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This article identifies one type of conjunctive vav (“and”) addition in 1QIsaa that accounts for over one-third of the 241 vav additions in the scroll. In these cases, vav serves to resolve structurally ambiguous verses in the biblical text of Isaiah. In 84 percent of the cases, vav resolves the ambiguous verses in a manner that accords with well-known language processing strategies. It is therefore argued that processing strategies were operative during the copying of 1QIsaa. Notably, more than half of vav additions that accord with processing strategies result in a verse division that differs from the MT’s reading tradition as recorded in its cantillation system. These findings offer a new perspective on the readings that are generated by vav additions when compared to the MT and also allow us to predict in which contexts this type of vav is likely to be found in other unpunctuated ancient texts.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"467 - 490"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42005570","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.3
Laura Hasler
Abstract:This article explores the relationships between sensation and embodiment along-side notions of exchange, economics, and collectivity in the postexilic writings of Haggai, Malachi, and Zech 1–8. I use the term embodied economics to describe how these texts envision the Judean community and its sensory-laden relations in terms of collection, exchange, and debt. This combination of economic and affective valences has critical implications for understanding the parameters of the prophetic task, of international relating, and especially the precise nature of Judean collectivity. In the history of scholarship, Haggai especially has been castigated for its “materialist” or “nationalistic” content. By contrast, the framework of embodiment invites the reader to think in a more textured way about the complex economic networks of deprivation, collection, and deferred satisfaction pictured in these texts. The idea of embodied economics illuminates the specific and consequential means by which the Judeans may constitute a legible, pleasing, and desirable collective within the postexilic prophetic imagination.
{"title":"Poor Circulation: Embodied Economics in Haggai, Malachi, and Zechariah 1–8","authors":"Laura Hasler","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.3","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This article explores the relationships between sensation and embodiment along-side notions of exchange, economics, and collectivity in the postexilic writings of Haggai, Malachi, and Zech 1–8. I use the term embodied economics to describe how these texts envision the Judean community and its sensory-laden relations in terms of collection, exchange, and debt. This combination of economic and affective valences has critical implications for understanding the parameters of the prophetic task, of international relating, and especially the precise nature of Judean collectivity. In the history of scholarship, Haggai especially has been castigated for its “materialist” or “nationalistic” content. By contrast, the framework of embodiment invites the reader to think in a more textured way about the complex economic networks of deprivation, collection, and deferred satisfaction pictured in these texts. The idea of embodied economics illuminates the specific and consequential means by which the Judeans may constitute a legible, pleasing, and desirable collective within the postexilic prophetic imagination.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"449 - 466"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42721431","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.8
W. Shin
Abstract:The meaning of the enigmatic verse of Acts 15:21, not to mention the issues around the preceding Apostolic Decree (vv. 19–20), has largely been researched individually and historical-critically. By contrast, in this study I explicate the meaning of the verse within the broader scope of James’s speech by attending to the Jewish spatiality on Luke’s narrative-ideological plane. The Lukan James’s speech tightly combines intertextual elements that bear on significant Jewish spatiality, namely, the restored tent of David (v. 16) within the quotation of Amos 9:11–12, the alluded-to holy land (v. 20) drawn from Lev 17–18 as the background of the decree, and the Jewish synagogues in every city (v. 21) as the background of James’s final invocation of Moses. From this perspective, I propose that v. 21 is part of the Lukan narrative-ideological portrait that reconfigures the holy land’s purity concern via the eschatological presence of the restored Davidic tent, making it relevant to the larger Greco-Roman world in accordance with the continuing monotheistic cultic sanctity.
{"title":"Holy Land Sanctity for Every Greco-Roman City: Rethinking the Lukan Apostolic Decree (Acts 15:19–21)","authors":"W. Shin","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.8","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.8","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:The meaning of the enigmatic verse of Acts 15:21, not to mention the issues around the preceding Apostolic Decree (vv. 19–20), has largely been researched individually and historical-critically. By contrast, in this study I explicate the meaning of the verse within the broader scope of James’s speech by attending to the Jewish spatiality on Luke’s narrative-ideological plane. The Lukan James’s speech tightly combines intertextual elements that bear on significant Jewish spatiality, namely, the restored tent of David (v. 16) within the quotation of Amos 9:11–12, the alluded-to holy land (v. 20) drawn from Lev 17–18 as the background of the decree, and the Jewish synagogues in every city (v. 21) as the background of James’s final invocation of Moses. From this perspective, I propose that v. 21 is part of the Lukan narrative-ideological portrait that reconfigures the holy land’s purity concern via the eschatological presence of the restored Davidic tent, making it relevant to the larger Greco-Roman world in accordance with the continuing monotheistic cultic sanctity.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"553 - 574"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48965260","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.6
Murray J. Smith, Ian J. Vaillancourt
Abstract:Many interpreters hold that Jesus’s response to the high priest (Mark 14:62), combining Ps 110:1 and Dan 7:13, refers to his imminent heavenly enthronement and says nothing of his future return. Many others recognize a reference to Jesus’s parousia but see this solely in the allusion to Dan 7:13 (“coming with the clouds”), rather than in anything drawn from Ps 110. In contrast to these views, we argue that Ps 110 provides a key to understanding Jesus’s eschatological vision in Mark. The psalm envisages a chronological distinction between the enthronement of David’s lord “at the right hand” and his eschatological victory in the world. Mark’s Jesus also, in his response to the high priest, envisages his future career in two distinct stages that mirror those set forth in the psalm: first, his enthronement at God’s “right hand,” and then his final advent from heaven as the glorious Son of Man. This reading is consistent with Jesus’s teaching elsewhere in Mark, which envisages a period of bodily absence before his final return. It is supported by other early Christian texts in which the chronological progression in the psalm provides scriptural warrant for a distinction between Jesus’s present heavenly enthronement and future return.
{"title":"Enthroned and Coming to Reign: Jesus’s Eschatological Use of Psalm 110:1 in Mark 14:62","authors":"Murray J. Smith, Ian J. Vaillancourt","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.6","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Many interpreters hold that Jesus’s response to the high priest (Mark 14:62), combining Ps 110:1 and Dan 7:13, refers to his imminent heavenly enthronement and says nothing of his future return. Many others recognize a reference to Jesus’s parousia but see this solely in the allusion to Dan 7:13 (“coming with the clouds”), rather than in anything drawn from Ps 110. In contrast to these views, we argue that Ps 110 provides a key to understanding Jesus’s eschatological vision in Mark. The psalm envisages a chronological distinction between the enthronement of David’s lord “at the right hand” and his eschatological victory in the world. Mark’s Jesus also, in his response to the high priest, envisages his future career in two distinct stages that mirror those set forth in the psalm: first, his enthronement at God’s “right hand,” and then his final advent from heaven as the glorious Son of Man. This reading is consistent with Jesus’s teaching elsewhere in Mark, which envisages a period of bodily absence before his final return. It is supported by other early Christian texts in which the chronological progression in the psalm provides scriptural warrant for a distinction between Jesus’s present heavenly enthronement and future return.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"513 - 531"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47937943","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.9
Rodney Kilgore
Abstract:Commentators on Rom 12:16 have widely translated Paul’s use of συναπάγω as “associate with” or a closely related phrase. Yet, despite the appearance of this definition in prominent Greek lexicons (e.g., BDAG, LSJ), no evidence exists in the broader corpus of Greek literature for the word to possess such a semantic range. I propose, rather, that the phrase “be carried away with” as a translation of συναπάγω more accurately captures Paul’s use of the word by both reflecting the word’s connotations and more closely aligning with Paul’s context, ethic, and theology.
{"title":"Paul’s Use of Συναπάγω in Romans 12: 16","authors":"Rodney Kilgore","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.9","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.9","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Commentators on Rom 12:16 have widely translated Paul’s use of συναπάγω as “associate with” or a closely related phrase. Yet, despite the appearance of this definition in prominent Greek lexicons (e.g., BDAG, LSJ), no evidence exists in the broader corpus of Greek literature for the word to possess such a semantic range. I propose, rather, that the phrase “be carried away with” as a translation of συναπάγω more accurately captures Paul’s use of the word by both reflecting the word’s connotations and more closely aligning with Paul’s context, ethic, and theology.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"575 - 592"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46953243","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.1
Amit Gvaryahu
The Biblical Hebrew word פללים is rare and cryptic. Various readings have been offered for it in its long reception history. Ancient readers of Scripture read פללים in Exod 21:22 in two distinct ways. Some read it as “judges,” whereas others associated פללים with requests, pleas, petitions, and prayers. This latter understanding of the word is found at Qumran, in the Samaritan Targum, and in several late-ancient translations of the Greek Bible. It is reflected in the Mishnah, perhaps in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, and in the writing of the sixth-century Christian scholar John Philoponus. Academic scholars of the Hebrew Bible, however, were not aware of the reading of פללים as “request” or “petition.” Scholars of later interpretive traditions often attempted to impose the “correct” reading of the word, “judges,” on ancient readers who read it to mean “request.” These different interpretations offer diverging understandings of the verse and the legal remedy it prescribes. The history of this reading tradition is a case study in moving beyond the important questions of Vorlage and historical linguistics to the long and usually unsung history of how biblical words were read by the many diverse communities that made them their own. Finally, these two readings offer different visions for how the Covenant Code was meant to function: Is it meant to be applied by judges, or are individual adherents meant to use it to solve disputes themselves?
{"title":"Asking for Trouble: Two Reading Traditions of פללים (Exodus 21:22) in Antiquity","authors":"Amit Gvaryahu","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.1","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The Biblical Hebrew word פללים is rare and cryptic. Various readings have been offered for it in its long reception history. Ancient readers of Scripture read פללים in Exod 21:22 in two distinct ways. Some read it as “judges,” whereas others associated פללים with requests, pleas, petitions, and prayers. This latter understanding of the word is found at Qumran, in the Samaritan Targum, and in several late-ancient translations of the Greek Bible. It is reflected in the Mishnah, perhaps in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, and in the writing of the sixth-century Christian scholar John Philoponus. Academic scholars of the Hebrew Bible, however, were not aware of the reading of פללים as “request” or “petition.” Scholars of later interpretive traditions often attempted to impose the “correct” reading of the word, “judges,” on ancient readers who read it to mean “request.” These different interpretations offer diverging understandings of the verse and the legal remedy it prescribes. The history of this reading tradition is a case study in moving beyond the important questions of Vorlage and historical linguistics to the long and usually unsung history of how biblical words were read by the many diverse communities that made them their own. Finally, these two readings offer different visions for how the Covenant Code was meant to function: Is it meant to be applied by judges, or are individual adherents meant to use it to solve disputes themselves?","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47382087","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.2
Dylan R. Johnson
Abstract:This study examines the literary and redactional history of the allotment motif in biblical tradition. The notion that the Israelite tribes apportioned the promised land through the casting of “lots” stems from a core narrative about a ceremony for the house of Joseph at Shiloh (Josh 17:17–18; 18:4, 8–10a). Through later redactional expansions, the allotment motif came to define the distribution of all Israelite territory in the central chapters of Joshua (chs. 13–21). Outside the book of Joshua, however, this idea gained little acceptance among scribal circles that preferred other explanations for how the Israelites came to occupy and possess the land. The only extensive engagement with the allotment motif outside of Joshua appears in the concluding chapters of Numbers (chs. 26–36). The post-Priestly redactors who organized these chapters harmonized the allotment motif with their own genealogies as a means to create narrative continuity between the desert wanderings and the conquest account in Joshua. By examining many “redactional reciprocations” between Numbers and Joshua, I demonstrate how biblical books and literary motifs developed in parallel narrative contexts, with punctuated revisions that alter the form and function of each through dialectical processes of harmonization. The allotment motif in Numbers is the literary legacy of scribes who did not consider Moses’s death in Deuteronomy to be a decisive break in the biblical narrative, instead promoting the view of Joshua as Moses’s spiritual successor and the conquest as the fulfillment of the exodus.
{"title":"The Allotment of Canaan in Joshua and Numbers","authors":"Dylan R. Johnson","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.2","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This study examines the literary and redactional history of the allotment motif in biblical tradition. The notion that the Israelite tribes apportioned the promised land through the casting of “lots” stems from a core narrative about a ceremony for the house of Joseph at Shiloh (Josh 17:17–18; 18:4, 8–10a). Through later redactional expansions, the allotment motif came to define the distribution of all Israelite territory in the central chapters of Joshua (chs. 13–21). Outside the book of Joshua, however, this idea gained little acceptance among scribal circles that preferred other explanations for how the Israelites came to occupy and possess the land. The only extensive engagement with the allotment motif outside of Joshua appears in the concluding chapters of Numbers (chs. 26–36). The post-Priestly redactors who organized these chapters harmonized the allotment motif with their own genealogies as a means to create narrative continuity between the desert wanderings and the conquest account in Joshua. By examining many “redactional reciprocations” between Numbers and Joshua, I demonstrate how biblical books and literary motifs developed in parallel narrative contexts, with punctuated revisions that alter the form and function of each through dialectical processes of harmonization. The allotment motif in Numbers is the literary legacy of scribes who did not consider Moses’s death in Deuteronomy to be a decisive break in the biblical narrative, instead promoting the view of Joshua as Moses’s spiritual successor and the conquest as the fulfillment of the exodus.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"427 - 447"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44232445","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.7
Meghan R. Henning
Abstract:This article reads Acts 2:1–13 as an example of apocalyptic ekphrasis, bringing together disparate imagery for rhetorical effect. In particular, the Septuagint imagery of theophany is combined with the imagery of divine healing that was associated with the god Asclepius. I explore the imagery of the divided tongue that rests on bodies and transforms them, an element of Acts 2:3 that many interpreters have given up trying to explain. The visual association of snakes and healing was prevalent not only at the shrines devoted to Asclepius but broadly in a variety of contexts outside the shrines. This complex of imagery is evoked by the story in Acts 2, depicting the bodies of the apostles as the site of divine transformation, and as a sign of apocalyptic inbreaking. The transformation in this story, however, is one of a holy impairment, combining the imagery of extraordinary comprehension and impairment to describe the apostles’ different speech. In Acts 2, a scene unfolds in which the bodies of the apostles are transformed through a divine touch, receiving a holy impairment that enables human connection, not by erasing difference but by leveraging it as a symbol of apocalyptic transformation.
{"title":"Holy Impairment: The Body as the Nexus of Apocalyptic Ekphrasis in Acts 2:1–13","authors":"Meghan R. Henning","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.7","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This article reads Acts 2:1–13 as an example of apocalyptic ekphrasis, bringing together disparate imagery for rhetorical effect. In particular, the Septuagint imagery of theophany is combined with the imagery of divine healing that was associated with the god Asclepius. I explore the imagery of the divided tongue that rests on bodies and transforms them, an element of Acts 2:3 that many interpreters have given up trying to explain. The visual association of snakes and healing was prevalent not only at the shrines devoted to Asclepius but broadly in a variety of contexts outside the shrines. This complex of imagery is evoked by the story in Acts 2, depicting the bodies of the apostles as the site of divine transformation, and as a sign of apocalyptic inbreaking. The transformation in this story, however, is one of a holy impairment, combining the imagery of extraordinary comprehension and impairment to describe the apostles’ different speech. In Acts 2, a scene unfolds in which the bodies of the apostles are transformed through a divine touch, receiving a holy impairment that enables human connection, not by erasing difference but by leveraging it as a symbol of apocalyptic transformation.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"533 - 552"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47973320","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-09-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.5
Philip F. Esler
Abstract:Babatha, a Judean woman from the early second century CE, hid a satchel of thirty-five legal papyri in a cave in Wadi Ḥever on the Dead Sea around 135 CE. This article argues that she brought two other papyri, in Nabatean Aramaic, into the cave (P.XḤev/Se Nab 1, also called “P.Starcky,” and P.XḤev/Se Nab 2), but culled her documents, hiding most in the satchel, while discarding these two. Initially, P.Starcky is analyzed as a title document relating to a date orchard in her hometown of Maoza in Arabia that passed by patrilineal succession to Judah, Babatha’s second husband. I then explain the relevance of P.Starcky to Babatha in relation to her seizing that orchard after Judah’s death, in spite of the claim of his orphaned nephews to the property. The nephews’ close connection with an elite woman of Roman citizenship explains why, at the end of the Bar Kokhba revolt, it was Babatha and not the nephews who carried P.Starcky into the cave. I argue further that Babatha also brought P.XḤev/Se Nab 2 into the cave but discarded it as irrelevant to her legal situation.
{"title":"Babatha’s Final Days: New Light from Papyrus Starcky","authors":"Philip F. Esler","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1413.2022.5","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Babatha, a Judean woman from the early second century CE, hid a satchel of thirty-five legal papyri in a cave in Wadi Ḥever on the Dead Sea around 135 CE. This article argues that she brought two other papyri, in Nabatean Aramaic, into the cave (P.XḤev/Se Nab 1, also called “P.Starcky,” and P.XḤev/Se Nab 2), but culled her documents, hiding most in the satchel, while discarding these two. Initially, P.Starcky is analyzed as a title document relating to a date orchard in her hometown of Maoza in Arabia that passed by patrilineal succession to Judah, Babatha’s second husband. I then explain the relevance of P.Starcky to Babatha in relation to her seizing that orchard after Judah’s death, in spite of the claim of his orphaned nephews to the property. The nephews’ close connection with an elite woman of Roman citizenship explains why, at the end of the Bar Kokhba revolt, it was Babatha and not the nephews who carried P.Starcky into the cave. I argue further that Babatha also brought P.XḤev/Se Nab 2 into the cave but discarded it as irrelevant to her legal situation.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"491 - 512"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45373091","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-06-15DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1412.2022.10
A. Wilson
Abstract:Paul's statements on law have recently been considered in the context of Hellenistic discourse, but these readings have not always included his "law of Christ." Here I analyze this phrase in Gal 6:2 in comparison with the Stoic "law of nature," arguing that both Paul's negative and positive discourse on law and this particular phrase can be elucidated by comparison to Stoic ethics, which used similar discourse to, respectively, elevate a first-order good, endorse a second-order value, and reference a higher-order norm. I first discuss the Stoic theory of "natural law," conventional laws, and their relationship to each other, then offer a reading of Gal 5:13–6:2 with reference to other statements in Galatians and 1 Cor 9:21. The metaphorical "law of Christ" in Gal 6:2 references a higher-order norm that could be placed in antithesis to conventional laws, including the Mosaic law, and could be used to challenge them. This metaphor portrayed the norm as functioning like a law in its ability to prohibit and command behavior, but more comprehensively than conventional laws. Paul posits a "law of Christ" as a shared standard of behavior for Jesus-believers that also grounds a qualified use of the Mosaic law.
{"title":"The Craftsman: Paul's Law of Christ and the Stoic Law of Nature","authors":"A. Wilson","doi":"10.15699/jbl.1412.2022.10","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1412.2022.10","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Paul's statements on law have recently been considered in the context of Hellenistic discourse, but these readings have not always included his \"law of Christ.\" Here I analyze this phrase in Gal 6:2 in comparison with the Stoic \"law of nature,\" arguing that both Paul's negative and positive discourse on law and this particular phrase can be elucidated by comparison to Stoic ethics, which used similar discourse to, respectively, elevate a first-order good, endorse a second-order value, and reference a higher-order norm. I first discuss the Stoic theory of \"natural law,\" conventional laws, and their relationship to each other, then offer a reading of Gal 5:13–6:2 with reference to other statements in Galatians and 1 Cor 9:21. The metaphorical \"law of Christ\" in Gal 6:2 references a higher-order norm that could be placed in antithesis to conventional laws, including the Mosaic law, and could be used to challenge them. This metaphor portrayed the norm as functioning like a law in its ability to prohibit and command behavior, but more comprehensively than conventional laws. Paul posits a \"law of Christ\" as a shared standard of behavior for Jesus-believers that also grounds a qualified use of the Mosaic law.","PeriodicalId":15251,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Biblical Literature","volume":"141 1","pages":"381 - 401"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2022-06-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43418533","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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