Judah and the Judeans in the Achaemenid Period: Negotiating Identity in an International Context 9781575066493

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Judah and the Judeans in the Achaemenid Period

Judah and the Judeans in the Achaemenid Period Negotiating Identity in an International Context

edited by

Oded Lipschits, Gary N. Knoppers, and Manfred Oeming

Winona Lake, Indiana Eisenbrauns 2011

© 2011 by Eisenbrauns Inc. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. www.eisenbrauns.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Judah and the Judeans in the Achaemenid period : negotiating identity in an international context / edited by Oded Lipschits, Gary N. Knoppers, and Manfred Oeming.   p. cm. “In April, 2008, an international colloquium was held at the University of Heidelberg—the fourth convocation of a group of scholars (with some rotating members) who gathered to discuss the status of Judah and the Judeans in the exilic and postexilic periods. The goal of this gathering was specifically to address the question of national identity in the period when many now believe this very issue was in significant foment and development, the era of the Persian/Achaemenid domination of the ancient Near East”—ECIP summary. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-57506-197-9 (hardback : alk. paper) 1.  Ethnicity in the Bible—Congresses.  2.  Group identity—Congresses. 3.  Jews—Identity—Congresses.  4.  Bible. O.T.—Criticism, interpretation, etc.—Congresses.  5. Jews—History—586 b.c.–70 a.d.—Congresses. 6.  Achaemenid dynasty, 559–330 b.c.—Congresses.  7.  Jewish diaspora— Congresses.  8.  Judaea (Region)—Ethnic relations—Congresses.  I.  Lipschitz, Oded.  II.  Knoppers, Gary N., 1956–  III.  Oeming, Manfred. BS1199.E84J83 2011 220.9′5009014—dc22 2010054514

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. †Ê

Contents Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ix Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   xi

Part 1 Negotiating Identity: Diversity within the Biblical Evidence Judean Identity and Ecumenicity: The Political Theology of the Priestly Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3 Konrad Schmid Torah and Identity in the Persian Period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   27 Joachim Schaper The Absent Presence: Cultural Responses to Persian Presence in the Eastern Mediterranean . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   39 Anselm C. Hagedorn Ethnicity and Identity in Isaiah 56–66 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   67 Christophe Nihan Trito-Isaiah’s Intra- and Internationalization: Identity Markers in the Second Temple Period . . . . . . . . . 105 Jill Middlemas From Ezekiel to Ezra–Nehemiah: Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Dalit Rom-Shiloni Israel’s Identity and the Threat of the Nations in the Persian Period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 Jakob Wöhrle The Rite of Separation of the Foreign Wives in Ezra–Nehemiah . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173 Yonina Dor v

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The Holy Seed: The Significance of Endogamous Boundaries and Their Transgression in Ezra 9–10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 Katherine Southwood What Do Priests and Kings Have in Common? Priestly and Royal Succession Narratives in the Achaemenid Era . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225 Deirdre N. Fulton

Part 2 Negotiating Identity: Cultural, Historical, Social, and Environmental Factors Yahwistic Names in Light of Late Babylonian Onomastics . . . . . 245 Paul-Alain Beaulieu “Judean”: A Special Status in Neo-Babylonian and Achemenid Babylonia? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267 Laurie E. Pearce Some Observations on the Traditions Surrounding “Israel in Egypt” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279 Donald Redford Judean Identity in Elephantine: Everyday Life according to the Ostraca . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365 André Lemaire The Interaction of Egyptian and Aramaic Literature . . . . . . . . . 375 Joachim Friedrich Quack Yehudite Identity in Elephantine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 403 Bob Becking Judean Ambassadors and the Making of Jewish Identity: The Case of Hananiah, Ezra, and Nehemiah . . . . . . . . . . 421 Reinhard G. Kratz Negotiating Identity in an International Context under Achaemenid Rule: The Indigenous Coinages of Persian-Period Palestine as an Allegory . . . . . . . . . . . . . 445 Oren Tal Judaeans, Jews, Children of Abraham . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461 Joseph Blenkinsopp

Contents

vii

The Controversy about Judean versus Israelite Identity and the Persian Government: A New Interpretation of the Bagoses Story (  Jewish Antiquities XI.297–301) . . . . . . 483 Rainer Albertz Surviving in an Imperial Context: Foreign Military Service and Judean Identity . . . . . . . . . . 505 Jacob L. Wright ʾel-mĕdînâ ûmĕdînâ kiktābāh: Scribes and Scripts in Yehud and in Achaemenid Transeuphratene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 529 David S. Vanderhooft Jewish Identity in the Eastern Diaspora in Light of the Book of Tobit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 545 Manfred Oeming The Identity of the Idumeans Based on the Archaeological Evidence from Maresha . . . . . . . . . . . . . 563 Amos Kloner Indexes Index of Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 575 Index of Scripture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 588

Foreword The present volume comprises the published outcome of an international conference held at the University of Heidelberg on 13–16 April 2008, entitled “Judah and the Judeans in the Achaemenid Period: Negotiating Identity in an International Context.” Recent discoveries in archaeology, epigraphy, historical linguistics, numismatics, and cuneiform studies have shed welcome new light on the history of the farflung Persian empire (ca. 550–330 b.c.e.) and the various regions this empire claimed as its own. This particular conference, the fourth in a series that began in 2001, paid special attention to the history, culture, and religious practices of one particular ethnic group (the Judeans) during the Neo-Babylonian, Persian (especially), and early Hellenistic eras. Among the disciplines represented at the conference were archaeology, Assyriology, anthropology, biblical studies, Egyptology, epigraphy, history, numismatics, ritual studies, and theology. Although the focus of the conference was on the different economic and cultural circumstances under which Judeans lived throughout the Persian realm, the conference also devoted ample attention to related communities (e.g., Babylonians, Samarians, Idoumeans, Egyptians, Mo­ abites, Ammonites, Phoenicians, Arameans) and the shifting crosscultural relations among these national (and international) groups. To complicate matters, a sizeable group of Yahwists is also attested in the province of Samaria to the north of Yehud. During Persian and Hellenistic times, more than one community claimed to carry on the legacy of ancient “Israel.” The goal of the conference was, therefore, not simply to study the history of one group in the southern Levant but also to explore the relations of the Judeans with other peoples. Moreover, given that Judeans found themselves residing in a variety of lands during the Achaemenid age, the participants in this conference were asked to explore how early Judaism changed as a result of its growing internationalization. As the large selection of essays in this book attests, the documentation available among the literary, epigraphic, and material remains from Babylon, Egypt, Samaria, Yehud, and Idoumea varies but has been steadily increasing thanks to new archaeological and epigraphic discoveries. Many of the contributions integrate the evidence provided by ix

x

Foreword

the material remains with that of the literary remains to formulate new historical reconstructions. Especially welcome is the possibility of new material analysis of Judean life in a variety of Diaspora settings, such as Elephantine in Egypt and Al-Yahudu, probably in the region of Nippur. As befitting the assorted disciplines represented at the conference, the contributions to this volume are diverse in methodology, subject matter, and theme. Some essays address the epigraphic evidence available from the ancient Near East and Egypt, while others address the interactions among a variety of ethnic groups evident in surviving literatures. Some contributors analyze particular material remains (e.g., coins, scripts) with a view to understanding local identities and local trade, while others study Achaemenid imperial policies toward smaller provinces and the adjustments made by these provinces in negotiating identity within a larger imperial context. Some essays explore shifting community boundaries in Judean historiography, while others examine the changing nature of Israelite identity in prophetic texts. Yet others examine the long-term development of Judean biblical and extrabiblical literature with a view to how the indexes of corporate identity (e.g., genealogy, history, religious practices, shared beliefs) varied in different settings and were renegotiated in different times. In closing, we would like to express our gratitude to all the people, including the authors themselves, who reviewed, revised, and edited the selection of essays found in this volume. The financial support and grants that helped defray the costs of this conference are appreciatively acknowledged. In particular, we would like to thank the Deutsche For­ schungsgemeinschaft (DFG), the Manfred-Lautenschläger-Stiftung, and the Stiftung Universität Heidelberg for their generous support of our meeting. We are also very grateful to the Internationales Wissenschaftsforum Heidelberg (IWH) for hosting the conference. Finally, a word of thanks is due to our publisher, Eisenbrauns, for the very good work of the Eisenbrauns “team” in expertly preparing the diverse collection of essays in this book for publication. A particular debt of gratitude is owed to Ms. Amy Becker, who copyedited the book, and to Jim Eisenbraun, who conscientiously oversaw the project from the conclusion of our conference until its publication. It is one thing to encourage international, interdisciplinary research on the social, religious, and historical complexities of the ancient world on a theoretical basis, but it is quite another to manage the publication process of such international collaboration from beginning to end. Oded Lipschits, Gary Knoppers, and Manfred Oeming

Abbreviations General Abbreviations Ant. Josephus, Jewish Antiquities J.W. Josephus, Jewish War kjv King James Version Tablets in the Metropolitan Museum of Art MMA njpsv New Jewish Publication Society Version nrsv New Revised Standard Version personal name PN rsv Revised Standard Version Tablets in the University Museum, University of Pennsylvania UM

Reference Works AB ABD ADPV AfO AfOB AJJS AJSL ANET

Anchor Bible Anchor Bible Dictionary Abhandlungen des Deutschen Palästinavereins Archiv für Orientforschung Archiv für Orientforschung: Beiheft Australian Journal of Jewish Studies American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literature Pritchard, J. B., editor. Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament. 3rd ed. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969 Alter Orient und Altes Testament AOAT AOS American Oriental Series ARG Archiv für Religionsgeschichte ATANT Abhandlungen zur Thologie des Alten und Neuen Testaments ATD Das Alte Testament Deutsch BA Biblical Archaeologist BASOR Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research BBET Beiträge zur biblischen Exegese und Theologie Babylonian Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania, BE Series A: Cuneiform Texts BETL Bibliotheca ephemeridum theologicarum lovaniensium Bib Biblica BibInt Biblical Interpretation BibOr Biblica et Orientalia

xi

xii BiOr BK BKAT BN BRev BSFÉ BTSt BVB BWANT BZ BZAR

Abbreviations

Bibliotheca Orientalis Bibel und Kirche Biblischer Kommentar: Altes Testament Biblische Notizen Bible Review Bulletin de la Société Franc¸aise d’Égyptologie Biblisch-theologische Studien Beiträge zum Verstehen der Bibel Beiträge zur Wissenschaft vom Alten und Neuen Testament Biblische Zeitschrift Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für Altorientalische und Biblische Zeitschrift BZAW Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft BZNW Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft Convivium assisiense CA CAD Oppenheim, A. L., et al., editors. The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Chicago: Oriental Institute, 1956– Cambridge Ancient History. 3rd ed. London: Cambridge CAH University Press, 1970– Catholic Biblical Quarterly CBQ CEJL Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature CHANE Culture and History of the Ancient Near East CNEB Cambridge Bible Commentary on the New English Bible Cowley Cowley, A. E. Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century b.c. Oxford: Clarendon, 1923 Tcherikover, V., ed. Corpus papyrorum judaicarum. 3 vols. CPJ Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1957–64 Classical Quarterly CQ Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British CT Museum Strassmaier, J. N., trans. Inschriften von Darius, König von Dar. Babylon (521–485 v.Chr.). Leipzig: Pfeiffer, 1897 Van der Toorn, K.; B. Becking; and P. W. van der Horst, editors. DDD Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. Leiden: Brill, 1995 Demotische studien DemSt DISO Jean, C.-F., and Hoftijzer, J. Dictionnaire des inscriptions sémitiques de l’ouest. Leiden, 1965 DMOA Documenta et Monumenta Orientis Antiqui DSD Dead Sea Discoveries ErIsr Eretz-Israel ESI Excavations and Surveys in Israel Forschungen zum Alten Testament FAT

Abbreviations

xiii

FB Forschung zur Bibel FoSub Fontes et subsidia ad Bibliam pertinentes FRLANT Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments GAT Grundrisse zum Alten Testament GM Göttinger Miszellen GOFI Göttinger Orientforschungen Iranica GS Geschichte Schriftlesung Handbuch zum Alten Testament HAT HBS Herders biblische Studien HCOT Historical Commentary on the Old Testament HKAT Handkommentar zum Alten Testament Harvard Semitic Monographs HSM HThKAT Herders theologischer Kommentar zum Alten Testament HUCA Hebrew Union College Annual IGCH Thomspon, M., O. Markholm, and C. M. Kraay, eds. An Inventory of Greek Coin Hoards. New York: American Numismatic Society, 1973 IMMP Pearce, L., and C. Wunsch. Into the Midst of Many Peoples: Judean and West Semitic Exiles in Mesopotamia. Cornell University Studies in Assyriology and Sumerology 18. Bethesda, MD: CDL, forthcoming INJ Israel Numismatic Journal JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society JBL Journal of Biblical Literature JBTh Jahrbuch für biblische Theologie JCS Journal of Cuneiform Studies JDTh Jahrbuch für deutsche Theologie Jaarbericht van het Vooraziatisch-Egyptisch Gezelschap JEOL (Genootschap): Ex Oriente Lux JHS Journal of Hellenic Studies JNES Journal of Near Eastern Studies Jüdische Schriften aus hellenistich-römischer Zeit JSHRZ JSJ Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic, and Roman Periods JSJSup Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplements Journal for the Study of the Old Testament JSOT JSOTSup Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series JSP Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha JTS Journal of Theological Studies KAT Kommentar zum Alten Testament KHC Kurzer Hand-Commentar zum Alten Testament KRI Kitchen, K. A. Ramesside Inscriptions, Historical and Biographical. 7 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969–90

xiv LCL LD LÄ

Abbreviations

Loeb Classical Library Lectio Divina Helck, W., and E. Otto, eds. Lexikon der Ägyptologie. Wiesbaden: Harassowitz, 1972– LHBOTS Library of Hebrew Bible / Old Testament Studies LSTS Library of Second Temple Studies MLC Olmo Lete, G. del. Mitos y leyendas de Canaan segun la tradicion de Ugarit. Madrid: Ediciones Christianidad, 1981 MPER Mitteilungen aus der Papyrussammlung der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek MSU Mitteilungen des Septuaginta-Unternehmens MThZ Münchener theologische Zeitschrift Mitteilungen der vorderasiatisch-ägyptischen Gesellschaft MVAG NABU Nouvelles assyriologiques brèves et utilitaires NBL Görg, M., and B. Lang. Neues Bibel-Lexikon. Zurich: Benziger, 1998 NCB New Century Bible NCBC New Century Bible Commentary Near Eastern Archaeology NEA NechtB Die neue Echter Bibel NICOT New International Commentary on the Old Testament OBO Orbis biblicus et orientalis Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta OLA OLZ Orientalistische Literaturzeitung Or Orientalia OTG Old Testament Guides OTL Old Testament Library OTS Oudtestamentische Studiën Publications of the Babylonian Section, University Museum, PBS University of Pennsylvania PIHANS Publications de l’Institut historique: Archéologique néerlandais de Stamboul P-M Porter, B., and R. Moss. Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs, and Paintings. 7 vols. Oxford: Oxbow, 1960– RA Revue d’assyriologie et d’archéologie orientale RB Revue biblique RES Répertoire d’épigraphie sémitique. RHPR Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuses RlA Ebeling, E., et al., editors. Reallexikon der Assyriologie. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1928– ROC Revue de l’Orient Chrétien RQ Römische Quartalschrift für christliche Altertumskunde und Kirchengeschichte

Abbreviations

xv

SAOC Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilizations SBAB Stuttgarter biblische Aufsatzbände SBLDS Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series SBLSS Society of Biblical Literature Semeia Studies SBLWAW Society of Biblical Literature Writings from the Ancient World SBS Stuttgarter Bibelstudien SBTS Sources for Biblical and Theological Study Sem. Semitica Symbolae Osloenses SO SSN Studia semitica neerlandica StDe Studia demotica SVTP Studia in Veteris Testamenti Pseudepigraphica TAD Türk Arkeoloji Dergisi TADAE Porten, B., and Yardeni, A., editors. Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt. 4 vols. Jerusalem: Hebrew University, Dept. of the History of the Jewish People, 1986–99 TB Theologische Bücherei: Neudrucke und Berichte aus dem 20. Jahrhundert TC Tablettes cappadociennes TRE Krause, G., and Müller, G., editors. Theologische Realenzyklopädie.Berlin: de Gruyter, 1977– TthZ Trierer theologische Zeitschrift TUAT Kaiser, Otto, editor. Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments. 3 vols. Gütersloh: Mohn, 1983–97 TW Theologische Wissenschaft TZ Theologische Zeitschrift UCP University of California Publications in Semitic Philology UF Ugarit-Forschungen Urk. Urkunden des ägyptischen Altertums UTB Uni-Taschenbücher VAT Vorderasiatische Abteilung Thontafeln VT Vetus Testamentum VTSup Vetus Testamentum Supplements VWGTh Veröffentlichen der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theologie Wb. Erman, A., and H. Grapow. Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache. 5 vols. Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1926–31. Reprinted, 1963. WBC Word Biblical Commentary WMANT Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament WSS Avigad, N., and B. Sass. Corpus of West Semitic Stamp Seals. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1997 WZKM Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes

xvi ZÄS ZAW ZBKAT ZThK

Abbreviations Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Zürcher Bibelkommentare: Altes Testament Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche

Part 1

Negotiating Identity: Diversity within the Biblical Evidence

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity: The Political Theology of the Priestly Document Konrad Schmid University of Zürich

The Priestly Document and Its Historical Setting There are numerous texts in the Hebrew Bible that deal with the problem of Judean identity in the international context of the Persian period. However, one perspective stands out in terms of its degree of political and theological reflection—the so-called Priestly Document, or P. Despite the numerous storms engulfing the Documentary Hypothesis, 1 P still seems to continue as a workable theory. There are many good reasons to conclude that its text began as a stand-alone source (rather than as a redactional layer), reaching from creation to at least Sinai, even if the final ending point remains unclear. 2 While not Author’s note: My thanks go to Peter Altmann (Princeton) for translating this article. 1.  See Jan Christian Gertz et al., eds., Abschied vom Jahwisten: Die Komposition des Hexateuch in der jüngsten Diskussion (BZAW 315; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2002); Tom Dozeman and Konrad Schmid, eds., A Farewell to the Yahwist? The Composition of the Pentateuch in Recent European Interpretation (SBLSS 34; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2006). 2.  Compare the general thematic agreement but variability with regard to where it ends, at either Exodus 29 (Eckart Otto, “Forschungen zur Priesterschrift,” TRu 62 [1997]: 1–50), Exodus 40 (Thomas Pola, Die ursprüngliche Priesterschrift: Beobachtungen zur Literarkritik und Tra­di­tions­­ge­­schichte von Pg [WMANT 70; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1995]; Reinhard Gregor Kratz, Die Komposition der erzählenden Bücher des Alten Testaments [UTB 2157; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000], 102–17; Michaela Bauks, “La signification de l’espace et du temps dans l’‘historiographie sacerdotale,’” in The Future of the Deuteronomistic History (ed. Thomas Römer; BETL 147; Leuven: Peeters, 2000], 29–45), Leviticus 9 (Erich Zenger, “Priesterschrift,” TRE 27:435–46; idem, Einleitung in das Alte Testament, Studienbücher Theologie 1,1 [5th ed.; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2004], 156–75), or Leviticus 16 (Matthias Köckert, Leben in Gottes Gegenwart: Studien zum Verständnis des Gesetzes im Alten Testament [FAT 43; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004], 105; Christophe Nihan, From Priestly Torah to Pentateuch: A Study in the Composition of the Book of Leviticus [FAT 2/25; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006], 20–68). A gradual extension of the Priestly

3

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Konrad Schmid

everyone dates P to the Persian period, this seems to be the most viable option. 3 Because of its considerably critical stance toward Egypt and its specific presentation of the sanctuary as a geographically unbound unit, an “early” dating of P in the Postexilic Period (before 525 b.c.e.) has some advantages, but this is neither compelling nor completely necessary for this argument.

Political Theology of P In order to understand the political theology of P in its Persianperiod setting, it is, of course, necessary to keep in mind that P speaks about the past, not the present. Its historical range covers the time period between the creation and Moses. However, P clearly uses this mythical past to sketch the everlasting political and religious organization of its contemporary world. For P, the Persian period is—to use an anachronistic saying—the end of history: God’s political will has beDocument from Exodus 40 to Leviticus 26 with various endings is suggested by Jan Christian Gertz, ed., Grundinformation Altes Testament (2nd ed.; UTB 2745; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007), 236. Christian Frevel, Mit Blick auf das Land die Schöpfung erinnern (HBS 23; Freiburg: Herder, 2000), supports the traditional ending in Deuteronomy 34 (cf. Ludwig Schmidt, Studien zur Priesterschrift [BZAW 214; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1993], 271; Peter Weimar, Studien zur Priesterschrift [FAT 56; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008], 17). Joseph Blenkinsopp, “The Structure of P,” CBQ 38 (1976), 275–92; Norbert Lohfink, “Die Priesterschrift und die Geschichte,” in Congress Volume Göttingen 1977 (ed. John Adney Emerton; VTSup 29; Leiden: Brill, 1978), 183–225 = idem, Studien zum Pentateuch (SBAB 4; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibel­werk, 1988), 213–53; E. A. Knauf, “Die Priesterschrift und die Geschichten der Deuteronomisten,” The Future of the Deuteronomistic History (ed. T. Römer; BETL 147; Leuven: Peeters, 2000) 101–18; Philippe Guillaume, Land and Calendar: The Priestly Document from Genesis 1 to Joshua 18 (Bern: Habilitationsschrift, 2008); see the conclusion of Pg in Joshua. For a sketch of the land thematic in P, see Matthias Köc­kert, “Das Land in der priesterlichen Komposition des Pentateuch,” in Von Gott reden: Beiträge zur Theologie und Exegese des Alten Testa­ments (ed. Dieter Vieweger and Ernst-Joachim Waschke; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1995), 147–62; Ludwig Schmidt, Studien, 251–74; my Erzväter und Exodus: Untersuchungen zur deppelten Begründung der Ursprünge Israels in den Geschichtsbüchern des Alten Testaments (WMANT 81; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1999), 258–64; Bauks, “Die Begriffe ‫מורׁשה‬ und ‫ אחזה‬in Pg: Uberlegungen zur Landkonzeption der Priestergrundschrift,” ZAW (2004): 171–88. For the thematic dimensions of this inclusion, see Bernd Janowski, “Tempel und Schöpfung: Schöpfungstheologische Aspekte der priester­schrift­li­chen Heiligtumskonzeption,” in Schöpfung und Neuschöpfung (ed. Ingo Baldermann et al.; JBTh 5; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1990, 37–69 = idem, Gottes Gegenwart in Israel: Beiträge zur Theo­logie des Alten Testaments (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1993), 214–46. 3.  A convenient discussion is provided by Jean-Louis Ska, Introduction to Reading the Pentateuch (trans. P. Dominique; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006), 159–61.

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

5

come clear with Achaemenid rule over the world. However, God’s will is not the same for everyone in P’s world because this world has a particular structure. Ever since Wellhausen, scholars have noticed the importance of the notion of covenant for P’s political theology. 4 However, Wellhausen’s own interpretation—following Ewald’s approach—which saw a four-covenant book (liber quattuor foederum) in P, cannot be accepted. 5 Present scholars, especially German-speaking, correctly follow the likes of Valeton and Zimmerli, who argued for a two-covenant theology (pointing to Genesis 9 and 17). 6 These two covenants are held to establish a two-part structure in P, differentiating between the “circle of the world” (Weltkreis) and the “circle of Israel” (Israelkreis). This essay will argue that, while this conclusion is not fundamentally wrong, neither is it completely correct. Though different approaches to structuring P have been proposed, by Joseph Blenkinsopp or Norbert Lohfink, for example, 7 the present argument will focus on the “circle” model because it is of crucial importance for P’s political stance. It is always helpful to understand how exegetical theories came about. In the case of the two-circle model for P, it is not very difficult to track down its orgins. The terminology of “circles” (“Kreise”) to describe the structure of P was introduced by Gerhard von Rad in his 1934 book Die Priesterschrift im Hexateuch: Literarisch untersucht und theologisch gewertet. 8 However, von Rad suggested a three- rather than a two-part structure for P. He differentiated between “three big concentric circles . . . which move from the outside inwards towards the salvific mystery of God—the circle of the world, the circle of Noah, and the Abrahamic circle” (“drei mächtige konzentrische Kreise . . . die von außen nach innen fortschreitend in das Heilsgeheimnis Gottes einführen: der Weltkreis, der Noahkreis und der abrahamitische Kreis”). 9 Later, especially Odil 4.  A different approach is offered by Joseph Blenkinsopp, “The Structure of P,” CBQ 38 (1976): 275–92. 5. Heinrich Ewald, Geschichte des Volkes Israel (3rd ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1864), 116–23. See also Julius Wellhausen, “Die Composition des Hexateuch,” JDTh 21 (1876): 392. 6.  Cf. especially Walther Zimmerli, “Sinaibund und Abrahambund: Ein Beitrag zum Verständnis der Priesterschrift,” TZ 16 (1960): 268–80 = idem, Gottes Offenbarung: Gesammelte Aufsätze zum Alten Testament (TB 19; Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1963), 205–17; before him, J. J. P. Valeton, “Bedeutung und Stellung des Wortes ‫ ברית‬im Priestercodex,” ZAW 12 (1892): 1–22. 7.  Blenkinsopp, “Structure”; Lohfink, “Priesterschrift.” See also the discussion in Ska, Introduction, 153–57. 8.  BWANT 65; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1934. 9. Von Rad, Priesterschrift, 167, is followed by Bernd Janowski, Sühne als Heilsgeschehen: Traditions‑ und religionsgeschichtliche Studien zur priesterschriftlichen

6

Konrad Schmid Table 1.  Zenger’s Structure of P

Text

Identification of Deity

Creation

Elohim (God)

Flood Abraham

Sinai

Elohim blesses the humans and entrusts them with the Earth. Elohim blesses the humans and establishes/gives his covenant (bĕrīt) and entrusts them with the Earth.

Elohim as El Shadday (“the Almighty”)

Jacob Exodus

Key Theological Words

El-Shadday establishes/gives his covenant (bĕrīt) and blesses Abraham and his descendents (Gen 17:7–8: the contents of the bĕrīt: Promise of divine presence and gift of land). El-Shadday blesses Jacob and his descendents (Gen 35:12: renewal of the land promise).

Yhwh

Yhwh recalls his covenant and creates his glory (kābōd) before the gods of Egypt (Exod 6:2–8: repeat of the bĕrīt: promise from Gen 17:7–8). Yhwh’s creational glory (kābōd) appears and dwells in the midst of His entire people (Exod 29:43–46, 40:34–35; Lev 9:23–24: fulfillment of the presence of God as well as the affirmation of the promise of land given to the ancestors).

Hannes Steck picked up on von Rad’s language of “circles.” However, he reduced the number of circles from three to two, though without any comment. 10 This two-part structure of P seemed to become almost canonical, at least among German-speaking scholars. For example, Erich Zenger’s Einleitung in das Alte Testament adopts this model, although it does not fit his own interpretation of P. Zenger explicitly quotes Steck and retains his suggested two-circle model of P as “most plausible.” 11 Sühne­theologie (2nd ed.; WMANT 55; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 2000), 9. In von Rad’s Theology of the Old Testament, a tripartite separation again appears, but this one is of a different kind: “As is well known, the Priestly Document presents its idea of history as a step by step process of the revelation of God— Noah—Abraham—Moses.” See Gerhard von Rad, Theologie des Alten Testaments, vol. 1: Die Theologie der geschichtlichen Überlieferungen Israels (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1957), 239. 10.  Odil Hannes Steck, “Aufbauprobleme in der Priesterschrift,” in Ernten, was man sät: Festschrift für Klaus Koch zu seinem 65. Geburtstag (ed. Dwight R. Daniels et al.; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1991), 287–308, esp. p. 307. Cf. the discussion of alternative structures for P as a whole, pp. 305–6. 11. Erich Zenger, Einleitung in das Alte Testament (5th ed.; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2004), 167–68, and his earlier study Gottes Bogen in den Wolken: Untersuchungen zu Komposition und Theologie der priesterschriftlichen Urgeschichte (SBS 112; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1983), 137–39. See also Werner Hugo Schmidt, Einführung in das Alte Testament (5th ed.; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1995), 104–5.

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7

But ironically, he presents this twofold structure in a three-part schema, which substantially contradicts his argument (see table 1). Regarding P’s political world view, I contend that the three-part schema is essentially correct, while the suggestion of a two-part structure misses some key elements of P’s political theology. The primary support for interpreting P’s political theology as structured in three concentric circles is its very well-known threefold notion of God. 12 P differentiates between a circle of the world over which God stands as ‫אלהים‬, an Abrahamic circle to which God relates as ‫אל ׁשדי‬, and finally an Israelite circle inside which God can be called on with his real and cultic name, ‫יהוה‬. 13 The circle of the world includes the entire politically ordered world, which, however, does not need to correspond with the then-known world in its entirety. The largest geographic exception for P might be Egypt, reflecting the anti-Egyptian notions emerging from the Priestly plague narrative 14 and P’s only mention of “gods” (the “gods of Egypt”) 12.  Albert de Pury, “Abraham: The Priestly Writer’s ‘Ecumenical’ Ancestor,” in Rethinking the Foundations: Historiography in the Ancient World and in the Bible (ed. Steven L. McKenzie et al.; BZAW 294; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000), 163–81, esp. pp. 172–73; idem, “Pg as the Absolute Beginning,” in Les dernières redactions du Pentateuque, de l’Hexateuch et de l’Ennéateuch (ed. Thomas Römer and Konrad Schmid; BETL 203; Leuven: Peeters, 2007), 99–128, esp. pp. 109–11; cf. my “Differen­zierungen und Konzeptualisierungen der Einheit Gottes in der Religions- und Literaturgeschichte Israels. Methodische, religionsgeschichtliche und exegetische Aspekte zur neueren Diskussion um den sogenannten ‘Monotheismus’ im antiken Israel,” in Der eine Gott und die Götter: Polytheismus und Monotheismus im antiken Israel (ed. Manfred Oeming and Konrad Schmid; ATANT 82; Zürich: TVZ, 2003), 11–38. However, it is noteworthy that the geographic closeness repeatedly contradicts the theological perspective because Jacob becomes the father not only of a nation through the promise but of a “collection of nations”; “nation,” ‫קהל עמים‬: Gen 28:3, 48:4; “collection of nations,” ‫גוי‬ ‫וקהל גוים‬: Gen 35:11. P may be considering the juxtaposition of the Samaritans and Judeans at this point but hardly the tribes of Israel as has often been suggested in the past, who are never called ‫ גוי‬or ‫ עם‬in Genesis (cf. de Pury, “Abraham,” 170 n. 26). 13.  Circle of the world: For a discussion of the cosmological “location” of God and the theology of God’s presence as ‫ כובד יהוה‬in the Priestly Document, see my “Himmelsgott, Weltgott und Schöpfer: ‘Gott’ und der ‘Himmel’ in der Literatur der Zeit des Zweiten Tempels,” in Der Himmel (ed. Dorothea Sattler and Samuel Vollenweider; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 2006), 111–48. Abrahamic circle  : cf. ‫אל‬ ‫ׁשדי‬, Ernst Axel Knauf, “Shadday,” DDD, 1416–23. Israelite circle: Norbert Lohfink, “Die priesterschriftliche Abwertung der Tradition von der Offenbarung des Jah­ we­na­mens an Mose,” Bib 49 (1968): 1–8 = idem, Studien zum Pentateuch (SBAB 4; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1988), 71–78; cf. the criticism of Erhard Blum, Studien zur Komposition des Pentateuch (BZAW 189; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1990), 235–36. 14. Cf. Blum, Pentateuch, 242–56; J. C. Gertz, Tradition und Redaction in der Exoduserzählung (FRLANT 189; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000), 79–97.

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in Exod 12:12. These polemics stand in opposition to P’s otherwise inclusive theology. 15 The circle of the world has stood under the unbroken promise of God since the Noahic covenant of Genesis 9, namely, that God will never threaten the earth with judgment again. The circle of Abraham includes “the Abrahamic household,” consisting of the Arabs (“Ishmael”), Israel (that is, “Samaria”) and Judah (“Jacob”), and Edom (“Esau”). Intermarriage within this circle is allowed: according to P, Esau marries—illegitimately (Gen 26:34, 27:46)—two “Hittite women” (Gen 26:34). 16 Subsequently, Jacob receives advice from his parents to marry a woman from among his kin in Paddan Aram (Gen 27:46, 28:1–5). In response, Esau marries another woman, one of the daughters of his uncle Ishmael (Gen 28:6–9). Therefore, it can be concluded with de Pury that “according to P Jews are permitted to intermarry with Ishmaelite and Edomite women, but not with ‘Hittite’ or ‘Canaanite’ women.’” 17 P furthermore records the genealogy of Ishmael’s descendants (Gen 25:12–18) as well as Esau’s (Gen 36:4–14), who possess a qualified theological nearness to Israel through this ethnic proximity. 18 This Abrahamic circle is defined by the Abrahamic covenant of Genesis 17, which promises the participating covenant partners fruitfulness, land inheritance (which seems to imply a right to use rather than to possess), and proximity to God. The circle of Israel narrows the focus down to the nation of God alone. It is generally concerned with the establishment of the sanctuary, which enables the sacrificial cult of Israel. This sacrificial cult alone is what allows Israel to achieve atonement. The sanctuary and the implementation of the cult seem to function as the partial restoration of See also Michaela Bauks, “Das Dämonische im Menschen: Einige Anmerkungen zur priesterschriftlichen Theologie (Ex 7–14),” in Die Dämonen: Die Dämonologie der israelitisch-jüdischen und frühchristlichen Literatur im Kontext ihrer Umwelt (ed. Armin Lange et al.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), 239–53. 15. Cf. my “Differenzierungen.” 16.  It remains unclear what this designation signifies. At any rate, these “Hittite women” have more in common with the “Canaanites” than with the historical “Hittites.” Cf. G. McMahon, “Hittites in the OT,” ABD 3:231–33. See, however, the position of Moshe Weinfeld, “Traces of Hittite Cult in Shiloh, Bethel and in Jerusalem,” in Religionsgeschichtliche Beziehungen zwischen Kleinasien, Nordsyrien und dem Alten Testament (ed. Bernd Janowski et al.; OBO 129; Freiburg: Universitätsverlag / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1993), 455–72. 17.  Albert de Pury, “Der priesterschriftliche Umgang mit der Jakobsgeschichte,” in Schriftauslegung in der Schrift (ed. Reinhard G. Kratz et al.; BZAW 300; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000), 33–60, esp. p. 55. 18.  Cf. Roger Syrén, The Forsaken First-Born: A Study of a Recurrent Motif in the Patriarchal Narratives (JSOTSup 133; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1993), 122–29; Thomas Hieke, Die Genealogien der Genesis (HBS 39; Freiburg: Herder, 2003), 144–50, 175–91.

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

9

the initial creation, in the sense of a second “creation within creation.” 19 The circle of Israel is not established by its own covenant because the foundational promise of the presence of God (“I will be your God”) was already given in Gen 17:7 (cf. Exod 6:7, 29:45–46). Nevertheless, the establishment of the sanctuary concretizes the presence of God specifically for Israel by locating God’s ‫ ׁשכינה‬in the midst of his people (cf. Exod 29:45–46). 20

The Extension of the Abrahamic Covenant in the History of Research Obviously, this proposal of a three-circle structure in P is substantially dependent on the specifics of the Abraham circle and especially Genesis 17, whose theological profile remains contentious among interpreters. 21 With whom does God make a covenant in Genesis 17? Or, in the language of the Priestly Document, to whom does God promise fruitfulness, land inheritance, and proximity to God? This question has received nearly every conceivable answer in 20thcentury scholarship. Holzinger began the discussion in 1898 by noticing that Gen 17:19, 21 narrows the covenant of Gen 17:7—clearly made with Abraham and all his descendants—to the Isaac line (“I will establish my covenant with Isaac”). 22 Subsequently, Gunkel concluded that Gen 17:23–27 stands in contradiction with Gen 17:19–21:   P made a mistake when Ishmael also receives circumcision because he hereby even becomes the first example of an heir to the leader, while he is at the same time explicitly removed from the covenant that makes circumcision its symbol of inclusion. 23   (Dabei hat P den Fehler gemacht, daß auch Ismael die Beschneidung bekommt: er ist sogar hier als erstes Exempel des Haussohnes die Hauptperson, während er anderseits von dem Bunde, dessen Zeichen die Beschneidung ist, ausdrücklich ausgenommen sein soll.) 19. Cf. Blum, Pentateuch, 287–322, esp. p. 311; Köckert, Leben, 102–7. 20.  Janowski, Sühne, 306; cf. Köckert, FS Wagner, 153 n. 21. 21. Benjamin Ziemer (Abram—Abraham: Kompositionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu Gen 14, 15 und 17 [BZAW 350; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2005], 280–90, esp. p. 289) has recently disputed the so-called “Priestergrundschrift” in Genesis 12–36; however, this attempt does not have sufficient textual support. Therefore, this “proposal” may be rejected. 22. Heinrich Holzinger, Genesis (KAT 1; Freiburg: Mohr, 1898), 128: “V. 19 und 21 enthalten die bestimmte Erklärung, dass die Berîth, die Gott gegenüber dem Abraham verfügt, nur dem Sohn der Sara gilt; für Ismael bleibt da nur ein einfacher Segen übrig, wie 20 dazwischen hinein die künftige Stellung Ismaels präcisiert.” 23. Hermann Gunkel, Genesis übersetzt und erklärt (HKAT 1/1; 8th ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1969; original, 1901), 272.

10

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Neither Holzinger nor Gunkel suggested the separation of different textual layers in Genesis 17. They instead limited themselves to the observation that P appears to be inconsistent at this point. This probably results from the long shadow of Wellhausen, who saw this chapter as a clearly unified text: “There is nothing to say about Genesis 17.” 24 Smend, however, considered the contradictory ideas in Genesis 17 to be a sign of literary growth:   The law concerning the circumcision of slaves is inserted in 17:12b, 13a, and is connected with a further expansion in vv. 23–27. A later hand must have reworked these verses because P—who continues the covenant only to Isaac (vv. 19, 21)—could not possibly have narrated the circumcision of Ishmael. 25   (Eingeschoben ist ferner 17,12b.13a das Gebot, die Sklaven zu beschneiden, womit eine starke Erweiterung in v 23–27 zusammenhängt. Diese Verse müssen auch deshalb von späterer Hand überarbeitet sein, weil P, der den Bund allein auf Isaak übergehn läßt [v 19.21], unmöglich von einer Beschneidung Ismaels erzählt haben kann.)

In 1916, Eichrodt concurred with Smend:  As Gunkel and Holzinger had already noticed, the inclusion of Ishmael and foreign slaves in the covenant with Yahweh actually contradicts the general thrust of the narrative. However, they still allowed the contradiction to remain as a constitutive part of P g itself. It would be more correct to determine vv. 12b, 13a, 23–27 in Gen 17 as secondary insertions to P g. 26   (Was die Aufnahme Ismaels und der fremden Sklaven in den Bund mit Jahve betrifft, so haben auch schon Gunkel und Holzinger bemerkt, daß sie eigentlich der in der Erzählung liegenden Tendenz widerspricht; doch lassen sie es bei der Konstatierung dieses Widerspruchs in P g selbst bewenden. Richtiger ist es wohl, in Gen 17 die Verse 12b.13a.23–27 als sekundären Einschub bei P g zu streichen.)

Steuernagel appeared to relate his comments to these interpreters a few years later, stating:   It has been observed numerous times that there is a certain contradiction in Gen 17, namely that the ‫ ברית‬through which God has committed himself to certain obligations is on the one hand narrowed to only Isaac and his descendants and not to Ishmael (v. 19ff.). On the other hand the circumcision 24. Julius Wellhausen, Die Composition des Hexateuch und der historischen Bücher des Alten Testaments (3rd ed.; Berlin: Reimer, 1899), 23: “Über Gen. 17 ist nichts zu bemerken.” 25. Rudolf Smend, Die Erzählung des Hexateuch auf ihre Quellen untersucht (Berlin: Reimer, 1912), 9; cf. p. 37. 26. Walther Eichrodt, Die Quellen der Genesis von neuem untersucht (BZAW 31; Giessen: Alfred Töpelmann, 1916), 27, with an explicit reference to Smend in n. 13.

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

11

commanded in v.10ff. and declared the sign of the ‫ ברית‬according to v. 11 is performed on all of the descendants of Abraham—also on Ishmael and even Abraham’s slaves and their descendants—so that they carry the sign of the ‫ ברית‬but without implying that the ‫  ברית‬has been extended to them. 27   (Es ist bisher wohl schon mehrfach beachtet worden, daß in Gen 17 ein gewisser Widerspruch steckt, sofern ausdrücklich erklärt wird, die ‫ברית‬, durch die sich Gott an bestimmte Verpflichtungen gebunden hat, beziehe sich nur auf Isaak und dessen Nachkommen und nicht auch auf Ismael (v. 19ff), und andererseits in v. 10ff geboten wird, die Beschneidung, die nach v. 11 das Zeichen der ‫ ברית‬ist, an allen Nachkommen Abrahams, also auch an Ismael, ja selbst an den Sklaven Abrahams und seiner Nachkommen zu vollziehen, so daß sie das Zeichen der ‫ ברית‬an sich tragen, ohne daß die ‫ ברית‬sich auf sie erstreckt.)

Steuernagel’s own suggestion included a fourfold diachronic differentiation of Genesis 17, including a pre-Priestly foundation and two additions to the Priestly Document itself. 28 Procksch’s Genesis commentary followed Steuernagel’s lead:   V. 19 ‫ אבל‬. . . opposes the notion that Ishmael should be the bearer of the covenant, thereby denying Abraham’s distraction (v. 18). 29      (V. 19 ‫ אבל‬. . . steht gegensätzlich, um Abrahams Ablenkung [v. 18] auszuschließen, als solle Išmaʾel Bundesträger sein.)

Procksch solved the tension of Ishmael’s circumcision as follows: 27. Carl Steuernagel, “Bemerkungen zu Genesis 17,” in Beiträge zur alttestamentlichen Wissenschaft Karl Budde zum siebzigsten Geburtstag am 13. April 1920 überreicht von Freunden und Schülern (ed. Karl Marti; BZAW 34; Giessen: Alfred Töpelmann, 1920), 172–79. 28.  Steuernagel, “Bemerkungen,” 177. There are two noteworthy arguments that guide Steuernagel’s conclusions. The first is that he assumes that the Abrahamic covenant in the stratum of the Priestly Document itself could only apply to the Israelite descendants of Abraham: “Es ist klar, daß diese ‫ברית‬-Zusagen [sc. in Gen 17,7–8] nur auf die Israeliten Bezug haben können, denn nur ihr Gott ist Jahwe und nur ihnen gehört das Land Kanaan” (p. 173). The second argument is that, from Steuernagel’s perspective, the narrowing of the Abrahamic covenant to Isaac is the decisive evidence that the Priestly Document was not aware of a Sinai covenant: “Nun ist es aber eine sehr bemerkenswerte Tatsache, daß P in allen seinen Schichten keine weitere ‫ ברית‬und insbesondere keine Sinai-‫ ברית‬kennt. Diese Tatsache wird nur dann verständlich, wenn Pg die Abraham-‫ ברית‬so dargestellt hatte, daß daneben eine Sinai-‫ ברית‬nicht mehr nötig war, wenn also die Abraham-‫ ברית‬als eine von vornherein auf Abraham und seine israelitischen Nachkommen und nur auf diese bezügliche dargestellt war” (p. 178). 29. Otto Procksch, Die Genesis (2nd ed.; KAT 1; Leipzig: Hinrich, 1924), 522. Procksch suggests that G* in v. 19 has been expanded with “to be their God” in order to clarify further the narrowing of the covenant proclamation. See n. 58 as well.

12

Konrad Schmid   The only fully qualified bearers of the covenant are the promised descendants of Abraham through Isaac (v. 15ff.), who grow up into the covenant people for whom God is the covenant God (v. 19 G*). For Ishmael circumcision is only a sign of relationship with Abraham’s family by blood and custom upon which a blessing of a nation is based (v. 20): for these second-class members of the household circumcision is only a household ritual requirement without promise. 30   (Der volle Träger des Bundes ist nur Abrahams in Isaak verheißenes Geschlecht [v. 15ff.], das zum Bundesvolke heranreift, in dem Gott Bundesgott ist (v. 19 G*). Dagegen ist für Išmaʾel die Beschneidung nur Zeichen der Verwandtschaft mit Abrahams Geschlecht nach Blut und Sitte, in der ein Volkssegen begründet ist (v. 20), für das Ingesinde ist sie lediglich Forderung als tabu des Hauswesens ohne Verheißung.)

Von Rad reached a similar conclusion in his aforementioned 1934 study. In his judgment, P separated humanity into three concentric circles—the world, the Noahic, and the Abrahamic circles—in which the Abrahamic is the smallest and innermost circle. Von Rad did recognize, however, that the periods of Abraham and Moses are further subdivided:   Although there is certainly an inner development between Abraham and Moses, this is an historical development from promise to fulfillment, and therefore cannot really be seen as similar to the development in salvation-economies from Gen 9 to Gen 17. 31   (Gewiß, es besteht ein innerer Fortschritt zwischen Abraham und Mose; aber das ist der der historische Fortschrittt [sic] von der Verheißung zur Erfüllung, und der kann nun wirklich nicht entfernt verglichen werden mit dem heilsökonomischen Fortschritt von Gen. 9 zu Gen. 17.)

However, he needed to follow this up by adding:   We must free ourselves, however, from the notion that P had an absolutely precise schema that he carried out in the creation of his work. 32   (Von dem Gedanken, P habe ein nach einem Schema absolut präzis durchgeführtes Werk geschaffen, müssen wir uns allerdings freimachen.)

According to von Rad, the Priestly Document lacked precision especially in its extension of the Abrahamic covenant:   The information that the proclamation regarding great fruitfulness for the descendants of Abraham includes the descendants of the Edomites and the children of Keturah contradicts the conclusion that the same 30.  Ibid., 520. 31.  Gerhard von Rad, Die Priesterschrift im Hexateuch: Literarisch untersucht und theologisch gewertet (BWANT 65; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1934), 176. 32.  Ibid.

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

13

promise is also given to Isaac and Jacob. It remains indecipherable what theological concern the report had in mind when stating that the Edomites and Arabs are sons of Abraham. The promise concerning the great fruitfulness of Arbaham’s descendants cannot be conceived of outside the close relationship between the Abrahamic covenant and the inaugurated divine relationship. This would be the case, however, if this element of the promise also includes the Edomites and Arabs. 33   (Die Auskunft, die Aussage der großen Vermehrung des Abrahams­ samens beziehe sich auf die von Abraham gleichfalls abstammenden Edomiter und Keturasöhne, versagt angesichts der Feststellung, daß die gleiche Verheißung auch dem Isaak und Jakob gegeben ist. Es ist auch nicht erfindlich, mit welchem theologischen Anliegen sich die Mitteilung, daß auch die Edomiter und Araber Abrahamssöhne seien, verbinden ließe; die Verheißung großer Vermehrung des Abrahams­samens kann doch nicht ohne die enge Beziehung zu dem durch den Abrahamsbund inaugurierten Gottesverhältnis gemeint sein; das wäre aber der Fall, wenn dieses Verheißungselement sich auch auf die Edomiter und Araber bezöge.)

Von Rad explains this discrepancy as follows:   We are dealing here with what are obviously some traditional elements. The Yahwist does not follow this line of thinking any further either and gives his readers no concrete picture about the way in which “all nations of the earth will be blessed through Abraham.” It therefore appears to have been received through the transmission of traditional elements from the beginning of the particular line of reasoning in order to express this final goal programmatically. Perhaps P in this case instead follows the tradition, since this element stands outside its particular interests. 34   ([W]ir [haben] es hier offenbar mit einem allgemeinen Traditionselement zu tun. Auch der Jahwist verfolgt ja diesen Gedanken nicht weiter und gibt seinen Lesern keine konkrete Vorstellung darüber, inwiefern ‚sich alle Geschlechter der Erde in Abraham segnen werden’. Es scheint also von der Überlieferung gegeben gewesen zu sein, gerade am Beginn der partikularen Linie dieses letzte Ziel programmatisch zum Ausdruck zu bringen. Ob P hier etwa mehr dem Herkommen folgt, ob nicht vielleicht dieses Element außerhalb seiner besonderen Anliegen steht, kann man immerhin fragen.)

Whereas source-critical evaluations since Humbert have rejected the separation of P into two sources as suggested by von Rad, they have

33.  Ibid., 177. Emphasis original. 34.  Ibid., 177–78. Von Rad does not appear to have changed his position noticeably in his later Genesis commentary; cf. idem, Das erste Buch Mose: Genesis (ATD 2/4; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1953), 172.

14

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also been silent with regard to the diachronic analysis of Genesis 17. 35 The literary unity of Genesis 17 appears to have been secured both by the analysis of McEvenue, who is able to show that the chapter could be organized carefully, albeit in two (!) overlaying structures, and by Westermann’s and Blum’s warm receptions of his conclusions. 36 They speak for the literary unity of Genesis 17 in which the covenant of God applies only the descendants of Abraham through the line of Isaac. In his Genesis commentary, Seebass reaches the same conclusion, and his opinion with regard to the promised son is as follows:   V. 19 renders God’s word unequivocal. It does not deal so much with an admonition for Abraham . . . rather it uses Abraham’s laughing and doubt in order to clarify the point that the covenant will only proceed by way of this miraculous son. 37   (V. 19 macht Gottes Wort eindeutig. Es enthält nicht so sehr einen Verweis Abrahams . . ., als dass Abrahams Lachen und Zweifel das Mittel bilden, um die Pointe scharf herauszustellen: Nur mit diesem Wundersohn wird der Bund weitergehen.)

The results for Ishmael are the opposite:   Ishmael receives a promise similar to that of Abraham—fertility, extremely numerous [descendants], and princes (cf. 25:13–17). He does not, however, belong to the covenant. 38   (Ismael bekommt ganz ähnliche Zusagen wie Abraham: fruchtbar, sehr sehr zahlreich, Fürsten [vgl. 25,13–17]. Aber in den Bund gehört er nicht.)

Finally, Kratz argues concerning Gen 17:15–21: 35. Paul Humbert, “Die literarische Zweiheit des Priester-Codex in der Genesis (Kritische Untersuchung der These von Rads),” ZAW 17 (1940–41): 30–57. Von Rad, Priesterschrift, 176. 36.  Sean E. McEvenue, The Narrative Style of the Priestly Writer (AnBib 50; Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1971), 145–78, esp. pp. 158–59. Cf. the study by André Wénin, “Recherche sur la structure de Genèse 17,” BZ 50 (2006): 196–211. Claus Westermann, Genesis: 2. Teilband. Genesis 12–36 (BK 1/2; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1981), 307–8. Erhard Blum, Die Komposition der Vätergeschichte (WMANT 57; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1984), 420–21. Cf. also Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 16–50 (WBC 2; Dallas: Word, 1994), 17–18. 37. Horst Seebass, Genesis II/1: Vätergeschichte (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1997), 109. 38.  Ibid., 110. Seebass determines that the portion of Genesis 17 belonging to P g—following Klaus Grünwaldt (Exil und Identität: Beschneidung, Passa und Sabbat in der Priesterschrift [Frankfurt am Main: Athenäum, 1992], 27–70) is as follows: “V.1–8.15–22.26–27a.24f” (p. 172). Cf. J. Alberto Soggin, Das Buch Genesis: Kommentar (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1997), 266: “auch [Ismael] er wird fruchtbar sein und ist zu Großem bestimmt, jedoch nicht dazu, der menschliche Partner im göttlichen Bund zu werden.”

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

15

  It clearly shows that the covenant with Abram/Abraham is only propagated through the primary line of Sarai/Sarah and her son Isaac (cf. Exod 6). 39   (Er [sc. der Neueinsatz] macht deutlich, dass sich der Bund mit Abram/ Abraham nur über die Hauptlinie, Sarai/Sara und ihren Sohn Isaak, fortpflanzt [vgl. Ex 6].)

All this shows that the discussion of Genesis 17 in the 20th century has been largely dominated by the axiom made explicit by Steuernagel, namely, that “[b]ecause only their God is Yahweh and the land of Canaan only belongs to them,” 40 the Abrahamic covenant can only pertain to the Israelites. There are exceptions, however. John Van Seters offers the following remarks in his Abraham book: There is a certain amount of ambiguity in the matter of who is included within this covenant. Since all the males in Abraham’s household are circumcised, including Ishmael . . . the covenant would seem to be wider than Israel. 41

Furthermore, Westermann reckons with some kind of a graduated understanding of ‫ ברית‬in Genesis 17 because his view of ‫ ברית‬in Genesis 17 explicitly includes v. 7, which specifically focuses on “offspring.” Therefore, the promise of descendants pertains to Ishmael as well. Contra E. Kutsch, 42 Westermann argues:   While he [Kutsch] says, “The berīt is reserved for Isaac”; [and] “God’s berīt applies only to Isaac,” this is not the case. The promise of descendants that Ishmael receives is also called berīt. It becomes clear that the word berīt when being connected with Isaac belongs to the new relationship with God. P coins berīt with a new meaning in Gen 17, designating Israel’s own relationship with God. 43   (Wenn er sagt: ‚Die berīt ist allein Isaak vorbehalten’; ‚Gottes berīt kommt nur Isaak zu’, so stimmt das nicht. Die Mehrungsverheißung, die Ismael erhält, wird auch berīt genannt. Es zeigt sich, daß das Wort berīt, wo es auf Isaak bezogen wird, eine neue Bedeutung bekommen hat:

39.  Kratz, Komposition, 241. Cf. Köckert, Vätergott, 167. 40.  Bemerkungen, 173; see above, p. 11 nn. 27–28. 41. John Van Seters, Abraham in History and Tradition (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1975), 291. 42. Ernst Kutsch, “ ‘Ich will euer Gott sein.’ berīt in der Priesterschrift,” ZThK 71 (1976): 367–88. 43. Claus Westermann, “Genesis 17 und die Bedeutung von berit,” Erträge der Forschung am Alten Testament: Gesammelte Studien III (TB 73; Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1984), 66–78, esp. p. 78 n. 2.

16

Konrad Schmid allein zu dieser berīt gehört das neue Gottesverhältnis. P prägt in Gen 17 einen neuen Begriff der berīt für das nur Israel eigene Gottesverhältnis.)

He describes this double meaning for ‫ ברית‬in his Genesis commentary as follows: Further specification is given to the promise in vv. 15–21; the promise of posterity continues in all the children of Abraham; the promise of the divine presence only in Isaac. 44   (In V. 15–21 wird die Verheißung dahin präzisiert, daß die Mehrungsverheißung in allen Kindern Abrahams weitergeht, die Verheißung des Gottseins nur in Isaak.)

Furthermore, interest in the question of Ishmael’s position in Genesis 17 has increased in recent scholarship. Thomas Naumann, Albert de Pury, Ernst Axel Knauf, Mark G. Brett, and Philippe Guillaume have highlighted P’s “ecumenical” characterization of Abraham in different ways. 45 Thomas Naumann, who had dealt with this theme in his yetunpublished Habilitationsschrift, writes:   The manner in which Ishmael is mentioned in Gen 17 does not support the traditional conclusion that Ishmael has been completely left out of the covenant with God. . . . In vv. 19–21 Ishmael and Isaac have been theologically ordered next to rather than opposed to one another. However, 44. Idem, Genesis 12–36, 255. 45. Thomas Naumann: Ismael: Studien zu einem biblischen Konzept der Selbstwahrnehmung Israels im Kreis der Völker aus der Nachkommenschaft Abrahams (Bern: Universität Bern, 1996); idem, “Ismael: Abrahams verlorener Sohn,” in Bekenntnis zu dem einen Gott? Christen und Muslime zwischen Mission und Dialog (ed. Rudolf Weth; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 2000), 70–89; idem, “Ismael unter dem Segen des Gottes Abrahams,” in Religiöse Minderheiten: Potentiale für Konflikt und Frieden, IV. Internationales Rudolf-Otto-Symposion (ed. Hans-Martin Barth and Christoph Elsas; Schenefeld: EB Verlag, 2004), 179–92; idem, “Ismael-Abrahams Sohn und arabischer Erzvater: Biblische Wege zum Verständnis des Islam,” in Blätter Abrahams (2003): 58– 79. Albert de Pury, “Abraham”; idem, “Priesterschriftliche”; cf. idem, “L’émergence de la conscience ‘interreligieuse’ dans l’Ancien Testament,” Theological Review, Near East School of Theology 22 (2001): 7–34. Ernst Axel Knauf, Ismael: Untersuchungen zur Geschichte Palästinas und Nordarabiens im 1. Jahrtausend v. Chr. (ADPV; Wiesbaden: Harassowitz, 1985); idem, “Die Priesterschrift und die Geschichten der Deutoronomisten,” in The Future of the Deuteronomistic History (ed. Thomas Römer; BETL 147; Leuven: Peeters, 2000), 101–18; idem, “Grenzen der Toleranz in der Priesterschaft,” BK 58 (2003): 224–27. Mark G. Brett, “Reading the Bible in the Context of Methodological Pluralism: The Undermining of Ethnic Exclusivism in Genesis,” in Rethinking Contexts, Rereading Texts: Contributions from the Social Sciences to Biblical Interpretation (ed. M. Daniel Carroll R.; JSOTSup 299; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000), 48–74, esp. pp. 72–73. Guillaume, Land, 72. For a thematically similar treatment of texts whose relationship to P is debated, see Ziemer, Abram, 309–14.

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17

neither a perspective of equality nor one of exclusion and rejection of one [brother] in favor of the other wins out. Greater weight is placed on Isaac. . . . In vv. 19–21 both brothers are bound by a theological importance that can only be understood in terms of an inclusive model containing the two unequal brothers, favoring the younger without either casting off the older or removing him from the care of God. 46   (Es hat sich ergeben, daß die Art und Weise, wie Ismael in Gen 17 Erwähnung findet, nicht geeignet ist, das herkömmliche Urteil zu stützen, Ismael werde aus dem Gottesbund dezidiert ausgeschlossen [. . .]. Ismael und Isaak werden in V. 19–21 theologisch einander zugeordnet, neben-[,] nicht gegeneinander gestellt. Es regiert aber weder Gleichheit noch Ausgrenzung und Verwerfung des einen zugunsten des anderen. Auf Isaak ruht das größere Gewicht. [. . .] In V. 19–21 werden mit beiden Brüdern theologische Bewertungen verbunden, die sich nur in einem inklusiven Modell der Zuordnung zweier ungleicher Brüder verstehen lassen, das den jüngeren bevorzugt, ohne den älteren zu verwerfen oder aus der blei­benden Fürsorge Gottes zu entlassen.)

De Pury argues more forcefully: The whole structure of this chapter [sc. Gen 17] would be incomprehensible if the covenant and its benefits were limited only to Isaac. Why would there be such an elaborate “first act” in the account of the covenant—with a threefold insistence on the “multi-nation” posterity of Abraham (Gen 17:4–6)—if that posterity was then to be excluded from the covenant? 47

Some recent interpreters also seek to solve the problem through source-critical analysis, arguing that the explicit institution of the covenant with Isaac in Gen 17:19–21 and the circumcision scene with Ishmael in Gen 17:23–27 emerge from different layers: [T]he two Ishmael sections in Genesis 17 present two different attitudes towards him: one exclusive, the other inclusive. 48

A look into the recent history of scholarship therefore shows that the question of who belongs to the Abrahamic covenant has become rather contentious. The mainstream of German-speaking scholars still opt for the idea that Ishmael is left out of the covenant, but a few recent voices argue for his inclusion with the as-yet unborn Isaac. The first conjecture that can be concluded from this diverse dialogue is that the text seems to include a certain amount of ambiguity. Is it possible to understand the chapter’s meaning better and with more clarity?

46.  Naumann, Ismael, 151–52. 47. De Pury, “Abraham,” 170. 48.  Syrén, Forsaken First-Born, 40–41.

18

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Does Ishmael Belong to the Abrahamic Covenant? To answer this question, it might be helpful to read Genesis 17 as a narrative, paying special attention to its various covenantal statements. First, it is clear that the covenant of 17:2, 4 is only concluded with the individual Abraham and can pertain to him alone because only he will become “a father of many nations”: 49 I will make a covenant between me and you, and I will make you exceedingly numerous. . . . Look, this is my covenant with you, that you will become a father of many nations.

Neither Ishmael nor Isaac is included in this “covenant” of Gen 17:2, 4, which instead applies to Abraham alone. The situation is different in the subsequent appearances of the “covenant” in Gen 17:7–8 because this covenant makes explicit mention of “you and your offspring”: I am establishing my covenant between me and you and your offspring from generation to generation as an eternal covenant, to be God for you and your offspring. And I am giving you and your offspring the land in which you sojourn as an alien, the whole land of Canaan, for an eternal holding, and I will be their God.

The covenant negotiated here (whether it is a second covenant or a further specification of the covenant from Gen 17:2, 4, is debatable, but the first option is less probable because “the content of ‫ ברית‬becomes progressively more” precise 50) applies both to Abraham and also to Ishmael as his first, and, to this point, only descendant. According to P, there is no question that Ishmael qualifies as a legitimate son of Abraham (Gen 16:1a, 3). 51 However, the formulation in Gen 17:7 is without a doubt just 49.  The statement in v. 6b, that kings will come from Abraham, is difficult to interpret. It is usually understood as having already been historicized by the time period of the author of P; however, for a different view, see, for example, Blum, Vätergeschichte, 458; Walter Groß, “Israels Hoffnung auf die Erneuerung des Staates (1987),” Studien zur Priesterschrift und zu alttestamentlichen Gottesbildern (SBAB 30; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1999), 65–96, esp. pp. 66–75. 50.  Cf. the discussion in Blum, Vätergeschichte, 422 n. 13. In any case, the mention of ‫ הקים ברית‬in v. 7 does not stand in the way of the interpretation of Gen 17:1–8 as one covenant; cf. W. Randall Garr, “The Grammar and Interpretation of Exodus 6:3,” JBL 111 (1992): 385–408, esp. p. 403: “The idiom hēqîm bĕrît means not only ‘make (establish) a promise (covenant)’ but also ‘keep (fulfill) a promise (covenant).’ ” For more precision: Blum, Vätergeschichte, 421. 51. Cf. Westermann, Genesis, 285–86; Irmtraud Fischer, Die Erzeltern Israels: Feministisch-theologische Studien zu Gen 12–36 (BZAW 222; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2004), 97–101.

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

19

as clear that the future descendants of Abraham—namely, Isaac, who first appears four chapters later—are also included in this covenant. 52 The substance of this second (aspect of the) covenant is now, in addition to numerous offspring (vv. 2, 4), the nearness of God to Abraham and his descendants. 53 Furthermore, this covenant also includes the promise of land holdings (‫ )אחוזה‬in v. 8, 54 which is enclosed by the repeated affirmation “I will be their God” in vv. 7, 9. Is the traditional view justified 55 that according to P the land of Canaan can only belong to Israel, and therefore the covenant of Gen 17:7–8—although it goes against the explicit formulation—can only pertain to Isaac’s lineage? It is crucial to see that an argument of this sort overlooks the fact that P speaks specifically of the whole land of Canaan only in 17:8. 56 “With this term he [P] envisages a region encompassing not only today’s geographical Palestine but nearly the whole of the Levant.” 57 The Priestly Document never gives exact boundaries for the “land of Canaan,” but it differs from the region of the upper Euphrates (Gen 12:5) as well as from “Paddan-Aram,” 58 which likely refers to northern Syria (Gen 25:20, 31:18). Egypt (Gen 46:6–7), the Jordan valley, and the land east of the Jordan (Gen 13:12) are certainly excluded. With regard to locations in “Canaan,” P only mentions Mamre and Qiryat Arba/ Hebron (Gen 25:9, 35:27; cf. Gen 23:1, 17, 19 59). The circumcision commandment of the next section, vv. 9–14, seems somewhat confusing when juxtaposed with “covenant” terminology in Genesis 17 because circumcision would seem to signify a “covenant” in 52.  The assumption that the formulation ‫ זרעך אחריך‬could apply exclusively to the yet unborn generation—which would imply the exclusion of Ishmael—does not hold true: cf. the evidence outside Genesis 17 in Gen 9:9, 35:12, 48:4; Exod 28:43; Num 25:13 from P  g und P  s; also Deut 1:8, 4:37, 10:15; 1 Sam 24:22; 2 Sam 7:12 // 1 Chr 17:11. 53.  This promise cites only the first half of the so-called covenant formula—the second half, in which Abraham’s descendants will be the people of God, is programmatically left out of the Priestly Document—thereby stressing the theological character of the “covenant” as an essentially one-sided commitment. 54. Cf. Bauks, “Die Begriffe,” 171–88. 55.  See, e.g., Steuernagel, “Bemerkungen,” 173. See above, p. 11 nn. 27–28 and p. 15 n. 40. 56.  Otherwise in the OT, found only in Josh 24:3, which looks back to Gen 17:8. The LXX may preserve an older tradition in its reading of Josh 24:3 (ἐν πάσηι τῆι γῆ). 57. De Pury, “Abraham,” 171. 58.  Cf. Manfred Görg, “Paddan-Aram,” Neues Bibel-Lexicon (ed. M. Görg and B. Lang; fascicle 11; Zürich: Benziger, 1997), 56; Westermann, Genesis, 503. 59. For the exclusion of Genesis 23 from P, see Blum, Vätergeschichte, 441–44; Kratz, Komposition, 241.

20

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and of itself. 60 However, it “is only metonymically called b·rit in so far as it is, as a matter fact, a sign of the b·rit.” 61As the overview of the history of scholarship above has made clear, it is conspicuous that circumcision in vv. 23–27 is also carried out on Ishmael and the slaves of the house. They also carry the sign of the covenant. However, the specific formulation of the instruction in vv. 12–13 needs to be taken into account:   Ishmael must be circumcised because he belongs to Abraham’s house (vv. 12f.); Ishmael’s circumcision remains a sign only for Abraham’s covenantal status.   (“Nach diesem muß nämlich Ismael als einer, der zu Abrahams Haus gehört (V. 12f.), beschnitten werden; auch Ismaels Beschneidung hat allein für Abraham eine Bedeutung als Bundeszeichen.”) 62

Whether or not Ishmael belongs to the Abrahamic covenant cannot therefore be affirmed or rejected solely on the basis of vv. 23–27. The section in vv. 15–22, where the relationship between Ishmael and Isaac is addressed, is much more decisive for this question. In response to the promise received by Sarah in vv. 15–17, Abraham petitions: :‫לו יׁשמעאל יחיה לפניך‬, “If only Ishmael might live before you!” (17:18b)

Verse 18b is often understood to mean “If only Ishmael may be allowed to remain alive!” 63 However, the phrase ‫  חיה לנפי יהוה‬implies much more than simply physical survival; it instead has clear cultic connotations, which the following selection of Priestly citations for ‫לפני יהוה‬ demonstrate: 64 60.  Regarding circumcision, see Grünwaldt, Exil; John Goldingay, “The Significance of Circumcision,” JSOT 88 (2000): 3–18; on signifying the covenant, Kratz (Komposition, 240) sympathizes with the suggestion that vv. 9–14, 23–27 are a later insertion. 61. Walter Groß, “Bundeszeichen und Bundesschluß in der Priesterschrift,” TThZ 87 (1987): 98–115, esp. p. 113 (Sie heißt “nur metonymisch b·rit, insofern sie in Wirklichkeit Zeichen der b·rit ist”). The result of circumcision rather than the act of circumcision is the sign of the covenant; cf. Matthias Köckert, Vätergott und Väterverheißungen: Eine Auseinandersetzung mit Albrecht Alt und seinen Erben (FRLANT 142; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988), 167 and nn. 29, 30. 62.  Blum, Vätergeschichte, 422. A similar position was reached earlier by Benno Jacob, Das erste Buch der Tora (Berlin: Schocken, 1934), 430–31. 63. For example, Ephraim Avigdor Speiser, Genesis (AB 1; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964), 125: “thrive. Literally ‘live,’ with the force of ‘stay well, prosper’ ”; Westermann, Genesis, 323: “Die Wunschbitte Abrahams für Ismael ist Ausdruck frommer Bescheidung mit dem einen Sohn der Nebenfrau, der ihm geschenkt ist”; Wenham, Genesis 16–50, 27. 64. For ‫ לפני יהוה‬in P, see Exod 6:12, 30; 27:21; 28:12, 30, 35, 38; 29:42; 30:16; 40:23, 25; within Genesis 17 see also v. 1.

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In the tent of meeting, outside the curtain that is before the covenant, Aaron and his sons shall keep it burning from evening till morning before Yhwh (‫ )לפני יהוה‬as a perpetual ordinance among the Israelites throughout their generations. (Exod 27:21) And Aaron shall wear it when he ministers, and its sound shall be heard when he enters the holy place before Yhwh (‫ )לפני יהוה‬and when he leaves so that he will not die. (Exod 28:35) It shall be a regular burnt offering throughout their generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before Yhwh (‫)לפני יהוה‬, where I will meet with you in order to speak with you. (Exod 29:42) Then he put the table in the tent of meeting, on the north side of the tabernacle, outside the curtain, and he set a row of bread before Yhwh (‫לפני‬ ‫)יהוה‬, just as Yhwh had commanded Moses. And he put the lampstand in the tent of meeting, across from the table, on the south side of the tabernacle, and he set up the lamps before Yhwh (‫)לפני יהוה‬, just as Yhwh had commanded him. (Exod 40:22–25)

“Before Yhwh” implies cultic presence before Yhwh in the context of the sanctuary (or, rarely, in direct conversation with the Lord, as in the case of Moses in Exod 6:12, 30). Correspondingly, de Pury seems correct when he writes:

Whether the Priestly writer’s Abraham is aware of it or not, what he asks is that Ishmael become Yhwh’s priest; and it is that request that is denied to Ishmael and offered instead to the yet to be born Isaac. In this whole exchange (vv. 18–21), the question therefore is not whether Ishmael will be allowed to live in the land of Canaan—the right of Ishmael to live in Canaan has been settled once and for all in v. 8—but the question is only whether there is a need for a further son, i.e. for a further category among Abraham’s multi-nation descendants. And the answer to that question is yes. Sarah’s son Isaac will beget those descendants of Abraham who are destined to become Yhwh’s priestly nation. 65

If the specific emphases of v. 18 are recognized, then some new light is shed on the subsequent passage in vv. 19–21 (see translation, top of p. 22). However, three translation difficulties remain. First, how should one translate the particle ‫ אבל‬in v. 19? Is God denying Abraham’s plea? The ancient versions as well as modern translations disagree. The 65. De Pury, “Abraham,” 172. See also idem, “Absolute Beginning,” 109: “The content of the second berît (or part of berît), apparently, is to ‘live before the face of Yhwh’, since that is the request denied to Ishmael (18–19). ‘Living before the face of Yhwh’, which is not equivalent to ‘living in the land of Canaan’, obviously refers to the cultic access to the ‫ מׁשכן‬that the sons of Israel will (later) be invited to build (Ex 25,1.8a.9; 29,45–46; 40,16.17a.33b.34b).”

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Konrad Schmid

‫ויאמר אלהים‬ ‫אבל שרה אשתך ילדת לך בן‬ ‫וקראת את־שמו יצחק‬ ‫והקמתי את־בריתי אתו‬ ‫לברית עולם‬ :‫לזרעו אחריו‬ ‫ולישמעאל שמעתיך‬ ‫הנה ברכתי אתו‬ ‫והפריתי אתו‬ ‫והרביתי אתו במאד מאד‬ ‫שנים־עשר נשיאם יוליד‬ ‫ונתתיו‬ :‫לגוי גדול‬ ‫ואת־בריתי אקים את־יצחק‬ ‫אשר תלד לך שרה‬ :‫למועד היה בשנה האחרת‬

17:19: Then God said: No /rather your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac, And I will establish my covenant with him as an eternal covenant for his descendants after him. 17:20: As for Ishmael, I have heard you: Look, I will bless him and make him fruitful and make him numerous beyond numbering; twelve princes will descend from him and I will make him into a great nation. 17:21: And I will establish my covenant with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this time next year.

Vulgate and kjv leave ‫ אבל‬untranslated, while the rsv and nrsv translate with “No.” Until 1912, the Luther Bible decided on “ja” but since 1984 uses “nein.” The Zürcher Bible changed its variant “vielmehr” from 1931 in the new translation of 2007 to “nein.” The Septuagint offers ναί ἰδου. 66 The uncertainty results from the unclear relationship between Abraham’s question in v. 18 and God’s answer in v. 19 on one hand and on the other hand from the philologically broad field of meaning for the term ‫אבל‬, which only appears 11 times in the Hebrew Bible. Its usage includes expressions of regret and complaint (2 Sam 14:5, 2 Kgs 4:14, Gen 42:21), an expression of regret along with a negative answer (1 Kgs 1:43), and the well-attested pure adversative usage (Ezra 10:13; 2 Chr 1:4, 19:3, 33:17; Dan 10:7, 21). 67 When the cultic background of the expression ‫ חיה לפני יהוה‬in v. 18 is recognized and the literary-historical setting of P taken into consideration, then a translation of “no” is more convincing than a positive (“yes”) or neutral (“rather”) rendering. A second question is whether ‫ הקים ברית‬must necessarily mean “establish a covenant” or if it may also mean the reaffirmation of an already-existing covenant. Especially relevant here is Exod 6:4, itself a Priestly text, which shows that the latter is clearly possible as well. 68 Several Greek manuscripts of v. 19 include a small addition and clarify: 66.  Cf. the report on the history in Naumann, Ismael, 138 n. 34. 67.  Cf. Norbert Kilwing, “‫‘ אבל‬ja, gewiss’—‘nein, vielmehr’?” BN 11 (1980): 23–28. 68.  See above, p. 18 n. 50.

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I will fulfill my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant “to be his God.” 69 The final difficulty with regard to translation is ‫ואת־בריתי אקים את־‬ ‫( יצחק‬v. 21), where ‫ ואת־בריתי‬conspicuously fronts the object. Is it better to follow the usual adversative rendering “my covenant, however” or instead translate with “and my covenant”? From a syntactical standpoint there is a strong inclusive connection with v. 19. Correspondingly, the above translation has opted for the neutral translation “and my covenant.” Usually this section is interpreted—as has been shown above—as meaning that the Abrahamic covenant is only realized through the lineage of Isaac: the “covenant” terminology only appears in connection with Isaac in vv. 19, 21. Ishmael, on the other hand, only receives a blessing of fruitfulness. Indeed, the double use of the term covenant, which is only applied to Isaac in vv. 19, 21, is conspicuous. However, this traditionally dominant interpretation encounters numerous problems, the gravest being that it cannot explain why P proceeds in Gen 17:7–8 to including explicitly all the descendants of Abraham in the covenant, only then to narrow the covenant back down to the lineage of Isaac. 70 This problem becomes more pressing if vv. 9–14 are considered secondary, 71 because the two positions then stand directly juxtaposed. Can the problem be solved through literary-critical measures? Gene­sis 17 probably does indeed incorporate both inherited material and some additions. 72 Nevertheless, it is unnecessary to deny that the 69. See above, pp. 7–8 n. 14. The variants are listed in John William Wevers, ed., Genesis (Septuaginta Vetus Testamentum Graece Auctoritate Academiae Scientiarum Gottingensis editum, 1: Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1974), 181. 70. De Pury, “Abraham,” 170. See full quotation above, p. 17. 71.  For the ensuing difficulties, see Detlef Jericke, Abraham in Mamre: Historische und exegetische Studien zur Religion von Hebron und zu Genesis 11,27–19,38 (CHANE 17; Leiden: Brill, 2003), 217–1–8. 72.  Cf., for example, Matthias Köckert, “Leben in Gottes Gegenwart: Zum Verständnis des Gesetzes in der priesterschrift­li­chen Literatur,” Jahrbuch für Biblische Theologie (vol. 4; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1989), 29–61 = idem, Leben in Gottes Gegenwart: Studien zum Verständnis des Gesetzes im Alten Testament (FAT 43; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004), 73–107. Köckert identifies the circumcision command in v. 10, 11a as a pre-Priestly tradition, on which the conditions in vv. 12–13 build in subsequent layers, and these are then updated by the cultic legal conditions of v. 14. Extensive textual additions are proposed by Peter Weimar, “Gen 17 und die priesterschriftliche Abrahamserzählung,” ZAW 100 (1988): 22–60. He sees a pre-Priestly Ur-text in vv. 1–4a, 6, 22, into which the Priestly source writes vv. 4b, 5, 7, 8*, 9*, 10*, 11, 15, 16*, 17a, 18, 19a, 20*, 24–26. The remaining portions of the text come from two post-Priestly redactions, the second of which is identical to the pentateuchal redaction. The beginning point of whether Ishmael is included in or

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prominent covenant-breaking command of Gen 17:14 belongs to the original Priestly layer, as Knauf and de Pury suggest because of the unconditional theology of the Priestly Document. 73 Because the circumcision command only deals with the disobedience of individuals who abandon the divine covenant, the covenant of God with Israel still remains unbreakable. 74 Another source-critical option for solving the tension between the covenant with the entire offspring of Abraham and only with Isaac’s lineage would be to consider the whole section of Gen 17:15–21 as secondary, narrowing the Abrahamic covenant to include only the descendants of Sarah. 75 However, separating vv. 15–21 off in this way would not completely solve the problem. One must still assume that the redactor had misunderstood or forgotten that the line of Sarah included not only Isaac and Jacob but also Esau. In other words, the Edomites would still be included in the covenant. This kind of Israelite-Edomite “circle”—to the exclusion of Ishmael’s offspring—is not conceptually recognizable elsewhere in the Priestly Document. Its intermarrying policy instead clearly allows for intermarrying within all the offspring of Abraham. 76 Therefore, a source-critical exclusion of vv. 15–21 seems improbable. Furthermore, the considerable agreement among the formulations of the different promises of fertility for Abraham in Gen 17:2, 6 on the one hand and for Ishmael in Gen 17:20 on the other is noteworthy: 77 Gen 17:2 Gen 17:6 Gen 17:20 Gen 17:20

Abraham Abraham Ishmael Ishmael

‫במאד מאד‬ ‫במאד מאד‬ ‫במאד מאד‬

‫אותך‬ ‫אותך‬ ‫אותו‬ ‫אותו‬

‫וארבה‬

‫והפרתי‬ ‫והפרתי‬

‫והרביתי‬

excluded from the Abrahamic covenant is seen by Weimar as no real problem at all (“Gen 17,” 37 n. 77). However, he only discusses the narrative theme of the circumcision of Ishmael in terms of Ishmael’s belonging to Abraham’s house (with a reference to Blum, Vätergeschichte, 422). 73.  Cf. de Pury, “Absolute Beginning,” 109, who follows Ernst Axel Knauf (see the reference in idem, “Abraham,” 168 n. 22). 74.  Cf. Hermann-Josef Stipp, “Meinen Bund hat er gebrochen (Gen 17,14): Die Individualisierung des Bundesbruchs in der Priesterschrift,” MThZ 56 (2005): 290–304. 75.  Kratz, Komposition, 241; cf. Köckert, Vätergott, 167; Syrén, Forsaken First-Born, 40–41. 76.  Cf. above, p. 8 n. 17. 77. Wilfried Warning, “Terminological Patterns and Genesis 17,” HUCA 70/71 (1999–2000): 93–107, esp. p. 100; Guillaume, Land, 72. For consideration of the reception history of Gen 17:20 as a reference to the sending of Mohammed, see Görg, Abraham, 163 n. 14.

Judean Identity and Ecumenicity

25

The promises of fertility given to Abraham as a “covenant” and to Ishmael as a “blessing,” when considering their concrete arrangements, are drawn up quite similarly and seem nearly equivalent. Therefore, it is much more likely that the function of vv. 19–21 is not the exclusion of Ishmael but rather in the inclusion of Isaac in the Abrahamic covenant. Ishmael’s inclusion in the covenant is clearly stated in Gen 17:7–8. Additionally, this section highlights the fact that the covenant with Abraham and his descendants, to which Ishmael belongs without a doubt, is an “eternal covenant.” The need for an explicit inclusion of Isaac in vv. 19, 21 can be explained its position in the narrative, namely, that at the time of Genesis 17 Isaac had not yet been born. This makes the double appearance of “covenant” terminology in vv. 19, 21, with reference to Isaac, plausible: an extension of the covenant to a person who did not yet exist is a bold enterprise and therefore needs special terminological emphasis. Nevertheless, the conclusion remains that Ishmael is not the same type of partner in the covenant of God as Isaac is. They are equal with regard to fertility and land holdings (in the sense of an ‫אחוזה‬, Israel will then signify its land in Exod 6:8 as ‫ )מורׁשה‬78 within the greater region of the “whole land of Canaan.” But they are not equal with regard to the possibility of cultic proximity (“living before God,” Gen 17:18b). This proximity—as the narrative of the Priestly Document goes on to show—only belongs to Israel by means of the foundation of the sanctuary and is explicitly denied to Ishmael. 79 The Priestly account of the Abrahamic covenant with its various levels within the covenant seems foremost to be a theological work without analogues among the ancient Near Eastern treaties. There are no multilevel treaties attested in the ancient Near East. Furthermore, the one-sidedness of God’s commitment strikingly displays P’s ability to transform its conceptual models completely, which are likely only to be

78.  For the Priestly status of Exod 6:8, see the discussion in my Erzväter, 245–48. The term ‫ מורׁשה‬could have been specifically influenced by Ezekiel, because Ezekiel’s influence is especially noticeable in Exod 6:2–8 (cf. Bernard Gosse, “Exode 6,8 comme réponse à Ézéchiel 33,24,” RHPR 74 [1994]: 241–47). 79. Cf. Knauf, “Grenzen,” 224–27, p. 224: “Die Priesterschrift (P) in der Tora vertritt die persische Staatsideologie mit einer Deutlichkeit wie sonst nur noch die altpersischen Königsinschriften. Jedes Volk hat seinen Platz in der Welt (Gen 10), darin erfüllen sich Schöpfungsordnung und Schöpfungssegen. Nur Israel gehört als Jhwh’s priesterliches Volk in seinem Land, das im Grunde als heiliger Bezirk (Temenos) die Wohnung des Schöpfergottes auf Erden umgibt, nicht der Schöpfungs-, sondern der Heilsordnung an.”

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found within the biblical material itself, specifically the Deuteronomic covenant texts. 80 In Genesis 17, the Priestly Document apparently attempts to balance the theological prerogative of Israel with the political reality of Persianperiod Judah: Judah lives in a modest province within “ecumenical” proximity to its neighbors. Perhaps the specific outline of Genesis 17, the creation of an “Abrahamic ecumenicity,” as Albert de Pury has put it, has to do with the fact that Abraham’s tomb of Hebron, which was in all likelihood venerated by Judeans, Arabs, and Edomites, was probably not part of Achaemenid Judah but part of Idumea as Ernst Axel Knauf and Detlef Jericke have convincingly argued. 81 This means that P had to include Judeans, Arabs, and Edomites in a privileged position and therefore developed the notion of an “Abrahamic” covenant of the peoples living in the “whole land of Canaan.”

Conclusion In conclusion, God’s covenant with Abraham in Genesis 17 is a covenant with all his descendants, including Ishmael and the yet-unborn Isaac, although Isaac has a somewhat-privileged position in that covenant superior to Ishmael’s. Isaac may live “before Yhwh,” a cultic nearness explicitly denied to Ishmael. Nevertheless, it is most remarkable that there is a specific “Abrahamic circle” in P’s political and religious world view that is narrower than the “world circle” but wider than the “Israel circle.” P seems to argue for an “Abrahamic ecumenicity” among Judeans, Israelites, Edomites, and Arabs within the Persian Empire. All these peoples share the promise of progeny and land, meaning that the exclusive Judean privilege is not political but cultic—only they may “live before Yhwh.” 80. For P as an opposing position to the Deuteronomistic literature, see Odil Hannes Steck, Der Abschluss der Prophetie: Ein Versuch zur Frage der Vorgeschichte des Kanons (BTSt 17; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1991), 17–18 n. 19; my Erzväter, 256 n. 476; Ernst Axel Knauf, “Die Priesterschrift und die Geschichten der Deuteronomisten.” 81.  Idem, “Grenzen,” 226; Jericke, Mamre, 18–19, 32–33, 81–96; Albert de Pury, “Le tombeau des Abrahamides d’Hébron et sa fonction au début de l’époque perse,” Transeuphratene 30 (2005): 183–84; for Ishmael, see E. A. Knauf, Ismael, Untersuchungen zur Geschichte Palästinas und Nordarabiens im 1. Jahrtausend v.Chr.

Torah and Identity in the Persian Period Joachim Schaper University of Aberdeen

The Problem Let not the foreigner say, Who has attached himself to the Lord, “The Lord will keep me apart from His people”; (. . .) As for the foreigners Who attach themselves to the Lord, To minister to Him, And to love the name of the Lord, To be His servants— All who keep the sabbath and do not profane it, And who hold fast to My covenant— I will bring them to My sacred mount And let them rejoice in My house of prayer.

This passage (Isa 56:3, 6–7) carries a message that is very different from, say, that of Ezra 10:2–3: We have trespassed against our God by bringing into our homes foreign women from the peoples of the land; but there is still hope for Israel despite this. Now then, let us make a covenant with our God to expel all these women and those who have been born to them, in accordance with the bidding of the Lord and of all who are concerned over the commandment of our God, and let the Teaching (torâ) be obeyed. (Translations taken from the njpsv.)

Both texts were produced in the Achaemenid period, and both refer their readers to the torah of the God of Israel, the former implicitly and the latter explicitly. How could this sort of discrepancy in the evaluation and interpretation of the Mosaic law arise, and what does it tell us about the development of an “Israelite,” Judean, Judahite, Yehudite, or Jewish identity in the Persian period? As my way of putting it indicates, the question of “Torah and identity” is a problematic and complex one, 27

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not just with regard to the relation between the interpretation and practice of torah and its consequences for identity formation but also with a view to the nature of that identity, the identity of a small society in the context of a world empire. A host of questions arises, and the following are just some of them: To what extent is that identity linked up with the land of Judah, and with what shape of that land? And how does it relate to the concept of “Israel”? And, of course, it needs to be clarified what the term identity actually means. In recent academic and nonacademic discourse, the term has been overused and has consequently become rather fuzzy. 1 All these questions come into what I am attempting to discuss here, but, given the space constraints, my main focus will have to be narrower: it is the aim of this essay to elucidate how the rise of the concept of torah, which started in the late Preexilic period and had its “breakthrough” in the Achaemenid era, contributed to the formation of identity in response to the challenges posed by the new political and social situation in Judah/Yehud. As my prime example, I choose the exegetical controversies that surrounded the reception of the deuteronomic Torah and especially the “Law of the Assembly” in Deuteronomy 23, in the Persian period. I shall build on some observations originally presented in Heidelberg (in 2001 at the Gerhard von Rad colloquium) and published in one of the conference volumes (Schaper 2004), and I shall develop them further in order to reconstruct what seems to have been an exegetical debate centering on identity that was conducted by Jews in the Achaemenid era and has left its traces in the Hebrew Bible. I shall then attempt to draw some historical conclusions from the textual evidence. I think it will be especially fruitful to explore this question against the background of the dialectic of integration and distinction, which will help us to understand the formation of a Judahite/Jewish identity as an interesting example of the formation of a collective identity in a time of major political and social reorientation. I shall also discuss how this process was intertwined with the growth of literacy and the rise of the technology of writing from the late Preexilic Period onward.

The Question of Jewish Identity in Recent Academic Discourse Much scholarship on the rise of a concept or concepts of Jewish identity in the Postexilic Period has concentrated, as far as Persian-period literature is concerned, on the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, and most scholars have preferred to focus on Hellenistic Jewish literature, simply 1.  For clarification with regard to Persian-period Judah, see Berquist 2006.

Torah and Identity in the Persian Period

29

because the issue presents itself in a much more clear-cut manner in the Hellenistic material. An important recent contributor to the debate who has studied both sets of sources and several more, including preexilic texts, sums up his conclusions regarding the Persian-period material by saying that these passages show that in the Persian period, with the destruction of the temple, the disappearance of the tribal system, the emergence of a diaspora, the weakening of the connection between the people and the land, and the gradual elaboration of non-temple-oriented forms of religiosity comes the beginning of the idea that gentiles could somehow attach themselves to the people of Israel by attaching themselves to Israel’s God. Here then are harbingers of the idea of conversion, in both its religious and its social sense, but the idea itself is not yet in evidence. (Cohen 1999: 122)

What Shaye Cohen states here in his study on The Beginnings of Jewishness throws a bright light on the overall topic I am addressing in this paper, and it does so from one particular angle, that is, that of conversion 2—in Cohen’s words: “the idea that gentiles could somehow attach themselves to the people of Israel by attaching themselves to Israel’s God.” Gentiles of this sort managed to do so by attaching themselves to the Torah given by that god; they redefined their political, social, and religious identity by choosing to adhere to the Torah. It is with regard to the converts to the Yhwh religion that the nature of the relation between Torah and identity becomes most clearly visible, because it is with regard to converts—which, in antiquity, always meant foreigners—and to foreigners generally that the boundaries demarcating and defining that identity become visible. Let us turn to the examination of these boundaries.

References to Torah and to Written Texts in Postexilic Biblical Texts and the Question of Identity and Conversion The Isaianic passage that I quoted at the beginning of this paper, and indeed the whole of Isa 56:1–8, makes a statement that is in direct contravention of the well-known rules found in Deut 23:2–9, the 2.  “By conversion we mean the reorientation of the soul of an individual, his deliberate turning from indifference or from an earlier form of piety to another, a turning which implies a consciousness that a great change is involved, that the old was wrong and the new is right. It is seen at its fullest in the positive response of a man to the choice set before him by the prophetic religions” (Nock 1933: 7). As we shall see, conversion also requires a “written” religion; in an “oral” religion, the concept of conversion cannot arise.

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so-called Law of the Assembly. Elsewhere, I explore, on the basis of observations made by Michael Fishbane and others, the details of the relations between Deut 23:2–9, Ezek 44:6–9, and Isa 56:1–8, which I see as three links in an exegetical “chain” and as a fascinating example of the process that Fishbane has named “inner-biblical exegesis” (Schaper 2004). It is not necessary to repeat my argument here. Suffice it to say that what we have in Ezek 44:6–9 and Isa 56:1–8 are two interpretations of Deut 23:2–9 that are mutually exclusive. The tension between the interpretations presumably betrays and mirrors a tension between different social and religious groups propelled by rather divergent interests. As Brooks Schramm has rightly pointed out (Schramm 1995: 122), “[the]issue being debated by Ezek 44:4–14 and Isa 56:3–8 is the issue of proselytism, and it is this that is the point of contention. Isaiah 56:3–8 accepts proselytes under certain conditions, while it would appear that the very concept of proselytism is an impossibility for Ezekiel.” This ties in with Shaye Cohen’s deliberations, from which I quoted earlier. However, Schramm is prepared to accept that these were reallife problems among Persian-period Judeans, whereas Cohen just speaks of “harbingers of the idea of conversion, in both its religious and its social sense” but thinks that “the idea itself is not yet in evidence” in the Persian period (Cohen 1999: 122). I doubt this, not least because we have, apart from the texts already mentioned, a number of other Persian-period texts that address that very problem and, indeed, address it by way of challenging the deuteronomic “Law of the Assembly.” Let us turn to these other texts now. Probably the most important among them is the book of Ruth. That book presents, in narrative form, an interesting exegetical challenge to Deuteronomy 23. Contrary to Deuteronomy’s ruling on the matter, the book of Ruth actually advocates the integration even of Moabites into the Judahite community (see 1:7: “land of Judah”). As Ruth 1:16 states it, “your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” The whole of the book of Ruth can be described, with Georg Braulik, as a Gegengeschichte, a “counter-story” directed against the deuteronomic Law of the Assembly (Braulik 1996). There are a number of other indicators of an antideuteronomic sentiment with regard to questions of identity and conversion in the Persian (and Hellenistic) period(s). One that is particularly interesting because it is so implicit—yet nevertheless clearly antideuteronomic—is the mention of the proselyte Achior, who is an Ammonite joining the people of Israel and thus blatantly contravening the Law of the Assembly, in the book of Judith (5:5–21, 14:5–10). None of the texts I have mentioned so far—and they are key texts in which questions of allegiance to Yhwh and the consequences for the adherents’ social, political, and religious status are discussed—ever use

Torah and Identity in the Persian Period

31

the term torâ. Among these key texts are all the relevant passages from Trito-Isaiah, that is, Isa 55:3; 56:4, 6–8; 59:21; 61:8. Not a single one of them uses the term torâ. Indeed, it is never used at all in Trito-Isaiah, nor is it employed in Ruth or Esther. Also, there are no references to written texts in Trito-Isaiah, Ruth, or Esther, in spite of the fact that they interact in great detail with written Torah-texts. One finds no formulas such as ‫ככתוב‬, “as it is written,” in those books. By contrast, Ezra–Nehemiah and Chronicles use both the term torâ and the formula ‫ ככתוב‬very frequently; see ‫ ככתוב‬in Ezra 3:2, 4; 8:15; 10:35, 37; 2 Chr 23:18; 25:4; 30:5, 18; 31:3; 35:12, 26. (The phrase ‫ככתוב‬ also occurs in Josh 8:31; 1 Kgs 2:3; and 2 Kgs 14:6, 23:21.) One particularly important example, Ezra 10:3, employs torâ in the context of the prohibition of marrying foreign wives: “Therefore let us make a covenant with our God to put away all these wives and their children, according to the counsel of my lord and of those who tremble at the commandment of our God; and let it be done according to the law” (‫ָׂשה‬ ֶ ‫ַּתֹורה יֵע‬ ָ ‫)וכ‬ ְ (rsv). That Nehemiah 13 is a clear endorsement of the “Law of the Assembly” becomes especially obvious in vv. 1–3, which relate that Deut 23:4–6 was read out and that the appropriate action— that is, the expulsion of “all alien admixture (kol-ʿerev, as the text has it) from Israel,” as the njpsv puts it—was then taken. Other passages in Ezra–Nehemiah that refer to the “torâ,” the “torâ of Moses,” the “torâ of Yhwh,” the “torâ of God,” the “Book of Moses,” or the “Book of the torâ” are Ezra 3:2; 7:6, 10; Neh 8:1, 2, 3, 7–9, 13, 14, 18; 9:3, 14, 26, 29, 34; 10:29, 30, 35, 37; 12:44. To what “torah” exactly do the texts we have mentioned allude (both the ones that use the term and that do not)? Georg Braulik, in his essay on Deuteronomy and Ruth, points out that Ruth refers not just to the “Law of the Assembly” but also to texts (pentateuchal texts, in fact) outside the book of Deuteronomy, “for example, to the narratives of Genesis on Israel’s arch-parents, to the Manna narrative in Exodus 16, and to the ‘kinsman-redeeming’ legislation in Leviticus 25. These references show that Ruth probably already presupposes the entire Torah as a canonical entity” (Braulik 1999: 3). Similarly, the texts in Ezra–Nehemiah and Chronicles—which do use the technical term torâ and the formula ‫—ככתוב‬refer to texts from Deuteronomy but also to texts such as Ezek 45:21–24, Num 28:16–25, and Lev 23:5–8 (thus, in 2 Chr 30:1, 3, 5, which also takes up Deut 16:1–8) and Numbers 28–29 as well as Ezek 5:17 (thus in 2 Chr 31:3). 3 Let us now explore some references to written texts that use the formula ‫ככתוב‬. Some of them refer explicitly to torah, and some do not. 3. See Shaver 1989 and Hänsel 1999: 57.

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And some that refer to torah, in fact refer to no known (quasi-)canonical or otherwise authoritative text (Hänsel 1999: 45–86). In these cases, the reference to an alleged written text simply seems to serve the aim of lending greater authority to a rule that actually has no support in authoritative texts. One case of this sort is Ezra 6:18 (no such orders are mentioned in the Pentateuch), and another is the passage on the wood offering in Neh 10:35. In the first case, we find the phrase ‫  ׁשה‬ ֶ ֹ ‫;כ ְּכ ָתב ְספַר מ‬ ִ in the second we have the formula ‫ַּתֹורה‬ ָ ‫ ַּכּכָתּוב ּב‬. However, the two written texts that the reader is referred to are not found in the Pentateuch or elsewhere. This is of special interest because it indicates that formulas such as ‫ ַּכּכָתּוב‬and the reference to the torâ were often used for the sole purpose of giving authority to a ruling, even if that ruling did not exist in written form or did not exist at all. This also tells us that, by the time of Ezra and Nehemiah (if not before), torâ had become a technical term denoting an authoritative textual corpus and that special authority was ascribed to written texts generally, and especially to written legal texts. 4 We can also deduce from this that the definition of the boundaries of 4. L. Hänsel concludes: “‫ ככתוב‬as a formula of relation that presupposes the written form of its referent is clearly linked formally with Torah. Most of the time, this relation is established explicitly. Therefore, we can assume that, in the view of the authors of Ezra–Nehemiah and Chronicles, its being written is an important characteristic of Torah. Conversely, we also observe that it is only Torah that is being referred to with a formula of relation that presupposes the written form. Other— later—parts of the canon are, in Ezra–Nehemiah and Chronicles, not referred to in this manner—i.e., with ‫—ככתוב‬in spite of the fact that several references to these texts, which also exist in written form, can be pointed out. . . . We have been able to observe a difference with regard to the subject matters that are referred to with ‫ ככתוב‬in Ezra–Nehemiah, on the one hand, and in Chronicles, on the other. Whereas, in Ezra–Nehemiah, matters are called ‫ ככתוב‬that are not found in the ‘Masoretic’ Pentateuch, in Chronicles [these] references are made only to matters that are indeed found in the ‘Masoretic’ Pentateuch” (my translation). (“‫ ככתוב‬als Bezugsformulierung, die eine Schriftlichkeit ihrer Referenzgröße voraussetzt, ist formal deutlich mit Tora verbunden. Diese Verbindung wird meist explizit hergestellt. Deshalb kann davon ausgegangen werden, daß ein wichtiges Merkmal von Tora im Verständnis der Autoren von Esr-Neh und Chr ihre Schriftlichkeit ist. Umgekehrt ist aber auch zu beobachten, daß nur auf Tora mit einer die Schriftlichkeit voraussetzenden Bezugsformulierung rekurriert wird. Auf andere—spätere— Kanonteile wird in dieser Weise, d.h. mit ‫ככתוב‬, in Esr-Neh und Chronik nicht Bezug genommen, obwohl sich mehrere Bezugnahmen dieser auch schriftlich vorliegenden Texte nachweisen lassen. [. . .] Es hat sich ein Unterschied hinsichtlich der Stoffe beobachten lassen, die einerseits in Esr-Neh und andererseits in Chr mit ‫ ככתוב‬bezogen werden. Während in Esr-Neh Stoffe als ‫ ככתוב‬bezeichnet werden, die so nicht im ‘masoretischen’ Pentateuch zu finden sind, ist in Chr nur mit Stoffen ein Bezug hergestellt, die sich auch im ‘masoretischen’ Pentateuch finden” [Hänsel 1999: 85–86]).

Torah and Identity in the Persian Period

33

what it meant to be a proper Judahite adherent of Yhwh—or, in the terminology of Ezra 9:1, a member of the “people of Israel”—had to be derived from the extant legal texts by means of interpretation. It seems that all participants in the debate agreed on this, but only one of the two big groups used the term torâ and formulas such as ‫ ככתוב‬to refer to these legal texts. The other group referred to the same texts but did not use the term or the formulas.

The Written Torah and Its Significance in Postexilic Identity Formation Why, then, do some authors avoid using the term torâ whereas others employ it all the time? Why do some of them refer to written texts whereas others choose never to do so? After all, all the texts that address problems of identity and/or conversion and that I discussed earlier interact with texts from the Torah (in the sense of Pentateuch), especially with Deut 23:2–4. Most likely, the use or avoidance of the term torâ is an implicit statement on the status of the Torah in the eyes of the authors of those passages. Using torâ would have indicated acceptance of the text or texts thus referred to as authoritative in the sense in which torâ is employed in deuteronomic/Deuteronomistic literature, in Ezra–Nehemiah and in Chronicles. In the Deuteronomistic History, Ezra–Nehemiah, and Chronicles, torâ is most of the time used as a collective term that refers to the whole of the revealed will of Yhwh, a term invested with the authority of that divine will. This may go back to earlier, similar uses of torâ found in Hosea (4:6, in parallel with daʿat; 8:1, 12, in parallel with bĕrīt) and, indeed, in Isaiah and Deutero-Isaiah (2:3, 5:24, 8:16, 30:9; cf. in Deutero-Isaiah, Isa 42:4, 21, 24; 51:4, 7). (Interestingly, however, this use of torâ is not present in Isaiah 56–66. Indeed, torâ is, as I pointed out, never used in Isaiah 56–66. This observation, by the way, supports, at least as far as I can see, views about Trito-Isaiah that are currently not fashionable among many Isaiah scholars. But that is of no immediate relevance in the context of this essay.) The texts that use the term torâ thus indicate that their authors accept the texts subsumed under that term as authoritative. They are the “hardliners” in the discussion that seems to have been raging in the middle and late Persian period. The texts that we have explored bear witness to a process of identity formation in a crucial situation in the history of Judah. It can be described in the terms used by Maurice Halbwachs and, following him, Jan Assmann in their analyses of cultural memory and its social, political, and cultural functions. The disruption wrought by the Babylonian Exile had dissolved what Assmann calls, in a general discussion of

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phenomena such as these and with no reference to ancient Judah, “the primary alliance between ethnic, cultural and political formation” that led, typically, to “problems of integration and problems of distinction” (Assmann 1997: 144). 5 What Assmann describes in general terms can be applied to the analysis of the problems faced by Judahites during the Persian period and makes perfect sense: a new political, social, and cultural formation had to emerge from the ruins of the old system, and the process that ensued can well be described as a new “ethnogenesis,” in Assmann’s terminology, an ethnogenesis under the very special conditions of the postexilic return. The main participants in the lively postexilic debate on demarcating boundaries and defining a Judean/Judahite identity can be assigned to either of only two main groups. The more “liberal” group is the one constituted by the authors of texts such as Isa 56:1–8, the book of Ruth, and the book of Esther. The other group, characterized by an exclusivist concept of identity, comprises the authors of texts such as Ezra 9–10 and Nehemiah 13. The exclusivist group is characterized also by its strong interest in genealogies—genealogies that serve to reinforce the group’s own exegesis of the relevant “Torah”-texts. That exclusivism is an inevitable consequence of the felt need to create a new identity by means of a wholesale reinterpretation of the Judahite cultural heritage. What we have here is, as Assmann points out (following Erik H. Erikson and others), a case of “pseudo-speciation.” The creation of identity on the inside is counterbalanced by bringing about a feeling of alienness toward the outside: “Indem die Kultur nach innen Identität 5. Cf. Assmann’s remarks in context: “Generally speaking, it is probably especially the incongruence between ethnic, cultural, and political formations that triggers this reflectivity which leads to the loss of spontaneity and a realization of the cultural sense that is connective and binding. As far as the forms of escalation are concerned, the primary alliance between ethnic, cultural, and political formations tends to dissolve and become problematic. The problems that result from this incongruence can be classed in two groups: problems of integration and problems of distinctiveness” (my translation). (“Allgemein gesprochen ist es wohl vor allem die Inkongruenz zwischen ethnischen, kulturellen und politischen Formationen, die auslösend wirkt für jene Reflexivität, die einen Verlust an Selbstverständlchkeit und eine Bewußtwerdung des verbindenden und verbindlichen kulturellen Sinns herbeiführt. Auf der Ebene der Steigerungsformen tendiert die primäre Allianz zwischen ethnischer, kultureller und politischer Formation dazu, sich aufzulösen und problematisch zu werden. Die Probleme, die aus solcher Inkongruenz resultieren, lassen sich in zwei Gruppen zusammenfassen: Probleme der Integration und Probleme der Distinktion” [Assmann 1997: 144]).

Torah and Identity in the Persian Period

35

erzeugt, stiftet sie nach außen Fremdheit. . . . Auch diese Ambivalenz gehört zur Phänomenologie des kulturellen Gedächtnisses” (Assmann 1997: 151–52). With regard to the exegetical debate that was raging in Persianperiod Judah, it is interesting how differently this ambivalence played itself out in different writings. The more strongly the ethnic definitions and religious practices were stressed, the tougher the outward boundaries became. There is a fascinating correlation, too, between the stress laid on the existence of the torah in written form (as opposed to just referring to it without further qualifications, even without calling it torâ) and the strictness with which that written torah was enforced: wherever written torah is invoked, whether truthfully or just rhetorically, the ensuing exegetical result is strictly exclusivist, whereas in the case of allusions and quotations to texts that are not specified as existing in writing, the resultant view is invariably more inclusive and more lenient. The phenomenon can be explained by adducing comparative evidence from social-anthropological research. This brings me back to the notion of conversion that is, as I have pointed out earlier, the key issue in the texts we have examined. As Jack Goody beautifully puts it, You cannot convert to an oral religion—you become a member of the political system (a “tribe”) and you subscribe, to a greater or lesser degree, to the beliefs of the group. Conversion implies a different definition of religion, commitment to a fixed text (beliefs or rituals), and it involves giving up one set of practices and beliefs in favor of another. (Goody 2000: 106)

What Goody says here in general terms basically describes the difference between the preexilic and the postexilic situation in Judah. The concept of conversion appeared on the horizon only when the old social and political structure had come down, and it went hand in hand with the growing rate of literacy and the rising importance of writing from the late Preexilic Period onward, which was caused by and in turn reinforced the increasing division of labor, with the result of eroding the traditional Judahite social structures even before the Exile. 6 Focusing again on conversion, it ties in with these observations that, as Goody puts it, the existence of conversion, of supratribal recruitment, means that the religion must necessarily break out of its local bonds; it must become partly decontextualized and partly universalized. Now, while these are 6. See Blenkinsopp 1995. On the remarkable role writing is accorded in Deuteronomy, see Sonnet 1997.

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Joachim Schaper preconditions for the spread of a multitribal religion, they are also part of the implications of literacy itself. (Goody 2000: 106)

This opens an additional perspective on why concepts of identity and conversion could differ so significantly in the Postexilic Period. It is not just that, in a new political and social situation after the Exile, the Judahite elites had to come up with a new definition of what it meant to be a proper Judahite—or, in the words of the book of Ezra, to be a member of the “people of Israel.” They had to, that is true, and there were others who saw it differently. On this level, a rational exegetical discussion between authors informed by different hermeneutical perspectives was being conducted. On another, deeper level, however, there was another driving force that gave a very special dynamic to the process of reorientation after the Exile, and that was the impact of writing and the growth in literacy on the new society that was evolving. The growing importance of fixing important texts in writing—and, even more so, of composing new texts in writing—led, for the first time in Israelite and Judahite history, to a heavy reliance on written texts, a reliance that is expressed in the so-called canon formula in Deut 13:1 (cf. Deut 4:2): “You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take from it; that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.” 7 “Conversion is a function of the boundaries which the written word creates, or rather defines” (Goody 1986: 10). The guardians of the written word were the scribes and the priests, 8 and it is not by chance that Ezra the scribe, who was of priestly decent, was such an ardent propagator of the written torah, whereas those who took a more lenient view were neither priests nor propagators of the written torah.3 The struggle over the uses of torah and the demarcation of identity, which a number of postexilic canonical and deuterocanonical writings help us to reconstruct (at least to some degree), was decisive for the emergence of what Shaye Cohen calls the “beginnings of Jewishness.” Work on that reconstruction has only just begun, and a deeper appreciation of not just that ancient debate itself but of the underlying social, political and, indeed, technological factors is called for.

7.  The rule most likely has its roots in a Neo-Assyrian treaty formula (Levinson 2009). 8.  See van der Toorn 2007, especially pp. 143–72.

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Bibliography Assmann, J. 1997 Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen. Munich: Beck. Berquist, J. L. 2006 Constructions of Identity in Postcolonial Yehud. Pp. 53–66 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Blenkinsopp, J. 1995 Deuteronomy and the Politics of Post-mortem Existence. VT 45: 1–16. Braulik, G. 1996 Das Deuteronomium und die Bücher Ijob, Sprichwörter, Rut. Zur Frage früher Kanonizität des Deuteronomiums. Pp. 61–138 in Die Tora als Kanon für Juden und Christen, ed. E. Zenger. Herders Biblische Studien 10. Freiburg: Herder. 1999 The Book of Ruth as Intra-biblical Critique on the Deuteronomic Law. Acta Theologica 19: 1–20. Cohen, S. 1999 The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Hellenistic Culture and Society 31. Berkeley: University of California Press. Goody, J. 1986 The Logic of Writing and the Organization of Society. Studies in Literacy, Family, Culture and the State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2000 The Power of the Written Tradition. Washington: Smithsonian Institute Press. Hänsel, L. 1999 Studien zu “Tora” in Esra-Nehemia und Chronik. Ph.D. diss. Leipzig University. Levinson, B. M. 2009 The Neo-Assyrian Origins of the Canon Formula in Deuteronomy 13:1. Pp. 25–45 in Scriptural Exegesis: The Shapes of Culture and the Religious Imagination (Essays in Honour of Michael Fishbane), ed. D. A. Green and L. Lieber. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nock, A. D. 1933 Conversion: The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine of Hippo. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Repr., Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998. Schaper, J. 2004 Re-reading the Law—Inner-Biblical Exegeses of Divine Oracles in Ezechiel 44 and Isaiah 56. Pp. 125–44 in Recht und Ethik im Alten Testament: Beiträge des Symposiums “Das Alte Testament und die Kultur der Moderne” anlässlich des 100. Geburtstags Gerhard von Rads (1901–1971),

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Heidelberg, 18.-21. Oktober 2001, ed. B. M. Levinson and E. Otto. Altes Testament und Moderne 13. Münster: Lit Verlag. Schramm, B. 1995 The Opponents of Third Isaiah: Reconstructing the Cultic History of the Restoration. JSOTSup 193. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Shaver, J. R. 1989 Tora and the Chronicler’s History Work: An Inquiry into the Chronicler’s References to Laws, Festivals, and Cultic Institutions in Relationship to Pentateuchal Legislation. Brown Judaic Studies 196. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Sonnet, J.-P. 1997 The Book within the Book: Writing in Deuteronomy. Biblical Interpretation Series 14. Leiden: Brill. Toorn, K. van der 2007 Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

The Absent Presence:

Cultural Responses to Persian Presence in the Eastern Mediterranean Anselm C. Hagedorn Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

During the fictitious encounter at Thermopylae between the Persian king Xerxes and Leonidas, king of Sparta in Zack Snyder’s movie 300 (based on the graphic novel by Frank Miller), the Oriental monarch opens diplomatic pleasantries in the following manner: Come, Leonidas, let us reason together, it would be a regrettable waste, it would be nothing short of madness were you, brave king, and your valiant troops to perish all because of a simple misunderstanding. There’s much our cultures could share . . .

To this invitation to cultural exchange, Leonidas of Sparta replies rather cockily: Haven’t you noticed? We’ve been sharing our culture with you all morning. 1 Author’s note: My sincere thanks to Gary Knoppers, Oded Lipschits, and Manfred Oeming for the invitation to partake in the symposium as well as for the manifold suggestions toward improving the argument of this paper. All remaining shortcomings are, of course, my own.   The first part of the title is taken from Herzfeld 2002: 899­–926. Herzfeld diagnoses two “intertwined absences” (p. 900) from anthropology’s theoretical canon: a conspicuous one and a furtive one. He sees modern Greece as a representative of a conspicuous absence because of its general absence from introductory social and cultural anthropology textbooks. “The furtive absence is that of the classical Greek culture. It is furtive because it shelters behind the multifarious signs of a presence, which melts into insignificance as soon as we attempt to grasp and identify it” (p. 900). Herzfeld, then, uses this observation to formulate a powerful critique of current anthropological discourse that tends to yield to a form of crypto-colonialism, which he defines as “the curious alchemy whereby certain countries . . . were compelled to acquire their political independence at the expense of massive economic dependence, this relationship being articulated in the iconic guise of aggressively national culture fashioned to suit foreign models” (pp. 900–901). 1.  Herodotus, Hist. 7.238, reports that the Persian king has the dead Leonidas beheaded and impaled (ἐκέλευσε ἀποταμόντας τὴν κεφαλὴν ἀνασταυρῶσαι). This is proof

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Anselm C. Hagedorn

What is expressed here is the standard view of Greek oratory and historiography stressing a sharp antagonism between noble Greeks fighting for the freedom of all Greece and barbarous Persians seeking world domination. 2 The wars against Persia become something like the foundation myth of a (unified) Greece that defies any attempt to impede on its freedom and values. This Hellenocentric perspective will then shape the view of the Greco-Persian conflict for centuries to come. 3 The mythmaking started very early. POxy 3965 contains an encomiastic narrative elegy that can be attributed to Simonides, praising the recent events of the battle of Plataea. 4 Here, we have for the first time an identification of the Persian Wars with the events at Troy, something that will also apfor Herodotus that the Spartan king must have caused Xerxes immense grief when alive (ἐν δὲ` καὶ τῶιδε οὐκ ἥκιστα γέγονε, ὅτι βασιλεὺς Ξέρξης πάντων δὴ μάλιστα ἀνδρῶν ἀθυμώθη ζῶντι Λεωνίδηι), because the Persians—according to Herodotus—honor brave warriors (ἐπεὶ τιμᾶν μάλιστα νομίζουσι τῶη ἐγὼ οἶδα ἀνθρώπων Πέρσαι ἄνδρας ἀγαθοὺς τὰ πολέμια). 2.  See, for example, Anth. Pal. 7.253 (attributed to Simonides [556/552–468/464 b.c.e.]): εἰ τὸ καλῶς θνήισκειν ἀρετῆς μέρος ἐστὶ μέγιστον,   ἡμῖν ἐκ πάντων τοῦτ᾽ ἀπένειμε Τύχη· Ἑλλάδι γὰρ σπεύδοντες ἐλευθερίην περιθεῖναι   κείμεθ᾽ ἀγηράντῳ xρώμενοι εὐλογίῃ. (“If the greatest part of virtue is to die nobly, then Fortune granted it to us above all others; for we strove to crown Greece with freedom and lie here in possession of unaging praise” [English translation according to Campbell 1991: 527]). A similar view is expressed in P. B. Shelley’s lyrical drama Hellas, written in 1821 under the influence of the Greek struggle for independence: In the great morning of the world, The spirit of God with might unfurled, The flag of Freedom over Chaos, And all its banded anarchs fled, Like vultures frightened from Imaus, Before an earthquake’s tread. So from Time’s tempestuous dawn Freedom’s splendour burst and shone: Thermopylae and Marathon Caught like mountains beacon-lighted, The springing Fire. (Shelley 1994: 253; on Shelley’s drama, see Erkelenz 1997: 313–37.) 3.  Recent scholarship has rectified a view of this sort; see especially Cawkwell 2005 and Hornblower 2001: 48–61. 4.  The text with notes and translation can be found in Sider 2001: 14–29; for a commentary, see Rutherford 2001: 38–42.

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pear in Herodotus, even though he exaggerates the Athenian contribution, while Simonides rightly stresses the leading role of the Spartans: 5 τοὶ δὲ πόλι]ν πέρσαντες ἀοίδιμον [οἴκαδ᾽ ἵ]κοντο φέρτατοι ἡρ]ώων̣ ἁγέμαχοι Δαναοί[, 15 οἷσιν ἐπ᾽ ἀθαν]ν̣ατον κέχυται κλέος ἀν[δρὸς] ἕκητι ὃς παρ᾽ ἰοπ]λοκάμων δέξατο Πιερίδ[ων πᾶσαν ἀλη]θείην, καὶ ἐπώνυμον ὁπ̣[λοτέρ]οισιν. ποίησ᾽ ἡμ]ι̣θέων ὠκύμορον γενεή[ν. ἀλλὰ σὺ μὲ]ν νῦν χαῖρε, θεᾶς ἐρικυ[δέος υἱέ 20 κούρης εἰν]αλίου Νηρέος· αὐτὰρ ἐγ̣ώ[ κικλήισκω] σ᾽ ἐπίκουρον ἐμοί, π̣[ολυώνυμ]ε Μοῦσα, εἴ περ γ᾽ ἀν]θρώπων̣ εὐχομένω[ν μέλεαι· ἔντυνο]ν̣ καὶ τόνδ[ε μελ]ι̣ φρονα κ[όσμον ἀο]ιδῆς ἡμετ]έ̣ρης, ἵνα τις̣ [μνή]σ̣ε̣τ̣α̣ι ὕ[στερον αὖ 25 ἀνδρῶ]ν, οἳ Σπάρτ[ηι τε καὶ Ἑλλάδι δούλιον ἦμ]αρ ἔσχον] ἀμ̣υνομ[ενοι μή τιν᾽ ἰδεῖν φανερ]ῶ̣ [ς oὐδ᾽ ἀρε]τ̣ῆς ἐλάθ[οντο φάτις δ᾽ ἔχε]ν οὐρανομ̣[ήκ]̣ης καὶ κλέος ἀ]ν̣θρ̣ώ̣π̣ω̣ν [ἔσσετ]α̣̣ι ἀθάνατο. [And so] the valiant Danaans, [best of warr]iors, sacked the much-sung-of city, and came [home]; [and they] are bathed in fame that cannot die, by grace [of one who from the dark-]tressed Muses had the tru[th entire,] and made the heroes’ short-lived race a theme familiar to younger men. [But] now farewell, [thou son] of goddess glorious, [daughter] of Nereus of the sea, while I [now summon] thee, illustrious Muse, to support, [if thou hast any thought] for men who pray: [fit out, as is thy wont, this [grat]eful song-a[rray] [of mine, so that rem[emberance is preserved] of those who held the line for Spart[a and for Greece,] [that none should see] the da[y of slavery.] They kept their co[urage, and their fame rose] heaven-high; [their glory in] the world [will] never die. 6

Thermopylae, in turn, in the Greek literary imagination becomes the site of destruction, rather than defeat, because the Spartan forces are extinguished holding their ground: 7 5. See Boedeker 2001a: 120–34 and Boedeker 2001b: 148–63. 6.  Simonides, fr. 11 (West) = POxy 2327 fr. 5 + 6 + 27 col. i + 3965 fr. 1 + 2. Text and translation follow West᾽s restoration of the rather fragmentary original (for a Greek text without reconstruction see Sider 2001: 17–20). 7.  The extensive reception history—especially during the Greek war of independence—of the Persian Wars in general and the battle of Thermopylae in particular

42

Anselm C. Hagedorn . . . Λακεδαιμόνοι δέ, οὐ ταῖς ψυχαῖς ἐνδεεῖς γενόμενοι, ἀλλὰ τοῦ πλήθους ψευσ­ θέντες καὶ οὓς φυλάξειν ὤιοντο καὶ πρὸς οὓς κινδυνεύσειν ἔμελλον, οὐχ ἡττηθέντες τῶν ἐναντίων, ἀλλ᾽ ἀπορανόντες οὗπερ ἐτάχθησαν μάχεσθαι· 8 . . . while the Lacedaemonians, showing no failure of spirit, but deceived as to the numbers alike of those whom they expected to mount guard and of those with whom they had contend, were destroyed, not having been worsted by their adversaries, but slain where they had been stationed for battle. 9

A Greek “nation” (if we want to call it this) or a Greek national identity is forged—at least, in the (Athenian) literary imagination—on the battlefields of Thermopylae, Salamis, and Platea. The reader gets the impression that without Persia this process would have been impossible. 10 Persia, however, seems to fade more and more to the background until it becomes almost invisible and, in doing so, is being transformed into a Greek concept of the barbarian only recognizable through a distinctly Greek lens. Here, tragedy becomes the most important vehicle. 11 From the 33 extant tragedies known to us from Attica, “there is not a single play in which the opposition between Greeks and barbarians, or between citizens and aliens, does not play a significant role.” 12 As far as the Hebrew Bible is concerned, things are very different but nonetheless comparable. For the biblical authors, Persia does not enter the world stage with a military bang (or at least one they felt). The impact of Persia is its difference from the other empires engraved in the actual or cultural memory of the authors. The Persian Empire, which defies classic notions of imperialism, gives rise to the possibility of creating new literary documents and reshaping and modifying existing literary forms to enable their survival and the continuing existence of

cannot be elaborated in detail. See Morris 2000: 211–30; Albertz 2006; van Steen 2007: 299–329; and for the late 20th century, see Hall 2004: 169–97. 8.  Lysias, Funeral Oration 31; see also Isocrates, Panegyric 92. The myth of Thermopylae is probably nowhere better expressed than in the two epitaphs quoted in Herodotus, Hist. 7.228 and attributed to Simonides in the Palatine Anthology. The first is directed at all Peloponnesians: μυριάσιν ποτὲ` τῆιδε τριηκοσίας ἐμάχοντο | ἐκ Πελοποννάσου χιλιάδες τέτορες. The second one only refers to the brave Spartans: ὦ ξεῖν᾽, ἀγγέλειν Λακεδαιμονίοις ὅτι τῆιδε | κείμεθα, τοῖς κείνων ῥήμασι πειθόμενοι. 9.  English translations according to Lamb 1988: 47. 10.  The problem of ancient Greek nationalism is notoriously difficult to explain; on this, see Hall 2002: 125–71; Walbank 1951: 41–60, 2000: 19–33. The role of sanctuaries in this process is investigated by de Polignac 1995: 32–88. 11.  See the excellent study by Hall (1989). 12.  Vidal-Naquet 1997: 111–12.

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the community in new historical and political surroundings. 13 This observation, however, stands in stark contrast to much of the biblical literature where references to Persia are slight, and the same can be said of actual cultural borrowings such as loanwords. 14 Also, the prominence of Persia and its king that we encounter in those books that the biblical canon as well as the writings themselves date to the Achaemenid period is obviously missing in the Pentateuch and the historical books. If, however, these books were reworked during Persian times, we should be able to trace how Persian presence influences the literary debate about Judean identity. In what follows, I would like to look at two texts that problematize Judean ethnic identity in a proposed Persian setting. 15 I will investigate how a Persian presence forced biblical authors to rethink and reformulate their theological and historical concepts in an attempt to maintain their ethnic identity. 16 The first example will be Genesis 20, because I believe that in it we can grasp questions surrounding Judean identity during the Persian period and unveil how biblical authors adjust older doctrines to their new historical situation. The second example will be the book of Esther. Here, the “absent presence” of my title seems to have vanished in favor of actual presence of both Persia and its empire. 17 So the question arises whether we have a different view of Judeans living abroad. 13.  See the apt statement by Gerstenberger (2005: 213): “Die persische Periode war für die Judäer im Blick auf Sammlung und Fixierung der Überlieferungen die bei weitem fruchtbarste. Es entstanden nicht nur neue Literaturwerke: Schon vorhandene Schriften und Sammlungen von Gebrauchsliteratur wurden in den Kommunikationsprozessen der Gemeinden weiter benutzt und den veränderten Situationen angepasst.” 14. See Grabbe 2007: 225–37 and Mankowski 2000: 54–55. 15.  We will deliberately not enter into the debate about terminology, that is, whether we should speak of Judeans, Judahites, or Jews in the early Postexilic Period. See the careful analysis and presentation of the evidence in Esler 2007: 106–37 and Mason 2007: 457–512. Both authors discuss the terms Ioudaios or Iudaeus in Greco-Roman times. This debate neglects the biblical self-designation “Israel” that is based on geography, politics, and ethnicity but has subsequently separated itself from this basis and can therefore be used by the “Judeans” too. On this, see Kratz 2000: 1–17. 16.  This cannot be the place to give a detailed historical overview of Judah and the provinces of Yehud and Samaria in the Persian period; see Carter 1999; Lipschits 2006: 19–52; Grabbe 2004; Gerstenberger 2005. 17.  Outside the book of Esther the term ‫ פרס‬occurs only in Ezek 27:10; 38:5; Dan 8:20; 10:1, 13, 20; 11:2; Ezra 1:1, 2, 8; 3:7; 4:3, 5, 7, 27; 6:14; 7:1; 9:9; 2 Chr 36:20, 22, 23; see also Dan 5:28; 6:9, 13, 16 (‫ )סרפו ידמ‬and 2 Kgs 17:6; 18:11 (‫ ;)ידמ‬cf. Isa 13:17; 21:2; Jer 25:25; 51:11, 28; Dan 8:20; 9:1.

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This essay continues my previous research on the nature of Persian impact on the biblical texts but moves in a different direction. Recently, I argued that the larger Persian context shaped the codification of the biblical legal material but that this shaping was done by the biblical authors themselves. In doing so, the authors of the Pentateuch created a new (legal) order that allowed postexilic Israel to function with a larger imperial context. 18

Genesis 20:1–18: Preserving Jewish Identity Close to Home Geographically, the Abraham narrative can be divided into three parts. The first part (Gen 11:27–19:38 and 21:1–7) moves from Ur in Chaldea to Hebron; part two (Gen 20:1–22:19) is situated in Gerar and Beersheba; and finally part three (Gen 22:20–25:11) is again situated in Hebron. 19 Here, the oldest parts of the cycle can be found in the so-called Abraham-Lot narrative. 20 Because the royal city of Hebron (2 Sam 2:1–4; 5:12–15; 15:7, 9) is the center of the narrative, we can assume a Judean origin of this part. 21 As such, the aim of the oldest narrative is to clarify the relationship between Judah and its neighbours during the Iron Age. 22 As we will see, Genesis 20 has long left this original purpose. Traditional scholarship generally attributes Genesis 20 to the Elohistic source of the Pentateuch. 23 The reasons for doing so are fairly simple: the use of ‫ אלהים‬instead of Yhwh, the importance placed on dreams in the narrative and the change of place in Gen 20:1, which does not seem to tally well with P’s portrait of Abraham, which has him living only at Mamre. 24 John Van Seters, taking up a proposal made by Rudolf Smend in 1912, has shown that Gen 20:1–18 can only be understood correctly if 18.  Hagedorn 2007: 57–76. 19.  See the careful narratological analysis of Gen 11:27–25:11 in Ska 2001: 153–78 and Köckert 2006b: 117–20. 20. According to Köckert 2006b: 120 n. 55, this Grundschicht consists of Gen 13:2abα, 5, 7–11a; 18:1b–16, 20–22a, 33b; 19*. 21.  Because Hebron was not occupied in the Persian period (Carter 1999: 100), a later date for the origin of the Abraham story is hardly possible. 22.  Köckert 2006b: 121. 23.  Wellhausen 1963: 27, and following him, e.g., Gunkel 1902: 193; Seebass 1997: 215; Graupner 2002: 202–3; Ruppert 2002: 443. 24.  Gen 20:18 is an addition (Gunkel 1902: 197; Köckert 2006a: 155), because only here in the narrative God is called Yhwh. The illness of the women clashes with the illness of Abimelech, and Gen 20:18 refers to a much later stage because the closing fast of every womb can hardly be an immediate result of the behavior of Abimelech.

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the reader already knows of Gen 12:10–20. 25 Scholars such as Erhard Blum and Matthias Köckert have followed Van Seters and established that Gen 20:1–18 cannot be part of an independent source of the Pentateuch. 26 Rather, Gen 20:1–18 (like the whole literary complex Genesis 20–22) interrupts the flow of the narrative leading toward Isaac and transfers elements of the Isaac story onto Abraham. 27 The apparent lack of integration of Genesis 20 into the larger literary frame and overall composition of the book of Genesis makes the chapter an ideal candidate for the investigation of an individual correction of earlier views. There are several indications that point to a change in the intention of the narrative in Genesis 20. The chapter opens with an unmotivated change of place. Abraham moves toward the south and lives in Gerar. 28 A famine (‫)רעב‬, as in Gen 12:10, does not seem to make sense here, because it would have affected the southern territory as well. This shows that the aim of the narrative seems to be different. The same can be said of the “historical” location of the narrative. Abimelech is simply called “king of Gerar” (Gen 20:2bα), while in Gen 26:1, 6 he is always the king of the Philistines in Gerar. 29 This suggests that any concrete memories of the Philistines no longer matter to either the authors or the readers of the story. A further problem is Abraham’s plan to pretend that Sarah is his sister. Since the episode with Pharaoh in Egypt, several years have passed, so the beauty of his wife can no longer be a problem. 30 The rabbis solve this issue by stating that God restores Sarah’s original beauty. 31 In their way, they also assume a connection between Genesis 12 and Genesis 20. 25.  Van Seters 1975: 171–77. Smend 1912: 38–39 (“Auf allen diesen Punkten ist die ältere Erzählung von 12:10 ff. in c 20 umgedichtet im Interesse des moralischen Monotheismus und der religiösen Würde Israels.”) is not mentioned by Van Seters. This cannot be the place to develop a complete literary history of the Abraham narrative. For this, see the insightful studies by Köckert (2006b: 103–28) and Kratz (2005: 260–74). 26.  Blum 1984: 405–10; Köckert 2006a: 139–69. 27.  Kratz 2005: 260–61. 28.  Gen 20:1aβ is possibly a secondary addition that links Genesis 20 with the Hagar narrative in Genesis 16 (Köckert 2006a: 153). Also, Gen 20:1aβ destroys the transition from dwelling as an alien in a foreign land (‫ ב‬+ ‫ ;רוג‬cf. Gen 21:23, 24; 26:3; 47:4; Exod 4:6; 2 Kgs 8:2; Jer 43:5; 49:18; 50:40; Ps 105:12, 23; Ruth 1:1; 1 Chr 16:19) to settling (‫ )ישב‬in Gen 20:15. 29.  In Gen 21:34, ‫ פלשתים‬is an addition that corrects Abilemech’s rule in the light of Gen 26:1, 14 (Köckert 2006a: 154 n. 45; Blum 1984: 411–12). 30.  Cf. Gen 17:17 (‫ )שרה הבת תשעים שנה תלד‬and Gen 18:12, where Sarah states, “Now that I am withered, am I to have enjoyment—with my husband so old?” 31.  “[H]er flesh was rejuvenated, her wrinkles smoothed out, and her original beauty was restored” (B. Metṣiʿa 87a, quoted according to Sarna 1989: 141). Sarna

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The most important shift in the narrative is, however, manifested in the role of the foreign king. Abimelech has completely replaced Abraham as the main protagonist of the story, and the reader gets the impression that Abraham and Sarah merely function as the starting point for a theological reflection that had to be placed in the time of the first patriarch. A similar literary device is employed in the additions of Gen 20:7aβ (‫ )כי נביא הוא ויתפלל‬and Gen 20:17, where Abraham appears as a prophet who is able to intercede on Abimelech’s behalf. 32 The change of status as far as the ruler is concerned becomes clear when we look at God’s encounter with Abimelech. In contrast to Gen 12:10–20, where Yhwh brings plagues to Pharaoh on account of Sarah, in Genesis 20 the conflict is solved by a polite disputation between the king of Gerar and God. The special status of Abimelech is further emphasized by the fact that he is the only person in the Pentateuch who answers God when he speaks to him in a dream. 33 The reader gets the impression that the divine concept has changed significantly. For the author of Genesis 20, a god who delivers plagues on behalf of an individual seems no longer imaginable. Also, the focus has shifted to the transgression of the individual, who bears responsibility for his actions and whose actions will affect his household. 34 Genesis 20 allows for the possibility of rectifying the (unintentional) wrongdoing and only envisages punishment if Abimelech does not do so. I am inclined to think that we have a far more universalistic concept of God here than in Gen 12:10–20. The God of Abraham in Gen 20:1–20 is equally the God of Abimelech and, as argues that sexual interests of Abimelech play no role here; rather he seeks “an alliance with the patriarch for purposes of prestige and economic advantage.” This interpretation however neglects the fact that Abraham comes to Gerar to dwell there as an alien (‫)גור‬, hardly a prestigious status. 32.  This is the only instance in Genesis where a patriarch is labeled a prophet (cf. Ps 105:15) who acts in a manner normally attributed to Moses (‫ ;)פלל‬cf. Num 11:2; 21:7; Deut 9:20, 26. We could speculate that in late literary stages of the Pentateuch, Mosaic features are transferred to the patriarchs. 33.  Num 22:9–12 is difficult in this context. Num 22:8 (‫ )הלילה הפ וניל‬and Num 22:13 (‫ )רקבב םעלב םקיו‬indicate that the events of the passage must have happened during the night. However, it is never mentioned that God speaks to Bileam in a dream or that Bileam answers him in one. Num 22:20 (‫אל בלעם לילה ויאמר לו ויבא‬ ‫ )אלהים‬is slightly more precise, but Bileam does not speak to God here; see Seebass 2007: 73; different, Lanckau 2006: 76–79. Achenbach (2003: 398) rightly notes the parallels between God’s appearance to Bileam and Abimelech but does not address the question of the dream. 34.  Gen 20:4b is close to Gen 18:22–32 (Levin 1993: 179), because the passage elaborates on the topic of divine justice (as far as the patriarchal narratives are concerned, the Hebrew word ‫ צדיק‬only occurs in Gen 18:23–26, 28 and Gen 20:4).

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such, the God of the whole world. This is most clearly expressed in Gen 20:4, when Abimelech himself addresses God as ‫אדני‬. In Genesis 20, a foreign king speaks of God in the same terms as does Israel. 35 In legal terms, Abimelech’s transgression is seen as adultery, and God himself protects him from any further sin, because he prevents the king from making any sexual advances on Sarah. 36 Within the literary structure of the Abraham cycle, the statement that Abimelech had not approached Sarah (Gen 20:4a) is necessary to be absolutely clear that Isaac is Abraham’s son, because Isaac’s birth is reported immediately after the incident at Gerar (Gen 21:2). 37 Because no change of place is indicated between chaps. 20 and 21, the birth of Abraham’s son takes place in Gerar. Sociologically speaking, God prevents a crosscultural marriage in Genesis 20 by ensuring that Abimelech does not approach Sarah. 38 What we have here is a view very close to the one put forward in Ezra 9–10, and I am inclined to argue that Genesis 20 already knows of the Ezra passages. My reason for doing so is the fact that the text stresses that there has been no encounter between Abimelech and Sarah, whereas the other narratives (Gen 12:10–26, 26:1–11) leave open the possibility that there can be a sexual encounter. 39 In Genesis 20, adultery is not enough and needs to be supplemented by issues of purity. While Genesis 12 and Genesis 26 focus on the survival of the patriarch himself, Genesis 20 concentrates on the purity of the genealogical line, and this purity must include the female side. Matters of purity are made, however, more complicated by Abraham’s statement in Gen 20:12 that Sarah is indeed his sister. 40 A marriage of this sort would have been forbidden according Lev 18:9, 11; 20:17; and Deut 27:22. Rather than using this fact as an indication for the age-old character of the narrative, 41 I would argue that the story itself is not concerned with in-group relationships. Genesis 20 wants to regulate the peaceful coexistence of the people of Israel and foreigners in a shared land. In contrast to Exod 1:17, 21, where the fear of God amongst foreigners leads to subversive acts that preserve Judean identity in Genesis 20, this 35.  Köckert 2006a: 158. 36.  For ‫ קרב‬with a sexual connotation: Gen 20:4; Lev 18:6, 14, 19; 20:16; Deut 22:14; Isa 8:3; Ezek 18:6. For a proposed legal context, see Deut 22:22, the only other appearance of ‫בעלת בעל‬. 37.  For a form-critical analysis of the birth report of Isaac, see Finlay 2005: 104– 10. 38. The term cross-cultural marriage has recently been proposed by Klingbeil 2007: 39–75, instead of the more common designation mixed-marriage. 39.  The “law” issued by Abimelech in Gen 26:11 only punishes adultery. 40.  This fact is also reported in Jub. 12:9. 41. Thus, Sarna 1989: 143; Ruppert 2002: 450.

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fear ensures the accepted existence of members of both ethnic groups. 42 During this process, the patriarch has to realize that even foreigners seem to follow and are guided by a universal law that regulates human relationships. 43 Abraham learns in exemplary fashion that a law of this sort is neither tied to one’s own group nor limited to a certain land. 44 A view such as this is difficult to imagine before the Persian period. Abraham has to modify his attitude to foreigners and is forced to correct his xenophobic world view. In the light of Abimelech’s fear of God, the patriarch’s fear for his life seems almost foolish. In contrast to Genesis 12 and Genesis 26, Abraham is explicitly invited to stay in the land of Abimelech. Whereas in Gen 12:10, living abroad is but a temporal state, Gen 20:1 and Gen 21:34 envisage a long Diaspora existence. 45 Acquiring wealth abroad is therefore explicitly allowed, and it is perfectly acceptable that a foreign ruler provides the start-up capital. This is a further indication that the Abraham of Genesis 20 is no longer seen as a nomad wandering about. That such a new definition of one’s own existence causes conflicts with other biblical traditions can only be mentioned in passing. The following chapter (Gen 21:22–34) reports of a contract between Abimelech and Abraham (‫ ;ויכרתו שניהם ברית‬Gen 21:27b). Here, we find a significant modification of the Deuteronomistic concept that forbids this sort of bonding with foreigners (Deut 7:7, 18:9–14; Josh 23:3–13). Lester Grabbe once wrote of the Persian period “it was a day of small things. Its accomplishments were not of might nor power but of the spirit.” 46 And it is precisely this “spirit” that makes Genesis 20 a Persian text. Without the positive experiences of Persia and its rule, the favorable portrait of Abimelech and the critique of the patriarch’s attitude toward the beliefs and behavior of the foreigners among whom one dwells would not have been possible. I would not go so far as to argue that Abimelech stands for the Persian king, but his attitude is often close to the one attributed to Artaxerxes in Ezra 7–8. Genesis 20 problematizes the question of ethnic identity in a historical context when 42.  Schmid (1999: 148–49) considers a possible link between Genesis 20 and Exodus so that Exodus influenced the Abimelech story, because Abimelech behaves as Pharaoh in Exodus should have. 43.  Most clearly expressed in Abimelech’s statement in Gen 20:9b: ‫אל רשא םישעמ‬ ‫ידמע תישע ושעי‬. 44. See Köckert 2006a: 158 and, different, Levin 1993: 173–74, who isolates a Grund­schicht consisting of Gen 20:1b–3, 7a*, 7b–8, 9a*, 11, 14–15 and argues that this narrative is an example for obedience to the deuteronomic law. 45.  Köckert 2006a: 159. 46.  Grabbe 2004: 360.

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this identity can no longer be tied to a defined geographical entity. The universal outlook of the Persian Empire pushes the boundaries of ethnicity and forces the biblical authors to rethink their concepts. As far as Genesis 20 is concerned, this is done by maintaining purity as proposed by the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. 47 What is often seen as restrictive in the interpretation of the so-called marriage crisis in Ezra 9–10 provides a vehicle for maintaining a distinct ethnicity in Genesis 20: as long as one marries inside one’s own group.

The Book of Esther: Perserie and Internationalism With the book of Esther, we have moved from the local to the global sphere. 48 Persia is a necessary backdrop to the Esther story, and without Persia there would be no book of Esther. 49 As far as the literary origin of the book is concerned, we seem to have left the Persian period altogether and moved into Hellenistic times. 50 The literary development of the book of Esther is problematic, and the artistic structure that unifies the book makes any literary stratification unlikely. There are, however, some instances where additions are possible: the notes on the Purim festival (Esth 3:7, 9:20–32) are clearly a secondary addition, which transform the original narrative of a wondrous deliverance of the Jewish community in Persia into a hieros logos of the Purim festival. 51 This observation is based on the simple fact that these passages are linked by the only occurrence of the word ‫ פור‬in Esther, from which the name of the festival is derived. 52 Additionally, there are passages 47. On the expulsion of foreign women in Ezra 9–10, see Smith-Christopher 1994: 243–65; Janzen 2002; Douglas 2003: 1–23; Dor 2003: 26–47; Japhet 2007: 141–61; and Klingbeil 2007: 39–75; and see Knoppers 2001: 15–30 on the question of intermarriage, lineages, and social complexity. 48.  This is not the place to discuss the manifold problems regarding the textual development of the book. See Fox 1991, Clines 1984, and Talmon 1995: 249–67 regarding Esther among the Qumran Scrolls. For our purpose, we will focus on the Hebrew MT. For the hermeneutical issues of the book, see Wahl 2000: 59–74, 2001: 25–40; for the structure of Esther, see Meinhold 1983: 435–45. 49.  The actual term ‫פרס‬, “Persia,” occurs in Esth 1:3 (‫)חיל פרס ומדי‬, 14 (‫שרי פרס‬ ‫)ומדי‬, 18 (‫)שרות פרס ומדי‬, 19 (‫)בדתי פרס ומדי‬, and 10:2 (‫ )ספר דברי הימים למלכי מדי ופרס‬and is always used in conjunction with ‫מדי‬, “Medes/Media.” 50. See Haag 2003: 118–33. Differently, Dalley 2007: 165–205, who stresses the manifold connections of the Esther story to Akkadian documents. 51.  Notes on the Purim festival: see Clines 1984: 51–57. Hieros logos of the Purim festival: see Levenson 1997: 124­–32. 52.  The history of violence associated with Purim and the reception of the book of Esther has been explored by Horowitz (2006).

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that tend to explain the Persian Empire in more detail (Esth 1:13–14, 21–22; 2:8, 16) and appear to be added to the original plot. Any search for literary sources behind the current narratives, such as an independent Vashti narrative or a Hamman-Mordechai cycle misjudges the character of the book of Esther. 53 Adele Berlin has rightly stressed that “to judge a story’s historicity by its degree of realism is to mistake verisimilitude for historicity.” 54 It is true that the book of Esther imitates the writing of history but it is doing so because it wants to sound biblical and not historical. 55 If we bear this is mind, the obvious dichotomy between passages that are well-informed about the Persian Empire and the historical “blunders” of the book can be evaluated in the light of storytelling and not in the light of historical accuracy. 56 As in the Greek world, Susa is the center of the Persian Empire for the book of Esther and our story is set there. 57 Events in the capital affect the rest of the empire and the other Jewish communities. Like the Joseph story, Esther describes and delights in the possibility of being able to rise in status and importance abroad. The many structural and literary parallels between the Esther story and the Joseph story have long been recognized, and both literary complexes have rightly been labeled “Diaspora novellas” (Diasporanovelle). 58 Throughout the book, the continued existence of Jewish communities in Persia is never questioned. 59 Also, a return to the homeland 53.  Bardtke 1963: 248–52; Kossmann 2000: 34–69. 54.  Berlin 2001b: 4. 55.  Berlin 2001b: 7. 56.  The obvious “blunders” are the fact that the Persian king was only allowed to marry within seven noble families (Herodotus, Hist. 3.84; the terminology of the book of Esther [‫וישם כתר מלכות בראשה וימליכה תחת ושתי‬, Esth 2:17b] does not allow interpreting Esther as one of the concubines; see Plutarch, Mor. 140b) and that Xerxes’ queen was called Amestris (see Herodotus, Hist. 7.114: Ἄμηστριν τὴν Ξέρξεω γυναῖκα); additionally, Esth 1:1, 8:9 speaks of 129 countries of the empire, whereas §6 of the Behistun inscription of Darius I only speaks of 23 countries (fraharavam : dahyāva : XXIII and §3 of the inscription of Naqš-i-Rustam mentions 29 countries subjected to Persia (the text of the Persian inscription is found in Kent 1953: 116–20, 137–38). 57.  The words ‫ שושן הבירה‬in Esth 1:2, 5; 2:3, 5, 8; 3:15; 8:14; 9:6, 11, 12 (cf. Dan 8:2, Neh 1:1) and ‫ שושן‬alone in Esth 4:8, 16; 8:15; 9:13–15, 18. In Greek, τὰ Σοῦσα describes the winter and spring residence of the Persian king (see Herodotus, Hist. 5.52; Xenophon, Anab. 3.5.15; Cyr. 8.6.22) and has to be distinguished from ἡ Σουσίς, denoting the province of Susa (see Aeschylus, Pers. 119.557). 58. See Rosenthal 1895: 279–84; Meinhold 1975: 306–24, 1976: 72–93; and the thoughts on Diaspora identity in Esther in comparison to 3 Maccabees offered by Hacham (2007: 765–85). For the later development of the Diaspora, see Kalmin 2006; Edrei and Mendels 2007: 91–137, 2008: 163–87. 59.  Esth 3:8 mentions dispersion of the Jews in Persia (‫)עם אחד מפזר ומפרד בין העמים‬.

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is never debated and we encounter a cosmopolitan Judaism in Esther where—just as in Genesis 20—ethnic identity is no longer tied to the land. This, however, does not preclude any connection to Palestine. The ties of the Diaspora community at Susa with the people in Palestine and especially in Jerusalem are emphasized in the figure of Mordecai, who is introduced as a Benjaminite who had been exiled from Jerusalem in the group that was carried into exile with king Jeconiah of Judah, who had been driven into exile by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon (Esth 2:5–6). 60 Taken literally, Mordecai would then have been roughly 115 years old and hardly able to have a very beautiful niece. 61 As in the case of Sarah in Genesis 20, too close a reading blinds us to the literary intention and purpose of the narrative. The genealogy of Mordecai stresses that he is both a ‫ יהודי‬and a member of the tribe of Benjamin and it is precisely this connection to which we need to draw our attention. 62 In the book of Ezra (Ezra 1:5, 4:1), Judah and Benjamin (together with Levi represent the continuation of the Southern Kingdom of Judah and are regarded as the only true community. 63 This means by the parameter set by the book of Ezra, Mordecai is an authentic Jew of the Exile. 64 With his genealogy, he fits the description of other prominent members of the Diaspora, because both Daniel (Dan 2:25) and Tobit (Tob 1:1–2) are described as being exiled from Judah or Israel. 65 As is common in Diaspora discourse, status and identity are related to the

60.  The association of the name Mordecai with the Babylonian god Marduk is obvious (see Bardtke 1963: 298). For the use as a personal name, see Driver 1965: 27 (= TAD A6 9:1), where a Persian officer ( pqydʾ ) is called mrdk: mn ʾršm ʿ l mrdk pqydʾ. Ezra 2:2 and Neh 7:7 mention a Jew named Mordecai as one of the first returnees with Zerubbabel. 61.  Traditional Jewish exegesis solves the problem by relating ‫ אשר הגלה‬in Esth 2:6aα to Kish rather than to Mordecai, or it is stated that his father was from the tribe of Benjamin, while his mother was from Judah (b. Meg. Esth. 12b). The additions to Esther in the MT mention that Mordecai is a descendant from the exiles (see Kottsieper 1998: 137). 62.  The words ‫ איש יהודי‬only appear in Jer 43:9, Zech 8:23, and Esth 2:5. B. Meg. Esth. 13a explains that Mordecai is called ‫ יהודי‬because he rejected idolatry, and everyone who does so will be called ‫יהודי‬. 63.  Gunneweg 1985: 45; Williamson 1985: 15. 64.  Berlin 2001a: 25. This does not explain why he stayed. Ezra 1:4 seems to envisage that some “Jews” were reluctant to return and simply offered a financial contribution. 65.  Meinhold 1976: 77 draws attention to the fact that Joseph also seems to fit this description; however, within the Joseph narrative the feature of the return to the land is still obvious.

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level of connection with the homeland as well as with a certain expression of “cosmopolitanism.” 66 As far as Jewish identity is concerned, we find a curious interplay between concealing and revealing one’s lineage. 67 It starts with Mordecai’s order given to Esther to conceal her ethnic identity (Esth 2:10; cf. Esth 2:20), and she must have done it remarkably well, because the Persian king appears oblivious to the fact that he has taken a Jewish wife. 68 When she finally reveals her identity (Esth 7:4), the king is untroubled by the fact. In contrast to Genesis 20, the authors of the book of Esther can imagine that a Jewish woman would have intercourse with someone outside her own ethnic group (the fact that Esther is unmarried might have helped here). All in all, the reader gets the impression that religion as an ethnic marker does not seem to matter anymore— this fact is clearly a cultural response to the (proposed) Persian setting, where theology is only the starting point for an otherwise secular political economy. A further striking feature of the book of Esther is the virtual absence of God in the book. 69 This has, of course, given rise to manifold speculation about hidden references, double entendres, and so on. 70 On the other hand, it is incorrect to view the apparent “secular” nature of the book as an indication of the book’s being of lesser quality. I think, if we approach the Esther story with the remarks about God in mind that were made above when dealing with Genesis 20, some light will be shed on the issue. The personal God of the patriarchs was changed in Genesis 20 into a universal divine being to whom Israelites and pagans can speak and to whose universal laws even apparently foreign kings 66.  For anthropological data, see Danforth 1995: 197–251; Sifneos 2005: 97–111. For recent treatments of the concept of Diaspora, see Levy 2005 and Dufoix 2008; for biblical terminology, see Kiefer 2005. 67.  The term ‫יהודי‬/‫ יהודים‬is used in Esth 2:5; 3:4, 6, 10, 13; 4:4, 7, 13, 16; 5:13; 6:10, 13; 8:1, 3, 5, 7–9, 11, 13, 16, 17; 9:1–3, 5, 6, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 18–20, 22–25, 27–31; 10:3. Other designations are also found: ‫( גולה‬Esth 2:6); ‫ להק‬is only used as a verb denoting assembly (Esth 8:11; 9:2, 15, 16, 18). Kossmann 2000: 292–382 has used this linguistic evidence for an argument of a redactional layer related to the term. 68.  Levenson (1997: 61) ponders the possibility that both verses are secondary. Following a model proposed by Brubaker 2004: 128–31, we might be able to argue for an abstract form of assimilation if it involves a process of becoming similar rather than becoming completely absorbed. 69.  On the problem, see Fox 1991: 237–47. 70.  The most obvious allusions are the use of ‫ מקום‬in Esth 4:14, an acrostic forming the Tetragrammaton in Esth 5:4b (‫)יבוא המלך והמן היום‬, a statement of Haman’s wife in Esth 6:13 (“If Mordecai . . . is of Jewish stock you will not overcome him”), and the note on the conversion of many pagans to Judaism in Esth 8:17.

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53

can adhere. This change from a personal to a universal God is taken a step further in Esther. Because none of the actions that lead to an endangerment of the Jews in Persia are explicitly linked to the religious factor, the absence of any direct divine intervention might be understandable. 71 Only in passing can we mention that the apparent noninvolvement of Persia in the religious affairs of its subject people makes Persia an ideal setting for the legitimation of a new festival, which seems to defy the common notions of biblical festivals. 72 For any issues of religion, the conflict between Mordecai and Haman reported in Esth 3:1–15 is often interpreted by drawing attention to Exod 20:1–5. True, ‫ חוה‬is used in the stipulation of Exod 20:5, but nothing in the text of Esther suggests that Haman had any divine quality, and only the Targum adds this aspect by stating that Haman wore a portrait of an idol on his clothes. 73 Despite Mordecai’s statement that he is a Jew (Esth 4:4bβ), we have instances in the Hebrew Bible in which it is perfectly acceptable to bow down before another man (see Gen 23:7, 27:29; 1 Kgs 1:31). The combination of the Hebrew verbs ‫ חוה‬and ‫ כרע‬is normally reserved for God (Ps 22:30, 95:6; 2 Chr 7:3), “but if idolatry is the cause of Mordecai’s noncompliance, the text is strangely silent about this. In addition it is difficult to see why the king commands that an underling be treated as god when he himself is not.” 74 Esth 3:4bβ (‫ )כי הגיד להם אשר הוא יהודי‬seems to look forward to Esth 3:8–15 rather than serving as an adequate reason why Mordecai refuses to bow down. Following a proposal made by C. A. Moore, I am inclined to think that questions of ethnicity come into play here. 75 Because Haman is labeled an Agagite, the reader is reminded of Agag, king of the Amalekites (1 Sam 15:8, 9, 20, 32, 33) and thus of the Amalekites as the archetypical 71.  On Achaemenian religion, see Lincoln 2007: 33–65, 2008: 221–41. 72.  The question of a proposed Achaemenid religious tolerance is difficult to assess; see Ahn 2002: 191–209. 73.  The motif of Haman’s divinity only occurs in Judg 3:8, where Nebuchadnezzar claims divine honors: καὶ κατέσκαψεν πάντα τὰ ὅρια αὐτῶν καὶ τὰ ἄλση αὐτῶν ἐξέκοψεν, καὶ ἦν δεδομένον αὐτῷ εξολεθρεῦσαι πάντας τοὺς θεοὺς τῆς γῆς, ὅπως αὐτῶι μόνῳ τῶι Ναβουχοδονοσὸρ λατρεύσωσιν πάντα τὰ ἔθνη, καὶ πᾶσαι αἱ γλῶσσαι καὶ αἱ φυλαὶ αὐτῶν ἐπικαλέσωνται αὐτὸν εἰς θεόν (“And he destroyed all of their sanctuaries and ravished their cultic groves. He was given the order to extinguish all the gods of the earth so that all people of the earth serve Nebuchadnezzar alone and all tongues and tribes should worship him alone as god”). The Targum states, “Now all the king’s servants that were at the king’s gate bowed down to the image which he set up on his chest and prostrated themselves to Haman” (Tg. Esth. I 3:2; English translation according to Grossfeld 1991: 51; see also Tg. Esth. II 6:1; b. Meg. 19a; Esth. Rab. 7:6). 74.  Levenson 1997: 67. 75. See Moore 1971: 36–37.

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enemy (Exod 17:8–16, Num 24:20, Deut 25:17–19). 76 Because Mordecai is identified as a descendant of Kish from the tribe of Benjamin (Esth 2:5, 15), it would have been impossible for him to honor Haman. 77 In this light, the conflict between Haman and Mordecai could be seen as a simple dispute over status. 78 Herodotus reports that bowing down indicates a sharp distinction between two people who meet in the street: ἐντυγχάνοντες δ᾽ ἀλλήλοισι ἐν τῆισι ὁδοῖσι, τῶιδε ἄν τις διαγνοίη εἰ ὅμοιοι εἰσὶ οἱ συντυγχάνοντες· ἀντὶ γὰρ τοῦ προσαγορεύειν ἀλλήλους φιλέουσι τοῖσι στόμασι· ἢν δὲ ἦι οὕτερος ὑποδεέστερος ὀλίγῳ τὰς παρειὰς φιλέονται· ἢν δὲ πολλῶι ἦι οὕτερος ἀγεννέστερος, προσπίπτων προσκυνέει τὸν ἕτερον. 79 When one man meets another in the way, it is easy to see if the two are equals; for then without speaking they kiss each other on the lips; if the difference in rank be but little, it is the cheek that is kissed; if it be great, the humbler bows down and does obeisance to the other. 80

Additionally, it is never reported that Mordecai refuses to bow down to the Persian king. Bending the knee as an indication of reverence to Haman may have been difficult for Mordecai because he is not only a relative of the king’s favorite wife but also has just saved the life of the king—both clear attributes of claim to status. 81 The response to Mordecai’s challenge to Haman’s honor follows the classic example of a reductive act of stereotyping. Haman learns of Mordecai’s Jewishness from the king’s courtiers in whom Mordecai has confided and assumes that Mordecai’s behavior mirrors the behavior of everyone from his ethnic group. In Haman’s report to the king in Esth 3:8, the Jewishness of Mordecai is no longer an issue. The whole affair is presented as a general uprising or revolt of a group of people against the laws of the king (‫)את דתי המלך אינם עשים‬. The king authorizes the suppression, and the anti-Jewish stance is inserted only by Haman. 76.  In the Greek tradition, Haman is given the attribute βουγαῖον, which is probably a misinterpretation of Hebrew ‫( אגגי‬see Kottsieper 1998: 145–46). In Greek, this epiteton is readily comprehensible, because βουγάϊος denotes a bully or braggart (see Homer, Il. 13.824, and Od. 18.79). 77.  “Der Jude aus Benjamin steht dem Erzfeind aus Amalek gegenüber” (Loader 1992: 240). 78.  The role of honor and shame in the book of Esther is explored in detail in Laniak 1998. Laniak, however, defines Diaspora as a shame state (pp. 172–74). This might be true for other biblical texts, but it is difficult to argue for Esther. 79.  Herodotus, Hist. 1.134. 80.  English translation according to Godley 1990: 175. 81.  This is alluded to in Esth A:12–17, where Haman is pictured as belonging to the side of the conspirators.

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55

Even after the issue of the decree for the destruction of the Jews, Mordechai continues to challenge Haman’s honor (Esth 6:9). When reading the Esther story, one is reminded of the powerful orientalizing pictures of Eugène Delacroix. 82 The full luxury of the Orient comes alive in these pictures, but historical accuracy is left aside in favor of transmitting the otherness of the Eastern world. 83 The author of the book of Esther delights in describing the sumptuous affairs in the Persian court; the reader gets the impression that he relished these details as well as propelling myths that were—from then on—long associated with the Orient. Here, the harem is only one example. 84 All this adds to the distinct international flavor of the book. Its author possesses a great deal of knowledge of the affairs and the language of the Persian Empire but uses it merely in a literary capacity. 85 Historically, Persia remains absent from Esther, and Adele Berlin is right when she states: [T]he story of Esther is nothing more than a conglomeration of common motifs associated with the Persian court, woven throughout the equally conventional storylines such as the wise courtier in a foreign court, the contest between courtiers, and the woman who saves her people. 86

How are we then to explain the role of Persian “presence” in the book of Esther? I would like to do so by using a model proposed by Margaret C. Miller in her excellent study of the relationship between Athens and Persia during the 5th century b.c.e. 87 After a careful examination of cultural artifacts such as vases, clothing, jewelry, and numerous literary 82.  See, for example, The Death of Sardanapalus (1827; Paris: Musée du Louvre) and the other examples in Lemaire 2000 and Warraq 2007: 333–45. 83.  The same has recently been argued for the work of Ctesias of Cnidus (cf. Stronk 2007: 25–58). His Persica is no longer regarded as a history but as a forerunner of a new literary genre mixing historical fact with fictitious elements. This genre eventually culminated in the classical novel. The text of Ctesias’s Persica can be found in König 1972 and in a new edition by Lenfant (2004). 84.  Throughout literature, painting, and music (e.g., W. A. Mozart᾽s Die Ent­füh­ rung aus dem Serail 1782), the very idea of a harem or seraglio has inspired (male) Western authors; see the excellent study of the topic by Yeazell (2000), and see Roberts 2002: 179–203 on how women Orientalists “claimed the imaginary and literal space of the harem as their domain of expertise and pleasure” (p. 197). For an anthropological perspective, see Farnea 1965: 24–39, where she reports that the inaccessibility of the sheik’s fourth wife, Selma, greatly increased her mystery and “beauty” for the men of the village. 85.  For a list of Persian words, see Gehman 1924: 321–28. 86.  Berlin 2001b: 14. Stereotypical storytelling of this sort using Persian elements does not necessitate a Persian setting, as Berlin argues. 87.  Miller 1997: 243–58. The following considerations have profited a great deal from these insights.

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sources, Miller is able to revise significantly the common “official” view of the Persians in Greek culture. She detects a cultural phenomenon that she labels Perserie, that is, a cultural receptivity to Persian customs and culture in Athenian daily life and a tendency to utilize them in discourse about status and empire. “Such acts contradict the contempt for the Oriental as expressed in Athenian public rhetoric.” 88 I believe that similar processes (with adaptations) can be found in Esther as well. So, how does Perserie work? First of all, a necessary prerequisite is a minimum degree of contact, be it military or through trade, that makes a society ready to receive. This readiness “is independent of power or complexity. It is misguided to limit discussion to hierarchical distinction, to suppose that a ‘higher’ society must act as a donor and a ‘lower’ society as beneficiary.” 89 In our case, however, the author is marveling in the sumptuousness of life in the Persian court, showing explicitly that Persia, as a donor culture, is the more powerful society. Second, during the process of cultural transfer we have to keep in mind that “no society is totally overwhelmed by the culture of another; rather they selectively adopt culture traits.” 90 It is tempting to employ a center-periphery model here, in which a dominant center overwhelms a periphery; but Esther moves beyond that by stating that all events of the story take place at the center of the Persian Empire and that the protagonists have moved from the periphery to the center. Here, a double movement can be observed: the genealogy of Mordecai indicates that his group moved from the geographical periphery, while the rise in Esther’s status indicates a move toward the social center. Additionally, a readiness for reception of a different culture does not have to lead to a cultural imbalance, because the receiving culture is often able to maintain its own vitality. 91 Here, the Purim festival may be seen as an expression of this vitality. Third, and probably most importantly, “[r]eceptivity of a foreign trait speaks more eloquently of the receiver than the donor.” 92 This means that the process of Perserie in the book of Esther tells us about the Jewish community in the Diaspora and not about the Persian Empire on which the process is based. Margaret Miller has further shown that social texture and need are important factors relating to reception. By emulating Persian life and 88.  Miller 1997: 243. 89.  Miller 1997: 244. 90.  Miller 1997: 245. 91.  Miller 1997: 246. 92.  Miller 1997: 246.

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by actively participating in it, Mordecai and Esther articulate their status and maybe draw boundaries between members of the same group or society. “Need” is of course socially constructed in order “to expand the vocabulary marking social relations in face of increasing social complexity.” 93 From here, we can draw further (and more psychological) conclusions. Any receptivity contains strong elements of domestication and symbolic domination. 94 By “domestication,” I mean the process of familiarization that allows the readers of the book of Esther to imagine that they are familiar with the Persian Empire—the alien quality is thus reduced and the other is incorporated into one’s own life(style). “Symbolic domination” refers to the possibility to increase the power of one’s own group by either marginalization or perversion of the alien other. The fall of Haman is actively marginalizing and results in a status increase for Mordecai and his group. I detect an act of perversion in the portrayal of the Persian king as clueless and (often) powerless. The powerful Persian king of history is strategically depicted as a willing tool. 95 This unfavorable portrait is the first step toward a critical view of the Persians and especially the Persian king, whom Esther can manipulate. 96 It seems that the historical absence of the Persian Empire enables a critique that seemed inappropriate and dangerous before.

Conclusion In conclusion, let us briefly evaluate the various cultural responses to Persian presence in the Hebrew Bible. Here, our quick tour through Genesis 20 and the book of Esther has revealed a striking dialectic: in Genesis 20, Persia is historically present but literarily absent, while in the book of Esther it is literarily present but absent historically. This fact 93.  Miller 1997: 248. 94.  Miller 1997: 248. 95.  This process of perversion is further developed in Roman times so that the fifth Sibyl is able to label the Roman emperor Nero, whom the oracle regards as evil incarnate, a Persian: ἥξει γὰρ Πέρσης ἐπὶ σὸν δάπος ὥστε χάλαζα | καὶ σὴν γαῖαν ὅλην ἀπολεῖ ἀνὴρ κακότεχνος | βαρβαρόφρων σθεναρὸς πολυαίματος ἄφρονα λυσσῶν | αἵματι καὶ νεκύεσσι ῥυφαίνων ἱερὰ πάντα | παμπληθεὶ ψαμαθηδὸν ἐπάξων αἰτὺν ὄλεθρον | καὶ τότ᾽ ἔσηι, πόλεων πολύολβος, πολλὰ καμοῦσα (Sib. Or. v.93–98). 96. See Gruen 2007: 68–69. It is quite striking that the Persian king tends to need wine before he can interact with his queen (see Esth 1:10, 5:5, 7:2). On the basis of Prov 31:4, this can be seen as a critique of the king as well; cf. Herodotus, Hist. 1.212, where wine is called φάρμακον. Herodotus, Hist. 1.133, also states that Persians are very fond of wine (οἴνῳ δὲ κάρτα προσκέαται, thus creating a stereotype most Greek authors followed; Strabo, Geogr. 15.3.2, reports that the Persians do all their important deliberations when drinking wine, and Herodotus, Hist. 1.34, links Cambyses’ frenzy to his love of wine (οἴνῳ προσκείμενον παραφρονέειν καὶ οὐκ εἶναι νοήμονα).

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allows for chronological differentiation. Whereas Genesis 20 originated in the Persian period itself, Esther reflects a retrospective view on Persia and its empire from later times. In contrast to Genesis 20, the book of Esther is well informed about several customs and the broader historical setting but uses this information to bring home the author’s view of the Diaspora setting. Such a voluntary and peaceful Diaspora existence is still a new social construction of reality for the authors of Genesis 20, and the surprise that it may effect is obvious. The literary setting within the patriarchal narrative as well as the historical closeness to Persia may be the reason for the absent presence of it in the text of Genesis 20. Additionally, the closeness to home (that is, Palestine) forces the authors of Genesis 20 to pay careful attention to questions of purity maintaining a distinct ethnic identity. In the book of Esther, however, this distinct identity is only stressed when Haman describes “the people” (‫ )עם אחד‬in Esth 3:8. 97 The book of Esther as a whole addresses the difficulties of solidarity with one’s own ethnic group in a multinational empire, where a career is just as possible as enduring hostility because of success. Additionally, the Persia of Esther—like the Persia of Ezra and Nehemiah—has become a literary topos for a description of the international character of Judaism describing an idealized time of the past when one could imagine the flourishing of one’s own ethnic group. 97.  The accusations are (again) stereotypical and seem to belong to a standard repertoire of anti-Jewish rhetoric in antiquity; see Schäfer 1997: 15–21.

References Achenbach, R. 2003 Die Vollendung der Tora: Studien zur Redaktionsgeschichte des Numeribuches im Kontext von Hexateuch und Pentateuch. BZAR 3. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Ahn, G. 2002 “Toleranz” und Reglement: Die Signifikanz achaimenidischer Religionspolitik für den jüdisch-persischen Kulturkontakt. Pp. 191–202 in Religion und Religionskontakte im Zeitalter der Achämeniden, ed. R. G. Kratz. Veröffentlichungen der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theo­logie 22. Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser. Albertz, A. 2006 Exemplarisches Heldentum: Die Rezeptionsgeschichte der Schlacht an den Thermopylen von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart. Ordnungssysteme 17. Munich: Oldenbourg. Bardtke, H. 1963 Das Buch Esther. KAT 17/5. Gütersloh: Mohn.

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Berlin, A. 2001a Esther. JPS Bible Commentary. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society. 2001b The Book of Esther and Ancient Storytelling. JBL 120: 3–14. Blum, E. 1984 Die Komposition der Vätergeschichte. WMANT 57. Neukirchen Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Boedeker, D. 2001a Heroic Historiography: Simonides and Herodotus on Plataea. Pp. 120– 34 in The New Simonides: Contexts of Praise and Desire, ed. D. Boedeker and S. Sider. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2001b Paths to Heroization at Platea. Pp. 148–63 in The New Simonides: Contexts of Praise and Desire, ed. D. Boedeker and S. Sider. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Briant, P. 2002 From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Brubaker, R. 2004 Ethnicity without Groups. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Buitenwerf, R. 2003 Book III of the Sibylline Oracles and Its Social Setting with an Introduction, Translation, and Commentary. SVTP 17. Leiden: Brill. Campbell, D. A. 1991 Greek Lyric: Stesichorus, Ibycus, Simonides, and Others. LCL 476. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Carter, C. E. 1999 The Emergence of Yehud in the Persian Period: A Social and Demographic Study. JSOTSup 294. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Cawkwell, G. 2005 The Greek Wars: The Failure of Persia. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Clines, D. J. A. 1984 The Esther Scroll: The Story of the Story. JSOTSup 30. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Dalley, S. 2007 Esther’s Revenge at Susa: From Sennacherib to Ahasuerus. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Danforth, L. M. 1995 The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Dor, Y. 2003 The Composition of the Episode of the Foreign Women in Ezra 9–10. VT 53: 26–47. Douglas, M. 2003 Responding to Ezra: The Priests and the Foreign Wives. BibInt 10: 1–23.

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Driver, G. R. 1965 Aramaic Documents of the Fifth Century b.c.e. Abridged and rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon. Dufoix, S. 2008 Diasporas. Berkeley: University of California Press. Edrei, A., and Mendels, D. 2007 A Split Jewish Diaspora: Its Dramatic Consequences. JSP 16: 91–137. 2008 A Split Jewish Diaspora: Its Dramatic Consequences II. JSP 17: 163–87. Erkelenz, M. 1997 Inspecting the Tragedy of Empire: Shelley’s Hellas and Aeschylus’ Persians. Philological Quarterly 76: 313–37. Esler, P. F. 2007 From Ioudaioi to Children of God: The Development of a Non-ethnic Group Identity in the Gospel of John. Pp. 106–37 in In Other Words: Essays on Social Science Methods and the New Testament in Honor of Jerome H. Neyrey, ed. A. C. Hagedorn, Z. A. Crook, and E. Stewart. Social World of Biblical Antiquity, 2nd Series 1. Sheffield: Phoenix. Farnea, E. W. 1965 Guests of the Sheik: An Ethnography of an Iraqi Village. New York: Doubleday. Finlay, T. D. 2005 The Birth Report Genre in the Hebrew Bible. FAT 2/12. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Fox, M. V. 1991 Character and Ideology in the Book of Esther. Studies on Personalities of the Old Testament. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. Gehman, H. S. 1924 Notes on the Persian Words in the Book of Esther. JBL 43: 321–28. Gera, D. L. 2007 Themistocles’ Persian Tapestry. CQ 57: 445–57. Gerstenberger, E. S. 2005 Israel in der Perserzeit: 5. und 4. Jahrhundert. Biblische Enzyklopädie 8. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Godley, A. D. 1990 Herodotus Vol. I (Books I–II). Rev. ed. LCL 117. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Grabbe, L. 2004 A History of the Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period, vol. 1: Yehud: A History of the Persian Province of Judah. Library of Second Temple 47. London: T. & T. Clark. 2007 The Terminology of Government in the Septuagint: In Comparison with Hebrew, Aramaic, and Other Languages. Pp. 225–37 in Jewish Perspectives on Hellenistic Rulers, ed. T. Rajak, S. Pearce, J. Aitken, and J. Dines. Hellenistic Culture and Society 50. Berkeley: University of California Press.

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Graupner, A. 2002 Der Elohist: Gegenwart und Wirksamkeit des transzendenten Gottes in der Geschichte. WMANT 97. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Grossfeld, B. 1991 The Two Targums of Esther. Translated with Apparatus and Notes. Aramaic Bible 18. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. Gruen, E. S. 2007 Persia through the Jewish Looking-Glass. Pp. 53–75 in Jewish Perspectives on Hellenistic Rulers, ed. T. Rajak, S. Pearce, J. Aitken, and J. Dines. Hellenistic Culture and Society 50. Berkeley: University of California Press. Gunkel, H. 1902 Genesis. 2nd ed. HKAT 3/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Gunneweg, A. H. J. 1985 Esra. KAT 19/1. Gütersloh: Mohn. Haag, E. 2003 Das hellenistische Zeitalter: Israel und die Bibel im 4. bis 1. Jahrhundert v. Chr. Biblische Enzyklopädie 9. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Hagedorn, A. C. 2007 Local Law in an Imperial Context: The Role of Torah in the (Imagined) Persian Period. Pp. 57–76 in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance, ed. G. N. Knoppers and B. M. Levinson. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Hacham, N. 2007 3 Maccabees and Esther: Parallels, Intertextuality, and Diaspora Identity. JBL 126: 765–85. Hall, E. 1989 Inventing the Barbarian: Greek Self-Definition through Tragedy. Oxford Classical Monographs. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2004 Aeschylus, Race, Class, and War in the 1990s. Pp. 169–97 in Dionysus Since 69: Greek Tragedy at the Dawn of the Third Millennium, ed. E. Hall, F. Macintosh, and A. Wrigly. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hall, J. M. 2002 Hellenicity: Between Ethnicity and Culture. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Herzfeld, M. 2002 The Absent Presence. Discourses of Crypto-Colonialism. South Atlantic Quarterly 101: 899–926. Heinz, K. 1987 Religion und Politik in Vorderasien im Reich der Achämeniden. Klio 69: 317­­–25. Hornblower, S. 2001 Greeks and Persians: West against East. Pp. 48–61 in War, Peace and World Orders in European History, ed. B. Heuser. London: Routledge.

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Horowitz, E. 2006 Reckless Rites: Purim and the Legacy of Jewish Violence. Jews, Christians, and Muslims from the Ancient to the Modern World. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Japhet, S. 2007 The Expulsion of the Foreign Women (Ezra 9–10): The Legal Basis, Precedents, and Consequences for the Definition of Jewish Identity. Pp. 141­–61 in “Sieben Augen auf einem Stein” (Sach 3,9): Studien zur Literatur des Zweiten Tempels. Festschrift für Ina Willi-Plein zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. F. Hartenstein and M. Pietsch. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Janzen, D. 2002 Witch-Hunts, Purity and Social Boundaries: The Expulsion of the Foreign Women in Ezra 9–10. JSOTSup 350. London: Sheffield Academic Press. Kalmin, R. 2006 Jewish Babylonia between Persia and Roman Palestine. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kent, R. G. 1953 Old Persian: Grammar, Text, Lexicon. AOS 33. New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society. Kiefer, J. 2005 Exil und Diaspora: Begrifflichkeit und Deutungen im antiken Judentum und in der hebräischen Bibel. Arbeiten zur Bibel und ihrer Geschichte 19. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Klingbeil, G. A. 2007 “Not So Happily Ever After . . .”: Cross Cultural Marriages in the Time of Ezra–Nehemiah. Maʾarav 14: 39–75. Knoppers, G. N. 2001 Intermarriage, Social Complexity, and Ethnic Diversity in the Genealogy of Judah. JBL 120: 15–30. Köckert, M. 2006a Abraham: Ahnvater, Fremdling, Weiser. Lesarten der Bibel in Genesis 12, Genesis 20 und Qumran. Pp. 139–69 in Das Buch der Bücher: Gelesen. Lesarten der Bibel in den Wissenschaften und Künsten, ed. S. Martus and A. Polaschegg. Publikationen zur Zeitschrift für Germanistik 13. Bern: Peter Lang. 2006b Die Geschichte der Abrahamüberlieferung. Pp. 103–28 in Congress Volume Leiden 2004, ed. A. Lemaire. VTSup 109. Leiden: Brill. König, F. W. 1972 Die Persika des Ktesias von Knidos. AfOB 18. Graz: Selbstverlag. Kossmann, R. 2000 Die Esthernovelle: Vom Erzählten zur Erzählung. Studien zur Traditionsund Redaktionsgeschichte des Estherbuches. VTSup 79. Leiden: Brill.

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Kottsieper, I. 1998 Zusätze zu Ester. Pp. 111–207 in Das Buch Baruch: Der Brief des Jeremia. Zusätze zu Ester und Daniel, ed. O. H. Steck, R. G. Kratz, and I. Kottsieper. ATD Apokryphen 5. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Kratz, R. G. 2000 Israel als Staat und als Volk. ZThK 97: 1–17. 2005 The Composition of the Narrative Books of the Old Testament. London: T. & T. Clark. Lamb, W. R. M. 1988 Lysias. LCL 244. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Lanckau, J. 2006 Der Herr der Träume: Eine Studie zur Funktion des Traumes in the Josefs­ geschichte der Hebräischen Bibel. ATANT 85. Zurich: Theologischer Verlag. Laniak, T. S. 1998 Shame and Honor in the Book of Esther. SBLDS 165. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press. Lemaire, G.-G. 2000 Orientalismus: Das Bild des Morgenlandes in der Malerei. Cologne: Könemann. Lenfant, D. 2004 Ctésias de Cnide: La Perse, L’Indie, Autres Fragments. Collection des Universités de France 75. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Levenson, J. D. 1997 Esther: A Commentary. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox. Levin, C. 1993 Der Jahwist. FRLANT 157. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Levy, A., and Weingrod, A., eds. 2005 Homelands and Diasporas: Holy Lands and Other Places. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Lincoln, B. 2007 Religion, Empire and Torture. The Case of Achaemenian Persia. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 2008 The Role of Religion in Achaemenian Persia. Pp. 221–41 in Religion and Power: Divine Kingship in the Ancient World and Beyond, ed. N. Brisch. Oriental Institute Seminars 4. Chicago: Oriental Institute Press. Lipschits, O. 2006 Achaemenid Imperial Policy, Settlement Processes in Palestine, and the Status of Jerusalem in the Middle of the Fifth Century b.c.e. Pp. 19–52 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Loader, J. A. 1992 Das Buch Ester. Pp. 201–80 in Das Hohelied, Klagelieder, Das Buch Ester, ed. H.-P. Müller, O. Kaiser, and J. A. Loader. ATD 16/2. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.

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Mankowski, P. V. 2000 Akkadian Loanwords in Biblical Hebrew. HSS 47. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Marincola, J. 2007 The Persian Wars in Fourth-Century Oratory and Historiography. Pp. 105–25 in Cultural Responses to the Persian Wars: Antiquity to the Third Millennium, ed. E. Bridges, E. Hall, and P. J. Rhodes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mason, S. 2007 Jews, Judaeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of Categorization in Ancient History. JSJ 38: 457–512. Meinhold, A. 1975 Die Gattung der Josephsgeschichte und des Estherbuches: Diasporanovelle I. ZAW 87: 306–24. 1976 Die Gattung der Josephsgeschichte und des Estherbuches: Diasporanovelle II. ZAW 88: 72–93. 1983 Zu Aufbau und Mitte des Estherbuches. VT 33: 435­­–45. Miller, M. C. 1997 Athens and Persia in the Fifth Century bc: A Study in Cultural Receptivity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Moore, C. A. 1971 Esther. AB 7B. Garden City: Doubleday. Morris, I. M. 2000 To Make a New Thermopylae: Hellenism, Greek Liberation, and the Battle of Thermopylae. Greece & Rome 47: 211–30. Polignac, F. de 1995 Cults, Territory, and the Origins of the Greek City-State. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Rhodes, P. J. 2007 The Impact of the Persian Wars on Classical Greece. Pp. 31–45 in Cultural Responses to the Persian Wars: Antiquity to the Third Millennium, ed. E. Bridges, E. Hall, and P. J. Rhodes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Roberts, M. 2002 Contested Terrains: Women Orientalists and the Colonial Harem. Pp. 179–203 in Orientalism’s Interlocutors: Painting, Architecture, Photography. Objects/History. Durham: Duke University Press. Rosenthal, L. 1895 Die Josephsgeschichte mit den Büchern Ester und Daniel verglichen. ZAW 15: 278–84. Rutherford, I. 2001 The New Simonides: Toward a Commentary. Pp. 33–54 in The New Simonides: Contexts of Praise and Desire, ed. D. Boedeker and S. Sider. Oxford: Oxford University Press

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Ethnicity and Identity in Isaiah 56–66 Christophe Nihan University of Lausanne

Introducing the Issue: “Third Isaiah” and Inner-Biblical Conflicts for the Self-Definition of the Community in the Persian Period For several years, scholarly interest in the history, archaeology, and literature of the province of Yehud under Achaemenid domination has gone hand in hand with a growing recognition not only of the social and ethnic diversity of Persian-period Yehud but also of the multiple and often conflicting ways of assessing this diversity. Several groups and communities claimed to be heirs to the ancient kingdoms of Judah and Israel, and a significant number of issues logically arose. Evidence for repeated conflicts between successive groups of returnees—possibly organized as “charter groups” (Kessler 2006)—and nondeported Judeans has long been pointed out by scholars (e.g., Blenkinsopp 1989: 69 and passim; Smith-Christopher 1994). More recently, however, additional aspects of this general issue have been emphasized, such as the relationship between Judeans and Samarians— the latter also claiming to be heirs of “Israel” (Knoppers 2006)—as well as between Diaspora and homeland (e.g., Bedford 2002; Kessler 2007). There is also considerable evidence for the ethnic complexity of the province of Yehud (for a recent discussion of the concept of “ethnicity” from a social-science perspective, see, e.g., Zehnder 2005: 21–47). Aramaic ostraca from Idumea dating to the fifth and fourth centuries b.c.e. point to the importance of Edomite presence in southern Palestine (Lemaire 2006; Porten and Yardeni 2006). The same point is actually made in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah by means of the continuous reference to the “peoples of the land(s),” ammê hāʾāreṣ/hāʾărāṣôt (Ezra 3:3; 9:1, 2, 11; 10:2, 11; Neh 9:24, 30; 10:29, 31, 32). 1 Recent archeological surveys 1.  I cannot address here the long debated problem of the difference and relationship between the expressions “peoples of the land” and “peoples of the lands” in Ezra–Nehemiah; see, e.g., Willi 1995: 30–33. Note also the expressions gôyê hāʾāreṣ in Ezra 6:21, and ʿam hāʾāreṣ in Ezra 4:4.

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of Yehud during the Persian period suggest that, before about 400 b.c.e. and the independence of Egypt, the province’s boundaries were not firmly defined by Persian administration and that “the Persian authorities deliberately permitted a certain degree of independence with regard to the resettlement of the area” (Lipschits and Tal 2007; see also Lipschits 2006). 2 The critical opposition to intermarriage documented in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah (Ezra 9–10; Neh 13:23–31) as well as in other writings of that period (e.g., Mal 2:10–16) suggests the ongoing importance of these marriages during the Persian period (e.g., SmithChristopher 1994; Eskenazi and Judd 1994), a point further corroborated by the Samaria papyri in the case of “intermarriages” between elite families in Jerusalem and Samaria (Cross 1998: 189–97). Last, as pointed out by Knoppers in particular (Knoppers 2001), the various genealogies found in the writings of the Persian period offer an important witness to the existence of competing ways of assessing Judah’s ethnic homogeneity. Contrary to the tendency observable in Ezra 9–10, where “Israel” is restricted to a genealogical definition—the “holy seed” (zeraʿ haqqodeš, 9:2)—and is apparently identified with the “community of the exiles” (qĕhal haggôlâ, see Ezra 10:8; compare also 9:4; 10:6, 7, 16), the genealogy of Judah in Chronicles appears to be significantly more open to ethnic diversity (e.g., Williamson 1977: 60–61; Japhet 1989: 346–51 and passim; Knoppers 2001). This essay will seek to contribute to this discussion by reassessing the significance of so-called Third Isaiah (Isaiah 56–66) with a view to determining the concept of “Israel” that permeates this distinct collection. Along with Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chronicles, Third Isaiah is one of our most important biblical sources for the Persian period. Parallels between Third Isaiah and the policies promoted by Ezra and Nehemiah, such as, for instance, emphasis on the Sabbath as an identity marker for the Judean ethnos (Isa 56:2, 4, 6; 58:13–14; 66:23–24; compare Neh 9:14; 10:31, 33; 13:15–22), have long been noted by commentators (e.g., Rofé 1985: 213–17; Koenen 1990: 223–24; Ruszkowski 2000: 156–59; Blenkinsopp 2003: 135). More generally, the importance of issues related to ethnicity and identity within Third Isaiah is especially emphasized in the framing chapters, Isaiah 56 and 65–66. The collection significantly opens with a discussion about admitting foreigners in the Jerusalem temple (56:1–8) and likewise concludes by returning to that issue (66:18–24). The apparent openness to foreigners led to the 2. The above observations regarding the ethnic complexity of Persian-period Yehud indicate, therefore, that it is not possible to maintain that ethnicity, for the Yĕhûdîm, could simply be considered presupposed (pace, e.g., Willi 1999: 75–81).

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traditional view—still held by many commentators—that Third Isaiah, while sharing some important parallels with the Ezra–Nehemiah traditions, nonetheless stood for a completely distinct conception of the community than the one reflected in the segregationist policy of Ezra 9–10—or, possibly, that it was designed as a critical alternative to that policy (e.g., Sehmsdorf 1972; Donner 1985; Fishbane 1985: 268; Sekine 1989: 41–42; Koenen 1990: 223–24; Berges 1998: 512). With respect to the much-debated issue of “proselytes” during the Persian period, several commentators continue to view Isa 56:1–8 as the first stage in the history of “conversion” to Judaism (e.g., M. Smith 1971: 137–39; Japhet 1989: 343; more recently, e.g., Berges 1998: 514–15; Park 2003: 100–101; Middlemas 2005: 174; Zapff 2006: 356; Enger 2006: 366–90, esp. p. 388). This view, however, is opposed by other authors (e.g., Kaufmann 1977: 136–39; Cohen 1999: 109–39, esp. p. 122). The whole issue is further complicated by the fact that the openness to foreigners appears to be paired with some sort of internal strife within the community, as suggested in particular by the polemics opposing the “Servants” of Yahweh and the rest of the community in chaps. 65–66. With respect to this latter point, however, the recent discussion has shown how difficult it was to determine the group identity of the tradents of Third Isaiah as well as of their opponents. The strong sense of inner-group identity that surfaces in a few passages (e.g., 66:1– 6) has led some scholars to identify the tradents of Third Isaiah as one of the first “sects” in the Second Temple period (see Blenkinsopp 1990; 2003: 64–66; 2007; Rofé 1985, 1988; and Talmon 1986) 3—a notion, however, frequently rejected by other commentators (e.g., Steck 1991: 275– 76). The identity of the “opponents” of Third Isaiah has likewise proven difficult to establish. In recent publications, earlier attempts to identify a sociologically well-defined group, such as Zadokide priests (Hanson 1975; differently, Rofé 1985), Ezra and/or his supporters (Sehmsdorf 1972; Donner 1985; Koenen 1990: 223–24), or even the native population of nondeportees (Berquist 1995: 74–79) 4 have growingly been criticized for being overly simplistic and for not accounting for the totality of the data (P. A. Smith 1995; Middlemas 2005; see also Park 2003: 88–114). A majority view thus tends to interpret the polemics along more general and more traditional lines, such as the opposition between worshipers of Yahweh alone and adherents of more syncretistic forms of cult (see 3.  Note, however, that these authors do not appear to share the same understanding of what the distinctive features of a “sect” should be nor of what, precisely, makes Third Isaiah a “sectarian” writing. 4.  Identification of the tradents of Third Isaiah with the Babylonian gôlah has also been advanced by other commentators, see, e.g., Schramm 1995: 179–80.

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M. Smith 1971; Schramm 1995); in many respects, the critiques of Third Isaiah would merely continue an earlier tradition of polemics against syncretism, especially in the Torah (Schramm 1995; Levenson 1996; similarly, Wells 1996). For some, the polemics need not even be indicative of a socio-political division within the community (e.g., Sommer 1998: 150); along similar lines, others consider Third Isaiah merely to align with Ezra’s policy of Torah enforcement (e.g., Sweeney 1997). While critique of the attempt to identify the “opponents” of Third Isaiah with one specific group is certainly relevant, one may ask nonetheless whether recent theories about Third Isaiah do justice to the complexity of the polemics involved in that collection or to the way these polemics may be related to more-general conflicts over the community’s self-definition. This essay will reassess this issue and, correlatively, the distinct concept of community laid out in Third Isaiah against the background of other traditions from the Persian period. Before this, however, a word is in order regarding the composition of Third Isaiah, as well as the portions of this collection that are of interest for our topic.

Isaiah 56 and 65–66 and the Composition of Third Isaiah The obvious place to begin an examination of the topic of “ethnicity and identity” in Third Isaiah is, of course, Isa 56:1–8, a passage that has already received a considerable amount of interest. Still today, however, several scholars tend to treat this poem separately from the rest of the collection (e.g., Zehnder 2005: 427–30; Enger 2006: 373–89). While this approach has been common for some time, especially in the socalled “fragment hypothesis” (Fragmentenhypothese), which tended to treat Third Isaiah as a rather heterogeneous collection of poems from various periods (e.g., Volz 1932; more recently, Lau 1994), most recent commentators tend instead to emphasize the unity of chap. 56 with the other end of Third Isaiah, chaps. 65–66. Especially since Westermann’s commentary, a majority of scholars acknowledge the close parallels between 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 (Westermann 1966; Hanson 1975; Steck 1991; Berges 1998: 414–534; Goldenstein 2001: 201–31; Zapff 2006). Not only do 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 share an impressive number of terms and expressions, 5 but 56:1–8 ends with a promise in v. 8—“Besides those 5.  Both 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 deal with the coming of foreigners to Jerusalem in order to worship Yahweh, in the context of a general reference to the “gathering” (qbṣ) of Israel’s diaspora at the end of times. Among other parallels between the two passages, the promise for the eunuch in 56:5 of an “everlasting name” (šēm ʿôlām) that will not be “cut off” finds an echo in the promise of 66:22 that the offspring

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already gathered to him [i.e., the people of Zion], I shall gather (even) more”—whose meaning remains ambiguous in the context of the poem alone. It is only in 66:18–24, at the other end of the collection, that the promise of 56:8 is picked up and further developed, with the return to the motif of Yahweh’s “gathering” (qbṣ P, 6 as in 56:8) of the nations (Koenen 1990: 28–29; Gärtner 2006: 59). The two poems are thus tightly connected through the theme of the coming of the nations to Jerusalem/Zion to worship Yahweh (see Isa 2:2–5!) and comprise a redactional frame around the entire collection. 7 Indeed, 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 form a system, devised at the time of the final composition of Third Isaiah, and the two poems require reading in parallel. As regards the relationship between 66:18–24 and the rest of chaps. 65–66, there is no real ground for separating 66:18–24 from the remainder of chaps. 65–66. Isa 66:18–24 shares several terms with the previous verses, 8 and it is possible to identify a coherent structure in chaps. 65– 66, as some commentators have done (Steck 1991; Berges 1998). Furthermore, there are also significant connections in 56:1–8, not just with 66:18–24 but with all of Isaiah 65–66, which confirms that these texts are best assigned to a common layer, as is now argued by several critics (Steck 1987, 1991; Berges 1998; Zapff 2006; see also Gärtner 2006; pace Goldenstein 2001: 201–29). 9 Finally, because chaps. 65–66 comprise the and the name of faithful members of the community will remain firmly established. The expression “my holy mountain” (har qădśî) recurs in 56:7 and 66:20, both times in connection with reference to the temple and the offerings. Also, in 66:23, the reference to universal observance of the Sabbath as a distinctive feature of the new cosmic order created by Yahweh already appears in 56:2, 4, 6. 6.  In this essay, P refers to Piel stems, N to Niphal, and H to Hiphil. 7.  In the light of these observations, the few attempts that have been made to assign 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 to distinct layers (Smith 1995: 131–32; Middlemas 2005: 165 n. 5) are to be rejected. Note, furthermore, that the transition between 56:1–8 and 56:9–12 is very harsh, on the levels of both content and syntax, and has continuously eluded commentators. Even critics who favor a “final-form” reading of Third Isaiah acknowledge this point: see, e.g., Schramm 1995: 125: “All in all, the logic behind the juxtaposition of this oracle [i.e., 56:9–57:13] with the previous one [i.e., 56:1–8] is elusive.” 8.  Note, especially, the reference to kŏl-bȃ śār, “all flesh,” in 66:16, an expression that never occurs so far in Third Isaiah (and only seldom in the rest of the book: Isa 40:5–6, 49:26) but that serves to prepare for the grand conclusion in 66:23–24. Compare also, e.g., the reference to the kābôd of Yahweh, 66:11, 12, 18, 19. Note, finally, that Schramm 1995: 161–62 had observed that not only 66:18–24 but the entire chapter was deliberately based on Isaiah 1. This can be interpreted as a possible confirmation that the entire chapter belongs to the same literary layer. 9.  See especially the reference to the “Servants” of Yahweh in 56:6; otherwise in 63:17; 65:9, 9, 13, 14, 15; and 66:14. There are, however, many more specific links

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divine response to the communal lament in 63:7–64:11, the redactor who composed Isaiah 65–66 must also be the one who inserted 63:7–64:11. 10 Thus, Isa 56:1–8, far from being an isolated piece within Isaiah 56–66 as it has sometimes been described, actually belongs to a comprehensive redaction within the book. That redaction is responsible for giving to Third Isaiah its final shape by introducing chaps. 63–66 after 60–62. At the same time, by means of the numerous parallels between 65–66 and Isaiah 1, it concludes Third Isaiah by rounding off the entire book. 11 The question of the dating of the final composition of Third Isaiah during the Persian period will be dealt with in the course of this essay. As we will see, there are indeed good reasons to support the view of the commentators who have traditionally linked the final composition of Isaiah 56–66 with Ezra and Nehemiah (e.g., Rofé 1985: 213–17; Koenen 1990: 223–24, Sweeney 1997; Blenkinsopp 1990). The decisive observation initially made by J. Blenkinsopp, that the reference to members of the community “trembling” (ḥrd) at Yahweh’s word occurs otherwise only in Ezra 9–10 (9:4; 10:3) indicates a profound sociological and historical continuity between the final editors of Third Isaiah and the community of Ezra’s time (Blenkinsopp 1990: 8–9). Assuming a low chronology for Ezra’s mission (i.e., 398 b.c.e.), this suggests a dating of the final editing of Third Isaiah in the fourth century b.c.e. (for a similar dating, compare, e.g., Enger 2006: 387). 12 between 56:1–8 and chaps. 65–66. Compare, e.g., the expression “to choose (bḥr) what pleases (ḥpṣ) / pleases not Yahweh,” which occurs in the Hebrew Bible exclusively in Isa 56:4; 65:12; 66:3, 4. Cf. also the topic of the eschatological rejoicing (śmḥ) of the Servants, only in 56:7, 65:13, 66:10, etc. 10.  It is still debated whether 63:7–64:11 is an ancient, exilic lament that was then introduced by the final editors of Third Isaiah or whether the lament was composed from the onset for its present literary context, as Steck (1991) and Goldenstein (2001) have argued. In my opinion, the significant evidence adduced by Goldenstein for sophisticated cross-connections between the lament and the remainder of the book of Isaiah, or of other books of the prophetic corpus, suggests at least that, if an ancient poem underlies the present text of 63:7–64:11, it has been heavily edited by the tradents of Third Isaiah. Contra Steck and Goldenstein (see also Zapff 2006), I see no decisive indication that 63:7–64:11 and chaps. 65–66 were added in two successive stages. 11.  Because it is generally acknowledged that the earliest collection in Third Isaiah comprised chaps. 60–62 (or a first form of these chapters), we may thus identify three successive stages in the forming of the book, as Steck (1989) and Berges, in particular, have proposed: first, Isaiah 60–62, and then 56:9–59:20 (but not 59:21 and 63:1–6, pace Steck), which reveals the emergence of conflicts within the community; last, 56:1–8 and chaps. 63–66, the final composition of Third Isaiah. 12.  However, whether one adopts a high or a low chronology for Ezra’s mission does not alter the general argument of this essay.

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The decisive point, for our analysis, is that the redaction responsible for the final composition of Third Isaiah is at the same time the one that introduces the topic of the coming of the nations to Jerusalem/Zion, which figures prominently in 56:1–8 and 66:18–24. This entirely new development accompanies a transformation of the judgment against the community that takes on truly cosmic dimensions: the community’s purification now involves the creation of “new heavens and a new earth” (65:17; see also 66:22). Since Westermann, the close parallel between 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 has often been described as the “universal framework” created by the final redaction of Third Isaiah (Westermann 1966; Hanson 1975; more recently, e.g., Goldenstein 2001: 201–29). As we will see, there are reasons to question that conception. The problem nonetheless remains of what the final editors of Third Isaiah intended with that device, and how it contributes to our understanding of the topic of “ethnicity and identity” in Third Isaiah.

Isaiah 56 and Inner-Biblical Conflicts over “Proselytes”: A Reassessment The poem of Isaiah 56 opens with a general exhortation to “keep (that is, observe) justice (ṣĕdāqâ)” and “do what is right (mišpāṭ)” in light of the impending divine judgment. There follows a comment (v. 2) that, while still formulated in general terms, already exemplifies the meaning of the exhortation in v. 1. Most significant is the fact that “keeping the Sabbath” is now explicitly paralleled with “keeping justice (ṣĕdāqâ).” Reference to the Sabbath as the paradigm for observance of Yahweh’s commands recalls in particular Exod 31:12–17 (Wells 1996: 143–44), a late insertion in the Priestly account of Israel’s stay at Mount Sinai; the close association between Sabbath and covenant in the sequel of the poem (56:4, 6) is likewise reminiscent of Exodus 31 (see especially 31:16). 13 A similar view of the Sabbath presents itself in Ezekiel 20 (compare Ezek 20:12 and Gosse 2005: 361–63). This observation takes on special significance if (as will be demonstrated below) Isa 56:3–8 is in reality directed primarily against another passage in Ezekiel (44:6–16). 14 Then, in vv. 3–8, the exhortation and its comment are followed by discussion of two specific issues, namely, the cases of the foreigner (ben-hannēkār) and the eunuch (sārîs), respectively. The connection between the two is not at once obvious, and a long-standing scholarly tradition has proposed 13.  Otherwise in the HB, only in Lev 24:8, which belongs to the same literary tradition as Exod 31:12–17, i.e., Holiness legislation. 14.  Note, besides, that the motif of “desecrating” the Sabbath (with ḥll Piel) occurs exclusively in Exod 31:14, Isa 56:4, 6, and Ezek 20:21!

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disassociating vv. 1–2 from 3–8 (e.g., Vermeylen 1978: 456–58). Recently, critics have been exercising more caution in this respect; a majority now hold the unity of 56:1–8 (e.g., Steck 1991: 244–48; Berges 1998: 509–15; Park 2003: 60–65; Gärtner 2006: 54–59). 15 As a matter of fact, the transition between vv. 1–2 and 3–8 is carefully prepared in v. 2. Verse 2b in particular introduces some key terms that recur in 56:3–8 and serve as criteria for deciding the case of the foreigner and the eunuch: “holding fast” to justice in 56:2 and “holding fast to the covenant” in 56:4, 6 (in both cases with ḥzq followed by bĕ); “keeping Sabbath from being profaned” (šomēr šabbāt mēḥallĕlô) in 56:2 and 56:6 (see also 56:4). Note also that the formulation of v. 2a prepares the reader for inclusion of foreigners in 56:3–8 by combining the terms ʾe˘nôš and ben-ʾādām. In the Hebrew Bible, this combination often refers to mankind in general—not Israel specifically—and in the few other passages of Isaiah using this pair (Isa 13:12, 51:12), this appears to be always the case. Actually, the close connections between 56:2 and vv. 3–8 clearly suggest that vv. 3–8 continue and develop the process of exemplifying the general exhortation in v. 1 initiated in 56:2. A decisive issue for the correct interpretation of the entire poem is therefore to understand why the foreigner and the eunuch were chosen to illustrate that exhortation and, furthermore, to recognize the logic behind their juxtaposition. Here, I will first focus on the case of the ben-hannēkār, before addressing the issue of his association with the eunuch at the end of this section. All of 56:3–8 is built on a chiasm (Volz 1932: 204; Gärtner 2006: 57– 58): while v. 3 reports the complaints of the foreigner and the eunuch respectively, the divine response to these complaints in vv. 4–8 deals with them in reverse order, that is, the eunuch (vv. 4–5) followed by the foreigner (vv. 6–8). Inversion of this sort may serve several functions. On one hand, the entire discussion in 56:3–8 begins and ends with the foreigner, resulting in the apparent subordination of the eunuch’s case to that of the foreigner. On the other hand, the technique makes it possible for 56:1–8 to conclude with a general reference to Yahweh’s “gathering” many more servants to his temple (v. 8), thus preparing for 66:18–24. As for the eunuch, discussion of the case of the foreigner is based on the literary technique of the Disputationswort, wherein a popular saying is quoted in such a way as to prompt the deity’s reply in the form of an oracle (on that technique, see, e.g., Zimmerli 1979: 54–55). In the present context, after the foreigner has expressed the fear that he will be “separated” (bdl H) from Yahweh’s people or community 15.  The belonging of 56:8 with the remainder of 56:1–7 was also traditionally disputed: compare, e.g., Schaper 2004: 135–36. There are, however, good reasons to regard v. 8 as being original; see further below, pp. 81–82.

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(ʿam), Yahweh responds with the assurance that, if he remains loyal to God by keeping the Sabbath, holding fast to the bĕrît, the foreigner will be allowed into the temple itself, which is fittingly redefined as a “house of prayer for all the peoples” (bêt-tĕpillâ lĕkŏl-hāʿ ammîm). The fact that the scribe who composed 56:1–8 resorted to the technique of the Disputationswort emphasizes the polemical intent of this oracle. The question that remains, however, is against whom the polemics are directed in this case. Especially since a detailed study by Donner, it has been commonplace in scholarly literature to read Isaiah 56 as a correction of the tôrâ in Deut 23:2–9 (Donner 1985; also Fishbane 1985: 118–19; Schramm 1995: 124; Schaper 2004; Tuell 2005: 202). 16 In Deuteronomy 23, the man with “crushed” or “castrated” genitals as well as the Ammonite and the Moabite are forever excluded from entering the qāhal, Yahweh’s assembly. Admittedly, the tension between Isaiah 56 and Deuteronomy 23 is unmistakable and, at the time of composition of Isaiah 56, a text such as Deuteronomy 23 could hardly be ignored. The connection with Deuteronomy 23 also accounts for the association of the eunuch with the foreigner 17 (although the language is distinct). Finally, as Fishbane first observed, reception of Deuteronomy 23 did play a major role in several traditions from the Persian period such as Ezekiel 44, Ezra 9, and Nehemiah 13 (Fishbane 1985: 138–43); Isa 56:1–8 indeed alludes to some of these traditions (Schaper 2004, and see pp. 76–81 below, especially as regards Ezekiel 44; pace Wells 1996: 150; Enger 2006: 378). For Donner, the blatant contradiction between Isaiah 56 and Deuteronomy 23 implies that those responsible for Isaiah 56 intended it to abrogate Deuteronomy 23 (1985: 87–88). 18 In particular, this interpretation accounts for the emphasis on the messenger formula in Isaiah 56 (see vv. 4a, 8a): Yahweh’s tôrâ in Deuteronomy 23 is now replaced by another tôrâ (pace Lau 1994: 268–72; it is therefore unlikely that Isaiah 56 was originally meant to stand along Deuteronomy 23). Having followed Donner’s interpretation so far, it must be noted, nonetheless, that the two texts do not share a single term in common. In Donner’s theory of Isaiah 56 as an Abrogationsfall of Deuteronomy  23, 16.  However, a similar view can already be found in some earlier commentaries; see especially Westermann, 1966: 250, commenting: “Die alte Bestimmung Dt. 23,2 wird außer Kraft gesetzt,” and so on. 17. As Schramm (1995: 124) notes, this kind of association between “ethnicity” (the foreigner) and “physical integrity” (the eunuch) has its closest parallel in Deuteronomy 23. 18.  On the concept of “abrogation,” see further Donner 1985: 88–91. The notion can be compared with the concept of abrogatio in the Roman laws.

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this may perfectly be explained; but it means that the relationship between Isaiah 56 and Deuteronomy 23 should not be identified with an instance of “inner-biblical revision,” insofar as the latter is precisely based on the principle of “lemmatic reformulation” (pace Schaper 2004; for the concept of “lemmatic reformulation,” see Levinson 1997: 34–38; somewhat similarly, Sommer 1998: 25–28). Rather, close analysis of the language in the portion of the oracle dealing with foreigners seems to point in two directions simultaneously. On the one hand, the complaint of the foreigner in v. 3a appears to allude to the ethnic policy reflected in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. The expression habdîl yabdîlanî . . . mēʿal ʿammô in 56:3aβ is closely reminiscent of the phrase nibdal—or hibdîl—mēʿammê, “to be separated” or “to separate” oneself “from the nations,” standard terminology for the segregation program of both Ezra 9–10 and Nehemiah (see Ezra 9:1, 10:11; Neh 10:29; on the use of bdl Niphal and Hiphil in Ezra–Nehemiah, see, e.g., the comments by Enger 2006: 448–52). Excepting the exhortation in Lev 20:22–26, the term appears nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible. Some critics have suggested that Isa 56:3 intends an open attack against the reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah (e.g., Fishbane 1985: 268; Koenen 1990: 223–24). Other commentators, however, have emphasized the contrast between Ezra 9–10 and Isaiah 56 insofar as the latter says nothing about interethnic marriages (e.g., Schramm 1995: 123 n. 6; Park 2003: 100–101). While this last observation is certainly correct, restricting the policy of ethnic purification endorsed by Ezra and Nehemiah to the case of mixed marriages, especially in the case of Nehemiah (compare Neh 13:1–3, and see pp. 79–80 below about Neh 13:4–9 and the issue of the foreigner’s inherent impurity) seems problematic. The parallel with Neh 13:1–3 proves all the more interesting in that this passage constitutes an explicit, exegetical development of Deut 23:2–9, applying now the tôrâ against Ammonites and Moabites to all ʿēreb, lit. “mixture,” i.e., someone who is not exclusively of Judean ancestry. At the very least, one should say that, in Isa 56:3, the formulation of the foreigner’s complaint alludes to the kind of segregationist exegesis of earlier oracles, such as Deuteronomy 23, that appears to have developed during the fifth century b.c.e. Besides, the fact that the formulation of Isa 56:3 attributes that saying to Yahweh himself suggests very clearly that the complaint calls to mind not only a common belief at the time of the composition of Isaiah 56 but also a belief that was assumed to have some sort of oracular basis—hence the need for a new oracle that follows in 56:4–8 with the so-called “messenger formula” (v. 4a). This recalls the reception of the tôrâ of Deuteronomy 23 in postexilic writings such as Ezekiel 44, Ezra 9, and Nehemiah 13 (Fishbane 1985:

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138–43), where the ban initially placed on the Ammonites and Moabites tends to be broadened to include other foreign ethnic groups. 19 On the other hand, the divine answer in vv. 6–8 contains several references to another prophetic oracle, namely, that of Ezek 44:6–16. 20 In Ezek 44:6–8, Israel is accused of bringing (bwʾ H) “foreigners” (bĕnênēkār) into the sanctuary who consistently “profane” or “de-sanctify” ( ḥll P) the “house” of Yahweh. These foreigners have thereby caused the “breaking” (  prr) of the bĕrît between God and Israel. For that reason Yahweh declares that, in the future temple, foreigners will be denied access to the sanctuary (v. 9). Furthermore, admission to the sanctuary will be restricted to the descendants of Zadok, who alone are entrusted with the service or the watch of the temple, šmr mišmeret (vv. 14–16). Isa 56:6–7, in contrast, proclaims that foreigners who “keep” (šmr) the Sabbath and abstain from “profaning” or “desanctifying” it ( ḥll P), and who hold fast to Yahweh’s bĕrît (maḥăzîqîm bibrîtî, i.e., the exact antonym of prr bĕrît in Ezek 44:7—compare, e.g., Jer 31:32), will be brought (bwʾ H) by Yahweh himself into his “house,” where they will be allowed to rejoice and to offer their sacrifices (see fig. 1, p. 78). The close relationship between the two texts has been noted by various scholars, some of whom already proposed interpreting Isaiah 56 as a critical response to Ezekiel 44 (see especially Fishbane 1985: 138–43; further, Schaper 2004; Tuell 2005; contra Cook 1995: 207–8; Park 2003: 98–99). All these commentators rightly emphasize that the central issue is not just admission of foreigners to the sanctuary but even the possibility for such foreigners to minister within that sanctuary. Consider Ezek 44:8b: “You appointed them to keep the service over my sanctuary,” as well as the phrase lĕšārtô, “to minister to him,” in Isa 56:6a, a phrase conspicuously absent in 1QIsaa. The omission—if it is not simply an accident— probably owes to the fact that the notion was considered particularly offensive (e.g., Wells 1996: 147–48; Sommer 1998: 147; Berges 1998: 511;

19.  For a similar view, see, e.g., Lau 1994, for whom the oracle in Isaiah 56 is directed against the reception of Deuteronomy 23 as is found in the Ezra–Nehemiah traditions. While I do accept this view, I find it difficult to adhere to Lau’s thesis that Isaiah 56 criticizes the reception of Deuteronomy 23 exclusively but not Deuteronomy 23 itself. Pace Lau, I can hardly imagine that the tradents of Third Isaiah intended Isaiah 56 to be read alongside Deuteronomy 23 when one takes into consideration the contradictions between the two texts. That the later, postbiblical tradition was able to reconcile the two texts (thus Lau) is indeed significant for the history of their reception but is a dubious criterion as regards the original intent of Isaiah 56 vis-à-vis Deuteronomy 23. 20.  For the delimitation of that unit within Ezekiel 44, see Konkel 2001: 102.

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Isaiah 56:3–8

Ezekiel 44:6–16 Tell these rebels, the house of Israel . . . You went too far with your abominations, house of Israel, 7 when you brought (bahăbîʾăkem) foreigners (benê-nēkār), uncircumcised in heart and flesh, to be in my sanctuary, thereby profaning it (lēhallĕlô), when you offered my food, the fat and the blood. They caused my bĕrît to be broken (prr H) because (LXX) of all your abominations. 8 You did not keep the service/ watch (šmr mišmeret) over my sancta; instead, you appointed them to keep the service/ watch over my sanctuary for you. 9 Therefore (LXX), this is what the Lord Yahweh says: No foreigner (ben-nēkār), uncircumcised in heart and flesh, is to enter (bw ʾ) my sanctuary, not one of the foreigners who are among the Israelites. 15 But the levitical priests, the sons of Zadok, who kept the service/ watch over my sanctuary when the Israelites went astray from me, it is they who will approach me to minister to me (lĕšārtēnî  ); they will stand before me to bring me the fat and the blood—oracle of the Lord Yahweh. 16 It is they who will enter (bwʾ  ) my sanctuary, and it is they who will approach my table, to minister to me (lĕšārtēnî  ), and they will keep my service/watch. 6

The foreigner (ben-hannēkār) who has joined himself to Yahweh must not say: “Surely, Yahweh will cut me off (habdēl yabdîlanî  ) from his ʿam!” 4 For this is what Yahweh says: . . . 3

And to the foreigners (benê hannēkār) who have joined themselves to Yahweh, to minister to him (lĕšārtô), to love the Name of Yahweh, and to belong to him as servants, all who observe (šmr) Sabbath so as not to profane it (mēhallĕlô), and who hold fast (ḥzq H) to my bĕrît,

6

I will bring them bwʾ H) to my holy mountain (har qădšî  ) and make them rejoice in my house of prayers: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be in favor upon my altar, for my house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples (ʿammîm).

7

Fig. 1. Synoptic comparison between Isa 56:3–8 and Ezek 44:6–16 Blenkinsopp 2003: 130; more cautiously, Tuell 2005: 194 n. 26). 21 At the time of writing of Isaiah 56, the matter in question was certainly any21.  The connotation of šrt as involving some form of cultic service in the temple is largely accepted by the commentators; see, e.g., Blenkinsopp 2003: 140. Zehnder 2005: 428 challenges that interpretation: according to his view, foreigners are to be admitted to the sanctuary in Isaiah 56 but do not have any specific task related to the cult. In Zehnder’s interpretation, however, the meaning of the phrase lēšārtô in

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thing but theoretical: indeed, there are several allusions in early Second Temple literature to the presence, within the Jerusalem temple, of foreigners portrayed as second-class cultic servants (see especially the list of cultic servants in Ezra 2:43–58 // Neh 7:46–60; on this see, e.g., Blenkinsopp 1989: 89–91). However, the commentators have seldom noted that Isaiah 56 also appears to take issue with one fundamental aspect of the accusation voiced in Ezekiel 44, namely, the alleged cause for the exclusion of foreigners from temple precincts. 22 Indeed, what the text of Ezekiel 44 affirms is that admission of uncircumcised foreigners inside the temple area has “profaned,” that is, desanctified (ḥillēl) the sanctuary. Because Ezekiel 44 does not specify the nature of the defilement caused by foreigners inside the temple, commentators generally agree that it is the nonnative and therefore “profane” status of the foreigner that actually defiles (e.g., Hayes 2002: 37). As a remedy to this situation, the role of the Zadokide priests is to “keep the watch” (šmr mišmeret) over the sanctuary, that is, to guard against any future profanation. In contrast, Isaiah 56 asserts that those foreigners who abstain from desanctifying the Sabbath should be allowed in the temple. It is in this vein that Isaiah 56 appears to take issue with the conception promoted by Ezekiel 44, namely, that the foreigner’s presence inside the sanctuary automatically leads to the latter’s profanation. The intertextual connection, one may note, is all the more striking because these constitute the only two texts in the entire Hebrew Bible that deal head-on with the problem of desanctification (with ḥll P) caused by foreigners (nēkār). 23 As some commentators have observed, the view laid out in Ezek 44:6–16 is quite reminiscent of the report in Nehemiah 13 concerning the Ammonite Tobiah’s stay within the temple, Neh 13:4–9. In this text, after discovering that the high priest Eliashib reserved a chamber inside the sanctuary’s precinct for Tobiah, Nehemiah has this chamber emptied of Tobiah’s belongings; then Nehemiah orders that all the chambers of the temple be purified (ṭhr P, v. 9a). As observed by R. Albertz, the text mentions no other cause for the temple’s pollution aside from Tobiah’s presence, and it seems legitimate to conclude that Nehemiah 13 does indeed believe that foreigners carry within themselves an Isa 56:6 MT remains unexplained—just as remains unexplained the omission of that phrase in 1QIsaa! 22.  Compare, e.g., Tuell 2005: 198, which deals only very briefly with this point when dealing with the parallels between Isaiah 56 and Ezekiel 44. 23.  See further Mal 2:11; but there, desanctification is caused by Judah’s union with the daughter of a “foreign god” (ʾēl-nēkār).

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innate, defiling impurity (Albertz 2004: 27; Olyan 2004: 10–11). 24 Thus, contrary to the widely held view that the notion of the inherent ritual impurity of foreigners does not surface in Second Temple literature prior to the Hellenistic period, there is some evidence in the Hebrew Bible that this notion actually saw preliminary development in the Persian period. Note, furthermore, how Ezra 6:21 may reflect this notion in its more general reference to “all those who had separated (bdl N) themselves from the uncleanness (ṭumʾat) of the nations of the land.” It is true, however, that Ezek merely refers to the sanctuary’s desecration, with ḥll P, and not explicitly to its (ritual) defilement, with ṭmʾ. Whether or not Ezekiel 44 also implies some form of ritual pollution of the sanctuary, as appears to be the case in Nehemiah 13, has been the subject of some debate recently (see Olyan 2000: 67; Hayes 2002: 34–37). The issue is not easy to decide; 25 the wording of Ezek 44:7, 9 may point in the direction that the foreigner’s uncircumcised prepuce was viewed as a major source of pollution (as suggested by S. Olyan 2000: 67; see however Hayes 2002: 34–37). In any event, Ezekiel 44 definitely shares with Nehemiah 13 the view that allowing outsiders inside the sanctuary constitutes a major transgression of the temple’s boundaries because of the inherent impurity or profaneness of these outsiders. Last, without engaging the complicated issue of the diachrony of Ezekiel 40–48, it should be recalled here that several commentators have already proposed viewing Ezek 44:6–16 as a late insert intended to foster the prerogative of Zadokide circles. Following H. Gese’s proposal, Zimmerli had argued for the postexilic origin of this passage (Zimmerli 1979: 1139–40 and passim). In a recent and thorough study of Ezekiel 40–48, M. Konkel argued that Ezekiel 44 belongs to the latest layer in chaps. 40–48; it was composed in the early 4th century b.c.e., when it already presupposes the tradition reported in Neh 13:4–9 (Konkel 2001: 300–304). I am quite prepared to accept these aspects of Konkel’s analysis. In any event, Ezekiel 44 apparently attests to the fact that at some 24.  Hayes 2002 fails to discuss the import of this text with respect to the origins of the concept of the inherent impurity of foreigners. Several commentators, however, accept the view that the chamber is somehow ritually defiled by Tobiah’s presence; compare, e.g., Blenkinsopp 1989: 355. 25.  On one hand, it is true that in Ezekiel (as already in the Holiness legislation) the distinction between ḥll and ṭmʾ often appears not to be strictly maintained (Milgrom 2000: 1327, 1734–35, 1800–1801; Olyan 2000: 155 n. 27); see, e.g., Lev 20:3 or Ezek 23:38–39. On the other hand, there is no clear indication in the Holiness legislation or in Ezekiel that ḥll alone can connote ritual pollution; Hayes (2002: 36–37) can thus argue that in Ezekiel ḥll does not connote defilement “unless it is accompanied by explicit terms of defilement.”

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point during the Persian period the Zadokide priesthood had taken up and developed the notion, also reflected in Nehemiah 13, of the inherent uncleanness of foreigners and used it to legitimate, or even consolidate, their monopoly over the Second Temple. As Konkel (2001) finely argues, in the pro-Zadokide redaction of Ezekiel 40–48 xenophobia and concern for the temple’s purity under the guidance of Zadok’s dynasty go hand in hand. For its part, Isaiah 56 reuses the language of Ezekiel 44, yet this time in order to justify admission of foreigners, or at least of a certain category of foreigners, into the sanctuary. Thus, the notion in Ezekiel 44 that the admission of foreigners into the sanctuary (miqdāš ) automatically leads to its desecration (lĕḥallĕlô, v. 7a), possibly even its pollution, is now countered by the assertion that proselytes may be capable of keeping the Sabbath from being desecrated (mēḥallĕlô). The point made by Isaiah 56 becomes all the more significant if one observes that the Sabbath in Ezekiel—as in the Holiness Code—is also considered a qodeš, a sanctum, and thus often appears in parallel with the sanctuary: see, e.g., Ezek 22:8 and 23:38, and compare with Lev 19:30 and 26:2. In other words, the author of Isaiah 56 appears to be engaging in a kind of proto-halakhic dispute with Ezekiel 44: the same foreigner innocent of desecrating the holy Sabbath can avoid desecrating the sanctuary. The argument made by Isaiah 56 against Ezekiel 44 and similar traditions from the Persian period is that willingness to comply to the Yahwistic rites and ethos would constitute a sufficient criterion for participation within the temple precinct (thus Hayes 2002: 37: Others would allow ‘morally qualified’ Gentiles some degree of access to—even ministration in—the temple.”) This does not mean, however, that Isaiah 56 simply rejects the notion of the intrinsic uncleanness of foreigners. The oracle obviously applies to individuals who, although lacking kinship ties with Judeans, nonetheless stand ready to accept the rules and customs of the Judean ethnos—among which the Sabbath and the covenant receive extra emphasis. To speak of “universalism” in the context of 56:1–8 would be to overstate the available data (for a similar point, see, e.g., Schramm 1995: 122). In order to grasp the meaning of the discussion about foreigners in Isaiah 56 fully, we need to situate that discussion within the context of the whole book of Isaiah. The motif of the coming to Zion of converts to Yahweh from the nations is a topos from early Persian-period prophetic literature, and the language of 56:5–6 clearly recalls earlier oracles such as, especially, Isa 14:1, Jer 50:5, and Zech 2:15, also using the key word lwh N. In the oldest portion of Third Isaiah, namely, chaps. 60–62, this topos was already

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reinterpreted in connection with the standard imagery in Achaemenid propaganda of the tributes paid by vassal nations of the empire, except that Yahweh himself now replaced the Persian king (see especially Isaiah 60, and on this, e.g., Strawn 2007). In Isa 56:1–8, the coming of foreigners to Jerusalem/Zion—a phenomenon that we also see evidenced in other biblical sources outside the prophetic corpus (see 1 Kgs 8:41–43 and, further, Esth 9:27)—undergoes reinterpretation by the tradents of Third Isaiah, where it becomes the sign that the earlier prophecies have started to be realized. This also appears to be the meaning of the divine statement in 56:8 which concludes the oracle: “Besides those already gathered, I shall gather (even) more to him.” From this perspective, the coming of proselytes to Jerusalem no longer constitutes a threat to the holiness (and even cleanness) of the sanctuary, as in Ezekiel 44, but rather the sign that (a) the judgment and the restoration long promised by Yahweh have arrived and that (b) he will now therefore replace the Persian king as ruler over foreign nations, as is described in detail in 66:18–24. Note, along the same lines, that the temple receives a new (eschatological) name in Isa 56:1–8, “house of prayers for all the peoples” (56:7)—a further reference to the cosmic function of the temple in a world where Yahweh will soon reign (on this motif, see, e.g., Willi 1999: 81–83). From the perspective of history of religions, the phenomenon described in Isaiah 56 corresponds to the category later described in antiquity as “proselytes.” The authors of the Persian period however obviously have no precise category for such individuals—apart from the verb nlwh—nor any clearly defined ceremony (see similarly Japhet 1989: 341–46; and compare also Ezra 6:21, Neh 10:29). In my view, given the lack of a better term, nothing militates against the use of the category “proselytes” in the Persian period already (though perhaps not “converts” and “conversion,” pace, e.g., Enger 2006: 388). Even the authors who express misgivings over the notion of “proselytism” before Hellenistic times must acknowledge that one finds during the Persian period the “harbingers” of these ideas (Kaufmann 1977: 136; Cohen 1999: 122). 26 The main point made by the author of Isaiah 56 appears to 26.  However, both Kaufmann and Cohen dismiss too easily the witness of Isaiah 56. Kaufmann views it as an “eschatological vision” (1977: 137), whereas Cohen discards it by arguing that Isaiah 56 “seems to suggest that the foreigners who have attached themselves to Israel in the preeschatological present have been excluded from the temple and the temple cult” (1999: 122). Whatever the social background of Isaiah 56 in the Persian period, this does not diminish the fact that such a text already appears to reflect the reality of proselytes. Kaufmann (1977: 298–99) also wants to restrict the term proselytism to a situation of drastic change from one religion to another in the context of a specific ceremony. However, this is in part an issue of how one defines terms. Kaufmann’s specific usage of “proselytism” seems to be largely based on the rabbinic ceremony of conversion of later times.

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be that proselytes do not suffer from an inherent uncleanness, and even if they do, their faithful observance of Yahwistic customs (especially the Sabbath and the Mosaic covenant) has the potential to compensate for any such uncleanness. 27 This surely does not mean, however, that these “proselytes” are to become Judeans. S. Cohen in particular points out, the concept of “naturalization” is closely tied to the introduction of the Greek polis and—in the case of Palestine—is unlikely to have occurred before Hasmonean times (Cohen 1999: 109–39). Furthermore, as we will see below, the corresponding oracle in 66:18–24 seems to imply that some general ethnic distinction is maintained between “Israel” and the other nations. At the same time, several indications suggest that the eunuch and the foreigner receive full, non-restricted membership within the community. The “meriting” foreigner is identified in 56:6 with the “Servants” (ʿăbādîm) of Isaiah 65–66, meaning he has become entirely part of the (eschatological) community. Likewise, the eunuch is promised a “stele” (yād) with an “everlasting name” inside the temple’s precinct (v. 5); moreover, this stele is said to be “better than sons and daughters.” When this promise is compared to the one made to the “Servants” in 66:22, assuring them that their “offspring” and their “name” shall forever endure because of their loyalty, the parallel explicitly suggests that, despite his physical infirmity the eunuch will also be fully included in the blessings awaiting the eschatological community. 28 27.  The absence of any reference to circumcision, on the other hand, is noticeable (e.g., Blenkinsopp 2003: 135), all the more when one considers the role played by circumcision in the polemics of Ezek 44:6–16. Likewise, in Exod 12:43–49 (a late supplement to the Passover legislation), circumcision is the condition sine qua non for the resident alien (  gēr) willing to participate in the Passover ceremony (see 12:48). Circumcision also comprised a distinctive feature of conversion to Judaism from the Hasmonean period onward (e.g., Cohen 1999: 137–38, 198–238, and passim). The omission of circumcision in Isaiah 56, on the other hand, may have various grounds. In particular, the absence of circumcision in Isaiah 56 has one obvious implication, namely, that observance of the Sabbath has now replaced circumcision as the main marker for the covenant, compare 56:4, 6. Whether circumcision is associated with the Abrahamite covenant in Genesis 17 (see 17:10–14), Sabbath, on the other hand, is presented as the sign of the Sinaitic covenant in Exod 31:17, whose close links with Isaiah 56 have been pointed out above. That development may be significant, considering that the Sinaitic tradition emphasizes observance of the commandments much more than genealogy as a condition for belonging to the covenantal community—a perspective not unlike the one developed in Isa 56:1–8 regarding the foreigner’s admission to the cult. 28.  Note that the eunuch’s complaint in 56:3b that he is a “dry tree” (ʿē̑ ṣ yābēš) recalls the metaphor used for the coming salvation at the end of the immediately preceding oracle, in 55:12–13, as first noted by Beuken (Beuken 1989). Namely, the eunuch fears that lack of offspring will cut him off from the promised eschatological

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This point makes all the more striking the fact that the foreigner and the eunuch in 56:1–8 come to be construed as the inverted image of the Jerusalem bourgeoisie in the following poem, 57:3–13 (see Smith 1995; Nihan 2001; Gosse 2005). The contrast is explicitly emphasized at the end of the two poems, Isa 56:7–8 and 57:12–13. 29 Despite their ancestry, the bourgeois of Jerusalem are nonetheless depicted as the “sons of a sorceress, the offspring of an adulteress and a harlot” (v. 3, with a slight emendation of the MT). 30 Here, ironically, it is no longer the ancestry of the bĕnê-hannēkār who yearn for membership in the Second Temple community that is now deemed problematic but rather the ancestry of the citizens of Jerusalem themselves, because of their “mother’s” tarnished reputation. Likewise, in contrast to the eunuch, who despite his lack of offspring nonetheless receives an “everlasting name” (56:5), Mother Jerusalem, who sets up her own stele (  yād) similar to the one blessing; and the oracle in 56:5 counters this complaint with the promise of a stele (yād) inside the temple’s precinct which is said to be “better than sons and daughters” by bestowing on him an “everlasting name” (šēm ʿôlām). These endowments function therefore as a compensatory phallus (another possible meaning for the Hebrew term yād), so to speak, for the eunuch because they secure his position and status within the community despite his lack of offspring. 29.  Isa 56:1, 7–8: “This is what Yahweh says: Observe justice and do what is right, for my deliverance ( yšʿ  ) is about to come, and my justice ( ṣĕdāqâ) to be revealed. . . . I will bring them to my holy mountain (har qădš î  ). . . . Oracle of the Lord Yahweh, who gathers (qbṣ P) the dispersed of Israel: I will gather (̌qbṣ) more to him besides those already gathered (qbṣ)!”

Isa 57:12–13: “I myself will announce your ‘ justice’ ( ṣĕdaqâ), and your deeds, and they will be of no help to you. When you cry out, may your ‘gathered ones’ (qibbûsayk) deliver you (nṣl ): a wind/spirit (ruaḥ) will lift them, a breath (ḥebel ) will take them away; but the one who takes refuge in me will possess land, he will inherit my holy mountain (har qădšî ).”

Other main parallels between Isa 56:1–8 and 57:3–13: sacrifices (zbḥym) on the mountain (56:7, 57:7); the yād (“stele/phallus”) in 56:5 and 57:8; to “love” (ʾhb) the name of Yahweh (56:6) / the bed of other gods (?; 57:8). 30. MT mnʾp wtznh hardly makes sense (“seed of an adulterer and she played the harlot”). Commentators often follow the Greek, translating “seed of an adulterer and a harlot,” which would render a Hebrew Vorlage *mnʾp wtznh. Another possibility, however, was advocated by Ackerman 1992: 102 n. 4, which proposed emending to *mnʾp twznh, later transformed through misplaced word order and metathesis of waw and taw, hence: “seed of an adulteress and a harlot.” While this solution necessarily remains speculative, it receives nonetheless some support from the fact that the second half of v. 3b then comprises a list of three feminine participles, as Ackermann rightly observes.

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promised to the eunuch (57:8), will in spite of her numerous offspring lose everything in the impending judgment (v. 13a). The contrast serves to emphasize a conception of the community according to which loyalty to Yahweh, rather than ancestry, has become the decisive criterion. 31 The same conception appears in other passages in Third Isaiah, such as the communal lamentation of 63:7–64:11, with its unique disqualification of the ancestors Abraham and Jacob in favor of Yahweh as the sole “father” (ʾāb) of the community (63:16). Commentators have customarily interpreted these observations as implying that the concept of “Israel” in Third Isaiah tends to become that of a “cultic” or “voluntary” community, in which blood ties no longer play any significant role (e.g., Volz 1932: 200: “das Volk als geistliche Gemeinde”; more recently, e.g., Berges 1998: 512: “prophetische . . . Neubestimmung des Verhältnisses des eschatologischen Gottestvolkes zu den Menschen” (emphasis original); Middlemas 2005: 174–75; more cautiously, Blenkinsopp 2003: 136–37). In my opinion, the evidence calls for a more qualified interpretation. Although the element of “merit” (i.e., loyalty to Yahweh) plays a significant role, the ethnic aspect is nonetheless maintained. In order to understand this, however, we need to turn to the other end of Third Isaiah, chaps. 65–66.

Isaiah 65–66: The Eschatological Age and the “New” Israel In spite of their manifest complexity, Isaiah 65–66 exemplify a coherent structure. Both chapters begin by leveling sharp criticism at a part of the people of Israel (a. 65:1–7 // 66:1–6), and both units conclude with

31.  It is of interest to observe in this context that some of the rituals denounced in Isaiah 57 have to do with ancestral worship, as various authors already observed (see especially Ackerman 1992: 101–63; Nihan 2001; Blenkinsopp 2003: 158–61). This is clear, in any event, for v. 9, referring to the sending of “emissaries” to the Sheʾol, and possibly for v. 6, which probably refers to the dead ancestors buried in the rock caves around Jerusalem (reading ḥallĕqê in 57:6 as deriving from a Semitic root ḥlq, “to perish, trespass,” hence, the “trespassed ones”), to whom the Judean members of the community bring food and drink offerings. In an agnatic society such as ancient Israel, ancestor worship had a central function of ensuring the cohesion of the clan and the family. Furthermore, several passages in the Hebrew Bible make clear that ancestor worship was closely tied with claims to ancestral estates and therefore with personal status within the community. The final statement in 57:13b is explicitly directed against a conception such as this because it affirms that after the divine judgment land possession will no longer be based on ancestral estate—the naḥalā already mentioned in 57:6—but exclusively on loyalty to Yahweh and his temple.

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a reference to the impending judgment (65:5b–7 // 66:6). 32 This development then leads to a series of oracles contrasting the fate of the “Servants” with the rest of the community (b. 65:8–16a // 66:7–14, 15–17); the prophecy then concludes with a description of the eschatological age (c. 65:16b–25 // 66:18–24). The transition taking place from the first unit (65:1–7) to the last (66:18–24) emphasizes the central topic of these two chapters, namely, the transformation of the present-day community, characterized by its continuous disloyalty vis-à-vis Yahweh (see 65:3a: “a people who enrages me continually,” t̄amîd ) to the ideal community of the eschatological age, in which only faithful worshipers will survive, forever acknowledging Yahweh’s cosmic reign (see 66:23: “From Sabbath to Sabbath, all flesh will come to bow down before me—says Yahweh”). The “people who did not seek (bqš  ) Yahweh” (65:1) will thus be replaced by a people continuously seeking Yahweh in his sanctuary on Mount Zion. Furthermore, the transition is signaled by the fact that the last reference to the divine judgment against the disloyal members of the community, in 66:17, picks up the motif of the (syncretistic) cults performed in the “gardens” (  gānāh), with which Yahweh’s accusation against the community’s ritual crimes opened in 65:3, after the general statement in 65:1–2 (compare also Isa 1:29–30). The device suggests that, following the divine judgment, ritual crimes of this sort will have been entirely erased, thus paving a way for the advent of the “new” Israel (66:18–24). As long observed by commentators, all of Isaiah 65–66 presupposes that the community of Yahwists is irremediably split into two groups (or parties or factions)—the “Servants of Yahweh” (56:6; 65:8, 9, 13–15; 66:14) and the rest of the community—and that only the first of these groups will survive judgment and benefit from the eschatological age (see especially 65:8–16a; further, 66:5–6, 15–17). In that regard, Isaiah 65–66 proffers a negative response to the hope still expressed by the community in the previous communal lament, 63:7–64:11. Whereas the lament consistently assumes that the community is, in its en32. For somewhat different divisions of chaps. 65–66, see Steck 1991: 217–28; Berges 1998: 497, 516. Berges does not really seek to parallel the structure of chap. 66 with that of 65. In this respect, the various signals suggesting the topical unity if 65–66 are not really acknowledged. Steck, for his part, correctly perceives that chaps. 65–66 as a whole comprise a thematic unit but offers a distinct division (65:1– 7, 65:7–12, 65:13–25, 66:1–4, and 66:5–24). However, the disproportion in the division of chap. 66 is obvious; also, there are good reasons to maintain the unity of 66:1–6, not vv.  1–4: see p. 88 below. As regards the division of chap. 65, see the detailed observations by Berges 1998: 497–509, who opts for the same division as the one proposed here.

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tirety, the people of Yahweh (e.g., 64:8: “Behold, look, we all are your people, ʿammĕkā kullānû!”), Isaiah 65–66 explicitly discards and rejects this claim (Steck 1989: 401; Schramm 1995: 155; Berges 1998: 501). 33 Instead, the view laid out in Isaiah 65–66 implies that, in the present-day situation of the authors of Third Isaiah, the true “Israel” is in fact not identical with the Judean ethnos; rather it comprises more specifically those “loyal” Yahwists counted among the “Servants.” This is the view laid out, for instance, in Isa 65:9, a passage that claims that a righteous “seed” (zeraʿ) will come out of Jacob after the judgment and inherit the “mountains of Judah” (compare 57:13 and 60:21). I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah an heir of my mountains: my chosen ones shall inherit it, my Servants shall dwell there.

This eschatological promise is completed by the description of the complete destruction of the rest of the community (see 65:11–15a). Correspondingly, the arrival of an age when the “Servants” will inherit the land and (thus) fulfill the promise once made to Jacob is tied to a new creation (see 65:16b–25), in which there no longer remains room in the community for those not counted among the Servants. On the other hand, the new “Jacob/Israel” of the eschatological age will also include foreigners (more specifically, proselytes), as suggested by 56:1–8 and further laid out in 66:18–24. Here, the author appears to go beyond merely redefining “ethnic” Israel. He now envisions an Israel in which membership is based on merit and not merely ancestry. We may go further in this issue, however, by scrutinizing more closely the evidence identifying the assailed party in Isaiah 65–66—or, at least, a significant group within that party. Various commentators have already recognized here a series of rather explicit allusions to the 33.  The difference between this conception and the one presented in earlier portions of Third Isaiah, especially 56:9–59:20, is unmistakable. Isa 56:9–59:20 consistently presupposes, on the contrary, that there is still a possibility for the entire community to “return” (šwb) to Yahweh, as is also implied, e.g., in Isa 55:6–7, and that the division between the “Servants” and the remainder of the people is therefore not definitive yet. The contrast between the community’s claim in 63:7–64:11 and the divine response in chaps. 65–66 also implies that, even if there is an earlier tradition underlying the communal lament (see the discussion above, p. 72 n. 9), that lament is reused by the final editors of Third Isaiah in an almost parody-like fashion. It is possible that this kind of parody implies a latent criticism against the tradition of communal lament that appears to be reflected in several traditions of the Second Temple period (e.g., Nehemiah 9!), especially in the light of the earlier criticism leveled against the bourgeoisie’s “insincere” fasting in Isaiah 58 (see v. 5!).

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priesthood, and I believe this identification to be indeed correct. There is no need, here, for a comprehensive rehearsal of the evidence but rather only a brief recital of some of the main observations supporting that conclusion that bear particularly on 66:1–6. 34 In a seminal essay, Rofé (1985: 208–12) proposed interpreting the accusation of 66:3 MT in the sense that the first member in each of the four pairs of participial clauses refers to the subject, whereas the second member refers to the predicate. Because the first member consistently refers to legitimate sacrificial acts performed inside the temple, the subject must necessarily be identified with the priests of the Second Temple. The second member consistently refers to various forms of ritual typically considered deviant by the Hebrew Bible (killing a man, breaking a dog’s neck, offering swine’s blood, and blessing idols). The meaning of 66:3 in that interpretation is to charge the priests currently serving in the temple with practicing various abominations, thereby profaning the cultic task entrusted to them. 35 This interpretation, which accepts the Masoretic Text as it stands, has been subsequently adopted by several commentators (see Blenkinsopp 1990: 10; Schramm 1995: 166–68; Smith 1995: 155–59; Berges 1998: 522–23; Zapff 2006: 430; pace Lau 1994: 173–77). After a concluding accusation in v. 4 that repeats the accusation in Isa 65:12—and therefore suggests that the accused party in Isaiah 65 and 66 is identical—66:5 continues by referring to a group of pious Judeans designated as the ones “trembling (or shaking) at his (Yahweh’s) word” ḥārēd ʾel dĕbārî; cf. Ezra 9:4, 10:3), who have been “cast out,” ndh, by the other group because the latter “hates” (śnʾ  ) them. The situation implied here, as proposed by Blenkinsopp (1990: 7–10), suggests a group provisionally excluded (“cast out”) from the temple’s precinct by the priesthood. This understanding not only maintains the logic of 66:1–4 (e.g., Schramm 1995: 170), it also makes sense of the following verse that alludes to the coming of Yahweh in his “palace” or temple: the divine judgment will commence at the precise location from which the “Servants” have been previously excluded! Additional observations of polemical barbs aimed at the priesthood could be multiplied. The language of the accusation voiced against the ritual practices of certain members of the community in 65:5 has often been understood as alluding to a group of priests, specifically, because of the weight of 34.  The unity of 66:1–6 has been occasionally disputed; see, however, Beuken 1989; or Goldenstein 2001: 216–17; pace, e.g., Volz 1932: 291; Koenen 1990: 183–94. 35.  In that understanding, the verse should then be translated as follows (according to the MT): “The slaughterer of oxen kills a man, / the sacrificer of sheep breaks a dog’s neck, / the offerer of (cereal) offerings offers swine’s blood, / the offerer of incense blesses an idol.”

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distinctively priestly terminology in that passage (for a recent, thorough discussion of the evidence, see Tiemeyer 2004). Furthermore, like the wording of 66:4 takes up 65:12, the formulation of 66:17 combines the motifs found already in the critique of 65:3b–5 (mention of rituals in the “gardens” corresponds to 65:3b and “eating swine flesh” to 65:4b; last, reference to the participants’ sanctified status recalls the threat voiced in 65:5a, “Do not come near to me, for I would sanctify you!”). As in the case of 66:4 and 65:12, this suggests that, at least to some degree, the accusations leveled in chaps. 65–66 are directed against one and the same group (e.g., Berges 1998: 528). In sum, there is cumulative evidence suggesting that, as various commentators have proposed, the party targeted in Isaiah 65–66 comprises first and foremost the priesthood of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. That conclusion fits well with the critique against the Zadokide theology in Ezekiel 44 identified above in Isaiah 56. 36 This does not mean, however, that the scribes responsible for the final composition of Third Isaiah oppose the temple cult in and of itself (pace Hanson 1975). Quite to the contrary, the logic of passages such as Isa 56:1–8 and chaps. 65–66 demonstrate that these authors eagerly await the coming purification of the temple, which remains the axis mundi, the very place where Yahweh exercises his justice and manifests his rule over his creation (see 66:6; further 66:23–24; compare, e.g., Rofé 1985: 212–13; Blenkinsopp 1990: 9–10; Schramm 1995: 168–69; Middlemas 2005: 180–81). Nor does it necessarily imply that the criticism targets the (Zadokide) priesthood alone; the formulation of 65:1–2, with its reference to a “rebellious people” (ʿam sôrēr), seems to me to be possibly more inclusive (see likewise Smith 1995: 137). Namely, the priesthood would be criticized not just for the rituals in which it indulges but also, and more broadly, for leading the community astray (compare Mal 2:4–9). 37 The “rebellious people” in 65:1–2 should then refer to the group of all those who somehow follow the erring leadership of the Jerusalem priesthood. According to the authors of Third Isaiah, these “people” will be soon condemned and replaced by that part of the community that is currently 36.  Likewise, it is probably not coincidence that the language used in 66:1 has its closest parallel in the phraseology used in Ezek 43:7 for describing the eschatological temple. Compare Isa 66:1: “The heaven is my throne (kiśʾî), and the earth my footstool (hādom raglāy): What is the house that you could build for me?” and Ezek 43:7, “Son of man, this is the place of my throne (kiśʾî), and the place of the soles of my feet (raglāy), where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever.” 37.  Further in his essay, Rofé (1985: 214) also appears to suggest a similar interpretation of Isaiah 66 against the background of Third Isaiah as a whole, on one hand, and of the traditions about the priesthood reported in Nehemiah, on the other.

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“cast out” and oppressed (see also 66:2 and the reference to the “poor” and the persons with a “humbled spirit”). Several texts from the Persian period witness to the close ties between the priesthood and the Jerusalem aristocracy; extrabiblical documents, for example, the Samaria papyri, sketch a similar picture. Hence, it seems likely that the polemics of chaps. 65–66 is aimed, notably, at a group comprising priestly families of the Second Temple and members of the Jerusalemite aristocracy (e.g., Berges 1998: 522). 38 Rofé has also insightfully perceived that the critique of the priesthood in Isaiah 65–66 finds its counterpart in the final oracle of this collection, 66:18–24, depicting the return of the Judean Diaspora (Rofé 1985: 212; for a very similar interpretation, see Berges 1998: 531–32; Zapff 2006: 440–41). Like the priests addressed in 66:1–6, the Judeans returned from the Diaspora by the nations and who have survived the divine judgment are designated as “your brethren” (ʾăḥēkem)—an otherwise unique designation in the book of Isaiah. Further, the fetching of the Diaspora Judeans is compared with the “offering” (minhāh) brought by the Israelites on pure vessels inside the temple (66:20). The meaning of these connections is transparent: the eventual return of the Diaspora corresponds with the replacement of the “brothers” who “hate you” (66:5), that is, the present priesthood, though with new “brothers”; likewise, the Diaspora’s return heralds the replacement of the soiled minḥāh of the priests (66:3) and the resumption of a purified cult (Zapff 2006: 430)! The reason for this is explicitly stated in the following verse (66:21), which affirms that some of “them” will be “taken” (that is, chosen) by Yahweh to serve as (Levitical) priests (66:21 MT). 39 The syntax 38.  On the other hand, it is not possible that ʿam, in 65:1–3, refers to the whole nation as a collective entity, pace Smith 1995: 137. Taking into account the general logic of Isaiah 65, it should necessarily designate that portion of the population that will soon be condemned by Yahweh. Use of the collective ʿam for a group such as this is possible because, as the sequel of chap. 65 implies, the righteous Servants are already considered as a distinct collectivity—i.e., the true “seed of Jacob”; see 65:8–16a. For a somewhat similar view, see, e.g., Schramm 1995: 158–59. Schramm aptly comments that “salvation is no longer conceived in purely national terms. The contents of such designations as ‘Yhwh’s people’, ‘Yhwh’s chosen’, ‘Yhwh’s servants’ . . . has been radically altered.” Tiemeyer 2004: 242 also notes that, in 65:1–2, when the terms gôy and ʿam are introduced, they do not take an article and thereby do not need to be interpreted as referring to the entire Judean population. 39.  On text-critical grounds the asyndetic syntax of the MT is to be retained against other ancient versions that add “and” between lakkohănîm and lallĕwiyyîm. The word lallĕwiyyîm should be understood as appositional (“priests, that is, Levites”). On the other hand, it is possible that the phrase lallĕwiyyîm is a gloss added under the influence of other passages in the Hebrew Bible, emphasizing the Levitical origin of the priesthood.

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of 66:20–21 suggests the Judeans from the Diaspora as the grammatical referent for “them” in v. 21 (e.g., Rofé 1985: 212; Schramm 1995: 172). 40 Nothing is said regarding the possible role played by the non-Judeans coming to Jerusalem. The formulation of 66:20–21 furthers the interpretation suggested above: the return of the Diaspora corresponds to the renewal of the priesthood in Jerusalem; as Rofé (1985: 212) aptly comments: “the monopoly of the Jerusalem priests will thus be broken.” This renewal will in turn make possible the recreation of the entire community, a community that, like the “new heavens” and the “new earth” described in 65:16b–25, will now endure forever (66:22). If correct, this interpretation has significant implications for Third Isaiah’s notion of ethnicity. First, even in the eschatological age, a clearcut distinction is maintained between Judeans and non-Judeans; in particular, the Diaspora Judeans are specifically designated as “your brethren,” a term that, significantly, is also used in Hananyah’s correspondence with the Egyptian Diaspora in Elephantine (Cowley 21, line 1). Second, the priesthood appears to be reserved for Judeans specifically (a point also noted by Schramm 1995: 172). Note how 66:20 similarly presents the offering of the minḥâ (the regular offering to the temple), namely, as a distinctive prerogative of the bĕnê-yiśrāʾēl. This notion is actually quite in keeping with the conception found in the earliest traditions of Third Isaiah (chaps. 60–62) that already referred to the inhabitants of the future Jerusalem as the “priests of Yahweh” (kohănê Yhwh), served by foreigners (61:5–6). In this respect, the reinterpretation of the relationship between Judah and the nations in the earliest portion of Third Isaiah (Isaiah 60–62) may turn out not to have been as radical as several commentators have implied (compare, e.g., Middlemas 2005: 174–75). As in Isa 61:5–6 (see, e.g., Berges 1998: 449–50; Zapff 2006: 393), the restriction of the priesthood to Judeans is probably based on Exod 19:6—a passage which, as is well known, comes to play a significant role in the self-definition of Second Temple Judaism (compare, e.g., Schwartz 1992: 57–80). Note, interestingly, that in Exodus 19 the notion of Israel as a “kingdom of priests” also connects with the gathering (bwʾ H) of Israel by Yahweh (see 19:4) in a way that suggests the author of Isa 66:18–24 believes the eschatological gathering of Israel to Mount Zion will eventually realize the promise once made at Mount Sinai in Exodus 19. Finally, as argued above, though it is true 40. Pace Westermann (1966: 339), Blenkinsopp (1988: 98, 2003: 314–15), and a few other commentators, there is no reason to view 66:20 as a later “orthodox,” “particularistic” interpolation. Note that the reference to Yahweh’s choosing “Levitical priests” in 66:21 makes better sense after the reference to the temple cult in the verse immediately preceding, 66:20. The unity of 66:18–24 is now maintained by a majority of commentators: see, e.g., Zapff 2006: 440.

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that the “meriting” foreigner of Isa 56:1–8 is granted a cultic function inside the temple, a close reading of the language of 56:6 reveals further insights. Various commentators have noted how the proselyte’s description in this verse appears to refer to Num 18:1–7; combined use of lwh N and šrt occurs exclusively in Num 18:2, where it is presented as a distinctive feature of the service of the Levites (e.g., Fishbane 1985: 118–19; Sommer 1998: 147; Tuell 2005: 194; Tuell also remarks that the folk etymology associating Levi with the root lwh is attested independently in Gen 29:34). However, that the context of the Numbers passage describes precisely the duties of Levites vis-à-vis Aaronide priests (!) appears to have been lost on commentators. The reference to Numbers 18 in Isa 56:6 suggests that the “meriting” foreigners of Isaiah 56 are to the Israelites what the Levites are to the priests—that is, subordinated cultic servants. The older distinction in Isaiah 61 between the “priestly” inhabitants of Jerusalem and their foreign servants (61:6) was therefore not abandoned in the final composition of Third Isaiah. Instead, it was reinterpreted by being equated with the distinction between Aaronide priests and Levites in the book of Numbers.

Ethnicity and Identity in Third Isaiah against the Background of the Persian Period I will now conclude this analysis with a few summarizing comments that will simultaneously further develop some of the points made above. The Concept of “Israel” according to Third Isaiah The concept of “Israel” that emerges from the foregoing analysis is that of an ethnic community that is nevertheless moving in the direction of integrating foreigners if they accept the covenantal obligations. In this respect, Third Isaiah does not represent the transition from a community based on blood ties to a community based on voluntary membership, contrary to a long-held view that can still be found in several commentaries (e.g., Blenkinsopp 2003: 136). It would be more accurate to say that ethnicity remains the basis of that community; but the dispute in Third Isaiah is about how Judean ethnicity is defined. Ancestry alone no longer suffices for full membership in “Israel”: observance of central Judean ethnic markers, paradigmatically, the Sabbath (56:2, 4, 6; 58:13–14; 66:23–24) and the (Mosaic) covenant (56:4, 6), are now even more significant. 41 That is the reason why disloyal Judeans will not sur41.  While biblical scholars often appear to have a narrow understanding of “ethnicity” as consisting of genealogy alone, ethnicity actually always encompasses bio-

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vive the judgment (Isa 65:11–15a, 66:15–17), whereas on the other hand “righteous foreigners” will be included within Israel, both in the present (56:3–8) and in the eschatological age (66:18–24). In social-scientific terms, membership and status within the community in Third Isaiah tend to be “acquired” rather than simply “assigned,” and the “cultural” component—that is, voluntary adoption of distinctive Judean customs— is valued over the genealogical one, as the contrast between the eunuch and the foreigner, on one hand, and the Jerusalem bourgeoisie in Isa 57:3–13, on the other, comes to show. In that respect, we might say that the final composition of Third Isaiah, in the fourth century b.c.e., corresponds to some extent to the beginnings of Judaism as an “ethnoreligion,” to borrow the terminology employed by Cohen and others (Cohen 1999: 109–39). Israel as a “Priestly Nation” and the Persistence of Ethnic Boundaries At this point, however, some qualification is required. First, as some commentators have rightly noted, it is no coincidence that Third Isaiah exclusively addresses the case of “proselytes” and remains entirely silent regarding the issue of intermarriages. Although this does not necessarily imply that the final editors of Third Isaiah endorse the segregation policy described in Ezra 9–10 and Neh 13:23–31 (pace Sweeney 1997; for a more nuanced view, see, e.g., Rofé 1985: 214–15), this observation should certainly call for a qualification of the common view regarding the general “openness” of Third Isaiah toward foreigners (e.g., Koenen 1990: 223–24; Middlemas 2005: 174–75). Building on the work of the so-called “exchange theorists” in sociology, conversion represents, together with intermarriage, one of the major forms, or types, of ethnic alteration through incorporation of foreigners. But, being more unilateral, it is naturally much easier to control from the perspective of the “insiders,” as we can see from the requirements in Isa 56:4, 6. This observation suggests that integration of foreigners goes along with a concern for preservation of ethnic identity in Third Isaiah. From the viewpoint of the editors of Third Isaiah, inclusion of foreigners in “Israel” is possible only insofar as these foreigners are committed to the covenantal obligations, in particular the Mosaic Torah. This conception comes close to the view laid out in Neh 10:29–31, referring to the admission into the community of “all those who had separated themselves from the peoples of the lands unto the Law of God (ʾel-tôrat hāʾĕlohîm).” logical as well as cultural aspects: see, for example, the recent survey by Zehnder (2005: 21–47); the same point was already made by the ancient Greek ethnographers: see, for example, Mason 2007.

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Group Function with respect to the temple

Judeans

“Other righteous Proselytes foreigners,” eunuchs

Priests

Levites

Lay worshipers

Second, we have seen that even in the depiction of the eschatological age a careful distinction is maintained between foreigners on one hand and homeland and Diaspora Judeans on the other who, as in the Elephantine correspondence, are designated as “brethren” (ʿăḥîm). Furthermore, close reading of 56:1–8 and 66:18–24 appears to indicate that the main reason for this distinction is that the priesthood is a privilege restricted to Judeans specifically, in agreement with the concept of Israel as a “kingdom of priests” and a “holy nation” (gôy qādôš) in Exod 19:6 and its reception in Isa 61:5–6. Because of their zeal, the proselytes are allowed to minister inside the temple as second-class servants, just like the Levites vis-à-vis the Aaronite priesthood in Num 18:1–7. This, it must be recalled, looks very much like a legitimation of the situation that appears to have prevailed during the Persian period with regard to low-class cultic servants: even the lists of repatriates in Ezra 2 and Nehemiah 7 cannot conceal the fact that most of these servants are actually of foreign, non-Judean origin, as pointed out earlier. By contrast, the description of the situation prevailing in the eschatological age suggests that priestly and levitical functions will mostly, if not exclusively, be endorsed by the returned Diaspora (66:20–22). Nothing is said about a possible involvement of the “righteous Gentiles” who survived judgment as regards their possible cultic functions; most likely, their situation compares to that of the eunuchs in 56:3–8 who, because they lack physical integrity, are forbidden to enter the sanctuary (see Lev 21:16–23). Rather, the emphasis is now laid on the coming of “all flesh” to worship Yahweh at his sanctuary on Mount Zion (66:23–24); note also, along the same lines, how righteous foreigners are associated with the bringing of offerings to the temple in the wording of 66:20. In that regard, 66:18–24 appears to be a sophisticated midrash based on Exod 19:5–6 and recounting the eventual, eschatological fulfillment of the concept of Israel as a “kingdom of priests” and a “holy nation” for all the other nations on earth. The system resulting from these observations is summarized in table 1.

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Ethnicity, Identity, and Inner-Biblical Conflicts at the Time of the Final Composition of Third Isaiah The above analysis also calls for a refinement of issues of ethnicity and identity in Third Isaiah in terms of this writing’s literary history and social-political background. From the perspective of redaction criticism of Third Isaiah, the concept of ethnicity and identity analyzed above goes back to the final stage in the composition of Isaiah 56–66, namely, when 56:1–8 and chaps. 65–66 were introduced (together with 63:7–64:11) and when the issue of the foreigner and its integration within the temple community was explicitly addressed. That issue does not surface in the earlier layers of Third Isaiah (namely, Isaiah 60–62* and 56:9–62:12). 42 The final stage in the composition of Third Isaiah reinterprets the earlier traditions by framing them with an elaborated discussion about proselytes and righteous foreigners (who are not Judean but are nevertheless admitted into the community) as well as about disloyal Judeans (who, despite their ancestry, will eventually be excluded from “Israel” in the oncoming judgment). As this summary shows, ethnicity and inner-community struggles cannot be dissociated from the perspective of Third Isaiah’s composition. The case of the benhannēkār, who is not a “resident alien” (gēr), who does not appear to have specific ethnic ties with the Judean community, and who logically represents a borderline case for the community’s boundaries, leads to an in-depth discussion of the concept of “Israel” as well as of the community’s self-identity. Part of the polemic, in Isa 56:1–8, seems to be directed against Deuteronomy 23 and—perhaps even more importantly—against this law’s reception during the Persian period. As such, the scribes responsible for the final composition of Third Isaiah do show an antagonism vis-à-vis the tendency within certain groups to restrict the community to a given ethnic group—be it the Yĕhûdîm in Nehemiah (e.g., Albertz 2004; see especially Nehemiah 13) or the “holy seed” (zeraʿ qodeš) in Ezra 9–10. However, even the Ezra–Nehemiah traditions do not appear to be quite consistent on that issue. A few other passages, such as Ezra 6:21 and Neh 10:29, do suggest that some form of integration within the community was indeed possible for proselytes willing to leave their older customs and adopt the Judean ones. 43 The conception laid out in these 42.  In Isaiah 60–62, foreigners are essentially viewed as servants and slaves for the Israelites: compare 60:10–16 and 61:5–6. Isa 56:9–59:20[21] hardly addresses the issue of other nations (see 59:18, 19a; however, 59:18b is missing in the LXX* and is probably a later gloss); the focus is entirely on the community’s inner struggles. 43.  Ezra 6:21 deals with the celebration of the first Passover after the rebuilding of the temple; Neh 10:29 occurs in the context of the “covenant” celebrated by

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passages appears to be quite compatible with the general view of Third Isaiah as laid out above; furthermore, as mentioned, Third Isaiah exclusively discusses the case of proselytes and remains suspiciously silent about intermarriages. In this regard, while I would reject the notion that the traditions found in Third Isaiah and Ezra–Nehemiah are fully compatible (pace, e.g., Schramm 1995; Sweeney 1997), it would equally be a mistake to stress exclusively the antagonism between these traditions. Rather, the agreement among Ezra 6:21, Neh 10:29, and Isa 56:3–8 does suggest that some sort of “common doctrine” regarding the inclusion of proselytes inside the community was developed and adopted by various groups in Jerusalem toward the end of the Persian period (first half of the fourth century b.c.e.). In that respect, Blenkinsopp’s earlier observation about the close relationship between the groups behind both Isaiah 66 and Ezra’s reform (Blenkinsopp 1990) may also find a satisfactory explanation. In addition, while it cannot be denied that the final stage in the composition of Third Isaiah does evince some “sectarian” traits (especially in chaps. 65–66), this observation also suggests that the group behind that composition was still actively engaged in a discussion—and possibly also some form of collaboration—with the rest of the community in Jerusalem. Apart from Ezra and Nehemiah, however, there is significant evidence throughout the final composition of Third Isaiah of a conflict with the Zadokide priesthood and its monopoly over the Second Temple. Isa 56:3–8 is largely construed as a critical revision and even rejection of the Zadokide tôrāh in Ezek 44:6–16; likewise, there are various indications in chaps. 65–66 suggesting that the incriminated group comprises primarily—albeit not exclusively—the priesthood of the Second Temple. Once again, the anti-Zadokide tendency that permeates Isa 56:1–8 and chaps. 65–66 should definitely not be understood along the traditional opposition between “(temple-based) theocracy” and “prophetic eschatology.” This sort of opposition is largely—if not entirely—misconstrued, and it certainly does not apply in the case of Third Isaiah, in which, on the contrary, the eschatological age is consistently identified with a purification of the temple on Mount Zion and the renewal of the sacrificial cult. Nehemiah in Jerusalem after the rebuilding of the walls. In both passages, the individuals who “separated themselves” (with bdl N!) from the surrounding peoples are allowed to take part in the celebration, alongside native Judeans. Commentators have occasionally proposed that the “peoples of the land(s)” referred here to other Judeans. Yet this is quite unlikely when one considers the context of these passages, and in the case of Ezra 6:21, which reads gôyê-hāʾāreṣ instead of the usual ʿămmêhāʾāreṣ, this interpretation is surely irrelevant.

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While the notion of the anti-Zadokide perspective of Third Isaiah is anything but a new insight, this observation does take a renewed significance once one pays due attention to the literary history of Third Isaiah. Just like the topic of the foreigners’ admission into the temple community, the critique of the priesthood is distinctive of the final stage in the composition of Isaiah 56–66; a critique of this sort appears nowhere in the earlier material. Hanson’s original insight needs to be revised in this respect as well. The critique of the Zadokide priesthood does play a role in the forming of Third Isaiah, but exclusively at the time of the final editing of that collection. The most significant point, however, is probably the fact that the final composition of Third Isaiah combines a critique of the Zadokide priesthood with a rather positive view vis-à-vis the inclusion of proselytes into the community. In this respect, the oracle of Isa 56:3–8 that affirms the right of the foreigner to enter the temple community by rejecting the Zadokide tôrāh in Ezekiel 44 is particularly telling, as is the fact that this oracle was deliberately placed ahead of Third Isaiah, as an introduction of sorts for the entire collection. If, as was argued in this essay, the final composition of Third Isaiah dates to the first half of the fourth century b.c.e., the conflict with the Zadokide priesthood makes good sense indeed. The fourth century b.c.e. witnessed the growing role assigned to the temple in Jerusalem in local administration, especially for the collecting of taxes (Lemaire 2007: 56–62). At that time, it was probably the main, if not the only temple for the population in Yehud (Lemaire 2007: 62). This development went along with an increasingly important political role for the high priest (see also Achenbach 2003: 130–40), as indicated by the Paleo-Hebrew legend “Yôhanan the priest (ywḥnn hkwhn)” on a fractional Judean coin from approximately the middle of the fourth century b.c.e. (proposed dates fluctuate between 378–368 b.c.e. and 335–333). It is probably no wonder, then, that the final stage in the composition of Third Isaiah witnesses the sudden appearance of a discussion about proselytes, the community’s internal divisions, and access to the temple. Indeed, in the light of the above remarks, the view of ethnicity developed in Third Isaiah appears to relate closely with another issue, namely, that of the temple’s control. For the Zadokide priesthood, control of the temple necessarily involved considerable authority in matters pertaining to the community’s self-organization. Passages such as Isa 56:3 (the foreigner’s complaint) as well as 66:5 actually suggest that the priesthood had sufficient power at that time to exclude both non-Judeans and Judeans from the temple grounds. The fourth-century tradents of Third Isaiah, in contrast, appear to emphasize much more the temple’s role as a collective and relatively open institution, whose significance is not

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restricted to Jerusalem or even the province of Yehud. The notion of the priesthood of all Judeans appears to play a significant role in Isaiah 65–66, as in Isaiah 61 already. Furthermore, the temple is designated in 56:7 as being both a sacrificial place and a “house of prayer” (bêt-tĕpillâ) for “all the peoples,” a notion that anticipates the description of the pilgrimage of the nations to Jerusalem/Zion in the eschatological age (66:23–24). Here, therefore, different views of the community appear to be ultimately rooted in different views of the temple itself, at a time when that temple was definitely becoming both a central institution as well as a national symbol for all Judeans.

Bibliography Achenbach, R. 2003 Die Vollendung der Tora: Studien zur Redaktionsgeschichte des Numeribuches im Kontext von Pentateuch und Hexateuch. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für Altorientalische und biblische Rechtsgeschichte 3. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Ackerman, S. 1992 Under Every Green Tree: Popular Religion in Sixth-Century Judah. Harvard Semitic Monographs 46. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Albertz, R. 2004 Ethnische und kultische Konzepte in der Politik Nehemias. Pp. 13–32 in Das Manna fällt auch heute noch: Beiträge zur Geschichte und Theologie des Alten, Ersten Testaments, ed. F.-L. Hossfeld and L. SchwienhorstSchönberger. Herders biblische Studien 44. Freiburg: Herder. Bedford, P. R. 2002 Diaspora: Homeland Relations in Ezra–Nehemiah. Vetus Testamentum 52: 147–65. Berges, U. 1998 Das Buch Jesaja: Komposition und Endgestalt. Herders biblische Studien. Freiburg: Herder. Berquist, J. L. 1995 Judaism in Persia’s Shadow: A Social and Historical Approach. Minneapolis: Fortress. Beuken, W. A. M. 1989 Does Trito-Isaiah Reject the Temple? An Intertextual Inquiry into Isa. 66.1–6. Pp. 53–66 in Intertextuality in Biblical Writings: Essays in Honour of Bas van Iersel, ed. S. Draisma. Kampen: Kok. Blenkinsopp, J. 1988 Second Isaiah: Prophet of Universalism. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 41: 83–103. 1989 Ezra–Nehemiah. A Commentary. Old Testament Library. London: SCM. 1990 A Jewish Sect of the Persian Period. Catholic Biblical Quarterly 52: 5–20.

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Isaiah 56–66. Anchor Bible 19B. New York: Doubleday. The Development of Jewish Sectarianism from Nehemiah to the Hasidim. Pp. 385–404 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

Cohen, S. 1999 The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley: University of California Press. Cook, S. L. 1995 Innerbiblical Interpretation in Ezekiel 44 and the History of Israel’s Priesthood. Journal of Biblical Literature 114: 193–208. Cross, F. M. 1998 From Epic to Canon: History and Literature in Ancient Israel. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Donner, H. 1985 Jesaja lvi 1–7: Ein Abrogationsfall innerhalb des Kanons Implikationen und Konsequenzen. Pp. 81–95 in Congress Volume Salamanca 1983, ed. J. A. Emerton. Supplements to Vetus Testamentum 36. Leiden: Brill. Enger, P. A. 2006 Die Adoptivkinder Abrahams: Eine exegetische Spurensuche zur Vorgeschichte des Proselytentums. Beiträge zur Erforschung des Alten Testaments und des Antiken Judentums 53. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Eskenazi, T. C., and Judd, E. P. 1994 Marriage to a Stranger in Ezra 9–10. Pp. 266–85 in Second Temple Studies: 2. Temple Community in the Persian Period, ed. T. C. Eskenazi and K. H. Richards. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement 175. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Fishbane, M. 1985 Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel. Oxford: Clarendon. Gärtner, J. 2006 Jesaja 66 und Sacharja 14 als Summe der Prophetie: Eine traditions- und redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung zum Abschluss des Jesaja- und des Zwölfprophetenbuches. Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament 114. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Goldenstein, J. 2001 Das Gebet der Gottesknechte: Jesaja 63,7–64,11 im Jesajabuch. Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament 92. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Gosse, B. 2005 Sabbath, Identity and Universalism Go Together after the Return from Exile. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 29: 359–70.

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Hanson, P. D. 1975 The Dawn of Apocalyptic: The Historical and Sociological Roots of Jewish Apocalyptic Eschatology. Philadelphia: Fortress. Hayes, C. E. 2002 Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities: Intermarriage and Conversion from the Bible to the Talmud. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Japhet, S. 1989 The Ideology of the Book of Chronicles and Its Place in Biblical Thought. Beiträge zur Erforschung des Alten Testaments und des Antiken Judentums 9. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Repr., Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2009. Kaufmann, Y. 1977 History of the Religion of Israel, vol. 4: From the Babylonian Captivity to the End of Prophecy, trans. C. W. Efroymson. New York: Ktav. Kessler, J. 2006 Persia’s Loyal Yahwists: Power Identity and Ethnicity in Achaemenid Yehud. Pp. 91–121 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2007 Diaspora and Homeland in the Early Achaemenid Period: Community, Geography and Demography in Zechariah 1–8. Pp. 137–66 in Approaching Yehud: New Approaches to the Study of the Persian Period, ed. J. L. Berquist. Society of Biblical Literature Semeia Studies 50. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Knoppers, G. N. 2001 Intermarriage, Social Complexity, and Ethnic Diversity in the Genealogy of Judah. Journal of Biblical Literature 120: 15–30. 2006 Revisiting the Samarian Question in the Persian Period. Pp. 265–89 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Koenen, K. Ethik und Eschatologie im Tritojesajabuch. Wissenschaftliche Monog1990 raphien zum Alten und Neuen Testament 62. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Konkel, M. 2001 Architektonik des Heiligen. Studien zur zweiten Tempelvision Ezechiels (Ez 40–48). Bonner Biblische Beiträge 129. Berlin: Philo. Lau, W. 1994 Schriftgelehrte Prophetie in Jes 56–66: Eine Untersuchung zu den literarischen Bezügen in den letzten elf Kapiteln des Jesajabuches. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 225. Berlin: de Gruyter. Lemaire, A. 2006 New Aramaic Ostraca from Idumea and Their Historical Interpretation. Pp. 413–56 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

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Administration in Fourth-Century b.c.e. Judah in the Light of Epigraphy and Numismatics. Pp. 53–74 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. G. N. Knoppers and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Levenson, J. D. 1996 The Universal Horizon of Biblical Particularism. Pp. 143–69 in Ethnicity and the Bible, ed. M. G. Brett. Biblical Interpretation 19. Leiden: Brill. Levinson, B. M. 1997 Deuteronomy and the Hermeneutics of Legal Innovation. New York: Oxford University Press. Lipschits, O. 2005 The Fall and Rise of Jerusalem: Judah under Babylonian Rule. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2006 Achaemenid Imperial Policy, Settlement Processes in Palestine, and the Status of Jerusalem in the Middle of the Fifth Century b.c.e. Pp. 19–52 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lipschits, O., and Tal, O. 2007 The Settlement Archaeology of the Province of Judah: A Case Study. Pp. 33–52 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Mason, S. 2007 Jews, Judaeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of Categorization in Ancient History. Journal for the Study of Judaism 38: 547–12. Middlemas, J. 2005 Divine Reversal and the Role of the Temple in Trito-Isaiah. Pp. 164–87 in Temple and Worship in Biblical Israel, ed. J. Day. Library of Hebrew Bible / Old Testament Studies 422. London: T. & T. Clark. Milgrom, J. 2000 Levicitus 17–22: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. Anchor Bible 3A. New York: Doubleday. Nihan, C. 2001 Trois cultes en Ésaïe 57,3–13 et leur signification dans le contexte religieux de la Judée à l’époque perse. Transeuphratène 22: 143–67. Olyan, S. M. 2000 Rites and Rank: Hierarchy in Biblical Representations of Cult. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2004 Purity Ideology in Ezra–Nehemiah as a Tool to Reconstitute the Community. Journal for the Study of Judaism 35: 1–16. Park, K.-C. 2003 Die Gerechtigkeit Israels und das Heil der Völker: Kultus, Tempel, Eschatologie und Gerechtigkeit in der Endgestalt des Jesajabuches (Jes 56,1–8; 58,1–14; 65,17–66,24). Beiträge zur Erforschung des Alten Testaments und des Antiken Judentums 52. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.

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Porten, B., and Yardeni, A. 2006 Social, Economic, and Onomastic Issues in the Aramaic Ostraca of the Fourth Century b.c.e. Pp. 457–88 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Rofé, A. 1985 Isaiah 66,1–4: Judean Sects in the Persian Period as Viewed by TritoIsaiah. Biblical and Related Studies Presented to Samuel Iwry, ed. A. Kort and S. Morschauer. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 1988 The Onset of Sects in Postexilic Judaism: Neglected Evidence from the Septuagint, Trito-Isaiah, Ben Sira, and Malachi. Pp. 39–49 in The Social World of Formative Christianity and Judaism: Essays in Tribute to Howard Clark Kee, ed. J. Neusner. Philadelphia: Fortress. Ruszkowski, L. 2000 Volk und Gemeinde im Wandel: Eine Untersuchung zu Jesaja 56–66. Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments 191. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schaper, J. 2004 Rereading the Law: Inner-Biblical Exegesis of Divine Oracles in Ezekiel 44 and Isaiah 56. Pp. 125–44 in Recht und Ethik im Alten Testament, ed. B. M. Levinson and E. Otto. Altes Testament und Moderne 13. Münster: Lit Verlag. Schramm, B. 1995 The Opponents of Third Isaiah. Reconstructing the Cultic History of the Restoration. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement 193. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Schwartz, D. R. 1992 Studies in the Jewish Background of Christianity. Wissenschaft­ liche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 60. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Sehmsdorf, E. 1972 Studien zur Redaktionsgeschichte von Jesaja 56–66. Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 84: 517–76. Sekine, S. 1989 Die Tritojesajanische Sammlung (Jes 56–66) redaktionsgeschichtlich untersucht. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 175. Berlin: de Gruyter. Smith, M. 1971 Palestinian Parties and Politics That Shaped the Old Testament. New York: Columbia University Press. Smith, P. A. 1995 Rhetoric and Redaction in Trito-Isaiah: The Structure, Growth and Authorship of Isaiah 56–66. Supplements to Vetus Testamentum 62. Leiden: Brill.

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Smith-Christopher, D. L. 1994 The Mixed Marriage Crisis in Ezra 9–10 and Nehemiah 13: A Study of the Sociology of Post-Exilic Judaean Community. Pp. 243–65 in Second Temple Studies: 2. Temple Community in the Persian Period, ed. T. C. Eskenazi and K. H. Richards. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement 175. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Sommer, B. 1998 A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40–66. Contraversions. Stanford: University Press. Steck, O. H. 1987 Beobachtungen zur Anlage von Jes 65–66. Biblische Notizen 38: 103–16. 1989 Tritojesaja im Jesajabuch. Pp. 361–406 in Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures. Unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, ed. J. Vermeylen. Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 81. Leuven: Leuven University Press. 1991 Studien zu Tritojesaja. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 203 . Berlin: de Gruyter. Strawn, B. A. 2007 “A World under Control”: Isaiah 60 and the Apadana Reliefs from Persepolis. Pp. 85–116 in Approaching Yehud: New Approaches to the Study of the Persian Period, ed. J. L. Berquist. Society of Biblical Literature: Semeia Studies 50. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Sweeney, M. A. 1997 The Reconceptualization of the Davidic Covenant in Isaiah. Pp. 41–61 in Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Festschrift Willem A. M. Beuken, ed. J. van Ruiten, M. Vervenne. Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 132. Leuven: Leuven University Press. Talmon, S. 1986 The Emergence of Jewish Sectarianism in the Early Second Temple Period. Pp. 165–201 in King, Cult and Calendar in Ancient Israel: Collected Studies. Jerusalem: Magnes. Tiemeyer, S. 2004 “The Haughtiness of the Priesthood” (Isa 65,5). Biblica 85: 237–44. Tuell, S. S. 2005 The Priesthood of the “Foreigner”: Evidence of Competing Polities in Ezekiel 44:1–14 and Isaiah 56:1–8. Pp. 183–204 in Constituting the Community: Studies on the Polity of Ancient Israel in Honor of S. Dean McBride Jr., ed. J. T. Strong, S. S. Tuell. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Vermeylen, J. 1978 Du prophète Isaïe à l’Apocalyptique: Isaïe, I–XXXV, miroir d’un demimillénaire d’expérience religieuse en Israël. Vol. 2. Études bibliques. Paris: Gabalda. Volz, P. 1932 Jesaja II. Kommentar zum Alten Testament 9/2. Leipzig: Deichertsche.

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Wells, R. D., Jr. 1996 Isaiah as an Exponent of Torah: Isaiah 56.1–8. Pp. 140–55 in New Visions of Isaiah, ed. R. F. Melugin and M. A. Sweeney. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement 214. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Westermann, C. 1966 Das Buch Jesaja, Kap. 40–66. Altes testament Deutsch. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Willi, T. 1995 Juda—Jehud—Israel: Studien zum Selbstverständnis des Judentums in persischer Zeit. Forschungen zum Alten Testament 12. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. 1999 Leviten, Priester und Kult in vorhellenistischer Zeit: Die chronistische Optik in ihrem geschichtlichen Kontext. Pp. 75–98 in Gemeinde ohne Tempel: Community Without Temple. Zur Substituierung und Transformation des Jerusalemer Tempels und seines Kults im Alten Testament, antiken Judentum und frühen Christentum, ed. B. Ego, A. Lange, and P. Pilhofer. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 118. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Williamson, H. G. M. 1977 Israel in the Book of Chronicles. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Zapff, B. M. 2006 Jesaja 56–66. Die neue Echter-Bibel 37. Würzburg: Echter. Zehnder, M. 2005 Umgang mit Fremden in Israel und Assyrien: Ein Beitrag zur Anthropologie des “Fremden” im Licht antiker Quellen. Beiträge zur Wissenschaft des Alten und Neuen Testaments 168. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Zimmerli, W. 1979 Ezechiel. Biblischer Kommentar zum Alten Testament 13/1–2. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag.

Trito-Isaiah’s Intraand Internationalization: Identity Markers in the Second Temple Period Jill Middlemas University of Zurich

Introduction The prophecies of Trito-Isaiah revolve around a central point in which the restoration of Jerusalem and the repatriation of the exiles take pride of place (Westermann 1966). The fall of Jerusalem and the resulting chaos that ensued through the destruction of the symbolic universe of the nation of the Southern Kingdom of Judah and the deportation of elite members of society to Babylonia lie in the background, as a past event that is on the verge of reversal. The issue of great importance in Trito-Isaiah is the failure of the predictions of Deutero-Isaiah to materialize (Kraus 1966). The prophet(s) responsible for the redactional material seeks to explain what could be perceived as divine failure and to project the return of Yahweh into the imminent future. 1 The deity will return and restore the city and its inhabitants through a great theophanic event, but it will not be the unconditional moment predicted by Deutero-Isaiah. Instead, the community will be judged anew when Yahweh enters history to intercede for the covenant people. At the point of divine reversal, a division will be made between members fit to participate in worship in the city ruled by God and those deemed unfit. Because much of the material in Isaiah 56–66 seeks to clarify who will have access to the new age of Yahweh’s rule and, thus, who can participate in worship, a large part of the discussion about the meaning of the prophecies of Trito-Isaiah has revolved around the identification of the nature of the division and the groups involved. A discussion such 1.  For the sake of simplicity I will subsequently use the singular with respect to the authors/editors of the material outside the central chapters (60–62 or 60– 63:6), but I am cognizant of the fact that there is no agreement yet as to number of redactors. Recommended analyses of the material include Pauritsch 1971; Sekine 1989; Koenen 1990; P. A. Smith 1995; Steck 1991; Kratz 2002.

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as this can take place on two different levels: an examination of the groups delineated in terms of whom they may represent in real life or an analysis of the different parties on a literary level. A significant amount of attention has focused on the first task, with little agreement. Researchers have seen separations of visionaries from hierocrats, the exiles from the community that remained in the land following the defeat of Judah in 587, the priests from other community members, and so on (see Schramm 1995; Middlemas 2005a: 164). Perhaps the difficulty with this type of assessment can be best illustrated by a comparison of the analyses of Bernhard Duhm (1892) and Paul Hanson (1975). On the one hand, Duhm argued that Trito-Isaiah was a theocrat in the extreme whose view was shared by Ezekiel as well as the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. The Trito-Isaiah perspective led, in his view, directly to Ezra as the forerunner of the Priestly Codex. On the other hand, Hanson has argued to the contrary that Trito-Isaiah stemmed from a portion of the community that was being ostracized by the Zadokites, who were leading the temple at the time. In his view, the Zadokite position could be found expressed also in the vision of restoration in the final chapters of Ezekiel (chaps. 40–48) as well as in the ideology expressed by the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. The Zadokite thought to which Trito-Isaiah was opposed continued in a direct line to the reform activities of Ezra, thus, well into the Second Temple period. These two important scholars have interpreted the same evidence in mutually exclusive ways. Discussions of identity and ethnicity in ancient Israel have tended to include Trito-Isaiah because it has been considered to respond also to community reforms made at the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, as can be seen in the thorough redactional studies of Seizo Sekine (1989) and Klaus Koenen (1990). In Ezra 9 and Nehemiah 10–11, Ezra and Nehemiah institute a series of regulations to enable the community of Yehud in the Persian period to realign itself with principles favorable to Yahweh. Sekine’s and Koenen’s redactional analyses have been subject to objections on a number of levels, mainly thematic. On the nature of the division, for example, the reforms instituted by Ezra and Nehemiah include the expulsion from the community of certain members, while Trito-Isaiah only projects separation into the future (Smith 1995). Another difficulty has to do with the conception of the foreigner. The foreigner in Ezra tends to be understood more properly as part of the population that remained in the land of Judah following the exile of members of society to Babylonia (Schramm 1995), while Nehemiah’s antiforeigner sentiments stem from concerns about certain political alliances (Smith-Christopher 2002: 122–27). Again, the views held by Ezra and Nehemiah are not consistent with that found in Trito-Isaiah.

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The careful redactional studies of Trito-Isaiah do not agree with studies of the material made on a more contextual basis. As this brief overview has indicated, it is difficult to ascertain the identity of the parties involved or the exact situation that lies in the background of Trito-Isaiah’s prophecies with any degree of certainty. This is due in part to the obscure nature of the references and the use of imagery in the argument. When speaking of wicked members of the community, the prophet utilizes vivid imagery that is difficult to pinpoint with accuracy, such as “They hatch adders’ eggs, and weave the spider’s web; whoever eats their eggs dies, and the crushed egg hatches out a viper” (Isa 59:5). Compounding this problem is that the actions of the critiqued group tend to be consistent with those subject to rebuke in the Preexilic and Exilic Periods (Schramm 1995). In addition, although it has been argued that the community members were divided because of issues related to access to the temple, a consideration of how the sanctuary functions in the prophecies has not borne out an interpretation of this sort (Middlemas 2005a). There are few, if any, sociohistorical reference points. A new consideration of the prophecies of Trito-Isaiah with respect to the question of its vision of communal membership becomes important in light of growing interest in questions of identity and ethnicity in the Second Temple period. Given the difficulty with determining the specific groups targeted by the prophet, an important first step in the reconsideration of this question comes from the second level of examining Trito-Isaiah: assessing the prophetic vision of the community according to the literary deposit. Who makes up the community according to Trito-Isaiah and what are his criteria for inclusion/exclusion? In order to investigate this question, we will analyze two interrelated factors: the identifiers used within the prophetic material and conceptualizations of the foreigner. The aim is to arrive at a more basic understanding of the characterization of identity in Trito-Isaiah and what it might suggest about its usefulness in discussions of this topic in the Second Temple period.

Definitions of Communal Identity Rather than attending to redactional issues related to the development of the material, this analysis explores Trito-Isaiah’s definitions of inclusion and exclusion in the community by focusing on general lines of thought. In particular, there are two main conceptions of community held together in Trito-Isaiah: one perspective maintains a national and geographic (intranational) identity while another can be characterized

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best as international in the sense that communal membership is open beyond national borders. An Intranational Vision The first definition of the community is consistent with ancient Israel in the First Temple period and is markedly national and geographic in character. 2 A negative attitude toward foreigners appears in conjunction with this view. This attitude is found in the central chapters, 60–62, in the hymn celebrating the entrance of the divine warrior in 63:1–6 (which is thematically if not literarily consistent with the central chapters; Smith 1995: 26–38), and in the communal lament, in which the nation presents its self-understanding to its deity (63:7–64:11). In the central chapters, the nation is the object of divine intervention in history and is spoken to as Jerusalem and Zion (mainly chaps. 60 and 62). Positive oracles are directed to other ambiguous groups including the economically and socially disadvantaged, called “the oppressed” (61:1), those who seem to mourn a disaster, termed “the broken hearted” (61:1), “all who mourn” (61:2), “mourners in Zion” (61:3), as well as others who suffer, called “captives” (61:1) and “prisoners” (61:1). On the basis of language consistent with debt slavery (e.g., ʿnh in 61:1), Bradley Gregory has recently argued that the author of the 61:1–3 understood the community to be experiencing a prolonged exile (2007). Other language, for example, “captives” and “prisoners,” is consistent with terminology employed of the exiles elsewhere (Smith-Christopher 1989). Given greater knowledge of the situation in the homeland and the laments that took place therein, it would be reasonable to suppose that the mourners are those who remained in the land following the collapse of Jerusalem (Middlemas 2005b: 171–228). The prophet seems to hold together the two main groups of the former Kingdom of Judah who survived the disaster, and the prolonged exile may function as a motif that adds to the intensity of the desire for the restoration predicted by Deutero-Isaiah. In any event, the central chapters convey a national and geographic perspective with its inclusion of an exilic point of reference in addition to the one more concerned with the restoration of Jerusalem. The concept of a national community in an intimate relationship with its god continues to find expression in the divine warrior hymn of 63:1–6, where Yahweh treads the nations in support of the covenant people (vv. 3, 6). In form, the poetic unit represents an oracle against the nation, in which Yahweh acts as a champion against the enemies of 2.  This is not to say that a national and geographical perspective is only found during this time frame (see Smith-Christopher 2002).

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ancient Israel, symbolized by Edom. Consistent with prophecy, the security of ancient Israel is guaranteed by the destruction of the nations. Schramm notes further that this new act of judgment is required to fulfill the prophecies of salvation found in the central chapters (60–62) and Deutero-Isaiah (Schramm 1995: 147–50). A national and geographic perspective similarly permeates the communal lament of 63:7–64:11, where the community speaks in its own voice of its perception of itself. In contrast to statements either about or to different groups found elsewhere in the oracles of Trito-Isaiah, it is in the lament of 63:7–64:11 that the people indicate who they understand themselves to be in relation to Yahweh. The communal lament in 63:7–64:11 varies from the traditional pattern by having a historical retrospect largely using the language of praise (63:7–14) and a confession of sin (63:14–64:6) along with an appeal (64:7–11; for more on this lament, see Westermann 1966; Pauritsch 1971; Sekine 1989; Williamson 1990; Goldenstein 2001; Middlemas 2005b: 156–58). In each section of the lament, the people speak of themselves in close relationship to Yahweh, using expressions such as “the House of Israel” (63:7), “[Yahweh’s] people” (63:8), “your people” (63:14, 64:8), “your servants” (63:17), “the tribes of your inheritance” (63:17), “your holy people” (63:18), and “the fashioning of your hand” (64:7). Many of these statements evoke the election traditions of ancient Israel (on this type of language in general, see Schniedewind 1995). In addition to intimating a special association with the deity through the expressions they use for themselves (including the divine statements in 63:8), the people appeal to a close personal, even familial, relationship by calling out to Yahweh as “our father” (63:16 twice, 64:7) and “our potter” (64:7). In addition, Yahweh’s use of the term sons in 63:8 enhances this portrait of familiarity, even kinship. In their lament, the community appeals to a special status to call for divine aid. The language they use for themselves again provides evidence that a national identity lies at the background of their thought. The language employed of foreigners in these central chapters further substantiates a national outlook. Consistent with First Temple prophecy, the enemies in the central chapters are perceived as foreign nations (63:1–6). In fact, foreign nations are included within the positive oracles directed to Jerusalem and Judah in chaps. 60–62 only insofar as they act as witnesses to the establishment of the divine sovereignty that transpires when devastated Judah’s fortunes are reversed. As such, they are portrayed in a subservient role. For example, foreign kings bow down to the restored Jerusalem and bring gifts, and even foreign animals leap up to offer themselves as ready sacrifices on

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Yahweh’s altar. Indeed, the characteristic view of foreigners is that they are separate, different, and distinct. They tend to be called gôy (foreign nation), gôyîm (the nations), and ʿammîm (peoples), as is consistent with one biblical view of their otherness. Moreover, foreigners are peripheral to the divine plans for the people of Jerusalem. The peoples and their kings will witness to some aspect of Yahweh’s involvement in history (61:9, 11; 62:2; 64:1[2]), and even the wealth of the nations will be brought to glorify Jerusalem as a symbol of the importance of Yahweh (60:5, 11, 16; 61:6). Otherwise, the nations are to be destroyed as part of the reversal of the fortunes of Jerusalem and its people (60:12; 63:3, 6). Depictions of the role of the other serve to maintain an intranational focus in 60:1–63:6 and 63:7–64:11. An International Redaction The nucleus of the material, the divine warrior hymn and the communal lament of 63:7–64:11, are surrounded by material that qualifies the identity of the community (56:1–59:21, 65:1–66:24). The redactor of Trito-Isaiah expands communal membership beyond a national identity but contracts it at the same time by applying criteria. The placement of the communal lament after the central verses that predict the unqualified entrance of Yahweh to act on behalf of the covenant people suggests that it functions in a particular way. In their lament, the people claimed a personal relationship with Yahweh and even do so inclusively (note the use of “all of us” 64:7, 8[8, 9]). However, it does not follow that Yahweh and the prophet of Trito-Isaiah regard the community in the same way. One of the interesting features of this lament, beyond what it tells us about how the people understood their relationship to their deity, is its placement. As Odil Steck has shown, chaps. 65–66 respond to the concerns raised in the lament and clarify who will be involved in the new Jerusalem to be established (Steck 1991: 217–28). Moreover, in spite of the fact that the lament is typically dated to the period immediately following the fall of Jerusalem (Westermann 1966; Williamson 1990; Goldenstein 2001), the nucleus delineated in chaps. 60–62 appears to have been written with knowledge of the complaints therein (Westermann 1966: 240–41). The placement of the lament is ideological rather than chronological. On this basis, Paul Smith argues that the ability to repent from wrongful behavior ceases after the central chapters (1995: 44–47, 132, 135, 172, 199, 206–7). In spite of the heartfelt plea in 63:7–64:11, only judgment or salvation remains thereafter. As such, the corporal complaint functions in Trito-Isaiah to clarify that the people are not able to appeal to tradition history or nationality for inclusion in the society to be established under divine rule.

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It could also be the case that all of Trito-Isaiah’s concern to delineate the community more narrowly is in light of the community’s claim about itself before Yahweh found in these passages. Brooks Schramm, for example, suggests it is an attack on the presumption of the lament that “we are all your people,” by asserting categorically “no, you are not!” (Schramm 1995: 154–55). If a national identity is not consistent with the message of the redactor of the Trito-Isaiah material, then what is? The collection known as Trito-Isaiah begins with a positive invective delivered as a divine oracle of salvation (56:1–2): “Thus says Yahweh: Maintain justice, and do what is right, for soon my salvation will come, and my deliverance be revealed. Happy is the mortal (ʾĕnôš) who does this, the human being (ben ʾādām) who holds it fast, who keeps the Sabbath, not profaning it, and refrains from doing any evil.” It is a general call, coming directly from Yahweh, in which divine salvation and deliverance are correlated with correct behavior. Because Yahweh’s salvific intervention is imminent, the deity demands right dealings, identified more generally by a negative command to refrain from evil and more particularly by a positive injunction to observe the Sabbath. A direct address introduced by kôh āmār Yhwh initiates the collection of Trito-Isaiah. Moreover, the deity addresses an unspecified plural audience, using second-person-plural forms. Although the beginning of a prophetic collection with the divine messenger formula is relatively rare, it is consistent with the other two major sections of the Isaiah material, appearing also at 1:2 and 40:1. Proto-, Deutero-, and Trito-Isaiah, thus, all begin with a double imperative. Thomas Leclerc has suggested that this rhetorical feature emphasizes divine authority and the divine word (2001: 133). On this basis, he argues further that vv. 1–2 deliberately echo the terms employed by and characteristic of the prophecies of Proto-Isaiah (mišpāt, “justice”) and Deutero-Isaiah (yĕšûâ, “deliverance”). At the outset, Trito-Isaiah holds together the main ideas of former prophecies (cf. Rendtorff 1993). The appearance of a double imperative at the start of a prophetic collection is otherwise rare. It is found in Amos where the prophet launches into a series of oracles against the nations (Amos 1:3), Haggai where the prophet speaks to “this people” regarding the divine word about the rebuilding of the temple (Hag 1:2), Zechariah where the prophet speaks to his audience, whose ancestors have sinned against Yahweh (Zech 1:3), and Obadiah where the prophet directs a divine word to and against Edom (v. 1). In these cases, the divine double imperative is used either to announce judgment on recalcitrant foreign nations or to call the community of ancient Israel to a different understanding of activity it should carry out with respect to its deity. These prophetic

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uses could shed light on the odd appearance of the double imperative in Isa 56:1. Amos announced Yahweh’s judgment on foreign nations as an introduction to his indictment of the Southern Kingdom of Judah (2:4–5) and the Northern Kingdom of Israel (2:6–16) because of failure in behavior, while Obadiah presents an oracle against Edom. Haggai and Zechariah, although differing in their message, urged the community to adopt an alternative perspective that in each case recognizes the imminence of divine activity and the need for a human response. The double imperative at the outset of Trito-Isaiah acts as an oracle against (or better, to) humanity, calling it to account, with particular attention to the importance of actions consistent with the deity’s favor. These two features—the divine oracle and the requisite behavioral component— play an important role in the subsequent prophecies. The appearance of the divine messenger formula in Isa 56:1 is unusual even within Isaiah in that it is the only occasion in which the addressees are not identified more specifically (also Leclerc 2001: 133). The rather general nature of the intended audience is reinforced further through the mention of humanity and the human person in the subsequent verse (1:2). The addressees are defined not by nationality or religious affiliation but by general terms that together could function as a split hendiadys denoting the full range of what it is to be human (Melamed 1961: 149; noted by Leclerc 2001: 133). Instead of specifying the community more particularly, the second verse clarifies just and righteous behaviors. Indeed, it indicates what is required, that is, Sabbath keeping (reinforced by a triple imperative—holding it fast, guarding it, and not profaning it) as well as guarding oneself from doing anything wicked. The oracles of Trito-Isaiah will define more precisely how one responds to this summons to all humanity. Immediately after the divine call in the opening verses of TritoIsaiah, the prophet delineates two groups who have no need to fear the intervention of Yahweh (56:3–7). Eunuchs and foreigners can be included among the worshiping community, in spite of the fact that they have been explicitly forbidden to do so in Deuteronomy 23. Although redactional analyses have focused on the relationship of 56:1–2 to the verses that follow, the unit closes naturally in v. 8, where the concluding messenger formula, nĕûm ʾadonāy Yhwh, appears (albeit out of its typical placement). 3 The vague ambiguity of the addressees in vv. 1–2 gives way to more concrete expression in vv. 3–7, which define the human person more particularly. Foreigners and eunuchs are the first group to be called out for inclusion in the Yahweh community. In common with 3. See Smith 1995: 50–66 and the references therein.

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the ʾĕnôš and the ben ʾādām, the acceptance of the eunuchs and foreigners depends on their observance of Sabbath worship and behaving according to principles acceptable to Yahweh. To them is applied another criterion, however: commitment to the covenant (bĕrît). Eunuchs who accept these three criteria can be included in the community, 4 whereas the foreigners who adhere to these three principles can participate in temple service. 5 It appears to be a startlingly inclusive message, whereby the restrictions of Deuteronomy are overturned. 6 The oracle at the very outset of the redacted material of Trito-Isaiah presents a programmatic vision that is at odds with what is promulgated in the nucleus. P. Smith, for example, has noted correspondence between the vocabulary used of foreigners in the nucleus and in the opening verses (1995: 59–60). For instance, in 56:6 the foreigners themselves serve Yahweh, but in 60:10 they serve the Israelites (cf. 60:7). Instead of playing a peripheral role in the age of divine intervention, the foreigners have a central role, as members of the community and even priests in the temple. Eunuchs have a place as well, so that neither physical disability nor ethnicity creates a separation from Yahweh’s purposes for the new age and society. Does this grand vision of internationalization or universalism mean that all foreigners can participate in the age of Yahweh’s rule? On the basis of nilwâ in v. 3, Blenkinsopp, for example, has argued that the foreigners are further specified as proselytes (1990). That is most likely true. However, his argument has been used to suggest that Trito-Isaiah does not create a universal vision, but concentrates instead only on the role of proselytes and the community. As we will see, Trito-Isaiah defines communal membership on the basis of criteria that is determinative for all people, whether of the former nation of Judah or from other, formerly “enemy,” nations. Proselytism, in this sense, is an issue common to all persons (the ʾĕnôš and the ben ʾādām), rather than to foreigners and eunuchs alone. So, the issue is not proselytism per se but rather the nature of the community desired by the deity and envisioned by the prophet. The closing verse of the unit acts as a link to vv. 1 and 2. It again speaks prosaically and generally, “Thus says Adonay Yhwh, who 4. On the different interpretations of the prophecy to the eunuchs, see van Winkle 1997 and the references therein. 5.  Note that the language employed denotes temple service: “to minister (srt) to Yahweh” and “to be his servants”; arguably also the expression “to love the name of Yahweh.” 6. The suggestion by Pauritsch (1971) that these references only connote the exiles taken to Babylon, although attractive, cannot be correct.

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gathers the outcasts of Israel, I will gather others to them besides those already gathered” (56:8). The concluding messenger formula appears at the beginning of the verse, where it functions somewhat like the kôh āmār Yhwh in v. 1. The rhetorical strategy may be particular to the TritoIsaiah redactor or indicate a later addition. Verse 8 has thought in common with 66:18–24, which has long been considered a later addition to the whole of the edited collection. But to whom does the unit refer? Does this verse narrow further, from all humanity to foreigners and eunuchs to only the Israelites in exile, or does it contain a vision of the new community of foreigners and exiles (and refugees?) together? The root qābāṣ, “to gather,” is found in only 5 verses in Trito-Isaiah. It found twice in 56:8, in the nucleus with reference to exiled sons and daughters gathering to Zion (60:4), of sacrificial animals from the nations gathering to Jerusalem to offer themselves on Yahweh’s altar (60:7), in a promise to the restoration community that what their produce will remain theirs to consume (62:9), and in the closing framework where the nations gather to Jerusalem to witness the divine effulgence (66:18). When used of persons, its referents include both the exiles and the nations. As a closing statement for the general call in vv. 1–2 and the open invitation to the eunuchs and foreigners in vv. 3–7, it must refer to a wide range of people. Moreover, as the summary of the divine speech in vv. 1–7, it indicates that there are many yet to be gathered to the restoration community who have not even been conceived of in specific terms. 7 It should surely be considered to reflect the thought begun in vv. 1–2 because it closes off the unit in which Yahweh’s oracle to humanity has invited an international community to take part in the divine restoration being brought about in Jerusalem. Another way to ascertain the recipients of the divine intention stated already in 56:1–8 is to consider the addresses of the salvation and judgment oracles. The oracles of salvation speak directly to or otherwise predict a positive future for a wide range of peoples. These include “foreigners” (56:6–7; cf. “the son of the foreigner” in 56:3), “eunuchs” (56:4–5; cf. 56:3), “the outcasts of Israel” (56:8), “the one who takes refuge in [God]” (57:13b), “[God’s] people” (57:14; 65:10, 22), Zion (59:20), “those in Jacob” (59:20), Jerusalem (65:18, 19; 66:12), “[God’s] servants” (65:8, 9; 3× in 65:13–15; 66:14), “descendants from Jacob” (65:9), “inheri­ tors of my mountain from Judah” (65:9), “my chosen ones” (65:15, 22), “her people” (with reference to Jerusalem in 65:18, 19), “offspring” (65:23), “those humble and contrite in spirit” (66:2), “those who tremble 7.  The interpretation suggested here helps to adjudicate interpretations of 66:1– 24, in favor of a more universal understanding.

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at Yahweh’s word” (66:2), and “kindred from all the nations” (66:20). A national identity (indicated by terms such as Zion, Jacob, Jerusalem, and other expressions indicative of election traditions) is supplemented by vocabulary of a more international character, such as the terms foreigners, eunuchs, and nations. In addition, Yahweh’s salvific activity will occur on behalf of a more general and elusive group, such as those spoken of with reference to the deity (e.g., chosen ones, servants, those taking refuge in God), and still others characterized even more vaguely, such as the ones who are humble and contrite in spirit and those who tremble at Yahweh’s word. There are two strategies apparent here. The prophecies of Trito-Isaiah expand those who are included among Yahweh’s community, beyond the claims made by the people themselves in their communal lament of 63:7–64:11. The only language in common between the two is the terms (ʿām, “people,” and ʿăbādîm, “servants.” Similarly, although it contains language consistent with the central chapters (60–62), such as Jerusalem and Zion, the redactor of Trito-Isaiah includes a more varied group for inclusion than just a national identity. Rather than defining the community of God only according to a close relationship determined through events consistent with ancient Israel’s salvation-historical traditions, the prophecies of Trito-Isaiah present a vision of the community that is open to a wide range of people, seemingly including the different communities that experienced the downfall of Jerusalem in 587 as well as peoples of foreign nations and those forbidden by the Deuteronomic Code from inclusion. In this way, Trito-Isaiah supports the understanding promoted in its opening verses, whereby access to Yahweh’s rule is extended beyond political or ethnic definitions. The second rhetorical strategy emphasizes this point even further. The Trito-Isaiah redactor tends to pluralize the recipients of the divine salvation oracles. This produces the effect of generalizing the audience, making it as unspecific as possible. As such, the prophetic idea of the society to be created is not correctly regarded as a national, a geographical, or even an ethnic one. It is a community more open than closed. In contrast to those for whom the saving actions of Yahweh are predicted, a less-lengthy list cites those destined for judgment. These include “children of a sorcerer” (57:3), “seed of an adulterer” (57:3), “a woman who acts as a whore” (57:3), “children of rebellion” (57:4), “seed of a lie” (57:4), a wĕātem or “but you” group (57:13a; 65:11, 13, 14), “the wicked” (pl.; 57:20–21), “my people” (58:1), “the house of Jacob” (58:1), “stiff-necked people” (65:2), and “enemies” (66:14). Furthermore, the actions of the evildoers are described in lengthy passages, such as 59:1–16a and 65:1–66:17. The language used in these judgment oracles

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indicates cultic violations in the main. For example, in 57:3–13, fertility language is employed in order to castigate the community for a range of worship practices considered by the writer to be unorthodox (see also chaps. 65–66; Schramm 1995; Middlemas 2005b: 77–80). The language employed of those for whom judgment is predicted in Trito-Isaiah is even more general and elusive than that found of those included in the prophecies of salvation. In addition, the prophet indicates that some of the lamenters of 63:7–64:11 are included in the portion of the community doomed by the use of the terms “people” (ʿām) and “house of Jacob”—directly parallel to the expression “house of Israel.” As in the salvation oracles, the Trito-Isaiah redactor generalizes the language employed for the parties destined for judgment. They are called children, seed, evil doers, stiff-necked people, and enemies. Even more general, they are portrayed as opposing Yahweh’s servants through the use of the expression wĕātem (“but you”). Again, this rhetorical strategy functions to make the addressees more unspecific. There are a number of persons to whom the prophecies are applicable and the prophet fails to be more specific in clarifying the identity of the addressees more exactly. It is also worth noting that the list of judged members of society is shorter than the list of persons included in the salvific purposes of the deity. Through this, the prophetic redactor indicates that the divine purposes are to save rather than to destroy. In addition and perhaps more importantly for our purposes, the prophet shows carefully that the identity of the community members destined for salvation or judgment is not his to determine more particularly. At the point of divine intervention, Yahweh will establish a society of members deemed fit to participate in the new age of divine rule. It is instructive to compare the view of the nations in the redacted material with that found in the prophecies that contain a more nationalistic and geographical perspective (e.g., chaps. 60–62, 63:1–6, 63:7– 64:11). The writer of the redacted material also foresees the transfer of the wealth of the nations to Jerusalem (66:12) and that foreigners will be gathered to witness the reversal of fortunes being brought about by Yahweh (66:18–20). As with the Yehudites, not all foreigners are included in the Yahweh community envisioned by the prophet. When the redactor of Trito-Isaiah refers to the nations in a way reminiscent of the central verses, he employs the usual and expected term gôyîm (66:12, 18–20). The term, however, is not used exclusively of foreign nations. What is quite remarkable is that the prophet makes it clear that the people who consider themselves part of Yahweh’s community can be considered foreign or gôy. In 58:2, when they fail to enact the righteousness of Yahweh, they are said to be “like a foreign nation” (kĕgôy).

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Isa 58:1–2 introduces a situation in the community worthy of criticism. As such, the copula that begins v. 2 continues the indictment of v. 1b (Sekine 1989: 122; Smith 1995: 105; Koole 2001: 124–25). Language more generally used of foreign nations is being applied to the particular community of ancient Israel, termed “a people” and “the house of Jacob” (58:1). When the people who see themselves traditionally as part of Yahweh’s chosen community act in a manner that is not consistent with Yahwism, they are comparable to a foreign nation. Similarly, in 65:1 when they are criticized for not seeking Yahweh, they are again gôy. It is widely held that chap. 65 responds to the communal lament raised in 63:7–64:11. As Schramm notes rather emphatically, it rejects the statement that the lamenters are all Yahweh’s community (1995: 154–56). Elsewhere in Isaiah, gôy and ʿām are parallel in contexts of judgment (Isa 1:4, 10:6; cf. Zeph 2:9; Smith 1995: 133). The indictment indicates that the people become gôy when they do not call on the name of Yahweh (65:1) and act in a rebellious manner (65:2). Normally, the term gôy is employed for the foreign nations in the Old Testament, but it can be used with reference to ancient Israel (Cody 1964). Found in these two verses as indictments of the people, its use shows that the prophet of the redacted material attributes what is foreign to those people acting in ways inconsistent with Yahwism as he defines it. Moreover, its appearance here illustrates the redacted message about the nature of the identity of the community. For the prophet, the community of Yahweh is not determined by ethnicity, lineage, nationality, or geography, but rather on the basis of activity. Behavioral Component For Trito-Isaiah, it is clear that a special relationship with Yahweh cannot be claimed by all the people. The use of alternating salvation and judgment oracles within a single prophetic address—a form particular to Trito-Isaiah, as Hanson has shown—provides a literary example of how a division in the community is perceived. The crucial question still remains about who is being separated. Trito-Isaiah delineates between different groups through the use of contrasting vocabulary to characterize the recipients of positive and negative predictions. In so doing, a conscious effort is made to grant more groups of people access to the divine community envisioned by the prophetic circle. While the prophecies of Trito-Isaiah exhibit rhetoric that extends membership of the community further than elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, the basis for inclusion narrows at the same time. It is this feature of the collection that has led scholars to talk about its confessional nature.

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Indeed, the oracles of salvation and judgment are motivated on the basis of further criteria. The groups are divided throughout on the basis of behavior, either favorable or unfavorable to Yahweh. This is an important feature of the lists of addressees: “he will come to Zion as Redeemer, to those in Jacob who turn from transgression” (59:20) and “Sharon shall become a pasture for flocks, and the Valley of Achor a place for herds to lie down, for my people who have sought me” (65:10). Exemplifying a more negative note is “I held out my hands all day long to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices” (65:2). Prescribed behavior that is favorable to Yahweh includes keeping the sabbath (56:2, 4, 6; 58:13), refraining from doing anything wicked (56:2), doing things that please Yahweh (56:4), keeping the covenant (56:4, 6), joining to Yahweh (56:6), ministering to Yahweh (56:6), loving the name of Yahweh (56:6), acting as servants (56:6), and not dealing falsely (63:8). These positive prescriptions are differentiated from other behaviors that clearly cause a separation from Yahweh and the community being envisioned. These include idolatrous worship practices denoted by the imagery of the green tree and child sacrifice (57:5 directed to the children of vv. 3–4; 57:6–10, directed to the woman of v. 3; 65:3, 4, 7, 11; 66:17), lying (57:11, 59:13), failing to remember Yahweh (57:11, 65:11), rebellion—most often used with reference to the covenant and in conjunction with idol worship (58:1, 59:13, 65:2, 66:24), sins (58:1, 59:2), forgetting the holy mountain (65:11), not acting (or enacting) mišpāṭ (58:2, 59:4, 8, 12, 13), shedding innocent blood (59:7); turning away from or not seeking God (59:13, 65:1), oppression (59:13), walking in one’s own ways that are not good (65:2), not answering or listening (65:12, 66:4), doing what was evil (66:4; cf. 56:2, 58:2), and choosing what does not please the deity (66:4; cf. 56:4). Actions considered to be inconsistent with Yahwism foreclose on the possibility of communal membership, while the positive prescriptions function to make available Yahweh’s salvation for groups of people not normally thought of in conjunction with the chosen people. Expanding perceptions of the community beyond those that found expression in the communal lament to foreigners and eunuchs, for example, depends in many cases on criteria determined by actions, specifically those that adhere to Yahwistic precepts as defined by the prophet. The importance of a behavioral component to the prophet becomes more apparent when the communal lament of 63:7–64:11 is contrasted with what has been viewed as a second communal lament in chap. 59. In chap. 59, a direct correlation is made between the transgression of the people and the delay of Yahweh’s salvation. It is probably right that

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Hanson classifies this not as a lament proper, but as a salvation and judgment oracle, in which the speaker responds to the people’s complaint that they are languishing (1975: 119–20). As such, the failure of the deity to return is based on the actions of the people, “your iniquities have separated between you and your god” (59:12). In this instance, the reference to sins is not to indict another group; rather, the speaker includes himself and states it is “our transgressions that are multiplied before god” (59:12). In the closing verses, the speaker clarifies the identity of the people Yahweh comes to redeem. It is Zion along with those who refrain from behavior that transgresses the covenant who are included in the new community. So behavior acts as the measuring rod determining who makes up the community and who does not. Is it possible to be more specific about what behavior Trito-Isaiah seeks? In 56:1–8, we found that the definition of the community was expanded on the basis of Sabbath worship, holding fast to the covenant, and participating in behavior pleasing to Yahweh. Certain texts from Deuteronomy seem to represent the ideas with which Trito-Isaiah grapples, including Deuteronomy 23, where issues of physical integrity and ethnicity appear (see Schramm 1995 and the discussion therein). In addition, P. Smith points to Deuteronomy 28, 30, and 39 as the background of Isaiah 65 (Smith 1995: 143–46). Leclerc is the most confident in that he finds that the term mišpāṭ refers to the Mosaic covenant in Isaiah 56–66 (2001: 136; cf. Westermann 1966; Kendall 1984). It may be the case that Trito-Isaiah is responding to the covenant of Deuteronmy, but it remains uncertain if the prophetic book has a concept of the Torah as such. The prophet calls the covenant in Isaiah 56–66 bĕrît; and never actually uses the term tôrâ. Worthy of further note is that the positive prescriptions for behavior are less numerous than the negative injunctions. In this respect, the prophet is being more clear about what not to do and remains open with regard to actions consistent with Yahwism. The guidelines offered by the prophet include a specific command to observe the Sabbath but remain rather general with regard to the covenant stipulations and to the exact behaviors regarded as pleasing to Yahweh. The list of negative injunctions adds some clarity, by defining at least what is not pleasing to Yahweh. In particular, the most problematic behavior in Isaiah 56–66 relates to the practice of unorthodox religious practices (idolatry) as defined by the prophet of the redacted material. The continued worship of other deities either in conjunction with or as oppossed to the worship of Yahweh delays divine intervention. By referring to general precepts that serve as guidelines, the prophetic redactor remains as open as possible about who has access to the community.

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The Role of Divine Intervention There are four scenes of divine intervention in the collection and they underscore what has been observed heretofore. The fulfillment of predictions of divine salvation on behalf of a suffering covenant people in chaps. 60–62 occurs in 63:1–6 when the divine warrior comes to trample the enemies of the nation (here named Edom) as one tramples grapes in a wine press. As in prophecy from the First Temple period, the future restoration of Jerusalem is considered to be inextricably linked with the defeat and subjugation of the nations. Three other theophanic scenes appear that qualify the vision of the vengeful (and bloody) Yahweh. The first theophanic scene that most clearly balances the one in 63:1–6 appears in the concluding verses of chap. 59, where a communal lament functions as a salvation and judgment oracle to delineate lapses among members of the community. The divine warrior enters history in order to sort out the rampant injustice of the covenant community at the conclusion of a section in which a list of covenant injustices forms the basis of the prophetic rebuke of the people (59:15b–20). In particular, this scene of the divine warrior acting against the covenant people is thought to function like a bookend, counterbalancing the avenger who defeats the nations in 63:1–6. Both surround the unequivocal statements of divine salvation in chaps. 60–62 and establish Yahweh’s purposes and, indeed, victory over internal and external enemies. Otherwise, Smith has argued that 56:1–8 represents a scene of divine intervention (1995: 53). The first and the last verses of the unit correspond to each other, with v. 1 providing an indication of Yahweh’s salvific intentions and v. 8 showing the fulfillment of divine intervention. Contrary to the message of the central chapters with their focus on the divine purposes only for the enrichment and renewal of Judah, Yahweh intercedes in history to create an inclusive community. Eunuchs and foreigners are not automatically separated out for destruction, while the temple becomes the location for the worship of all peoples. One further scene of divine intervention appears in 66:1–6 and balances 56:1–8 with the centrality of the temple. The final divine theophanic passage unveils the message of the redactor more fully. In so doing, the text focuses attention on the enemies—defined more particularly as those who are not worshiping Yahweh correctly—in opposition to those destined for a Yahwistic future. The first and last verses correspond with references to the temple. Yahweh in 66:1 announces the purposes for building the temple, while v. 6 shows that the fulfillment of temple construction is the appearance of the deity to establish

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divine rule. Sandwiched in between, the prophet delineates clearly between two groups. 8 (2b) But this is the man to whom I will look, he that is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word. (3) “He who slaughters an ox kills a man; he who sacrifices a lamb breaks a dog’s neck; he who presents a cereal offering offers swine’s blood; he who makes a memorial offering of frankincense blesses an idol. These have chosen their own ways, and their soul delights in their abominations; (4) I also will choose affliction for them, and bring their terror upon them; because, when I called, no one answered, when I spoke they did not listen; but they did what was evil in my eyes, and chose that in which I did not delight.’ (5) Hear the word of Yahweh, you who tremble at his word: ‘Your brethren who hate you and cast you out for my name’s sake have said, “Let Yahweh be glorified, that we may see your joy”; but it is they who shall be put to shame. (6) “Hark, an uproar from the city! A voice from the temple! The voice of Yahweh rendering recompense to his enemies!”

The scene of divine intervention in 56:1–8 finds its counterpart in 66:1– 6. These passages are similar with respect to the role of divine intervention in creating a means of determining membership in the community. Because the redactor of Trito-Isaiah is mainly concerned with enemies within, a significant portion of his message defines who will have access to the community under Yahweh’s rule in the future. In 56:1–8, he presented an oracle to humanity, whereby he clarified a policy of open access to people previously denied admittance. The crieteria for inclusion, in his view, include Sabbath worship, the observance of the covenant, and refraining from behavior inconsistent with Yahwistic favor. The passage in chap. 66 presents a more detailed vision of who has access to the temple and community in the new age of Yahweh’s rule. Here the concern is to show the limitations. Members of society who either have the wrong attitude toward worship or continue to participate in idolatrous ritual practices are denied entry in the Yahwistic-run order. Then, the prophet indicates a group destined for inclusion, calling them rather vaguely “the humble and contrite in spirit” (literally, the afflicted or oppressed and the stricken of spirit) as well as “the ones who tremble at the divine word” (Isa 66:2; cf. v. 5). He fails to specify their identity more particularly, other than by references denoting oppression as well as devotion. 8.  For the sake of convenience I have quoted the nrsv. I have dealt with this passage and its translation more extensively elsewhere. The reader is referred to the discussion in Middlemas 2005a: 177–81.

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Divine intervention plays a pivotal role in the Trito-Isaiah material. The scenes in which Yahweh is to enter history help to clarify the prophet’s argument on at least two levels. On the first, Yahweh’s appearances coincide in every case with greater understanding of who will form the community in the period of divine rule. In this respect, they mirror the concerns regarding the identity of the community found in the core chapters, with their focus on a national and geographical identity, and the redacted material that carefully defines potential Yahweh worshipers more broadly, while clarifying a behavioral component. Like the redacted material, Yahweh’s salvific intentions have the potential to include an international body of persons while excluding members of the intranational community that fails to observe certain requisite behaviors. On another level, the theophanies function to underscore further what the prophet regards as divine initiative. Yahweh’s appearance in history provides the cataclysmic event that will create division and separation in the community.

Conclusions A close literary study of Trito-Isaiah reveals that the prophetic redactor expands the concept of identity characterized by national or geographical indicators to one that is religious and international. TritoIsaiah’s redefinition was discernible in the terminology employed and the behaviors delineated and in the scenes of divine intervention. Identity according to Trito-Isaiah is flexible but characterized more particularly by obedience to Yahwistic principles. One of the important rhetorical strategies of the redactor of Trito-Isaiah has been to leave things as open as possible—note the pluralized addresses and the vague references even to behaviors consistent with Yahwism. There is a remarkable unspecificity in Trito-Isaiah that cautions against overemphasizing the particular. The question then arises, can Trito-Isaiah be used in discussions of identity in the Second Temple period? Yes and no. The book of Trito-Isaiah presents a view of the community that is not defined on the basis of ethnicity. In this respect, it offers an important counterbalance to material that maintains an ethnic focus. In addition, Trito-Isaiah includes material that grapples with the national and geographical definitions of identity so prevalent elsewhere. It provides a reference point for conceptualizations of Yahweh as a universal deity and what that means for the community. With its concerns about transitions in definitions of identity, Trito-Isaiah seems to continue the thought begun already in the literature commonly regarded as related to the fall of Jerusalem and the deportation of some of its populace in the sixth century b.c.e. (Middlemas 2007). The prophecies

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of Deutero-Isaiah presented a future vision of homecoming and reversal, and Ezekiel 40–48 concentrated more specifically on the centrality of the temple and the purification of praxis after return and reconstruction. The prophets concerned with temple construction further add to ideas about restoration. Haggai spoke more specifically of the need to rebuild the sanctuary to place Yahweh at the center of community life, whereas Zechariah (chaps. 1–8) dealt more fully with the need for social transformation. Common to each is the concept that Yahweh’s intervention in history is on the verge of taking place or already occurring. Trito-Isaiah shared this view of the imminence of divine reversal but placed an even greater emphasis on defining the community acceptable to Yahweh and thus able to participate in the new kingdom to be established. Seen in this light, Isaiah 56–66 radically redefines the basis for communal membership as part of the continued elucidation of conceptions of social, political, and religious life in Second Temple Yehud. At the same time, Trito-Isaiah is less useful when discussed in conjunction with Second Temple literature focused on particular issues, as a reaction to the reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah, for example. Although there is some indication in Isaiah 56–66 that one group finds itself in conflict with another group (e.g., 65:13–14, 66:5), the impressions of disharmony are of a more general nature. The prophet foresees a division made in the community at the point of divine intervention and according to Yahwistic rather than to human action. Nevertheless, Isaiah 56–66 and Ezra contain a rare expression, “the one(s) who tremble at Yahweh’s word” (Isa 66:2, 5 // Ezra 9:4; cf. 10:3) that has been used to align them (Blenkinsopp 1990). Although Ezra also uses the language of servants, not all of Trito-Isaiah’s terms were co-opted. The “oppressed and stricken in spirit” parallel to the tremblers in 66:2 is not found in Ezra. This suggests that Ezra used concepts that were considered consistent with the reforms being made. In addition, the terms were either part of the vocabulary used in the Second Temple period with reference to members of Yehud and do not reflect a reference to Trito-Isaiah, or, alternatively, Ezra drew on language from the tradition of TritoIsaiah that was thought to reflect similar interests. Trito-Isaiah’s vision of the new community adhering to Yahweh’s covenant may have been thought consistent with the reforms carried out by Ezra and the vision of community they represented. Adopting language from Trito-Isaiah would provide, therefore, additional authority and authentication for the activities being carried out at the time of Ezra and Nehemiah. So, Isaiah 56–66 can be brought into discussions of identity and community formation as long as Trito-Isaiah’s intrinsic reticence to the specific is honored. Indeed, discussions of the exact nature of the division in society and its relation to other schismatic situations in the Second

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Temple period have tended to overshadow the prophetic commitment to internationalization. The Trito-Isaiah redactor’s international focus complements rather than supplants intranational conceptions. It is this feature, more than any other, that establishes the distinctiveness of its definitions of identity in the Second Temple period.

References Blenkinsopp, J. 1984 A History of Prophecy in Israel: From the Settlement of the Land to the Hellenistic Period. London: SPCK. 1990 A Jewish Sect of the Persian Period. CBQ 52: 5–20. 2003 Isaiah 56–66: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AnBib 19B. New York: Doubleday. Cody, A. 1964 When Is the Chosen People Called Gôy? VT 14: 1–6. Duhm, B. 1892 Das Buch Jesaia. HAT 3/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Goldenstein, J. 2001 Das Gebet der Gottesknechte: Jesaja 63,7–64,11 im Jesajabuch. WMANT 92. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Gregory, B. 2007 The Postexilic Exile in Third Isaiah: Isaiah 61:tJBL 126: 475–96. Hanson, P. D. 1975 The Dawn of Apocalyptic. Philadelphia: Fortress. Kendall, D. 1984 The Use of mispat in Isaiah 59. ZAW 96: 391–405. Koenen, K. 1990 Ethik und Eschatologie im Tritojesaja buch: Eine literarkritische und redaktionsgeschichtliche Studie. WMANT 62. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Koole, J. L. 2001 Isaiah III, Isaiah 56–66. HCOT. Leuven: Peeters. Kratz, R. G. 2002 Tritojesaja. Theologishe Realenzyklopäidie 34: 124–30. Kraus, H.-J. 1966 Die ausgebliebene Endtheophanie: Eine Studie zu Jesaja 56–66. ZAW 78: 317–32. Leclerc, T. L. 2001 Yahweh Is Exalted in Justice: Solidarity and Conflict in Isaiah. Minneapolis: Fortress. Melamed, E. Z. 1961 Break-Up of Stereotyped Phrases as an Artistic Device in Biblical Poetry. Pp. 115–53 in Studies in the Bible, ed. C. Rabin. Jerusalem: Magnes.

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Middlemas, J. 2005a Divine Reversal and the Role of the Temple in Trito-Isaiah. Pp. 164– 87 in Temple and Worship in Biblical Israel, ed. J. Day. LHBOTS. London: T. & T. Clark. 2005b The Troubles of Templeless Judah. Oxford Theological Monographs. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2007 The Templeless Age: An Introduction to the History, Literature, and Theology of the ‘Exile.’ Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox. Pauritsch, K. 1971 Die neue Gemeinde: Gott sammelt Ausgestossene und Arme (Jesaja 56– 66). AB 47. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute. Rendtoff, R. 1993 Isaiah 56:1 as a Key to the Formation of the Book of Isaiah. Pp. 181–89 in Canon and Theology, ed. M. Kohl. Minneapolis: Fortress. Schniedewind, W. M. 1995 Are We His People or Not? Biblical Interpretation during Crisis. Biblica 76: 540–50. Schramm, B. 1995 The Opponents of Third Isaiah: Reconstructing the Cultic History of the Restoration. JSOTSup 193. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Sekine, S. 1989 Die Tritojesanische Sammlung (Jes 56–66) redaktionsgechichtlich untersucht. BZAW 175. Berlin: de Gruyter. Smith, P. A. 1995 Rhetoric and Redaction in Trito-Isaiah: The Structure, Growth and Authorship of Isaiah 56–66. VTSup 72. Leiden: Brill. Smith-Christopher, D. L. 1989 The Religion of the Landless: The Social Context of the Babylonian Exile. Bloomington, IN: Meyer Stone Books. 2002 Between Ezra and Isaiah: Exclusion, Transformation, and Inclusion of the “Foreigner” in Post-Exilic Biblical Theology. Pp. 117–42 in Ethnicity and the Bible, ed. M. G. Brett. Boston: Brill Academic. Steck, O. H. 1991 Studien zu Tritojesaja. BZAW 203. Berlin: de Gruyter. Westermann, C. 1966 Das Buch Jesaja: Kapitel 40–66. ATD 19. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Williamson, H. G. M. 1989 The Concept of Israel in Transition. Pp. 141–61 in The World of Ancient Israel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1990 Isaiah 63,7–64,11: Exilic Lament or Post Exilic Protest? ZAW 102: 48–58. Winkle, D. W. van 1997 The Meaning of yād wāšēm in Isaiah LVI 5. VT 47: 378–85.

From Ezekiel to Ezra–Nehemiah: Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology Dalit Rom-Shiloni Tel Aviv University

Introduction Perceptions of exclusivity and core-periphery interactions illuminate vivid negotiations within and between the divided people of Judah throughout the sixth and fifth centuries b.c.e. This study focuses on issues of group identity or, more accurately, on strategies of reidentification recorded in exilic and postexilic biblical literature. I would like to return to Frederik Barth’s important observation concerning the socioanthropological phenomenon that nations, or groups within a nation, tend to redefine their collective identity on specific occasions, particularly under threat or distress (Barth 1969: 1–38). This occasional process of reidentification constantly involves reconstructing boundaries of otherness within and between groups. Hence, using the socialpsychology categories of ethnicity and in-group/out-group definition (often called “inclusion” and “exclusion”), the present study focuses on the ideological sphere, that is, on Babylonian exilic ideology as the arena for the constant process of ethnic reidentification over the course of about 150 years. 1 Babylonian exilic ideology is defined here according to two differentyet-intertwined contexts deriving from the term exilic literature. As locative terminology, “exilic literature” specifies exile as the place of writing, compiling, and editing literary compositions. This designation thus pertains to the large corpus of biblical literature authored or edited in Babylon during the sixth century (and probably beyond). 2 “Exilic lit1.  The basic dichotomy between inclusion and exclusion serves Ben Zvi 1995: 96–149. Focusing here on the ideological sphere in biblical sources, I will not address the actual historical-social contexts of this polemic. This and previous volumes contain many up-to-date contributions on that topic. 2. See Thomas 1961: 33–46. Though there is general agreement that the Deuteronomistic compositions, like the editorial strata of Jeremiah and other prophetic

127

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erature” may also be used to designate a category of authorship, that is, literature written by exiles, such as the prophetic books of Ezekiel and Deutero-Isaiah. 3 By this definition, the term also includes literature written by Repatriates in Achaemenid Yehud. 4 Within this category of repatriate authorship fall the late sixth-century prophetic books of Haggai and Zechariah 1–8 and likewise the fifth-century historiography of Ezra–Nehemiah. 5 The following study is thus based on the understanding of Babylonian exilic ideology as comprising the ideologies reflected in the literature written (and/or compiled) both by exiles in Babylon and by repatriates in Achaemenid Yehud. One of the best examples would be the collection of oracles attributed to Deutero-Isaiah, which presumably first took shape in Babylon (Isaiah 40–48) but continued to develop in Yehud (Isaiah 49–66), directed to the community of exiles-now-turned-repatriates. 6 The chronological range starts as early as the first wave of Judean exiles to Babylon in the Neo-Babylonian collections, gained their final shape and diverse additions under the circumstances of the Babyolonian Exile, most of these writings are recognized to have earlier strata originating in Judah (and to lesser extent even earlier, in Israel). For the gradual growth of Kings (as but one example), see Lemaire 2000: 446–60. 3.  For other compositions written in Babylon during the Persian period, see Albertz 2003: 15–44. 4.  Ackroyd (1975: 12–13) emphasizes the extensiveness of this Exilic Period, in which he included “the time of Judah’s collapse,” and “the dark years of exile,” as well as the Restoration period. Compare to Albertz (2003), who discussed the exilic literature down to Deutero-Isaiah but did not include the repatriate literature of the late sixth century in his thorough discussion. 5.  This definition of Babylonian exilic literature/ideology stands independently of the reasonable assumption that literary creativity had also continued during the Exilic Period among Judeans who remained in the land. See Jannssen 1956 and Williamson’s discussion of the penitential prayer in Neh 9:6–37 (1988: 117–31; 1990: 12– 17, 44). My study focuses on the biblical (literary and ideological) mainstream voice, which is clearly governed by the Babylonian Exile and repatriate communities. My assumption is that in late sixth-century Yehud, authors from (at least) two Judean communities (repatriates and “nonexiled” groups) were active, writing from independent, even antagonistic, perspectives (on this I would also counter Ackroyd’s insistence on continuity throughout the period; see Ackroyd 1975: 232–56). 6.  On this literary division of Deutero-Isaiah (40–48, 49–66) I follow Paul (2008: 3–11), who assumes a single prophet who has started his prophetic activity in Babylon and was among the returnees to Zion, where he continued to prophesy to them. Compare to Albertz (2003: 381, 399–404, 428–33), who finds Isaiah 40–66 to be the product of two editorial groups both active in Yehud, DtIE1 (521 b.c.e., pp. 381, 399– 404) and DtIE2 (after 515 and early in the fifth century b.c.e., pp. 429–30). I would oppose Albertz’s assumption that on return to Judah the DtIE1 group changed its audience and now addressed those who had stayed in Judah in an attempt to enfold them into the Repatriate enclave (Albertz 2003: 403–4, 432).

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era (that is, the Jehoiachin exile, 597 b.c.e.) 7 and concludes with the later waves of return, those of Ezra and Nehemiah (458–432 b.c.e.) deep in the Persian period. Accordingly, the geographical spectrum encompasses both literature produced in exile (Ezekiel and Isaiah 40–48) and repatriate literature written in Yehud (Isaiah 49–66, Haggai and Zechariah 1–8, Ezra–Nehemiah). Ezra–Nehemiah’s perceptions of group exclusivity have long been a major target of scholarly criticism. 8 Scholars have mustered valuable data from biblical and mostly extrabiblical sources that illustrate the continuation of Judean existence, albeit in reduced measure, throughout the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods (Lipschits 2005: 258–71). This contrast between history and archaeology on the one hand and the repatriates’ exclusive ideology on the other has dictated the scholarly categorization of Ezra–Nehemiah’s perspective as deliberately biased, reflecting a great postexilic polemic thought to have flared up in Yehud during the Restoration period (Blenkinsopp 1988: 60–70). I would like to address further this ideological, indeed, biased internal polemic but with a somewhat different approach, by examining Ezra–Nehemiah’s positions in a wider context. Synchronically, within early Persian-period literature, Ezra–Nehemiah illustrates only one opposition between “the people,” that is, the repatriates, and all “other” communities residing in Yehud. Another and different opposition is set up in the prophecies of Zechariah (chaps. 1–8). Diachronically, I argue that these two oppositions should be examined by looking back to the context of the Babylonian exilic literature/ideologies. While several ideological shifts may be discerned during this transitory period, Babylonian exilic ideology itself shows clear lines of ideological continuity with Ezekiel. This prophet of the Jehoiachin exiles may have laid the foundations for exilic ideologies that operate throughout the NeoBabylonian and the Persian periods, in both Babylon and Yehud—or from an internal biblical perspective, the time span encompassed by the books of Ezekiel and Ezra–Nehemiah. So Ezra–Nehemiah does not mark the beginning of the internal polemic in Yehud; this book rather 7.  Dan 1:1 (as also 2 Chr 36:6) opens with mention of an exile that took place within Jehoiakim’s third year, 606/5 b.c.e.; though there is no way to corroborate this historical event (see Albertz 2003: 20), Hartman (1978: 29–42) suggests that “the seer of the Book of Daniel is among the exiles in Babylon” (p. 34). 8.  Haggai and Zechariah 1–8 have received much less attention in this scholarly debate. I do not accept the suggestion that Haggai advocates an inclusive all-Israel ideal and thus poses a clear contradiction to the separatist, exclusive position of Ezra–Nehemiah. The latter view is set forth by Japhet 1983: 103–25; Bedford 2001: 270–92; and Kessler 2002: 236; and see pp. 136–137 nn. 30–31 below.

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carries on and transforms a long-lived polemic initiated in the early sixth century b.c.e.

Establishing Exclusivity: Changing Oppositions in Babylonian Exilic Ideology Exclusivity: The Product of Boundary Setting The exclusiveness of one’s own community is the major consequence of setting boundaries between groups. 9 National groups establish their self-identities by utilizing relative categories of distinction, through which they narrow down their “shared characteristics” by the process of differentiation. 10 Exclusivity constitutes a perception of superiority in prestige and rank of one group over any other, and particular stereotyped characteristics symbolize the differences between the antagonistic groups. 11 Motivated by current circumstances, reidentification involves retrospective reflections, which produce new narratives of the groups’ respective histories, based on shared historical traditions (Barth 1969: 32–37; Sparks 1998: 18). Hence, exclusivity operates by processes that continually set in opposition social designations and counterdesignations, as well as arguments and counterarguments advanced to legitimize the status of one group and delegitimize the status of the other(s). Finally, the opponents employ social strategies and counterstrategies to enact the changes advanced in their identities. Two Distinct Oppositions in the Persian Period Though time progresses from earlier to later, in discussing ideological shifts I will go from last to first. This reversed sequence seems to be demanded by the evidence, because postexilic (early Persian) biblical literature written by repatriates advances two distinct perceptions of group exclusivity. We open, then, with what seems to be a significant difference between the historiography and the prophetic compositions, Ezra–Nehemiah and Zechariah 1–8. 12 9.  I discussed these socioanthropological and sociopsychological categories of “otherness” and their relevance to exilic ideology in 2005a: 1–45; see pp. 5–8. On the process of identity formation, see Berquist 2006: 53–65, especially pp. 63–64. 10. See Horowitz 1975: 111–40. According to Horowitz’s model of identity change, groups may widen or narrow their group boundaries, using two contradictory strategies, assimilation (amalgamation or incorporation) and differentiation (division or proliferation). 11.  For this definition of “otherness,” see Smith 1985: 3–48; Green 1985: 49–69, especially p. 50. 12.  With this distinction I call for a more delicate differentiation within the body of repatriate postexilic literature than suggested, for instance, by Carroll 1992: 79– 93; and, following him, Grabbe 1998: 136–38.

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Ezra–Nehemiah Ezra–Nehemiah articulates diverse connections between the repatriates and two different communities. First, the remainder of their in-group, the Babylonian Diaspora, has now become the group left behind, ‫“ וכל הנשאר מכל המקמות אשר הוא גר שם‬those who stay behind, wherever he may be living” (Ezra 1:4), that is, in Babylon. Nevertheless, as of the first return and throughout the Persian period, the repatriates considered themselves part of this community of Babylonian exiles. 13 The Repatriates are those who had once experienced the exile or, more probably, the community descended from exiles. Even after they had already been long resettled in Yehud (for three or four generations), this group continued to identify itself as the Remnant who had returned from exile (and see Neh 8:17: ‫)כל הקהל השבים מן השבי‬. 14 These 13.  Both earlier and later waves of returnees refer themselves to the Babylonian exile carried out by Nebuchadrezzar; see Ezra 2:1, 3:8, and Neh 7:6, for the return under Zerubbabel and Joshua; and again, in reference to Sheshbazzar, see Ezra 5:11–16. Similarly, the later returnees under Ezra (Ezra 7:6, 8:1) identify themselves as coming from Babylon and upon arrival are labeled ‫הבאים מהשבי בני הגולה‬, “The returning exiles who arrived from captivity” (8:35). To these returnees in their different waves of return belong these terms: ‫( בני הגולה‬Ezra 4:1; 6:16, 19, 20; 8:35); ‫גלותא‬ ‫בני‬ (6:21); ‫( קהל הגולה‬10:8); ‫( הגולה‬9:4, 10:6); ‫( בני ישראל השבים מהגולה‬6:21). Ezra 4:12, ‫די יהודיא די סלקו מן לותך עלינא אתו לירושלם‬, “the Jews who came up from you to us have reached Jerusalem,” is considered by Blenkinsopp (1988: 113) to refer to an “aliyah” during the reign of Artaxerxes I (465–424 b.c.e.) and not following the Edict of Cyrus. Finally, the reference to the exiles as returning from captivity appears also in Nehemiah’s memoir, referring to the situation in Jerusalem (Neh 1:1–3, 7:5–6). 14.  All these designations clearly refer to the repatriates and do not encompass any of the people who remained in Judah after the Babylonian Destruction. This is contra Wright (2004: 62–65), who argues that Nehemiah himself is interested in “those remaining in the province and thus [who] escaped deportation” (p. 64), whereas only “the authors of the texts” in Nehemiah 1, 8–9 and the final editors of Ezra–Nehemiah are responsible for this exclusive exilic/repatriate terminology (p. 65). It is also contra Japhet (2006: 432–50, especially pp. 438–39), who finds a common use of the term remnant in Haggai, Zechariah, and Nehemiah to refer to “the people who survived destruction and captivity and remained in Judah” (p. 439). The remnant terminology and conception, however, are relative rather than fixed terms, used by both communities, and thus their meanings change with the speakers. The key term that identifies the “remnant” in these books as the repatriates of earlier returns is ‫“ השבי‬captivity,” used regularly in Ezra–Nehemiah in the phrases “those who return from captivity” (‫ )השבים מן השבי‬and “those who come from captivity” (‫ ;הבאים מהשבי‬see Ezra 2:1 and Neh 7:6; Ezra 3:8, 8:35; Neh 8:17, 9:7); in addition, as Wright (2004: 299) acknowledges, Ezra 9:8 and 13–15 refer to the repatriates as the remnant (‫שארית‬, ‫)פליטה‬, in complete accord with Neh 1:2. Hence, Nehemiah’s geographic location should not confuse scholars. Nehemiah’s mission is focused throughout on his community of repatriates in Yehud, although the in-group designations differ from those mentioned in Ezra.

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designations are further validated by three arguments of exclusivity that are frequently used in Ezra–Nehemiah: (a) Claims of continuity assert that the in-group is the only successor to past group history. The repatriates are ‫“( אנשי עם ישראל‬the men of the people of Israel,” Ezra 2:2, Neh 7:6; ‫בני ישראל‬: Neh 1:6, twice; 2:10; 8:14, 17: ‫ ;זרע ישראל‬Neh 9:1, 2), who have returned and resettled, each in his or her own city (‫איש לעירו‬, Ezra 2:1, 70). The repatriates’ spokespeople further reembrace the terms ‫( עם יהודה‬Ezra 4:4) and ‫ישבי יהודה וירושלים‬, “the residents of Judah and Jerusalem” (4:6 and 5:1), or in Aramaic: ‫שבי‬ ‫יהודיא‬, “the elders of the Jews” (Ezra 5:5; 6:7, 8, 14). Nehemiah uses    ‫היהודים‬ (translated “the Jews,” Neh 1:2; 3:33, 34; 4:6; 5:1, 8, 17; 6:6) or ‫בית יהודה‬ (4:10) as he emphasizes that his contemporaries descend from “those who were the first to come up” (‫העולים בראשונה‬, Neh 7:4–5). 15 (b) Claims of entirety insist that the in-group completely encompasses all heirs to that history. The repatriates claim to be the entire people of Israel, ‫כל העם‬, “all the people” (Neh 10:9, 13), or simply ‫העם‬, “the people” (Ezra 3:1, 11–133). 16 Another and even more powerful device to advocate entirety is the common use of lists in Ezra–Nehemiah; the repatriates are categorized within specific subgroups, the totality of which builds a complete community. In Ezra–Nehemiah, 21 times the community is listed according to its components. Of these, 17 lists follow this pattern: Israel (‫בני ישראל‬, “the chiefs of the clans of Judah and Benjamin”), priests, and Levites (‫ראשי האבות ליהודה ובנימן והכהנים והלוים‬, Ezra 1:5; 3:8, 12; 6:16, 20; 7:7, 13, 24; 8:29; 9:1; 10:5; Neh 8:13; at times complemented by other temple personnel: singers, gatekeepers, and servants, ‫ וכל ישראל‬. . . ‫;הכהנים והלוים ומן העם והמשררים והשוערים והנתינים‬ Ezra 2:70; Neh 7:72; 10:29, 35–40; 11:3). 17 And 4 lists in Nehemiah mention the rest of the people: Jews, priests, nobles, prefects, and other officials (‫ ;וליהודים ולכהנים ולחרים ולסגנים וליתר עשה המלאכה‬Neh 2:16; 4:8, 13; 7:5). 18 These lists seem to be more than a stylistic feature in the histori15.  On genealogy as a genuine focus for continuity, see Albertz 2003: 106–7. 16.  “(All) the people” (‫ כל העם‬/ ‫)העם‬: Neh 4:7, 8, 13, 16; 5:1, 15, 19; 7:4; 8:1; and in parallel to Israel: 8:3, 5 (3 times), 6, 7 (twice), 9 (3 times), 11–13, 16; 10:35; 11:1 (twice), 2; 12:30, 38; 13:1. 17.  Williamson (1985: 15) mentions this tripartite division as “the regular sociological division of the people in the Persian Period,” understanding the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, and Levi “as the only true community” (p. 15). 18. Following Williamson (1985: 191), I understand ‫ היהודים‬to stand for “the population at large”; i.e., not designating a closed specific circle of leaders that then follow. In addition to this second pattern, the former subgroup division (Israel, priests, and Levites, which dominates Ezra) occurs in other descriptions in Neh 7:6–72; chaps. 9–12. See Neh 10:1: officials, Levites, and priests; mentioned together with Israel in 9:1–5; as also 10:2–34, 35–40; 11:3–36; 12:1–30, 31–47. Though nobles and

Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology

133

ography of Ezra–Nehemiah. Their ideological significance is substantiated by their appearances in highly important contexts (such as the reinstitution and dedication of the sanctuary, Ezra 3; dedication of the temple, 6:13–22; reading the torah, Neh 8:13; and so on). Although they mention different subgroups, these lists express the self-reliant status of the repatriates—a clear inclusive tendency, which embraces all the people, embraces all Israel. But this inclusiveness is actually a genuine rhetorical strategy that restricts the community only to the repatriates’ group, ‫הגולה‬, and excludes all others. 19 In sociological terms, entirety is the most accurate and detailed conceptual framework by which to establish in-group/out-group categories, to designate who is considered part of the community and who is not. Finally, (c) annexation marshals religious institutions and historical traditions in the service of a group’s claims. The repatriates reconstruct and appropriate religious institutions: the sanctuary, the Temple with its vessels and personnel (Ezra 1–6); the city wall (Nehemiah 3–4); the high festivals of Passover and Sukkoth (Ezra 3; Nehemiah 8); 20 the practice of reading from the Torah on the initial days of the seventh month and daily in Sukkoth (Nehemiah 8); legal obligations specifically determined by adhering to ‫ספר (תורת) משה‬, “the scroll of the teaching of Moses” (Neh 8:1, 9:14; and 13:1). 21 The repatriates revive national conceptions (the remnant as standing for all of Israel) and actualize historical traditions (such as the exodus, the settlement under Joshua). Casting themselves as the heirs to and the guardians of historical traditions, these repatriates build a powerful argument advocating their exclusive status as the one and only legitimate community of Judeans, Jews, people of Israel, people of God.

prefects are mentioned in Neh 13:11, 17, the overall national subgroups remain the three major ones: Jews, priests, and Levites (13:1–3, 11–12, 28–30). For the sake of the present discussion it is not necessary to delve deeper into the differences behind these two list patterns. While they may indeed reflect levels of literary evolution (as suggested for instance by Wright 2004: 298–301, and passim), both patterns designate the community as a whole throughout Ezra–Nehemiah. 19. For ‫ הגולה‬as a designatory term, see n. 13 above (p. 131). 20. Each wave of repatriates reinstituted festivals and daily cultic customs: Zerubbabel and Joshua were responsible for the reinstitution of the Passover (Ezra 6:19–21); Ezra reinstituted the Sukkoth festival (Neh 8:13–18; 9:1–5), the reading and interpretation of the Torah (Neh 8:1–12), and the reestablishment of the covenant with God (Nehemiah 10); finally, Nehemiah reorganized the ritual institutions of the Jerusalem temple (Neh 12:44–47; 13:1–13, 28–31), emphasized the Sabbath (Neh 13:15–22), and advanced social aspects of moral obedience to God (Nehemiah 5). 21.  Japhet 1988: 99–115. See also “the book of their God” (Neh 9:3).

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Counterdesignations as well as counterarguments play equally important roles in Ezra–Nehemiah. Throughout the three waves of return, the “others” are never known as Judean Yahwists or even Yahwistic Israelites. 22 They are constantly delegitimized and categorized as foreigners, Gentiles, “the peoples of the land” (‫ עמי הארצות‬,‫)עם הארץ‬. 23 Because this topic has been so much discussed, it suffices only to call attention to the fact that Ezra–Nehemiah applies three major yet different “nonJudahite” identifications to those “peoples of the land.” First, in referring to the return of Zerubbabel and Joshua (Ezra 1–6), the actual identity of the amalgamated groups designated as ‫עמי הארצות‬, “the peoples of the land,” or the singular ‫עם הארץ‬, is obscured (“The people of the land,” who appear as adversaries of ‫“ העם‬the people,” Ezra 3:3, or “the people of Judah,” that is, the repatriates, 4:4). The only characteristic they do explicitly hold (and hold in common) is their being “of the land.” According to the self-designation ‫צרי יהודה ובנימין‬, “the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin,” quoted in Ezra 4:1–4 (and vv. 9–10, 17), these peoples are the descendants of multiethnic deportees brought from afar to the Assyrian province of Samaria; they are not even of a single national group. 24 The author uses the argument of continuity against these peoples, put into their own mouths. They cannot even claim to be the ancient (autochtonic) residents of the land. They themselves are deportees of foreign nationalities who had no previous connection to God, to the land, or to the people of Israel. Moreover, they themselves recognize the continuing relationship of Yhwh to the repatriates (‫כי‬ ‫—)ככם נדרוש לאלהיכם‬God is their (the repatriates’) God, while ‫צרי יהודה‬ ‫ ובנימין‬only “offer sacrifices to Him” (‫ ולא| אנחנלו זבחים‬v. 2; Qere: |‫)ולו‬. 25 22.  Exceptions to this categorical dichotomy may only occur in Neh 5:8, 17, but see Williamson 1985: 239–40, 244–45. This opposition suggested in Ezra–Nehemiah does not recognize any of the other Yahwistic communities that were in existence as of the early sixth century; for instance, the community of Judeans in Egypt. See Albertz 2003: 134–35. 23.  On the possible meanings of these designations, see Nicholson 1965: 59–66; Blenkinsopp 1988: 108; and the recent but less persuasive Fried 2006: 123–45. 24.  Although the exact historical reference in this passage to Esarhaddon as the Assyrian king who brought foreign peoples to Samaria does not accord with 2 Kgs 17:24–41, it is quite enough rhetorically (in terms of the present discussion) to substantiate the foreign origin of the “other” peoples currently living in the land. For the possible historical background, see Blenkinsopp 1988: 105–7. 25. The Qere/Ketiv tradition (Ketiv: ‫ולא‬, Qere: ‫ )ולו‬tells of the theological/ideological difficulties the Masoretes faced in reading it. See Williamson 1985: 42; and compare to his reconstruction of the tension between the “native” Judahites and the returnees as political, based on 4:3 (pp. 49–50). Zerubbabel interprets King Cyrus’ decree to the returnees as restricting the personnel authorized to join the project.

Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology

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Second, in reference to Ezra’s return to Jerusalem (Ezra 7–10), outside groups are mentioned only in the context of the issue of intermarriage (chaps. 9–10). “The people of Israel” or “the holy seed” (9:1–2) did not separate themselves from “the peoples of the land” (9:2, 11), who are characterized as acting in continuity with the behavior of a detailed list of former foreign peoples: the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians (v. 2). 26 As much as the typological nature of this list of ancient peoples gives it no historical credibility and can hardly shed light on the contemporary identity of these peoples of the land, these very characteristics are extremely valuable for their implicit ideological statement: these peoples of the land are foreigners, as foreign as can possibly be, peoples with whom interrelationships are legally forbidden: the Canaanites, the Transjordanian peoples, and the people of Egypt. Third, Nehemiah 1–13 suggests two distinct counterdesignations. Chapters 9–10 use the obscure and general terms and set up an opposition between “the stock of Israel” and “all foreigners” from whom they are to separate (Neh 9:2); and the oath the repatriates take to follow “the Teaching of God,” his commandments, rules, and laws opens with the demand to cut themselves off from “the peoples of the land” (Neh 10:31, 32). In Nehemiah’s memoir, however, Nehemiah’s opponents are very clearly marked and defined by personal name and national identity: Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite, and Geshem the Arab (Neh 2:10, 19; 6:1–9, 11–19; 13:1–13). The conspiracy against the people in Jerusalem headed by Sanballat and Tobiah is joined by the Arabs, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites (4:1–2). 27 Similarly, Nehemiah’s list of “foreign women,” unlike Ezra’s (9:2), includes only Ashdodites, Ammonites, and Moabites (Neh 13:23). 28 The overarching opposition in Ezra–Nehemiah is thus posed between the repatriates and the peoples of the land, which the sources 26.  Other general references to the foreign women: “the peoples of these abominations,” Ezra 9:14; “foreign women from the peoples of the land,” 10:3, 11, 17, 44. Ezra 9:1 (and 12) alludes to legal materials and creates an “exegetical blend” out of Deut 7:1–4, 23:4–9 (thus Blenkinsopp 1988: 175–76); and see Exod 23:23–24, 34:11–16; Lev 18:1–5, which adds the abhorrent deeds of Egypt to those of Canaan (so Williamson 1985: 129–31). See Japhet 2007: 379–401. 27. On the geographic orientation of this list of adversaries, see Blenkinsopp 1988: 247; Williamson 1985: 225. 28.  While the Ashdodite women are the focus of this incident (Neh 13:24), the mention of Amonite and Moabite women seems to follow Deut 23:4–8. Together with the reference to Solomon’s sins (1 Kgs 3:12–13, 11:1–6), both texts supply an appropriate context to exhort the present community. On the application of these authoritative texts, see Blenkinsopp 1988: 363–64.

136

Dalit Rom-Shiloni

introduce as of different amalgamated nationalities. The absence of any reference to Judeans or Israelite-Yahwistic communities in the land is noteworthy in a context that intentionally obscures other national identities; the three major perspectives on “the peoples” are marked by inconsistencies and deviations and feature among them the anachronistic mention of the ancient peoples of Canaan and its surroundings. Hence, Lester L. Grabbe (1998: 138) observes correctly that “the text simply refuses to admit that there were Jewish inhabitants of the land after the deportations under Nebuchnezzar. . . . One can only conclude that many, if not all, these ‘people of the land’ were the Jewish descendants of those who were not deported.” 29 Accepting what seems indeed to be an inevitable conclusion, I would call attention to the ideological strategies that advance this position. Amalgamation (a + b = c) serves in Ezra–Nehemiah as an overall strategy to unify and denigrate outsiders. In contrast, the repatriates separate themselves from this amalgamated mongrel “other” population by advocating their own genuine and distinctive (versus “amalgamated”) status; in religion, culture, national history, law, and politics, the repatriates are “the Judeans (Jews)”—or should we say “the [true] Judeans (Jews).” Placed in a wider, roughly synchronic context, the exclusivizing perceptions noted in Ezra–Nehemiah illustrate but one type of opposition; another quite-different opposition is established in the prophecies of Zechariah (1–8). Zechariah 1–8 Zechariah 1–8 testifies to the perspective found among the repatriate community in Yehud under the leadership of Zerubbabel and Joshua (Zech 3:1, 4:9). 30 The two small prophetic collections Zechariah 1–8 and 29.  See also Williamson (1985: 46): “The possibility of true Jews being among them is simply not envisaged in these books.” Studies of the historical-sociological reality of this presentation have empowered the assumption that any Yahwistic communities of either Judeans or Israelites were disregarded. Dor (2006: 94–98, 245–52) arrived at this same conclusion, arguing that six different ceremonies of separation are described in Ezra–Nehemiah. 30.  Due to space limitations, I discuss here only Zechariah 1–8. Nevertheless, I should comment on Haggai’s independent positions in reference to group identity issues. I would agree with Kessler (2002: 263–64) that “the absence of conflict evidenced in Haggai is highly striking. Simply put, the book contains no ‘other’—that is to say, no denigrated population distinct from ‘true Israel.’. . . The book deliberately obscures whatever divisions may have existed and presents a stylized and schematic portrait of the community as acting in concert in obedience to the word of Yahweh through the prophet Haggai.” I would, however, challenge Kessler’s conclusion that

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137

Haggai cover a very short time span (522–520 b.c.e., but only three months within 520 b.c.e. in Haggai) and tell of prophets who no doubt addressed the community of the repatriates from the Babylonian captivity in Yehud. 31 Zechariah’s prophecies focus on the return, which he designates first and foremost as the return of God after a long period of anger and absence (Zech 1:7–17, 2:14–16, 8:1–3). Having returned to Zion, His city, God brings the people, Judah, and resettles them in the land (1:16–17), in their previous territorial allocation: ‫ונחל ה’ את יהודה חלקו על אדמת הקדש‬ “The Lord will bestow Judah upon his portion in the Holy Land” (2:16; also 8:4–8). 32 The repatriates are now to fill the towns of Judah again (1:17) and specifically Zion (8:6–8). The restoration of the temple was the major mission of the time articulated by both prophets (Zech 4:9; 6:9–14; 7:1–7; 8:9, 18–19; also Hag 1:2–14; 2:1–9, 10–19). This setting within the repatriate community goes hand in hand with the way Zechariah conceptualizes the state of the land of Judah during the Exile. The prophet describes a single prior deportation that left Judah in complete desolation (Zech 1:7–17, 7:14). Hence, in contrast Haggai was a nonrepatriate, or at least did not return with Zerubabel (for a similar suggestion, see also Bedford 2001: 273). For differences between Haggai and Zechariah on identity issues, see Japhet 2006: especially 433–37. Contra Kessler, Bedford, and Japhet, however, I would consider Haggai’s purported ignorance of—or failure to mention—any “others” as a consciously excluding strategy and not as evidence of the prophet’s inclusive outlook. 31.  The proposition that these collections address the repatriates, and only them, is substantiated by (a) other biblical testimony: Ezra–Nehemiah mentions the two prophets together as encouraging the Jews in Jerusalem to complete the reconstruction of the temple (Ezra 5:1, 6:14); (b) the leadership of Zerubbabel and Jeshua (Haggai 1:1; Zechariah 3–4), who are (c) the major addressees of Zechariah’s prophecies (Zechariah 3, 4); (d) other persons mentioned by name (Heldai, Tobijah, Jedaiah, and Josiah son of Zephaniah), who are designated (via an inclusio) as part of ‫הגולה‬ “from the exiled community,” people “who have come from Babylon” (Zech 6:9–14). Petersen (1984: 18–19) has aptly emphasized that “Haggai’s own life history remains enigmatic”; nevertheless, Petersen (1984: 55–60) holds to the position that Haggai addressed both repatriates and nonexiled Judeans. I would challenge Haggai’s connections with the nonexiled Judeans. 32.  Compare to the njpsv: “The Lord will take Judah to Himself as His portion in the Holy Land,” which understands the portion as an apposition to Judah—the people, not the territory (see also Meyers and Meyers 1987: 162, 169; on linguistic and semantic grounds, I would object to the parallels drawn by Meyers and Meyers between Zech 2:16 and naḥal in Exod 34:9 and Ps 82:8). I have suggested above a different translation, in which the portion is a second object to the verb naḥal, following the common biblical phrase that otherwise uses the causative (Hiphil), “Yhwh/PN hinhil ʾet-(Nation/PN) ʾet-(land),” as in Deut 3:28, 21:16; Josh 1:6; Prov 8:21.

138

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to Ezra–Nehemiah, Zechariah articulates an opposition between the repatriates and an empty city and land. 33 This conception of the land as a “vacuum” encompasses nonexiled Judeans as well as any other peoples. Zechariah 1–8 has no counterdesignations for any resident population of Yehud. 34 Whereas at face value these two lines of opposition reveal a major distinction between the historiography of Ezra–Nehemiah and the prophetic perspective of Zechariah (and implicitly Haggai), it is important to notice that these repatriate-exilic ideologies share the same basic excluding tendency. The repatriate-exilic community of the Persian period styles itself as the one and only people of Judah, people of God, confronting on its return either an empty land or foreign peoples. Independently of each other, these two perspectives convey a complete disregard for any other Judean/Israelite-Yahwistic communities, in Yehud or elsewhere. These diverse excluding presentations lead me to suggest that exclusivity was not an innovation of the Restoration period or an invention introduced for the first time in Yehud on the repatriates’ return. 35 To discover the origins of this exclusive ideology, which intentionally ignores the existence of other Judean communities, we must make a diachronic survey and continue our investigation of Babylonian exilic ideology backward to its earliest phase. Ezekiel’s Two Oppositions Ezekiel brings us to the beginnings of Babylonian deportations from Judah. The first deportation, the Jehoiachin Exile (597 b.c.e.) was fol33. This is then a clearly divisive presentation that demonstrates Zechariah’s repatriate-exilic position in this conflict as well. Contra Bedford 2001: 264–68. 2 Chr 36:20–21 suggests this same opposition, explicitly drawing on Jeremiah’s prophecies of judgment, which projected total annihilation within the land for 70 years (see for instance Jer 25:11). 34.  The only opposition we find is between God’s people (the deportees) and their enemies: Babylon, the symbol of evil (5:1–11); or those peoples who had previously afflicted Judah as God’s agents but carried their mission too far and thus are doomed to God’s judgment (1:15, 2:12). Zechariah, then, ignores the existence of any residents in the Holy Land of God, the land of Judah. 35. Contra Blenkinsopp (1988: 60) and Smith (1989: 179–200), who considers the return as the point of clash and reformulation. Bedford (2001: 20) noted that the roots of the social conflicts known in the Persian period were laid already within the NeoBabylonian era, but he did not discuss the actual relationship between these two periods. Bedford (2001: 147–66) negated the possibility of an actual internal conflict during the Neo-Babylonian and the early Persian periods and argued that it had come into existence only by the time of Ezra and Nehemiah in the fifth century (2001: 150–51).

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139

lowed by 11 years in which Judeans were compulsorily divided into two independent communities—of exiles and of people who remained in the land/in Jerusalem. The Destruction in 586 b.c.e. introduced a second (and then a third) wave of deportations (Jer 52:28–30). The trauma of this first dislocation of the Jehoiachin exiles and the need to reestablish the ethnic-national identity of this community independently of the Jerusalemites stand at the core of Ezekiel’s prophetic activity (RomShiloni 2005: 8–10). Ezekiel’s in-group is clearly his compatriots, the Jehoiachin exiles. The prophet resides among them (1:1–3, ‫)בתוך הגולה‬, and he counts the years in his prophetic activity from this crucial point in history, “Our exile” (‫לגלותנו‬, Ezek 33:21, 40:1). 36 The exiles, laymen as leaders, approach him constantly (as evidenced in 33:30–32; and 8:1, 14:1, 20:1), and even when he reproves them, his adherence to this community regularly shows itself. 37 The prophet considers the Jehoiachin exiles in Babylon to be “Israel,” “the House of Israel” (‫בית ישראל‬, as in Ezek 3:1, 4), and “the children of Israel” (‫בני ישראל‬, as in 2:3). 38 They are the people of God and are consistently addressed with sympathy, thus they are the addressees of future consolation and hope (Ezek 11:15–21, 33:10–20, 37:1–14, etc.). 39 In light of these self-designations, one cannot ignore the clear counterpositions Ezekiel advances. The people who remained in Jerusalem 36.  The Jehoiachin Exile serves as chronological reference at the opening of 14 prophecies (1:1–2; 8:1; 20:1; 24:1; 26:1; 29:1, 17; 30:20; 31:1; 32:1, 17; 33:21; 40:1). Although this is considered an editorial convention, it is significant that most of these chronological references appear as part of the prophet’s first-person testimony. 37.  For example: “Go to your people, to the exile community” (‫בא אל הגולה אל בני‬ ‫עמך‬, 3:11), or “your brothers, your brothers, men of your kindred [LXX: “your brothers and the men of your exile (οἱ ἀδελφοί σου καὶ οἱ ἄνδρες τῆς αἰχμαλσίας σοῦ)], all of that very house of Israel,” ‫האחיך אחיך אנשי גאלתך וכל בית ישראל כל‬, 11:15). 38.  For the 83 occurrences of ‫ בית ישראל‬in Ezekiel and the 11 occurrences of ‫בני‬ ‫ישראל‬, with the differences between the MT and the various Greek translations, see Zimmerli 1983: 563–65. On ‫ בית ישראל‬as a marker of exclusion, see Joyce 1996: 45–58. In the present discussion, the two phrases testify indistinguishably to the phenomenon pointed out above. 39.  There are several exceptions to this sympathy. When God sends Ezekiel to the exiles, they are designated as the “sons,” descendants of generations of sin; they themselves are “brazen of face and stubborn of heart” (2:4); they are “a rebellious house” (2:5, 6, 8; 3:9, 26, 27; 12:2 (twice), 3, 25; 17:12; 24:3; 44:6; njpsv: “a rebellious breed”; transgenerational sins are also mentioned in 20:5–31). And the prophet characterizes his compatriots in exile as those who “have turned their thoughts upon their fetishes” (14:1–11). This nevertheless stands in clear contrast to the fury, the specific accusations, and the calamitous future Ezekiel prophesies against Jerusalem itself, as we will see below.

140

Dalit Rom-Shiloni

hardly ever appear as “Israel.” 40 The prophet quotes statements (rebellious ones, I should mention) from the homeland, which he presents as having been said “upon the soil of Israel”(18:2, 12:21, ‫)על אדמת ישראל‬. The remaining Judeans/Jerusalemites are called at times “the inhabitants of Jerusalem” )11:15, ‫(ישבי ירושלים‬, or “those who live in these ruins in the land of Israel” )33:24, ‫ ;(ישבי החרבות האלה על אדמת ישראל‬but above all, the repeated designation by which Ezekiel refers to those who remained is through the metonymy of “Jerusalem”—as the sinful city, the adulterous wife (Ezek 16:1–43, 44–58; 23:1–49; 24:1–15), and the major target of judgment throughout chaps. 1–24, 33. In fact, in constructing the opposition between the exiles and those who remained behind, Ezekiel introduces two characterizations of Jerusalem that serve later in the Persian-period sources (with some significant modifications): Jerusalem as equivalent to the (ancient) Canaanite people(s) of the land and Jerusalem as doomed to total annihilation, to becoming an empty city and land. The first analogy employs the argument of continuity; the second uses the assertion of entirety. Continuity: Jerusalem Is of the “People(s) of the Land” Ezek 16:1–43 portrays Jerusalem “by origin and birth” as “from the land of the Canaanites—your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite” (‫מכרתיך ומלדתיך מארץ הכנעני אביך האמרי ואמך חתית‬, Ezek 16:3). 41 With this genealogy, Ezekiel goes a significant step beyond both the common prophetic accusation of Israel as disobedient and idolatrous in her embracing of Canaanite worship (as does, for instance, Jer 2:20–28), and the pentateuchal exhortations that demand that the people of Israel refrain from any contact with the Canaanites in order to avoid participating in their cult (such as Exod 23:23–26; Lev 18:24–30, 20:22–24; Deut 7:1–6). Ezekiel uses the argument of continuity to condemn Jerusalem as the biological descendant of the three major Canaanite peoples, ‫הכנעני‬ ‫האמורי והחתי‬. 42 Identifying Jerusalem with these ancient peoples of the land is only half of the analogy Ezekiel employs in regard to the two Judean communities after 597 b.c.e. On the other side of the dichotomy, Ezekiel 40.  The two exceptions are in Ezek 9:8 and 11:13, where the prophet cries out to God: “Ah, Lord God! Are You going to annihilate all that is left of Israel?” a cry that symbolizes the completeness of Jerusalem’s judgment. 41. For a full discussion of Ezek 20:1–38 and Ezek 16:1–43, see Rom-Shiloni 2005a: 20–31. 42.  The mention of this specific genealogy is thus intentional and is based on the literary position occupied by these three major peoples in lists of the Canaanite nations; see Ishida 1979: 461–90.

Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology

141

puts the Jehoiachin exiles, whom he considers to be the direct descendants of the “stock of Jacob,” chosen by God in Egypt to be his people (Ezek 20:5). Ezekiel projects God’s present and future reconstitution of the covenant relationship with this people, outside of the land of Israel, in exile (Ezek 20:33). Hence, for the community of the Jehoiachin exiles, Ezekiel appropriates the exodus narrative—including the covenant traditions. This analogy portraying the dichotomy of Jehoiachin exiles versus Jerusalem as Israel versus the foreign peoples of Canaan is based on historical national traditions, which Ezekiel for the first time “annexes”/ appropriates/manipulates as ideological devices in an internal conflict. Moreover, Ezekiel employs legal materials pertaining to concepts of land and of exile (that is, loss of the land) to advocate his exclusion of the Jerusalemites from membership in the people of God. In his denigration of Jerusalem, Ezekiel draws on the Holiness Code’s strategy of separation, suggested in Leviticus 18 and 20. 43 These two chapters exhort Israel to distinguish their own practices from those of the previous nations that have inhabited the land, by posing antagonistic differences between God’s laws and the practices of the land of Canaan (‫ לא תעשו ובחקתיהם‬. . . ‫ וכמעשה ארץ כנען‬,‫ לא תעשו‬. . . ‫כמעשה ארץ מצרים‬ ‫ את משפטי תעשו ואת חקתי תשמרו ללכת בהם‬.‫לא תלכו‬, Lev 18:3–4; ‫ושמרתם‬ ‫ ולא תלכו בחקת הגוי‬. . . ‫את כל חקתי ואת כל משפטי ועשיתם אתם‬, 22:20–24). “The abhorrent practices” (‫חקות התועבות‬, Lev 18:30) that characterize the nations of the land are idolatry and specifically (cultic) bloodshed (20:2–6), together with sexual offenses (18:6–23, 20:10–21). All these had defiled the land to the point that it had vomited out its previous inhabitants and spurred God to expel and wipe out those peoples of the land before the face of Israel (Lev 18:24–30, 20:22). Echoing the language of Leviticus 18 and 20, Ezekiel builds the judgment prophecy of Ezek 16:1–43 as a criticism of Jerusalem on three cardinal points: its origin, its sins, and its judgment. 44 In origin, Jerusalem is the deserted daughter of an Emorite and a Hittite, whom God saved upon her birth in the land of the Canaanites (16:2–8). In her misconduct Jerusalem follows the abominations of the nation(s) of Canaan, combining adultery and idolatry (vv. 15–34). The apex of her crimes is the cultic bloodshed when she took “the sons and daughters that you bore to Me and sacrificed them to those [images] as food” (‫ותקחי את בניך ואת בנותיך‬ ‫ אשר ילדת לי ותזבחים להם לאכול‬, 16:20). Jerusalem is thus accused of the 43.  For a discussion of the allusions to Leviticus 18 and 20 in Ezek 33:23–29, see Rom-Shiloni 2005a: 18–20. 44.  Ezekiel also alludes to and adapts Leviticus 18, 20 for his disputation against Jerusalem in Ezek 33:24–29; see Rom-Shiloni 2005a: 27–29.

142

Dalit Rom-Shiloni

two capital crimes characteristic of Canaanite practice in Lev 20:2–6, 9– 21, that is, adultery and cultic murder (‫ושפטתיך משפטי נאפות ושפכת דם‬, “I will inflict upon you the punishment of women who commit adultery and murder,” Ezek 16:38). According to Ezekiel, Jerusalem’s sins are not merely the result of acculturation or environmental influence but are part of her genuine heritage. Therefore, given her inheritance and practices, Jerusalem is destined to death, to total annihilation (vv. 38–43). 45 The Holiness Code’s distinctions between the holy people (Lev 20:26) and the previous peoples of the land (Lev 18:27, 20:23–24) supply the legal basis for completely excluding Jerusalem from the people of God. Drawing on this analogy, the prophet emphasizes the geographical difference between the communities. Jerusalem resides from birth to death in the land. She is Canaanite, she behaves like a Canaanite, and here she will be sentenced and die. However, as of the time of the Jehoiachin Exile, the (real) people of Israel reside far from the land but not at all far from God (11:16–20), in continuity with the constitutive period when God first revealed Himself to His chosen people in Egypt, away from the land (20:5). This dichotomy between the peoples of the land and the people of God, then, is crucial for Ezekiel and his fellow Exiles, as it allows this dislocated community to rebuild its national and religious status in the face of very prominent preexilic concepts, according to which residence in the land was a precondition for the worship of God and for the inclusion in God’s people (see Deut 28:36, 63; see also 1 Sam 26:19). Entirety: Jerusalem as the Empty City and Land Complementing this denunciation of the people who remained in Jerusalem, Ezekiel refers constantly to the desolation of Jerusalem and of the land of Israel/Judah. Descriptions of desertion and annihilation in both urban and rural areas regularly conclude Ezekiel’s prophecies of judgment against Jerusalem (Ezek 6:11–14; 12:19–20; 14:13, 15, 17, 19; 15:8; 21:1–5; 33:27–29; also 38:8). Along the same lines, the prophet presents restoration in the land as a new revival of the empty, desolate mountains of Israel, in preparation for the return of the gathered exiles, who are called “My people” (‫עמי ישראל‬, 36:5–12). Ezekiel uses the theme of the empty land—a theme that had originated in descriptions of pu45.  For the use of metaphor in expressing Jerusalem’s guilt and judgment, see Day 2000: 285–309. Ezekiel deviates from the analogy when he does not prophesy exile against Jerusalem, whereas Lev 20:22–23 prescribes dislocation. The prophet applies to Jerusalem the individual death penalty of the murderer and the adulterous person (Lev 20:9–21), and foresees that total calamity will be visited upon the land (Ezek 16:38–41).

Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology

143

nitive total destruction brought about by God—to construct a definitive end to an era and to a community, that of sinful Jerusalem and Judah. 46 The theme of the empty land is thus a second ideological device Ezekiel borrows to advance a clear distinction between the two geographically separated Judean communities. The representation of total destruction, which is to leave Judah empty and annihilated, strengthens the Jehoiachin exiles’ claim of entirety. Since no one is going to be left in the land, the Jehoiachin exiles are the entire people of Israel. Indeed, Ezekiel’s consolation prophecies envision the Exiles as the sole heirs to a hopeful future. 47 Any projected restoration of the people of God is restricted to the exiles (repatriates-to-be) who will be saved and gathered back into the land (Ezek 11:17–21, 20:32–44, etc.); and only those Jehoiachin exiles have God’s authorization to reinherit the land (as in Ezek 11:17–20). Ezekiel is the first exilic prophet to mobilize the theme of the empty land in the service of this divisive internal conflict between Judean communities, a conflict already in place by the early years of the sixth century. 48 Strategically, this is a clear, narrowly divisive position that is not even open to accepting other Judean exiles of any succeeding Babylonian deportation into the reconstituted people of God. 49 Ezekiel is thus the originator of a well-rounded separatist ideology, crafting the exclusive position of the Jehoiachin Exiles by completely delegitimizing the Judean community left in the land. The two major components in this delegitimizing ideology are, first, a complete national-religious exclusion of the Jerusalemites from the “Judeans” / God’s people by identifying those who remained as Canaanites and, second, the assurance of the impending annihilation of Jerusalem, which would leave an “empty land” behind. For Ezekiel, these two components complement each other. 46.  See Ezekiel’s prophecies against the nations (Ezek 25:5, 13; 35:3–4, 7–9) and Jeremiah’s prophecies against Israel and against the nations (as in Jer 9:9–11; 51:26, 62). In Mesopotamian sources, the image of empty, annihilated land characterizes descriptions of punitive destructions brought about by the gods; see Dobbs-Allsopp 1993: 66–72; Michalowski 1989: lines 300–330. 47. For the Jehoiachin Exiles as the sole addressees of Ezekiel’s promises of present and future hope, see Block 1997: 53–57. Inclusive prophecies in Ezekiel (as in 37:15–28) may stem from the later Ezekiel tradition, which may be closer to Deutero-Isaiah’s inclusive positions. 48. Contra Carroll’s late date for this contention (1992: 79–93); also Barstad 1996. 49.  This very definitive break between the Jehoiachin exiles of 597 b.c.e. and the Jerusalemites who remained in the city afterwards continues to be relevant for Ezekiel even after the Destruction of 586; see Ezek 14:21–23, 24:15–25.

144

Dalit Rom-Shiloni

Furthermore, Ezekiel’s polemic supplies us with the ideological motivations for this internal conflict among the Judeans, which may be fully understood only in the context of the early sixth century b.c.e. During these constitutive years of the first Judean dislocation to Babylon, we find references to a discourse among the Jehoiachin exiles and the prophet as the exiles voice their desperation at being detached from the land and possibly rejected by their God. Ezekiel’s rhetorical strategies demonstrate the first crucial confrontation with the reality of dislocation. The exiles were to reconsider their national/communal status as the people of God in face of well-accepted preexilic concepts of exile, both deuteronomic and Priestly (Holiness Code), which take the fact of exile as evidence of God’s rejection and punishment (as in Deut 28:36, 63; Lev 26:14–38). 50 This is the background to the plea of the elders of Israel quoted in Ezek 20:32: ‫נהיה כגוים‬ ‫“( כמשפחות הארצות לשרת עץ ואבן‬We will be like the nations, like the families of the lands, worshiping wood and stone”; and see 33:10, 37:11). 51 Ezekiel had to transform traditional concepts of land and of exile in order to enable his compatriots, the Jehoiachin exiles, to continue to understand themselves as God’s people away from their land. He effected this transformation by utilizing arguments of continuity and entirety to position the exiles as the true people, just as he mobilized historical and prophetic traditions to cast those who remained in the land outside of the national history. At its earliest phase, then, setting boundaries of exclusion and otherness between the two Judean communities was a major tactic in reconsolidating the Jehoiachin exiles’ identity. Later crafters of Babylonian exilic ideology inherited these excluding designations and arguments as obvious, without questioning their foundations. I will conclude with some observations on the overall ideological shifts within Babylonian exilic ideology.

Conclusions: Ideological Shifts within Babylonian Exilic Ideology This journey backward from the Persian period to Neo-Babylonian times illustrates shifts in designations and in the excluding arguments applied by the exilic communities to both in-group and out-group (see table 1).

50.  For deuteronomic concepts of exile reevaluated by Ezekiel, see Rom-Shiloni 2008: 101–23. 51. See Rom-Shiloni 2005a: 21–22; 2005b: 194–205.

Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology

145

Table 1. Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology Exclusivity: The Oppositions Period

Early Exile (ca. 597–586 and after)

1

2

Ezekiel

Ezekiel

Ezekiel

Jehoiachin Exiles (Israel, Jacob) versus Jerusalem (by origin is Canaanite, of the land)

Jehoiachin Exiles

Core: Jerusalem

Exilic Diaspora (ca. mid-sixth century and after) Ezra–Nehemiah Repatriates Persian (ca. late sixth– fifth century)

Foreign people(s) of the land

versus

Core-Periphery

Periphery: Babylon

Jerusalem will become desolate, empty land

Babylon will gain core.

Deutero-Isaiah

Deutero-Isaiah

Babylonian exiles versus Empty land

Core: Babylon

Zechariah (and Haggai)

Ezra– Nehemiah

Repatriates versus Empty land

Core: Babylon

Periphery: Jerusalem

Periphery: Yehud

Zechariah (and Haggai) Core: Babylon Periphery: Jerusalem restores its central position

Concerning the definition of the in-group, a first shift occurs as early as Deutero-Isaiah, who does not give a special prominence to the Jehoiachin exiles but refers in general terms to the exiles in Babylon. 52 This more inclusive definition of the exiles, comprising both those in Babylon and those who return to Yehud, remains the operative conception of the exilic community in the repatriate literature, Haggai, Zechariah 1–8, and Ezra–Nehemiah. Definitions of the out-group present an even more complicated picture. Nevertheless, Babylonian exilic ideology both in Babylon and back in Yehud reveals several clear common denominators in its treatment of 52.  This change in addressee between the presumed words of the prophet and the diverse additions by disciples and later developers of the tradition may also have appeared within the book of Ezekiel, but this deserves a separate discussion.

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“others.” The first might be called “land orientation,” which throughout is the focus of Babylonian exilic ideology. The exiles in Babylon continued to negotiate their status in relation to Judeans remaining in the land of Israel, rather than in relation to “proximate others”—the diverse national groups present in Babylon. 53 Second, Babylonian exilic ideology totally excluded the possibility of the continuing existence of any Judean/Israelite community (or communities) from preexilic times; the “peoples of the land” are by definition not Israel. These two common denominators, which originated in exile, are carried back by the repatriates as they struggle to reestablish their position as the only people of God in Yehud. These foundational conceptions are given rhetorical force through the designations, the arguments (continuity, entirety, and “annexation” of national traditions), and the divisive strategies and counterstrategies that unite Babylonian exilic ideology from Ezekiel to Ezra–Nehemiah. This study sheds light on the important position Ezekiel occupied in establishing this Babylonian exilic ideology. Active as a prophet in the Exile, Ezekiel not only collected the “broken pieces” of that catastrophe, but with great aptitude he laid the foundations for the Babylonian community’s self-perception as the only people of God. In so doing he formulated the “takeover” strategy of this Diasporan community by which it became the core community of “Judah” within just a few decades. Exilic authors, prophets and historiographers carried on and developed further Ezekiel’s oppositions between the (Jehoiachin) exiles and the people who remained in Jerusalem. The major shift in the Babylonian exilic ideology is the evolution of an independent status for each of the two parts of Ezekiel’s unified argument. Ezra–Nehemiah used the analogy in which the “others” are the foreign peoples of the land, thus echoing Ezekiel’s designation of Jerusalem and its inhabitants as the Canaanites / foreign peoples of the land. Deutero-Isaiah, on the other hand, used the imagery of Zion as the empty land and the exiles as the people of God who would fill it, the path which Zechariah the son of Iddo (and implicitly Haggai) would follow (seen in the similarities between Isa 49:15–21 and Zech 8:1–15). 54 53. On the possible interactions between the Babylonian exiles and other deportees or Babylonians, see Albertz (2003: 106–9), who mentions various strategies of survival by which the Babylonian golah is assumed to have distinguished its members from other communities in exile. What seems to be worth noting is that the exilic biblical literature is hardly interested in these social-national aspects of the exilic life. The one topic that gets explicit attention is the polemic against other gods in Deutero-Isaiah. 54.  Compare to Albertz (2003: 303–4), who considers the Deutero-Isaiah group to address those who remained in Judah with a consoling message meant to smooth

Shifts of Group Identities within Babylonian Exilic Ideology

147

On the basis of this long view of Babylonian exilic ideology, I believe we can safely see its latest manifestation in Ezra–Nehemiah as an ideological delegitimization of Judeans who remained in the land, a denigration that the repatriates inherited from their exiled ancestors and brought to Yehud on their return. Its manifestations by the early Persian period in Yehud are not the beginning of an internal conflict but another phase in a trajectory of polemic that goes back to the very first Babylonian deportations, to the constitution of Babylonian exilic ideology, and specifically to the reshaping of the exiles’ group identity as early as the beginning of the sixth century.

Excursus: Further Challenges for This Study of Babylonian Exilic Ideology This study of Babylonian exilic ideology, with its references to the conflicts between Judean groups, leaves several very challenging and unanswered questions concerning the constitution of the in-group. Did the Jehoiachin exiles loose their prestigious position as the exclusive exilic group? The memory of the Jehoiachin Exile may still be in the background of Zerubbabel’s special position (especially in Hag 2:23–27), and it appears as a short note in the patronymics of Mordechai (Esth 2:4) from the fifth and probably fourth centuries b.c.e. But, may we assume that a general inclusive tendency overpowered Ezekiel’s extreme exclusive positions and crystallized the several waves of Judeans who were gradually deported to Babylon into a single homogeneous community, as early as the first decades of the Babylonian Exile? While the evidence is scant, we should bear in mind the possibility of a heterogeneous Babylonian exilic ideology on the issue of in-group identity. It may be of interest to explore further the relationship between Ezekiel and Deutero-Isaiah on this issue. Is the latter prophet (and/or the Deutero-Isaiah circle) a descendent of the Jehoiachin exiles and thus close to Ezekiel? Or might he(/they) have descended from the 586 Judean deportees? If the latter is more probable, then we will find Ezekiel and Deutero-Isaiah to be representatives of distinct prophetic perceptions that may point to an internal conflict among the exiles in Babylon. 55 the repatriates’ return. The texts illustrate an opposite picture, in which Judeans who had remained behind were totally disregarded and clearly discouraged from joining the community returning to Zion. 55.  This latter option may be substantiated by the many similarities and literary allusions in which Deutero-Isaiah draws on Jeremiah; see Sommer 1998: 167–73, 315–31; and Paul 2008: 40–41.

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Bibliography Ackroyd, Peter R. 1975 Exile and Restoration: A Study of Hebrew Thought of the Sixth Century b.c. OTL. Philadelphia: Westminster. Albertz, Reiner 2003 Israel in Exile: The History and Literature of the Sixth Century bce. SBL Studies in Biblical Literature 3. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Barstad, Hans M. 1996 The Myth of the Empty Land: A Study in the History and Archaeology of Judah during the “Exilic” Period. SO 28. Oslo: Scandinavian University Press. Barth, Fredrik 1969 Introduction. Pp. 1–38 in Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Culture Difference, ed. Fredrik Barth. Bergen: Universitetsforlaget / London: Allen & Unwin. Bedford, Peter R. 2001 Temple Restoration in Early Achaemenid Judah. JSJSup 65. Leiden: Brill. 2002 Diaspora: Homeland Relations in Ezra–Nehemiah. VT 52: 147–66. Ben Zvi, Ehud 1995 Inclusion in and Exclusion from Israel as Conveyed by the Use of the Term “Israel” in Post-Monarchic Biblical Texts. Pp. 96–149 in The Pitcher Is Broken: Memorial Essays for Gösta W. Ahlström, ed. S. W. Holladay and L. K. Handy. JSOTSup 190. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Berquist, Jon L. 2006 Constructions of Identity in Postcolonial Yehud. Pp. 53–65 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Blenkinsopp, Joseph 1988 Ezra–Nehemiah. OTL. Philadelphia: Westminster. Block, Daniel I. 1997 Ezekiel 1–24. NICOT. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Carroll, Robert P. 1992 The Myth of the Empty Land. Semeia 59: 79–93. Day, Peggy L. 2000 Adulterous Jerusalem’s Imagined Demise: Death of a Metaphor in Ezekiel XVI. VT 50: 285–309. Dobbs-Allsopp, F. W. 1993 Weep, O Daughter of Zion: A Study of the City-Lament Genre in the Hebrew Bible. BibOr 44. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute. Dor, Yonina 2006 Have the “Foreign Women” Really Been Expelled? Separation and Exclusion in the Restoration Period. Jerusalem: Magnes.

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Fried, Lisbeth S. 2006 The ʿam hāʾāreṣ in Ezra 4:4 and Persian Administration. Pp. 123–45 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Grabbe, Lester L. 1998 Ezra–Nehemiah. London: Routledge. Green, William S. 1985 Otherness Within: Towards a Theory of Difference in Rabbinic Judaism. Pp. 49–69 in “To See Ourselves as Others See Us”: Christians, Jews, “Others” in Late Antiquity, ed. J. Neusner and E. S. Frerichs. Chico, CA: Scholars Press. Hartman, Louis F. 1978 The Book of Daniel. AB 23. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Horowitz, David L. 1975 Ethnic Identity. Pp. 111–40 in Ethnicity: Theory and Experience, ed. N. Glazer and D. P. Moynihan. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Ishida, Tomoo 1979 The Structure and Historical Implications of the Lists of Pre-Israelite Nations. Biblica 60: 461–90. Jannssen, Enno 1956 Juda in der Exilszeit: Ein Beitrag zur Frage der Entstehung des Judentums. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Japhet, Sara 1983 People and Land in the Restoration Period. Pp. 103–25 in Das Land Israel im biblischer Zeit, ed. G. Strecker. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 1988 Law and “the Law” in Ezra–Nehemiah. Pp. 99–115 in Proceedings of the Ninth World Congress of Jewish Studies. Panel Sessions: Bible Studies and the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Goshen-Gottstein. Jerusalem: Magnes. 2006 The Concept of the “Remnant” in the Restoration Period: On the Vocabulary of Self-Definition. Pp. 432–50 in From the Rivers of Babylon to the Highlands of Judah: Collected Studies on the Restoration Period. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2008 The Expulsion of the Foreign Women (Ezra 9–10): The Legal Basis, Precedents, and Consequences for the Definition of Jewish Identity. Pp. 379–401 in Teshurah Le-ʿAmos: Collected Studies in Biblical Exegesis Presented to ʿAmos Hakham, ed. M. Bar-Asher, N. Hacham, and Y. Ofer. Alon Shevut: Tevunot. Joyce, Paul M. 1996 Dislocation and Adaptation in the Exilic Age and After. Pp. 45–58 in After the Exile: Essays in Honor of Rex Mason, ed. J. Barton and D. J. Reimer; Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.

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Kessler, John 2002 The Book of Haggai: Prophecy and Society in Early Persian Yehud. VTSup 91. Leiden: Brill. Lemaire, André 2000 Toward a Redactional History of the Book of Kings. Pp. 446–60 in Reconsidering Israel and Judah: Recent Studies on the Deuteronomistic History, ed. G. N. Knoppers and J. G. McConville. SBTS 8. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2000. Lipschits, Oded 2005 The Fall and Rise of Jerusalem: Judah under Babylonian Rule. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Meyers, Carol L., and Meyers, Eric M. 1987 Haggai and Zechariah 1–8. AB 25B. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Michalowski, Pioter 1989 The Lamentation over the Destruction of Sumer and Ur. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Nicholson, Ernest W. 1965 The Meaning of the Expression ‫ עם הארץ‬in the Old Testament. JSS 10: 59–66. Paul, Shalom M. 2008 Deutero-Isaiah 40–48. Mikra Le-Israel. Jerusalem: Magnes; Tel Aviv: Am Oved. Petersen, David L. 1984 Haggai and Zechariah 1–8. OTL. Philadelphia: Westminster. Rom-Shiloni, Dalit 2005a Ezekiel as the Voice of the Exiles and Constructor of Exilic Ideology. HUCA 76: 1–45. 2005b Facing Destruction and Exile: Inner-Biblical Exegesis in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. ZAW 117/2: 194–205. 2008 Deuteronomic Concepts of Exile Interpreted in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Pp. 101–23 in Birkat Shalom: Studies in the Bible, Ancient Near Eastern Literature, and Postbiblical Judaism Presented to Shalom M. Paul on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday, ed. C. Cohen et al. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Smith, Daniel 1989 The Religion of the Landless: The Sociological Context of the Babylonian Exile. Bloomington, IN: Meyer Stone. Smith, Jonathan Z. 1985 What a Difference a Difference Makes. Pp. 3–48 in “To See Ourselves as Others See Us”: Christians, Jews, “Others” in Late Antiquity, ed. J. Neusner and E. S. Frerichs. Chico, CA: Scholars Press. Sommer, Benjamin D. 1998 A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40–66. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

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Sparks, Kenton L. 1998 Ethnicity and Identity in Ancient Israel: Prolegomena to the Study of Ethnic Sentiments and Their Expressions in the Hebrew Bible. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Thomas, David Winton 1961 The Sixth Century b.c.: A Creative Epoch in the History of Israel. JSS 6: 33–46. Williamson, Hugh G. M. 1985 Ezra–Nehemiah. WBC 16. Waco, TX: Word. 1988 Structure and Historiography in Nehemiah 9. Pp. 117–31 in Proceedings of the Ninth World Congress of Jewish Studies. Panel Sessions: Bible Studies and the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Goshen-Gottstein. Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies. 1990 Laments at the Destroyed Temple. BRev 6/4: 12–17, 44. Wright, Jacob L. 2004 Rebuilding Identity: The Nehemiah-Memoir and Its Earliest Readers. BZAW 348. Berlin: de Gruyter. Zimmerli, Walter 1983 Ezekiel 2:(25–48). Hermeneia. Philadelphia: Fortress.

Israel’s Identity and the Threat of the Nations in the Persian Period Reflections from a Redactional Layer of the Book of the Twelve Jakob Wöhrle University of Münster

Introduction The Book of the Twelve is characterized by the numerous judgment oracles against all the nations. In the redaction-critical research on the Book of the Twelve, it has often been recognized that most of these words are secondary insertions to their individual context. However, until now, the interpretation of these words has been difficult, because there is not yet a way to date them. Therefore, it was not possible to determine the historical situation and the intention that led to the insertion of these words. We can gain new insights into the judgment oracles against all the nations in the Book of the Twelve by examining the formation of this corpus as a whole. In the 1990s, the works of James Nogalski, Erich Bosshard-Nepustil, and Aaron Schart proved not only that the individual books of this corpus underwent redaction of their own but that these books were collected in several stages and that the growing corpus as a whole underwent redactional processes. 1 Based on a redaction-critical analysis of all the individual books of the Book of the Twelve, which cannot be presented in detail here, 2 we can see despite the work of Nogalski, Bosshard-Nepustil, and Schart that most of the judgment oracles against all the nations in this corpus derive from one and the same redaction. 3 By this redaction, a new collection 1. Cf. Nogalski 1993a, 1993b; Bosshard-Nepustil 1997; Schart 1998. 2. Cf. Wöhrle 2006; 2008. 3.  Until now, only Bosshard-Nepustil presumed that some of the passages concerned with judgment against the nations in the Book of the Twelve go back on the same redaction. He ascribes to a redaction qualified as Babel-Red.XII Joel 2:12–27; Mic 4:9–10, 14; 5:2; 7:7–10; Nah 1:1b, 2–10, 12, 13; 2:1; Hab 1:12a*; 2:5–17*; 3:2–19a; Zeph 2:13–15; Zech 2:10a, 11, 14; 8:1–6 (1997: 434–44). However, his assumptions are

153

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of prophetic books was composed, which I/we call the Foreign-Nations Corpus I. 4 Against this background, for the first time the date and the intention of these passages can be determined in a more concrete way. In the following, first, we will glance quickly at the formation and the structure of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I and, second, define the date of this corpus. Third, we will discuss the intention of this corpus and, fourth, draw conclusions regarding the identity of Israel in the international context of the later Persian period. The Formation and Structure of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I Recent research on the formation of the Book of the Twelve led to a small consensus that the books of Hosea, Amos, Micah, and Zephaniah were connected to a common corpus in the time of the Exile—the socalled exilic Book of the Four 5—and that the books of Haggai and Zechariah were connected to a common corpus in the middle of the fifth century—the Haggai–Zechariah Corpus. 6 Based on a redaction-critical analysis of all the individual books, we can see that in the middle of the fifth century the exilic Book of the Four was reedited and thereby the book of Hosea was taken out of this collection and replaced by the book of Joel. 7 This new Book of the Four can be called the Joel Corpus. Furthermore, the Joel Corpus, the Haggai–Zechariah Corpus, and the books of Nahum and Deutero-Zechariah were taken together to a new

not based on a redactional critical analysis of all the individual books, and thus he cannot prove in detail that the passages ascribed to the Babel-Red.XII were inserted into the Book of the Twelve by the same hand. Additionally, he cannot exclude that even more passages must be ascribed to this redaction. And most of all, BosshardNepustil could not define the overall intention of this redactional layer. 4.  The term Foreign-Nations Corpus I is used because in the early Hellenistic period the Book of the Twelve was edited by another redaction with a hostile attitude toward the nations. By this redaction, a new precursor of the Book of the Twelve was made, referred to as “Foreign-Nations Corpus II.” The Foreign-Nations Corpus II differs from the Foreign-Nations Corpus I in the fact that it is characterized by judgment oracles against some concrete nations and not, as in the Foreign-Nations Corpus I, against the nations as a whole. 5. See Nogalski 1993a: 176–78; Schart 1998: 156–233; Albertz 2001: 164–85; 2003: 232–51; Macchi 2004: 381; Schmitt 2005: 366; Zenger et al. 2006: 520; Schmid 2007: 364; Wöhrle 2006: 51–284. 6.  See, for example, Klostermann 1896: 213; Ackroyd 1952: 152; Elliger 1956: 99; Beuken 1967: 331–36; Coggins 1987: 26–27; Meyers and Meyers 1987: xlvii; Nogalski 1993a: 256; Tollington 1993: 47; Redditt 1995: 12, 42–43; Albertz 1996–97: 484; Lux 2002: 191–213; Pola 2003: 40–41; Schmid 2007: 364; Wöhrle 2006: 285–385. 7. See Wöhrle 2006: 387–460.

Israel’s Identity and the Threat of the Nations 1. Exilic Book of the Four

Hos Amos

2. Haggai– Zechariah Corpus

Hag

3. Joel Corpus

4. ForeignNations Corpus I

Mic

155

Zeph

Zech

Joel • ∞

Hos

Joel

Amos Mic

Zeph

Joel Corpus

Nah

Hag–Zech Corpus

DtZech

•

•

•

•

Joel Amos

Mic

Nah

Zeph Hag

Zech

DtZech

Fig.1.  Prophetic corpuses of the fourth and fifth centuries.

collection of prophetic books: the Foreign-Nations Corpus I (which is illustrated in fig. 1). 8 The redactors of this Foreign-Nations Corpus I integrated several new passages into the individual books, all of which are characterized by a hostile attitude toward the foreign nations. These passages are listed in table 1 (p. 156). By this redaction, the book of Joel—formerly focussed on a drought and the overcoming of this distress—was re­ edited so that the attack of a locust army, becoming a metaphor for a real, hostile army, is described in Joel 1:1–2:11. 9 After the repentance of the people in 2:15–17, the annihilation of this army and the compensation of the damages caused by it is announced in 2:18–27. At last, in Joel 4 it is promised that Yhwh will gather all the nations, that he will prepare his own people to fight against the nations, and that the nations will be defeated. After this judgment on the nations, according to the last word of this redactional level in Joel 4:17, Jerusalem will be holy, and no strangers will pass through the city anymore. 8. See Wöhrle 2008: 139–89. 9. See Wöhrle 2006: 413–18.

Jakob Wöhrle

156

Table 1.  New Passages in Foreign-Nations Corpus I Joel

1:4, 6–7; 2:2* (‫ ועצום‬. . . ‫)כׁשחר‬, 4–5, 7–9, 11a, 18–20, 25, 26b, 27; 4:1–3, 9–17

Amos

none

Micah

1:2; 4:6–7, 10* (from ‫)ׁשם‬, 12–13; 5:7–8, 14; 6:1; 7:10b–13, 16–17aα

Nahum

1:1a, 9b, 10, 12–13; 2:1* (without ‫)הנה‬, 4–11; 3:2–3, 7, 8* (‫)מים סביב לה‬, 15aγ–19

Zephaniah

2:7, 9b–10, 13–15; 3:8b, 18–19

Haggai

2:6–8, 21b, 22

Zechariah

none

DeuteroZechariah

9:1aβb, 14–16; 10:3b–5, 11; 12:3aβ, 4bβ, 6aβb, 9; 14:3, 11* (from ‫)וחרם‬, 12, 14b, 15, 20–21

In the book of Micah, the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I implemented their additions especially in chaps. 4–5 and 7. These additions describe, in Micah 4–5, God’s preparation of the people to fight against the nations, who have come to Jerusalem and who have exiled the people, and Micah 7 announces the annihilation of all the nations and the devastation of the whole world. The book of Nahum, the primary layer of which was only directed against the authors' own people, was reedited by the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I into a prophecy against the Assyrian city of Nineveh. After the psalm in Nah 1:2–8 and some words against the people in 1:9–14, the siege and destruction of Nineveh is announced in Nahum 2–3. In the book of Zephaniah, first, a few words have been added to the judgment oracles against foreign nations­in Zeph 2:4–15*, especially another word against Nineveh in Zeph 2:13–15. The additions in Zeph 3:8b, 18–19, promise the annihilation of the nations and the gathering of the people. In the book of Haggai, the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I have inserted words in places: 2:6–8 and 2:21b, 22. According to these additions, Yhwh will shake all the nations, and their treasures will come to Jerusalem, and their strength will be destroyed. Finally, the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I reedited the book of Deutero-Zechariah, which was formerly distinguished by the proclamation of a military campaign by the nations against Jerusalem. Because of this redaction, judgment against all the nations after they come to Jerusalem is announced, and the book now ends in Zech 14:11*,

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157

20–21—comparable to the book of Joel (4:16–17)—with the expectation that after these events Jerusalem will be a secure and holy place and that no stranger will enter the temple anymore. 10 This short overview shows that the additions ascribed to the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I share several common features. First and foremost, nearly all these additions are directed against the nations as a whole. The concrete misdeeds of concrete nations are not the focus of these words, as in the judgment oracles against the nations in Isaiah 13–23, Jeremiah 46–51, Ezra 25–32, or Amos 1–2. These words rather speak of the nations (‫עמים‬/‫ ;גוים‬Joel 2:19, 4:9; Mic 5:14, 7:16; Zeph 3:8b; Hag 2:22), all the nations (‫עמים‬/‫ ;כל הגוים‬Joel 4:2, 11, 12; Hag 2:7; Zech 12:6, 9; 14:12, 14), many nations (‫ ;עמים רבים‬Mic 4:13, 5:7), the whole earth (‫ ;ארץ‬Mic 1:2, 7:13; Zeph 3:8b), or an unspecified number of foreign enemies. 11 But also the additions to the books of Nahum and Zephaniah in which a particular enemy—especially Nineveh—is mentioned go with the other, more generally formulated additions. For in the book of Nahum, no concrete details about the city of Nineveh—its behavior, its misdeeds, or its fate—are described that could not refer to any other city. 12 Nineveh functions in the book of Nahum as an example of a hostile city that will meet Yhwh’s fate. In the context of the ForeignNations Corpus I, the judgment of Nineveh announced in the book of Nahum can therefore be understood as an example of the judgment that will meet all the foreign nations. The same holds true for the judgment oracles against some foreign nations in Zeph 2:4–15*. According to the universal words of judgment in Zeph 3:8b, 18–19, the oracles of Zephaniah 2 also give an example of the judgment against the nations as a whole. 13 10.  Zech 14:21 uses the term ‫ינענכ‬, which is mostly interpreted as “trader” (see Wellhausen 1963: 203; Marti 1904: 455; Sellin 1922: 528; Rudolph 1976: 239; Hanson 1979: 370; Reventlow 1993: 128; Petersen 1995: 160; Beck 2005: 216 and n. 67; Gärtner 2006: 68). However, at the end of the chapter, which is characterized by the description of future conflicts between the people and the nations, it is much more likely that the term ‫ ינענכ‬has to be understood literally as “Canaanite,” and on this basis it probably should be taken as a reference to foreigners in general (cf. Mason 1977: 132–33; Sæbø 1969: 307; Schwesig 2006: 204–5). 11.  See, for example, Nah 1:12; Zeph 3:18; Zech 9:14–16; 10:3b–5. 12. See Keller: “Wenn nicht die Stadt ausdrücklich zweimal mit Namen genannt wäre (ii 9; iii 7), dann wäre es völlig ausgeschlossen, mit Hilfe der Schilderungen Nahums die gemeinte Stadt zu identifizieren. Es könnte sich um irgendeine Stadt handeln” (1972: 410). 13.  See, for example, Ryou 1995: 280. Also Sweeney presumes that Zeph 3:8b has to be understood as a generalizing reference back to the oracles against foreign nations in Zeph 2:4–15 (2003: 181).

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Besides the rather general observation that all the passages ascribed to the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I expect a universal judgment, some further and more concrete common features between these passages can be mentioned. To begin with, the role of the nations in these passages is comparable: according to the Foreign-Nations Corpus I, the nations initially functioned as an instrument of God’s judgment against his own people. The locust army of Joel 1–2 is called God’s army (‫י‬/‫ )חילו‬in Joel 2:11, 25, 14 and Nah 1:12 describes the oppression of an external enemy as coming from Yhwh. 15 Furthermore, the additions in Micah 4 and in the book of Deutero-Zechariah presuppose—on the basis of the default passages taken up by the redactors of the ForeignNations Corpus I—that the nations have come to Jerusalem at Yhwh’s command. 16 Additionally, the nations are accused of similar transgressions: in Joel 2:1–11, Mic 4:9–14, and Zech 12:3–9* and 14:3–14*, military incursions are criticized. In Joel 4:2, Mic 4:6–7 and 9–14, Zeph 3:18–19, and Zechariah 14*, the scattering of the people is indicted. The fate of the nations is also portrayed in a similar manner throughout the passages ascribed to the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I. At first, it is announced in several passages that Yhwh will gather the nations (‫ ;קבץ‬Joel 4:2, 11; Zeph 3:8b; Mic 4:12) in order to carry out his judgment. Furthermore, these passages presume that Yhwh will annihilate all the nations (Joel 4:1–17; Mic 7:10–17*; Zeph 3:8b; Hag 2:7; Zech 9:14–16, 10:3b–5). No distinction between more or less guilty nations is made in these words, but all the nations will meet the same and definite fate. Not only the nations, their role in the judgment against the authors’ people, their transgressions, and their fate but also the authors’ people themselves are described similarly in the additions made by the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I. Significantly, the role of the people in the judgment of the nations corresponds to the former role of the nations: they are an instrument of God’s judgment. In Joel 4:9–17, Mic 4:9–14, Nahum 2–3, Zeph 2:9b, and Zech 10:5 and 12:6b, it is announced that the people will execute God’s judgment against the nations. The passages ascribed to the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I also share common features regarding the future salvation of the 14. See Weiser 1956: 114; Wolff 1875: 56; Rudolph 1971: 57; Andiñach 1992: 436. Crenshaw also claimed that the locust army described in Joel 1–2 must be understood as an instrument of God’s judgment (1995: 127). 15. See Elliger 1956: 8; Rudolph 1975: 161; Roberts 1991: 52–53; Seybold 1991: 24–25. 16.  See Mic 4:12; Zech 12:2–3, 14:2.

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people. In Mic 4:6–7 and Zeph 3:18–19, the gathering of the scattered people is announced. 17 Moreover, in several of these passages the expectation of new prosperity plays a special role. In Joel 2:25, Yhwh promises that he will repay the people for the years the locusts have eaten, and the subsequent books of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I announce several times that the people will get the treasures and the territories of the nations (Mic 4:13; Nah 2:10; Zeph 2:7, 9b, 10; Hag 2:7–8; Zech 14:14). One last and important common feature can be found in Joel 4:16–17 and Zech 14:11*, 20–21. Both passages pronounce that Jerusalem will be a safe place, that no foreigner will enter the city or the temple anymore, and that the city will be holy (‫)קדׁש‬. 18 The book of Joel and the book of Deutero-Zechariah thus end with a similar promise. Besides the similarities in terms of content, we can see several distinctive catchword connections between the additions ascribed to the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I. Here are a few examples. In Joel 2:20, the locust army is called the northerner (‫)צפוני‬, and it says that this army will be driven out into a dry and desolate land (‫ארץ ציה‬ ‫)וׁשממה‬. According to Zeph 2:13, Yhwh will stretch out his hand against the north (‫)צפון‬, and he will make Nineveh desolate and dry like the desert (‫)לׁשממה ציה כמדבר‬. The terms ‫ ציה‬and ‫ ׁשממה‬are found together only in these two verses in the Hebrew Bible, and in view of the parallel ‫צפוני‬/‫צפון‬, the similarities between Joel 2:20 and Zeph 2:13 cannot be a coincidence. 19 Another catchword connection can be found in Joel 4:16 // Hag 2:6, 21. These verses make the uncommon promise that Yhwh will shake heaven and earth (‫רעׁש‬, ‫ׁשמים‬, ‫)ארץ‬. 20 Additionally, Mic 4:6 and Zeph 3:19 announce the gathering of the lame (‫ )צלע‬and the strays (‫)נדח‬. Notably, the terms ‫ צלע‬and ‫ נדח‬are found together only in these two verses in the Hebrew Bible. 21 Finally, the composition of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I is remarkable. In this corpus, the book of Joel stands at the beginning, as a distinct introduction of the whole collection, and the structure of this book is repeated in the subsequent books.

17. Already Zapff and Schart have presumed that Mic 4:6–7 and Zeph 3:18–19 were added in the same redaction (Zapff 1997: 278–79; Schart 1998: 258–59). 18.  See above, p. 157 n. 10. 19. Due to the significant catchword connections, already Bosshard-Nepustil has assumed that Joel 2:20 and Zeph 2:13–15 derive from the same redaction (1997: 363). 20.  Besides Joel 4:16 // Hag 2:6, 21, the shaking of heaven and earth is only mentioned in Judg 5:4, 2 Sam 22:8, Isa 13:13, and Ps 68:9. 21.  See n. 17 above.

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This can already be seen on a rather general level. The book of Joel is characterized by the sequence judgment against the authors' people in 1:1–2:17* and salvation for the people in 2:18–4:17*. A sequence such as this from judgment to salvation is passed through in the subsequent books once again, for the book of Amos is mainly characterized by judgment, the books of Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Haggai are characterized by the same sequence from judgment to salvation as the book of Joel, and the books of Proto- and Deutero-Zechariah are mainly characterized by salvation. Thus, as in the book of Joel, a way from judgment to salvation is portrayed in the books of Amos through Deutero-Zechariah (see fig. 2). However, the composition of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I can be defined in an even more concrete way. The thematic arrangement of the book of Joel—and therefore the exact thematic arrangement of the passages added by the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I—is repeated in the same order in the subsequent books of this corpus. In Joel 1:4, 6–7, the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I added the description of a locust plague. Remarkably, a locust plague is also mentioned twice in the next books, in Amos 4:9 and 7:1–3. Thereby, in Amos 4:9 the term ‫ גזם‬is used for the locusts, which is found elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible only in Joel 1:4, 2:25. Additionally, in Joel 1:7 as in Amos 4:9 it is mentioned that the locusts eat the fig trees (‫)תאנה‬. The book of Micah is also connected to the description of the beginning locust attack in Joel 1:4, 6–7. Joel 1:4 mentions a mighty nation (‫ עצום‬. . . ‫ )גוי‬with teeth like a lion (‫)אריה‬. In Mic 4:7, it is said that the people will be made into a mighty nation (‫)גוי עצום‬, and according to Mic 5:7, they will be like a lion (‫)אריה‬. 22 Thus, the beginning of the attack of the locust army in Joel 1:4, 6–7 and the beginning of the counterattack of the people against the nations in Micah 4–5 are connected by distinct catchwords. In the additions inserted by the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I in Joel 2:1–11*, an attack of the locust army against a city is described. Nahum 2–3 describes an attack against the city of Nineveh, and many catchword connections exist between Joel 2:1–11 and Nah 2–3: 23 ‫( מראה‬Joel 2:4 // Nah 2:5); ‫( סוס‬Joel 2:4 // Nah 3:2); ‫( פרׁש‬Joel 2:4 // 22.  The phrase ‫ גוי עצום‬can be found elsewhere in the Book of the Twelve only in the plural form, and in the rest of the Hebrew Bible the singular form appears only in Deut 9:14, Isa 60:22, and Ps 35:18. 23.  Many have seen similarities between Joel 2:1–11 and Nahum 2–3 (see, for example, Schulz 1973: 41; Seybold 1991: 40–41; Spronk 1997: 137; Perlitt 2004: 37). But until now, the redactional relationship between these passages could not be explained with certainty.

Israel’s Identity and the Threat of the Nations Amos 1:1–2:17: Judgment

Micah

Nahum

Joel

Zephaniah 2:18–4:17: Salvation

Haggai ProtoZech DeuteroZech

161

1–9: Judgment 1–3: Judgment

4–5: Salvation

6:1–7:7: Judgment

7:8–17: Salvation

1: 2–3: Judgment Salvation 1:1–2:3: 2:4–3:19: Judgment Salvation 1: 2: Judgment Salvation 1–8: Salvation 9–14: Salvation

Fig. 2.  From judgment to salvation in Amos–Deutero-Zechariah.

Nah 3:3); ‫( רוץ‬Joel 2:4, 7, 9 // Nah 2:5); ‫ כ‬+ ‫( קול‬Joel 2:5 // Nah 2:8); ‫מרכבה‬ (Joel 2:5 // Nah 3:2); ‫( רקד‬Joel 2:5 // Nah 3:2); ‫( להב‬Joel 2:5 // Nah 3:3); ‫( אׁש‬Joel 2:5 // Nah 2:4); ‫ כל־פנים קבצו פארור‬// ‫( ופני כלם קבצו פארור‬Joel 2:6 // Nah 2:11); ‫( גבור‬Joel 2:7 // Nah 2:4); ‫( חומה‬Joel 2:7, 9 // Nah 2:6); ‫עלה‬ (Joel 2:7, 9 // Nah 3:3); ‫( ׁשקק‬Joel 2:9 // Nah 2:5); ‫( חיל‬Joel 2:11 // Nah 2:4). In Joel 2:18–27, an end of the present distress and new salvation is announced. In Joel 2:20 it is said that Yhwh will drive out the northerner (‫ )צפוני‬to a dry and desolate land (‫)ארץ ציה וׁשממה‬. In Zeph 2:13, Yhwh promises that he will stretch out his hand to the north (‫ )צפון‬and make Nineveh desolate, dry like the desert (‫)לׁשממה ציה כמדבר‬. 24 At the end of the promise of Joel 2:18–27, it is said in 2:25 that Yhwh will repay the people for the damages caused by the locust army. Although no verbal link can be found between this passage and the book of Haggai, the expectation that the treasures of the nations will come to Jerusalem in Hag 2:7–8 can be taken as a thematic reference to Joel 2:25. At the end of the book of Joel, the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I added a judgment oracle, in which the annihilation of all the nations is announced. Correspondingly, the whole corpus ends with the books of Proto‑ and Deutero-Zechariah, which are all-in-all characterized by a hostile attitude toward the nations. Thereby, distinct 24.  See above, p. 159.

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catchword connections can be found between Joel 4:9–11 // Zech 10:5 (‫ )גבור‬and Joel 4:9 // Zech 10:3, 4–5 (‫)מלחמה‬. Remarkable also is the last word added by the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I to Joel 4:16–17. In this passage, it is announced that Jerusalem will be a secure place, that no foreigner will invade the city anymore, and that Jerusalem will be holy. The security of the people, the defense against foreign invasions, and the holiness of Jerusalem are also the subject of the last word of the book of DeuteroZechariah on the level of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I in Zech 14:11*, 12–15, 20–21. 25 Joel and Amos through Deutero-Zechariah thus end with identical promises. All in all, in the Foreign-Nations Corpus I, the thematic arrangement of the book of Joel is repeated in Amos through Deutero-Zechariah. Therein, several catchword connections can be found between the individual units. The most important of these connections are summed up in table 2. The Foreign-Nations Corpus I can be taken as a coherent collection of prophetical writings, as is illustrated in fig. 3 (p. 164). This corpus presents a way from judgment to salvation, first describing the threat to the people by the hostile nations and then God’s intervention in this threat, his judgment against the nations, and new salvation for the people.

The Date of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I A first hint at a possible date for the Foreign-Nations Corpus I is given by the chronology of the redactional layers in the Book of the Twelve. The redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I took up the Joel Corpus and the Haggai–Zechariah Corpus, both of which can be dated in the fifth century. 26 The next redactional layer after the ForeignNations Corpus I, which can be dated with certainty, is the ForeignNations Corpus II, originating from the early hellenistic period. 27 Thus, the Foreign-Nations Corpus I must be dated in the late fifth or in the early fourth century. The fourth century, however, is not without reason called the “dark century.” 28 But some arguments support the assumption that the ForeignNations Corpus I should be dated in this time. First, in the passages added by the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I, the scattering 25.  See above, p. 157 n. 10. 26. See Wöhrle 2006: 364, 453–56. 27. See Wöhrle 2008: 279–81. 28.  Donner 1995: 467; Grabbe 2004: 322.

Israel’s Identity and the Threat of the Nations

163

Table 2.  Catchword Connections in the Foreign-Nations Corpus I. Locusts (Joel 1:1–20 // Amos)

‫ גזם‬Joel 1:4

Amos 4:9

‫ תאנה‬Joel 1:7

Amos 4:9

Beginning of the attack (Joel 1:1–20 // Micah)

‫ גוי עצום‬Joel 1:6

Mic 4:7

‫ אריה‬Joel 1:6

Mic 5:7

Attack against the city (Joel 2:1–17* // Nahum)

‫ מראה‬Joel 2:4

Nah 2:5

‫ סוס‬Joel 2:4

Nah 3:2

‫ פרׁש‬Joel 2:4

Nah 3:3

‫ רוץ‬Joel 2:4, 7, 9

Nah 2:5

‫ כ‬+ ‫ קול‬Joel 2:5

Nah 2:8

‫ מרכבה‬Joel 2:5

Nah 3:2

‫ רקד‬Joel 2:5

Nah 3:2

‫ להב‬Joel 2:5

Nah 3:3

‫ אׁש‬Joel 2:5

Nah 2:4

/ ‫כל־פנים קבצו פארור‬ Joel 2:6 ‫ופני כלם קבצו פארור‬

Nah 2:11

‫ גבור‬Joel 2:7

Nah 2:4

‫ חומה‬Joel 2:7, 9

Nah 2:6

‫ עלה‬Joel 2:7, 9

Nah 3:3

‫ ׁשקק‬Joel 2:9

Nah 2:5

‫ חיל‬Joel 2:11

Nah 2:4

Judgment against the northerner / the north (Joel 2:18–27 // Zephaniah) ‫צפוני‬/‫ צפון‬Joel 2:20

Zeph 2:13

‫ ציה‬Joel 2:20

Zeph 2:13

‫ ׁשממה‬Joel 2:20

Zeph 2:13

New Prosperity (Joel 2:18–27 // Haggai) Compensation for damages / treasures of the nations

Joel 2:25

Hag 2:6–8

Judgment against the nations (Joel 4:1–17* // Zechariah 1–8;  Zechariah 9–14) ‫ גבור‬Joel 4:9, 10, 11

‫ מלחמה‬Joel 4:9

Zech 10:5

Zech 10:3, 4, 5

Security and holiness of Jerusalem (Joel 4:16–17 // Zechariah 14:11–21*) ‫ קדׁש‬Joel 4:17

Zech 14:21

Jakob Wöhrle

164 Joel

1:1–20

Locusts Beginning of the attack

ª Amos

ª Micah ª Nahum

2:1–2:17*

Attack against the city

2:18–27

Defense against the Northener

ª Zephaniah

Compensation for the damages

ª Haggai

4:1–15*

Judgment against the nations

ª Zech 1–8*

Zech 9–14*

4:16–17

Security and holiness of Jerusalem

ª Zech 14:11–21*

Locusts Beginning of the counterattack Counterattack against the city Judgment against the north Treasures of the nations come Judgment against the nations Judgment against the nations Security and holiness of Jerusalem

Fig. 3.  Composition of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I.

of the people and thus the time of the Exile are often presupposed. But in these passages, the scattering of the people is taken not as the fault of the Babylonians but as the fault of all the nations (Joel 4:2–3; Mic 4:6–7, 5:7; Zeph 3:18–19). Thus, a long time seems to have passed since the time of the Exile. Additionally, the hostile attitude toward the nations, in the ForeignNations Corpus I can be explained well against the background of the later Persian period because, since the fifth century, several revolts had taken place in the western Persian Empire, some of which probably also affected the Judeans. From the Chabascha-revolt (486 b.c.e.) to the Tennes-revolt (350 b.c.e.), several rebellions and turmoils are known, which—provided that Judah got involved in these events—could explain why the foreign nations as a whole are described as being hostile to the authors’ people. 29 Another consideration speaks for a date of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I in the late fifth or the early fourth century. One of the few his29. See Stern 1984: 72–77; Albertz 1996–97: 471–72; Donner 1995: 432, 469; Veenhof 2001: 299–304; Grabbe 2004: 346–49.

Israel’s Identity and the Threat of the Nations

165

torical facts known from later-Persian-period extrabiblical sources are the events surrounding the Judean governor Bagoses at the end of the fifth century. 30 According to the Elephantine papyri, this governor supported the request of the Judean community of Elephantine to rebuild the local Yhwh Temple. 31 Additionally, according to Josephus, Bagoses wanted to replace the high priest Jochanan with his brother Joshua. After Jochanan killed his brother, Bagoses took revenge on the Judeans and let them suffer for seven years. He entered the temple and profaned the sanctuary, and he established a tax of 50 drachms for every sacrificed lamb. 32 The Bagoses episode is important for the dating of the ForeignNations Corpus I, for it shows how in the later Persian period a Judean governor installed by the Persians acted against the interests of the people. The Judean autonomy and self-administration supported by the Persians in the early Persian period had been restricted by this time. Thus, events like these could have led the people to the conclusion that all the nations are a source of danger. This applies all the more if the governor Bagoses was really, as is often presumed because of his Persian name, a foreigner installed by the Persians. 33 Against this background, it could well be explained why the redactors of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I at the end of the book of Joel in Joel 4:16–17 and at the end of the whole corpus in Zech 14:20–21 added the promise that no foreigner will enter Jerusalem—and especially the temple—anymore and that Jerusalem and the temple service with its sacrifices will be holy again. This can be understood well as a direct consequence of the fact that Bagoses had entered the temple, profaned the temple, and restricted the sacrifices by his tax. One last consideration also supports a date of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I in the later Persian period. The rejection of mixed marriages during this time is documented (Mal 2:10–16; Ezra 9–10; Neh 13:23– 27). 34 This can be another illustration that in this time the people's distinction from the nations was an important issue, and it can explain the hostile attitude toward the nations within the Foreign-Nations Corpus I.

30. See Gunneweg 1989: 147–48; Donner 1995: 468–69; Grabbe 1992: 49–55, 2004: 319–21. 31.  Cowley 1923: Nos. 30–32. 32.  Josephus, Ant. XI, 297–301. 33. See Galling 1964: 161–62; Williamson 2004: 82. 34.  See, for example, Albertz 1996–97: 585–88, 2004: 13–32; Olyan 2000: 81–90, 99–102.

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All in all, several arguments can be brought forward for dating the Foreign-Nations Corpus I in the late fifth or the early fourth century. The chronology of the redactional layers in the Book of the Twelve and its hostile attitude toward the nations, which fits the few known issues of this time, make this date appear quite reasonable.

The Intention of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I The Foreign-Nations Corpus I is characterized by its multiple descriptions of a way from judgment to salvation. In Joel as in Amos through Deutero-Zechariah, repeatedly the judgment of Yhwh against his own people and new salvation for the time after this judgment is announced. Additionally, these two bodies of writing describe the same things: a hostile army, the beginning of military actions, the attack against a city, the annihilation of the enemy, compensation for the damages caused by the enemy, and bitter judgment against all the nations. The whole corpus thus leads to the expectation that the people will overcome the present situation. Based on this structure, the Foreign-Nations Corpus I has a twofold intention: first, it gives the reasons for the present situation. The transgressions of the people have caused the assaults of the nations. 35 Thus, the present disaster is not only and not mainly the fault of the nations but the fault of the authors’ own people. Additionally, the Foreign-Nations Corpus I strives to give a new perspective of hope. In this corpus, God’s intervention is awaited, leading to an end of the present distress, judgment of the hostile nations, and new salvation with economic wealth and national security. Thereby, it is interesting to note that the foreign nations will meet their fate because they have also offended Yhwh. They went beyond their mandate to act as an instrument of Yhwh’s judgment. They were arrogant (Zeph 2:10, 15; Zech 10:11), they mocked God’s people (Joel 2:17, 19; Zeph 2:8, 10; 3:18), and they magnified themselves (Joel 2:20, 21; Zeph 2:8, 10). Thus, the Foreign-Nations Corpus I seeks not only to proclaim the judgment against the nations but also to explain why this judgment will arrive. With its double intent—to explain the nations’ assaults as Yhwh’s just judgment against his people and to proclaim a judgment against the nations because of their misdeeds—the Foreign-Nations Corpus I reacts to the situation of the people in the later Persian period. It points that the present disaster, especially the nations’ hostilities and the economic distress, are the result of the people’s transgressions. But it also 35.  See above, p. 158.

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—probably against the general mood 36—adheres to the expectation that Yhwh will turn the fate of his people. Therefore, the Foreign-Nations Corpus I cannot be taken as an appeal to fight against the nations. It is not a theological foundation of war. For in the passages added by the redactors of this corpus, Yhwh is the main actor in the present and in the coming events. The people are only an instrument of Yhwh’s judgment against the nations. Therefore, Yhwh must prepare his people for this action. The people are not able to fight against the nations alone, being weak (Joel 4:10) and lame (Mic 4:6, Zeph 3:19); Yhwh must strenghten (Mic 4:13) and support the people (Zech 10:5). Additionally, the nations are described several times as great, mighty, and powerful (Joel 2:2, 11; Mic 4:13; Nah 1:12; Zeph 2:15). Thus, the Foreign-Nations Corpus I presumes a situation in which the people have not been able to fight against the nations. It calls not for violence but perseverance, despite the hostilities of the nations. 37 It is a counterfactual piece of Scripture that adheres to the expectance that the present distress will come to an end. The Foreign-Nations Corpus I therefore serves as an attempt to cope with the situation of the people among the nations in the later Persian period. It explains the distress of this time as the consequence of the people’s transgressions. But it still adheres to the hope that Yhwh will also judge the transgressions of the nations and that he will save his people and lead them to new prosperity.

Conclusion: The Identity of Israel in the International Context of the Later Persion Period This examination of the Foreign-Nations Corpus I leads to some interesting conclusions regarding the identity of the people in the later Persian period. First, the recollection of the people’s own transgressions is significant in this corpus. The people’s present distress is interpreted as just judgment because of their offenses against Yhwh. Thus, awareness of the people’s guilt characterizes this corpus. Besides the recollection of the people’s own transgressions, the ForeignNations Corpus I is most of all determined by a sharp distinction between the people and the foreign nations. The nations as a whole are portrayed as being hostile toward the people, having exceeded their mandate to act as an instrument of Yhwh’s judgment and thus bearing guilt themselves. No differentiation is made among the foreign nations, 36.  See Joel 2:27, 4:17. 37.  See, for example, Kessler, who interprets Mic 4:12–13 as a “Gewaltphantasie der Gedemütigten” (1999: 215).

168

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between the more and the less guilty. According to the Foreign-Nations Corpus I, all the nations have oppressed the people and therefore the complete annihilation of all the nations is expected. In the Corpus, the situation of the people in the later Persian period led to a homogenous view of the nations and an unrestricted negative attitude toward them. This homogenous view is connected with an equally homogenous view of the authors’ own people. The people is also considered a unity; no differentiation is made among the people of different geographic locations or between Jerusalem and Judah, between the people in the land and those in the Diaspora. There is even no differentiation between the people of Judah and the people of Samaria. 38 However, the Corpus avoids delineating not only the different geographic locations of the people but also the different social groups of the people, for example, the lower and the upper classes or the laity and the priests. The distress of the people is not seen as the fault of a distinct group within the people, like in the former prophetic tradition, but as the fault of the people as a whole. Accordingly, the future salvation is also not restricted to a certain part of the people; instead, the people as a whole will be saved and partake in the new prosperity. Therefore, it is interesting to note that Yhwh is the main actor in the coming events. According to the Foreign-Nations Corpus I, only Yhwh is able to change the situation of the people, to nullify the threat of the nations, to protect the people against new assaults, and to lead them to new prosperity. The Foreign-Nations Corpus I presupposes a situation in which the people is powerless and unable to help itself. The Foreign-Nations Corpus I thus reveals how the theological underpinnings of the circumstances in the later Persian period contributed to determining the people’s identity. It shows, how the situation of the people led to a recollection of their own transgressions and a sharp distinction between the people and the nations, in light of which intrasocietal conflicts became less important. The Corpus also illuminates the lack of power of the people, which led to the expectance that Yhwh would act for his people and abandon using the nations as a threat. 38.  Astonishingly, Joel 4:1 speaks of Jerusalem and Judah, and Joel 4:2 speaks of Israel. This could be a hint that the Foreign-Nations Corpus I does not distinguish between the people of Judah and the people of Samaria but has the fate of the whole nation in Judah and Samaria in mind.

References Ackroyd, P. R. 1952 The Book of Haggai and Zechariah I–VIII. JJS 3: 151–56.

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Albertz, R. 1996–97 Religionsgeschichte Israels in alttestamentlicher Zeit. GAT 8/1–2. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2001 Die Exilszeit: 6. Jahrhundert v. Chr. BE 7. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. 2003 Exile as Purification: Reconstructing the “Book of the Four.” Pp. 232– 51 in Thematic Threads in the Book of the Twelve, ed. P. L. Redditt and A. Schart. BZAW 325. Berlin: de Gruyter. 2004 Ethnische und kultische Konzepte in der Politik Nehemias. Pp. 12–32 in Das Manna fällt auch heute noch: Beiträge zur Geschichte und Theologie des Alten, Ersten Testaments, FS E. Zenger, ed. F.-L. Hossfeld and L. Schwienhorst-Schönberger. HBS 44. Freiburg: Herder. Andiñach, P. R. 1992 The Locusts in the Message of Joel. VT 42: 433–41. Beck, M. 2005 Der “Tag Yhwhs” im Dodekapropheton: Studien im Spannungsfeld von Traditions—und Redaktionsgeschichte. BZAW 356. Berlin: de Gruyter. Beuken, W. A. M. 1967 Haggai-Sacharja 1–8: Studien zur Überlieferungsgeschichte der frühnachexilischen Prophetie. SSN 10. Assen: van Gorcum. Bosshard-Nepustil, E. 1997 Rezeptionen von Jesaia 1–39 im Zwölfprophetenbuch: Untersuchungen zur literarischen Verbindung von Prophetenbüchern in babylonischer und persischer Zeit. OBO 154. Freiburg: Universitätsverlag / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Coggins, R. J. 1987 Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi. OTG. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Cowley, A. 1923 Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century b.c. Oxford: Clarendon. Crenshaw, J. L. 1995 Joel: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 24C. New York: Doubleday. Donner, H. 1995 Geschichte des Volkes Israel und seiner Nachbarn in Grundzügen. GAT 4/1–2. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Elliger, K. 1956 Das Buch der zwölf kleinen Propheten, vol. 2: Die Propheten Nahum, Habakuk, Zephanja, Haggai, Sacharja, Maleachi. ATD 25. 3rd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Galling, K. 1964 Bagoas und Esra. Pp. 149–84 in Studien zur Geschichte Israels im persischen Zeitalter, ed. K. Galling. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Gärtner, J. 2006 Jesaja 66 und Sacharja 14 als Summe der Prophetie: Eine traditions—und redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung zum Abschluss des Jesaja—und des Zwölfprophetenbuches. WMANT 114. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag.

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Grabbe, L. 1992 Who Was the Bagoses of Josephus (Ant. 11.7.1, §§ 297–301)? Trans­ euphratène 5: 49–55. 2004 A History of the Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period, vol. 1: Yehud: A History of the Persian Province of Judah. Library of Second Temple Studies 47. London: T. & T. Clark. Gunneweg, A. H. J. 1989 Geschichte Israels: Von den Anfängen bis Bar Kochba und von Theodor Herzl bis zur Gegenwart. 6th ed. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Hanson, P. D. 1979 The Dawn of Apocalyptic: The Historical and Sociological Roots of Jewish Apocalyptic Eschatology. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: Fortress. Keller, C. A. 1972 Die theologische Bewältigung der geschichtlichen Wirklichkeit in der Prophetie Nahums. VT 22: 399–419. Kessler, R. 1999 Micha. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder. Klostermann, A. 1896 Geschichte des Volkes Israel: Bis zur Restauration unter Esra und Nehemia. Munich: Beck. Lux, R. 2002 Das Zweiprophetenbuch: Beobachtungen zu Aufbau und Struktur von Haggai und Sacharja 1–8. Pp. 191–217 in “Wort Jhwhs, das geschah . . .” (Hos 1,1). Studien zum Zwölfprophetenbuch, ed. E. Zenger. HBS 35. Freiburg: Herder. Macchi, J.-D. 2004 Les douze petits prophètes. Pp. 379–82 in Introduction à l’Ancien Testament, ed T. Römer et al. Le monde de la bible 49. Genève: Labor et Fides. Marti, K. 1904 Das Dodekapropheton. KHC 13. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Mason, R. 1977 The Books of Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi. CNEB. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Meyers, C. L., and Meyers, E. M. 1987 Haggai, Zechariah 1–8: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 25B. New York: Doubleday. Nogalski, J. 1993a Literary Precursors to the Book of the Twelve. BZAW 217. Berlin: de Gruyter. 1993b Redactional Processes in the Book of the Twelve. BZAW 218. Berlin: de Gruyter. Olyan, S. M. 2000 Rites and Rank: Hierarchy in Biblical Representations of Cult. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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Perlitt, L. 2004 Die Propheten Nahum, Habakuk, Zephanja. ATD 25/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Petersen, D. L. 1995 Zechariah 9–14 and Malachi: A Commentary. OTL. Louisville: Westminster John Knox. Pola, T. 2003 Das Priestertum bei Sacharja: Historische und traditionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zur frühnachexilischen Herrschererwartung. FAT 35. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Redditt, P. L. 1995 Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi. NCBC. London: Pickering. Reventlow, H. Graf 1993 Die Propheten Haggai, Sacharja und Maleachi. ATD 25/2. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Roberts, J. J. M. 1991 Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah: A Commentary. OTL. Louisville: Westminster John Knox. Rudolph, W. 1971 Joel—Amos—Obadja—Jona. KAT 13/2. Gütersloh: Mohn. 1975 Micha—Nahum—Habakuk—Zephanja. KAT 13/3. Gütersloh: Mohn. 1976 Haggai—Sacharja 1–8—Sacharja 9–14—Maleachi. KAT 13/4. Gütersloh: Mohn. Ryou, D. H. 1995 Zephaniah’s Oracles against the Nations: A Synchronic and Diachronic Study of Zephaniah 2:1–3:8. Biblical Interpretation Series 13. Leiden: Brill. Sæbø, M. 1969 Sacharja 9–14: Untersuchungen zu Text und Form. WMANT 34. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Schart, A. 1998 Die Entstehung des Zwölfprophetenbuches: Neubearbeitungen von Amos im Rahmen schriftenübergreifender Redaktionsprozesse. BZAW 260. Berlin: de Gruyter. Schmid, K. 2007 Hintere Propheten (Nebiim). Pp. 303–401 in Grundinformation Altes Testament: Eine Einführung in Literatur, Religion und Geschichte des Alten Testaments, ed. J. C. Gertz. UTB 2745. 2nd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schmitt, H.-C. 2005 Arbeitsbuch zum Alten Testament: Grundzüge der Geschichte Israels und der alttestamentlichen Schriften. UTB 2146. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schulz, H. 1973 Das Buch Nahum: Eine redaktionskritische Untersuchung. BZAW 129. Berlin: de Gruyter.

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Schwesig, P.-G. 2006 Die Rolle der Tag-Jhwhs-Dichtungen im Dodekapropheton. BZAW 366. Berlin: de Gruyter. Sellin, E. 1922 Das Zwölfprophetenbuch. KAT 12. Leipzig: Deichert. Seybold, K. 1991 Nahum, Habakuk, Zephanja. ZBKAT 24/2. Zürich: Theologischer Verlag. Spronk, K. 1997 Nahum. HCOT. Kampen: Kok Pharos. Stern, E. 1984 The Persian Empire and the Political and Social History of Palestine in the Persian Period. Pp. 70–87 in The Cambridge History of Judaism, vol. 1: Introduction; The Persian Period, ed. W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sweeney, M. A. 2003 Zephaniah: A Commentary. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress. Tollington, J. E. 1993 Tradition and Innovation in Haggai and Zechariah 1–8. JSOTSup 150. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Veenhof, K. R. 2001 Geschichte des Alten Orients bis zur Zeit Alexanders des Großen. GAT 11. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Weiser, A. 1956 Das Buch der zwölf kleinen Propheten, vol. 1: Die Propheten Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadja, Jona, Micha. ATD 24. 2nd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Wellhausen, J. 1963 Die kleinen Propheten. 4th ed. Berlin: de Gruyter. Williamson, H. G. M. 2004 The Historical Value of Josephus’ Jewish Antiquities xi. 297–301. Pp. 74–89 in Studies in Persian Period History and Historiography, ed. H. G. M. Williamson. FAT 38. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Wöhrle, J. 2006 Die frühen Sammlungen des Zwölfprophetenbuches: Entstehung und Komposition. BZAW 360. Berlin: de Gruyter. 2008 Der Abschluss des Zwölfprophetenbuches: Buchübergreifende Redaktionsprozesse in den späten Sammlungen. BZAW 389. Berlin: de Gruyter. Wolff, H. W. 1975 Dodekapropheton 2: Joel und Amos. BK 14/2. 2nd ed. NeukirchenVluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Zapff, B. M. 1997 Redaktionsgeschichtliche Studien zum Michabuch im Kontext des Dodeka­ propheton. BZAW 256. Berlin: de Gruyter. Zenger, E. et al. 2006 Einleitung in das Alte Testament. 6th ed. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer.

The Rite of Separation of the Foreign Wives in Ezra–Nehemiah Yonina Dor

Oranim–Academic College for Education

  When these things were finished, the chiefs approached me and said: The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the peoples of the lands, but have acted according to the abominations of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites. For they have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons, so that the holy seed has become mixed with the people of the land. What is more, the chiefs and officials have led the way in this unfaithfulness. When I heard this I rent my garment and cloak, pulled hair from my head and beard, and sat in a state of severe shock. . . .   While Ezra was praying and confessing, weeping and prostrate in front of the house of God, a very large crowd of Israelites—men, women and children—gathered around him, for the people were weeping very bitterly. (Ezra 9:1–10:1)

Jewish identity of the postexilic congregation of the Persian period is one of the central issues in the recent research on the late biblical period. This is seemingly associated with the current worldwide problem of national identity versus the trends of globalization and of multinational societies. I wish to present the role of the “foreign wives” in the book of Ezra–Nehemiah as a unique and sophisticated way of dealing with the problem of belonging to the Jewish commununity within the multiethnic society of postexilic Judah. The returnees who arrived in Jerusalem in the first waves of immigration from Babylon apparently attempted to integrate with the Israelite nonexiled population by marrying their daughters. However, some decades later, Ezra, Nehemiah, and their followers declared that the congregation of the returnees must separate itself by expelling those who did not originally belong. The exact meaning of the “peoples of the lands” and “foreign wives” remains somewhat obscure. However, I prefer the identification of the peoples of the lands and the foreign women as the descendants of the Israelites who were not deported, whether from the Northern Kingdom 173

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by the Assyrians or, later, from Judah by the Babylonians. 1 We do not know the numbers of the separatist group: did it consist of a significant majority among the returnees, or was it merely a small minority? The book of Ezra–Nehemiah openly represents this group, disregarding the Israelite inhabitants who didn’t return from captivity. However, throughout the book there is a clear opposition to mixing with these “foreigners,” particularly marrying their daughters. The climax of the issue is a series of events in which the leaders and the crowd decide to expel the foreigners. A literary-textual analysis of Ezra 9–10 led me to conclude that the story told in these chapters stems from three different sources that share a model of community-wide gathering. 2 This model recurs also in three independent passages in Nehemiah (9:1–3; 13:1–3; chaps. 23–30). This evidence suggests that the events of separation of the foreign women are merely symbolic ceremonies or rituals that were meant to enable accepting of outsiders into the community. 3 To support this assumption, I will concentrate on three points: (a) the steps that were taken in order to establish a separate identity of the returnees, (b) the identification of a ritual of separation, and (c) the meaning of the ritualistic solution to the command to “purify” the community of returnees.

The Implements of Establishing a Separate Identity of the Returnees The book of Ezra–Nehemiah and especially the descriptions of the separation episode reveal some devices that were meant to establish and strengthen the self-recognition of the returnees as an exclusive, separate unit. First, we find the terminology of the separatist ideology. The book of Ezra defines its congregation as “the assembly of exiles,” ‫קהל הגולה‬ (Ezra 10:8), or “exiles,” ‫( הגולה‬Ezra 9:4, 10:6), or “the whole assembly,” ‫( הקהל‬Ezra 14; Neh 5:13, 7:66), or “those who had come from the captivity,” ‫( הבאים מהשבי‬Ezra 8:35; 10:7, 16). This clearly refers only to the returnees. The expression “the holy seed,” ‫( זרע הקודש‬Ezra 9:2), indicates the high self-estimation of this group of people. The book uses 1. See Grabbe 1998: 136–38; Dor 2006: 99–154, which includes a review of other interpretations. 2.  Dor 2003: 29–41. 3.  The present study does not treat the historical questions, that is, the credibility of the information or the time and the manner in which it was authored, but only the account in Ezra–Nehemiah as it is, meaning the story that was accepted as the truth. For historical and authorship questions, see Japhet 1994: 189–216; Wright 2005: 243–69.

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a language that is hostile toward “foreigners,” ‫בני נכר‬, “foreign wives,” ‫נשים נכריות‬, and “the people of the lands,” ‫עמי הארצות‬. More specific names are used by the chiefs for defining the people of the lands when calling them as the ancient autochthonous peoples: Canaanites, Hittites and the others (Ezra 9:1). Nehemiah mentions Horonites, Ammonites, Moabites, and Ashdodite women in these contexts (2:19, 13:23). The names as such are actually names of foreigners. However, there are several indications that suggest that these were Israelites who had not been exiled: the Jahwistic suffix of Tuvia’s name, their marriages with the respected people of Judah and the family of the chief priest, and the fact that the chief priest assigned for Tuvia a room in the courts of the house of God (Neh 13:7–9). The book refers to Israelites who are not part of the returnees as people who belong to other nations, in order to make them hated. This is how the terminology reveals the author’s attitude. Second, there is a list of exlusive membership of the community, which is also a communicative and political tool. The list of “the people of the province who came up from the captivity of the exile” in Ezra 2:2–61 and Neh 7:6–63 is a “membership register” illustrating the exclusive character of the community of returnees. The comment about those who could not prove their origins clarifies the ultimate condition of belonging to their group (Ezra 2:59–62; Neh 7:61–65). A third means was to stress that only the returned exiles could participate in public events such as the building of the temple (Ezra 4:1), celebrating the Passover (Ezra 6:19–21), making sacrifices (Ezra 8:35), attending public meetings (Ezra 10:7), and celebrating Succot (Neh 8:17). All these events were open only to returnees. Another means is in the vast elaboration in the first and third sections of the book. These are mainly meant to arouse tension and hostility between the returnees and other groups. Here the local groups are described as falsely accusing the returnees of planning to rebel against the king (Ezra 4:12–16; Neh 2:19, 6:6). In an atmosphere of rivalry, informing, and intrigue, Nehemiah inflames hatred toward his adversaries, Tuvia and Sanballat, as well as the respected people of Jerusalem who collaborated with them (Neh 6:17–19). 4 By endorsing the sense of siege and hostility, he contrives to enforce their segregation. Yet in reality the returnees were very loyal to the king of Persia. The king, motivated by royal interests, supported them, released them from 4.  In spite of G. Knoppers’s (2007: 305–32) description of the complicated, nonmonovalent relations between Nehemiah and his opponents, the book depicts a deep hostility between Nehemiah and his adversaries. This picture strengthens the isolated character of the community.

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taxes, and financed the rebuilding of the temple. Due to their dependence on the Persian king, the returnees thanked both God and him (Ezra 7:27, 9:9). Their loyalty to him even led them to reject any Israelite national or political aspirations. Thus, for example, the book does not refer to any hope for the renewal of the independence of Israel or the kingdom of the house of David. Yet, at the same time, Haggai expressed hopes for political independence (2:21–23). In addition, Ezra the scribe is portrayed as the charismatic leader around whom the returnees cluster. He is the admired figure with whom they identify, as is common in separatist groups. 5 Finally, the most dramatic means of forming the segregation of the assembly is the episode of the expulsion of the foreign wives. The story consists of several public gatherings, and in all of them the people are called to separate out the foreign wives and the foreigners by expelling them. This is an amazingly unique story; there is no similar story in the Bible or in the entirety of Jewish literature. Furthermore, the idea of a mass expulsion of married women, some of whom were mothers of children, is alien to the biblical spirit and is quite opaque. This response would be justified if they had been mistresses or prostitutes; it would be more acceptable had the Bible related a severe transgression to these women, such as idol worship, wrongdoing, or tempting their husbands to sin. Had they been childless, the expulsion would somehow been easier to understand. However, none of these extenuating circumstances are mentioned. Still, despite its apparent incomprehensibility, Jewish tradition has accepted the events of separation as accurate information about an expulsion that actually took place. 6 By making of a list of names of the people who took foreign wives (Ezra 10:14–44) the community pronounces a wish for personal responsibility by asking the elders to point out exactly those who took foreign wives, name by name, city by city, and to accuse them individually (Ezra 10:14). The shaming public listing of the names of citizens who took foreign wives endowed the idea of separation with specificity and authenticity. The preparation of this “black list” and its publication are presented as functional; in fact, the action is purely demon5.  Ezra is “elevated to the status of a Lawgiver . . . as a new Moses” in the climatic scene of the book (Ezra 10:12–13). Here, one can hear “an echo of the covenant ceremonies of Sinai (Exodus 24:3) and Shechem (Jushua 24:16–28)” (Hays 2008: 68). See Blenkinsopp 1990: 19–20 about the central place Ezra holds as the charismatic leader. See also his hypothesis about Ezra’s activity as representing an early stage in the process of the late Second Temple sectarianism: 2007: 397. 6.  See, for instance, Kaufmann 1969: 302.

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strative, because only the publication of the list and nothing else was indicated as the practical response to the demand to expel those women. The fact that some of the listed persons continued to take other active roles among the returnees testifies that they were not actually boycotted, and their status was not married. In addition, I do not rule out this explanation when dealing with the expulsion of the high priest’s son (Neh 13:28). 7 But it is not only the making of this list that is merely symbolic. I maintain that the entire story is simply a description of ceremonies. With more details about the separation of the women, with any hints of some opposition to this draconian demand or of any difficulties with its feasibility, the story would have seemed much more authentic and convincing. However, the testimonies of an actual separation are scarce. The book of Ezra contains no documentation of the expulsion. It is noteable that the harmonistic “correction” of the Septuagint, at the end of the book (Ezra 10:43), has changed the end of the list of men from a vague report into a clear statement that the women had been expelled. 8 In the three texts of Nehemiah, the information about the execution of the separation is minimal, laconic, and technical, such as “they separated out from Israel all who were of mixed descent” (Neh 9:2; 13:3, 28). On the one hand, one can see the story as fiction, because of the great disproportion between the rich, detailed, and emotional descriptions of the preparation for expulsion, and the paucity of information about the implementation. 9 On the other hand, the vast reference of the separation events in the book and the bulk of details of each event support the traditional approach that this is not an imaginary report. My point is that the contradiction can be solved: by repeatedly performing the events that are involved with sending away the foreign women, the right and proper norms of life were gradually clarified by the people themselves.

A Ritual of Separation The separation events were mere rituals. To support this idea I will present some brief, general characteristics of ritual, followed by some of its typical features, in order to show how these features play a central role in the separation events. Ritual is a unique form of communication. 7.  See pp. 180– 181 below. 8.  This “simplification” of the text follows 1 Esdr 9:36. It conveys the will “to solve the problem.” See Williamson 1985: 145. 9.  See for instance, Grabbe 1992: 119–22.

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It is a dramatic, formal public event that helps to “deal with the chaos of human experience and put it into a coherent framework.” 10 But the message of the event is often ambiguous, because the main symbol lacks one definite and precise meaning. 11 Jonathan Z. Smith writes about this aspect as follows: Ritual is a means of performing the way things ought to be in conscious tension to the way things are in such a way that this ritualized perfection is recollected in the ordinary, uncontrolled course of things. Ritual relies for its power on the fact that it is concerned with quite ordinary activities, that what is described and displayed is, in principle, possible for every occurrence of these acts. But it relies, as well, for its power on the perceived fact that, in actuality, such possibilities cannot be realized. . . . Ritual provides an occasion for reflection and rationalization on the fact that what ought to have been done was not done, what ought to have taken place did not occur. . . . Ritual is . . . a magical imitation of desired ends, a Translation of emotions, a symbolic acting out of Ideas. 12

This description clearly reflects the thesis of this essay. In addition to this concept, the anthropological literature provides several clear features of ritual. Among them are repetitions, characteristic elements, and the way in which a new ceremony can be accepted. These traits can be used as means to demonstrate the idea that the foreign women’s separation events were rituals. Repetitions Anthropologists point out the repetitive and formalized nature of a ritual. 13 The events related to the separation occur six times in Ezra– Nehemiah—three times in Ezra (9–10:1; 10:2–6, 7–44), 14 and three times in Nehemiah (9:1–3; 13:3–1, 23–30). The procedure of each event is almost identical, consisting of a combination of the same elements, but not always in the same order and with some of them sometimes missing. 15 This is not a strict pattern but rather variations on a theme, using similar but not identical terms. Verbal variations indicate the existence of different sources for these stories that prove their authenticity.

10.  Kertzer 1988: 8. 11.  About ambiguity as characterizing ritual, see Kertzer 1988: 11; Muir 2005: 5–6. 12.  Smith 1966: 480. 13.  Kertzer 1988: 9; Moor and Myerhoff 1977: 8. 14.  Dor 2003: 29–41. 15.  Geertz (1973: 28) explains that devoutness presented in a fixed formal order is not authentic.

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Elements of Ritual Significant Place and Time Any ritual needs a significant place and solemn circumstances. 16 To celebrate the separation event, the congregation assembled in a public place, mainly in the vicinity of the temple (Ezra 9:4–5; 10:1, 6, 9; Neh 9:1–4). 17 The ceremony took place during an important time in public life. One or two of the three events of Ezra 9–10 are part of the preparations for the reading of the Law (Nehemiah 8); 18 Neh 9:3–1 is an introductory event for signing the covenant pledge and the completion of the construction of the wall. Neh 13:1–3 may be understood as a solemn opening to Nehemiah’s farewell speech. Explicit Sayings A ritual includes postulates, unique verses, and declarations or prayers that clarify the main issue of the event. 19 In our story, the leaders and the congregation admit their wrongdoing—taking foreign wives—and they openly repent. This admission is expressed by a variety of declarations: Ezra recites a prayer of confession (Ezra 9:6–15), Shekaneyah ben Yeḥîʾel admits the public guilt (Ezra 10:2), and there are some direct reproaches of the whole crowd (Ezra 10:12–13; Neh 9:2, 13:25–27). At the end of the event, the participants may reach a decision or an agreement, or take an oath. One example would be the encouraging words of the audience to Ezra: “Arise! For it is your duty to deal with this matter, but we will support you. Take courage and act! . . .  Then the whole assembly shouted in reply: yes, we must do as you say” (Ezra 10:4, 12–13, emphasis mine) The account provides direct and indirect examples that demonstrate the people took oaths (Ezra 10:5; Neh 13:25). Also, ‫( ויתנו ידם‬Ezra 10:19) is described as taking an oath. Using formulaic expressions known from old, sacred traditions is important in order to form a direct connection between the concrete new ritual and the religious traditions. For example: “separate,” the root ‫( בד”ל‬Ezra 9:1), “holy,” ‫( הקדש‬Ezra 9:2); “neglected your commandments,” ‫( עזבנו מצותיך‬Ezra 9:10), “their impurity,” ‫( טמאתם‬Ezra 9:11), “abominations,” ‫( תעבות‬Ezra 9:11); “and eat the good things of the land and bequeath it to your children forever,” ‫ואכלתם את־טוב הארץ והורׁשתם‬ 16. See Smith 1996: 474–75. 17.  The phrase “until the evening offering,” ‫למנחת הערב‬, describes time, but the issue is specific to the location of the Temple. The same holds true for “the stairs of the Levites,” ‫מעלה הלוים‬, which are located in the temple. 18.  Understanding Nehemiah 8 as the direct continuation of Ezra 10 is based on 1 Esdras 9. See Grabbe 1998: 53. 19.  Rappaport 1996: 122–27.

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‫( לבניכם עד־עולם‬Ezra 9:12). The use of these key words and expressions represents the canonical culture, intensifies the rite, and legitimizes its national-religious status. 20 Expressing Strong Feelings Most rituals typically include dramatic utterings of feelings. In the case of the foreign women, strong feelings are related to the admission of guilt. The great cry (Ezra 9:3–7) is a well-known convention in various ceremonies expressing the pain of separation and farewell. By describing mixed marriages in terms of death, they are also furnished with the heavy weight of a serious disaster. Dramatic Gestures Some dramatic gestures are meant to illustrate depth of sorrow. 21 Examples of these are the fasting, the tearing of clothes, the tearing of hair (Ezra 9:3, Neh 13:25), sometimes quarreling and cursing (Neh 13:25), or the ceremonial silence (Ezra 9:3). 22 These actions, which cause physical suffering, create a sense of sanctity and sacrificial aura as is expected in mourning ceremonies. Sacred Object Ritual needs to concentrate on some sacred object. This is usually a tangible symbol to be viewed, admired, considered as sacral. 23 The Torah is presented in the separation events as the legal and holy source of authority representing God, as was the ark of the covenant in the past. The ceremonial separation is presented as a direct implementation of the demands of the Law, as the last chapter of the book states: “When they read the book of Moses to the people, they found written in it that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God. . . . When the people heard this law, they separated out from Israel all who were of mixed descent” (Neh 13:1–3). Symbolic Expulsion D. Kertzer writes: “Ritual is an action wrapped in a web of symbolism. . . . symbolization gives the action much more important meaning. Through ritual, beliefs about the universe come to be acquired, reinforced, and eventually changed.” 24 This perception is based on E. Cas20.  Kertzer 1988: 9; Rappaport 1996: 428, 436–38; Raglan 1971: 122–27. 21.  Regarding the strength of gestures in rites of passage, see Turner and Turner 1982: 203–15; Rubin 1997: 163–67. 22. Regarding “sat in a state of severe shock,” ‫ואשבה משומם‬, as a gesture of mourning rites; see Lohfink 1962. 23. See Turner and Turner 1982: 21. 24.  Kertzer 1988: 9.

Rite of Separation of the Foreign Wives in Ezra–Nehemiah

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sirer’s definition: “Ritual action not only gives meaning to the world, it becomes part of the world.” 25 Had there been a description of a real physical expulsion of the women, I would understand it as a symbolic action, a simulated implementation of the separatist ideal. That is why Ezra fails to mention a successful expulsion. The text of Nehemiah refers very briefly to three actions, but the information is vague. The question of who should be separated from whom remains obscure: is it the foreign wives from Israel (Neh 13:3) or Israel from a wide congregation (Neh 9:2)? The same occurs when  Nehemiah mentions chasing away the high priest’s son as a response to his marrying Sanballat’s daughter. This case is portrayed in Nehemiah’s farewell speech as the symbolic climax of the purification of both the priesthood and the Levites (Neh 13:28–30). On the one hand, the location of this issue at the end of the book highlights its central importance. On the other hand, the achievements are very disappointing: only one family actually executed the separation. What should we learn from the fact that Nehemiah mentions only the “purification” of the priests and the Levites and not their expulsion, as was demanded? And why does the text refer only to them and not to the entire congregation? Why was the son of the high priest expelled and not his wife, Sanballat’s daughter? The strength of this symbolic expulsion in the book’s epilogue stems from its relating to a personal injury of a member of the most important family. This symbolic concretization demonstrates the power of the demand to expel. Shaming and punishing a celebrity spices up the issue of separation. The six sections that repeatedly describe the separation events of foreign wives follow a generally similar procedure, based on the typical features of rituals. The superiority of a ritual over other ways of molding public opinion is in its concreteness. The common people could be both participants and observers in the multimedia event. Active participation in the experience creates partnership and personal involvement, allowing the expression of feelings and, at the climax of the event, a spiritual exaltation. This gesture that symbolizes separating grants the ritual its power. Mircea Eliade writes that an idea is actually perceived only by the repetition of an archetype or by participating in the exemplary experience that represents it. 26 However, in those times, a public ceremony of separation was a novelty. Including it in the list of ceremonies of the community was an attempt to provide a normative status to the separatist point of view.

25.  Cassirer 1955: 38–39. 26.  Eliade 1969: 70–84.

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Motivating the People to Accept the New Ceremony The ritualistic event of expelling the foreign women was a new invention. But a new incident such as this when repeated and based on religious obligations to the God of Israel, could never have been accepted had it not been rooted in established traditions. E. Hobsbawm and T. Ranger maintain that the use of ideas, linguistic expressions, customs, symbols, or other conventions of a traditional ethos often serve to impose new ideological and political concepts. 27 This dynamic has appeared during crucial changes throughout political and cultural history. According to the theory of these historians, in order to be accepted by the general public, the initiation of the separation ritual was accepted at that time because it was based on ancient and well-known traditions. The deep roots of the separation ethos can be recognized in typical beliefs, laws, and symbols in various biblical contexts. One example is the Bible’s “demonization of the other” (the Gentiles, the foreigner, Amalek). The presentation of “the other” as impure, contaminated, and endangering anyone who comes close to him is a powerful recurring motif in the Bible and an essential factor of the separatist ideology. Hatred for the other should be understood as a protective measure against ethnic mixture. People are often hostile toward those who resemble them or are near their territory. 28 The most wellknown resented relatives in the Bible are Joseph (hated by his brothers), the tribe of Benjamin (hated by the other tribes), and the most cursed person, Amalek, Jacob’s nephew according to Gen 36:12. A specific example of otherness is the “foreign women myth,” in which most of the non-Israelite women are described as unclean, turning Israel’s hearts to worship their gods and their “abominations.” Marriage and any sexual ties with them are described in many stories as a source of disaster. See the story of Baʿal-Peʿor (Num 25:1–18), Samson’s wives (Judges 13–16), Isabel (1 Kings 17–21; 2 Kgs 9:30–37), and of King Solomon’s wives (1 Kgs 11:1–10). Their sons brought nothing but trouble, such as Abimelech son of Gideon and his mistress from Nablus (Judges 9) and Absalom son of David and Maʿacha daughter of the King of Geshur (2 Samuel 13–18). Ties with foreign women are related to worship of other deities and to a national defeat. The book of Deuteronomy bans intermarriage with the autochthonic peoples (Deut 7:1–3). Otherness is also essential to the purity ritual. The dynamics of purification and separation ceremonies are deeply rooted in biblical cul27.  Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983: 1–14. 28. See Elizur 2004: 132.

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ture. The Israelites were commanded to send away afflicted and impure people, such as lepers and people with the plague (Num 5:2–4; Lev 13:46), a girl who is not a virgin when she marries (Deut 22:21), and a woman during her monthly period or after birth (Lev 12:2, 15:19–33). The purity of the camp was achieved only by expelling these people from the congregation. The people of the lands and foreign women are presented as impure, requiring purification (Ezra 9:11, 14; Neh 13:9, 30). The most enduring and colorful ritual of this kind of banishment is that of the scapegoat (Lev 16:21–22). Symbolically, the goat carries upon itself the impurity of the people of Israel, and in sending it away to the desert the congregation becomes purified. Stories about expulsion of dangerous figures follow a similar pattern. The common model of these stories has a typical structure: the society is in trouble, so it searches for the source, finds the guilty person, and sends him away, sometimes killing him or her, and in doing so it releases the society from the trouble. This is why Pharaoh sends the Israelites from Egypt, because they cause the smiting of the firstborn (Exodus 12). Sending Achan from the camp allows victory over the Ai (Josh 7:24). Throwing Jonah into the stormy sea causes the sea to “cease from his raging” (Jonah 1:15), and so on. These examples display the traditions that justify expulsion of a group of people of whom the community wants to be rid. Blaming them by calling them impure is a pretext, a way to exploit religious concepts in the interest of the society. One may well ask why the wives were “selected” to represent the local community that had not been exiled and not the men. The story discusses men. The names of the men who took foreign wives and not the names of the women are mentioned on the black list (Ezra 10:18–43). The men are the ones Nehemiah attacks and curses and blames. Nothing is actually said about the women’s guilt, except that they spoke with their children in their own languages, thus bringing up children who “were unable to speak the language of Judah” (Neh 13:24). 29 When I see these women as a symbol representing their families and their societies, I understand that they were “scapegoats.” The “wrong” origin of the foreign wives was already known to their men prior to the marriages. They probably considered these women to be Israelites. Among the religious returnees, marriage to Gentile women was certainly not acceptable. The segregation command was late, after the establishment of a separatist group. There is more than one possible main cause for 29.  On the changes in the use of Hebrew in the Persian era, see Kottsieper 2007: 95–110; Willi-Plein (2007: 188–89) suggests that Nehemiah’s main concern was to preserve and strengthen the status of the Hebrew language.

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the change. 30 It seems that the expulsion of the foreigners as a scapegoat was a dramatic symbol to solve a crucial problem for the returnees. Intermarriage was demonstrated as the main sin, demanding rectification. However, though a man can cast aside his former belief or attitude, it is much more difficult to cast aside his wife who has already borne his sons. Thus, an acceptable cultural compromise was found: to condemn the sin of the past by conducting a ceremony of separation that included a declaration of the sin to be corrected but to do nothing beyond this symbolic act.

The Ambiguous Meaning of the Separation Ritual It seems that the crucial function of the rite was to promote a sense of solidarity, of a “real Israel,” in the absence of a consensus about the question “Who is Israel?” After all, a ritual is a political strategy of enforcing positions and interests. 31 Thus, we should see the ceremony as a public appeal for the returnees to close ranks, exclusively identifying themselves as the true, real Israel. If an expulsion actually took place, it was probably only a show. This explains why they repeated similar ceremonies again and again. Having realized that it was impossible to expel the foreign women, they accepted the ritualistic declaration that separation was appropriate and by this they formally established the status of the separated ones: “the priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, the temple servants, and anyone who had separated himself from the people of the lands for the sake of the Law of God” (Neh 10:29, Ezra 6:21). The status of “anyone who had separated himself,” ‫כל הנבדל‬, is the last reference in the list of the community members because he is the least worthy. 32 Although this is not a venerable status, it is considered a legitimate group within the community. The Hebrew uses the passive voice, the literal translation being “whoever had been separated,” which indicates that they had lost their previous outsider status, and they are now part of the congregation. This story follows the “rites of passage,” defined by A. van Gennep, comprising three stages. 33 The first is separation, which is described 30.  Among the  different reasons suggested by researchers for the demand to separate the returnees, including religious reasons, socioeconomic conflicts, competition between the holy places, and so on, I prefer Schultz’s (1980) explanation. He claims that the political tension between the various groups who fought for control over Judah is what caused the in-house conflict; see Dor 2006: 138–45. 31.  Kertzer 1988: 12–34; Bell 1992: 47–54. 32.  Dor 2006: 196–200. 33. Van Gennep 1977: 1–14.

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in detail in Ezra–Nehemiah. The second stage, also described in Ezra– Nehemiah, is liminality, consisting of weeping, fasting, tearing the clothes and plucking at the beard, retreating into solitude and silence, praying, and expressing remorse. This is the hardest stage, in which one is neither an outsider nor part of the new group. The third stage is formally rejoining the community. This stage is not described in Ezra– Nehemiah, but it is clearly mentioned that “one who had been separated” belongs to the groups of Israel, celebrating Passover with them or signing a covenant pledge. The symbolic rite of separation made these persons acceptable to the community. Therefore, we can regard this ritual as an ancient form of conversion to normative Judaism, because conversion is expressed by a symbolic ceremony. The text intends to strengthen the separatist ethos. But by forming an institutional status of “all those who separated themselves,” its great innovation is not the idea of expulsion from the community but the opposite of this, namely, the idea of accepting into the community. The dilemma of deciding between the fundamental demand for separation and the practical inability to fulfill it was settled by ritual “mediation,” which bridges between the ultimate command to separate and the inability to do so. Explaining the separation event as ritual answers two hard questions that arise from the episode: why does the congregation of Jews banish a group of wives, and why is there no information that Ezra and Nehemiah succeeded in doing it? This understanding is implicit in the silence of the wives and in the biblical sense of justice, according to which idea of banishment would be considered unethical. “Mere ritual” is a possible response to the ethical criticism of the issue of the foreign women that undercuts Ezra’s message. 34 The silent agreement to accept “all those who separated themselves” was an expression of the mature recognition that no “perfect” solutions were actually possible. In addition to acknowledging that a monolithic congregation is ideal, it also brought the community to a silent and tolerant compromise with imperfect reality.

Summary The six repetitions of separation events in the book of Ezra–Nehemiah and the characteristics of these events have led me to conclude that they were merely rituals. Moreover, textual analysis of the descriptions 34.  Hays (2008: 80) is not the first one to criticize this issue. See, for example, Eichhorst (1969: 18, 21, 27), who defines the events of Ezra 9–10 as tragedy. Hays, following Bakhtin, explains the silence of the wives as typical of the “stubborn unity” monologism of the book of Ezra.

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reveals that they fit ritual models. The separation rituals were a sophisticated and original means for the returnee community to negotiate its relations with the indigenous Israelites. The first returnees took indigenous wives because they initially considered them Israelites. It was only later, after the establishment of the separatist group, that those wedlocks were condemned  as sinful. However, a man can cast aside his former attitude, but it is much more difficult to cast aside his wife. This dilemma was solved by a compromise: they condemned the already committed errors, they performed a ceremony of separation, they publicly denounced the sin, and then they refrained from taking any steps beyond these symbolic acts. The events of separation are traditionally considered a means to establish the exclusive, separate identity of the community of the returnees. I challenge this consideration and maintain that the ceremony was meant to enable the acceptance of the outsiders as part of the community. Purifying the separated people by the symbolic rite made their reintegration possible. Alongside the simplistic traditional view that the text intends to strengthen the separatist ethos, we must also recognize the hidden message it carries—the elevation of pluralism over zealotry.

Bibliography Bell, C. 1992 Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. New York: Oxford University Press. Blenkinsopp, J. 1990 A Jewish Sect of the Persian Period. Catholic Biblical Quarterly 52: 5–20. 2007 The Development of Jewish Sectarianism from Nehemiah to the Hasidism. Pp. 385–404 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Cassirer, E. 1955 The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, vol. 1: Mythical Thought, trans. R. Man­heim. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Dor, Y. 2003 The Composition of the Episode of the Foreign Women in Ezra IX–X. Vetus Testamentum 53: 26–47. 2006 Have the “Foreign Women” Really been Expelled? Separation and Exclusion in the Restoration Period. Jerusalem: Magnes. [Hebrew] Eichhorst, W. R. 1969 Ezra’s Ethics on Intermarriage and Divorce. Grace Theological Journal 10: 16–28.

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Eliade, M. 1969 Mythe de l’eterenel retour: Archetypes et repetition, trans. Y. Reuveni. Jerusalem: Carmel. [Hebrew] Elizur, A. 2004 Memory of Amalek and the Boar Taste: Anatomy of Metaphysic Hatred. Pp. 118–82 in The Cradle Of Creativity, ed. C. Ben Nun et al. Hod Hashron: Shaarei Mishpat. [Hebrew] Geertz, C. 1973 The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays, trans. Y. Meizler. Jerusalem: Keter. [Hebrew] Gennep, A. van 1977 The Rites of Passage, trans. M. B. Vizedom and G. L. Caffee. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Grabbe, L. L. 1992 Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian, vol. 1: The Persian and Greek Periods. Minneapolis: Fortress. 1998 Ezra–Nehemiah. London: Routledge. Hays, C. B. 2008 The Silence of the Wives: Bakhtin’s Monologism and Ezra 7–10. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 33: 59–80. Hobsbawm, E., and Ranger, T. 1983 Introduction: Inventing Traditions. Pp. 1–14 in The Invention of Tradition, ed. E. Hobsbawm and T. Ranger. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Japhet, S. 1994 Composition and Chronology in the Book of Ezra—Nehemiah. Pp. 189–216 in Second Temple Studies, vol. 2: Temple Community in the Persian Period, ed. T. C. Eskenazi and K. H. Richards. JSOTSup 175. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Kaufmann, Y. 1969 History of the Religion of Israel. Vol. 4. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute / Tel Aviv: Dvir. [Hebrew] Kertzer, D. I. 1988 Ritual, Politics, and Power. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Knoppers, G. N. 2007 Nehemiah and Sanballat: The Enemy Without or Within? Pp. 305–32 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Kottsieper, I. 2007 “And They Did Not Care to Speak Yehudit”: On Linguistic Change in Judah during the late Persian Era. Pp. 95–124 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lohfink, N. 1962 Enthielten die im alten Testament bezeugten Klageriten eine Phasedes Schweigens? Vetus Testamentum 12: 260–77.

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Moor, S. F., and Myerhoff, B. G. 1977 Secular Ritual: Forms and Meanings. Pp. 3–24 in Secular Ritual, ed. S. F. Moor and B. G. Myerhoff. Assen: Van Gorcum. Muir, E. 2005 Ritual in Early Modern Europe. New Approaches to European History 33. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Raglan, L. 1971 Myth and Ritual. Pp. 122–35 in Myth: A Symposium, ed. T. A. Sebeok. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Rappaport, R. A. 1996 The Obvious Aspects of Ritual. Pp. 427–40 in Readings in Ritual Studies, ed. R. L. Grimes. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Rubin, N. 1997 The End of Life: Rites of Burial and Mourning in the Talmud and Midrash. Tel Aviv: Hakkibutz Hameuchad. [Hebrew] Schultz, C. 1980 The Political Tensions Reflected in Ezra–Nehemiah. Pp. 221–44 in Scripture in Context, ed. D. Evans, W. W. Hallo, and J. B. White. Pittsburgh: Pickwick. Smith, J. Z. 1966 The Bare Facts of Ritual. Pp. 473–83 in Readings in Ritual Studies, ed. R. L. Grimes. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Turner, V. 1982 Introduction. Pp. 11–32 in Celebration: Studies in Festivity and Ritual, ed. V. Turner. Washington, DC: Smithsonian. Turner, V., and Turner, E. 1982 Religious Celebrations. Pp. 201–19 in Celebration: Studies in Festivity and Ritual, ed. V. Turner. Washington, DC: Smithsonian. Willi-Plein, I. 2007 Problems of Intermarriage in Postexilic Times. Pp. 177–89 in Shai leSara Japhet: Studies in the Bible, Its Exegesis and Its Language, ed. M. bar Asher et al. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute. Williamson, H. G. M. 1985 Ezra, Nehemiah. Word Biblical Commentary 16. Waco, TX: Word. Wright, J. L. 2005 Rebuilding Identity: The Nehemiah-Memoir and Its Earliest Readers. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift fur die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 348. Berlin: de Gruyter.

The Holy Seed: The Significance of Endogamous Boundaries and Their Transgression in Ezra 9–10 Katherine Southwood University of Oxford

Ezra’s only direct command, for the Gôlāh to ‫הבדיל‬, “separate,” themselves from the people of the land and from their foreign wives has almost since its utterance encountered an uneasy reception (Ezra 10:11, Isa 56:3–6; Eskenazi 1988: 69). 1 Scholars find it strangely ironic that Ezra should be upheld as a model of piety when “piety” of this sort is explicitly xenophobic (Fried 2007; Grabbe 1998b; Douglas 2002: 8; SmithChristopher 1991: 256). This paper suggests looking beyond the text’s ethical difficulties to probe the potential insights it offers into the world views of its authors. The representation of “marital” unions within Ezra 9–10 is considered with reference to contexts in which in-group relationships are applied as a gatekeeping measure. Following brief clarification of marriage theory and its categories, we will examine the extent to which Blau’s hypothesis concerning heterogeneity and intermarriage can provide a useful matrix for understanding the text. Forms of social organization are, partly, constructs of the mind. They are not given in the nature of things. However, once they exist, they take on a reality and have an empirical referent and independence 1.  Ezra’s language distantly resonates through Trito-Isaiah’s rhetorical plea that the ‫הנכר בן‬, “foreigner,” should not consider himself ‫יבדילני הבדל‬, “utterly separated,” from Yahweh’s people (Isa 56:3; see ‫נכריות נשים‬, “foreign women”: Ezra 10:2, 10, 11, 14, 17, 18, 44; Neh 13:26; ‫הבדיל‬, “separate”: Ezra 9:1, 10:8, 11, 16; Neh 9:2, 10:28, 13:3; see Isa 56:6–8; 60:1–6, 10; 66:18; see Smith-Christopher 1996). This may provide a good example of Amit’s theory of the “hidden polemic” against Ezra’s ideals (Amit 2003). Refer also to Middlemas’s contribution to this volume. Modern scholarship’s disdain is more direct; Williamson considers this to be among the “least attractive” parts of “the whole Old Testament”; Clines is “appalled” and “outraged” by the action, which he understands as a type of “fanaticism”; Blenkinsopp admits the text contributed “to the generally pejorative assessment of early Judaism,” and Eskenazi and Judd describe the narrative, prima facie, as a “disheartening” tale (Williamson 1985: 159; Clines 1984: 116, 118; Blenkinsopp 1988: 201; Eskenazi and Judd 1991: 266).

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in their own right as abstractions of values are translated into workable patterns of behavior. As such, marriage and its functions may be seen as an expression of the underlying structure representing social differentiations (Rivière 1971: 63; Barth 1973). Although, for reasons of practicality, it is necessary to use the term marriage, it is important to recognize its disputed accuracy. The difficulty of reaching a crosscultural definition of “marriage” has provoked considerable debate among anthropologists. 2 Moreover, the text’s use of idiosyncratic vocabulary to describe the relationships could insinuate intercohabitation, rather than intermarriage. 3 Given considerations such as these, the intuitive use of terms such as religious intermarriage, interreligious marriage, mixed marriage, or interfaith marriage in translations and commentaries is imprecise and unclear (niv; kjv; nrsv; Blenkinsopp 1988: 173; Brockington 1969: 105; Yamauchi 1988: 662, 759; Grabbe 1998a: 177; Myers 1965: 211). 4 A more focused analytical grasp of the issue that 2. As Herodotus recognized, societies regulate sexual unions in wondrously different ways (Gough 1959; Leach 1955; Rivière 1971; Needham 1971). Significant research exists concerning the Hebrew Bible’s representation of the Westernized categories, “marriage” and “divorce” (see Davison 2007; Hugenberger 1994; Lipiński 1981, 1991; Eskenazi 1992; Instone-Brewer 1998, 2002; Epstein 1973; Westbrook 1986). 3. The author may be implying that the relationships were illegitimate unions through using carefully selected, loaded terminology, such as ‫התחתן‬, “intermarry” (Ezra 9:14), ‫השיב‬, “cause to dwell” (Ezra 10:2, 10, 14, 17, 18; Neh 13:23, 27), ‫ נשא‬+ ‫ל‬, “take up” (Ezra 9:2, 12; 10:44; Neh 13:25) and the metaphor ‫התערב‬, “intermingle” (Ezra 9:2), rather than the common formulaic terms expressing marriage, PN + ‫לקח‬ + ‫ל‬, “take to,” and/or PN + ‫ נתן‬+ ‫ל‬, “give to” (Guenther 2005). The terms ‫לקח‬, “take,” and ‫נתן‬, “give,” are often used in conjunction but may also appear independently. The formula, found throughout the Hebrew Bible and at Elephantine, is ‫ לאשה‬PN + ‫ לקח‬and/or ‫ לאשה‬PN + ‫נתן‬, “Take/give PN for a wife” (Gen 29:19, 28; 30:4, 9; 41:45; Deut 22:16; 1 Kgs 2:17; 1 Chr 2:35; TAD B2.6.3; see TAD B3.3.3–4, B3.8.3–4). Although Ezra does use the verb ‫נתן‬, “give,” it occurs within the context of a heavily nuanced exegetical quotation rather than as a straightforward description of marriage (Ezra 9:12, Deut 7:3–4; see Gen 34:9, 16, 21; Josh 23:12; Judg 3:6; Jer 29:6; Ezek 16:61; Neh 10:31, 13:25). Likewise, the women are not “divorced” using the conventional term ‫שלח‬, “divorce,” but are instead ‫הוציא‬, “cast out,” (the LXX attempts to represent this irregular terminology through using the aorist infinitives of ἐκβαλλω, “cast out,” and ἐκφερω, “carry out,” respectively, rather than ἐζαποστέλλω, “send away/divorce”). The Hiphil verb is unparalleled in the case of divorce, and the atypical linguistic usage may imply a different action. Dor’s contribution to this volume suggests ceremonial expulsion; however, it must be noted that the verb ‫הוציא‬, “cast out,” has a very wide semantic range. 4.  Gordon’s attempts to distinguish different types of intermarriage illustrate the complexity of relating terminology accurately to practice: an interfaith marriage is one in which the parties to the marriage were born or reared in families, each of which has identified with a different religion. If,

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uses clearly defined evaluative categories is necessary to come to terms with marital and selection systems. Social anthropologists use numerous categories for describing marital patterns and structures (Cavan 1970). Most theorists assume homogamous selection. This references a process, addressed most extensively in the social-psychological literature concerning attraction, 5 wherein group members select marital partners with similar characteristics, such as ethnicity, socioeconomic status, physical traits, educational attainment, or religious affiliations (Epstein and Guttman 1984; Kalmijn 1998, 1994; Byrne 1971). In contrast, heterogamous choice references the union of partners who are culturally conceived to be dissimilar (Cavan 1970; Marcson 1950). 6 Exogamy refers to marital systems prescribing out-group marriage. For example, in order to avoid the incest taboo, most marital systems are exogamous at the immediate kin-group level, but endogamous marriage systems proscribe out-group marriage (Davis 1941: 376). Numerous types of endogamous systems are possible, for example, religious, class, caste, or, to use Weber’s terms, ständische endogamy (Weber 1978: 305–7). 7 Endogamy is distinguished from homogamy in that it is a normative pattern for a specified group that expects a designated type of behavior; deviations in the case of homogamy are of no social concern, whereas digressions from endogamy involve sanctions (Merton 1941). On an emic level, exogamy and endogamy are not uniformly interpreted. Moreover, their significance varies according to specific contextual determinates, such as economic and political conditions.

prior to or following the marriage, the parties continue to identify with their separate religions they are not only intermarried but are parties to a “mixed marriage” as well. (Gordon 1964: 1) 5.  Theories of attraction are redundant in the case of arranged marriages. 6.  Although homogamy and endogamy both refer to marriage of persons with some of the same characteristics, the terms are not synonyms. Homogamy, unlike endogamy, is not a normative pattern supported by social sanctions. Ethnicity, status, and religious affiliation may be relevant to homogamous selection if they are perceived to be individual characteristics; when they are perceived to be cultural boundaries, they are part of endogamous systems (Cavan 1970). 7.  Lévi-Strauss also distinguishes between “functional” endogamy, such as cross-cousin marriage, which is the reverse of and explicable only in terms of exogamy, and “true” endogamy representing the exclusion of marriage outside the group (Lévi-Strauss 1969: 42). However, since Lévi-Strauss’s main concern is kinship, rather than ethnicity, his distinctions will not be used in this essay.

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Given these evaluative coordinates, “intermarriage” can be understood as referring to deviations from endogamous marital rules. 8 Merton defines intermarriage as “marriage of persons from different ingroups and out-groups . . . which are culturally conceived as relevant to the choice of a spouse” (Merton 1941: 362). Thus, religious, ethnic, caste, or class intermarriages are possible. Intermarriage differs from exogamy because exogamy is not deviation but a normative system. Moreover, low rates of heterogamous selection do not necessarily permit analytical speculation regarding group self-perceptions. This sort of selection may be explained through reference to broader structural factors influencing the availability of partners such as group size (Barron 1972), segregation (Lieberson and Waters 1988; Peach 1980), age (Atkinson and Glass 1985), or the sex ratio (Besanceney 1965; South and Messner 1986). However, the presence of endogamous norms does require explanation because it implies specific constructions of and attempts to impose boundaries on group identity. Scholarship has continually found functional explanations for endogamous systems because critical interest in intermarriage initially developed through debates concerning ethnic assimilation in America (Zangwill 1914: 33; Kennedy 1944; Herberg 1955; Park 1964; M. Gordon 1964). 9 For example, Merton and others understood endogamy as facilitating boundary maintenance through symbolically accentuating exclusive in-group “realities” (Davis 1941; Merton 1941: 483; see Barth 1969). 10 Thus, social prerogatives and immunities become more sustainable, and the diffusion of power or resources beyond the group’s boundaries can be prevented (Merton 1941: 374; Davis 1941; see Cohen 1986). Merton theorizes that “hypergamy” can explain ethnic intermarriages as part of a reciprocal compensatory system wherein lowerstatus white women of talent or beauty “marry up” through selecting 8.  If intermarriage is interpreted simply as marriage between individuals from different “groups” then many marriages, given gender divisions, are in some sense “intermarriage,” and the word is redundant (Davis 1941: 376). Because of the variety of eligibility systems that can occur, even within a single society, the term intermarriage is so vague that it is almost meaningless without being clearly qualified. Yinger (1968) suggests a scale to measure qualities such as religiosity that may be given to prospective marriage partners to ascertain at what point of difference “marriage” becomes “intermarriage.” 9.  Unfortunately, this has resulted in a substantial quantity of research concerning intermarriage arising from sociological studies and census data in America. This has caused the field to be shaped by a somewhat modern, Westernized perspective. 10.  Merton illustates this aspect of the functioning of any endogamous system, describing endogamy as “a catalyst which activates and intensifies group consciousness” (Merton 1941: 486).

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black partners within the higher social stratum, thus trading their higher caste status for economic power (Merton 1941; cf. Eskenazi and Judd 1991; Smith-Christopher 1994). 11 Such functionalist theories are criticized for often providing popular, post facto explanations such as “anxiety” rather than measurable and rigorously tested empirical data. Similarly, functionalist hypotheses often translate emic explanations of behavior into analytical theory. 12 Returning to Merton, an emic perspective is clearly inherent within the analytical language describing marrying “up” or “down.” Evaluative categories of this sort problematically assume particular preconceptions concerning relative group hierarchies (Davis 1941). The anthropologist’s interpretation of the evidence may have a very different epistemological status to that of the actors in one or both supposedly ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ groups (Ardener 1972, 2007; Mitchell 1974; Heer 1974). This casts doubt on the generalizability of these theories and their usefulness for understanding Ezra 9–10. 13 Having briefly explored the phenomenon of marriage and its categories, the theoretical parameters within which Blau’s model of intermarriage occurs are clear. The model can now be described. The intrinsic weaknesses of functionalist approaches to intermarriage have instigated a band of more strategy-based investigations. The most developed exposition of these is provided by Blau and his colleagues (Blau 1977, 1994; Blau, Blum, and Schwartz 1982; Blau and Schwartz 11.  Merton’s seminal paper, explaining endogamy through hypergamy, encountered significant criticism within scholarship (Merton 1941). The contentious assumption that men are naturally more upwardly mobile than women, who are better equipped to “marry up,” has been questioned (Liang and Ito 1999; Schoen and Wooldredge 1989). Additionally, the notion of “beauty” is subjective and thus difficult to measure. Furthermore, while the better-educated members of a given ethnic group frequently exhibit heterogamous selection, the same is not true for the groups as whole entities; better-educated ethnic groups are not more exogamous (Lieberson and Waters 1988). One strength of Merton’s hypergamy theory is that it accounts for the gender bias within the text; foreign men apparently do not constitute a threat. However, other anthropological models, such as honor and shame or women’s roles as symbolic “border guards” of the ethnos, may also explain this (Armstrong 1982; Yuval-Davis 1997). 12.  The typical division between emic and etic that is used by social anthropologists is somewhat artificial. The terms are not dichotomous but should be conceived as a continuum because the supposedly etic anthropologist is subject to the categories of his or her own culture (Epstein 1978; Ardener 2007; Pike 1964; Taylor 1985). 13. The exchange hypothesis has found considerable support in examples of “black-white” marriages (Spickard 1989; Roberts 1994; Schoen 1995); however, its potential for generalization remains dubious because it is not translatable to AsianAmerican groups (Hwang, Saenz, and Aguirre 1995, 1997; Spickard 1989).

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1984; Blau, Beeker, and Fitzpatrick 1984). Blau develops Simmel’s notions of abstracting social forms from their empirical contents (Simmel 1955). 14 Blau therefore portrays the social framework to be comprised of a series of groups, delineated according to contextually relevant distinctions such as ethnicity, class, or political subdivision. Groups such as these have multiple affiliations and intersecting boundaries and it is this quality that facilitates or inhibits marriages on an aggregate level, independently of homogamy or endogamous predilections. Blau describes situations of “heterogeneity,” which may be visualized on an intergroup level as numerous cross-cutting circles representing the multiple affiliations between groups. It is the nature of boundaries involved within this intergroup contact that dictates the conditions facilitating intermarriage (Blau, Beeker, and Fitzpatrick 1984). Blau emphasizes that boundary intersection varies depending on the degree to which the lines of differentiation are related and how many boundaries are crosscutting (that is, the degree of heterogeneity). Consolidated boundaries reinforce the barriers to social intercourse and intensify endogamy (Blau and Schwartz 1984: 83). In contrast, the complex web of affiliations created by the intersection of numerous groups generates greater heterogeneity. This is conducive to intermarriage because it weakens the power of in-group third parties to enforce endogamous restrictions on members through providing numerous possibilities for identity construction (Blau, Blum, and Schwartz 1982; Blau and Schwartz 1984; see Romain 1997). Blau explains that “intersection” and “consolidation” are opposite poles of a continuum represented by the degree to which several forms of differentiation are associated (Blau and Schwartz 1984: 84). 15 Blau’s theory shares significant conceptual similarities with Wallman’s portrayal of the significance of social networks and boundary processes in polyethnic areas of London (Wallman 1986; see Barth 1969; Mitchell 1969). This makes Wallman’s diagrammatic representa14.  Simmel’s theory of crosscutting circles focuses on numerous lines of social differentiation and their implications, such as age, sex, kin group, ethnic affiliation, social class, and political subdivision (Simmel 1955). 15.  Blau argues that certain structural factors inhibit or promote heterogeneity. For example, Blau notes that segregation impedes social relations between groups, thus reinforcing exclusive group identities (Blau 1977: 90–93; see Lieberson and Waters 1988; Peach 1980; Spickard 1989). Similarly, Blau references the effects of group size on boundary intersection; members of smaller groups have diminished opportunities for endogamous marriage, whereas larger endogamous groups are more able to sustain the enforced homogamous selection. This implies that endogamy is negatively related to the degree of heterogeneity of a population (Blau and Schwartz 1984).

The Significance of Endogamous Boundaries

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Fig. 1.  Local systems: Boundary overlap (arrows indicate implications for entry). (a) Hetrogeneous system; boundary intersection; (b) Homogenous type; near consolidation of boundaries.

tion of “heterogeneous” and “homogeneous” systems particularly fitting for expressing Blau’s theories (Wallman 1986: 241). The nature of gate-keeping mechanisms is sharply contrasted in each system. The heterogeneous system provides numerous routes of access to other groups. Contrastingly, entry into any of the groups within the homogenous structure is difficult because existing boundaries are reinforced by congruent boundaries, making the group deeply exclusive, and highlighting intermarriage as a more deviant behavior (see fig. 1). Thus, when a homogenous social structure occurs, recognition of outsiders, for example, the ethnic “other,” is sharper. The same boundary may, in another context, have no bearing on ethnicity’s level of significance and thus not cause it to enter the level of social consciousness. Blau’s model portrays ethnic consciousness and intermarriage as an almost epiphenomenal effect, rather than a cause, of structural and ideological frameworks. Although “ethnicity” itself is a term “so vague, and so variously used” (Cohen 1985: 107) that its definition remains debatable, Blau’s use of ethnicity within the model has considerable advantages. 16 The theory provides a topographic map showing the connections and constraints shaping marital behavior, to the extent that boundaries become generative of structures (Barth 1981). This enables 16.  Ethnicity’s definition and dynamics is a long-standing, contentious debate among anthropologists (Barth 1969; Cohen 1985, 1986; Mitchell 1950, 1974; Banks 1996; Eriksen 1993; Jenkins 1997; Hutchinson and Smith 1996; Smith 1992a, 1992b, 1999; Yelvington 1991; Glazer and Moynihan 1963, 1975; Barron 1972).

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a contextualized recognition of ethnic identity—alongside other constructions of perceived difference—to be reached. Blau and Schwartz acknowledge that a group that is homogenous in one dimension, such as ethnicity, may be quite heterogeneous in another, such as socioeconomic status (Blau and Schwartz 1984; see Janzen 2002). Independent empirical studies corroborate Blau’s perspectives concerning intermarriage (Blum 1984, 1985; South and Messner 1986). Furthermore, because Blau’s hypothesis is general and formal, it lends itself well for application to postexilic Yehud. In order to apply Blau’s theories to Ezra 9–10 effectively, one must initially acknowledge the pitfalls. Methodological difficulties inevitably confront researchers when coupling the theories of foreign disciplines with Hebrew Bible scholarship. 17 While Blau’s model provides a generalized matrix for comparative reconsideration of evidence, it does not retain independent ontological status (Esler 2006). Applying the model gives a static snapshot of community relatedness reconstructed from the text. However, in reality, boundaries constantly fluctuate through pressures of internal and external stimuli; for example prolonged waves of migration or sustained contact with Diaspora societies may reinforce ethnic boundaries (Ezra 1:5–7, 11b; 2:1–70; 5:14–16; 7:8–10; 8:1–36; Neh 11:1–36; 12:1–26; Blau and Schwartz 1984; Bedford 2002), 18 while emic perceptions of pure ancestry categories decrease intermarriage and assimilation (Alba and Golden 1986; see Ezra 2:62 // Neh 7:64). Additionally, cautious application of the model to Ezra–Nehemiah is complicated by reconstructions of Persian political systems 19 and by dating issues (Miller 2008). 20 The time period between the text’s setting and the crystallization of ethnic boundaries that it communicates is unclear. 17.  For a fuller discussion of methods, refer to: Miller 2008; Esler 2006; Aguilar and Lawrence 2004; Carroll R. 2000; Chalcraft 1997; Overholt 1996; Lang 1985. 18.  The return from exile was probably gradual, leaving no sudden changes in the demographic structure (Lipschits 2003: 354–55, 2005; Becking 2006; Carter 1999: 201; Hoglund 1992; Fried 2003), which “did not leave its imprint on the archaeological data” (Lipschits 2006: 32). 19.  The current debate, especially concerning the impact of the Persian political system on circumstances in postexilic Israel, remains contentious (Japhet 1968, 1982, 1994, 2006a, 2006b, 2006c; Grabbe 1991, 1999; Berquist 1995; Vanderhooft 2003; Kessler 2006; Bedford 2001; Hoglund 1991, 1992; Fried, 2006; Williamson 2004; Blenkinsopp 1987, 1991; Edelman 2005; Kuhrt 1983; Cataldo 2003). Smith-Christopher illustrates with reference to Persian and Greek sources that intermarriage was encouraged as imperial policy to consolidate the power of the ruling elite (1994; see Fried 2007). 20.  Extensive debates concerning dating have continued for over a century (Torrey 1896; Batten 1913; Rowley 1955; Rudolph 1949).

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The historical and cultural distance of the evidence prevents simplistically superimposing any model onto it. Furthermore, the text does not neutrally represent “history” but communicates ethnic-intermarriage within a religious exegetical context. 21 Recognizing these difficulties makes straight the path for a more mature awareness of the utility and the limitations of using Blau’s model as a heuristic tool. It is now possible to progress to the second section of this essay which applies Blau’s model to the text. Increasing attention to Judaism’s so-called dark age means scholars are better informed than ever before about the social realities of the (smallish) Persian province of Yehud. 22 Understandings of identity and ethnic self-definition within the Hebrew Bible are also growing. 23 Numerous scholars have directly addressed the question of intermarriage in Ezra 9–10 and Neh 13:23–27 (Fried 2007; Klingbeil 2007; Willi-Plein 2007; Janzen 2002; Zlotnick-Sivan 2000; Hays 1999; Pichon 1997; Gitay 1997; Smith-Christopher 1994; Eskenazi and Judd 1991). Current thinking suggests an ethnically multifaceted population influenced by surrounding provinces within the Satrapy of Transeuphrates, such as Moab, Ammon, Gilead, Samaria, Ashdod, and what became Idumea. However this gives sparse data regarding the attitudes of and relationships between diverse communities and certainly does not lead to the conclusion that postexilic Yehud was an ethnic melting pot. 24 21.  The type of identity at stake is difficult to distinguish. This is partly as a result of the multifaceted and ill-defined nature of “ethnicity” itself (see p. 195 n. 16). Ethnicity and religious affiliation are not mutually exclusive any more than ethnicity can be convincingly isolated from primordialist questions of race and descent (Geertz 1996; Shils 1957; Grosby 1994) or instrumentalist questions of resources and power (Cohen 1974; Glazer and Moynihan 1975) or even of history itself (Tonkin, McDonald, and Chapman 1989; Smith 1992a). 22. Recent contributions to knowledge include numerous archaeological and demographic studies (Levin 2007; Carter 1999, 1994, 2003b; Lipschits 2003, 2005; Stern 1982, 1990, 2006, 2007; Edelman 2007; Faust 2003, 2007) in addition to a wealth of research into the province’s social, literary, and ideological context (Edelman 2006; Eskenazi 2006; Japhet 1982, 1999, 2004, 2006a, 2006b; Knoppers 2003; Knowles 2004; Stern 2006; Wright 2006; Bautch 2008; Duggan 2006; Ben Zvi 2003). 23. Recent contributions focus particularly on postexilic Yehud (Janzen 2008; Esler 2003; Kessler 2006; Berquist 2006; Dyck 1996; Willi 1995; Smith-Christopher 1991, 1996; Ben Zvi 1995; Johnson 1995), although studies of ethnicity and identity throughout the Hebrew Bible are increasingly common (Killebrew 2005; Brett 1996; Bultmann 1992; Rendtorff 1996; Sparks 1998; Smith 1987, 1989; Grabbe 2003). 24. The Kennedy-Herberg “triple melting-pot hypothesis,” although subject to later criticism, was among the first to discredit idealized notions of ethnic sentiment simplistically dissipating (Kennedy 1944; Herberg 1955; Glazer and Moynihan 1963; Greeley 1974; Novak 1972; see Zangwill 1914: 33).

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As an emic representation of ethnos and “Other,” the text’s description of “foreign women from the people of the land” who are likened to Israel’s archaic enemies using the simile ‫ כתועבתיהם‬is pejorative and imprecise (Ezra 9:1; Eskenazi and Judd 1991). 25 The women’s actual ethnicity remains unspecified. Numerous possibilities have been postulated with reference to ever-expanding understandings of the area’s demography. 26 Most recent studies concerning the issue are suspicious of the text’s lines of debate, suggesting that the episode is intra-Jewish rather than interethnic (Smith-Christopher 1996). Janzen, through a synchronic interpretation of “the people of the land,” suggests Ezra– Nehemiah’s final redactor gives readers enough information to discern that this group are Yahwists (Ezra 4:1–4; Janzen 2007: 123). The observation is consistent with anthropological and sociological theory, because individuals usually select homogamously, and “proximate others” often instigate the most problematic social transactions (Bogardus 1933). Regardless of the precise ethnicity of the women against whom endogamous boundaries are forcefully imposed, maintaining the ethnic boundary is clearly, in itself, Ezra–Nehemiah’s unifying theme. However, what is interesting is the technique used to configure the ethnic boundary in relation to other modes of differentiation. The demarcation of, and relationships between, various group-Other boundaries that the text communicates expose the methods through which its authors organize and understand the social universe of postexilic Yehud. Readers witness, at every point through the narrative, their attempts 25.  Ezra’s list of ethnic Others (Ezra 9:1), which resembles other pentateuchal lists of Israel’s preconquest, archetypical enemies, is anachronistic. It may be accounted for through the later use of Deut 7:4 in Ezra 9:14. Of the nations enumerated, only the Ammonites, Moabites, and Egyptians were still extant in the Post­exilic Period. The “Ammonites” and “Moabites” are drawn from Deut 23:3, as those who “shall not enter the congregation (‫( ”)קהל‬congregation: see Ezra 10:1, 8, 12, 14) and whose peace and welfare is not to be sought “forever” (Deut 23:6; Ezra 9:12; see Neh 13:1–3, 23–27). 1 Esdras 8:66 (The MT is Ezra 9:1) reads “Edomites” (hypothetically, the Hebrew would be ‫ֲדֹומי‬ ִ ‫“ א‬Edomites,” instead of “Amorites,” ‫אֱמִֹרי‬, implying the typical scribal errors of dalet-reš orthographic confusion and metathesis; see Mal 1:4–5). However, one should hesitate before emending the MT since, as Talshir notes, 1 Esdras is preoccupied with the Edomites (1 Esd 4:45, 50; Talshir 2001: 441; Batten 1913: 331; see Bartlett 1989). 26.  Eskenazi and Judd provide sensible suggestions concerning the possibilities for the women’s ethnic identity (Eskenazi and Judd 1991). Japhet also gives a comprehensive list of the various peoples comprising overall the community during the period (Japhet 2006b). The identity of Ezra–Nehemiah’s “people of the land” is much discussed, often alongside other descriptions of the postexilic community (Gunneweg 1983; Karrer 2001; Vogt 1966; Willi 1995; Ben Zvi 1995; Harvey 1996).

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to inculcate into audiences the perception that heterogeneity must be avoided and thus to intensify the social consciousness of difference. 27 This is achieved through a crescendoing perpetuation of mechanisms delineating, correlating and reinforcing a plurality of margins. The effect of congruous boundaries, which are propelled through constant group-identification, is the construction of a highly exclusive, particularistic portrayal of community. The obligation to observe endogamy, communicated by parading intermarriage as the exemplar of deviant behavior, aptly demonstrates this essentializing, inflexible world view resulting from boundary relationships of this sort. The remaining portion of this essay demonstrates how the author brings numerous boundaries into congruence and considers the effects of this process. The collective title ‫הקדש זרע‬, “holy seed,” at once aligns numerous boundaries (Ezra 9:2; see Neh 9:2, 8; Isa 6:13; Mal 2:15). Through unifying diverse notions such as Abraham’s elected seed (Gen 9:9, 12:7, 15:5, 17:8), injunctions against mixing seeds (Lev 19:19), and the notion of Israel as a “holy” nation (Exod 19:6, Deut 7:6–7) texts are exegetically twisted into a pseudo-legal argument against heterogamous selection (Williamson 1985: 132; Becking 1999: 270). This is germinated, resulting in the fusion of ethnic and religious boundaries, which promotes a primordial sense of ethnic differentiation. 28 Effectively, those selfascribing the title “Abraham’s seed” are coerced into conformity with other mechanisms delineating identity. In-group legitimacy is marked by holiness, which is qualified as being transmitted only through genealogy (see Ezra 2:62; Neh 7:64; Hayes 2002: 10). 29 Thus, through the semantic ambiguity of the term ‫“( זרע‬seed/race”), election is reformulated according ethnicity and to biological descent from Abraham. 30 The polemical use of the title (Ezra 9:2) consolidates the strands of identity so that potential for heterogeneity is decreased. It is now not possible to claim identity’s center of gravity as a “seed of Abraham” without implying ethnic exclusivity as part of the “holy” community whose 27.  This assessment of the issue arises from an etic, rather than an emic, perspective; the movement toward homogenous boundaries may not be a self-conscious intention of the text’s authors. 28.  Primordial, as opposed to instrumental. Refer to p. 197 n. 21. 29.  This is a stark contrast to the Chronicler, whose pan-Israel, horizontal genealogies undermine the narrower portrayal of “Israel” in Ezra (Knoppers 2001, 2003; Dyck 1996). 30.  The noun ‫זר‬, “seed,” has a broad semantic range; it can be used to reference agricultural seeds (Lev 27:30), semen (Num 5:28), descendants (Gen 12:17), family (1 Kgs 11:14) and race, that is, the Israelite or Jewish race (Esth 9:27–31) or, metaphorically, the beginning of an idea (Zech 8:12) or moral quality of a person or community (Isa 57:3).

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Fig. 2.  Qualifications for the legitimate community. Representation of the consolidation of entities through ethnicity, genealogy, and holiness, forming a dense homogenous system that reinforces the strength of the boundary. The arrow demarcates the attempted injection of “foreign women" into the community (adapted from Wallman 1986: 241).

“seed” must not be intermingled. Effectively, the system’s overall reach is diminished, and the density of what constitutes the ethnos (ἐθνος) 31 is increased as the boundaries encircling “identity” are tightened. Consequently, a radical, intensely restrictive notion of those considered the legitimate community is created. Only those within the congruent boundaries of ethnicity, genealogical continuity with Abraham and holiness can qualify (see fig. 2). The plasticity of genealogies and of “history” and the context-bound social construct of “ethnicity” itself must be acknowledged. 32 Nevertheless, using Blau’s model of how heterogeneity effects intermarriage enables discernment of how the text effectively promotes ethnic boundaries. 33 Representation on both sides of the boundary line is drastically affected by the suppression of heterogeneous identity groups. Internal 31.  The term ethnicity is ill-defined (see p. 195 n.16). The noun ἐθνος has, from an early period, had a broad semantic range. However, even within the early Greek period, the term was imbued with a strong sense of the foreign, animalistic, nonAthenian Other (Aristotle, Pol. 1324.b.10; Sophocles, Philoctetes 1147). 32.  Genealogies: Many anthropological studies illustrate that genealogies often function affirmatively, through providing a representation of the social structure that is projected backward in time and thereby legitimized and rationalized (Fortes 1962; Eriksen 1993). See Fulton’s essay in this volume (pp. 225–241). History: Ton­ kin, McDonald, and Chapman 1989; Hobsbawm and Ranger 1992. 33.  In light of this, the long-standing difficulties concerning sociologically classifying the “Ezra group” are unsurprising (Causse 1937).

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differentiation is reduced, most strikingly, through the democratization of holiness throughout the entire ethnos. 34 Marriage instructions, aimed at managing a priest’s purity “so that he does not profane his seed” (‫ )לא יחלל זרעו‬now apply to the entire “holy seed” community who must “marry” (‫ )לקח‬those “from the seed of the house of Israel” (‫ ;מזרע בית ישראל‬Lev 21:7, 14–15; 22:13; Ezek 44:22). Priestly, genealogical, and ethnic endogamy are transferred onto the entire community. According to this logic, intermarriage “transgresses” (‫ ;מעל‬Ezra 9:2, 4; 10:2, 6, 10; see Neh 13:27) 35 the sanctum’s endogamous boundaries by intermingling of the holy and the profane; thus, a sacrifice is required (‫ ;אשם‬Ezra 10:19; Lev 5:15, 6:2, 26:40; Num 5:6; Milgrom 1976: 16–35; pace Bautch 2008). 36 Instead of restrictions for priests, the entire community’s undifferentiated “holy” status means ritualized regulation of all marriages. Equally, those outside the boundaries are undifferentiated, being negatively mystified and obscured (Becking 1999: 273). The puppetroyal kings “of the lands” (Ezra 9:7), 37 Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes, are described using the single noun “king of Persia” (Ezra 6:14). Likewise, Sanballat and Tobiah are often grammatically undifferentiated (Ezra 6:14; Neh 6:12, 14). Similarly, every difficulty confronting the postexilic community is portrayed as a consequence of these outsiders’ “conspiring together” (Neh 4:8) to break into and profane the ethnos (Zlotnick-Sivan 2000; Wright 2004). Whether as wives (Ezra 2:61–62 // Neh 7:63–64; 1 Esd 5:38; Ezra 9–10; Neh 6:18–19, 10:30, 13:23–31), cobuilders (Ezra 4:1–3), co-worshipers (Ezra 4:2b; Neh 9:2, 10:28, 13:7–8), co‑inheritors of the land (Neh 2:20), or traders (Neh 10:31, 13:16–22), the faceless, deindividualized, homogenous “people of the land” category 34.  Unlike P, who restricts holiness to the domain of the temple and cult (Douglas 2004), holiness is “firmly established” (Ezra 9:8) within the whole community and its reach expanded to the “holy city” (Neh 11:1, 18; see Hayes 2002; Karrer 2001: 277; Harrington 2007; Himmelfarb 1997). 35.  In Chronicles, ‫ מעל‬usually refers to an offense against the temple and the purity of its service (2 Chr 26:16; Williamson 2007: 53). 36.  Bautch argues that the term ‫מעל‬, “transgression,” is used of covenantal kinship in Ezra 9–10 (Bautch 2007). There is a vast body of literature on kinship, and the term ‫אח‬, “brother,” in Nehemiah 5, with its wide semantic range, is not enough to delineate precisely the implications and dynamics of kin relations (Parkin and Stone 2004; Lévi-Strauss 1969; Needham 1971; Radcliffe-Brown and Forde 1987; Fox 1967; Goody 1973). 37. While the depiction of Persian kings is, on the surface, positive, the text makes it clear that their benevolence is not the result of their personal moral qualities. Rather, their actions are instigated ‫העיר‬. . . ‫ רוח את‬by Yahweh, who “stirred the spirit” to fulfil prophecy (Ezra 1:1; see Jer 25:12, 29:10, and Jeremiah 30–31).

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must not cross the consolidated boundaries (ethnicity, holiness, religion, genealogy, and election) to profane the holy seed. The consequence of reducing differentiation on both sides of the boundary is that the boundary itself is brought to the foreground, and perpetually reemphasized, representing only the binary world of those inside and outside the coalescing boundaries. As such, the ambivalent hybridity caused by intermarriage or intersecting boundaries, which would result in greater heterogeneity, is utterly intolerable (Werbner and Modood 1997). The bifurcation resulting from homogenized boundaries is effectively illustrated by the separation-versus-intermixing motif. The “holy” community’s guilt occurs through not having ‫נבדלו לא‬, “separated themselves,” from foreign women from the people of the lands (Ezra 9:1; see Lev 10:10, Ezek 42:20). They must either ‫הבדלו‬, “separate,” themselves (Ezra 10:11, 16) or ‫הגולה מקהל יבדל‬, be “separated from the Gôlāh congregation” (Ezra 10:8; see 6:21; Neh 9:2, 10:28, 13:3; Carter 1999; Schaper 2003). Just as disparate fabrics, threads, and seeds must not be ‫התערב‬, “intermingled” (Lev 13:48–59, 19:19, 22:9–11), so too, the text presents a world where failure to appropriately differentiate between those inside and outside the various consolidated boundaries by ‫התערב‬, “intermingling,” and ‫התחתן‬, “intermarrying,” is sinful (Ezra 9:2, 14; see Ps 106:35). The divisions of ritual regulation are therefore translated into social policy (see Harrington 2007: 112). However, rather than being shocked by the episode’s distance from modern Westernized ethics, its enforced prescription of endogamy should be understood as a consequence of the consolidated social differentiation systems. A second major mechanism by which boundaries are consolidated is through the representation of “separation” in terms of proximity. Repeated acts of physical segregation and ‫הוציא‬, “expulsion,” of foreigners dominate the narrative. This is most explicit in the form of the wall and temple building (Ezra 10:3, 19; see 4:1–4, 6:19–22; Neh 9:2; 10:31; 13:1–3, 23–27; Japhet 2006d: 312; Wright 2004; Janzen 2008: 126). Blau argues that segregation inhibits heterogeneity through obstructing potential heterogamous encounters. The author’s use of narrative exemplar to persuade audiences of the ethnos’s need for endogamous purity illustrates his interpretation of the wall building and expulsion through binary insider-outsider logic (see Schaper 2003). Regardless of the nature of the boundaries, ethnic, physical, or economic, all are consolidated in order to reinforce group exclusivity. A further means of unifying ethnic and other boundaries occurs through the conversion of cultic purity into ethnic and social categories (see Hayes 2002; Karrer 2001). Foreigners are infectiously unclean,

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203

having ‫נדה‬, “defiled,” the land with their ‫טמא‬, “uncleanness,” and their ‫תועבה‬, “abominations” (Ezra 9:11; see Lev 18:19, 24–26). By converting purity ideology into a matrix guiding interaction, stringently polemic polarizations are implemented between ethnos and not-ethnos. 38 Purity rhetoric is therefore marshalled as a tool justifying the exclusion of those considered aliens in order to preserve group integrity and symbolically clarify boundaries (Olyan 2004; Harrington 2007: 107). Douglas’s perspective on ritualized pollution behavior as the reaction to concepts threatening to contradict cherished classifications is useful here (Douglas 1966: 124–25). 39 Ethnicity increases in social significance through perceived threats to boundaries (Eriksen 1993). Because intermarriage occurs at the volatile zone of intersecting ethnos/ not-ethnos boundaries, classification structures are destabilized by the emergence of a “betwixt and between” category, of “ethnic anomalies” (Turner 1967; Douglas 1966; see Bhabha 1994). As such, intermarriage is a good indicator of heterogeneity. However, the author emphasizes the need for a homogenously unified community through escalating intermarriage beyond the issue of ethnicity to that of transgressing religious and purity boundaries. Purity language provides a powerful tool here, enabling the author at once to merge boundaries of ethnic purity (Ezra 9:11, Neh 13:30), cultic purity (Ezra 6:20, Neh 12:30) and genealogical purity (Ezra 2:62 // Neh 7:64). Throughout the narrative, there are continual acts of purification and repurification of the community, temple, and city (Ezra 6:20; Neh 12:30; 13:9, 22). However, this culminates in a clear indication of boundary integration through Nehemiah’s self-congratulating 40 claim of having ‫נכר מכל וטהרתים‬, “purified them [the priests and the Levites] of everything foreign” (Neh 13:30). Like Ezra, Nehemiah’s conclusion represents a metamorphosis from religious divisions to ethnic boundaries. Concerns with the purity and inheritance of land are veiled in the language of deuteronomic instruction (Deut 11:8ff.). Thus, a fourth 38.  Ezekiel’s interpretation of “foreigners” whose presence “pollutes” the sanctuary employs similar exegetical logic (Ezek 44:6–9; see Rom-Shiloni’s contribution to this volume, pp. 127–151). Smith also names purity rituals among several survival mechanisms facilitating the persistence of ethnic identity during the structural adaptations encountered during the Exile (Smith 1989). Such powerful survival mechanisms may have become so deeply ingrained that they were retained by later generations independently of the reality of Exile itself (functional autonomy). 39.  However, the exegetical context of this kind of purity language must be recognized in the case of Ezra–Nehemiah. 40.  On Nehemiah’s highly stylized representation of “history,” see Clines 1990 and Eskenazi 1988.

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means of boundary consolidation is introduced: that of uncompromising allegiance to (the author’s interpretation of) Torah. 41 The author’s ideal community would have, in Josephus’s words “a greater regard to the observation of the law than to their natural affection” (Ant. 11). This is explicit through the polemical application of the verb ‫התחתן‬, “intermarry” (Ezra 9:14). 42 The author’s exegetical assessment of intermarriage pivots on the use of ‫התחתן‬, “intermarry,” in Deuteronomy’s grave warnings against assimilation (Deut 7:1–7). However, Deuteronomy’s explicitly religious rationale for avoiding intermarriage (Deut 7:4) is replaced with an injunction emphasizing the boundaries of the ‫קהל‬, “congregation” (Deut 23:3–6; Ezra 9:12; see Ezra 10:1, 8, 12, 14; Neh 13:1). 43 Thus, ethnic intermarriage to a foreign woman is legally interpreted as a transgression of Yahweh’s requirements for inheriting the land (Japhet 1988; Janzen 2007; Zlotnick-Sivan 2000). 44 The author depicts violations of endogamy as the ultimate form of deviance according to every possible criterion for boundary delineation in an effort to (unconsciously) reduce the audiences’ tolerance of heterogeneity. Therefore, intersection of the boundaries, intermarriage, represents a lack of allegiance to Yahweh’s instructions and becomes the sin, par excellence. The connection between intermarriage and the Exile, which forms a fifth mode of boundary consolidation, provides perhaps the deepest force of division for discriminating between the ethnos and the not-ethnos. Ezra’s rhetorical use of the historical retrospect provides a 41. See Schaper’s article in this volume, pp. 27–38. 42.  Each occurrence of the verb references marriages in which there is a significant social gulf separating the partners, implying reciprocal, assimilative unions and a mutual cross-fertilization of cultural and religious values (Gen 34:9; Deut 7:3; Josh 23:12; 1 Sam 18:21–23, 26–27; 1 Kgs 3:1; Ezra 9:14; 2 Chr 18:1). Pace Guenther, who argues for a distinction between use of the prepositions ‫ ל‬and ‫ב‬, claiming that in the use of the cognate noun ‫ ל‬+ ‫חתן‬, “become son-in-law to,” the lamed of advantage is used to indicate alliances motivated by economic or political improvement (Guenther 2005). Because there is only a single instance of ‫ ל‬+ ‫( חתן‬2 Chr 18:1), and because economic and political considerations also have a significant role in David’s marriage where ‫ ב‬+ ‫ חתן‬appears, this assertion is difficult to substantiate (1 Sam 18:21–23, 26–27). 43.  The motivational clause following the asyndetic warning against ‫ התחתן‬intermarriage, “For they will turn away your son from following me that they may serve other gods ‫( ”עבדו אלהים אחרים‬Deut 7:3–4), is replaced in Ezra 9:12 by this instruction: “An Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of Yahweh; even to their tenth generation shall they not enter into the congregation of Yahweh forever. . . . You shall not seek their peace nor their prosperity all your days forever.” (Deut 23:3, 6) 44.  Bedford, among others, notes the primacy of the issue of land, in an intergenerational context, as a subtext to Ezra–Nehemiah (Bedford 2002: 162).

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narrative-based form of ethnic identity that emphasizes a shared collective history (Hutchinson and Smith 1996: 6–7; Tonkin, McDonald, and Chapman 1989; Cornell 2000; Peterson 1991). Furthermore, the emotive first-person penitential prayer 45 gives the author considerable persuasive leverage concerning endogamy’s necessity. The attempted crushing of heterogeneity is again discernable, this time through aligning the boundaries of historic exclusivity using the titles “Exile,” “Israel,” and “remnant.” The only legitimate bearers of the name “Israel” are interpreted as being the returned Gôlāh remnant (Karrer 2001: 276). Throughout Ezra, self-ascription of the titles “Israel,” “people of Israel,” and “descendants of Israel” appear when describing the reconstituted Gôlāh (Ezra 2:2, 70; 3:1; 6:16, 21; 7:7, 13; 8:25; 9:1; 10:5). 46 Similarly to the text’s use of “holy” status, internal differentiation is minimized, giving the impression of a unified community acting “as one man” in accordance with Torah instructions concerning endogamy (Ezra 3:1). 47 This is clear through the repeated Niphal verbs representing “all Israel” (Ezra 10:5), ‫נקבצו‬, “gathering” (Ezra 10:1, 7, 9) and ‫יאספו‬, “assembling” (Ezra 9:4), themselves, as well as “all” affirming Ezra’s action “with a loud voice” (Ezra 10:12). The “holy seed,” the ‫זרע ישראל‬, “seed of Israel,” are the only legitimate bearers of the nation’s past and, as such, must maintain their bounded ontological exclusivity (Neh 9:2l; see Ezra 2:59 // Neh 7:61). The focus of Israel’s current “guilt” through intermarriage provides the author with a powerfully coercive device through which to reaffirm and reemphasize endogamous boundaries (Ezra 9:14; see Grol 1997; Bechtel 1991). Interpretation of the Exile as a consequence of intermarriage allows these boundaries themselves to be retrojected into history. This causes any sense of ideological attachment to the identity “Israel” to 45.  Regarding penitential prayer, refer to contributions to Boda, Falk, and Werline 2006. Also see Bautch 2003; Newman 1999; Werline 1998. 46.  There is much discussion of the titles used by the postexilic community; see p. 198 n. 26. 47.  This motif is in counterpoint with the portrayal of endogamy, Israel, and the law in Nehemiah (Neh 13:3, 26; 2 Kgs 23:1ff.). Ironically, the text deconstructs itself at this point; clearly, because some members of the community had intermarried, the emphasis on such unity is not historically authentic. Moreover, a hint that the Gôlāh are, in fact, a divided community may be discernable through the parenthetical statement “Only )‫ )אך‬Jonathan the son of Asahel and Jahzeiah the son of Tikvah, supported by Meshullam and Shabbethai the Levite opposed this (‫”)עמדו על־זאת‬ (Ezra 10:15). The statement is, however, unclear owing to the ambivalent nature of ‫על‬, which could indicate support or opposition (Williamson 1985: 156). Weeks notes that it was probably a small portion of the upper classes of society that shared a sense of identity of this sort (Weeks 2002).

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be understood within the frame of reference dictated by Ezra’s ethnic endogamy. The depiction of the ethnos as “Israel” is assimilated in the concept of the ‫שארית‬, “remnant,” community, forming a further means of repressing the possibility of heterogeneity. The term remnant is a combination of two independent ideas from different origins (Japhet 2004; see Gunneweg 1983). Initially, the concept referred to those who survived the destruction and stayed in the land. However, an ideology, predating Ezra, also understood the “remnant” as the “exiles/refugees” in Babylon who would return and purge the land of Israel of its ‫תועבה‬, “abominations” (Ezek 11:13–18; see Ezra 9:11; Ezek 11:13, 16:43–51). The text refuses to acknowledge the possibility of a “remnant” group whose identity is different from that of “Gôlāh-Israel.” 48 Thus, the boundaries between the Israelite/non-Israelite ethnos are reinforced through the representation of a congruous remnant, ‫פליטה‬, “escapee,” group (see Isa 10:20–22). A further history-based level of boundary delineation is consolidated with the titles “Israel” and “remnant” through the exilic self-ascription of the Gôlāh (‫ ;הגולה‬Ezra 1:11, 9:4, 10:6; Neh 7:6; see Esth 2:6). 49 This title is emphasized within the “foreign women” crisis, wherein readers encounter an “uncomplicated,” “dogmatic conviction” that “Israelites” equal “returned exiles” (Japhet 2006b: 114). The titles are used interchangeably; “all Israel” swears to attend the covenant renewal (Ezra 10:5), whereas it is the Gôlāh community who do attend (Ezra 10:6–8). The text does not allow for the possibility of numerous heterogeneous facets of Israelites who were, or were not, exiled. There is only one Gôlāh-Israel community, and one is either inside or outside its boundaries. As such, the heterogamous choice of a nonexiled “Israelite” spouse, regardless of religious predilections, 50 is deviant because it transgresses the community’s boundaries by establishing points where different groups intersect. As a consequence, all other possible “Israelite” groups 48.  “Israel,” qualified according to the text’s internal logic as those who formerly intermarried, was punished by the Exile, and has narrowly escaped utter destruction (Ezra 9:8, 13–15; see Neh 1:3). 49.  The self-ascription, Gôlāh, which references and reinforces the experience of the Exile, occurs in various forms throughout the books; ‫( הגולה משבי העלים‬Ezra 2:1, Neh 7:6); ‫( ירושלם מהשבי הבאים כל‬Ezra 3:8); ‫( מהגולה השבים ישראל בני‬Ezra 6:21); ‫השבי‬ ‫( מן השבים הקהל כל‬Neh 8:17); ‫( הגולה קהל‬Ezra 10:8) ‫( הגולה‬Ezra 1:11, 9:4, 10:6; Neh 7:6; Esth 2:6); ‫( גלותא בני‬Ezra 6:16); ‫( הגולה בני‬Ezra 4:1; 6:19–20; 10:7, 16; see Bedford 2001; Japhet 2006c). See Knoppers’s contribution to the conference, which will be published elsewhere. 50.  The “foreign” women’s worshiping patterns and deity/deities are not communicated.

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Fig. 3. Boundaries of postexilic Israelite groups. (a) Representation of boundary consolidation in terms of remnant identification, ascribed memory of participation in the exile, and Israelite status, forming a dense homogenous system that reinforces the strength of the boundary. The arrow demarcates the attempted injection of “foreign women” into the community (adapted from Wallman 1986: 241); (b) alternative, more heterogeneous system for representing groups within postexilic Yehud (not to scale).

are subsumed in the vortex of the author’s restricted criteria for “Israel.” This homogenization of boundaries, rather than acknowledgement of the heterogeneity that is achieved through forming links with the past may be represented diagrammatically as in fig. 3. 51 Finally, Blau notes that the homogenized boundary system often strengthens the power of third parties over intermarrying partners. Romain lists the coercive strategies adopted by significant others in order to prevent proscribed unions in the case of religious intermarriage (Romain 1997: 283). Coercion of this sort is explicit in Ezra 9–10, where third-party power dominates. 52 Given this sort of strengthened third-party power, 51.  The title Gôlāh is anachronistic for initial generations of returnees; the event’s setting during Ezra’s time is, at the earliest, about 80 years after Cyrus and over 60 years after Darius, indicating that an ethnicity rooted in the experience being retained or sustained as a focal point of boundary regulation. 52.  Romain’s “coercive strategies” are discernable within Ezra 9–10 (Romain 1998). For example, third parties may “prevent further meetings” (see Ezra 9:12); “create obstacles and excuses” (see Ezra 9:1b–2, 14a); “criticize the other person’s suitability” (see Ezra 9:11); “instill a sense of guilt” (see 9:3, 6, 7, 10, 15; 10:1, 10, 19); “utter direct threats” (see Ezra 10:7–8); “predict a terrible future” (see Ezra 14b); or “enlist others to dissuade against intermarriage” (see Ezra 9:1a, 10:2).

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the “sending away” (‫ )הוציא‬of “foreign” wives is, whether a historical reality or not, believable. In conclusion, Blau’s representation of how boundaries interrelate provides a better tool for gaining insight into the so-called “intermarriage crisis” of Ezra 9–10 than Merton’s functional model. The acknowledgement that humans have multiple identities and exist within numerous groups allows scholars not to overemphasize ethnicity simply for the sake of analytic interest but instead to recognize that ethnic identities are always relational social constructs. It is the integrated configuration of variant group identities, running along indistinguishable boundary lines, that makes the sense of identity communicated through the text so robust. There is no possibility of another “Israelite” group separate from the “holy seed”; there was no “remnant” group that was not exiled; no genealogical continuity exists outside the Gôlāh community. One is inside or outside the ethnos, its boundaries are utterly impermeable, and the cross-cutting of these boundaries is not only to be avoided but is also sinful. However, this also creates the representation of an extremely particularistic, perhaps somewhat insecure group who perceive that their identity is being threatened. Application of Blau’s model to Ezra 9–10 suggests that the crisis represented runs much deeper than a conflict about land or economic or political status. Exclusion and separation form the ground-bass upon which the entire book hinges. This frame of reference greatly assists understandings of Ezra’s enforced endogamy through purging and purifying the “holy seed” from foreign women.

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2006d Postexilic Historiography: How and Why? Pp. 307–30 in From the Rivers of Babylon to the Highlands of Judah: Collected Studies on the Restoration Period. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Janzen, D. 2002 Witch Hunts, Purity and Social Boundaries. Sheffield: JSOT Press. 2008 Crisis of Jerusalem: Ethnic, Cultic, Legal and Geographic Boundaries in Ezra–Nehemiah. Unity and Disunity in Ezra–Nehemiah: Redaction, Rhetoric, and Reader, ed. M. J. Boda and P. L. Redditt. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Jenkins, R. 1997 Rethinking Ethnicity: Arguments and Explorations. London: Sage. Joannès, F., and Lemaire, A. 1999 Trois Tablettes Cunéiforme à Onomastique Oust-Sémitique. Trans­ euphratène 17: 17–34. Johnson, W. M. 1995 Ethnicity in Persian Yehud: Between Anthropological Analysis and Ideological Criticism. Pp. 177–86 in Society of Biblical Literature 1995 Seminar Papers: One Hundred and Thirty-First Annual Meeting, ed. E. H. Lovering. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Kalmijn, M. 1994 Assortive Mating by Cultural and Economic Occupational Status. American Journal of Sociology 100: 422–52. 1998 Intermarriage and Homogamy: Causes, Patterns, Trends. Annual Review of Sociology 24: 395–421. Karrer, C. 2001 Ringen um die Verfassung Judas: Eine Studie zu den Theologisch-politischen Vorstellungen im Esra–Nehemia-Buch. Berlin: de Gruyter. Kennedy, R. J. R. 1944 Single or Triple Melting Pot? Intermarriage Trends in New Haven 1870–1940. American Journal of Sociology 49: 331–39. Kessler, J. 2006 Persia’s Loyal Yahwists: Power Identity and Ethnicity in Achaemenid Yehud. Pp. 91–121 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Killebrew, A. E. 2004 Biblical Peoples and Ethnicity: An Archaeological Study of Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, and Early Israel, 1300–1100 b.c.e. Boston: Brill. Klingbeil, G. 2007 Not so Happily Ever After: Cross Cultural Marriages in the Time of Ezra–Nehemiah. Maarav 14: 39–75. Knoppers, G. N. 2001 Intermarriage, Social Complexity and Ethnic Diversity in the Genealogy of Judah. JBL 120: 15–30. 2003 The Relationship of the Priestly Genealogies to the History of the High Priesthood in Jerusalem. Pp. 109–34 in Judah and the Judeans in

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the Neo-Babylonian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and J. Blenkinsopp. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Knowles, M. D. 2004 Pilgrimage Imagery in the Returns in Ezra. JBL 123: 57–74. Kuhrt, A. 1983 The Cyrus Cylinder and Achaemenid Imperial Policy. JSOT 25: 83–97. Labov, T., and Jacobs, J. A. 2001 Gender Differentials in Intermarriage among Sixteen Race and Ethnic Groups. Sociological Forum 17: 621–46. Lang, E. P., ed. 1985 Anthropological Approaches to the Old Testament. London: SPCK. Leach, E. R. 1955 Polyandry, Inheritance and the Definition of Marriage. Man 55: 182–86. Levin, Y., ed. 2007 A Time of Change: Judah and Its Neighbours in the Persian and Early Hellenistic Periods. London: T. & T. Clark. Lévi-Strauss, C. 1969 The Elementary Structures of Kinship. London: Beacon. Liang, Z., and Ito, N. 1999 Intermarriage of Asian Americans in the New York City Region: Contemporary Patterns and Future Prospects. International Migration Review 33: 876–900. Lieberson, S., and Waters, M. C. 1988 From Many Strands: Ethnic and Racial Groups in Contemporary America. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Lipiński, E. 1981 A Wife’s Right to Divorce in Light of an Ancient Near Eastern Tradition. Jewish Law Annual 4: 9–27. 1991 Marriage and Divorce in the Judaism of the Persian Period. Trans­ euphratène 4: 63–71. Lipschits, O. 2002 Literary and Ideological Aspects of Nehemiah 11. JBL 121: 423–40. 2003 Demographic Changes in Judah between the Seventh and the Fifth Centuries b.c.e. Pp. 323–76 in Judah and the Judeans in the Neo-Babylonian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and J. Blenkinsopp. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2005 The Fall and Rise of Jerusalem: Judah under Babylonian Rule. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2006 Achaemenid Imperial Policy, Settlement Processes in Palestine, and the Status of Jerusalem in the Middle of the Fifth Century b.c.e. Pp. 19–52 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns. Lipschits, O., and Blenkinsopp, J., eds. 2003 Judah and the Judeans in the Neo-Babylonian Period. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

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Lipschits, O., and Oeming, M., eds. 2006 Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Marcson, S. 1951 A Theory of Intermarriage and Assimilation. Social Forces 29: 75–78. Merton, R. K. 1941 Intermarriage and the Social Structure: Fact and Theory. Psychiatry 9: 361–74. Milgrom, J. 1976 Cult and Conscience: The Asham and the Priestly Doctrine of Repentance. Leiden: Brill. Miller, J. C. 2008 Ethnicity and the Hebrew Bible: Problems and Prospects. Currents in Biblical Research 6: 170–213. Mitchell, J. C. 1974 Perceptions of Ethnicity and Ethnic Behaviour. Pp. 1–36 in Urban Ethnicity, ed. A. P. Cohen. London: Tavistock. Mitchell, J. C., ed. 1950 The Kalela Dance: Aspects of Social Relationships among Urban Africans in Northern Rhodesia. Manchester: Manchester University Press. 1969 Social Networks in Urban Situations: Analysis of Personal Relationships in Central African Towns. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Mullen, E. T. 1996 Ethnic Myths and Pentateuchal Foundations: A New Approach to the Formation of the Pentateuch. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Myers, J. M. 1965 Ezra–Nehemiah. New York: Doubleday. Needham, R. 1969 Remarks on the Analysis of Kinship and Marriage. Pp. 1–29 in Rethinking Kinship and Marriage, ed. R. Needham. London: Tavistock. Needham, R., ed. 1971 Rethinking Kinship and Marriage. London: Tavistock. Novak, M. 1972 The Rise of the Unmeltable Ethnics: Politics and Culture in the Seventies. New York: Macmillan. Newman, J. H. 1999 Praying by the Book: The Scripturalization of Prayer in Second Temple Judaism. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Olyan, S. M. 1997 What Do Shaving Rites Accomplish and What Do They Signal in Biblical Ritual Contexts? JBL 117: 611–62. 2004 Purity Ideology in Ezra–Nehemiah as a Tool to Reconstitute the Community. JSJ 35: 1–17. Overholt, T. W. 1996 Cultural Anthropology and the Old Testament. Minneapolis: Fortress.

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Park, R. E. 1964 Race and Culture. Glencoe: Free Press. Parkin, R., and Stone, L., eds. 2004 Kinship and Family: An Anthropological Reader. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Peach, C. 1980 Ethnic Segregation and Intermarriage. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 70: 371–81. Peterson, B. O. 1991 Popular Narratives and Ethnic Identity: Literature and Community in Die Abendschule. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Pichon, C. 1997 La Prohibition des Marriages Mixtes par Néhémie. VT 47: 168–99. Pike, K. 1964 Towards a Theory of the Structure of Human Behaviour. Pp. 154–61 in Language in Culture and Society, ed. D. Hymes. New York: Harper & Row. Qian, Z., and Preston, S. 1992 Changes in American Marriage: 1972–1987: Availability and Forces of Attraction by Age and Education. American Sociological Review 58: 482–95. Radcliffe-Brown, A. R., and Forde, D., eds. 1987 African Systems of Kinship and Marriage. New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Rendtorff, R. 1996 The Gēr in the Priestly Laws of the Pentateuch. Pp. 77–87 in Ethnicity and the Bible, ed. M. G. Brett. Leiden: Brill. Rivière, P. G. 1971 Marriage: A Reassessment. Pp. 57–70 in Rethinking Kinship and Marriage, ed. R. Needham. Routledge: London. Roberts, R. E. T. 1993 Black-White Intermarriage in the U.S. Pp. 25–80 in Inside the Mixed Marriage: Accounts of Changing Attitudes, Patterns and Perceptions of Cross-Cultural and Interracial Marriages, ed. W. R. Johnson and D. M. Warren. Lanham, MD: University Press of America. Romain, J. 1997 The Effects of Mixed-Faith Marriages on Family Life and Identity. Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford 28: 275–95. Roth, G., and Wittich, C., eds. 1978 Max Weber Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology. London: University of California Press. Rowley, H. H. 1955 Nehemiah’s Mission and Its Background. Aberdeen: University of Aberdeen Press. Rudolph, W. 1949 Esra und Nehemía. Tübingen: Mohr.

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Schaper, J. 2003 Priestly Purity and Social Organisation in Persian Period Judah. BN 118: 51–57. Schoen, R. 1995 The Widening Gap between Black and White Marriage Rates: Context and Implications. Pp. 103–16 in The Decline in Marriage among African Americans: Causes, Consequences and Policy Implications, ed. B. M. Tucker and C. Mitchell-Kernan. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Schoen, R., and Wooldredge, J. 1989 Marriage Choice in North California and Virginia, 1969–71 and 1979– 81. Journal of Marriage and the Family 51: 465–81. Shils, E. 1957 Primordial, Personal, Sacred, and Civil Ties. British Journal of Sociology 8: 130–45. Simmel, G. 1955 Conflict and the Web of Group-Affiliations. New York: Free Press. Smith, A. D. 1986 The Ethnic Origins of Nations. Oxford: Blackwell. 1992a Ethnicity and Nationalism. Leiden: Brill. 1992b Chosen Peoples: Why Ethnic Groups Survive. Ethnic and Racial Studies 15: 440–49. 1994 The Formation of National Identity. Pp. 129–53 in Identity: Essays based on Herbert Spencer Lectures Given in the University of Oxford, ed. H. Harris. Oxford: Clarendon. 1999 Ethnic Election and National Destiny: Some Religious Origins of Nationalist Ideas. Nations and Nationalism 5: 331–55. Smith, D. L. 1989 The Religion of the Landless: The Social Context of the Babylonian Exile. Bloomington, IN: Meyer-Stone. Smith, M. S. 1987 Palestinian Parties and Politics That Shaped the Old Testament. London: SCM. Smith-Christopher, D. L. 1991 The Politics of Ezra: Sociological Indicators of Postexilic Judean Society. Pp. 73–98 in Second Temple Studies, ed. P. R. Davies. JSOTSup 117. Sheffield: JSOT Press. 1994 The Mixed Marriage Crisis in Ezra 9–10 and Nehemiah 13: A Study of the Sociology of the Post-exilic Judean Community. Pp. 243–65 in Second Temple Studies, vol. 2: Temple and Community in the Persian Period, ed. T. C. Eskenazi and K. H. Richards. JSOTSup 175. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. 1996 Between Ezra and Isaiah: Exclusion, Transformation and Inclusion of the “Foreigner” in Post-exilic Biblical Theology. Pp. 117–44 in Ethnicity and the Bible, ed. M. G. Brett. Leiden: Brill.

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What Do Priests and Kings Have in Common? Priestly and Royal Succession Narratives in the Achaemenid Era Deirdre N. Fulton

The Pennsylvania State University

Throughout the history of the ancient Near East, genealogies were constructed as a way of creating identity, enhancing a pedigree, and even asserting specific claims over a position or group of people. This trend continued into the Persian period, when Persian kings created records of their genealogies, and is most evident in royal inscriptions, such as the Cyrus Cylinder and the Behistun Inscription of Darius, both of which use genealogies as a way of legitimizing their claims to the throne. Similar patterns can also be found in nonroyal genealogies, namely, the priestly genealogies found in Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah, and genealogies dealing with the priesthood in Babylonia (Hunger 1968; McEwan 1981). Both kings and priests had clear motives for legitimizing their positions within their respective family lines. These reasons were oftentimes complex, but all seem to involve the perceived notion that a genealogy would create legitimacy for its bearer. In this study, I will explore two issues concerning the construction of genealogies during the Persian period. First, I will examine the use of long genealogies, that is, genealogies that are more than three generations, beginning with Cyrus, Darius, and other Achaemenid kings, and then continuing with selected biblical materials. In each case, the use of long genealogies may be viewed as an attempt to connect individuals to clearly defined positions and pedigrees. In certain cases, the lineages were well established, while in other cases traditional genealogies may have been altered. Additionally, I will examine the appearance of new or competing royal and priestly lineages that reworked and supplemented traditional genealogies for the purpose of authorizing someone to a specific position. By exploring these issues, I will illustrate how genealogies during the Persian period helped verify new royals, new priests, new positions, and also new institutions, constructed (in some cases) out of past institutions. In so doing, they tied individuals to established and well-represented traditional lineages. 225

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Royal Achaemenid Genealogies Within the study of family trees, scholars have paid close attention to both style and form. One important issue when examining genealogies is their length, which may reflect the social and political circumstances of the period. Robert Wilson (1977: 70) asserts that long genealogies— that is, genealogies that are several generations in length—tend to appear during periods when the political climate is particularly unstable or during periods of dramatic cultural change. One effect of the creation of a lengthy genealogy may be to connect a figure in an era of instability with a revered ancestor who lived in a formative era or a time of great stability. This is seen during the Persian period, particularly during the reigns of Cyrus and Darius the Great. The use of linear genealogies has a long history in the ancient Near East, but the most common genealogies tend to be two or three generations in length. Genealogies that are four or more generations in length are relatively uncommon and occur in Assyrian royal inscriptions, with only a few examples appearing before the fourteenth century b.c.e. Still, many Assyrian rulers and the majority of Babylonian rulers tended not to use genealogies, or if they did, they only mentioned their fathers. 1 In many but by no means all cases, when dramatic changes occurred, internally, externally, or both, there appears to have been a spike in the use of genealogy, specifically in Assyria and Persia. 2 Conspicuous in their absence are long genealogies during the NeoBabylonian period. Indeed, in the case of Nabopolasser, he refers to himself as the “son of a nobody” (see Beaulieu 2000: 307–8). The lack of long genealogies in Babylonian records points to a conscious break with traditions that could be perceived as linking the Babylonian kings to the Assyrian Empire. Other examples can be found in the kind of titles that appear in Babylonian royal inscriptions compared to Assyrian royal inscriptions. 3 An example of this phenomenon is the use of the title šarru dannu, “mighty king,” which Nabopolasser is called in the “Nabopolassar Epic” (Grayson 1975: 82, II:14) and other of his inscriptions (Berger 1973: 140–41). 4 This thoroughly Assyrian title loses attraction, however, 1.  It should be noted that king lists were used in Sumeria, Assyria, and Baby­ lonia. These lists kept track of all of the kings in succession (some of which are artificial creations), their reigns, and the names of their fathers. For a discussion and bibliography, see Glassner (2005). 2. See Oppenheim (1961: 101–2) for a summary of the different ways for Assyrian kings to legitimate their rule. 3.  For a discussion of the different Assyrian epithets and their use or absence in the Neo-Babylonian period, see Vanderhooft (1999). 4. See Seux (1967: 203ff.) for a discussion of the meaning of šarru dannu. He responds to Oppenheim’s (CAD D 94–95) translation of šarru dannu. Tadmor (1998:

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under subsequent rulers, and is not employed by Nebuchadnezzar or Neriglissar (Tadmor 1998: 356). There is, however, one example that appears during the reign of Nabonidus, found in the Sippar-Cylinder, where he uses the title šarru dannu. This text was probably following an earlier inscription of Ashurbanipal found at Harran (Tadmor 1998: 356; Beaulieu 1989: 58–59). This almost total break from earlier Assyrian titles is also relevant to Babylonian genealogies. The lack of genealogies cannot be coincidental considering the desire of Babylonian monarchs to distance themselves from certain practices that could link them to the Assyrian Empire. Like Nabopolasser, Nabonidus, a usurper to the throne, does not provide a genealogy. In Nabonidus’s monumental inscription, he states, “I am Nabonidus, the only son, who has nobody. 5 In my mind there was no thought of kingship” (Beaulieu 1989: 67). 6 Yet under the Persians, the resurgence of Assyrian titles combined with early Elamite titles shows the desire of the royalty to connect themselves to the earlier Mesopotamian rulers, in particular the Assyrians. Long genealogies emerged in the Persian period, after a hiatus during the Babylonian period, particularly during the reigns of Cyrus and Darius. For Cyrus, the founder of the Persian Empire, the importance of proving legitimacy served several purposes, both to demonstrate his political “right” to the throne as well as to give him the “divine right” for a position of this sort. In the Cyrus Cylinder, he uses several different criteria for validating his kingship. First, he highlights the ineffectiveness of Nabonidus, the recently dethroned Neo-Babylonian ruler. He also maintains that Nabonidus did “evil” against both Marduk and Marduk’s city, Babylon. As Pierre Briant asserts, Cyrus presents himself not as an outsider but rather as the legitimate heir to the throne, “coming to mend the thread of ancient Babylonian history” (2002: 44). 356) adds to this discussion, pointing out that the “Assyrian phrase šarru dannu, definitely expresses the king’s full vigour, not his legitimacy.” 5.  Glassner (2005: 29–30 n. 36) argues that, in the case of Sargon of Akkade, the phrase “I did not know my father” found in his pseudo autobiography was written by the Babylonians as “he had no father” or “the son of a nobody.” While this phrase carries a negative meaning in English, this was not necessarily the case in the ancient texts. He points to Nabopolassar’s use of “son of a nobody” as an example. This term, in essence, meant a person who was not from the royal line. Shalmaneser III calls Hazael a “son of a nobody” but never refers to Jehu this way. Halpern (2001: 184–86) argues that this is to privilege Jehu, who was paying tribute to Assyria, where Hazael was not. 6.  Beaulieu (1989: 84–86) notes that there are no references to Nabonidus or his family before his accession, which is probably due to the fact that he was not part of the Babylonian oligarchy. Rather, he gained power by rising through the court system.

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Amélie Kuhrt observes that each of the motifs present in the Cyrus Cylinder uses standard Mesopotamian themes. Kings claiming the Babylonian throne employed these themes in order to gain legitimacy for their rule (2007: 110). 7 One example of this is found in his titulary, in which he declares, “I am Cyrus, king of the world, great king, powerful king, king of Babylon, king of the country of Sumer and Akkad, king of the four corners of the earth” (Cogan 2003: 315 line 20). By the time of Cyrus, this type of ancient titulary, particularly the phrase “king of the four corners,” had been used since the third millennium. 8 This conscious archaizing on the part of Cyrus is evident from the use of such a common phrase that is present in both Akkadian and Assyrian sources. After declaring himself “king of the four corners”, Cyrus then states that he is “son of the great king Cambyses, king of the city of Anshan, grandson of the great king Cyrus, king of the city of Anshan, greatgrandson of the great king Teispes, king of Anshan from an eternal line of kingship” (Cogan 2003: 315 line 21). Several noteworthy issues appear in this genealogy: First, Cyrus seems to justify his control through listing a four-generation genealogy. Although four-generation genealogies are used occasionally in the Assyrian records, it was not standard for declaring oneself king during the Assyrian period. Additionally, Cyrus makes it clear that each of his ancestors was king of Anshan. 9 He also ends his lineage with the phrase “of an eternal line of kingship” (numun da-ru-u-sha lugal-u-tu). A similar phrase also appears in a Neo-Assyrian genealogy of Esarhaddon, in which he declares himself “of the eternal royal line (numun lugal-u-ti da-ru-u) of Belu-bani son of Adasi” (Borger 1956: 97, lines 15–17). Thus, Cyrus takes an established form of genealogy and places his own family line within this context. Cyrus incorporated the standard style of royal titulary present in Assyria, which had been around for a lengthy period of time, but he distinctly made it his own by connecting himself to a line of Elamite kings, centered in Anshan. In doing this, he is providing clear justification for dynastic control through his bloodline. Additionally, although 7.  Yet the reality of Cyrus’s reign is in stark contrast to this image. Amélie Kuhrt observes that contrary to the image of liberator with a “new vision for ruling the world, we can begin to define a king, heir to an already fairly significant realm, who deploys brutal and placatory gestures in a calculated and effective manner” (2007: 117). 8.  Naram-Sin, the King of Akkad, is the earliest king to be referred to as the “king of the four corners of the earth” (Studevent-Hickman and Morgan 2006: 31). 9.  For a discussion of these titles, see Stronach 2003. The title “king of Anshan” is probably used because it was reminiscent of the Elamite title “king of Anshan and Susa.”

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he attempts to tie himself to the great empires of the past, particularly the Assyrians through key wording and phrases, his genealogy focuses on his family’s traditional Elamite roots concentrated in Anshan. While royal genealogies could serve to legitimize a line that was already established, like that of Cyrus, they could also give rise to new claims. This is manifest with Darius, who was not directly in line for the throne. The Behistun Monument clearly illustrates this in that he formulates a six-generation lineage back to the eponymous founder, Achaemenes. I (am) Darius the great king, king of kings, king of Persia, king of the countries, the son of Hystaspes, the grandson of Arsames, an Achaemenid. Proclaims Darius, the king: my father (is) Hystaspes; the father of Hystaspes (is) Arsames; the father of Arsames (was) Ariaramnes; The father of Ariaramnes (was) Teispes; the father of Teispes (was) Achaemenes. Proclaims Darius, the king: For this reason we are called Achaemenids; from ancient times we are noblemen; from ancient times our family has been kings. Proclaims Darius, the king: (There are) eight in my family who formerly have been kings; I (am) the ninth; (thus altogether) nine, now as ever, are we kings. (Schmitt 1991: 49 lines 1–11)

This genealogy is particularly significant because Darius, like Cyrus, claims that his right to the throne is based on his family line. 10 Also, like Cyrus, he claims that his family had been kings for a long period of time, in succession. 11 What can one make of these statements? There are conspicuous absences in this genealogy, including Cyrus and Cambyses. Herodotus comments in a story concerning Cambyses in Egypt that Darius was a member of Cambyses’ guard and a “man of no great importance” (III.139–40).  12 Thus, according to Herodotus, Darius was not in line for the throne, although he was of noble birth. Yet David Stronach argues that Darius’s ancestors may have had control of certain 10.  Darius also claims that the protection of his deity, Ahuramazda, is also the reason for his success. The will of a specific deity is a common reason kings provide for their kingship. 11.  He claims that there were eight kings in his family but does not supply as many names in his genealogy. Tuplin (2005: 229–30) points out that Darius might have been lying and so did not provide a long enough genealogy. It may also be that Darius realized this statement would “provoke pedantic questions” when it was placed within the context of a genealogy. 12.  It is notable that Herodotus (VII.11) provides an alternative genealogy that does not fully agree with the Behistun Monument. In an impassioned speech by Xerxes, he states “For I am not the son of Darius, the son of Hystaspes, the son of Arsames, the son of Ariaramnes, the son of Teispes, the son of Cyrus, the son of Cambyses, the son of Teispes, the son of Achaemenes, if I am not avenged against the Athenians.” Herodotus combines the genealogies of Darius and Cyrus into one.

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areas of Fars, and thus he was from a family of monarchs (2003: 256). Hence, his claim is not necessarily a lie. What then is Darius attempting to do in his genealogy? There are clear examples of usurpers who did not attempt to create a genealogy in order to justify their right to the throne. The classic case is the Neo-Assyrian ruler, Sargon II, who never provides a genealogy to support his right to the throne. 13 Yet Darius did not claim that he had no royal pedigree but, rather, justifies his right to the throne through his family. Still, he provides no specifics except for family names. Unlike Cyrus, he gives no geographical location for his ancestors’ supposed kingdom. Hence, Darius attempted to redefine what it meant to be the rightful monarch through the use of his genealogy. Briant observes, “It was not because he was Achaemenid (in the clan sense) that Darius achieved power; it was his accession to royalty that allowed him to redefine the reality of what it meant to be ‘Achaemenid’” (2002: 111). Christopher Tuplin questions Briant’s interpretation, adding that Darius may not have been intentionally lying about his descent from Achamenes but rather is speaking in “symbolic terms” (2005: 230). Whether Darius is giving a faithful rendering of his family line or lying is unclear. But it is apparent that through the use of his genealogy, Darius, in essence, is undoing Cyrus’s rightful claim to the throne by taking his genealogy to the founder of the dynasty, Achaemenes, whereas Cyrus only connects himself to Teispes. 14 Wilson adds that, in the case of the Achaemenid kings, “many . . . were engaged either in expanding the Persian Empire or protecting it from the threat of internal political chaos” (1977: 70). Darius felt the need to construct this genealogy, whether real or imaginary, in order to show his family’s past claims to power. Additionally, both Artaxerxes II and Artaxerxes III provide long genealogies in order to legitimize their rules. There are several inscriptions that record Artaxerxes II’s genealogy. One example, placed on a column base at Susa, states “Artaxerxes, the great king, the king of kings, the king of all nations, the king of the world. Son of Darius, Darius, the son of Artaxerxes, Artaxerxes the son of Xerxes, Darius the son of Hystaspes, of the line of Achaemenes” (Weissbach 1911: 123). The need for Artaxerxes to show a legitimate genealogy may be due to the difficult beginnings of his reign when he had to put down a revolt led by his 13.  Sargon justifies his control through the will of the gods. He states in several monumental inscriptions that the gods gave him his position. See Luckenbill (1927: 48–80 nos. 96, 98, 99, 107, 117, 133, 137, 153). 14.  Briant (2002: 110) argues that the Teispes mentioned in Cyrus and Darius’s genealogy are in fact not the same. He believes it is a coincidence and not, in fact, represented as two branches of the same family. This is based on Aelian (Var. hist. XII.43) and Plato (Leg. III.65), who both argue that Darius was not the son of a king.

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brother Cyrus. After suppressing this revolt, he continued to struggle to control his empire (Olmstead 1948: 371–424; Wilson 1977: 70; Briant 2002: 645–75). Similarly, Artaxerxes III provides a nine-person genealogy. This too was compiled in a particularly unstable period of the Persian Empire. In the cases of Cyrus, Darius, Artaxerxes II and III, their genealogies reflect or perhaps mask periods of dramatic change in ancient history. Cyrus brought about the destruction of Nabonidus and the Babylonian Empire, and Darius usurped the throne from Cyrus’s line. Yet both strove to make themselves appear not as having caused havoc or terminated existing dynasties but rather as the true heirs to kingship based on their family histories. In the case of both Cyrus and Darius, their genealogies reappropriate motifs used in past genealogies, particularly those used in the Assyrian Empire. For Artaxerxes II and III, their genealogies attempt to also mask times of crisis and instability, hearkening back to periods of stability. Each ruler contextualizes his rise to power by recourse to long-established patterns of royal legitimation.

Royal Genealogies: David and Saul In the biblical material, certain royal and priestly genealogies may point to periods when legitimizing one’s genealogy was particularly important. There are two examples of this, 1 Chr 3:1–24, the Davidic genealogy, and 1 Chr 8:33–40, the so-called Saulide genealogy. Both lineages focus on monarchs who had long been out of power. In the example of the Davidic genealogy in 1 Chr 3:1–24, this extensive genealogy continues for 26 generations in the MT, from David to the seven sons of Elioenai. 15 It also builds on the Judahite genealogy in 1 Chronicles 2, which also connects David to Judah, Jacob, and beyond. 1 Chr 3:1–24 employs both linear and segmented formats that continue for over 600 years. The Davidic lineage begins with a segmented genealogy highlighting all of the first-born sons born to him in Hebron by his six wives and then moving on to the sons born to him in Jerusalem by Bath-shua. 16 A linear genealogy is employed from the time of Solomon to Josiah (16 generations). The genealogy returns to a segmented format from the period of Josiah until the sons of Elioenai. 17 But this 15.  The LXX version of 2 Chr 3:1–24 has a total of 30 generations. 16.  Other sons are born to David, but their mother(s) are not mentioned. 17.  In this genealogy, Zerubbabel is called the son of Pedaiah, whereas in every other reference, his father is recorded as Shealtiel (Ezra 3:2; 5:2; Neh 12:1; Hag 1:1, 12, 14; 2:2, 23; Matt 1:12; Luke 3:27). See Japhet (1993: 100) and Knoppers (2004: 328) for a discussion of the various interpretations. Also, it is noteworthy that 3:17–24 is unique to this genealogy (Williamson 1982: 57; Japhet 1993: 99–102; Knoppers 2003: 331).

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is not simply a genealogy of David’s dynastic line. It continues long past the Exile and Return, through the family line of Zerubbabel and down to the sons of Elioenai. Thus, the Davidic genealogy focuses on one line and its endurance and survival, even after the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah. Although the power of this family had long ago diminished, it is clear that this genealogy is attempting to position one branch of the Davidic family in line for power. And thus, in a period when they had long been out of power, as Gary Knoppers points out, the “careful demarcation of continuity among the descendants of David throughout periods of tremendous change demonstrates the dynasty’s resiliency and importance” (2004: 335–36). The genealogy functions as a way of authorizing one family line within the larger Davidic lineage to a position of power, if the occasion ever arose where power could be bestowed on them. Another example of a royal genealogy found within the lineage of the Benjaminites is the so-called Saulide genealogy (1 Chr 8:33–40), which is really the Jeielite genealogy because it begins with Saul’s grandfather Jeiel. The Chronicler’s interest in the family of Saul acknowledges his earlier importance as well as his descendants’ continued importance during the postexilic period. The importance of Saul’s family is carried through Chronicles, where Saul and David are the two royal lines within the narrative of the monarchy. Unlike the Davidic genealogy, which highlights one particular family line, 1 Chronicles 8 highlights the importance of the Benjaminite clan and their position in their different territories, including Jerusalem and Gibeon. 18 Saul’s genealogy, which begins in v. 29 with his grandfather Jeiel and continues for 17 generations, ends with the phrase “all these were from the descendants of Benjamin” (8:40), thus concluding the Benjaminite genealogy with Saul’s descendants. Saul’s family clearly endures long after the loss of the monarchy, and the Benjaminite genealogy does not hide the character of Saul but rather honors him and his sons and holds them in a position of esteem, ending the lengthy Benjaminite genealogy with Saul’s particular family line of the Benjaminites. As a consequence of the antique Jeielite and Saulide genealogy, the tribe of Benjamin gained prominence. 19 Further, the 18. 1 Chr 8:1–32 references several different areas of settlement for the Benjaminites: Geba (vv. 1–7), Moab, Ono, Lod (vv. 8–12), Aijalon, Gath, and Jerusalem (vv. 13–28), and Gibeon (vv. 29–32). Peter Dirksen (2005: 132) argues that the first section of 1 Chronicles 8, which consists of vv. 1–8, can be subdivided by their area of settlement. 19.  It is also noteworthy that the Benjaminite genealogy is the final one provided. This is not a position of shame but rather a position of honor.

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Benjaminites were an important tribe within postexilic Yehud and, for the Chronicler, a loyal subject of the Davidic monarchy (Knoppers 2004: 491–92). They were also an integral member of Yehud during the Achaemenid era, and thus past events or the genealogy legitimized their place in the Second Commonwealth by recourse to the ancient past through Jeiel and Saul, their most famous members.

Priestly Genealogies: Qohath and Ezra Turning to other biblical genealogies, particularly 1 Chr 5:27–41, the Qohathite genealogy, and Ezra 7:1–5, Ezra’s genealogy, these priestly genealogies indicate sacerdotal lines with active claims in the Persian period. 1 Chr 5:27–41 is an extensive genealogy, focusing on Levi and his descendants, employing both a segmented and a linear genealogy. The lineage in 1 Chr 5:27–41 commences with “the sons of Levi” and then lists his three children. Next, the genealogy follows Qohath, the second son of Levi, and then provides the names of his four children. For four generations, Levi’s genealogy follows a segmented lineage. This pattern switches to a linear genealogy after listing Aaron and his children, Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar. Thus, starting with Eleazar, the genealogy lists the father and then son who inherits the chief position in the family. From Eleazar to Jehozadak, the linear genealogy provides ostensibly 22 continuous generations. Consequently, 1 Chr 5:27–41 links all of these generations to Levi, the ancestral head of the family. 1 Chr 5:27–41 attempts to link the Qohathite priestly lineage to the foundations of Israel. Within the milieu of postexilic Judah, this genealogy appears to legitimize a specific line of priests, the Qohathites (Knoppers 2004: 412–14). Yet it seems likely that there are other branches in the Aaronide genealogy that could lay claim to this coveted position. Thus, by compiling a lineage from Levi (and Aaron) to Jehozadok, the genealogy is claiming the rights of a particular family line for the position of priest, as well as high priest, during the Postexilic Period. Additionally, the author of this list is validating Jeshua’s position of power by validating Jehozadok. Hence, the compiler of the Qohathite genealogy endorses a specific lineage of priests during the Preexilic Period with clear implications for Yehud during the Achaemenid era. Concerning Ezra 7:1–5, Ezra is linked to past institutions through his own 17-generation genealogy. Yet unlike the other linear genealogies explored in this paper, this genealogy is fairly selective. Therefore, it is clear that comprehensiveness was not necessary for a genealogy to be considered valid. Robert Wilson (1977: 65–67) observes that telescoping, or linking a person to earlier generations without offering the entire

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genealogy, was common, particularly when a king wanted to connect himself to a “dynastic founder.” 20 In the case of Ezra 7:1–5, where the text chronicles Ezra’s genealogy back to Aaron, listing 17 names, including Ezra, this does not begin to represent the actual number of generations between Aaron and Ezra. The lineage is incomplete and does not attempt to record a complete genealogy. Rather, the purpose of Ezra 7:1–5 is to establish Ezra’s authority during the Persian period by linking him to earlier priests of the Sinaitic age (Knoppers 2009: 150–52). One function of such long genealogies may be to establish the rights of an individual figure or family to a specific position by clearly linking that individual or family to a legitimate line that was already long established or respected. This seems to be the case for both the Qohathite genealogy and Ezra’s genealogy, in which competing claims for the priesthood were prevalent. To validate specific family claims, the genealogies begin with the relevant eponymous ancestors of the priesthood and chart a succession through the ages. For both genealogies, the need for a lineage appears to have been a necessity to achieve certain positions in the community. Based on the prevalence of genealogies appearing during the Persian period, this need for legitimacy became essential to holding onto the right to occupy a position. This is reflected in the stories found in Ezra 2:62 and Neh 7:63–64, where certain priests could not provide proper genealogies and thus were excluded from the priesthood.

Priestly Genealogies: The Levitical Singers In the same way that Darius redefined what it meant to be an Achaemenid, religious authorities could redefine or sanction who might be eligible to hold a certain position. Positing a link with the venerable past could also justify new institutions. An example of a move of this sort may be found in 1 Chr 6:18–33, in which Levitical singers are connected to older priestly genealogies. 21 The old validates the new. The three lineages of the Qohathite line, some 23 generations, gained legitimacy by means of royal Davidic appointment. A concern with the future is evident in the fact that David appointed the “sons” of Heman, Asaph, and Ethan and not simply Heman, Asaph, and Ethan themselves. The use of an ascending genealogy instead of a descending one highlights the continued importance of tying this institution to the past. The association 20.  The Assyrian king Esarhaddon provides his genealogy, which connects him to Sennacherib (his father), Sargon (his grandfather), and Belubani. Belubani was one of the founders of the Assyrian dynasty, spanning a line of some 62 kings from Belubani to Sargon. 21.  The material in 1 Chr 6:1–38 is mostly unique to Chronicles.

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with and links to major priestly and royal figures provide legitimacy to the figures appearing in the long genealogies. Moreover, the position of the Levites, especially the Levitical musicians, of the Second Temple may well have been enhanced by their links to prestigious figures associated with the First Temple. Therefore, it would appear that the past held significance for the present during the Achaemenid period because even the temple singers needed a clear lineage that gave them a right to function as an integral part of the Second Temple sacerdotal structure. Yet the Levitical singers are never mentioned by the Deuteronomistic Historian or in the Priestly source. Even so, these three families could maintain their claims through their supposed connection to David, the great institutor of Temple cult practices, according to Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah.

Other Non-Royal Genealogies: Ionia, Egypt, and Mesopotamia Long genealogies were fairly uncommon in nonroyal material, save a few notable exceptions. One such example appears in Herodotus’s Histories. In book two, Herodotus recounts his visit to Thebes (Karnak), where he tells a story about Hecataeus of Miletus, the sixth-century historian (550–490 b.c.e.), who wrote works on geography, enumerating different regions of the known world, and also genealogies, in which he attempted to order the stories of gods and heroes (of these works, there are extant some 35 fragments). 22 Hecataeus is also credited with revising a map of the world first created by Anaximander. 23 Herodotus states that Hecataeus “had studied his own lineage and had traced his family history back to a divine ancestor in the sixteenth generation” (II.143). He continues his narrative, stating that the priests at Thebes did not believe Hecataeus’s claim that one could descend from the divine, and took him into the Temple of Amun and showed him the statues of the high priests, each representing a generation. The position was passed down from father to son. In the end, the priests showed Hecataeus 345 statues and claimed “that every one of the figures represented 22. See Lloyd (1988) and West (1991) for a discussion of Herodotus’s possible use of Hecataeus as a source. 23.  For an overview of Hecataeus’s life, see Lionel Pearson (1939: 25–108). It is unclear how much Hecataeus added to Anaximander’s map. Although Herodotus never names Hecataeus in connection to maps, he mocks a map he has seen, stating “I am amused when I see that not one of all the people who have drawn maps of the world has set it out sensibly. They show Ocean as a river flowing around the outside of the earth, which is as circular as if it had been drawn with a pair of compasses, and they make Asia and Europe the same size” (IV. 36).

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a piromis descended from a piromis [in Greek this would be a “man of rank”] . . . they did not connect any of them to either god or a hero” (II. 143). Herodotus questions this notion that one could trace a genealogy back to the gods, and indeed Herodotus states that he does not have a genealogy of his own family and thus this practice seems strange to him. 24 This story is noteworthy because this is the only real evidence for the creation of long genealogies during this period in the Ionian world. For Hecataeus and his home city of Miletus, the late sixth century was a particularly unstable period of time regarding their relations with Persia. 25 It is very likely that Near Eastern (as well as Egyptian) thought and writings had an impact on Hecataeus, as they did on many of the early Ionian Historians. His lineage was a means of legitimacy and continuity with the past. The only great difference is that Hecataeus placed his foundations in the mythical realm. Although this is difficult to support, for Hecataeus it was a means of legitimizing his place within elite Milesian society in an unstable period in Ionian history. It was also a status symbol, pointing to the particular importance of his family. Herodotus’s story is also significant because of the reference to the Egyptian priesthood, which in certain cases was passed down from the father to son. There are examples of genealogies that are at least 17 generations in length (David 2002: 198). 26 Further, the practice of placing people (statues) in chronological order is not only mentioned by classical authors but was also practiced in private genealogies during the first millennium b.c.e. (Redford 1986: 56 n. 188). Additionally, Donald Redford observes that even though the placement of the statues was cultic, “one senses that the Egyptians were awed by a long and uninterrupted historical sequence which was thus manifest in concrete form, and exhibited pride in the proof it afforded of the permanence of their family, society, and state” (1986: 56). This appears to be what Herodotus was commenting on in relation to Hecataeus’s experience. 24. See Dewald for a discussion of Herodotus’s autobiographical material. She observes that Herodotus’s voice generally is “detached, austere, non-personal in its intellectual engagement with the material it narrates” (2002: 268). However, this one narrative conspicuously provides more of an autobiographical note than most of Herodotus’s narrative. 25.  Herodotus states that Hecataeus advised the Milesians “against starting a war with the Persian king, enumerating all of the tribes under the rule of Darius and showing how great the king’s power was; but when he could not persuade them to agree with him, he recommended that if they did revolt they should gain control of the sea” (V.36). 26. See Bierbrier (1975) for examples of long genealogies for the priests of Amun during the Late New Kingdom.

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Another example of priestly genealogies is found in connection to the Memphite priesthood of the first millennium b.c.e. At Memphis, there is a relief depicting 60 priestly statues all facing the now lost depiction of what is presumed to be the king. Next to each relief of the priest statues, it records the priest’s name, title, and then who is his father (Borchardt 1935: pl. 2). Thus, the Memphite genealogy of the high priests is depicting, in relief form, the practice of dedicating statues of each high priest to the temple. The relief at Memphis created a running genealogy of the high priesthood for 60 generations. Redford (1986: 63) does question the accuracy of the genealogy, pointing to periods that have too few high priests for the period they cover. The last 15 names, however, appear to match accurately the chronology of the period. What is clear regarding the practice of genealogies in Egypt is that extended genealogies were kept by kings, priests, and also private families, particularly after the 20th Dynasty. In fact, they become more common during the Persian period, appearing in both priestly and private contexts (Bothmer 1960: 80; Redford 1970: 5). In the case of the priestly genealogies, their increase in appearance may be due to their importance as a physical marker, thereby strengthening claims to certain priestly positions. Thus, they served both a cultic function and an important political function, particularly since the priesthood of Thebes decreased in importance during the Persian period (Wilson 1977: 127). Also, the length of the genealogy lent credibility to both a specific family and the family’s right to a position, which is evident in the relief at Memphis as well as in Herodotus’s story of Thebes. A final example of nonroyal genealogies has been found in several different types of Mesopotamian sources. Some of the most abundant are the genealogies of scribes who recorded their lineage in the colophons of their work (Hunger 1968). Most often, they consist of only two generations, but even as early as the Kassite period, there are examples of lineages three generations in length (Lambert 1957: 1–14; Wilson 1977: 115). In the case of the priesthood, there are a few cases of long genealogies; the earliest example dates to the 14th century b.c.e. (Nazimaruttas the Kassite king). Several later examples from the Hellenistic period trace different family lines within the various priesthoods back to the Kassite period (Lambert 1957: 3–4). In one specific case, the Babylonian kalû priest, that is, the lamentation priest, who presumably sang lamentation songs in various ritual contexts, 27 provides some genealogical information within the colophons of certain cuneiform texts. In Babylon, there are several genealogies that are up to 27. See Boiy (2004: 266–69) for a discussion of the kalû priesthood in Babylon.

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four generations in length, but the connection between the generations is ambiguous. Within this one family, several generations are traceable, leading back to one ancestor, Sin-leqe-unnini. This is one of the only clear Mesopotamian examples in which it is evident that this temple position was indeed inherited (McEwan 1981: 10–12). In other examples found in Uruk, one family seems to have controlled the kalû priesthood for several generations. What these genealogies share with one another is a concern with supporting specific claims, and in this case within certain temple positions. Thus, these genealogies may have functioned as a way to strengthen the authority of the kalû priesthood in connection to specific family lines.

Conclusion In both Achaemenid and Judean texts, genealogies create links with the past to legitimate the present. For the Achaemenid kings, the use of long genealogies in monumental inscriptions helped establish legitimacy, particularly during periods of instability. For Cyrus, genealogy established legitimacy during the formation of the Persian Empire, while Darius, a usurper to the throne, used his genealogy as a means of redefining the monarchy. In the case of the Judean texts, the necessity to legitimize one’s family was important in both royal and nonroyal genealogies. Like the Achaemenid kings, Judean genealogies attempted to link the Persian-period priests and kings to the distant past. Thus, the genealogies created a link with the past that lent credence to the present. The connection with past institutions highlights the real issue of legitimating one’s right to a position. Claims of this sort reflect multiple possibilities of competing interests among different groups of people. Because there were competing claims to certain positions, linking one’s family back to the foundations of Israel or, in the case of the priesthood, the Sinaitic age, was necessary in order to have an authoritative voice. In some cases, these pedigrees were created or supplemented in order to gain authority. Ties to a classical past were critical to demonstrating one’s right to privilege in the present. Thus, the classical past became the authoritative past for contemporary institutions in the Persian period.

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Studevent-Hickman, B., and Morgan, C. 2006 Old Akkadian Period Texts. Pp. 17–44 in The Ancient Near East: Historical Sources in Translation, ed. M. W. Chavalas. Oxford: Blackwell. Tadmor, H. 1965 The Inscriptions of Nabunaid: Historical Arrangement. Pp. 351–63 in Studies in Honor of Benno Landsberger on His Seventy-Fifth Birthday, April 25, 1965, ed. H. G. Güterbock and T. Jacobsen. Assyriological Studies 16. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1998 Nabopalassar and Sin-shum-lishir in a Literary Perspective. Pp. 353– 57 in Eine Festschrift für Rykle Borger zu Seinem 65. Geburtstag, ed. S. Maul. Groningen: Styx. Tuplin, C. 2005 Darius’ Accession in (the) Media. Pp. 217–44 in Writing and Ancient Near Eastern Society: Papers in Honour of Alan R. Millard, ed. P. Bienkowski, C. Mee, and E. Slater. Library of Hebrew Bible / Old Testament Series 426. New York: T. & T. Clark. Vanderhooft, D. S. 1999 The Neo-Babylonian Empire and the Babylon in the Later Prophets. Harvard Semitic Monographs 59. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Weissbach, F. H. 1911 Die Keilinschriften der Achämeniden. Leipzig: Hinrichs. West, S. R. 1991 Herodotus’ Portrait of Hecataeus. JHS 111: 144–60. Williamson, H. G. M. 1982 1 and 2 Chronicles. NCB. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Wilson, R. 1977 Genealogy and History in the Biblical World. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Yahwistic Names in Light of Late Babylonian Onomastics Paul-Alain Beaulieu University of Toronto

Every year new finds in the realms of archaeology and epigraphy increase our knowledge of the ancient world, continually adding to the testimony of literary sources such as the Bible and Classical authors. While these collections of data seem discontinuous and haphazard in their configuration, it is possible through their analysis to understand certain aspects of the identity of ancient peoples. An important and at times abundant source for studying ancient cultures is anthroponyms, that is, personal names. Although names may, in some contexts, be meaningful carriers of identity, scholars of the ancient Near East have not always given them the attention they deserve. In this essay, I will address the question of Judean identity during the Persian period from the point of view of onomastics, mostly with a comparative angle. Ancient Hebrew onomastics belongs to the larger field of Semitic onomastics. 1 The onomasticon of Semitic peoples is characterized by its predilection for theophoric names, anthroponyms in which one component is a divine name (e.g., Babylonian Marduk-apla-iddina, “Marduk has given an heir”; Hebrew Yehoiachin, “Yahweh establishes”). Names such as these disclose critical information on the ancient concept of the relation between deity and worshiper. They may also reveal changes in preference for one deity or the other. Discussion of ancient Hebrew personal names has focused mostly on theophoric names, largely in an effort to correlate changes in the onomasticon with the perceived extension, consolidation, and eventually with the almost exclusive worship of the god Yahweh during the late Judean monarchy. The increase in the proportion of Yahwistic names has been correlated with the movement toward a form of monotheism, while individuals bearing these names have been viewed implicitly as discrete participants in a revolution in 1.  The most comprehensive studies of the ancient Hebrew onomasticon are Gray 1896, Noth 1966, and Fowler 1988. Additional remarks can be found in a number of articles, notably Zevit 1983 and Pike 1992.

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the religious identity of the ancient Near East that is loosely labeled “Yahwism.” The task of analyzing Hebrew names seems fairly unproblematic for the period of the monarchy, with institutions regulating a relatively homogeneous society. But the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah ushered in a long period when Judeans lived as exiles in Babylonia, Egypt, and other less-well-documented regions, mingling with other nations in their new homelands. Along with the papyri and ostraca from Elephantine, the cuneiform documentation from Babylonia is the most important source for studying Judean onomastics during the Persian period. The Neo‑ and Late Babylonian documentation, currently evaluated at more than 60,000 texts, stretches over a long period coeval with the late Judean monarchy and the exilic and postexilic era all the way down to the Maccabean revolt and the establishment of an independent Jewish commonwealth in Palestine. The texts stem mostly from the archives of temples and private business families, with smaller groups originating from the state and local administrations. 2 They contain a large treasure trove of personal names that are of great importance for our subject in two respects. 3 First, the cuneiform documentation yields a large number of personal names of Judeans living in Babylonia in the two centuries that followed the destruction of Jerusalem. Second, the native Babylonian onomastics of the Persian period provide some interesting structural parallels to the spread of Yahwistic names that broaden our understanding of patterns of name giving among Judeans before and during the Exilic Period, as well as among returnees to Palestine during the fifth century. Comparative study of the two onomastica seems likely to yield interesting results. The purpose of this essay is to take an initial step in that direction, hoping that other scholars, be they Assyriologists or Biblicists, will find an interest in developing the subject further.

Personal Names as Carriers of Identity The study of personal names must follow some basic principles of methodology. Most scholars who conduct research in the field of onomastics would agree that personal names, when viewed strictly as 2.  A recent and comprehensive survey of that documentation can be found in Jursa 2005. 3.  The main analytical study of the Akkadian (Babylonian and Assyrian) onomasticon is still Stamm 1939. While dated, it has not yet been replaced. Several compilations of Assyrian and Babylonian names are available; the most useful include translations of each name, such as Hölscher 1996 and Baker and Radner 1998–2002.

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linguistic utterances, are purely indexical. 4 They possess no intrinsic meaning beyond pointing to the bearer of the name. If an individual is named Peter, the utterance “Peter” carries no reference to Peter the Apostle but only to the individual named Peter. Also, in most cases it is questionable whether an individual named Peter received that name in reference to the Apostle. A number of reasons, often trivial ones, can justify the choice of a name for a child. Perhaps that child’s uncle was named Peter, or his parents just liked the sound of that name. Even children not born of Christian parents may be called Peter. By and large, the same principles applied in the ancient world. The fact that one of the first great Christian exegetes of Late Antiquity, Origen, bore a name honoring the Egyptian god Horus, is a case in point. No one would build an argument about Origen’s faith and religious convictions on the basis of his pagan name. Similarly, in ancient Israel and among the Judean exiles, the sole fact that a particular individual bears a Yahwistic name tells us a priori nothing about his religious convictions or those of his parents. The name could have been chosen for a number of reasons we cannot know. However, personal names also carry a symbolic meaning. This is the meaning that scholars view as most important but that need not have motivated the parents’ choice of a name. There are, by and large, two cases in which the symbolic meanings of personal names can be considered significant indicators of social, cultural, or religious identity. The first case is when individuals either changed their names in the course of life to reflect new circumstances in their social, cultural, or religious statuses or adopted a second name for the same reasons, a well-known practice in the ancient world. 5 The second case is trend. Personal names become highly meaningful when studied collectively, especially if we can detect trends and fashions in onomastic preferences. That one individual bears a Yahwistic name is not necessarily a reflection of his religious beliefs, 6 but if the vast majority of individuals in a community do so, then we must find some explanation. Not every generation is creative with its onomasticon. There are certain periods in the history 4.  The bibliography on onomastic studies is vast. Gardiner 1957 is a useful introduction. 5.  In most of these instances, it is clear that the name was chosen for its symbolic meaning. For Mesopotamian examples, see Michalowski 1987. 6.  To take a concrete example dating to the period under investigation, the fact that Sanballaṭ, the governor of Samaria in the fifth century, bore a Babylonian name (< Sîn-uballiṭ “The god Sîn has provided life”) but gave Yahwistic names to his two sons, need not be of any significance to appraise the respective Yahwistic convictions of father and sons.

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of a culture that witness important onomastic shifts. These are the most meaningful to study because they can be correlated with broader cultural and religious developments. The appearance and proliferation of Yahwistic names during the period of the monarchy constitutes one of these important developments, and another is their ossification and disappearance during the Hellenistic period. 7

Judean Onomastics during the Late Monarchy Before considering trends in Judean onomastics during the Persian era, we must look at the situation in Palestine during the last century of the Davidic monarchy. Our sources consist mainly of ostraca, seals, and seal impressions on bullae dating to the seventh and early sixth centuries, although biblical sources must also be taken into account. We know the situation on the eve of the exile mostly from the archive of Eliyashib at Arad, which dates probably to the year 597, and also from the Lachish ostraca, which are contemporaneous with the second Babylonian onslaught against Judah 10 years later. The majority of the names appearing in these two groups of documents are Yahwistic. Moreover, Yahweh is the only theophoric element appearing in the names with the exception of El, which must probably be interpreted in this context as a neutral name for “god.” Yahweh’s hegemonic position is corroborated by the epistolary correspondence, which repeatedly and exclusively invokes the god of Israel by his name in address and blessing formulas. Scholars have emphasized the complete absence of the god Baʿal in the documentation, in contrast with the ostraca from Samaria dating to the eighth century in which Baʿalist names are almost as numerous as Yahwistic ones (Lemaire 1977: 226–27). A comparative and statistical study of the ostraca from various levels at Arad has also revealed a progressive increase in the percentage of Yahwistic names. Given the overall small number of texts we have, the worth of these statistical analyses can be disputed, but nevertheless it still indicates that by the end of the monarchy Yahweh had established an exclusive position in theophoric name giving. This is also entirely consonant with our main biblical source for the closing years of the monarchy, the book of Jeremiah. Here also, most of the names of Judeans who appear in the book are theophoric names with the element Yahweh (Lundbom 1999: 876–81). No other divine name except El 7.  See the remarks by Cohen 1976–77. The abandonment of Yahwistic names during the Hellenistic period is probably related to the gradual disappearance of the name of Yahweh and the prohibition of pronouncing the Tetragrammaton; see Lemaire 2007: 127–34.

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is attested. The only pending question is the representativeness of our sources. Do they really provide an overall sample of the population of Judah or only of certain classes of society? D. Edelman has argued that “the preponderance of the use of Yahweh as the theophoric element to date merely indicates that the worship of Yahweh was particularly strong among the upper class of the state at the end of the monarchy. . . . The individuals who appear in these inscriptions tend to be associated with the military, the civil administration, or with the cult, the spheres of influence especially considered the domain of the head of a national pantheon” (Edelman 1996: 19). While this is a sobering reminder of the limitations of our sources, the predominance of Yahwistic names, even within that restricted class of people, is still striking. One can legitimately presume that it reflects the success of the movement toward the exclusive worship of Yahweh among the ruling classes and their dependents. Whether the entire population of Judah followed the same onomastic trends is a question that cannot at present be answered. 8

Judean Exiles in Babylonia After the conquest of the Kingdom of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar sent many Judeans into exile in Babylonia. Cuneiform sources refer to those Judeans by the term Yahudayû, while they use the name Yahudu (or Yakudu), sometimes preceded by the cuneiform determinative for countries (kur), to identify the Kingdom of Judah (Zadok 1985: 186). The entry for the Babylonian Chronicle for the year 597 mentions the first capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and refers to the city as āl Yahudu, “the city of Judah” (uru ia-a-hu-du; Zadok 1985: 6; and Glassner 2004: 230). This is also the name given to a settlement of Judean exiles in southern Babylonia. This indicates that the Babylonians perceived the Judeans as an identifiable group of people, although they may not have clearly differentiated between Judah as territorial state and Jerusalem as capital of that state. For them, the Judeans came basically from Jerusalem, “the city of Judah,” and its hinterland. Up to a few years ago, extrabiblical evidence for Judeans exiles in Babylonia came from one tablet found in the storeroom of the royal palace in Babylon datable to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II, and from the archive of the Murašû business family at Nippur dating to the last quarter of the fifth century. 9 Now, however, we have a group of nearly 8.  A recent survey of the question is Hess 2007. 9.  The text from the reign of Nebuchadnezzar was published by Weidner (1939) and mentions Yehoiachin, the captive king of Judah, and members of his family and retinue. A brief study of the archive of the palace of Nebuchadnezzar can be found in Pedersén 2005b and a general description of the texts in Pedersén 2005a: 111–27

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100 cuneiform texts that provide us with substantial information on communities of Judean deportees. 10 The majority of them were drafted in the town of Yahudu (āl Yahudu) in the vicinity of Nippur and date to the sixth and fifth centuries. When we approach the Babylonian documentation, one major difficulty arises: who is a Judean? The Babylonian ethnicon Yahudayû is attested a few times to designate the Judean community or one of its members, but not systematically. 11 Even if it were, problems would still arise. Ethnicons affixed to individual names in the ancient world are often problematic. Use of the terms Judean and Aramean at Elephantine seems sometimes arbitrary, and there is solid evidence from Mesopotamia, as early as the third millennium b.c.e., that ethnicons do not always correspond to the language of personal names or to the assumed ethnic affiliation of individuals. This kind of apparent inconsistency poses evident problems to historians in their effort to define identity. It is questionable whether ancient scribes, whose points of view dominate our sources, accurately perceived the components of any given identity. In our case, this does not apply only to their use of the term Judean. The Babylonian scribes who wrote the Yahudu documents and the transactions of the Murašûs also did not always understand the nature of the theophoric element “Yahweh” in personal names. Babylonian scribes of the first millennium b.c.e. always prefixed theonyms occurring in personal names with a special cuneiform sign that functions as determinative. Some scribes, however, regularly omitted that determinative before the element Yahweh, suggesting their lack of awareness of the theophoric nature of those Judean names. 12 Even as we consider the documentation from the town of Yahudu, we cannot assume that all individuals appearing in the transactions were Judean exiles or their descendants. Therefore, the linguistic and theological content of anthroponyms remains in most cases the sole potential indicator of ethnic affiliation. This would not pose a problem (Archive N1). The main general study of the Murašû archive is by Stolper (1985). Several studies have been devoted to Judean personal names appearing in these documents as well as in other archives from Babylonia, e.g., Stolper 1976, Coogan 1976, and especially Zadok 1977, 1979a, 1979b, and 1984. 10. The texts are currently being prepared for publication by L. Pearce and C. Wunsch. A few texts from this archive as well as preliminary studies have appeared in Abraham 2005–6 and 2007, Joannès and Lemaire 1999, Lambert 2007, and Pearce 2006. 11.  Zadok 1979a: 38; 1985: 186, s.v. Jahūdu; and the discussion by Laurie Pearce in the present volume, pp. 267–277. 12.  This is especially the case when the theophoric element “Yahweh” is in final position and written with the sequence ia-a-ma (= Yaw or Yawo).

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if all Judeans bore easily identifiable Hebrew names. But a significant number of Judeans in the Babylonian Diaspora adopted Babylonian names as well as West Semitic names that are not Hebrew. Therefore, the boundaries between Judeans and their neighbors remain altogether not clear, which makes it extremely difficult to compile statistics of name typology. Luckily, most individuals appearing in the late Babylonian documentation are identified with the name of their fathers and, in several cases, with their grandfathers or ancestors as well. Sometimes, only one name in a given lineage can be identified as Hebrew on a linguistic or theological basis, allowing us to trace additional families of Judeans in our documentation. But it is important to realize that a number of individuals of Judean origin cannot be identified at all because they adopted the onomastics of their new country completely. Therefore, the situation is quite confused compared with late monarchical Judah, where all individuals appearing in our sources can be assumed to be Judeans. A detailed study of patterns of name giving among Judean exiles and their descendants must await the full publication of the Yahudu corpus. According to the preliminary study by L. Pearce published recently (Pearce 2006), of the 500 names appearing in the Yahudu and Bīt-Našar corpus, half are Babylonian and one-quarter are West Semitic. Yahwistic names, about 80 in total, make up two-thirds of the West Semitic names and about 15% of all names. When individuals are counted, the proportion of Yahwistic names increases from about 15% to about 20% in the overall corpus. Among approximately 600 individuals that can be identified, about 120 bear Yahwistic names, the largest concentration of them occurring, as expected, in the town of Yahudu. If we assume that all Judeans in the corpus bear West Semitic names, it would mean that the majority of them had Yahwistic names. However, this cannot be ascertained. A number of families have mixed names. Of 300 name pairs (father and son) in which the linguistic origin of both names is known, about 150 pairs are two Babylonian names, about 70 pairs are two West Semitic names, and 55 pairs are one Babylonian and one West Semitic name, which can be further subdivided into 35 pairs with West Semitic fathers and Babylonian sons and 20 pairs with Babylonian fathers and West Semitic sons. Study of the Judeans appearing in the Murašû archive of Nippur reveals similar patterns. Zadok has estimated the proportion of Yahwistic names among the some 70 identifiable Judeans of Nippur at about half of the names (Zadok 1979a: 78–80). But Coogan and more recently Fowler have pointed out how difficult, if not impossible, it is to tell apart Judeans from other individuals in the Murašû archive, especially from other Western Semites (Coogan

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1976: 121; Fowler 1988: 319–25). Indeed, Judeans were concentrated not so much in Nippur itself as in settlements that had been founded by other deportees from Syria and Palestine, notably Phoenicians from Tyre and Philistines from Ashkelon (Zadok 1979a: 53). Here also we find many cases of families with mixed names, a substantial number of them made up of sons with Yahwistic names and fathers with Babylonian ones, some of them theophoric names honoring Babylonian deities such as Bēl and Šamaš. One important factor caused a blurring of distinctions between Judean exiles and their Babylonian or West Semitic neighbors. This factor was the expansion of the Aramaic linguistic and cultural koine (Beaulieu 2006). Late Babylonian, the Akkadian language of the cuneiform documents dated to the Persian period, was almost certainly a grapholect, a language that had ceased to be spoken but continued to be used in writing, especially in the administration of temples and in the business archives of prominent urban families. Aramaic had become the vernacular language of Babylonia and was certainly used in writing extensively, although all the documentation in Aramaic has disappeared because it was written on perishable support. Hebrew underwent a parallel development both in Palestine and in the Diaspora (Schniedewind 2006). We should assume that after one or two generations Judean exiles in Babylon adopted Aramaic as their vernacular and even cultural language. In the end, Babylonians, exile Judeans and the other Western Semites of Babylonia came to share a common language and culture, but one in which Babylonian elements still remained very influential. This can be seen in the adoption of a number of Babylonian deities in the Aramaic onomasticon, notably Nabû, Nanaya, Bēl, and Šamaš. Babylonian culture remained predominant in its homeland largely because the urban elites of Babylonia successfully preserved their cultural and economic power, notably by their tight control of the temples and their holdings and also by their preservation of traditional cuneiform learning. The onomasticon of these urban elites is remarkably conservative. In spite of the increased Aramaicization of the country, traditional Babylonian names continued to thrive, maintained by the scribal curriculum that included copying lists of personal names as part of the basic training of students (Gesche 2000: 81–102). Many examples of these lists dating to the sixth century were found in the temple of Nabû-ša-ḫarê in Babylon in the 1970s (Cavigneaux 1981: 125–33). In light of parallels such as these, how should we interpret patterns of name giving among the Judean exiles and their descendants? In texts from the end of the Davidic monarchy, the hegemonic position of Yah-

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wistic names, at least in the official classes, must be explained in light of both a state-sponsored theological program centered on the exclusive worship of Yahweh and the general pressure imposed on the population to conform to the god that symbolizes the power of the monarch, a principle not all that different from the dictum cuius regio eius religio established in Germany by the Peace of Augsburg in 1555. Among the exiles, however, there is too much variation and cross-cultural fermentation to sustain the same interpretation. Judean state institutions have disappeared. True, we still have a large number of Yahwistic names, but their proportion is difficult to ascertain. If we ascribe a theological meaning to the maintenance of Yahwistic names during the exile, then we must apply the same reasoning to Judeans who adopted Babylonian and West Semitic names with theophoric elements honoring Mesopotamian deities such as Bēl, Marduk, Nabû, Nanaya, Sîn, Šamaš, and so on, even within families in which other members bore Yahwistic names. Were these people truly less Yahwistic than others? Did they worship Marduk, Nanaya, and other Babylonian deities alongside Yahweh? Or, more likely, did they just adopt fashionable names of their new homeland, names that sounded right and gave them the impression of participating more fully in the ambiant culture and society? The situation in Babylonia was similar to the one at Elephantine, where the onomastic diversity was even greater, possibly because the community originated in a period prior to the consolidation of Yahwistic monotheism. 13 In this context, the persistence of Yahwistic names among exiles in Babylonia should most likely be interpreted as attachment to a traditional onomastic repertory. Traditional names were transmitted within families or perhaps even by scribes, as in Babylonia. They may have become, in some cases, strictly indexical utterances with no religious or cultural referent, although we cannot exclude that they also represented for some dispersed Judeans a means of asserting their ethnic origin and cultural identity. Of course, it may be difficult to separate cultural identity from religion, especially in view of the strong identification with the god Yahweh felt by a number of Judeans. It seems in fact that some families of exiles maintained a particularly strong tradition of Yahwistic name giving (Zadok 1979a: 54). Is it possible that some of these families were responsible for maintaining a cult or some form of worship of Yahweh among their brethren? True, in contrast to the situation at Elephantine in Egypt, there is as yet no conclusive literary, epigraphic, or archaeological evidence for the existence of a build13.  Names from Elephantine are analyzed notably by Silverman (1969, 1970) and Grelot (1972: 455–502).

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ing that can be associated with the cult of Yahweh in Babylonia. 14 But one parallel case from Babylonia seems quite suggestive of what might have been the situation of particularly zealous Judean Yahwists in exile: this is the case of the cult of the Assyrian god Aššur at Uruk.

Worshiping a Foreign God in Babylonia: The Case of Aššur Several cuneiform texts from the southern Babylonian city of Uruk dated to the Neo-Babylonian and early Persian eras, roughly between 605 and 520, mention the existence in that city of a Temple of Aššur, the patron god of Assyria. One document from that group (UCP 9/2, 57; Appendix 1) contains a list of cultic officials and dependents of that temple. Half of the individuals whose names are fully preserved bear theophoric names honoring the god Aššur. Even more revealing is the fact that at least two names in the list, Pāni-Aššur-lāmur and PāniBēl-lāmur, display Assyrian linguistic forms, not Babylonian ones. The document even refers to all or some of these individuals as “natives of the city of Assur,” the old Assyrian capital and religious center of the defunct empire. The god Aššur was not at home in Babylonia. However, there is some evidence suggesting that the cult of Aššur was transplanted to Uruk during the last period of Assyrian ascendancy in the seventh century, possibly at the instigation of a local pro-Assyrian faction (Beaulieu 1997). When the Assyrian empire collapsed at the end of the seventh century, the city of Assur suffered extensive devastation, and the Temple of Aššur was destroyed and subsequently abandoned for a long period, just like the Temple of Yahweh in Jerusalem. The Temple of Aššur at Uruk may have become a place of refuge for clerics of the god fleeing their homeland, reinforcing the Assyrian presence in the city. This documentation from Uruk seems quite relevant to the study of Judean exiles. It shows that a cult deprived of state sponsorship in its original homeland could survive in Babylonia, which was, even for Assyrians, an alien environment. The cult of Aššur at Uruk was maintained by a group of native Assyrians who proclaimed their identity and attachment to their god partly through the preservation of an Aššur-centered theophoric onomasticon. Likewise, some clusters of 14. See Lemaire 2007: 114 for evidence for temples of Yhwh during the Persian period. Temples are mentioned at Jerusalem, Samaria, Elephantine, and Idumea; for the latter, probably located in Khirbet el-Qom/Makkedah, see Lemaire 2006: 416– 17. There is no firm evidence for a temple in Babylonia except perhaps an oblique allusion in Ezek 11:16, where Yahweh says that he will be a sanctuary to his people in exile for a little while, but this need not refer to an actual temple.

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Yahwistic names, particularly when they are concentrated within the same families, could be interpreted as potential evidence for a parallel phenomenon among Judeans with the cult of Yahweh. In these cases, bearing a Yahwistic name would have carried special theological significance. This, however, cannot be extended to the entire Judean population. As I have argued already, personal names do not normally possess such symbolic resonance. Of course, the exilic literature shows a concerted effort to maintain and even reinforce Yahwism. But the name patterns of the exile population does not provide clear evidence as to a systematic success of this effort. There is only one place where we see it quite clearly reflected, and this is in the lists of names preserved in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah.

Return from Exile The books of Ezra and Nehemiah together contain the majority of biblical personal names. The two books contain several lists recording names of Judeans residing in the land of Yehud or allegedly returning to that province after the Persian takeover of Babylon. The authenticity of these lists has often been disputed, and some of them were probably created or doctored to advance theological views and bolster claims to entitlements. A couple of lists, however, may contain relatively faithful versions of archival documents. Thus, the list of builders of the wall of Jerusalem in Nehemiah 3 is generally deemed authentic. Yet for our purpose, even the lists that were manipulated are important, because they provide us with the idealized view of name giving among the groups that produced them. The overall onomastics of the lists are Hebrew and do not contain recognizable theophoric names that are not Yahwistic, with the exception of the element “El.” The proportion of Yahwistic names differs greatly in each list. Yahwistic names are remarkably few, less than 20%, among population groups such as the nethinim and the sons of the slaves of Solomon. But, not surprisingly, they are particularly numerous in the lists of priests and Levites, where they make up as much as 75% of the names in some lists (Weinberg 1992: 80–83). Similar proportions are found only in the sources from Judah dating from the closing decades of the monarchy. These data stand in sharp contrast with the epigraphic material found in other areas of Palestine and dating from the end of the Persian era. The papyri from Wadi ed-Daliyeh in Samaria include theophoric names not only with Yahweh and Baʿal but also with the Edomite god Qos, the Syrian god Sahar, and the Babylonian gods Nabu, Sîn, Šamaš, and many others (Dušek 2007: 486–95). The onomastics of the ostraca from Idumea are even more diverse, which is understandable given that they lay outside

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the core of the ancient Israelite world (Lemaire 2006: 416–17; Kloner and Stern 2007: 142–43). Our sources are still limited, but one pattern emerges. The Judean onomasticon is linguistically and theologically homogeneous, with exclusive dominance of Yahweh in theophoric names, only in contexts in which everyone is integrated within a structure that dictates a strict theological plan. This happens, as far as I can see, in the last decades of the Kingdom of Judah, and probably only among the classes that are directly dependent on the state and cult apparatus. It happens again later among the same classes of people in fifth-century Yehud, at least insofar as we rely on the lists in Ezra and Nehemiah. We must now ask whether Israel is unique in its monotheizing onomasticon. Is this phenomenon of one god’s becoming the exclusive focus of devotion in personal names limited to Judah and to the Persian province of Yehud, and is it contingent on the strict monotheism of the late Kingdom of Judah and the exilic period? Analysis of contemporary sources reveals a striking parallel in late Babylonian onomastics, once again in the city of Uruk.

Hegemonic Theophoric Onomasticon: The Case of Late Babylonian Uruk Late Babylonian Uruk experienced nothing less than a theological reform. In the fifth century, the pantheon of the city was thoroughly reorganized under the aegis of the god Anu, and two large temples were eventually built to house the new divine patrons of the city. A large number of texts of all kinds dating between the fifth and second centuries provide us with many details of this new phase and local variant of Babylonian religion (Beaulieu 1992). The god Anu was the sky-god of ancient Mesopotamia, and this yields a possible clue as to the reason behind his sudden rise: Persian authorities may have favored local forms of worship that were consonant with the official religion of the Achaemenid rulers. 15 Indeed, the same reason has been advanced to explain the support given to the restoration of the temple in Jerusalem, Yahweh being presented to Persian officials as a God of Heaven, similar if not identical with the imperial god Ahura-Mazda (Lemaire 2007: 111–13). The same reasoning could apply to the god Anu. Within 15.  Other factors may have contributed to the change. Kessler (2004) has argued that the departure of families originating from Babylon may have reinforced the movement toward a new theology more centered on the gods of Uruk. The departure of these families is probably linked to the failure of the Babylonian revolts against Xerxes in 484 b.c.e. and the wave of repression that followed (Waerzeggers 2003–4).

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the space of one generation in the middle of the fifth century, the urban elites of Uruk decided to promote allegiance to that god. And soon, this found a reflection in the onomasticon of the population. By the last quarter of the fifth century, personal names at Uruk underwent a complete revolution. The vast majority of personal names are theophoric, and the overwhelming majority of those names, more than 90% in some documents, honor the god Anu. The text quoted in appendix 2 (pp. 260–261) illustrates this point. It consists of a list of workmen and members of the temple assembly of Uruk, the main governing body of the city and temple community. Individuals appear either only with the names of their fathers or with the names of both father and grandfather. The list includes 68 names, of which 57 are theophoric names with Anu, 6 are nontheophoric, and 5 are theophoric names honoring 3 goddesses: 3 names with Nanaya, one with Ishtar, and one with Gula. Nanaya and Ishtar belonged to the close circle of Anu. In sum, about 85% of the individuals listed bear Anu theophoric names. And this text is not unique; it typically reflects the onomastics of Uruk in the Late Persian and early Hellenistic periods. 16 Hegemonic position such as this of one god in name giving is not only unparalleled in the entire cuneiform record, but it equals and even surpasses in intensity the most compact clusters of Yahwistic names known to date. From the theological point of view, this seems all the more extraordinary because we are not even dealing with a form of monotheism. At least 14 major deities resided in the two main temples of Uruk, with an organized cult and offering system. None of the many religious and scholarly texts from Uruk hints at monotheism. At most, can we talk about henotheism, with a strong monolatric tendency in personal names. The value of this documentation for comparative studies is selfevident. But we must not extend the conclusions gained from this documentation to the entire population of Uruk. The texts we have concern a restricted class of individuals who controlled the city administration and the temples and the people who were completely dependent on them. This is a stratum of the population that strove to maintain a Babylonian identity, free of the interference of other cultures, in a world that was growing increasingly diverse in language, religion, and customs. Beyond that community, a great diversity of naming practices certainly prevailed in Uruk and its region. However, this is not documented by cuneiform tablets, which are the only texts that survive. But inside that 16.  This can be gauged from a look at the indexes of personal names in some recent editions of cuneiform texts from Hellenistic Uruk, e.g., Corò 2005, Wallenfels 1998, and Weisberg 1991.

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community, the cultural bond between the members, a bond sanctified by religion, indeed, a religion that truly tied members of society together, that bond was expressed by a nearly exclusive onomastic allegiance to the god Anu. The nucleus of the civic and temple community of Uruk provides the closest parallel, in terms of name-giving practices, to the official and priestly classes of late monarchical Judah and restoration Yehud. And this parallel certainly merits closer study in the future, because it could refine our understanding of how the exclusive bond between Yahweh and his people became redefined and strengthened to provide a new beacon of Judean identity during the Persian era.

Conclusions The study of personal names as markers of identity raises complex issues. Biblical texts remain the main source of our knowledge for the history of ancient Israel, but these texts were inspired mostly by theologians and visionaries and do not reflect all the complexities of daily life and of the elaboration of personal or collective identity. The identity they privilege centers on the worship of Yahweh. Modern scholars have endeavored to relate extrabiblical finds in the realm of archaeology and epigraphy to biblical narratives. Thus, epigraphic sources confirm the predominantly Yahwistic character of the onomastics of late monarchical Judah and the absence of theophoric names honoring other deities. We just do not know how deep in the Judean population these patterns of name giving had penetrated by the time of the exile. The term Yahwism (or Yahwisms) is used to refer to this religious identity. The term is convenient because it reflects a transitional stage between the early forms of Israelite religion and Judaism. However, it relies too exclusively on the theologizing of the intellectual classes. Indeed, it seems dubious whether the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Judah defined themselves primarily as Yahwists, exclusive worshipers of Yahweh. As expected, Babylonian sources do not mention “Yahwists” or “Yahwism,” and cuneiform scribes sometimes did not even perceive Yahwistic names as theophoric. However, they knew of Jerusalem as “the city of Judah,” of the people deported from there as “Judeans,” even if they used the term sparsely, and of their main place of settlement in Babylonia as āl Yahudu. There is little doubt that the people stemming from the Kingdom of Judah, before and after the Exile, identified themselves primarily as “Judeans.” The Judean onomastics from Babylonia and other places of exile did not develop in the context of a hegemonic cult of Yahweh, and this is naturally reflected in its diversity, especially compared with that of seventh-century Judah. Among exilic communities, worship of Yahweh constituted the focus of iden-

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tity probably only for a minority. This, of course, does not mean that the cult of Yahweh lost its importance. It only means that “Yahwism” did not constitute the main referent of identity. Being a Judean did, and one could be a Judean without bearing a Yahwistic name or a Hebrew name at all, and probably even without being an exclusive worshiper of Yahweh. Judean and Yahwistic identities became more coextensive only after the creation of a theocratic state in Yehud. Jerusalem was a very small center during the Persian period (Schniedewind 2004) and restoration of the cult of Yahweh there was probably engineered by few leading families. A parallel phenomenon occurred at the same time in the Babylonian city of Uruk, also under the leadership of a small compact of families. This phenomenon did not entail monotheism, although the overwhelming majority of individuals dependent on the new civic structure that emerged in the fifth century bear Anu names, while the religious literature produced at Uruk places more emphasis on the god Anu. Should we speak of “Anu-ism” in this case? Hardly, because being an “Urukean” (Urkayû) remained the foremost referent of identity, as it had always been throughout the history of Babylonia, irrespective of political, cultural, and theological transformations. In the colophons of literary and scientific texts, scribes always refer to themselves by the sole term Urukean. 17 Allegiance to Anu, expressed mainly in the onomasticon, constituted only one way of proclaiming that identity. Similarly, the Judeans retained the same referent of identity throughout the monarchical, Persian, and Hellenistic eras, that is to say, being a Yehudi, a term that remained the same in Hebrew even if modern scholarly parlance speaks of “Judean,” “Judahite,” “Jew,” and “Jewish” to reflect various historical periods in the history of ancient Israel and the Jewish people. One could express that identity with a Yahwistic name, but the Judean identity was not contingent on a specific onomasticon. And indeed, the demise of Yahwistic names during the Hellenistic period did not alter this identity, which became only more focused on ancestry, lineage, and history, hence the rise in the popularity of patriarchal names in that era. In the final analysis, to evaluate the significance of Yahwistic names, we must look at each specific situation. In some contexts, the names seem purely indexical; in others, they could be symbols of Judean identity and adherence to a cultural tradition, but without necessarily subscribing to a particular theological agenda. Compact clusters of Yahwistic names among exilic communities could reveal the presence of committed Yah17.  This can be appraised from the numerous colophons from Uruk edited by Hunger (1968: 37–49).

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wists, even clerics and priests responsible for maintaining a cult in exile, but not necessarily so. Finally, hegemonic Yahwistic name giving occurs only in specific historical circumstances, when the theological outlook of religious elites that dominates the biblical corpus is enforced politically over the entire society.

Appendix 1 Text UCP 9/2, 57, edited and discussed in Beaulieu 1997: 59–60; and 2003: 331–32. Provenance: Uruk, archive of Eanna, the Temple of the goddess Ištar, sixth century b.c.e.   1.  [o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o ]   2.  the king, x x x [o o o o o o o o o o o o]  3. Aplâ, son of [o o o o o o o o o o o o o]  4. Šumiya, son of [o o o o] before Na[naya? o o o]   5.  the brewer[s of the temple of Aš]šur; Aḫu-lūmur, son of Ina-qībi-[o o o],   6.  son of Aššur-zēru-ibni; [o o]-šumi, son of Abu-[o o o];  7. Rēmanni-Aššur, son of Mannu-akî-bīt-Aššur, Iddin-[o o o];  8. Pānī-Aššur-lāmur; Rībi-Aššur; these are the butchers [o o o];  9. Aššur-dayān, the overseer of Aššur; Aššur-aplu-iddin [o o o]; 10.  Mušallim-Aššur; these are the rab-banî of the temple of Aššur [o o o]; 11.  the potter; Balāṭu and Marduk, sons of Na-[o o o]; 12. Aššur-uballiṭ and Nādin, sons of Nabû-zēr-ēdi-ibni [o o o]; 13. Aššur-erība, son of Marduk-mudammiq; Iddiya, son of Pānī-[o o o]; 14.  son of Gula-šum-ibni; these are the rab-banî of Aš[šur who, on the estates    of Aššur,] 15.  live; Pānī-Bēl-lāmur, son of Guriya; Bēl-[o o o]; 16.  the natives of the city Assur; the merchants of [o o o]; 17.  [o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o]

Appendix 2 Text MLC 1853; published in Beaulieu 1989: 76–77. List of workmen and members of the temple assembly. Provenance: Uruk, Temple of Anu (Rēš temple), late fourth or third century b.c.e.   1.  The workmen and member of the temple assembly . . . . . .  2. Lābâši, son of Anu-aḫḫē-iddin;   3.  Kidin-Anu, son of Anu-aḫu-ittannu, grandson of Kidin-Anu;   4.  Illut-Anu, son of Sumuttu-Anu;  5. Ina-qibīt-Anu, son of Kidin-Anu;  6. Ina-qibīt-Anu, son of Anu-uballiṭ, grandson of Tanit[tu-Anu];   7.  Nanaya-iddin, son of Anu-erība;   8.  Anu-ittannu, son of Dumqi-Anu;  9. Anu-uballiṭ, son of Kidin-Anu, grandson of Anu-uballiṭ; 10.  Arad-Gula, the fisherman;

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11. Anu-abu-utēr, son of Anu-ikṣur, grandson of Šul[lumu]; 12. Anu-uballiṭ, son of Sumuttu-Anu, grandson of Rabi-[Anu]; 13. Riḫat-Ištar, son of Sumuttu-Anu; 14.  Idat-Anu, son of Lāqīpu; 15. Ina-qibīt-Anu, son of Anu-balāssu-iqbi; 16. Uṣuršu-Anu, son of Anu-aḫu-ittannu; 17.  Illut-Anu, son of Riḫat-Anu; 18. Anu-aḫu-ittannu, son of Ina-qibīt-Anu; 19.  Idat-Anu, son of [Illu]t-Anu; 20. Riḫat-Anu, son of [o o o]-Anu; 21.  Nanaya-iddin son of Anu-aḫḫē-iddin, grandson of Nidintu-Anu; 22.  Idat-Anu, son of Šullumu; 23.  Idat-Anu, son of Anu-mukīn-apli; 24.  Idat-Anu, son of Sumuttu-Anu; 25.  Nidintu-Anu, son of Anu-uballissu; 26.  Anu-ittannu, son of Nanaya-iddin, grandson of Anu-abu-utēr; 27. Ana-rabûti-Anu, son of Anu-aḫu-ittannu; 28.  Illut-Anu, son of Anu-abu-utēr; 29. Anu-zēru-iddin, son of Illut-Anu; 30. Mušēzib-Anu, son of Anu-balāssu-iqbi; 31.  Tattannu, son of Ardiya; 32.  Tanittu-Anu, son of Anu-uballiṭ.

Bibliography Abraham, K. 2005–6 West Semitic and Judean Brides in Cuneiform Sources from the Sixth Century bce: New Evidence from a Marriage Contract from Al-Yahudu. Archiv für Orientforschung 51: 198–219. 2007 An Inheritance Division among Judeans in Babylonia from the Early Persian Period. Pp. 206–21 in New Seals and Inscriptions, Hebrew, Idumean and Cuneiform, ed. M. Lubetski. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Avigad, N. 1976 Bullae and Seals from a Post-exilic Judean Archive. Qedem 4. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology–Hebrew University. 1986 Hebrew Bullae from the Time of Jeremiah: Remnants of a Burnt Archive. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Avigad, N., and Sass, B. 1997 Corpus of West Semitic Stamp Seals. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Baker H. D., and Radner, K. 1998–2002  The Prosopography of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. 5 vols. Helsinki: State Archives of Assyria.

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Beaulieu, P.-A. 1989 Textes administratifs inédits d’époque hellénistique provenant des archives du Bīt Rēš. Revue d’assyriologie et d’archéologie orientale 83: 53–87. 1992 Antiquarian Theology in Seleucid Uruk. Acta Sumerologica 14: 47–75. 1997 The Cult of an.šár/Aššur in Babylonia after the Fall of the Assyrian Empire. State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 11: 55–73. 2003 The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Cuneiform Monographs 23. Leiden: Brill. 2006 Official and Vernacular Languages: The Shifting Sands of Imperial and Cultural Identities in First Millennium bc Mesopotamia. Pp. 185–215 in Margins of Writing, Origins of Cultures, ed. S. Sanders. Oriental Institute Seminars 2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Callaway, R. 1999 The Name Game: Onomastic Evidence and Archaeological Reflections in Late Judah. Jian Dao 2: 15–36. Cavigneaux, A. 1981 Textes scolaires du temple de Nabû ša Ḫarê I. Texts from Babylon. Baghdad: State Organization of Antiquities and Heritage. Corò, P. 2005 Prebende Templari in Età Seleucide. Padua: S.A.R.G.O.N. Editrice e Libreria. Cohen, N. 1976–77 Jewish Names as Cultural Indicators in Antiquity. Journal for the Study of Judaism 7: 97–128. Cohen, S. J. D. 1990 Religion, Ethnicity, and Hellenism in the Emergence of Jewish Identity in Maccabean Palestine. Pp. 204–23 in Religion and Religious Practice in the Seleucid Kingdom, ed. P. Bilde et al. Studies in Hellenistic Civilization 1. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press. Coogan, M. D. 1976 West Semitic Personal Names in the Murašû Documents. HSM 7. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press. Dušek, J. 2007 Les manuscrits araméens du Wadi Daliyeh et la Samarie vers 450–332 av. J.-C. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 30. Leiden: Brill. Edelman, D. V., ed. 1996 The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Fowler, J. D. 1988 Theophoric Personal Names in Ancient Hebrew: A Comparative Study. JSOTSup 49. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Gardiner, A. H. 1957 The Theory of Proper Names. London: Oxford University Press.

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Gesche, P. 2000 Schulunterricht in Babylonien im ersten Jahrtausend v. Chr. AOAT 275. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Glassner, J,-J. 2004 Mesopotamian Chronicles. Writings from the Ancient World 19. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Gray, G. B. 1896 Studies in Hebrew Proper Names. London: Black. Grelot, P. 1972 Documents araméens d’Egypte. Paris: du Cerf. Hamilton, M. W. 1995 Who Was a Jew? Jewish Ethnicity during the Achaemenid Period. Restoration Quarterly 37: 102–17. Hess, R. 2007 Aspects of Israelite Personal Names and Pre-exilic Israelite Religion. Pp. 301–13 in New Seals and Inscriptions: Hebrew, Idumean and Cuneiform, ed. M. Lubetski. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Hölscher, M. 1996 Die Personennamen der kassitenzeitlichen Texte aus Nippur. IMGULA 1. Münster: Rhema-Verlag. Hunger, H. 1968 Assyrische und Babylonische Kolophone. AOAT 2. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Joannès, F., and Lemaire, A. 1999 Trois tablettes cunéiformes à onomastique ouest-sémitique. Transeuphratène 17: 17–33. Jursa, M. 2005 Neo-Babylonian Legal and Administrative Documents. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Kessler, K. 2004 Urukäische Familien versus babylonische Familien. Altorientalische Forschungen 31: 237–62. Kloner, A., and Stern, I. 2007 Idumea in the Late Persian Period (fourth century b.c.e.). Pp. 139–44 in Judah and the Judeans in the 4th Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Kornfeld, W. 1979 Zur althebräischen Anthroponomastik ausserhalb der Bibel. WZKM 71: 39–48. Lambert, W. G. 2007 A Document from a Community of Exiles in Babylonia. Pp. 201–5 in New Seals and Inscriptions, Hebrew, Idumean and Cuneiform, ed. M. Lubetski. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Lemaire, A. 1977 Inscriptions hébraïques, vol. 1: Les Ostraca. Littératures anciennes du Proche-Orient 9. Paris: du Cerf.

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2006 New Aramaic Ostraca from Idumea and Their Historical Interpretation. Pp. 413–56 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2007 The Birth of Monotheism: The Rise and Disappearance of Yahwism. Washington, DC: Biblical Archaeology Society. Lubetski, M., ed. 2007 New Seals and Inscriptions: Hebrew, Idumean and Cuneiform. Hebrew Bible Monographs 8. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Lundbom, J. R. 1999 Jeremiah 1–20: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 21A. New York: Doubleday. Michalowski, P. 1987 Charisma and Control: On Continuity and Change in Early Mesopotamian Bureaucratic Systems. Pp. 55–68 in The Organization of Power: Aspects of Bureaucracy in the Ancient Near East, ed. R. D. Biggs and M. Gibson. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Noth, M. 1966 Die israelitischen Personnennamen im Rahmen der gemeinsemitischen Namengebung. Hildesheim: Olms. Oded, B. 2000 The Settlements of the Israelite and Judean Exiles in Mesopotamia in the 8th–6th Centuries bce. Pp. 91–103 in Studies in Historical Geography and Biblical Historiography, ed. G. Galil and M. Weinfeld. Leiden: Brill. Pearce, L. E. 2006 New Evidence for Judeans in Babylonia. Pp. 399–411 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Pedersén, O. 2005a Archive und Bibliotheken in Babylon: Die Tontafeln der Grabung Robert Koldeweys 1899–1917. Berlin: Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft. 2005b Foreign Professionals in Babylon: Evidence from the Archives in the Palace of Nebuchadnezzar II. Pp. 267–72 in Ethnicity in Ancient Mesopotamia: Papers Read at the 48th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Leiden, 1–4 July 2002, ed. W. H. van Soldt, R. Kalvelagen, and D. Katz. PIHANS 102. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Pike, D. 1992 Names, Theophoric. Pp. 1018–19 in vol. 4 of Anchor Bible Dictionary, ed. D. N. Freedman. New York: Doubleday. Schniedewind, W. M. 2004 How the Bible Became a Book. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2006 Aramaic, the Death of Written Hebrew, and Language Shift in the Persian Period. Pp. 141–51 in Margins of Writing, Origins of Cultures, ed. S. Sanders. Oriental Institute Seminars 2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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1979b Sources for the History of the Jews in Babylonia during the Chaldean and Achaemenian Periods with an Appendix on West Semitic Names in 1stMillennium Mesopotamia. Jerusalem: Academon. 1984 Some Jews in Babylonian Documents. Jewish Quarterly Review 74: 294–97. 1985 Geographical Names according to New and Late Babylonian Texts. Répertoire géographique des textes cunéiformes 8. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Zevit, Z. 1983 A Chapter in the History of Israelite Personal Names. BASOR 250: 1–16.

“Judean”: A Special Status in Neo-Babylonian and Achemenid Babylonia? Laurie E. Pearce

University of California, Berkeley

The national narrative of the biblical account and Jewish historical tradition privilege the exiled Judeans as a distinctive and unfortunate group. In historical and prophetic passages, the Bible records the inglorious end of the Judahite kingdom, makes explicit its destruction and devastation, identifies royals who suffered at the hands of the Babylonians, enumerates individuals carried off, and details the plunder of the temple treasury. The prominence and gravity of this event in the Judean experience raise this question: what was the Babylonian perspective on the Judeans’ status? The purpose of this brief essay is to identify textual evidence that will frame an answer to the question “Was ‘Judean’ a special status in Neo-Babylonian and Achemenid Babylonia?” In light of the biblical claim that “mighty men of valor, 10,000 captives and all the craftsmen and the smiths” (2 Kgs 24:12) accompanied Jehoiachin to Babylon or that Jeremiah could account for 3,023 exiles (Jer 52:28), it has been presumed that the lack of evidence of Judeans in the cuneiform record was due to accidents or failures of discovery. If these numbers are to be believed, it would seem improbable that little or no trace of Judeans should be found in the cuneiform record. However, the texts of the Murašû corpus demonstrate that, to the extent that Judeans bore Yahwistic names, they are readily identified in the textual record. The Judean presence in Achemenid Nippur poses important questions: (1) How do modern scholars deal with the lack of textual references to Judeans in the 130-year period from Jehoiachin’s exile in 597 to the earliest texts in the Murašû archive? (2) Is it plausible or probable that these poor farmers were descendants of the urban elite who accompanied Jehoiachin into exile (Ephʿal 1983: 110), or, rather, do their presence at Nippur, at some remove from the capital, Babylon, and their status in the Murašû documentation reflect social and economic changes that occurred in the 130+ years since the first exilic wave? If the biblical suggestion that the deported population of Judah originally was resettled in the immediate urban area of Babylon is accepted, it is 267

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necessary to consider what social, economic, or political forces would account for its migration to and appearance in the Nippur countryside. Although the cuneiform documentation published to date does not offer any indication that a significant number of Judeans were resettled there, eventual publication of the 290 texts from the Babylon 7 archive from Nebuchadnezzar’s southern palace (Jursa 2005: 60; Pedersén 2005) may provide evidence necessary to determine the degree to which Judeans were settled and remained in Babylon or its immediate environs. Other new textual evidence already shows that any perception that the individual and group identity “Judean” was considered an exceptional status in Neo-Babylonian or Achemenid Babylonia must be set aside. Direct evidence of the Judean presence on the Babylonian landscape leads to the conclusion that Judeans bore the same responsibilities as and appeared in roles identical to those of other deportees in the southern Mesopotamian landscape. Further analysis of this evidence will demonstrate that the participation of Judeans in Babylonian economic, legal, and administrative processes and institutions facilitated and reflected their integration into Babylonian society. As historical passages in the biblical text prompt the question at hand, Babylonian historical records may likewise be consulted as the starting point for the present discussion. The Babylonian Chronicles are generally viewed as “impartial” and “reliable” historical sources (Grayson 2000: 23; Glassner 2004: 48), characterized by a straightforward style, as seen in this example from the chronicle of the early years of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign: The seventh year: In the month Kislev, the king of Akkad [Nebuchadnezzar] mustered his army and marched to Ḫattu. He encamped against the city of Judah and on the second day of the month Adar he captured the city (and) seized (its) king. A king of his own choice he appointed in the city (and) taking the vast tribute he brought it into Babylon. (Grayson 2000: 102; cf. Glassner 2004: 231)

This passage, the only explicit mention in the cuneiform record of Nebuchadnezzar’s defeat of Judah, provides no insight into the Babylonian attitude toward this population. The brevity and dispassionate tone are consistent with the chronicles’ treatment of each defeated population and reflect Babylonian preoccupation with the success of a program of imperial conquest rather than with the creation of comprehensive historical narrative. Although the Cyrus Cylinder 1 was once believed to support biblical reports that Cyrus privileged the Jews in his granting them permis1. Accessed December 15, 2009. Online: http://www.livius.org/ct-cz/cyrus_I/ cyrus_cylinder2.html.

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sion to return to Jerusalem and rebuild Yahweh’s Temple, the way that the text frames Cyrus’s activities as a component of his foreign policy program (Kuhrt 1983) eliminates any impression that the Judeans were viewed as having special status in the Achemenid state. Further, in view of the passage that reports that Cyrus restored all populations to their previous abodes together with indications from other sources (including evidence from administrative documents that Cyrus allowed Neirabians to return to Syria; Ephʿal 1978: 84–88) and that, earlier, Babylonians returned from Assyria (van der Spek 1982: 281), it is clear that repatriation to an ancestral home was not a practice exclusively applied to the Judeans, nor was it a component unique to Achemenid policy (Ephʿal 1983: 108). Although the historical documentation fails to provide substantive information on the status of the Judeans under Babylonian or Achemenid rule, monumental, administrative and legal documents present additional information that informs this discussion. The fragmentary Weidner ration lists (Weidner 1939) recording the rations Jehoiachin and his sons received remain the only confirmation in the cuneiform record of the biblical report of Amēl-Marduk’s treatment of Jehoiachin. However, it is difficult to argue that these notices sustain the biblical claim that Jehoiachin’s treatment under AmēlMarduk (2 Kgs 25:30; Jer 52:31–34) was extraordinary. The cuneiform evidence mentioned so far is frustratingly silent with regard to data that permit any assessment of the Babylonian perception of Judean status. However, there is positive evidence for the question at hand in the texts from the Murašû archive, as well as in recent (Joannès and Lemaire 1999; Abraham 2005–6, 2007) and forthcoming (Pearce and Wunsch; Wunsch) publications. These administrative and legal texts preserve details that facilitate a limited but supportable and consistent view of the status of the Judeans from the Babylonian perspective in the Neo-Babylonian and Achemenid periods. At the risk of restating the obvious, the assessment of the Judeans’ status depends first and foremost on their secure identification in the textual record. The data that permit this are (1) the specificity of Yahwistic names to the Judean population (Zadok 1979: 4), and (2) the appearance of gentilics identifying the place of origin of an individual or group. Heretofore, the gentilic “Judean” has appeared only in the Weidner texts in a description of the rations received by eight individuals (lúia-a-hu-da-a-a, Babylon 28178 = VAT 16283 ii 40) and in a list of individuals from foreign lands (lúia-ú-da-a-a, Babylon 28122 rev. 13; lú ia-da-a-a, Babylon 28122 rev. 28). The tablet on which the latter is inscribed is broken in such a way that none of the other attestations of individuals who can be identified as Judeans on the basis of their distinctive names is accompanied by the gentilic (Zadok 1979: 39). The first

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of “Trois tablettes cunéiformes à l’onomastique ouest-sémitique” published by Joannès and Lemaire (1999) was written in a town called ālYāhūdu, demonstrating that Judeans, like other deported populations, were brought to and settled in the Babylonian countryside in a location named for their group or place of origin. 2 Soon-to-be published texts from āl-Yāhūdu preserve the Akkadian gentilic both in the designation of the place in which the Judeans were located (ālu šá lúia-a-hu-du-aa, “town of the Judeans”) and in the formulation of an administrative term that informs the discussion of Judean economic status. The first of the texts written in “the town of the Judeans” dates to Nebuchadnezzar 33 (572 b.c.e.), 15 years following the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem; it is now the earliest known direct reference to Judeans in a cuneiform text. 3 Chronologically, the second text composed in the town of the Judeans (written ālu ša lúYāhūdāia) dates to Nebuchadnezzar 38. Although references to āl-Yāhūdu continue to appear in the subscriptions to texts dated from Amēl-Marduk 1 through Xerxes 13, they omit the gentilic and read simply uru (ša)Yāhūdu, “Judahville.” This evidence makes clear that a sizeable population of Judeans were settled here. While the location of āl-Yāhūdu is yet to be determined, internal evidence from the texts in Pearce and Wunch (forthcoming) and Wunsch (forthcoming) makes clear āl-Yāhūdu was located in the Nippur-Keš-Kakara triangle, not near Sippar (Joannès and Lemaire 1999: 25–26) or Babylon/Borsippa (Pearce 2006: 402). If in fact the Judean elite was settled in Babylon, the possibility of the existence of at least two centers of residence for the exiled Judean population must be considered. While Judeans are readily identified in the Murašû texts on the basis of the Yahwistic names, the size of that group must be kept in perspective. Fewer than 100 Judeans are identified in the approximately 700 Murašû texts, and they are estimated to constitute 2.8% of the indi2.  Other examples include ālu šá lúArbāia (BE 8/1 26:13; 50:15), the town of the Arabians; uruBīt lúṢurrāia (BE 9 79:5; BE 10 33:6, 9; 71:4; PBS 2/1 89:5, 8), the town of the Phoenicians; uruḪazatu, Gaza (BE 8 56:5, 15; BE 10 9:2, 20, 24), uruIšqallunu, Ashkelon (BE 9 86a:8; BE 10 118:4, 7, 9, 10, 24). See further Ephʿal 1978: 80–81. 3.  IMMP 1 (20 Nisanu Nebuchadnezzar 33) antedates MMA 79.7.37 (8 Araḫ­ samnu Neriglissar 2; Spar and von Dassow 2000: 95–97 [text 46]), noted by Avishur and Heltzer (2007: 21–2) to be the earliest attestation of a Judean: Dādiya son of Minašše. Although the name Dādiya can be analyzed as a hypocoristic of the divine name Dadi, or from Semitic dādu, it cannot be securely identified as a Judean name without understanding the West Semitic name Minašše as Judean. Spar and von Dassow (2000: 96) note only that the names of father and son are West Semitic. Zadok (2002) does not include this citation in his study of Israelite and Judean onomastics.

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viduals mentioned in the Murašû archive and no more than 3% of the Nippur population. (Zadok 1979: 23, 78). Although those 100 individuals hardly represent a significant portion of the exiled population, their status and interactions emulate those of other Babylonian and foreign dependents; new evidence substantiates their ordinary standing. Forty-four tablets written in āl-Yāhūdu, dating from Nebuchadnezzar 33 to Xerxes 9, preserve approximately 75 Yahwistic names borne by more than 200 individuals. 4 It is clear that the 200+ individuals bearing Yahwistic names at āl-Yāhūdu constitute a significantly larger portion of the documented population than do the Judeans in the Murašû texts at Nippur. The āl-Yāhūdu texts chronologically link the Judean presence in Babylonia from shortly after the start of the Exile to the start of the Murašû documentation and provide a unique opportunity to evaluate Judean status in a context where they represent a significant percentage of the town’s population. The picture that emerges is that of a group of “ethnically” homogeneous state dependents, concentrated in a town named for their place of origin. Like their counterparts in the Murašû texts, Judeans at āl-Yāhūdu participated in economic activity in ways that indicate they were wholly integrated into the Babylonian state structure and practices. Neo-Babylonian āl-Yāhūdu texts are promissory notes recording the obligation of Judeans to repay quantities of grain. While the details of each transaction are unique, the rate of interest in every case is the standard 20% (1 pi per kur). One Nebuchadnezzar text (date broken) makes clear that a Judean has been assigned to bow land, designated by the rare term bīt azanni instead of the customary bīt qašti. Not only does this text contribute to the knowledge of the early history of bow lands in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar (Jursa 1998) but it makes explicit that, within one generation of the Exile, Judeans were tied to crown lands and bore the standard obligations of Babylonian dependents. This establishes the Judeans’ dependent status in the Neo-Babylonian period. Lacking from the Murašû texts is evidence for the existence of a Judean ḫaṭru, the small-scale fiscal district characteristic of the Nippur region. The term ḫaṭru designates territory granted to a collective of royal 4.  A smattering of additional Yahwistic names are attested in the remainder of the two text corpora. Note that these figures differ substantially from those previously suggested (Pearce 2006: 404). The numbers and percentages given there resulted from tabulating name types and language backgrounds across the entire IMMP corpus of 101 texts; data from the Schøyen collection texts were not included. Confining the tabulation to names and individuals attested at āl-Yāhūdu (even if this covers nearly 80 years) provides a more accurate impression of the composition of the population.

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feudatories, soldiers, or civil servants. It was an institutional means of producing and extracting taxes for the Achemenid state and a source of labor for a standing military reserve, a local garrison force, and cadres of state-controlled workers (Stolper 1985: 70–103; see also Cardascia 1951; 1972–75: 150). Ḫaṭrus were typically identified by gentilics or professional terms reflecting the ethnic, territorial, professional, military, or social composition of their population. The combination of the distinctive characteristics and economic activities with the conspicuous presence of non-Babylonians make it possible to identify at least eight population groups that belong to ḫaṭrus, although they are not explicitly labeled as such (Stolper 1985: 72–79; 1993–97: 428; van Driel 2002: 309). Ephʿal (1978) recognized the designation of ḫaṭrus by geographic background as a mechanism that may have facilitated the preservation of characteristic linguistic, ethnic, or religious features of their constituent populations. In particular, he suggested the activities of these groups might illustrate the means by which Judeans living in Babylonia were able maintain their distinct self-identification in exile. Terms designating officials and socioeconomic groups facilitate the identification of the presence of a ḫaṭru. One such term is šušānû, which refers to a class of individuals who are neither chattel slaves nor fully free (Dandamaev 1984: 626–42; CAD Š/3 379). In his description of the organization and composition of the ḫaṭru, Stolper (1985: 79–82) points out that the appellative šušānû may be attached to the name of an estate or stand in apposition to an occupation. Although the term is not limited to use in these contexts in the Neo-Babylonian period, in the Achemenid and Seleucid periods it serves as a marker of social or administrative status and frequently functions as a component in ḫaṭru names. The attestations of the term šušānû in the āl-Yāhūdu texts provide compelling evidence that some Judeans in Achemenid Babylonia were associated with ḫaṭrus or ḫaṭru-like establishments. The phrase šušanê ša lúYāhūdāia, “the šušānû of the Judeans,” appears in four promissory notes written in āl-Yāhūdu in Darius 11. All stipulate quantities of barley (IMMP 21) or dates (IMMP 19, 20; JWB 7) owed by individuals as imittu (estimated rent) on the šušānû-fields of the Judeans of Across-the-River. The individuals charged with these obligations are securely identified as Judeans on the basis of their characteristic Yahwistic names or patronymics: Šama-Yāma/Naḫim-Yāma; Azriqam/Šama-Yāma; Qīlu-Yāma/Šiqin-Yāma; Šalamān/Rapa-Yāma; Šalam-Yāma/Pilli-Yāma. The officials named in these texts confirm that the lands to which these Judeans were attached were crown lands. All name Uštānu of Across-the-River as having authority over these fields; in one text, he

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is identified as governor (šākin ṭēmi, lúgar.ku) of the province Acrossthe-River. In Murašû texts dating from Darius 1–6, Uštānu is known as “Governor of Babylon and Across-the-River” but is not attested with the title “Governor of Across-the-River” (Stolper 1989: 290–91). The assignment to the governor of responsibility for the lands with which the Judeans were associated confirms their status as state dependents, integrated into the system in which agricultural production occurred on crown lands in exchange for military obligations. Iddinâ, son of Šinqâ, who served under Uštānu and bore the title šanû ša urītī, “deputy of the mares,” was more directly involved in the administration of these lands. In the organization and administration of the ḫaṭru, the šanû (“number two man,” “deputy”) assisted or represented the ḫaṭru foreman; Iddinâ belongs to the chain of command from foreman to satrap (see the diagram in Stolper 1985: 88 n. 70). The mention of another low-level official supplements the picture of the Judeans’ status. The title dēkû, “summoner,” refers to a low-level official who assisted the “foreman and his staff in marshaling the taxes and services incumbent on land holders” (Stolper 1985: 83). Reference to the dēkû in three texts sheds some light on the existence and role of Judean officials in the administrative organization of Achemenid Babylonia: (1) The text written in Bīt Našar and published by Joannès and Lemaire (1999: 27, 29) identifies Ahiqar/Rīmūt as the bēl pīhāti, “administrator,” and also mentions a dēkû of āl-Yāhūdu, Abdi-Yāhu, son of Barak-Yāma. (2) IMMP 83, also written in Bīt Našar, records that Šalam-Yāma acted as an agent of Yāma-izri, the dēkû of āl-Yāhūdu, in collecting a payment (quantity and commodity not preserved) from Ahiqar/Rīmūt. In his role as administrator, Ahiqar appears in many Bīt Našar tablets as the individual to whom quantities of barley and dates are paid. The dēkû (and, in this case, both the official and his agent are Judeans) would receive the payment and submit it to the next higher authority. (3) IMMP 12, written in Keš, records that Ahiqam son of Rapa-Yāma paid his ilku obligation for the year Cyrus 5 to Pilli-Yāma son of Yadi-Yāma, who served on behalf of Yāhu-ēṭir, son of Ṭāb-šalam, “his dēkû.” Two of the three dēkû officials bearing Yahwistic names are specifically responsible for administrative matters in āl-Yāhūdu. These Judeans served in official capacities within their own community, further supporting van Driel’s observation that, in the haṭrûs, “vocational or ethnic organisations . . . are obviously responsible for the fulfillment of obligations by their members” (van Driel 2002: 256). The texts date from three different years (Cambyses 1, Cyrus 5 and 7), indicating that this office was held only for brief periods of time, a pattern also evidenced in the Murašû corpus. In BE 10:65 (Dar. 3), Yišrib-yā son of

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Pilli-yā holds the position of chief officer of serfs of royal treasury, and in UM 205, dated one year later, another individual occupies the same role. Similarly, ḫaṭru foremen were “mobile in their tenure and responsibility,” with a number of individuals holding the position in short succession (Stolper 1985: 87). Published legal documents reflect activity within the private realm of family matters and further confirm that, though Judeans attained no special status in the Neo-Babylonian or Achemenid worlds, they were readily integrated into Babylonian social and economic practices. In “A Document from a Community of Exiles in Babylonia,” Lambert (2007: 205) suggested that, in the Postexilic Period, the text from āl-Yāhūdu published by Joannès and Lemaire (1999) pointed to “direct evidence of a whole Jewish community living together and trading with each other, using current Babylonian legal processes.” Two additional legal documents confirm his conclusion. K. Abraham (2007) published a duplicate to IMMP 45 (Pearce and Wunsch forthcoming), recording an inheritance division among five brothers. In her presentation at the conference (not published here), Wunsch detailed the ways in which this particular division conforms to Babylonian legal practice and suggested that acculturation to Babylonian practices may have already taken place prior to the Judeans’ return to Judah; the ready adaptation to Babylonian customs may have played a role in the development of tensions between returning exiles and those who had remained in the land. Similarly, a marriage contract dated to Cyrus 5 (Abraham 2005–6) points to the Judeans’ ready adoption of or inclusion in Babylonian legal practices. Documents from āl-Yāhūdu and surrounding towns provide a glimpse at the activities and status of Judean deportees to Babylonia from the time shortly after the start of the Exile to the period in which the Murašû documentation begins. Like the Murašû texts, these sources offer evidence of many individuals bearing Yahwistic names. But unlike the Murašû texts, they record the activities of these Judean exiles in the context of a community composed largely of their own people. The interactions with both local and higher echelons of the administration point to an economic status comparable to that of any dependent population. The Judeans who can be identified in positions of administrative responsibility appear with titles comparable to those held by other low-level administrators from other population groups. Their financial and service obligations compare favorably with those of the population at large. The evidence of texts from āl-Yāhūdu not only identifies the settlement to which Judean exiles were brought but it provides solid data on which a picture of the status of these Judeans can be based.

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Their position in the Babylonian economy was comparable to that of other deportee populations, from their agricultural obligations to their occupation of administrative roles at the levels held by other state dependents. The data clearly show that “Judean” was a presence but not a special status in Neo-Babylonian or Achemenid Babylonia.

Bibliography Abraham, K. 2005–6 West Semitic and Judean Brides in Cuneiform Sources from the Sixth Century bce: New Evidence from a Marriage Contract from Āl-Yahudu. AfO 51: 198–219. 2007 An Inheritance Division among Judeans in Babylonia from the Early Persian Period. Pp. 206–21 in New Seals and Inscriptions: Hebrew, Idumean, and Cuneiform, ed. M. Lubetski. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Avishur, Y., and Heltzer, M. 2007 Jehoiachin, King of Judah in Light of Biblical and Extra-biblical Sources: His Exile and Release according to Events in the NeoBabylonian Kingdom and the Babylonian Diaspora. Transeuphratène 34: 17–36. Beaulieu, P.-A. 2002 Ea-dayān, Governor of the Sealand, and Other Dignitaries of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. JCS 54: 99–123. Cardascia, G. 1951 Les archives des Murašû. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale. 1972–75 Ḫaṭru. RlA 4: 150–51. Dandamaev, M. 1984 Slavery in Babylonia. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press. Driel, G. van 2002 Elusive Silver: In Search of a Role for a Market in an Agrarian Environment. Aspects of Mesopotamia’s Society. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Ephʿal, I. 1978 The Western Minorities in Babylonia in the 6th–5th Centuries b.c.: Maintenance and Cohesion. Or n.s. 47: 74–90. 1983 On the Political and Social Organization of the Jews in the Babylonian Exile. Pp. 106–12 in XXI. Deutscher Orientalistentag vom 24. bis 29. März 1980 in Berlin, ed. F. Steppat. Wiesbaden: Steiner. Glassner, J.-J. 2004 Mesopotamian Chronicles. SBLWAW 19. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Grayson, A. K. 2000 Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Joannès, F., and Lemaire, A. 1996 Contrats babyloniens d’époque achéménide du Bīt-Abî Râm avec une épigraphe araméenne. RA 90: 41–60.

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Jursa, M. 1998 Bogenland schon unter Nebukadnezar II. NABU 1998: §124. 2005 Guides to the Mesopotamian Textual Record, vol. 1: Neo-Babylonian Legal and Administrative Documents: Typology, Contents and Archives. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Kuhrt, A. 1983 The Cyrus Cylinder and Achemenid Imperial Policy. JSOT 25: 83–97. Lambert, W. G. 2007 A Document from a Community of Exiles in Babylonia. Pp. 201–5 in New Seals and Inscriptions: Hebrew, Idumean, and Cuneiform, ed. M. Lubetski. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Pearce, L. 2006 New Evidence for Judeans in Babylonia. Pp. 399–411 in Judah and Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Pearce, L., and Wunsch, C. forthcoming  Into the Hands of Many Peoples: Judans and West Semitic Exiles in Mesopotamia. Cornell University Studies in Assyriology and Sumerology 18. Bethesda, MD: CDL. Pedersén, O. 1998 Archives and Libraries in the Ancient Near East 1500–300 b.c. Bethesda, MD: CDL. 2005 Foreign Professionals in Babylon: Evidence from the Archive in the Palace of Nebuchadnezzar II. Pp. 267–72 in Ethnicity in Ancient Mesopotamia: Papers Read at the 48th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Leiden 1–4 July 2002, ed. W. H. van Soldt. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Spar, I., and Dassow, E. von 2000 Private Archive Texts from the First Millennium b.c. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Brepols. Spek, R. J. van der 1982 Did Cyrus the Great Introduce a New Policy towards Subdued Nations? Cyrus in Assyrian Perspective. Persica 10: 278–83. Stolper, M. W. 1985 Entrepreneurs and Empire: The Murašû Archive, the Murašû Firm, and Persian Rule in Babylonia. Leiden: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul. 1989 The Governor of Babylon and Across-the-River in 486 b.c. JNES 48: 283–305. 1993–97 Murašû. RlA 8: 427–29. Unger, E. 1931 Babylon, die heilige Stadt nach der Beschreibung der Babylonier. Berlin: de Gruyter.

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Vanderhooft, D. 1999 The Neo-Babylonian Empire and Babylon in the Latter Prophets. Harvard Semitic Museum Monographs 59. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Weidner, E. F. 1939 Jojachin, König von Juda, in babylonischen Keilschrifttexten. Pp. 923– 35 and pls. 1–5 in Mélanges Syriens offerts à M. René Dussaud. Vol. 2. Paris: Geuthner. Wunch, C. forthcoming  Judeans by the Waters of Babylon: New Historical Evidence in Sources from Rural Babylonia. Texts from the Schøyen Collection. Babylonische Archive. Dresden: Islet. Zadok, R. 1977 On West Semites in Babylonia during the Chaldean and Achaemenian Periods: An Onomastic Study. Jerusalem: Wanarta and Tel Aviv University Press. 1979 The Jews in Babylonia during the Chaldean and Achaemenian Periods according to the Babylonian Sources. Haifa: University of Haifa Press. 1988 The Pre-Hellenistic Israelite Anthroponomy and Prosopography. OLA 28. Leuven: Peeters. 2002 The Earliest Diaspora: Israelites and Judeans in Pre-Hellenistic Mesopotamia. Tel Aviv: Diaspora Research Institute–Tel Aviv University Press.

Some Observations on the Traditions Surrounding “Israel in Egypt” Donald Redford

Pennsylvania State University

Dramatis Personae and Plot Structure The longest narrative in the Bible enjoying an Egyptian setting extends (with brief interruptions; Wénin 2004; Weimar 2005) from Genesis 37 to Exodus 15, approaching 23 chapters in total. Broadly speaking, the story covers the exploits of Joseph and the settlement of Jacob, his father, in Egypt and the bondage and expulsion of his descendants. The material within these chapters suffers from uneven literary treatment: the Joseph Story is a well-honed, beautifully written, and unified novella, and the Moses narrative is an improbable pastiche of folklore and pompous monologue. Nevertheless, the multiple authors/narrators/redactors of both blocks of writing have chosen to present their work as believably historical, even though the real historical substratum lurks far below the surface. In a context such as this, the narratives leave themselves vulnerable to adverse historical assessment, in the same way as is any historical source, and thus attract the tiresome efforts of the apologist. Continued study of the Joseph1 and Moses narratives suffers from the phenomenon of rethreshing old straw. Lacking new evidence, or missing what is really at hand, scholars endlessly go over the text and what is already known by way of external evidence, in a ceaseless parade of the same facts in varying arrangements. The present contribution is not intended to promote this round dance by dragging out all the old discussions and passing judgment on their authors. Rather, I should like to inject into the debate evidence that is, in fact, new, as well as to 1.  Studies on the Joseph story continue to proliferate. Most approach the story with ethical, exegetical, or theological concerns, and these are irrelevant in the present undertaking. Eisegesis is rife. From the past quarter century, one might single out and take into account the following: Westermann 1982; Coats 1976; Ruppert 1985; Schmidt 1986; Scharbert 1987; Longacre 1989; Schweizer 1991; Boecker 1992; Fox 2001; Kunz 2003; Weimar 2004; Wilson 2004; Döhling 2006; Sutskover 2007.

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restore to the limelight bodies of narrative long since dismissed as secondary or irrelevant. One thing that cannot be disregarded is the story form of the 23 chapters under discussion. These are to be assessed and appreciated primarily on the basis of an analysis of plot construction, character development, the standards of narratology, and the schemata of predictable action. An analysis of this sort will inevitably point to a date of composition in the light of what is known of authorial predilection and audience reception as they evolved over time. After all, plots, character types and “messages” underwent linear development through the centuries: what was novel and current in the 18th century b.c.e. did not correspond to what was novel and current in the 8th century b.c.e. No scholar 2,000 years from now, were he in possession of but a modicum of the facts, could possibly make the mistake of dating a Jane Austen novel to the Middle Ages! But it is precisely such an egregious and ludicrous error that scholars have been guilty of in fixing a date of composition for the Joseph and Moses narratives. The Persona of “Pharaoh” and the Role of the “Savior” in Late Period Literature From the 11th Dynasty on through the New Kingdom, the roles of “king of Egypt” and savior of the nation are identical. As “jumped-up” potentates emerging from baronies rooted in the manorial system, the kings of the Middle Kingdom parade themselves much as the commoners, their ancestors, had done, namely, as men “who speak (freely) with their mouth, and act with their (own) arm.” But when Pharaoh appears in written or figurative discourse, he is almost always described as a superhuman phenomenon who never fails to succeed in all he attempts. He consorts, at the divine level, with his siblings and ancestors, the gods, and on a terrestrial plane effects his ineffable will through superior intellect and speech-power. He stays awake far into the night, devising new ways to benefit his people. On the battlefield he is invincible: his tactics are daring and never miscarry. Enemies and rebels fall to his sword, and the mere mention of his name cows the world. While Egypt, as a defenseless widow, finds a champion in Pharaoh, Pharaoh expects obedience from all mankind “as far as that which the sun-disc encircles.”2 Likewise, in (more popular) narrative discourse3 the king 2.  For the ancient Egyptian concept of kingship, see, inter alia, Radwan 1975: 213–34; Barta 1975; Moftah 1985; Gundlach and Weber 1992; O’Connor and Silverman 1995; Gundlach and Klug 2004. 3.  The so-called Königsnovelle enjoyed a long history from the beginning of the second millennium b.c.e. until the Greeks became thoroughly fed up with it. For sources and most recent treatment, see Hofmann 2004.

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maintains the same image as in the high-flown ideological pieces. The king, all-powerful on the battlefield, is still a compassionate, forgiving ruler (Sinuhe); let down by intimates, he nonetheless wins through as an object of respect and glory (Amenemhet I, Kamose, Ramesses II). The petty squabbling of the court acting as a foil, the dignity of the kingly office remains untarnished (Horus and Seth). The mighty monarch retains his lofty status, even when consorting with his people (Snofru). Pharaoh needs no help from anyone else: “he is a god by whose direction one lives . . . [ex]clusively unique, without equal” (Urk. IV, 1077: 5–8). If he occasionally becomes bored, the magician or seer is there to beguile him with magic tricks or well-crafted speech. One senses a change in the pharaonic image after the close of the New Kingdom. Although the Königsnovelle continues in its many genre forms and permutations, a specific treatment of the royal persona begins to develop that is unflattering. While kings in the past had addressed themselves to the gods in songs, hymns, oracular exchanges, vituperative accusations, and reports, kings of the first millennium often beseech the godhead in supplication.4 Unwittingly, perhaps, the texts and reliefs of the 22nd and 23rd Dynasties indicate the growing importance of royal progeny, acting on behalf of their fathers in a way designed to rectify a dire situation.5 There is also a creeping awareness and recognition throughout the period of other citizen classes as potential power wielders and not simply subjects. Osorkon II acknowledges nobility, high-priests of Amonrasonther, great chiefs of the Me, foreigners(?), and prophets of Arsaphes.6 Prince Osorkon nods to all the priestly classes of the Amun temple, the children of the councilors (“those choice of speech”).7 With the dawn of the Kushite revival, 4.  See Sheshonq I’s beseeching the god for a great kingship (Caminos 1952: 46– 61); Osorkon II pleading with the god on behalf of his family and queen (JacquetGordon 1960); Peftjau-a-Bast’s supplicating the conquering Piankhy (Grimal 1981: lines 71–76); Taharqa’s imploring Amun to forgive(?) him (Vernus 1975); cf. the implied supplication for divine protection underlying the 22nd-Dynasty amuletic decrees (Edwards 1960: L.7 [son of King Osorkon]); the daughter of Psamtek I’s supplicating Amenophis-son-of-Hapu for healing (Wildung 1977: 277–78). 5.  See Sheshonq I’s son Namlot’s apprising the king of the desuetude of the cult of Arsaphes and laying plans to refurbish it (Jansen-Winkeln 2006: 297–316); the same king’s son Auputi’s undertaking quarry work for his father (Caminos 1952: 46– 61); Osorkon II’s offspring, displaying considerable independence (Jacquet-Gordon 1960); Osorkon son of Takelot II’s suppressing the Theban civil war with scarcely a mention of his father (Caminos 1958); the sons of Tefnakhte’s acting as his garrison commanders (Grimal 1981: lines 28 and 80). 6.  Jacquet-Gordon 1960. 7.  Caminos 1958: cols. 29, 37, 41; second text, col. 9.

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sociopolitical senses are honed to the realities of political power: Piankhy knows full well that “gods make a king, men make a king,” but it is Amun “that makes a true king, namely, one whom no dukes have ever made.”8 On his great stela,9 he is keenly aware of rank and distinction among rulers, and he never confuses kings, princes, priests, great chiefs, or mayors. The “true” king is no longer the great god-on-earth, older than the eldest, surviving bull of the wild bulls, seizing his inheritance, but rather one chosen by Re or Amun.10 Equally destructive of the traditional image of the king is the topos of the “rage” of the king, well known from the period of empire if not before (Blumenthal 1970: 222, 237; Grimal 1986: nn. 1365, 1379, 1419 [Ramesses II and Merenptah]). In narratives of that period, the king falls into a justifiable rage when news is brought that the enemy is plotting to rebel, has rebelled, or is marching on Egypt.11 He can also rage on the battlefield.12 “Rage, fury, storm” (nšny), when predicated of divine beings, merely described a natural and acceptable characteristic of their natures.13 But there comes a time when “uproar” associated with kings can be neither condoned nor considered a “good thing.” Horemhab prides himself on being “summoned before the sovereign of the palace (Tutankhamun or Ay), when he had fallen into a rage; he opened his mouth and answered the king and placated him with the utterance of his mouth” (Gardiner 1953: 3–12, line 7). Montemhet too was “one that quelled the raging in the house of the king,” (Leclant 1961a: 7–8 note b) and Udjahorresne “rescued its (the city’s) people during the great disorder which happened everywhere in the land” (Posener 1936: 18– 19). Likewise, Djedkhonsefankh boasts, “I spoke to His Majesty daily without fear, while his officials said (only) what he liked. It was I that pacified his heart when (he) had fallen into his rages” (Cairo 42210). His close contemporaries (all of Third Intermediate Period date) have much the same to recall: “I calmed the sovereign down in his rages” 8.  Reisner 1931: 90–91. 9.  Grimal 1981. 10.  Note the ubiquity of stp.n-Rʿ or stp.n-ʾImn in titularies from the 21st to 23rd Dynasties: Bonhême 1987: passim. As in so many other modes of expression, these dynasties merely ape and parrot the great Ramesses II. 11.  A. J. Spalinger 1982: 3–33; the verb used is ḫʿr, “to rage (like a panther),” Wb. III, 244:2–7; see Klug 2002: 85–87. 12.  See above, n. 9. 13. On nšny, see Wb. II, 340–41; Jansen-Winkeln 1985: 330. Originally designating an atmospheric disturbance (Koenig 1981: 34–36; Caminos 1958: 90), the term often characterizes the behavior of gods and goddesses: CT II, 340b; Urk. IV, 1301:17; Wilson 1993: 550.

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(Cairo 42211:13) and, “I pacified His Majesty in his moment (of rage)” (Philadelphia E 16025).14 But royal rages sometimes involve danger to innocent bystanders, and one who is worthy (in this case Nakhtefmut, mid-ninth century b.c.e.) might well breathe a sigh of relief: “I served several kings and was unscathed in their rages” (Cairo 42208 f. 15). Rage can issue in brutal action but also betokens frustration at being ineffectual. Side by side with the “tyrant king” made famous in Herodotus’s portrayal of Khufu and Khefren (Herodotus ii.124–28), the same author reflects the currency in contemporary folklore of the “weak, powerless king.” Anysis the Blind cannot prevent Sabaco’s invasion and runs away (Herodotus ii.137); Psamtek has to flee for his life (Herodotus ii.152). Sethos, the foolish priest, rejects the military and then requires divine intervention to save him from the Assyrians (Herodotus ii.141); but Apries is an utter failure and no one can save him (Herodotus ii.161). The denigration of kingship in popular oral tradition15 issued in the plot pattern of the weak and/or deceitful king who must be saved by the intercession of a magician/wise man.16 1.  “The whipped pharaoh”17: Pharaoh and his court are in a quandary over their inability to counter the sorceries of a clever Nubian magician. Pharaoh, in a nocturnal trance, is taken nightly to Nubia, where he is beaten. Only the magician and wise man Si-osir is found capable of thwarting the evil Nubian, and eventually saves Pharaoh from a terrible fate. 2.  Pharaoh on the point of death (Vandier and Posener 1986): Pharaoh suffers from nocturnal sweating and discomfort, and his wise men prophesy that he has only seven days to live. Through the selflessness of his youngest magician, theretofore unknown to the king, who cedes some of his own allotted time on earth, is Pharaoh’s life saved and prolonged. The young magician elicits from the king promises that he will not harm his wife and children, then goes to his death, whereupon Pharaoh reneges on all his commitments. 3.  The plot against Pharaoh18: A conspiracy to murder Pharaoh,19 organized by the chief physician, is thwarted by a guard who overhears the 14.  To be published by the present writer. 15. “The sḏd of the people,” on which, see Redford 2000: 171–75. 16. E.g., (ẖry-ḥb) ḥry-tp; West Sem., ‫חרטם‬: see Quaegebeur 1987: 368–94; Ray 1976: 59 and note c, 51–52 note h; Houtman 1993: 533. In general, on magic and magicians in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt, see Frankfurter 1998: 1401. For Pharaoh in the Joseph story, see Green 1998: 150–71. 17.  Khamois II: Griffith 1900. 18. Onkh-sheshonqy: Glanville 1955; Smith 1980; see also Spiegelberg 1912. 19.  In a new version of this “frame narrative,” Pharaoh appears actually to have been poisoned: Ryholt 2000.

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plot as the physician tells it to Onkh-sheshonqy. Pharaoh throws most of the plotters into the fiery furnace and imprisons Onkh-sheshonqy. 4. Merib and the captive pharaoh (Smith and Tait 1983: 109–42 [Text 2, back]): In a dream, Hathor reveals to Merib the high steward the plight of Pharaoh, who is banished in a desert setting, hungry and thirsty and surrounded by wild animals, unable to help himself. The papyrus is fragmentary, but it is clear that Merib, with divine help, rescues Pharaoh from death. 5.  The blind pharaoh20: In a rage, Pharaoh hurls a spear (?) at an unnamed individual and, perhaps because of this act, suffers blindness. In a dream, he is told that the tears of a virtuous woman will restore his sight. Again: the source of his salvation is external to his own person. 6.  Pharaoh and the impending doom—low Niles and famine (Vandier 1936; Aufrère 2004: 1–20): The Nile has not risen for seven years, and famine pervades the land. Pharaoh Djoser sends his chamberlain and chief lector-priest to discover the source of the river. In a dream, the god Khnum of the cataract region reveals himself to Pharaoh, who secures the abatement of the famine by liberally endowing the cult of Khnum with offerings and land. 7.  Pharaoh, low Niles, and temple building (P. Berlin 23701; Burkard 1990): In the reign of Khufu, the inundation fails to come for seven years. Pharaoh has a dream, consults the contents of his library, and dispatches a lackey to rebuild dilapidated temples throughout the country. There is also mention of a magician, but the lacuna-ridden papyrus does not permit a definition of his role in the story. 8.  The embattled pharaoh (Hughes 1951: 256–64; Parker 1958): The Egyptian omen literature, much of it Roman in date but dependent on Vorlagen from the Saite and early Persian period (Parker 1958: 30), often conjures up the picture of a state in turmoil. Pharaoh suffers rebellion, fights his enemies (not always successfully), and is threatened by foreign foes. Once, a rebellion is envisaged in which Pharaoh is unseated by his rebellious army. This story type took its rise during the Kushite-Saite period21 and became common in the Persian and Ptolemaic eras. Its origin and form are rooted in the loss of faith in and the rejection of the monarchic ideal 20.  Ryholt 2006: 31–58 (frg. C 1). The story is a variant of the Tale of Pheron, Herodotus ii.111. 21.  There exist numerous other narratives that may belong to this genre, but most are too fragmentary to permit certainty: see Verhoeven 1999: 255–65. Regarding its rise during the Kushite-Saite period, the Pharaoh’s name in no. 2 recalls that of Sabaco, and the name form in no. 3 is very late. As indicated above, omen literature came to Egypt no earlier than the 26th Dynasty.

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of the traditional Königsnovelle both in real life and in rhetorical and lyrical creations. Recurring elements include the crisis that desperately requires solution, the inability of the king to act, the dream or night vision, and the magician/wise man who saves the day. This latter figure replaces the savior-Pharaoh of Middle and New Kingdom belleslettres and sometimes inserts him in a “rags-to-riches” subplot.22 The king then becomes a monarchic “cipher,” the Altoum of Turandot, or il re in Aida. Genesis 39–41 clearly belongs in this category. Like Djoser and Khufu, Pharaoh faces a famine brought on by low Niles; like the king in Khamois II, Si-sobek and Khufu, Pharaoh has dreams of great significance that he cannot interpret; like the magician in P. Vandier, Joseph is young and unknown; like Onkh-sheshonqy, Joseph spends time in jail. Libraries and Archives Of all the novellas and folkloric pieces of which the Pentateuch is composed, the Joseph story makes the poorest “fit” in its present context. But the plot motifs and genres passed in review above raise questions beyond their bearing on biblical material and lead us into questions regarding mechanics of dissemination and preservation. How were the stories noised abroad? Were they fixed in form before or after their creation? Why should they be preserved in writing, and where were they stored? If, as we shall see, the destruction of an old library could spell oblivion for an entire culture, what does this tell us of the oral register?23 Collections of written documents played a major role in government and society in ancient Egypt.24 Of the two types of collections mentioned in the heading, archives are mentioned more frequently and played a more useful role than libraries, which often took shape solely through private predilection.25 Private collections mostly belonged to the scribes 22.  Wholly unknown and alien to the ethos of the earlier Königsnovelle: Assmann 1980: 14. 23.  The promulgation of the Torah has been linked with library creation: Ska 2007. Attention has been drawn (Ben Zvi 1997) to the relatively small community of literati in Jerusalem in the Persian II period, and the conundrum of the wide variety of styles, content, and theology they produced. Was their work underpinned by the existence of some kind of formal library in the city and/or its revived temple? 24. See Black and Tait 1995: IV, 2197–2209. It is surprising that studies on libraries in the neighboring Levant would not cull Egypt for comparanda more extensively. 25.  The term for “private collection” is probably ṯꜢy-drf (“collection of writings”: Schott 1990: no. 1416). Iverson’s suggestion (1979: 78) that the first word here means “box” founders on other examples in which “collection” would seem the best translation: cf. “The Memphite collection” (ṯꜢy n ʾInbw: Schott 1990: no. 1707); “collection of the embalmer’s profession” (ṯꜢy n iry wt: Schott 1990: no. 1708);

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who had copied the individual books: colopha (Lenzo Marchese 2004: 359–76) will often include a reference to the dedicatees,26 a statement of authorship and ownership, and an imprecation against criticism: “Well and successfully done! For the ku of the treasury scribe Ka-gab of the treasury of Pharaoh l.p.h., the scribe Hory and the scribe Mer-em-ope; done by the scribe Inena, the owner of this writing. As for the one who criticizes this writing, may Thoth be his opponent!”27 Archives occupy a central position in the Egyptian administrative and cultic systems.28 Born of the needs of an incipient civil service in the late fourth millennium b.c.e. to provide for the new phenomenon of an increasingly dense population centered on the “residence” of the king, “Horus-town,” enumeration, commemoration, identification, and prognostication became the watchwords of the time. The need to extract and redistribute goods of all kinds over the entire nation demanded a visible aide memoire, the script, and a far more precise gauge of time reckoning than the primitive farmer’s calendar. The increasing dependence of the state on the Nile and its varying annual inundation led to attempts to forecast the strength (or weakness) of future floods; but this, it was soon realized, could only be accomplished by comparing the height of past inundations over time. Some record was therefore necessary to preserve a running notation of Nile heights, linked to a specific year that was initially identified by its salient events. This rudimentary collection became the core of a rapidly growing state archive housed at Memphis. Titles from the First and Second Dynasties apprise us of the existence of “scribes” (Jones 2000: nos. 1168–73) “sealers of royal re“collection of wound therapy” (ṯꜢy n iry wbn: Schott 1990: no. 1709); “collection of hieroglyphic texts” (ṯꜢy n mdw-nṯr: Schott, 1990: no. 1710); “Scribe of the document file” (sš ṯꜢ: Contardi 2006: 147). 26.  Sometimes the scribe dedicates the text to himself! Cf. Anastasi iii.7, 10–11, “Well and successfully done, for the ku of him that is great in his office, greatly praised by his city, royal envoy to every foreign land, chief of the lands and foreign countries, Amenemope, justified. He did it in regnal year 3, [month . . .], day 28.” Similarly Helck 1972: 84; the P-text of Merikare is dedicated to the writer and his brother: Helck 1977b: 93. 27.  Ka-gab is copyist-writer of several extant Ramesside papyri, including Anastasi vi, vii; Sallier ii. “Done by”: ı͗ r.n, the most common verb referring to the actual composition and/or writing: Anastasi iii.7, 10–11; Sallier iv.16.2; P. Chester Beatty III, pl. 8A recto 10, 20, 23; IX verso 3.3–4; KRI II, 101:11–14; when copying alone is indicated, the verb spẖr is used: P. Louvre N 3176 (S) (Barguet 1962: iv. 27– 8); Cairo 20075, 20520. Occasionally, a scribal assistant is named: Helck 1984: 71. P. D’Orbiney 19, 7–10; var. Sallier iv verso 16.2: “may Thoth be his opponent to the death!” 28.  For the argument developed here, see Redford 1986; 2006a: 39–50.

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scripts” (Kaplony 1963: III, 88:335; 132:804) and “archivists” (Kaplony 1963: 87:327, 114:636, 91:237A, 349, 92:351, 352), and the appearance of the term house of the book signals the formal recognition of the “archive” (Goedicke 1976: 117–19; Jones 2000: no. 1034; cf. nos. 1167–73; Hannig 2003: I, 452; by the high Old Kingdom, the phrase “house of the god’sbook” may indicate the birth of a sacred collection at the residence [Hannig 2003: i, 452]). “The two chambers of the archive” (ı͗ s.wy pr-mḏꜢt) indicates that a bifurcation had been introduced, corresponding to the two halves of the kingdom (Piacentini 2002: I, 729). The royal chancery was housed within a “chamber” of this institution.29 Specific allusions in texts, though not actual exemplars, show that the contents comprised items of practical, governmental use, such as royal decrees, royal charters of immunity, census records, notices and rescripts, work orders, conscription lists, copies of property transfers, and annals. Unexpected perhaps, but insisted on in later tradition, would be treatises in medicine.30 To judge by the contents of the library of the mortuary temple of Neferirkare (Posener-Kriéger 1968, 1976), a sacerdotal archive might contain not only ritual books, magic spells, and beatifications, but also duty tables, daily records of income, monthly salary and disbursement sheets, and inventories! Again, as in the case of the residence archive, the use envisaged for the temple archive is essentially as a repository for records. In the New Kingdom, archives, both secular and sacred, increased in size and number, though scarcely in complexity. The phrase prmḏꜢt, “House of Books,” continued to be used as a general designation (Hannig 2006: 899–900), with the addition of nṯr, “god,” for a temple library; but now their location, in a “chamber,” is sometimes added.31 The reconfiguration of the government in the Middle Kingdom threw up the “office” (ḫꜢ  ) as the unit of administrative organization for civil and juridical affairs.32 The “office” functioned not only as an administrative center but also as a scriptorium and archive for documents. There was, of course, the “office of the king” with branch offices (?) for specific 29.  “Chamber (ı͗ s) of the copying of royal rescripts”: Helck 1956: 277. 30.  Texts dating from “Athothis” (= Hor-aha): Waddell 1940: 28. From Den: Ebers C 111, 1ff.; Budge 1910: pl. 42; P. Berlin 3038: 15, 1ff.; BD 130. From Khufu: PBM 10059, 11–13. From Menkaure: Budge 1910: pl. 41, 9–11; Naville Totenbuch: 137A, 23, 37–39. From Tety: Ebers 66, 15–16. 31.  P. Chester Beatty IV, recto 4:3; KRI III, 296 (ı͗ s n sšw, “chamber of writings”), Anastasi I.1,2 (same); Abd el-Razik 1974: 144 (parallel to sšyw pr ʿnḫ, “writings of the House of Life”). 32.  Wb. III, 479:2; Sethe 1929: 81:3, 5, 9; Lacau 1949: 30. Also called st n nꜢ sšw, “bureau of the writings”: Anastasi I.12.1; Malinine 1973: pl. 10:12, p. 207 note w.

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purposes, and “the office of the royal sealer and overseer of fields” responsible for the assessment of the grain tax.33 There was also the “bureau of the granaries of Pharaoh,” which had archives (and archivists) concerned with inventories, registry of arable land, land cadasters, and draft lists of menials.34 Sharing “functional space” with the granary department was the treasury (pr-̣hḏ), whose archivists (̣hry-sꜢwtyw) were concerned with cattle-census figures, records of farm produce, farmers, and booty from foreign wars.35 But the central and most important archive of state was undoubtedly what was attached to the “office of the vizier” (Helck 1956: 51–64). We are fortunate to have preserved for us the “office manual” of this institution, with precise evidence regarding its archival function (van den Boorn 1988). The scribes of the vizier stand close to him and take down what is said, and thus produce a procès-verbal of all business addressed (Urk. IV, 1104:11; P. Leopold II: iv.3; P. Abbott 7:16 [transcript of an official investigation]; cf. Helck 1956: 63). “As for all matters entering and emerging from the palace, it is his (the vizier’s) messenger that has them put into writing” (Urk. IV, 1106:16). Every petition is to be put into writing before the petitioner goes before the magistrate, and a copy taken to the king (Urk. IV, 1111:15–16, 1112:3–4). The vizier has ready access to the laws governing real estate throughout the land (Urk. IV, 1111:1–2; “This law which is in his hand”) and copies of provincial records (Urk. IV, 1113:15; “In his [the vizier’s] office are the township documents for the purpose of all farm-land hearings”). Every royal decree had to be sealed by the vizier and (by implication) deposited in his archive (Urk. IV, 1116:13). Wills, testaments, and property transfers also had to receive the vizier’s seal and be copied into the archives (Urk. IV, 1111:6–7; “to him (the vizier) every property transfer is brought and it is he that seals it”). Tax-lists of long standing, still to be found in the “stacks,” governed municipal dues (Urk. IV, 1120:5), and the vizier kept a copy of the “criminal register” (šfdw n ḫbnty) listing people incarcer33.  Branch offices: see Urk. IV, 150:13; and “every office of writing of the king’s house,” a repository for records of benefactions: KRI V, 416:11, 417:6; probably identical to the “office of writings of the land of Egypt”: P. Harris 26, 9; 47, 8; 56, 7. Office responsible for the grain tax: Smither 1941: 74–76; cf. ḫꜢ n Ꜣḥt, “the office of the fields”: Meeks 1982: 209. 34.  Turin A, verso 2, 10; P. Chester Beatty V, verso 2, 1–2; Caminos 1954: 457; Schmitz 1984: 591–98; similar granary bureaus were found in the temples: Eichler 2000: 38–42; Wb. III, 418:11, 478:19–23. 35.  The inscription of Mes (N7, N14–15) shows this overlap between granary and treasury: Gardiner 1964: 43, 47. For the archive, see Sallier I, 3, 5; 3, 11; 4, 5; 5, 4; and passim; P. Berlin 6747; Urk. IV, 694:7; Helck 1956: 190–92; 1963: 44; Redford 1983: 4 n. 9.

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ated along with their crimes (Urk. IV, 1109:2–3; Hayes 1955: 65ff.). If for some reason the vizier lacked a document or a copy in his own archive, he could request it from whatever office in which it could be found (Urk. IV, 1109:11–1110:8). Civil servants summoned to committee with the vizier were “to bring him their documents in their hands” (Urk. IV, 1112:11). We have little evidence as to how archives were organized, but ease of reference seems to have been of overriding concern. Scrolls were kept in “chests of lists,”36 occasionally in jars (Ambras I, 2; 2, 1; Peet 1929: pl. 38). A basic division into “classified” and “unclassified” scrolls is attested in the vizier’s archive (Urk. IV, 1109:11–1110:8); the letters of Pharaoh were copied and stored in a “bureau of the letters of Pharaoh, l.p.h” (Theban Tomb 23; KRI IV, 108). When we examine the “checklists” of archival collections in temple libraries,37 a certain ordering of materials seems to underly the presentation of documents. The collection is housed in “numerous chests, filled with great scrolls of pure vellum,” which are, at certain points, specified according to category. Thus, “magical protection-(spells)” are grouped together: “protection of the city, protection of the house, protection of the crown, protection of the throne, protection of the year.” But the criteria of listing remains, for the rest, at present, beyond our ken.38 The archives of the first millennium b.c.e. continue uninterrupted the wealth of documentation we have reviewed above. Saite government archives are particularly rich and suffered only slightly when a new language of government, Aramaic, was introduced by the Persian authorities. If the practical concerns of the administration, which had earlier informed the Pharaonic collection, were now transferred to the office of the satrap,39 the temple libraries assumed the task of preserving lore of a literary, mythological, metaphysical, cultic, and “scientific” nature.40 In this purpose they overlapped with the age-old and somewhat 36.  Wb. I, 566:15; Anastasi I.12.1. For graphic rendering of chests such as these, the library of Sety I’s Abydos temple offers examples: Umm Sety. 37.  Edfu is the most complete: P-M VI, 134–35. But one wonders whether this list is “token” and only intended to convey an impression. 38. Why, for example, group these in an apparently meaningless order: “the order of temple service pertaining to the shrines, instructions for copying (texts) on walls, the protection of the king in his house, spells to ward off the evil eye . . . the inventory of every ‘mound’ and knowing what is in them, all the ritual of the of causing (the god) to appear”? 39.  For insight into Persian archival practice, see Chauveau 1996: 32–47; Aperghis 1999: 188; Klinkott 2005: 169–70; Kock 2007: 29–31. 40.  For the contents of an Egyptian temple library, ca. 700 to 100 b.c.e., based on the papyri recovered from Soknopiau Nesos and the temple checklists from

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mysterious institution known as the “House of Life” (Gardiner 1938: 157–79; P. Derchain 1959: 73–80; 1965; Habachi and Ghalioungui 1971: 59ff.)41 which functioned as a repository and scriptorium for the most sacred texts, “the Manifestations of Re” (Wilson 1997: 299–300). One point that all the evidence continues to stress with regard to temple archives is the uninterrupted preservation and longevity of collections. The trope of finding ancient writings, some very difficult to read because of their archaic diction, is far too common to deny that this kind of eventuality corresponded to a believable reality for the ancients (Redford 2000: 163–66). Historically speaking, and in striking contrast to the embattled Levantine states, Egypt rarely suffered the destruction of libraries attendant on civil strife, foreign war, or invasion. The troubles at the close of the Old Kingdom and the Hyksos invasion of the Second Intermediate Period may have wrought some destruction of archives, but the Kushite “takeover” in 711 b.c.e. and the Persian invasion of 525 introduced authorities who were bent on preserving written records. (There is no evidence that the brief Assyrian occupation, destructive though it was, seriously targeted book collections.) Only in 343 b.c.e. did a serious and premeditated attack on the archives threaten the records of Egypt’s past, and much more besides (see below, pp. 321–322). With a longstanding reputation for successfully preserving antiquity in written form, Egypt presented itself as a viable model for library creation. The media of writing, moreover, which the Levantine littoral and the hinterland south of the Amuq shared with Egypt, namely, a cursive script on papyrus or vellum, would have appealed to the Iron Age ethnic states of Western Asia more than any model offered by the cuneiform world. And the evidence proves this to be the case. The prince of Byblos in the 11th century b.c.e. possessed an archive in which account texts and journals, cloned from Egyptian models, could be accessed easily (Gardiner 1932: 68, 1–3; Schipper 2005: 191–93). Sanchuniaton is said to have compiled his history “from the city registers and records kept in the temples,” which sound markedly like the pr-mḏꜢt or ḫꜢ n sšw and pr-mḏꜢt nṯr (Eusebius, Praep. ev. I.9.21; Attridge and Oden 1981: 25–26 n. 29).42 Undoubtedly, major inland centers such as Damascus, Samaria, Edfu and Tod, see Redford 1986: 215–24; since this publication, our corpus has been enriched by the publication of additional material: Beinlich 1991; Ryholt 1999, 2006; Smith 2002a, 2002b; Quack 2004; Thiers 2004; Meeks 2006. 41.  Unlike the “House of the God’s-Book,” no room or structure has certainly been identified as a “House of Life,” which must thus have lain at some remove from a temple and its compound: Wilson 1997: 351. 42.  For the temple at Sidon as the repository of texts, see Krahmalkov 2000: 131.

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and Jerusalem during Iron II also possessed archives, but these would have been largely destroyed in the conquests of 732, 722, and 586 b.c.e. The almost fanatical zeal that attended the search for and the recopying and editing of ancient texts during the Saite period brought books and collections to a prominent place in Egypt’s collective consciousness and conferred on them a vital role in the archaizing resuscitation of the past.43 In light of the close and influential connections Egypt enjoyed at this time with Greece and the Levant, it is inconceivable that those cultures should have remained unaffected by the “export” of Egypt’s intellectual property and mechanisms.44 The Oral Register In our hypothetical reconstruction of a temple library ca. 700–100 b.c.e., one type of document seems out of place: literary, or better, narrative, fictional creations. Did these not have their origin in oral composition and transmission? And, when they did achieve written form, were they not to be found in private collections? The “oral register” does not correspond to any depressed social stratum of illiterates, to whom the rarefied air of reading and writing is closed off. True, creative skill and eloquence can be found among poor peasants, lower class rabble-rousers, and maidservants at the grindstone,45 but even a ruler is listened to (not read), and the “sword of a king is his tongue, (for) oratory is better than any weapon” (Edel 1984: 79, col. 55–56; Meri­ kare iii.8; Doxey 1998: 52–57). Narrative, of the sort examined above in the first chapter, belonged to what was called the “oral discourse (sḏd) of the people” (Urk. IV, 1242:15; 344:10, “of old times”; Redford 2000: 171–72), and as such had a life of its own, weak or robust, passing “from mouth to mouth.”46 But he who narrated what he had heard, or even 43. Restoration of ancient texts is ubiquitous: consider the expression mḥ gm wš, “restoring what was found lacuna-ridden”; Redford 1986: 225 n. 84; in general, Manuelian 1994. 44. It is to be expected that tyrants such as Peisistratus and Polycrates, both in close contact with Egypt, should have been influenced by Saite book collection to indulge in archival and editorial practices on their own: pace Pfeiffer 1968: 25. Sanchuniaton and Pherecydes too are products of this Egypt-inspired “literary renaissance,” which reflects the urge to collect and preserve. See Albright 1965: 470; Attridge and Oden 1981: 6 and passim; Edwards 1991: 213–20; Heally 1999: 1352. 45. Cf. Vogelsang and Gardiner 1908; “an orator is scum! Suppress him, kill his children, wipe out his name!” Merikare I.11–12; Sethe 1929: 37,12–13. 46.  “Oral discourse of the people”: The great liking for word play and alliteration in hymns, poems, narratives, and ritual texts betokens a strong underlying oral tradition: Grapow 1936: 16–18. “From mouth to mouth”: Urk. IV, 344:10; KRI: I, 42:14–15; 65:6–8; VI, 22:11 (note the tone of distrust: “this is recounted in writing,

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seen, without a written source, ipso facto had invited skepticism on the part of the audience: the orator who expatiated on the mighty acts of Thutmose III (Armant Stela: Urk. IV, 1245:9–11; cf. 1281:2–3) was at pains to stress his accuracy: “I speak truly of what he did: there is no falseness nor distortion—after all, it was in the presence of his entire army!—there is not a single statement of exaggeration therein!” Composition achieved written form when the content, verbatim, was deemed too important to be left to the vagaries of memory and oral transmission. A reputation might issue in “pronouncing (my) name” (Urk. IV, 101; 131:9, 16–132:2; 194:17; 945:2–4; 1063:3–4; 1899:11; KRI: VII, 24:15; P. Chester Beatty: IV, 3:1–4, etc. ) on the lips of future generations; but it would be best to help them remember by writing it down.47 A king might rejoice that his mighty acts were being noised abroad by his army and people (Urk. IV, 365:8–9; KRI: IV, 7:2, 11:3–5, 12:4, 15:7, 20:11, 118:1; V, 14:15ff.; 45:12ff.; Anastasi ii, 1:1, etc.), but he made sure to inscribe them in formal encomia (Helck 1977a: 241–56; Klug 2002; Redford 2003, esp. part 2; Hofmann 2004). An erstwhile sufferer, afflicted by the gods for sin, will loudly celebrate divine forgiveness by telling his companions and all the natural creation about his salvation; but he will make sure to have his supplication and hymn of thanksgiving inscribed on a stela for all to see.48 All litigants in court were expected to plead orally, but their case must also be submitted in written form.49 The proceedings in trials (“The laws in their journals” constituted a “collection raisonné” of transcripts such as these: Kruchten 1981: 154–55; P. Berlin 9010, 5; Redford 1986: 102 and n. 20), orders in council (Urk. IV, 833; “the king himself it was that commanded that they be put into writing publicly, in accordance with what was spoken in council renot in oral transmission”); similarly, Westcar (Sethe 1929: 28, 17–19); LD III, 140d, 2; KRI II, 254:1–5; Wreszinski 1906: I, 21:3–4; KRI: VII, 24:15. 47.  It was this pressing need for an existence instans that called forth, from the earliest occurrence of the incipient script, the carved name representation, personal symbol, title(s), and in full-blown form the “Address to the living”: see Shubert 2005. 48.  These “penitential psalms” are frequently encountered at Deir el-Medinah: see, inter alia, Turin 279, 284; BM 374, 589; cf. Anastasi V, 9, 8; Turin Ostr. 1088; Cairo 42208; in general, see Sadek 1988. These texts deserve a detailed study. 49.  Pleading orally: see Ptahhotpe (Sethe 1929: 39,1–2): “if you are a leader to whom petition is made, hear the speech of the petitioner calmly, do not turn him away before he has got off his chest what he intended to say to you.” Written pleas: Harari 1950: 45ff.; Hayes 1955: 78; cf. Urk. IV, 1111:15–16, “every petition must be put in writing: he (the litigant) is not to be allowed to petition orally (only)”; cf. Rylands IX, 4:1–4, and 5:12–14 (to Pediese’s oral statement the governor replies), “these matters you’re telling me are multitudinous! . . . write down everything that happened to your fathers, and write an account of what happened to you (too)!”

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garding directing monuments”), and commissions of enquiry, though involving oral discourse, were speedily and verbatim transcribed on ostraca and papyri. Curiously, the genre we might consider most firmly rooted in the oral register, both in composition and transmission, wisdom, is closely tied to a written, almost a canonical tradition! Even though the common script calls for the setting of a fatherly (oral) chat with a son, the usual verb used to introduce and identify the “wisdom” is ı͗ ry, “to make,” with overtones of the creation of the written text.50 The conclusion of the wisdom of the vizier Kagemni is revealing:51 “then the vizier had his children summoned after he had finished the ‘Condition of Mankind.’ They came before him in wonderment. At last he said to them: ‘as for everything in writing in this scroll, hear it (just) as I said it. Do not add to what has been authorized.’ Then they took it to their hearts, and read it just as it was written.” Thus, the author consciously established the official version and set a canon that was to be adhered to in perpetuity. The concept of a canon, applied to wisdom in general, emerges from the satirical piece Anastasi I. The writer twits the recipient, an allegedly sophisticated and knowledgeable scribe, with not appreciating a good version, or knowing canonical order (Anastasi I.11.1ff.; cf. Cairo 41541; Volten 1937: 49–50).52 The immediacy of the copying down of an oral, extemporized composition is startling.53 If the content portended to be of importance, the scribes stood ready to copy verbatim.54 Even the king was skilled enough to transcribe a speech! (Neferty 16–17; W. Helck 1970a: 12–13). 50.  “Chat”: Verbs of “saying” and “hearing” are ubiquitous. Pharaoh’s teaching was communicated through hearing, not reading: see Davies 1909: I, pl. 30; V, pl. 2:11; VI, pl. 15:10, 25:16. For wisdom as written text, see the Satire of the Trades (Helck 1970a: 1a); a man for his son (Gardiner and Černy 1957: pl. 6, 1, 1); Ptahhotpe (Zaba 1956: 1); Hordedef (Posener 1952: 109–10); Amenemhet (Urk. IV, 1408); loyalist teaching (Posener 1976: 53); Amun-nakhte (BM 41541); the great scribes of antiquity (Chester Beatty IV: verso 2, 8–9). The list could be significantly extended. See also the telling term “teaching in letter-form,” sbꜢyt n šʿt (Sallier I, 3–4; Grapow 1936: 60 n. 30; Caminos 1958: 125); Merikare attests to the inscripturation of Wisdom: “emulate your fathers, your ancestors . . . behold! Their words abide in writing—open that you may read!” (Helck 1977b: X, p. 19). 51.  Sethe 1929: 43, 8ff. 52.  Ptahhotpe similarly honors a canonical approach: “do not take out a word and re-insert it! Do not mix them up!” Ptahhotep 608–9. 53.  Cf. P. Abbott, 3:9, 6:11–12. Sometimes the writing up of the final copy took rather longer, 10 days in one case: Parker 1962: 7. 54.  Cf. the graphic depictions of the Pharaonic court in session where the scribes (in groups of two, three, four, or six) are already writing down the king’s words: Davies 1908: I, pl. 8; IV, pls. 6 and 9; VI, pls. 4, 18, 20, and 29. Verbatim transcription

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No “literary” creation, even that of an illiterate peasant, was deemed unworthy of immediate transcription, if it showed brilliant eloquence. The king enjoins his high steward not immediately to decide the case of a peasant who has shown a gift for fine speech, “so that it (the speech) may be brought to us in writing that we may hear it.” In the end, the steward addresses the bewildered peasant: “now stay here, and listen to your petitions”—he had extemporized nine of them on successive days!—“and he had read out from a new papyrus roll every petition in its entire content” (Peasant B1, 73–80, 126–29). Orality and a written tradition clearly ran parallel in many areas of Egyptian life.55 But what of “fine words,” belletristics, whether for didactic purposes or entertainment?56 Was anyone standing behind the arras, pen in hand, when the local raconteur or teacher entertained the patrons in the midan or the beer hall? And why should there have been? The oral delivery satisfied the audience for the moment: the next evening the speaker would produce another story or song. It was only when an aesthetic sense imposed standards of excellence in entertainment or an oral message was underlaid by a didactic purpose that content forced a consideration of writing. A piece whose excellence lay in its specific Kunstspruchen and “performance language” deserved preservation outside the memory of the orator who had created it (Hearon 2004; de Vet 2005; Yaumagata 2005). Because a specific form of the piece was in question here, no reliance could be had on desultory dictation during performance. The speaker had to bring himself to prepare his story or song,57 from no matter how many earlier trial deliveries, in writing parlando. The written form would serve the underlies the phrase “this writing was taken down corresponding to what N said,” P. Berlin 9010:5; cf. “written in a writing of dictation,” Urk. I, 67:14. 55.  Redford 2000: passim; the unusual and unheralded nature of an event was often expressed in terms of the absence of anything like it in written or oral records: KRI I, 42:14–15; II, 254:1–5; Taharqa year 6 stela, line 11 (Laming MacAdam 1949: 5–7); cf. Redford 1986: 83–84; Finnegan 1988; Rydberg-Cox 2003. 56. Neferty 7–8: “a few fine words and choice phrases which will entertain My Majesty when I hear them”; Anastasi I, 8:7: “for you I have made, by way of diversion, a document which will be amusing to listen to”; P. Chester Beatty I, verso C, 1, 1: “Here beginneth the utterances of the great entertainer.” On oral storytelling, see Baumann 1986. 57.  On the role of music, see Slings 1990–92: 9–14. Singing from a prepared text is attested in Egypt: Bremner-Rhind, 1:1–2, “Herewith beginneth the stanzas of the festival-book of the Two Kites, performed in the House of Osiris”; 1, 5, “they sing from the stanzas of this book in the presence of this god”; Merikare, 51: “do not slay a man whose ability you know, one with whom you used to sing the writings” (that is, when they were children in school); P. Chester Beatty IX, recto 13:1 (8:19), “What is said in the ‘Song of the Two Banks (Egypt)’ to Amun at the time of evening”;

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double purpose of aide memoire and record for posterity (Thomas 1989: 21, 32–33, 49, 62–63). When creation takes place primarily in an oral register, we are plummeted into performance composition. The needs of this type of creation assign much more importance to lyric and rhetoric, in which choice of words, phrases, and syntactical forms minimize interest in prosaic presentation of fact. In stories created with performance in mind, modalities and gesture language need not be specified: they are implicit and are supplied by the performer. Picturable images may be extensively used (Minchin 2001: 26–27). Devices to capture and hold attention are used as the need arises, including word play and ribald content. The plot unfolds without the necessity of turns dependent on lesser “support” figures.58 “Script pointers” trigger in the listeners’ minds the range of units in sequence in an oral piece (Shank and Abelson 1977: 46ff.). Finally, the speaker often addresses his audience, exhorting them to listen, admonishing them, and asserting the veracity of what he is saying. A story written, neither by dictation, or as parlando alone but as a record of content, can also offer itself for quiet, private reading and reflection. A creation of this sort does not have to expose itself to the requirements of oral delivery (cf. “post-oral style,” Friedrich 2000: 17), even though at a didactic level teachers might require it to be learned and parroted by rote. Rhetorical embellishment is unnecessary. A written narrative might show sensitivity toward niceties on which the plot turns59 that a raconteur would pass over on the assumption that a live audience would only be concerned about the story line. It also shows an increased complexity in levels of narration and an attention to developing emotional responses (Bal 1985: 134ff.). There will be offered a clear invitation for a reader to concretize the narrative and a level of “indeterminacies” that allows a dynamic interaction between individual and (absent) author (Eagleton 1996: 66–67). When we review the biblical writings from, say, Genesis 12 to Exodus 15, it is hard to elicit any direct relationship to an oral register. Except, perhaps, for Abraham and Pharaoh, Jacob and his father-in-law, and Yahweh’s dialogue with Moses, the markers of orality reviewed above are absent. Instead, what we find is (a) folklore, modified and Sauneron 1952: 8, 7: “hear thou the writing in the House of the Book, the Openingof-the-mouth (book), sung in the House of Sokar.” 58.  E.g., scenes in which the hero or heroine is said or implied to be alone, yet by definition this would have been impossible. 59.  E.g., the language barrier, consciously singled out in these pieces composed in writing as Sinuhe, Wenamun, and the Joseph story.

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recounted by a writer, (b) novellas already in existence, adapted by a writer,60 (c) genealogies and related forms, and (d) cultic prescriptions. The novellas should attract our attention. One of the unexpected components of a temple library in Egypt of the Late Period was the section comprising narrative in the form of novellas. They offer an antiquarian hermeneutic that can be misinterpreted as historiography, replete with a prejudicial intent to avoid misunderstanding (Gadamer 1977: 7–9), to explain why we are where we are. How were communal and “birth” rights confirmed or purloined? Why did some rulers achieve legitimacy and prosper while others were doomed? Why does the supernatural sometimes turn against mankind? What role do the ancestors play in the ongoing “legitimacy” of the native community and its belief system? The whole exercise issues in a crude attempt at cyclical, serial “history” (Braudel 1982: 98–99), rooted in an antiquarian approach to the past (Bolin 1999: 137) but shaping and justifying the present. The spirit of Sais in the disenfranchisement of the Persian period is here at one with the mindset of the creators of the Pentateuch. The Kushite-Saite Reordering of Antiquity The obsessive fascination with the past evinced by the 25th and 26th Dynasties (“the spirit of Sais”) is well known. This is not merely a use of the past but rather an adopting of the past in its varied manifestations as a desirable model, not merely a source of inspiration, for the full range of artistic expression, social structure, language, script, cult, and custom (see, among others, Brunner 1970: 151–62; 1972: 386–95; Josephson 2001: 109–13; Russmann 1974; Manuelian 1994; Smith 1998: 232–51). The origins of the archaizing movement of the Kushite-Saite period are imperfectly known. It has been claimed first to become manifest in late Libyan times, just before the Kushite takeover (Yoyotte 1961: 238; Leclant 1961: 255 and n. 6; Kitchen 1973: §317); but its roots may descend somewhat deeper in the early first millennium b.c.e. and spring 60.  The independent creation of the Joseph story is plain in the inception and denouement of the plot. The latter ignores or is at variance with all the traditions linking tribal groups within the Benē-Yiśraʾel to the land of Canaan and reduces tribes to the roles required by the novella: old father, favorite son(s), good brother(s), bad brother(s), hostage brother. At the conclusion of the tale, the expectation from the vantage point of the Pentateuch as a whole requires the family to go back home to Canaan, now that the famine has gone. In the event, only Jacob goes, simply to fulfill the requirement that he be buried at Mamre. The others stay in Egypt, in turn to fulfill the requirement of Exodus that a numerous and alien people be present to provide the mainspring for the action of Exodus 1.

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from the new interpretation of Isis as a sort of primordial Weltmutter and Osiris as cosmic savior. If the past is of such vital importance as a praeceptum vitae, it behooves the pious to “get it right.” This entails consulting directly, not in secondary or tertiary quotations, or paraphrase or midrash, the words of the ancients themselves (Urk. IV, 121:9–15; 1084:8; Merikare 35–36; P. Chester Beatty iv verso 2.5ff.). Thus arises the trope of consulting ancient writings in an archive (Helck 1975: 21; Abd el-Razik 1974: 144; Kitchen 1979: VI, 10, 22; for the archive and library in antiquity, see Redford 1986: 215–29; Pedersén 2000; Casson 2001) or wherever they may be found. The Kushite-Saite revival witnessed a recopying and redaction of text corpora, some from remote antiquity, which were either ferreted out of ancient archives or copied directly from inscriptions: the Book of the Dead recension (Mosher 1999: 636–39), the shawabti formula (Taylor 1991: 44 n. 53), the Pyramid Texts (Altenmüller 1984: 23; see also Driota 1962: 105–28; Nagy 1977: 99ff.; Patanè 1993: 93–95; Bommas 2006: 1–15), the Memphite Theology (Redford forthcoming b). The “redacting imperative,” arising from the necessity to establish a “true” text, led to the scribal penchant for restoration of texts. Epithets such as “(able) to restore what is dilapidated (čs stpw)” and “filling in what was found lacuna-ridden (mḥ gm wš)” become very common at this time (Redford 1986: 225 n. 84; Berlin 20339; Josephson and Eldamaty 1999: no. 48634; “going beyond what ancient kings did, restoring what was dilapidated, filling in what was found lacuna-ridden in the scrolls of this temple”). Also related to the past, but as ḫprt, “(real) event,” and not as the Treulesen of surviving texts, was the overriding urge to evaluate, to provide a hermeneutic for events. The latter had not happened at random and without purpose but had constituted “ensamples,” “types,” for the edification of the present generation. The past interpreted in a “tract for the times” informed a type of persuasion composition that sought to explain, comfort, and admonish. The tumultuous events of the period between 711 and 663 b.c.e. and the attempted invasions of 600, 568, and 525 established a scripted sequence, or schema, in which occupation by hostile foreigners from the north was balanced by salvation from the south (Redford 1986: 276–96). The pattern was easily imposed on the Hyksos occupation (Waddell 1940: 71–91)—it basically corresponded to reality—and with great difficulty and considerable distortion on the Amarna period. The script was to descend through the periods of Persian and Greek occupation to become part of a popular pseudepigraphic eschatology. Recurrent script of tragic events inevitably conjures up sin, crime, prediction, warning, retribution. Past deeds, tied into individual reigns,

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are evaluated as the reward or retribution of god meted out to the pious and the sinner (Wessetszky 1981: 11–21; Johnson 1983: 61–72; 1984: 107–24; Meyer 1997: 177–212). Perspicacity and retribution are even retrojected into the “reigns” of the gods. Re himself had provided a sure defense against the evil children of the east by erecting a fortified temple compound at Pi-Sopdu, described in detail and in the specifics of a Late Period temple; but incest and indiscreet inquisitiveness had frustrated the purpose and had humbled so great a deity as Geb himself (Goyon 1936: 1–42). Nor had god left mankind without a warning: a sacred animal or an ancient wise man had prophesied once upon a time. It is significant that, at many sites in Egypt, refurbished places of burial of prophesying animals can be dated to the Saite period.61 The creative imagination of the times was not wholly negative. A foil for ineffectual kings and times of troubles, heroes, and halcyon days were conjured up either from fragments or “whole cloth,” as a gauge against which to measure current failure. One schema imposed on the past an order derived from creation. The earliest rulers of the earth had been the gods whose reigns had comprised a golden “Saturnian” age, when maʾat had descended to earth (Firchow 1957: 81). They were nine in number, forming the Great Ennead now construed as an Ahnendynastie. At certain points, the King-list was adjusted by recourse to excision or reduplication to organize the names into groups of nine (Redford 1986: 233–38 and passim). This in fact happened in the case of the 26th Dynasty itself, in which, by beginning with “Stephinates” (= Tefnakhte) and ending with Psamtek III, the requisite “nine” was made up. Beneficence and conquest crystallized, respectively, within the figures of Osiris and Sesostris, paragons of the arts of peace and war. While Osiris had enjoyed a lengthy evolution in the history and theology of the gods, and a Hellenic mantle of the bringer of civilized living was just beginning to settle over him (Murray 1970: 161; Griffiths 1970), Sesostris was a relatively new creation.62 The name itself, derived from the hypocoristicon of Ramesses II, Ssy-Rʿ, with infixed euphonic

61.  Apis: the “Greater Vaults,” founded by Psamtek I (P-M III [2nd ed.], 796ff.; Dodson 2005: 84ff.); Hesat: Atfih hypogeum (Kamal 1908: 113–17; Leitz 2002: 482–83; although burials may have begun earlier, personal observation convinces me that the present sequence of gigantic vaults dates from the Saite into Ptolemaic times); Ba-neb-djed: the present “Mansion of the Rams” founded under Apries (Redford and Redford 2005: 164–98). 62. In general, see Kees 1923: II, 1861ff.; Lange 1954; Malaise 1966: 244–72; Froidefond 1971. To derive the core of the tradition from the Middle Kingdom (Simpson 1984: 903–6; Obsomer 1989) seems wrongheaded.

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-t-,63 points to the major component of this legendary figure. The period during which the legend took shape postdates the 22nd Dynasty, and coincides with a time when Sheshonq (= Sesonchosis) was confused with the great ancestor of kings, probably through a folkloric “reading” of the great Karnak battle relief.64

The Egypt and Hither Asia of the Joseph and Moses Stories The Kushite-Saite Period witnessed the birth of new plot patterns, role types, tropes, and didactic intent, some of which is reflected in the biblical account under scrutiny. It is useful to stand back from the detailed hypothesizing inherent in text-critical analysis with its alltoo-facile assumption of circumstance, purpose, and agent(s) of composition and view empirically the great historical and geographical backdrop against which the pieces were composed. What did the speakers/writers know of the world into which they introduced their narratives? What did they not know? Genesis and Exodus know of an Egypt ostensibly united under one king, with a center of power in the north. Of the union of Egypt and Nubia under Napata or the ethnic blocks of the Labu and Meshwesh that dominated Egypt from 930 to 654 b.c.e. the pentateuchal source knows nothing. If one wishes to postulate a New Kingdom scenario, the embarrassment increases: there is no trace of an Egyptian imperial framework in Asia, with forts, garrisons, and governors controlling access corridors and interdicting movement. Even Egyptian control of Levantine cities such as Gaza, Ashkelon, and Tyre, which Egypt exercised ca. 711 to 605 b.c.e., is not reflected. The eastern Delta was the frontier of Egypt, and it was a hostile border: in fact, one of the border districts, the “Land of Gashmu,” is occupied by alien pastoralists. Pharaoh is often qualified as “king of Egypt,” recalling the misconstruction of the Late Period (Osing 1982: 1021). He owns all the land of Egypt except that of the priests who live on his stipend (Gen 47:22), a naive view that might be excused in the case of a foreigner observing from afar.65 To Pharaoh, as tax (according to Gen 47:26) goes the “fifth,” a confusion 63. Cf. Maspero 1901: 593–606, a treatment still worth reading, but unfortunately overshadowed by Sethe’s (1900) overwhelming argumentation. The name appears again in the book of Judges as ‫סיסרא‬, attached to the embattled general of Jabin of Hazor. 64.  On “Sesonchosis” in this context, see Pseudo-Callisthenes Historia Alexandri Magni i.34.2; Pfister 1946: 56; Ivantchik 1999: 417–19. 65.  The actual picture is much more complicated: see Katary 1989; Warburton 1997.

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due to similarity of ligature in Demotic between the word “portion” (dnı͗ t) and “fifth” (Erichsen 1954: 639, 704). “Portion” is the common word either for “tax,”66 “of Pharaoh” (Lichtheim 1957: 78; Andrews 1990: 128; Muhs 2005: 218) or apportioned shares in temple income (Hughes, with Mattha 1975: 115; Erichsen 1963: passim; Wilson 1993: 1199). Egyptian officials mentioned in the stories are not referred to by Egyptian titles or by “calques” of Egyptian titles but rather by a nomenclature at home in Western Asia: ‫שר‬, for example, though undoubtedly cognate with Egyptian sr (Murtonen 1989: 437), is not a loanword (Mettinger 1971: 3 and n. 10). In Asia, it has overtones of heredity, “princeliness,” and even semidivinity (Fox 1997: 249–57). Śr, on the other hand, is a high-ranking civil servant, in Egypt, who can be posted anywhere in the realm, not merely a member of a local government support staff (smdt).67 While śr is related to the abstract śrt, “civil service” (Urk. I, 223:8–9), and enjoys its own internal gradations (Urk. I, 165:8–9), it is not used as ‫ שר‬as in the Joseph story, in a bound construction to create a designation of function (Rüterswörden 1985: 47–54). Similarly, ‫פקדים‬, “officials” (Gen 41:34), is a term much at home in the Levant (Fitzmyer 1995: 152; Lipiński 2000: 503; Krahmalkov 2000: 406; Koehler and Baumgartner 1983: 899ff.) but is found in Egypt only in the Persian period (Cowley 1923: 306; Driver 1957: 15–16; Bresciani 1958: 142–45; 1984: 366). The word ‫( סריס‬Gen 39:1) is simply ša rêši of Akkadian, with a Levantine purview, and has nothing to do with Egyptian titulary; it too is found in Egypt in the Persian period (Posener 1937: 118–19). Against the scenery of the Egypt of Joseph and Moses beyond the Sinai, where a nation is taking shape, Genesis paints a specific picture of patriarchal families with parochial interests (Lemche 1998: 45–46). Pieces known and enjoying primacy of creation elsewhere are purloined in inferior adaptations: the antediluvian patriarchs, the flood story, a four-generation sojourn (Genesis 15), and famine and displacement. The latter trope, used three times in the patriarchal tales (Van Seters 1975: 167–83), anticipates the great famine on which the plot of the Joseph story turns. We are introduced to the concerns and details of water rights and how obscure wells got their names. Convoluted or declarative stories are trotted out to explain the origin of an ethnic group or the geographical placement of transhumants: the origins of Ammon, 66.  Warburton 1997: 639. 67. Cf. the revealing passage in Anastasi v.26.5–6, in which a lieutenant commandant derides the local police chief: “you are (merely) a child of the support staff (smdt), you are not a (ranking) civil servant (śr) brought from elsewhere to be assigned (a task) here!” On smdt, see Černy 1973: 50; Valbelle 1991: 123–28; Janssen 1992: 13.

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Moab, and Edom, the displacement of Ishmael, Hagar, and the Sinai nomads, the desert Arabs Midian and Dedan. Tales, some picaresque, relate to wooing, marriage, and childbearing, and explain how tribes in a federation got their names and pecking order. All of this paltry material in itself is of little interest—preexilic texts are even ignorant of Abraham and Isaac68 and have to be forced to fulfill an etiological role. But, lest Abraham and company forget—they could certainly be forgiven for doing so—the Almighty intrudes from time to time to remind them of what is expected of them and to parrot the prediction that “you’re going to be the ancestor of a nation,” thus elevating the significance of this hodgepodge of folklore. The patriarchs in Genesis, for their part, move in a kind of saraband. Nothing inherent in the patriarchal narratives links the “fathers” to Mesopotamia; yet it is from here that they come, anticipating and foreshadowing the postexilic trek of the returning exiles. Within the “promised land,” their movements are restricted: the coastal plain is foreign, the “way of the land of the Philistines” is characterized as a place of war, the central hill country is alien and hostile, Transjordan a wild frontier zone peopled by wrestling angels and ethnic blocs that are the product of incest. Only in the area encompassed by Bethel, Mt. Moriah, Beersheba and Hebron, and the Negeb do the patriarchs move with relative ease, that is, the territory of postexilic Judea (Kallai 1998: 63ff.). One glaring concern of the patriarchal narratives from Genesis 12–36 also points to postexilic Judaea, namely, a racist zeal to maintain the ethnic purity of the stock (Liverani 2005: 264–69). Those damned Philistines are not going to take our wives! God will get them for that! Our sons are not going to marry Canaanites: we’ll go back to Mesopotamia, if we have to, to get kinfolk. No Canaanites are going to marry our sisters! Half-breeds, get out—go to the east, go to the western wilderness, but don’t stay here! If people do stay, they have to put away their foreign gods. The Challenge of the Toponyms: Goshen, Pithom, Ramses and Baʿal Saphon The place name Goshen, vocalized in the pejorative fashion, is born by districts and towns in southern Judah (Josh 10:41, 11:16, 15:51), and in all likelihood derives from the root ‫גוש‬, “hard, rough, rocky ground” 68.  Liverani 2005: 262. Liverani’s conjuring up of a tribe called *Banu-Raham in the central hill country of whom Abraham was the eponymous ancestor (2005: 25) is highly ingenious; but one difficulty may lie in the localities with which Abraham is associated: Hebron, Beer Sheva, the Negeb, and Shur are all far to the south, bordering even on Egypt!

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(Murtonen 1989: 131; with locative -an ). Its occurrence in Genesis and Exodus (Gen 45:10; 46:34; chap. 47; 50:8; Exod 8:18; 9:26) owes its distortion to the Joshua passages: the original form is arguably preserved in the LXX as γη Γέσεμ. It is usually located in the Wadi Tumilat around Tell el-Mashkuta, with a northern extension to Saft el-Henne and Faqus.69 A more recent suggestion posits a derivation from a late Egyptian word gsm, occurring in Anastasi IV 1b, 1–2, where the passage is translated, “your trappers have made their way into TꜢ-rw-h, the gsm makes waves” (Groll 1998: 190). Professor Groll adds that gsm “apparently refers to a body of water of some sort.” In fact, the word is not a body of water at all but a Canaanite loanword, gsm, “torrential downpour” (Gordon 1965: no. 626; Murtonen 1989: 142; Hoch 1994: 354, no. 522), surviving in Demotic gsm and Coptic ⳒⲞⲤⲘ, “storm, darkness” (Erichsen 1954: 593; Westendorf 1977: 468). The passage should then be translated, “the sheets of rain produce choppy water.” In any case, the resultant “land of the torrential downpour” would conjure up climatic conditions wholly at variance with weather patterns in the eastern Delta!70 The most plausible recourse remains to link Gesem with Gashmu and the Qedarite Arabs who, from the late sixth century b.c.e., and under Persian aegis, dominated the western Tumilat and the 20th township of Lower Egypt, namely, Arabia.71 This was the eastern march, where Sopdu the falcon, from his redoubt in Pi-Sopdu (modern Saft elHenne), guarded the eastern frontier against the “children of the east.” Here, well-ordered Egypt faced the chaos of the outside, non-Egyptian world.72 The first of the three(?) fortresses73 built by the Israelites and listed in Exod 1:11 was Pithom. The place name is clearly derived from Pr-ʾItm, 69.  For discussion and bibliography to 1960, see Vergote 1959: 183–87; Simons 1959: §419; for the last quarter of the century, see Houtman 1993: 106–7; for gs iꜢbty, “the eastern side,” from which Goshen is sometimes derived, see Gomaà 1987: 128– 29. 70.  God is supposed to have wrought his miracles in the “fields of Tanis” (Ps 78:12, 43) which calls to mind the Egyptian sḫt ḏʿ, “field of the storm,” located in the northeast Delta: Gauthier 1929: 59–60; Caminos 1959: 19. 71. See Davoli 1990: 47–61; 2001; “Arabia” was used as the equivalent for Egyptian iꜢbtt: Redford 1986: 278 n. 77. 72.  On “Arabia,” the 20th nome, see Helck 1974: 197–98; on Sopdu, see Schu­ macher 1988. 73.  Regarding there being three fortresses, the LXX adds to Pithom and Ramses “On which is Heliopolis.” If this is original, as is likely, the sequence would indicate the western (Heliopolis) and the eastern (Pithom) termini of the Necho canal. Note the reference (terminus post quem, the reign of a “Takelot”) to the occupation of Heliopolis by Asiatics from the ḪꜢrw, that is, the southern Levant, who vandalized

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“House of (the god) Atum,” the great solar deity of Heliopolis, the fons et origo of the cosmos (Myśliwĩec 2002: 411ff.). Temples thus designated are known from a variety of times and places (Gauthier 1929: II, 59–61), including the western Wadi Tumilat;74 but Exod 1:11 describes the place not as a temple but as a fortified city. The consensus has been long since reached that Pr-ʾItm (nty m Čkw) is to be identified with Herodotus’s Πατουμος, also called ἑρονπολις (Herodotus ii.158; see Lloyd 1988: 154– 55; Calderini 1974: 228–29) modern Tel el-Mashkuta (Redford 1982: 1054–58). Excavation at the site has revealed little before the Persian period and nothing between MB IIB and Saite times (Holladay 1982: 50–55). An origin in the late seventh century b.c.e. would be consonant with an original function as a work site during Necho II’s building of the eastern canal. As an entrepot on a commercial waterway, the later cosmopolitan nature of the city is fully explained.75 One point might be worth setting on record with regard to the cult of Atum as an informing element in toponymy and belief structure in the Wadi Tumilat. Curiously, the form this deity adopted in the region in question was that of a serpent.76 In light of the role snakes play in the Mosaic tradition(s), this association may not be fortuitous. The appearance of the name “Ramses” in the biblical account of the sojourn and exodus presents us with a conundrum.77 The original pronunciation, Ri-a-ma-se-sa, betrays an N(1) + N(2) syntactic pattern, namely, Re-it-is-that-has-fashioned-him (Ranke 1939: 218, 6). The active participle in N(2) position bears a stressed long -a- between the first and second radical, thus CVCCe (Loprieno 1995: 87). In the 19th Dynasty, the ayin is strong and was reinforced by a pataḥ furtive, as well as, in one case, a preformative alep (Edel 1997: 18 and n. 4). But Greek transcriptions, such as Ραμεσσῆ, Ραμὲσσης, Ραμεσής, and Ραμεσσής (see Waddell 1940: 108, 112, 148, 236) show that by the mid-first millennium and distressed the city: Osing 1983: 347–61; 1991: 269–79. “Fortresses”: ‫;ערי מסכנות‬ certainly not “cities of store”; cf. LXX πόλεις οχυρὰς. 74.  Anastasi vi. 4.15–5.1; Caminos 1954: 293–95. Note that the text refers to pools belonging to the temple, at a remove from the border fort. One salient fact about the miscellanies is often overlooked: these are teaching tools, designed to inculcate a wide vocabulary in the scribal pupil, and will therefore often sacrifice historical accuracy and even logic to considerations of lexicon and style. 75. See Lust 2001: 190–212. One can only grieve at the personal and scholarly loss represented by the passing of Pat Paice, whose dissertation on the commerce passing through Maskhuta would have been a goldmine of fact and interpretation. 76.  Myśliwĩec 1977: 89–91; 1978–79: I, 95–124; cf. P. Jumilhac xlii; iv.14–15: “a living snake . . . called ‘Atum of Tjeku.’” Koemoth 2007: 137–46. 77. The commentaries are legion. See, in particular, Vergote 1959: 183–87; Westermann 1982: 190–92.

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b.c.e. the accent had shifted from the participial form to word-final position with the resultant reduction of the -a- to a shewa, ĕ (Sethe 1923: 190). Moreover the gravitation of the stress has reduced the secondary stress on the first syllable, and has occasionally introduced a euphonic -p-.78 This is the distorted vocalization that the Hebrew reflects, not that of the original Bronze Age, pronunciation. In the Bronze Age, the equivalence of Egyptian ś/š with West Semitic ‫ ש‬was standard, as one would expect; and the entry of loanwords into the dialects of the latter can be virtually dated by the adherence to this standard.79 The rendering of Egyptian ś (sin) by ‫( ס‬samekh), however, demonstrates that the form of the name Rʿ-ms-sw entered Hebrew and other West Semitic languages no earlier than the end of the eighth century b.c.e.,80 as no certain examples of the equivalence ś/š with Hebrew samekh occur before this time (Hoch 1994: 270; cf. 432–33). In Exod 1:11, the name is applied to a city; in Gen 47:11, to a land. While there is nothing inherently impossible in a royal name occurring in the designation of a settlement—in fact, it is extremely common— the result is a name compounded with another element in a bound construction, e.g., ẖnw, “residence,” pr, “house,” ḥwt, “mansion, plantation,” ı͗ nbw, “walled fort,” and so on. In the case of Pr-rʿ-ms-sw ʿꜢ-nḫtw, “The House of Ramesses, Great of Victories,” with which the city of Exod 1:11 is often identified (see Hoffmeier 1997: 116–19 and passim), one would expect pr, “house,” to survive in the pronunciation, and in the vast majority of cases in which the town is cited this is indeed the 78. Cf. Ραμψής: Waddell 1940: 150, 244; Ραμψίνιτος in Herodotus ii.121, on which, see Lloyd 1988: 52. 79. Cf. KꜢš > ‫ ;כוש‬zššn > ‫ ;שושן‬Tḫsy > ‫( תחש‬Gen 22:24); skı͗ wt > ‫( שכיות‬Isa 2:16); Susi-in-qu > ‫ ;שישק‬Sheshy (?) > ‫( ששי‬Num 13:22); šsr > ‫ ;שש‬Š-Ḥr > ‫ שיחור‬cf. from the root NHS > ‫ ;נחשתן‬if the PN ‫ משה‬does derive from the Egyptian root msı͗ , the choice of the sibilant is an interesting criterion of date of entry. 80.  The interchange of Egyptian č and West Semitic s (samekh) survived into the 25th Dynasty (Hoch 1994: 368, no. 548). But thereafter samekh was used to render Egyptian ś (Zadok 1991: 38); cf. Krahmalkov 2000: 65, 67 (‫ = אס‬Isis; ‫ = אסר‬Osiris); Segal 1983: no. 6, 61a (‫ = חרסיס‬Ḥr-sꜢ-ı͗ st; ‫ = פטובסת‬PꜢ-dı͗ -bꜢst); Ranke 1939: 272:4, ‫= ענחחבס‬ ʿnḫ-ḫꜢ-bꜢ.s. The appearance of the equivalence Egyptian s = Hebrew ‫ ס‬in the second quarter of the first millennium helps date the fixing of the following forms: ‫פינחס‬ (PꜢ-nḥsy, “the Southerner”), ‫( תחפנחס‬Jer 43:7–9, etc.; TꜢ-ḥwt-pꜢ-nḥsy, “the Mansion of the Southerner”), ‫( סוא‬2 Kgs 17:14; SꜢw, “Sais”), ‫( תחפנס‬1 Kgs 11:19–20; TꜢ-ḥwtpꜢ-nsw, “the king’s mansion”; but perhaps a garbling of tꜢ ḥmt-nsw, “king’s-wife”), ‫( חנס‬Isa 30:4; Ḥwt-nn-nsw, “Mansion of the king’s child”), ‫( סתרוס‬Gen 10:14, Isa 11:11 etc.; pꜢ tꜢ rsy, “the Southland”), ‫( סין‬Ezek 30:15, Sin, “Syene” [Pelusium]), ‫( פיבסת‬Ezek 30:17, Pr-BꜢst, “House of Bast”). The continued vacillation between the two sibilants in Biblical Aramaic (cf. Bing 1985: 118 n. 54) shows that the distinction had been lost.

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case. It used to be maintained (Rowley 1948: 33 n. 1) in defense of the identification with Pı͗ -rʿ-ms-sw that the latter dropped out of usage after the Ramesside era and that therefore its presence in the Exodus tradition must prove historical authenticity. But this is not strictly true: “Ramesses” does appear sporadically in the 22nd Dynasty and later. The word appears in (a) the expression “King’s-son of Ramesses,” (b) the compound Pr-Rʿ-ms-sw, “House of Ramesses,” and (c) the expression “God x of Ramesses.” In the first, it is not immediately apparent or necessary to conclude that the allusion is to a (Pr)-rʿ-ms-sw. The dozen or so examples of this title occur in the epithets of military officers (Chevereau 1985: 258–59), but they are too few and isolated to permit us to see in their bearers the literal descendants of Ramesses the Great. Might it be that the Ramesside war reliefs that give prominence to royal sons on the battlefield (Heinz 1995: 446–47) have given birth to an honorific military title?81 “God x of Ramesses” occurs with Re, Amun, Ptah, and Arsaphes (Tresson 1934: 820 line 28).82 A text of the early fourth century b.c.e. locates Temples of Re of Ramesses and Ptah of Ramesses on the eastern river, that is, the Pelusiac branch of the Nile (Naville 1891: pl. 46B). One inscription of the same period significantly links “Amun of Ramesses” with Pr-Rʿ-ms-sw (Chevereau 1985: 166–67, no. 239; Zivie-Coche 2004: 114–16). Archaeologically, it is impossible that the reference here is to the 19th-Dynasty residence; but the god’s qualification “of Ramesses” shows a surviving cult form of royal patronage that may well go back to the city of Ramesses the Great and the specific divine forms honored within it. The presence of “Ramesses” in a compound indicating a place is of some importance. In the Late Period, Pr-Rʿ-ms-sw does indeed occur with the variant ḥwt (nsw) Rʿ-ms-sw, “the Mansion (that is, temple) of King Ramesses.”83 It is uncertain whether a specific cult seat dedicated to the memory and worship of the king existed somewhere in Egypt in the Late Period or whether the king enjoyed a “guest cult” in several temples. The fact is that *tꜢ ḥwt Rʿ-ms-sw, “the Mansion of Ramesses,” was a known form in the six centuries from the 24th Dynasty to Ptolemaic times. Now during this span of time, tꜢ ḥwt was pronounced 81.  See the extended discussion with references in Collombert 1996: 23–36. 82.  “God x of Ramesses“: Cf. Moret 1909: 142, pl. 64. Amun: Berlin 6764 (Schäfer and Roeder 1913–24: 307). Ptah: Schäfer and Roeder 1913–24: 307. 83. Cairo 22054 (= Kamal 1908: pl. 17). For Ḥwt Rʿ-ms-sw alone, see Brugsch 1879: 1135; and the “Athens” stela of Tefnakhte: Yoyotte 1961: end plate. For ʿꜢ Ḳn of Ramesses, see Leclant 1954: 22–23.

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θω,84 while “land,” tꜢ in Egyptian, was pronounced to in Sahidic, θο or θω in Old Coptic and Bohairic (Westendorf 1977: 219). What has happened is clear: an original tꜢ ḥwt Rʿ-ms-sw, “The Mansion of Ramesses,” has given rise in the Delta to a false back formation through Hörfehler, namely, tꜢ Rʿ-ms-sw, “the land of Ramesses,” both pronounced “T(h)oRamesses.” The alleged “land of Ramesses” in Genesis is no more historical than the “land of Oz.” Considerable discussion has been expended on the identity of their divine names and the location of the cult seat referred to in Exodus (Exod 14:2, Num 33:7; Houtman 1993: 105–6; Figueras 2000: 174–78; Carrez-Maratray 2001: 87–100). Its placement, in the immediate environs of the “miracle of the sea,” puts the entire account within the penumbria of Mons Casius,85 Lake Bardawil, and the divine denizens honored therein. Principal among the latter are Horus Triumphant, hero of the late myth type “deliverance from the south, expulsion to the north” (Redford 1986: 276ff.) and Seth in his original “Typhonian” form (Redford 1990: 824–35), not as the Egyptian equivalent of hero-Baʿal. According to the Myth of Horus of Edfu (Griffiths 1980: 54–59), the final defeat and slaughter of Seth and his minions took place in Sile in the 14th township of Lower Egypt (Edfu VI: 127–7-1), and his burial was amid the quicksands and lacustrian deposits of Lake Serbonis (Herodotus iii.5). The sequence of the narrative—the event retained, personal identities, and motivation transmogrified—conjures up the themes of final exodus/expulsion, the savior-hero with staff,86 and the slaughter of the enemy and their burial in a watery grave. The same plot ingredients inform another mythical rationalization of the racial problems and national integrity associated with the eastern frontier. The Wadi el-Arish naos, a product of the fourth century, is inscribed with a sort of “Mishnaic” screed interlarded with etiology of a cultic nature. A good deal of space is devoted to the word description of the dimensions, construction, and layout of a shrine and its complex of buildings; but the porosity of the border is a concern that runs through the pseudoannals of the gods that constitute the overall framework. “Now the children of Apophis, the brigands of the wilderness came on the road leading to Yat-nebes (part of the temenos of Pi-sopdu, modern Saft el-Henna) treading on Egyptian soil by night . . . they came 84. Cf. Wb. III, 1; Erichsen 1954: 284; Westendorf 1977: 352; Calderini 1996: 74 Θῷλθις (< Ḥwt-Ꜣ-ḏwy), Θῷσβις (< tꜢ ḥwt-ı͗ sbt: Wilson 1993: 627). 85.  Occupation no earlier than the Saïte period: Figueras 2000: 178; also Oren (oral communication). 86.  On the power of the staff, see Aufrère 2007: 286 and n. 599; cf. the high-priest of Horus of Mesen at Sile, “the fighter with full justification, at the front of the people, the chief”: Daressy 1914: 29–38; Montet 1957: 189–91.

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from the mountains of the East. . . . The Majesty of Re issued forth to do battle with the confederates of Apophis.” Re’s successor in this Urdynasty, his son Shu, fought against the enemy with the help of the uraeus serpent. The rebels were defeated at the “lake of knives” when the god transformed himself into a true Leviathan, a crocodile with the face of a falcon and the horns of a bull. Again, we have an enemy from the east, trespassing on Egyptian soil, a body of water the site of their defeat, and a serpent.87 The Problem of the Foreign Wives In Genesis 39, Joseph is propositioned by the wife of an Egyptian official, Potiphar (Potipherah), and in Gen 41:45 Pharaoh is said to have given Asenath88 the daughter of Potipherah, the priest of Heliopolis, to Joseph in marriage. In Num 12:1, Moses is said to have married a Kushite woman. The implications for those reading or hearing the stories and taking them seriously seemed not to have entered the consciousness of the authors: the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh were half Egyptian, and the offspring of Moses the prophet had Kushite blood in their veins! That these corollaries are never dwelled upon by the biblical writers should have alerted the reader that the notations in question are mere peripheral accretions of importance only in pointing to specific traditions, existing at the time of composition, which are passed by and not further developed in the Pentateuch. With respect to the marriage of Joseph and the specifics (name and hometown) of his wife and father-in-law, facts of no moment to the plot, scholars have now become aware of a genre of stories that may have a bearing on the author’s choice. These are a cycle of moralizing tales centering on the virtues (and vices) of the women and daughters of priests of Heliopolis (Ryholt 1999: 81–91; 2002: 361–66; 2006). The stories belong to the Demotic repertoire of the fourth and third centuries b.c.e.,89 but an early exemplar of the genre is the Aramaic text from

87.  On the Wadi el-Arish stela, see Goyon 1936: 1–42; Luft 1978: 219ff. 88. The name Potiphar has undergone modification (dropping the ‫ )ע‬and re­ vocalization to distinguish the character from the priest of Gen 41:45. The name, of course, means “He whom the (god) Re has given.” See Görg 1996: 8–10. Asenath is probably Ns-Nı͗ t, “belonging to Neith”: see Vergote 1959: 149; the name occurs in Greek as Ασενέθ: Preisigke 1922: 60. Attestation in Demotic is doubtful. 89.  Heliopolis prospered during the Saite era (Porter and Moss 1934: 59, 62–65; Perdu 2002: 87–106; el-Sawe et al. 1993) and into the 30th Dynasty (Ricke 1935: 111– 33). Thereafter, it appears to have been used as a quarry by the Ptolemies (Kakosy 1977: 1113), and when Strabo visited the site it was partly abandoned: Strabo xvii.1.29.

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the tomb at Sheikh Fodl, which belongs to the reign of Darius I.90 The presence of the prominent Hathor-Ius-aas (Vandier 1964, 1965; Posener 1985) at the site lent a strong feminine aura to Heliopolis and made it appropriate as the setting for these tales of virtuous women. It remains to be seen, in light of the above, to what extent the pseudepigraphical Joseph and Asenath owes anything to the cycle of tales of Heliopolitan women (Burchard 1985). And so the construction of the Joseph novella has the hero encounter two women of markedly different character. Both are associated with men named “Potiphar/Potipherah,” linked by name (PꜢ-dı͗ -pꜢ-Rʿ, “He whom Re has given”), and one by title, “priest of On,” with Heliopolis. The first is wife, the second daughter, to the man in question. The wife by her very role in the plot plays the part of the disreputable woman of loose morals; the daughter by implication—Pharaoh himself had bestowed her!—was a virtuous woman above reproach. The pair presents us with a “Heliopolitan” balance, clearly reflective of the stories of virtuous and immoral women of Heliopolis. No text analysis, therefore, could assign different sources for Genesis 39 and 41:45 or date them before the close of the sixth century b.c.e. at the earliest. As in the case of Gen 41:45, Num 12:1 touches on the matter of exogamy: “Miriam and Aaron too spoke against Moses on account of the matter of the Kushite wife he had taken; for he had taken a Kushite wife.” These are the grounds given for Miriam’s criticism (Coats 1988: 127–28; Schart 1990: 217), but when the disaffection is further elaborated on, it has nothing to do with marriage but rather with Moses’ claim to divinely sanctioned authority.91 A favored interpretation, but one that scarcely solves the problem of relevance, involves the reading ‫( כושן‬cf. Hab 3:7) for the MT’s ‫ כושית‬and construes the ethnic term as a reference to the Midianite origin of Zippora (Gray 1903: 121–22; Noth 1982: 84; Schmidt 1983: 111; Schmid 1986: 57; Dijkstra 2006: 20 and n. 12): Kush is, after all, at a far remove from the wilderness of the north Sinai! But the solution not only depends on an emendation; it also produces a problem of plot sense: Zippora had long been married to Moses, and offspring had long since appeared. Is Miriam only now becoming aware that she has a sister-in-law and nephews and nieces? The way 90.  Porten and Yardeni 1999: D 23.1, p. 288 panel 2; ‫ חיל‬could be for ḫl, “servant,” or priest. A manuscript in abnormal hieratic dated to Taharqa(?) year 21 has also been assigned to this type, but until publication attribution must remain moot: Baines et al. 1998: 234–36. 91.  Van Seters 1994: 234–35; Knierim and Coats 2005: 180–82. To rabbinical interpretation, however, the marriage was the central issue of the chapter: Neusner 1977: 674.

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in which Num 12:1 is phrased suggests an aside, a “toss-off” alluding to a known tradition, that is, that Moses had, at some time and under certain circumstances, had a marital liaison with a Kushite woman, but one that in the context of the Pentateuch is left unelaborated. What and whence is this piece of folklore?

Independent Exodus-Moses Tradition Most treatments of the exodus assume that the biblical account enjoys a traditio-historical and canonical advantage and priority over fourth–third-century Egyptian accounts (whether native or Alexandrian Jewish), all of which simply “piggyback” on a known and “published” exodus account. It is worthwhile to test this assumption. In the second book of Manetho’s Aegyptiaca, a king-list expanded by the addition of Demotic folklore and “historical” texts, the author inserts under the 18th Dynasty the story of a King Amenophis and the lepers. The story has a certain integrity, but as it now appears it is linked to the Hebrew exodus. Through the leader of the lepers, one Osarseph,92 the legend has acquired an identifying tag and has often been treated in the past, but with such a wide variation in results as to defy confidence (cf., among others, Meyer 1928: II, 1, 146–52; Drioton and Vandier 1962: 363–64; Krauss 1978: 224–32; Redford 1986: 281–83; Assmann 1997: 30–34; Schneider 1998; Gozzoli 2006: 213–25). References to the Hyksos ought to be treated as tangential and in no way indicative of anything other than false association. The tale of King Amenophis and the lepers in the quarry is rooted in the interpretation of certain observable ruins and artifacts and remembered incidents deriving from the reigns of Amenophis III and Akhenaten (14th century b.c.e.). (a) the name of the king, as well as his alias “Hor” (Redford 1986: 291–93; Schade-Busch 1992: 190, 304, 316–17; Bickel 2002; Gundlach and Klug 2004: 185ff., esp. 204, 263) (b) the role of Amenophis son of Hapu, the seer who predicted catastrophe (Wildung 1977) (c) the rite of “seeing the gods”93

92. The personal name was long ago derived as a composite from Wsı͗ r and SpꜢ (the centipede): Horovitz 1921: 124 n. 1; van der Horst 1984: 50 n. 8; SpꜢ-wsı͗ r certainly occurs: Leitz 2002: VI, 270. I have argued for an original ı͗ ḫr-sb, “doomed rebel.” That “Moses” should be linked not with Osarseph but with Nektanebo II (so Gmirkin 2006) seems implausible. 93.  Cf. numerous references: Urk. IV, 1819:6, 9, 12, 13; 1830:3; 1835:3; Kitchen 1979: 891:4, 894:5; Aegyptische Woerterbuch II, 7:14; for the rite of “seeing the gods” in the Late Period, see Wilson 1993: 393–94.

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(d) the ravages of the plague94 (e) the importance of quarry work under Amenophis III and Akhenaten95 (f) the presence of the high-priest of Amun Maya in the Wadi Hammamat quarries (Goyon 1957: no. 90 [pl. 25]; Redford 1963: 240–41) (g) the 13-year-long occupation by the lepers96 (h) the impiety of not worshiping the gods97

It is arguable, therefore, that the original story took shape as an etiology of the momentous events preceding and accompanying Akhenaten’s revolution in the belief system. Yet the inclusion of elements such as “Avaris” and the return of “the Shepherds,” although quite extraneous to the plot, betray a misguided later attempt to fasten on the Hyksos and thus produce an unbelievable conflation. The period when the present form of the tale took shape can be ascertained by considering the following. First, the story depicts Amenophis son of Hapu as a semidivine seer, a status he achieved in historical memory only in the outgoing Third Intermediate Period and Saite times.98 Second, the nature of King Amenophis’s action when faced by the Shepherds and lepers—reluctance to offer battle, hasty withdrawal to Memphis, flight to Nubia—derives from the pattern of the historical abandonment of Egypt by defeated kings such as Taharqa, Tanwetamani, and Nektanebo II in the face of invasion from Asia. Third, the savage destruction of cities and temples perpetrated by the returning “shepherds” mirrors the savage historical reprisals taken by Assyrians and Persians.99 Fourth, the butchering of the sacred animals reflects the great issue of the Persian occupation, especially in its later stages. Finally, the dietary laws and social customs introduced by Osarseph/Moses are precisely what, when Egyptians and Judean garrisons came into increasing contact in the sixth and especially the fifth century b.c.e. (Briant 2002: 603–8; Bleiberg 2002), caused serious friction.

94.  On the historical plague of the Amarna period, see Redford 1984: 187. 95. Cf. Urk. IV, 1648, 1681; for the epithet “monument man,” see Urk. IV, 1697, 1709, 1756; Kozloff and Bryan 1992: 73–124; Johnson 1998: 63–94; in the Silsileh quarries, the great inscription of Akhenaten and his galleries are visible from a great distance: Redford 1984: 60. 96.  Cf. the occupation of Amarna, years 5 through 17 of Akhenaten. 97.  No more damning denial of the gods and their worship could be conceived of as Akhenaten’s direct statement to his court in the early years of his reign: cf. Redford 1981: 87–102. 98.  Wildung 1977: 281, “O Amenophis, in thy great and precious name” (Dynasty 22); 277, “O prince Amenophis son of Hapu, thou good healer” (627 b.c.e.). 99.  See below, pp. 321–322.

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Bocchoris and the Exodus Another piece of folklore clearly related to the material Manetho drew upon singled out Bocchoris of the 24th Dynasty (ca. 717–711 b.c.e.) as the Pharaoh of the exodus. The leprous Jews clustering in and around the temples of the gods contaminated the shrines, and an oracle of Amun declared that they would have to be removed. This Bocchoris did, rounding them up and expelling them into Asia, where they founded Jerusalem.100 Why this story, of tenacious popularity though absurd in its chronological implications, should have captured the Egyptian imagination is difficult to determine.101 The story is clearly rooted in a native Egyptian modification of the Osarseph legend and born as a reaction to events in hither Asia that was detrimental to Egyptian interests and positioned in a time when Jerusalem and the Jews loomed sufficiently “large” in Egyptian consciousness to single them out as the requisite “northerners” of the tradition. Abetting the appropriateness of the linkage, the great cosmic ramifications of the myth pattern provided an irresistible attraction: Horus and the forces of good drove Seth and the forces of evil back northward and finally expelled them into Asia (Kurth 1982–83; Redford 1986: 279–81). We have little contemporary evidence of Bocchoris’s reign. A series of texts commemorating the burial of an Apis bull at Saqqara date to his sixth year, shortly before his death (Malinine, Posener, and Vercoutter 1968: nos. 101–2) and occasional finds in the Greek islands and the Italian peninsula (Gill and Vickers 1996: 1–9; Ridgeway 1999: 143–52). Classical tradition, however, offers a rich description of this monarch. First and foremost is the persistent claim that he was a lawgiver and a wise judge (Diodorus i.65.1, i.79.1, i.94.5; Aelian, xi.11), an assertion that has met with varied responses on the part of scholars (Redford 2001: 137 n. 10). It should be noted, however, that the legal reforms credited to Bocchoris seem to be in operation from the reign of Sabaco on, a fact that lends some credence to the tradition (Menu 1982: 272–74, 282–84). Second, it was to Bocchoris’s reign that the prophecy of a “lamb” was dated, predicting invasion from the north, the destruction of cities and the pillaging of sacred paraphernalia (Waddell 1940: 164 n. 2; 165–67; 100.  Redford 1986: 283–89. The poor and afflicted within temple courts conjures up the well-known trope of temple purification, through the expulsion of the poor and diseased who, in a moment of lassitude, on the part of temple administrators, had squatted in temple courts and built their hovels there: cf. Barguet 1962: 36–37; Posener 1937: 14–15; Montet 1946: pl. 16, col. 4. 101. On Bocchoris in general, see Krall 1898; Moret 1903; Janssen 1954; de Meulenaere 1973; Ray 2001; the story is preserved in the fragments in Lysimachus, Apion, the Prophecy of the Ram and Tacitus: for sources, see Redford 1986: 283–89.

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Aelian, xii.3; Eusebius, Chron., 86; Meyer 1910: 135–36; Lobel and Roberts 1954: 89–99, 162–64; Griffiths 1970: 550; Kakosy 1981: 142–43). While this sounds like the second Persian invasion of 343 b.c.e,102 the prophesying ram in question (undoubtedly the ram of Mendes) was noted for prophesying before the fourth century (Daressy 1911: 124– 27). Third is the claim that Tefnakhte and his son Bocchoris undertook a military expedition into the wilderness of Sinai (“Arabia”) which was not well planned. Supplies ran out and father and son were forced to survive on plain peasants’ fare.103 Though told with moralizing overtones—the king was incensed with Menes, who had introduced luxury in living and cursed him on a stela set up in Thebes—the last quarter of the 8th century, with its marching and counter-marching of hostile armies in the Sinai, provides a suggestive backdrop to the historical core of this folklore. Finally, the tradition unexpectedly comments on Bocchoris’s appearance and character: “contemptible in body,” “weak,” and “greedy.”104 Whence did this curious judgment arise? Does it hark back in any way to a face-to-face memory or the (wrongheaded) interpretation of a graphic representation? Or is the intent more subtle: to promote the “antihero” ideal, as the weak but intellectual scribes of the Satirical Letter are lauded at the expense of the athlete?105 It is interesting that Moses too in Num 12:3 is described as “meek” and “selfeffacing,” qualities that approximate the meaning of the Egyptian ẖsy, “weak, ineffectual, old, meek,” qualities that in context are often used, though not necessarily, as pejoratives. That Bocchoris’s reign should have been chosen as the setting for the “invasion” motif is understandable. Bocchoris is the last native ruler, short-lived though he was, to sit on the throne of Egypt before 50 years of invasion. In fact, his reign is bracketed by the invasions of Piankhy and Sabaco; and the way he died, by fire, in keeping with the law on treason, turned him into a tragic figure. If to these traditions focusing on Tefnakhte and Bocchoris we add the legends surrounding Nechepso the Saite (Redford 1986: 326–27), Anysis the Blind (Herodotus ii.137, 140; Lloyd 1988: 90–91), Psamtek and Tementhes (Polyaenus vii.3 [FgrH 102.  The destructiveness of the Persians in their retaking of Egypt is now vividly reflected in the excavations at Mendes: Redford 2004. 103.  Diodorus 45 (“Tnephachthon” alone); Athenaeus x.418e (Bocchoris with father Neochabis); Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride 8.354B (Bocchoris); cf. Athenaeus xi.478a. 104.  Diodorus i.65.1, i.94.5. 105.  P. Anastasi I, 9.3–10.7. Cf. the revealing (and unfortunately unpublished) paper by James Hoch, “The Grotesque in Ancient Egypt,” where the subject is well treated.

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608F9]; Burstein 1984: 31–34), Psamtek and the Bronze Men (Herodotus ii.151; Lloyd 1988: 134), and so on, one must be impressed by the fact that these narratives that lend a personal profile to the kings in question belong to Dynasties 24 and 26. We have nothing remotely similar for the faceless and eminently forgettable monarchs of Dynasties 22 and 23, and even Dynasty 25 has begun to slip beyond the scope of memory, with the single exception of Piankhy’s campaign.106 The traditions of Tanis and Napata have been interrupted, have not traversed the centuries in any intact form. But the tradition of Sais (that is, Dynasties 24–26) not only throve over the centuries but survived in a continuum thanks to the strength and vibrancy of the intellectual climate of the city, which triumphed and reunited Egypt and in the process supplanted all that had gone before. As founders of the house Tefnakhte and Bocchoris stand at the beginning of this cycle of traditions. The primacy of place enjoyed by these monarchs, their “defeat” in the wilderness, and their tragic end—had not Pharaoh suffered similarly in Exodus?—transformed them proleptically into the monarchs who had expelled the Jews. Moses and Piankhy The writings of Hellenistic and early Roman Jewish authors within the Judeo-pagan polemic are often viewed as attempts to lionize Hebrew patriarchal figures at the expense of Egypto-hellenic figures of the past (Gager 1972; Inowlocki 2004: 5–16). In particular, Thoth (Hermes) and Sesostris were frequently reinterpreted as Moses in pagan guise in a historical setting, and all the inventions claimed for either were credited to the patriarch.107 The obviously tendentious thrust of Hellenistic Judaism in Alexandria has had the deleterious effect of seeding in the mind of the modern investigator the assumption that the Jewish side of the polemic contains nothing other than what derives from biblical references on the one hand and standard classical traditions on the other. In spite of the locale of the writings, that is, Egypt, nothing of native Egyptian origin is supposed to have penetrated the discourse on the Judaic side; and this discourse came into existence only after the founding of Alexandria. 106.  For Taharqa, see Strabo i.3.21; xv.1.6; Goossens 1947: 239ff.; Leclant 1986: 156–84. Sabaco and Shebitku have already faded from collective memory and been transmogrified into Kushite tribes: Astour 1965: 253–58. 107. On Thoth-Hermes, see Schott 1972: 20–25; Derchain and Derchain 1975: 7–10; Attridge and Oden 1981: 72 and notes 6 and 8; Quaegebeur 1986: II, 525–44; Copenhaver 1992; Volokhine 2004: 131–56; Aufrère 2007: 286 n. 399 (Moses the magician).

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This negative assessment is incorrect. Already at the close of the fourth century b.c.e., the discussion on the Jews was lively in Egypt and clearly not of recent origin.108 Both Artapanus and Josephus play heavily on an incident involving the siege of a city in Upper Egypt, conducted by Moses, which is not en tant que tel treated in the Bible.109 The story begins with the invasion of Egypt right through to the Delta, under a Pharaoh Χενεφρης, who inveigled Moses into leading the Egyptian army in a counter-attack. Moses, dispatching his generals in advance, led a rag-tag army of farmers up the river and, by skillful use of ibises, rid the locality of snakes. Hermopolis (in the writings of Josephus, Meroë, capital of the Ethiopians) was placed under siege and carried after ten years. In the Josephus version, Tharbis, daughter of the Ethiopian king, saw Moses from the walls, fell in love with him, and, on her father’s capitulation, emerged to be given in marriage to him. The whole story throws up details that have their origin not in Hellenistic romance but in texts of the late Pharaonic period. Not only is Hermopolis the home of Thoth-Hermes (Boylan 1929: 150–58; Kees 1956: 305–15; Bleeker 1973: 111–14; Griffiths 1970: 559) but the great siege of the city is clearly a folkloric reminiscence of the historical investment undertaken by the “Ethiopian” Piankhy, who devotes so much space to the incident on his famous stela from Napata that the account took on a rhetorical existence of its own (Grimal 1981: lines 29–70). The points of similarity between the contents of the stela and the accounts of Artapanus and Josephus are striking. The personal name Χενεφρης, with the common interchange between χ and Σ,110 recalls Piankhy’s prenomen Snfr-rʿ. The dispatch of generals in advance reflects exactly the tactic Piankhy made use of early in his campaign (Grimal 1981: lines 9–21). The trope of the rag-tag army of nonprofessionals, farmers in this case, is also found in the Piankhy stela: such a motley crew of amateur commoners engaged Piankhy, suitably enraged at being so insulted, at the siege of Memphis.111 The king’s daughter Θαρβις—the personal name is in fact the common Egyptian name Tʾ-rpyt (Wb. II, 415; Ranke 1939: 108.  Murray 1970: 141–71; Dillery 1998: 255–75. That certain Hebrew traditions, particularly those in Genesis, had not achieved inscripturation in the early Ptolemaic period has been inferred from Aristoboulos’s failure to mention them: Holladay 1995: 215. 109.  Josephus, Ant. ii.10.1–2; Eusebius Praep. ev. ix.27.1–37. It is most unlikely that Num 12:1 alone lies at the root of this midrash: Silver 1973: 123–53; on Artapanus, see Braun 1938: 26–31, 99–102; Rajak 1978: 111–22; Denis 1987: 49–65. 110.  Cf. Σοῦφις and Χεωψ (Waddell 1940: 46), Σταάν and Hayan (1940: 90), Μίσαφρις and Mn-ḫpr-rʿ (1940: 112). 111.  Grimal 1981: line 86 “craftsmen, builders, and sailors”; the motif of the noble, professional warrior being insulted by opponents not worthy of him, is

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I, 364:20; Lüddeckens et al. 1996: 1070)—appearing on the walls and coming forth to the conqueror, reproduces the same action of Namlot’s women at the siege in question (Grimal 1981: 33–35). Another irrelevant fact abetting the (false) insertion of “Moses” into the Hermopolis siege is the title of Piankhy’s Libyan enemy chiefs on this campaign: though often rendered by the Egyptian wr, the Libyan title, which continued to appear in Egyptian texts as a calque, was māsĕ, “lord, master,” a homonym of the PN mōšě (cf. Yoyotte 1958: 81–89; 1985: 41 note b). Through the dominance of themes and characters, inverted roles and assigned motivation, the siege of Hermopolis by Piankhy has become a vehicle for the Mosaic tradition. Num 12:1 knows of this tradition: the verse is not its origin.112

Egypt in the Fourth Century b.c.e. We have been drawn increasingly in our examination of the backdrop of the Joseph and Moses traditions to the post-Saite period. More specifically, it is on the outgoing fifth and the whole of the fourth centuries b.c.e. that our interest focuses. What was Egypt like during this century and a quarter, and what was her outlook on the external world? The Saite Dynasty of Egypt had showed great concern in maintaining ties with the states of the southern Levant in order to stabilize a buffer zone on Egypt’s northeastern frontier. To that end, Psamtek I, Necho II, Psamtek II, and Apries had dispatched, or led, legations and sometimes expeditionary forces into the bailiwicks of Gaza, Ashkelon, Ekron, and Judah. But with the sudden and wholly unexpected collapse of Egyptian defenses in the spring of 525 b.c.e. in the face of Cambyses’ advance, these policies and preoccupations became things of the past. For 120 years, Egypt was to become a backwater: Qedarite Arabs infiltrated and settled in the Wadi Tumilat, and Saite border forts were abandoned. As the fifth century b.c.e. drew to a close and Persian neglect of its African province increased, food riots broke out and rapidly transformed themselves into political insurrection. True, sporadic rebellions had broken out before, after the failure of Inaros to liberate Egypt, yet none gained much support beyond the Delta fastnesses where most known elsewhere in the Late Period: cf. Herodotus ii.141; Lloyd 1988: III, 101–2; Plutarch, Agesilaus xxxviii.1 (Nektanebo II). 112. Another curious link between Moses and Piankhy is to be found in the mountain: Moses is associated with the “Mount of God,” whence Yahweh thunders his laws and regulations; Piankhy and the 25th Dynasty are associated with the “Pure Mountain” (Gebel Barkal), where Amun-Re king of the gods resides and where he gives oracles.

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of the rebels were at home.113 Even the latest “troubles” from 414 to 405 b.c.e, which issued in true independence for Egypt under the 28th Dynasty, weaned diehards only gradually from loyalty to Persia: even as late as 398 b.c.e., Widarnaga, commandant at Elephantine, was still dating according to the regnal years of Artaxerxes II.114 Upon the death of Darius II in the spring of 404 b.c.e., one of the warlords of the day, Amyrtaeos II of Sais, declared independence and backdated his reign to the previous New Year’s Day (December 2, 405 b.c.e.). Of his six-year floruit almost nothing is known, save that the process of routing out Persian officialdom and influence proved more difficult than expected.115 Providing unforeseen complications, the city of Mendes, which had enjoyed political prominence in the Delta throughout the entire first millennium b.c.e, promoted itself as a major center of anti-Persian activity and a rival to Sais (Redford forthcoming a). In 400, Tamos, the Egyptian admiral serving with Cyrus the Younger, fled back to his homeland, only to be fleeced and murdered by “Psamtek the Mendesian.”116 P. Berlin 13571 and ostraca from the oasis of Dush are dated to years 5 and 6 of a “King Psamtek,” who must be positioned in an array of dated texts between Darius II and Neferites and very plausibly must be identified with Diodorus’s Psamtek (Chauveau 1996: 32–47). In that case, he will have been Neferites’ immediate predecessor in Mendes, dating his reign from the same event, the death of Darius II, as Amyrtaeos had used. Early in 398 b.c.e. (with the passing of Psamtek?), disturbances must have broken out in the Delta that presaged the changing political fortunes of the older power centers of the country. One of the Brooklyn Aramaic papyri (Kraeling 1953: no. 13, lines 2–5; Grelot 1972: 42–43 no. 105; Porten 1984: 400; Porten and Yardeni 1986: 46–47) contains a 113.  Ray (1987: 79; CAH 4:277) has rightly characterized them as “warlords” and “disaffected warriors.” 114. Lemaire 1991: 199–201; 1995: 51–61. Scholars have tended to generalize about the toleration and easy administration of the Persian authorities in Egypt: Nylander 1979: 353; Bresciani 1984: 368; Holm-Rasmussen 1988: 33; Calmeyer 1991: 285–303; Johnson 1994: 150; Kock 2007: 40 n. 51. But this view certainly must be nuanced. No one who has contemplated the brutality attending the suppression of the Inaros revolt or the destruction of Mendes by Artaxerxes III could possibly maintain a view of this sort. 115. See Porten 1990: 19; Briant 2002: 619. Only in his fifth year (400 b.c.e.) was Amyrtaeos’s authority acknowledged at the First Cataract: Cowley 1923: no. 35 (June 19). 116.  Diodorus xiv.19; 35.3–5; Xenophon, Anab. I.2.21; iv.2. Donadoni (1983: 34) believed him to be a genuine “piccolo sovrano,” Lloyd a Diodoran mistake for “Amyrtaeos” (CAH 5:347 and n. 48).

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cryptic statement, almost by way of an aside to the main burden of the missive: “They will bring to Memphis King Amyrtaeos; King Neferites has assumed (the throne) on the [. . .] of Epiphi,” and after a substantial lacuna, “King Neferites has/will. . . .”117 Unfortunately, it is not clear whether Amyrtaeos is being “brought to Memphis” as a corpse for burial or alive and possibly under constraint (Ray 1987: 81; 1988: 284). In the latter case, and in view of the reference to “King” Neferites, one would be justified in postulating a power struggle that had issued in victory for the Mendesian general.118 In that case, we should also be obliged to postulate incarceration and perhaps execution of Amyrtaeos at Neferites’ hands (Bianchi 1982: 454–556; Salmon 1985: 158 nn. 97–98). This may prove a preferable solution, because no dynastic “Saite” succession ensued (even though the “spirit” of Sais lived on), a fact that the Demotic Chronicler felt constrained to explain.119 The success of Egypt’s struggle for independence from 414 b.c.e., in contrast to the failure of similar attempts two generations earlier, must be put down largely to the changing face of geopolitics in the eastern Mediterranean. Unrest in various parts of the empire meant that the great king could no longer command universal loyalty or direct the weight of Persian imperial might solely against Egypt. A case in point is the belated attempt in 401 b.c.e. to amass an army under Abrocomas, allegedly 300,000 strong,120 to bring Egypt to heel, which in the event had to be diverted for action against the rebel Cyrus.121 A similar, though smaller, mustering of ships in Phoenicia in 396 b.c.e. likewise came to nought.122 These failures of the Persian administration, coupled 117.  Grelot (1972: 42–43, no. 105) renders “La forteresse de . . . [. . .] le roi Neferites (l)a écrasée.” But the reading is doubtful. 118.  It is possible that the shawabti of a general Neferites, probably from Mendes, belonged to an early stage in the later monarch’s career: Chevereau 1985: no. 266. For shawabtis of Neferites as king, undoubtedly from Mendes, see Janes 2002: nos. 95a–c. 119. Amyrtaeos had violated divine law (Demotic Chronicle iii.18–19), and therefore it was “ordained that the ordinance should not be fulfilled” (iv.1–2), that is, that no son should follow him on the throne. 120.  All figures for combatant forces during this period should be taken cum grano salis, especially those based on multiples of the figure “3.” The most egregious example is the enumeration of the attacking force in 343 b.c.e. 300,000 men, 30,000 cavalry, 300 triremes: Diodorus xvi.40; cf. also the 300 ships of Xenophon: Hellenica III, iv.1. A generalizing expression such as “hundreds, thousands, and hundreds of thousands” could only be rendered in the Egyptian script by tripling the numerals in question, with no means available of distinguishing a true and intended multiple of three. 121.  Xenophon, Anab. I.4.3; Isocrates, Philip, 101. 122.  Xenophon, Hellenica III, iv.1.

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with the success of Amyrtaeos’s and Neferites’ bids for power, find a reflection in the sudden unanimity of allegiance among the Egyptians and a decision on the part of the authorities to take the initiative against Persia. While the outcome of the troubles was yet unclear, the great king’s legitimacy was still acknowledged following his regnal years;123 but when the finality of Neferites’ victory became apparent, this124 and other trappings of Persian control were eliminated. The garrisons at Elephantine were heard of no more and were probably arrested and disarmed, if not put to death.125 It is quite likely that, with Neferites’ consolidation of power, the Qedarite Arabs under their chief Qainu son of Gashmu were expelled from the eastern sector of the Wadi Tumilat, where they had enjoyed jurisdiction for over a century (Winnett 1970: 115–17; Salmon 1985: 159; Graf 1990: 138–42; Ephʿal 1998: 115; Eshel 2007: 149). In the aftermath, the eastern canal, the transit corridor of commerce and the military, was allowed to silt up, and no more would the great king enjoy it as the direct link between the Nile and the Persian homeland (Tuplin 1991: 238). Persia was forced to abandon north Arabia (Knauf 1990: 201–17); not surprisingly, the land route to South Arabia began to revive, much to the benefit of Gaza, its northern terminus (Katzenstein 1989: 77–78; Tuplin 1991: 272–73; Klengel 1993: 134*). The Egypt that emerged from foreign occupation in 404 b.c.e. was to enjoy 60 years of independence. Culturally, it remained within the tradition and spirit of Sais of the 26th Dynasty, but political power had passed to Mendes, which provided the families constituting Manetho’s 29th and 30th Dynasties. Here, the “Ram, Lord of Djedet” dominated the cult, a veritable Azazel, and issues of animal taboos and sacrificial animals lurked in the sensitivities of the inhabitants. With the usurpation of Neferites I, efforts toward internal restoration and an active foreign policy revived. The new city of royal origin, Mendes, shows a resumption of work on the great temple complex of Ba-neb-djed, in abeyance since the reign of Amasis 150 years earlier (Redford forthcom123.  Kraeling 1953: no. 10 (March, 402 b.c.e.: Grelot 1972: 51; Parker 1955: 274 n. 7), Cowley 1923: no. 7 (September, 401 b.c.e.: Porten 1987: 89–92), and Kraeling 1953: no. 12 (December, 401 b.c.e.), all dated to the reign of Artaxerxes II. Amyrtaeos was not acknowledged before early summer of 401 b.c.e, his fifth year by his own reckoning (Cowley 1923: no. 35); but the unrest of 398 b.c.e, which brought Neferites to power, resulted in a brief reversion to Artaxerxes II’s regnal years. 124.  On the abandonment of the Babylonian calendrical dating in favor of the Egyptian at the end of the fifth century, see Porten 1985: 41–51. 125.  The plausible suggestion has been made (Kraeling 1953: 113) that Neferites’ animus against the Elephantine garrison was motivated by the spiritual affinity of the Ram-cults of Mendes and Elephantine, both now rallying points for nationalist and xenophobic sentiments: Redford and Redford 2005: 190–91.

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ing b). Columns, dadoes, and new chambers were added, and a royal necropolis laid out east of the temple (Redford 2004).126 By the advent of the 30th Dynasty, a major program of temple reconstruction had been set on foot, requiring the outlay of an astonishing amount of wealth (Arnold 1999: 93–136). It is astounding, under these circumstances, that the 29th–30th Dynasties could still amass the wealth and the wherewithal to involve themselves actively and belligerently in the politics of Western Asia. In keeping with the extent of its traditional sphere of influence, Egypt attempted to reassert itself along the Levantine littoral, reactivating old friendships or exercising force (MacAlister 1912: 313 fig. 452 [stela of Neferites I]; Elayi 1980: 22 and n. 82 [Egyptian influence strong in Tyre]; Rowe 1936: 295, pl. 38; Stern 1984: 75 [Akoris in Accho and Sidon]; Diodorus xv.2.2–3; Aristophanes, Plutus 178; Kienitz 1953: 83 [alliances with Salamis and Athens]; Diodorus xv.9.18; Ruzicka 1999: 23–43 [alliance with Glos]; it remains moot whether destruction levels in Palestinian sites at this time can be attributed to Egyptian military activity [Stern 1978: 82–83; Bennett and Blakely 1989: 337; Blenkinsopp 2007: 386–87]). But through a typical lack of perseverance and a proclivity to settle for half measures, Egypt was unable to make any headway in creating a permanent empire. Trade with Greece and Phoenicia remained strong, to judge by the discoveries from the three harbors at Mendes, where East Greek and Phoenician crisp wares abound in fourth century contexts;127 as well as the alabastra and jewelry that continued to be exported to Asia (Stern 1973: 233). But the Egyptians were unable to prevent the Persians from heavily garrisoning the Negeb, laying in large quantities of supplies (Stern 1973: 251–52; Fantalkin and Tal 2006: 186–89; Lipschits and Vanderhooft 2007: 86–89) and mounting large-scale invasion attempts with impunity. That Pharnabazos and Abrocomas failed is no credit to Egyptian military prowess. Even diplomatic aid was not bestowed with any success. The auxiliaries, food, and supplies sent by Neferites to Greece in 396 b.c.e. were seized by the Persians (Diodorus xiv.35.3, 79; Justin vi.2; cf. Xenophon, Hellenica iii.4.1). In spite of his aid to Evagoras, Akoris watched him come to terms with Persia and was thereafter obliged to erect his defenses with the help of Chabrias just beyond Pelusium (Kienitz 1953: 126.  To date, only the tomb of Neferites I has been unearthed. 127.  Publication in preparation. Discussion of the place of provenience of the customs register from Elephantine has fastened on Naukratis and Memphis, with sites on the eastern side of the Delta or the Wadi Tumilat being less likely: Briant 1998: 91–92. Judging by the evidence alluded to above and also the strength of discharge the Mendesian branch enjoyed from ca. 650 to 200 b.c.e, Mendes must certainly be added as a candidate.

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83; Salmon 1985: 160; Strabo xvii.647, 679, 682; Pliny Nat. V.14, Diodorus xv.2–3). Tachos attempted to finance the “Satraps’ Revolt,” only to suffer the confiscation of his money by Rheomithres, who defected to the Persians (Diodorus xv.52.1). It is against the backdrop of the general frustration felt by Egypt at having no diplomatic or military success and having to depend for its defense on foreigners that Tachos’ military escapade in Western Asia is to be viewed (Briant 2002: 663–66). This incident, now partly confirmed by the biography of the priest-healer Onnophrios (von Kaenel 1980: 31–45), shows us the king of Egypt returning to his ideological roots: using the “decimation” method to create an expeditionary force (Bresciani 1958: 166–67; Will 1960: 254–75; Salmon 1985: 163–64; Ray 1987: 83); insisting on leading the army himself, probably putting himself in the center of the line as Nektanebo did (Plutarch, Agesilaus xxxix.4); proceeding to the Levantine coast by sea (Plutarch, Agesilaus xxxix.2), using Phoenician cities as bases from which to besiege and reduce forts in the hinterland.128 (Significantly, the action was directed against the northern Levant and Syria, not against Palestine and the south; Ephʿal 1998: 109.) It is interesting to note that, although these strategies and personal antics are perfectly in keeping with the macho persona of the imperial Pharaoh, recalling a sort of Mameluk dash and bravado, they called forth on the lips of a contemporary Greek the contemptuous κενεφροσύνη, “empty-mindedness” (Plutarch, Agesilaus, xxxvii.2). Incidentally, the biography of Onnophrios might suggest that Tachos’s invasion was somewhat more successful than we often assume. In the wake of machinations involving “evil letter[s]” (from Tachos to Tjahepimu?), Onnophrios was obliged to go to Asia (by sea in a trireme!) to meet Nektanebo II and encountered him in “the land of Su[. . .].” Several possible restorations suggest themselves, all in north Syria (see Gauthier 1929: 18–19; Marín 2001: 276–79), but Sura on the Euphrates east of Emar is a distinct possibility (Lipiński 2000: 42). Many have long sensed and now concrete evidence has emerged that the treatment of Egypt by the Persians differed markedly from the first occupation to the second. In the past, the outrages of Artaxerxes III—the destruction of cities (Diodorus xvi.51.2) and the slaughter of sacred animals (including the Ram of Mendes) (Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, 355C, 363C; Aelian, Var. hist., vi.8; Nat. an. X.28; Hopfner 1929: 128.  There should therefore be no confusion concerning what “Syria” refers to in Diodorus xv.92.4. The strategy followed that of Egyptian kings from Thutmose III on and involves securing the coast and then striking inland into the Orontes valley and farther north: Redford 2006: 325–43.

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429; Thompson 1988: 106)—have been dismissed as simple mimicry, assumed by later historians, of the (alleged) crimes of Cambyses (Ray 1987: 84; cf. Schwartz 1949: 69 [who calls the murder of Apis at the hands of Artaxerxes “pure legend”]). “Persian rule was presumably slightly more enlightened than this.”129 According to Bresciani, the reimposition of Persian rule proved to be as benign as ever, and the temples enjoyed a quick return to normal life.130 Nothing could be farther from the truth. The Satrap stela specifically alludes to destruction (Urk. II, 15:18). Graffiti from Elephantine speak of the destruction of the temples by the Medes (Lüddeckens 1971: 203–6), as does Ptolemy II in his Mendes stela (Urk. II, 38:7–8). Padi-osiris, lesonis-priest at Hermopolis, cannot be more plain in his description of this period: “I passed seven years as lesonis-priest of this god (Thoth), managing his endowment without a (single) fault of mine coming to light—all the while a foreign ruler was in charge of Egypt, and nothing was in its wonted place. For war had broken out within Egypt, and the south was in uproar, and the north in turmoil. People moved hither and yon, and no temple had a support staff or a priesthood; but people did not know what the future had in store” (Lefebvre 1923: 54). To be added now to the textual evidence is the archaeological. We should expect that Mendes, the city that had led the fight for freedom and provided Egypt with two rebel dynasties, should have come in for punishment. We discovered the tomb of Neferites I wholly demolished, the sarcophagus opened, the body destroyed, and the debris thrown over the adjacent city wall of Nektanebo I to a depth of nearly four meters, wholly concealing the outer face. The burial chamber was turned into a periodically inundated cesspool for about 20 years, until filled Hellenistic times. The palace east of the temple was fired after someone had tried to secrete thousands of pottery vessels (temple utensils?) in an upper chamber. The burial place of the sacred rams was also disturbed, though refurbished later by Ptolemy II. The little shrine of Nektanebo II adjacent to the northwest harbor was destroyed and the harbor intentionally filled in. In short: all the evidence bespeaks an all-out effort to make the city uninhabitable and to terminate domestic and cultic life.131 A similar motivation underlies the confiscation of the cult images, censors, ʿbꜢ scepters, and sacred books (bꜢw-Rʿ ) from all the temples of 129.  Ray 1987: 90. 130.  Bresciani 1958: 167; 1985: 526, drawing on the dubious evidence of a single papyrus! Sottas 1921: 54 n. 27. 131. “The 1993 Summer Expedition to Mendes,” ATP Newsletter, Sept. 1993; “Five Years of Excavations at Mendes,” ATP Newsletter, May, 1996; The Excavations at Mendes I. The Royal Necropolis (Leiden, 2003), passim.

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Upper and Lower Egypt.132 Conquerors in the past (Assyrians, for example) had often committed images and cult paraphernalia to destruction or taken them off as part of the booty; but the Persian intent was infinitely more sinister and malevolent. Without cultic implements, temples would suffer a hiatus in divine service until replacements could be obtained. But far more serious was the removal of the contents of the pr-mḏꜢt nṯr and the pr-ʿnḫ with their liturgical and prescriptive manuals, such as the sı͗ pty wr, without which divine service would lapse indefinitely and cultic replacements remain impossible to obtain.133 The implications of this Persian act of violence with respect to Egyptian libraries has not been fully realized. If successful, it would have seriously damaged the Egyptian belief system.134 That contemporaries realized this was borne out by the pious act of restoring the cult paraphernalia to their respective temples, repeated in the first three reigns of the Ptolemaic Dynasty until it became cliché (Winnicki 1944: 149–90). It was also borne out by the dramatic change in the surface treatment of walls in temples built under the Ptolemies. Thus, while their imperial authorization of Egyptian religious texts remains implicit, the Persians could dramatically and catastrophically withdraw that authorization if and when they felt the need. The ingredients of the biblical exodus and the Persian domination and Egyptian resistance crystallized during the late fourth to fifth centuries b.c.e. into the stories as we know them.135 The span of years between 414 and 390 b.c.e. was especially crucial in the shaping of the self-conscious apprehension of the Egyptians toward the north. While by “inversion” the roles of Cyrus, Yahweh, and the bloodthirsty Pharaoh produced the transmogrified Exodus account (cf. Zlotnick-Sivan 2004: 189–205; Guillaume 2004: 232–36), in Egypt the rigors of Persian occupation and the successful rebellion of Sais and Mendes (411–399 b.c.e.) provided the background to the legend of the detrimental nature of northern occupation, the continued threat from the north, and 132.  Diodorus xvi.51.2. The “Satrap” stela (Urk. II, 14:9–11) specifies this breakdown; the Pithom stela (Urk. II, 91) mentions only images, the Canopus Decree (Urk. II, 128:11) only “divine utensils.” 133. The generic designation of liturgical texts is nt-ʿ (“ritual”): Schott 1990: 117–26; on sı͗ pty wr (“the great inventory,” that is, the compendium of directions for making images and cultic utensils), Schott 1990: 343–44; Daumas 1973: 18–20; Fischer 1968: 48–49; Redford 1981b: 92–94. 134. On Roman attempts to suppress an entire religion through razing of temples, see Rutledge 2007: 179–95. 135.  On this general consensus, see, inter alia, Bolin 1996: 3–13; Ben Zvi 1997: 194–209; Kessler 2001: 137–58; Schmid 2007: 237–52; Niesiolowski-Spanò 2007: 106– 26.

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the desirability of expelling the indigestible alien elements. It was the end of the fifth century b.c.e. that witnessed the revival of a specifically Saite tradition in art and archaism and the interpretation of the past. The details for a “Chronicler’s” rereading of history fell into place: the founders, Tefnakhte and Bocchoris, became martyrs to foreign invaders, and all subsequent kings were about to be judged on the degree of piety in their relations with the gods (cf. Spiegelberg 1914; Johnson 1983: 61–72; 1984: 107–24; Wessetdzky 1981: 11–21; Meyer 1997: 177–212). Though the folklore of foreign invasion and deliverance was rooted in the Kushite, Assyrian, and Persian invasions, the Egyptians now had risen up and had expelled the hated occupiers by themselves, back into Asia. And there they lurked, waiting to return, by either force or invitation, providing the background for the motif of the “Return of the Shepherds.”136 Now all Egyptians manifested apprehension over the strength of the northern frontier, and royal titulary stresses the need for vigilance in the northern marches (Kahl 2002: 31–42). The geopolitical stance and motivation of the national actors in the Joseph and Moses narratives in Genesis and Exodus perfectly mirrors the reality of the times. The Persian occupation of the fifth century was a period when descent into Egypt to thrive on government employment was easy for any “Joseph” stolen away from the “land of the Hebrews.” Pastoralists could be allowed to settle in Goshen (the Qedarite Arabs) and to assert their identity by refusing burial in Egypt (Berman 2006: 11–31). And then “there arose a king that knew not Joseph” (Dynasty 29), and a real fear took root that resident aliens might grow in number and side with the enemy seeking to return (the Persians). The possibility of ‫ מרגלים‬sent to spy out the land and identify its weakness constituted ready and plausible accusations. The threat of invasion (Pharnabazus, 373 b.c.e.)137 caused Pharaoh to throw up massive urban circumvallations of mud-brick, turning towns into true ‫ערי מסכנות‬. The revived cults of Khnum, Arsaphes, Apis, and Ba-neb-djed raised the treatment and possible slaughter of the sacred animals to the level of an issue of importance. The “land of Goshen” became sensitive territory and its occupation by foreigners unthinkable. Thus, the fourth century produced a lively repartee in pointed political tractates. As we have seen, on the Egyptian side there appeared 136. For ḥḳꜢ ḫꜢswt applied to Persian kings, see Lefebvre 1923: 81, 28; Posener 1937: 6, 21; Hölbl 1992: 273–78. 137.  Diodorus xv.1.41–43; Ray 1987: 82–83, 87–88. Surviving walling systems from Nektanebo I are to be found at Balamun (Spencer 1999: 93), Mendes (Redford 2004: 7ff., and n. 6), Karnak (Redford 1981a: 16–17), Elkab (Baines and Malek 1980: 80–81).

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(1) a reworking of an etiology on the Amarna period, encorporating prophecy by a wise man and/or potter and the return of the shepherds, and (2) the lionization of Tefnakhte and Bocchoris in a Saite tradition of celebration, attached to the motifs of temple defilement, ovid prophecy and expulsion. On the “Hebrew” side, we have already seen the linkage between Moses and the Kushites, but what else?

Scripturalizing Mnemonic History: Inclusion and Omission Four cycles of written traditions expand on the “exodus” event, the two Egyptian traditions discussed above, the first 14 chapters of the canonical book of Exodus, and the riposte contained in the Judeo-pagan polemic, reflected in Artapanus and Josephus (among others). None of these, however, can claim any sort of prior status as textus receptus from which the others wholly derive. Each is very much a tract for the times, heavily weighted by the writer’s, or raconteur’s, hidden agenda. The burden of the first 14 chapters of Exodus does not constitute, nor could it, even if the intent were present, a comprehensive treatment of Moses, Israel in bondage, or the exodus itself. Its overriding interest lies in telling how someone shepherding flocks, from a community of shepherds, received a miraculous and divine call, entered Egypt from the east, became an agent of god’s intimidating power, and led the Israelites out of Egypt. This “Moses” has nothing to do with Egypt,138 does not move in court circles (cf. Exod 3:11), and is thoroughly alien to the culture of the Nile land (even though in the connected Exodus narrative he must have been Pharaoh’s cousin or half-brother!). The narrative of this “Moses” accounts for nearly 60% of the material in these chapters, while cultic regulations (upwards of 52 verses) and genealogies (21 verses) amount to an additional 20%. Even the actual “miracle of the sea” yields only 32 verses or 9% of the total. Themes that find their setting solely in Egypt, namely, the bondage, occupy 28 verses, only 8% of the whole; while “Moses, prince of Egypt,” his birth and life in Egypt, accounts for a mere 18 verses, or 5% of the total! Clearly, “Moses in Egypt” did not suggest itself to the writer or redactor as a theme on which he should or could(?) elaborate, given that his chief task was to laud the power of Yahweh and, humorlessly and legalistically, to describe in detail and to legitimize the “law.” By contrast, the dialogue between Yahweh, the divine force, and the zögernd Tor Moses, reluctant to assume the role and in need of persuasion, takes us into the realm of folkloric repartee with almost picaresque overtones. 138.  The “mythic founder/leader”: see Meyers 2005: 13; Carr 2001: 294–95.

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The style and arrangement of the first 14 chapters of Exodus present us with a disquietingly half-finished piece with unsifted source material. In contrast to the patriarchal narratives, and especially the Joseph story, the Exodus account lacks plot integrity and, by its repetition, contradiction, and illogicality, would confuse and puzzle the perceptive reader. Doublets139 are ubiquitous and have, as expected, called forth ingenious explanations. The use of disparate sources and the failure to make the pericopes join smoothly results in an awkward pace to the plot,140 and in some cases outright contradiction. Where, for example, does Israel live, all over the land (Exod 1:7) or in Goshen (Exod 8:22 and passim)? Are they abject slaves, living in bondage under the whip, or do they own houses with doors and flocks and herds (Exod 9:7; 10:23; 12:3ff., 32)? Who really meets Moses at the inn, and who really resides in the cloudy pillar, Yahweh (Exod 3:4, 4:24, 13:21) or the malakh Yahweh (Exod 3:2, 4:24 [LXX], 14:19)? The shoddy way in which the “Plague-theme”141 is left as a piece of undeveloped folklore reduces the individual plages to mythemes outside a syntagmatic structure and thus susceptible to ridiculous inconsistencies. Thus, the story demands the slavish repetition of the parallel acts of magic performed by Pharaoh’s magicians, in spite of the fact that in context this would have been impossible (cf. Exod 7:22; 8:7, 18; etc.). The river, once changed to blood (Exod 7:20–8:6), remains in that state: can frogs really swarm in such a bloody mess (Exod 8:3)? The fifth plague kills all the Egyptian cattle (Exod 9:6), yet the next day all the cattle are back (Exod 9:19–20)! The hail destroys every beast and plant in the fields (Exod 9:25), yet when the locusts come there is still foliage to attract them (Exod 10:12). After tasting the heady wine of the Joseph story, to be cast into this shoddy narrative is like plunging into a barrel of plonk. In spite of the difficulty in establishing domain, genre, and authorial intent in such ancient texts, Exodus by anyone’s standards is a failed narrative. Was Exodus 1–14 “authored” or merely “written” (Hodge 1990: 74) by throwing preexistent pieces into a rough sequence and tying up 139.  Twice Yahweh introduces himself to Moses (Exodus 3 and 6), twice Moses and Aaron appear before Pharaoh, ostensibly for the first time (Exod 5:1; 6:11, 29), twice Moses sees Pharaoh for the last time (Exod 10:28–29, 12:31), twice the ordinance of Passover is issued (Exod 12:2–20, 13:1–16); three times Moses is commissioned to go before Pharaoh (Exod 3:10, 4:19, 6:29, 7:2). Attempts at harmonization, of course, only heighten the reader’s incredulity. 140.  Cf., for example, the unexpected interruptions of Exod 6:14–26 and 11:9–10. 141.  The symmetry some have claimed to be observable in the present state of the plagues-narrative (cf. McCarthy 1965: 336–45; Greenberg 1967: I, 51–54; Schmidt 1983) is wholly artificial and scarcely rescues a poorly articulated tradition.

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the interstices by connective anecdotes? The resultant “script,” or episodic memory sequences, which inform most narratives and give rise to genre expectations (Minchin 2001: 13–37), are only partly successful here. The “redactor,” that deus ex machina, is often dragged forth in these cases to explain everything away; but there is such confusion over the meaning of the term that his powers are rapidly diminishing (Van Seters 2006: 314–17). The poor style, however, does not deter whoever is talking to us from adopting the expected hegemony of the narrator who “knows” and condescends to “tell” (Hodge 1990: 173). He makes use of dramatic tension, a device used in oral presentation, but here carried over into the written form of oral discourse (  parlando).142 He can also “shout,” metaphorically speaking. The crude insistence on identification without risk of mistake (cf. Exod 6:26–27) is but a carryover of the gestural aspect of language, drawn from the system of metasigns (Falck 1994: 40–43). Whoever is speaking to us cares nothing for “Moses the Egyptian” or anything remotely related to that theme: his core interest lies in the Yahweh-Moses dialogue issuing in the extended Yahwistic monologue, linked to Moses’ acquiescence in carrying out the divine demands. The central theme is larded with otiose (e.g., genealogical) or irrelevant (e.g., chronological) marginalia, with etiologies thrown in at points deemed appropriate to underscoring the power of Yahweh and his laws (e.g., the midwives, the “bloody husband,” the unleavened bread, and so on), the whole served up “raw.” There is no need to postulate a “depth” beneath this kind of “purposefully spare” text (Alter 1992: 180). Conciseness and understatement may well produce a profoundly esthetically pleasing presentation; yet again, they may betray the presence of an unskilled writer or compiler. The latter’s sole intent in Exodus 1–14 is to lionize the figure of Yahweh in all his awful power so as to underpin the law giving at the Mount of God and the law itself, with a legitimation that no one can disregard or challenge. In contrast to Exodus 1–14, Artapanus and Josephus pretend to have detailed knowledge of “Moses-in-Egypt.” The episodes in their slightly varying accounts may be set forth as is shown in the chart on p. 327. Where Exodus 1–14 is essentially ignorant of “Moses in Egypt,” the tradition adumbrated above has a good deal to say. Five themes stand out: Moses as a Thoth/Hermes, lawgiver, and innovator; the campaign against Hermopolis and the “Ethiopians”; the plot against Moses; the projected Arabian campaign against Egypt; and the incarceration of Moses by Pharaoh. The last is what one would have expected if one 142. In Exodus and Numbers it is evident in the plague and “murmuring” narratives: Wilcoxen 1974: 97; Bar-Efrat 1992: 197.

The Traditions Surrounding “Israel in Egypt” Artapanus (Eusebius, Praep. evang.)

327

Josephus (Ant.) ii.9.2.  Prophecy of the birth of a wise man prompts the killing of the newborn. Amram’s vision.

ix.27.1–4.  Moses adopted by childless Meris; called Mousaios.

ii.9.5.  King’s daughter called Termuthis. (Paraphrase of Exodus)

ix.27.4–5.  Moses teaches arts of civilized living, warfare, and established cults of sacred animals. ix.27.7–10.  The “Ethiopian” campaign (Hermopolis).

ii.10.1–2.  The “Ethiopian” campaign.

ix.27.11–16.  King Chenephres accepts Moses but deceitfully plots to kill him.

ii.11.1.  The king is envious of Moses’ success in war.

(Etiologies: first Cataract garrison, building the Amun temple and the city Meroe, the Apis cult.) ix.27.17–19.  Aaron suggests flight to Arabia; proposed attack on Egypt by Arabia.

(Paraphrase of Exodus)

ix.27.22–26.  Moses returns and is put in prison, whence he effects a miraculous escape.

were following the plot and demanding a certain degree of integrity: the king would naturally clap the troublemaker in irons! Yet in Exodus, Pharaoh merely dismisses Moses with an illogical and perfunctory, “get out of here and back to work!” (Bahar 2007: 5–9). The plot against Moses, again a perfectly logical plot development, is covered in Exodus solely by 2:15. The introduction of the East, Arabia, into the plot is absent from Exodus—Midian is used—unless an echo is to be heard in ‫( ערב רב‬Exod 12:38). Lacking the original Artapanus but aided by Josephus (who admittedly follows Exodus more closely), one can see that these themes are treated romantically. Nothing of the picaresque is discernible. Yet the material already in existence, on which Artapanus works, centering on the concept of the wise lawgiver Thoth-Hermes, the reinterpreted

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Piankhy campaign, honesty and deceit, and Arabia threatening, is not of itself cast in a Hellenic “romantic” mold. (The other aspects of Artapanus’s working up of the stories, his style and plot consistency, elude us, because we have only the [inferior] Eusebian paraphrase.) The Intertextuality of the Exodus Accounts So far we have isolated four late treatments of the Exodus from Egypt of an Asiatic element, two Egyptian and two Hebrew: (1) the Osarseph story, derived from an etiology of the Amarna age; (2) the Bocchoris story, a product of a Saite tradition; (3) the exodus account of Exodus 1–14; and (4) the Egypto-Jewish riposte, fastening mostly on the tradition of Moses in Egypt. All four reflect communal stances assumed by the exigencies of the late fifth and fourth centuries b.c.e. and underpinned by a cycle of mnemo-historic orality, no part of which is extraneous to the whole or occupies a privileged position in tradition history. Thus, the Bocchoris version is certainly aware of the more elaborate Osarseph legend, which in a sense it “downsizes”; and Artapanus, writing in the third century, certainly not only knows of Exodus 1–14 but also draws on the constellation of motifs surrounding the Bocchoris version. What is perhaps seldom acknowledged is the awareness the Exodus account betrays of the Egyptian stories. We have already seen that the theme of the Kushite wife is rooted in the Piankhy-Hermopolis tradition, and Moses-Hermes, the celebrity among the Egyptians (Artapanus), finds a reflection in Exod 11:3. Egyptian sensitivity, clearly stated in the Osarseph and Bocchoris tales, toward the abomination of slaughtering sacred animals, is the burden of Exod 8:26. The theme of the “return of the shepherds” (Osarseph) to augment the forces of the lepers, is echoed in the return of Moses the shepherd from the east (Exod 3:1) and the expressed fear of increased enemy forces (Exod 1:10). The potter’s kiln, so central to the story of the Oracle of the Potter,143 appears again, with Moses rummaging in its ashes, in Exod 9:8–10. Leprosy is a theme in both Exodus and the Egyptian tales, afflicting the Jews in the latter, meted out to the Egyptians in the former (Exod 9:10–11; cf. v. 15).

“The Wiping Out of the Great God’s Abomination and the Removal of All Trace of Them”: The Exodus in Mnemo-history before the Saite Period The fact that the written tradition of an exodus, formulated in the Egyptian and Hebrew accounts we have passed in review above and 143.  On this piece, see, among others, Koenen 1970: 249–54; Lloyd 1982: 33–55; Redford 1986: 284–86.

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dating from the late sixth to fourth centuries b.c.e., in no way precludes the existence of an “exodus” memory in earlier times. While a full-fledged, dedicated treatment is not to be had, there are unmistakable allusions both in the prophets and in classical authors to a great coming out from northeast Africa across the Sinai and into hither Asia, dated sometime in the Bronze Age past. The prophets claim for Israel participation in an exodus, an origin event that finds a place alongside Yahweh’s geographical distribution of many other peoples (Amos 9:7). Some 20 direct references are distributed among Amos, Hosea, Micah, Jeremiah (with the most), Trito-Isaiah, and Ezekiel. References to the “House of Bondage” are much rarer, being confined to the “questionable” passage in Mic 6:4–5 and Jer 34:13; Ezekiel (23:8, 19, 21, 27) remembers only Israel’s “days in Egypt.” Mention of the plagues is also rare, but they are alluded to already in Amos 4:10. Apart from the suspicious pericope in Mic 6:4–5, the early prophets are also silent on the identity of the leader—Hos 12:13 knows only of a prophet—and it is only with Jeremiah (15:1) and the postexilic prophets (Isa 63:11, Mal 4:4) that Moses puts in an appearance. Yahweh’s wonders and the miracle at the sea are attested from the last half of the eighth century b.c.e. (Isa 10:26, 11:16, 63:12; Mic 7:15; Jer 32:20–21). The wilderness experience is the burden of Amos 2:10 (already 40 years’ duration!), Jer 2:6 and Ezek 20:10. Some prepentateuchal passages, however, seem to reflect details and formats at variance with the “official” record of the book of Exodus. 1.  In pericopes that, although prospective, are constructed with the exodus experience in mind, some details are new. Isa 11:15–16, for example, has Yahweh destroying the ‫לשון ים מצרים‬, “the tongue of the sea of Egypt,” not the ‫ים סוף‬, and splitting the Nile into branches by means of a hamsin, so that the channels can be crossed on foot. The whole is intended to create a ‫ מסלה‬for “the remnant of his people,” “such as Israel had on the day it came out of the land of Egypt.” Similarly, Zechariah looks forward to a kind of return from exile in Egypt, in which the exiles will pass through “the Sea of Egypt” and the Nile will be dried up (Zech 10:11). While the Nile would have made a more suitable barrier in an Egyptian context to be dried up and breached by mighty acts of Yahweh,144 the account of the book of Exodus knows nothing of a hot wind, a body of water called “the Sea of Egypt,” the drying up of the Nile, or a highway to facilitate the exiles’ march.

144.  The trope of the dried-up Nile, to be crossed on foot, is very well known in Egyptian literature: cf. Anthes 1928: 20:8, 23:5–6, 24:9–10; Vandier 1950: inscription 10 (IV, 10); Helck 1970b: 24; Hannig 2006: 2754.

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2. In a curious recapitulation of the sojourn and exodus, Ezekiel states (20:5–23) that Yahweh had made himself known to the “House of Jacob” in Egypt (partly true) and had promised to bring them out of Egypt; but they had refused to give up their Egyptian gods (not in Exodus). In consequence, he had threatened to scatter them in exile among the nations (not in the wilderness account). 3.  Most jarring is the contradiction regarding the nature of the content of the covenant and the law giving in the wilderness. Jeremiah knows of a covenant (31:32), but it was characterized by obedience to Yahweh’s voice (11:7). The covenant and the statutes in no way contained elaborate cultic provisions regarding offering, sacrifice, and ritual (Amos 5:25, Mic 6:6–8, Jer 7:21), the phraseology of the denials suggesting that the accepted tradition was devoid of cultic law giving of this sort. 4. In Ps 78:12, 43, the miracles (associated with the plagues) are localized in the “fields of Tanis,” a tradition contradictory to the implications of Exodus, where the Israelites focus their activity around Ramses, the last fortified city they constructed. 5.  The books of Exodus and Numbers paint a bleak picture of the wilderness through which the Israelites journeyed. While some of these passages may be convincingly shown to be exilic or postexilic accretions to an original document, enough remains to substantiate the assertion that Israel in the ninth and eighth centuries b.c.e. believed it had come out of Egypt. But so did others. This origin tradition, in fact, was claimed by a number of Canaanite communities in the Levant. In one coastal region in particular lived Phoenicians who, according to tradition, moved south, followed by occupation and expulsion. Historically, there is much to be said for locating the “Ur-Hyksos” in this part of the Levant.145 Manetho preserves the memory of their origin in Phoenicia, an assertion that takes on new meaning in light of the correct interpretation of the enigmatic “brothers.”146 The Hyksos personal name Ynss-idn certainly contains the element ‫אדון‬, “lord,” the divine epithet, but surviving on the Phoenician coast as the common greeting “Mein Herr” until classical times.147 The last Hyksos ruler, ḤꜢ-mw-dı͗ , bears a name that most 145.  Bietak 1987: 41–56. The author has only slightly altered his views in the interim. 146.  Waddell 1940: 90, 94. It was on the Phoenician coast in his 30th year that Thutmose III first encountered and captured “brothers” (Urk. IV, 690:2). These are certainly the “fraternal council” known from contemporary Levantine government and society: Adamthwaite 2001: 13–15, 191, 213; Redford 2003: 71. 147.  The divine epithet: Bietak 1981: 63–73; Redford 1997: 21. For Adonis, especially at Byblos, see Soyez 1977; de Vaux 1967: 210–37; Robertson 1982: 313ff. The cu-

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likely derives from ḤMD, a root that even today is a common base for Lebanese personal names.148 Interestingly, the line of rulers of Byblos can be reconstructed from the outgoing 12th Dynasty through to the beginning of the 16th century, or well into the period of Hyksos occupation.149 In one of the later and more impressive tombs, the legend ḥḳꜢw ḫꜢswt appears on a jar (Montet 1929: 208 no. 826). Archaeologically, the picture has been unnecessarily clouded by the NAA results of an analysis of more than 200 vessels of “Hyksos” provenience and date.150 Certainly, the results show a strong “trade” connection with the region of greater Gaza and the Negeb; but in the light of the known use of the Wadi Tumilat as a transit corridor and the presence there of a major port of entry, namely, Tell el-Mashkuta (Holladay 1982; 1990: 183–252), this is only to be expected. Denying a Phoenician connection in the quest for Hyksos origins on the basis of NAA results would be like denying trade links with the Levant and the Aegean in the oil and perfume industry at Mendes simply because the chief type of transport container, the basket-handle jar, can be proven by NAA to have originated in the Cyrenaica!151 Patterns of trade dependent on Hyksos hegemony burgeoned without reference to the place of origin of the 15th Dynasty. In legend and derived mythology, memory of a great movement from Asia into Africa and its subsequent reversal lived on among the Canaanites, albeit for the most part transmitted in Greek. Philo states that El (Kronos) went to the “southern land” and placed all Egypt under Taautos (Thoth) as his kingdom; while he (El) ruled over Libya and Sicily.152 The legend of Io and her descendants has long been understood as reflecting a movement from Asia to the Nile Valley, the identity of which is assured by the appearance of figures such as Epaphos rious statement that “in the Hellenistic Period and apparently not before” the cults of Adonis and Aphrodite (in their original Canaanite guise) were “characteristic” of Byblos (Millar 1993) is wholly at variance with the facts. See Redford 1997: 824–35. “Mein Herr”: Wigham 1975: 7.419; Jay 1981: no. 289. Elsewhere ‫ אדון‬in Egyptian transcription may show a -T- in place of -D-: Schneider 1992: 48–49; 2007: 113–20. 148. See Gardiner 1959: x.20. It is difficult to see what other derivation might plausibly suggest itself (Krahmalkov 2000: 186–87), even though the rendering of ḥ by ḫ would be irregular: cf. Hoch 1990: 196; Tropper 1995: 58–66. 149.  See the fundamental study of Kitchen 1967: 39–54; also Weinstein 2001: 219– 21; with the addition of Kiyun (Martin 1968: 141–42; 1971: no. 1689), Riyanta (Martin 1971: no. 810) and Kundiya, the timespan extends almost to the New Kingdom! Perhaps significantly, the hieroglyphic script continues uninterrupted to inform the style of royal reference! 150.  McGovern and Harbottle 1990: 141–57; McGovern and Bagh 2000. 151. R. Hancock, personal communication. 152.  Taavta: Eusebius, Praep. ev. I.10.38. Libya and Sicily: Lydus, De mensibus 4.154.

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(Apophis)153 and Belos (Baʿal). The appearance of a bovide in the “valley of the Cedar” in the Lebanons who migrates to Egypt and eventually becomes king there has a parallel in the figure of Bata in the Tale of the Two Brothers.154 The occupation of Egypt for four generations—a datum consonant with the 108 years of the Turin canon for the 15th Dynasty—finds an echo in Gen 15:16. The expulsion is also not forgotten. Belos led an exodus back into Asia as far as Mesopotamia (Diodorus i.28.1) and was buried in a pyramid in Babylon (Strabo xvi.1.5. See Garstad 2004: 246–56). Agenor, grandson of Epaphos and brother of Belos, retraced the steps of his ancestor and came to rest in Phoenicia, where he became king.155 Danaus, the hero whose traces weighed most heavily with classical mythographers, went to Greece. In the works of both Jewish and Greek writers, the latter controlling sources independent of any “biblical” tradition, there is a persistent claim that the exodus of Moses and the Israelites was coeval, if not identical, with the exodus of Io’s descendants. Josephus’s assertion that the Hyksos were the ancestors of the Israelites is well known (Contra apionem i.91–92), but Hecataeus also states (FGrH. IIIA, 264 frg. 6) that Kadmos and Danaus were Moses’ contemporaries and by implication links them to the Hyksos expulsion. Again, Manetho (epitomized in the writings of Africanus) places the exodus in the reign of Ahmose (Waddell 1940: 110 [frg. 52]), founder of the 18th Dynasty, a statement that might be claimed as a later accretion manufactured by chronographers in the Judeo-pagan polemic, were it not for the evidence of Ptolemy of Mendes (Tatian, Oratio adversus Graecos, 38). In his History, he apparently stated that the exodus of the Jews led by Moses took place in the reign of an Αμῷσις, who can be none other than Ahmose, expeller of the Hyksos and founder of the 18th Dynasty. The parallels continue. Like Moses, Aegyptos, the fourth generation from Io and therefore contem153.  Io: Apollodorus, i.1.1–5. On the legend, see Bérard 1952: 1–43; Edwards 1979; Davison 1989: 61–79; Gershenson 1996: 192–200; Dowden 1999: 762–63. The bovine associations of Io may point to an Egyptian origin of the name: cf. ı͗  ḥ (Coptic ⲉⲝⲉ), “cow”; ı͗ hw, “bower” (Coptic ⲟⲝⲉ, “herd”); ı͗ ʿḥ, “moon” (Coptic ⲟⲟⲉ). Epaphos: Of all the Hyksos kings, Apophis attained an illustrious status while he yet lived: cf. the allusions to world dominion and superior scribal ability in his surviving inscriptions: Helck 1975: nos. 75–86. In classical authors he is also celebrated: Herodotus ii.38; Griffiths 1970: 57, 77, 443. 154.  P. D’Orbiney 14,5–18,10; on the Tale of the Two Brothers, see Wettengel 2003. 155. Gr. ἀγηνωρ, “manly” (of animals), “stately, magnificent.” One wonders whether there is a connection to *ʿAgelya, “calf” (‫)עגל‬, used in the personal names of some Byblian rulers of the Second Intermediate Period: Montet 1964: 63, fig. 1; 64, fig. 2.

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porary with the “exodus,” went to Arabia and, again like Moses, married both an “Arabian” and an Ethiopian wife (Apollodorus, ii.1.5). In summary, the movement of West Semitic–speaking peoples from the Levantine coast into Egypt in the Middle Bronze Age and their subsequent expulsion, events that scholars have long dubbed the “Hyksos” phenomenon, lived on in the collective consciousness of Canaanite communities. That participation in the event should have been claimed by a group of Shasu from the desert edge who came to be known as the Benē-Yisraʾel merely illustrates the communal adoption of traits, cultic acts, myths, folklore, and foundation legends of the autochthonous inhabitants among whom these incoming Benē-Yisraʾel now lived.

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Ray, J. D. 1976 The Archive of Ḥor. Texts from Excavations 2. London: Egypt Exploration Society. 1987 Egypt: Dependence and Independence (425–343 b.c.). Pp. 79–95 in Sources, Structures, and Synthesis: Proceedings of the Groningen 1983 Achaemenid History Workshop, ed. H. Sancisi-Weerdenburg. Achaemenid History 1. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. 2001 Bakenrenef. P. 162 in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt 1. New York: Oxford University Press. Redford, D. B. 1963 The Identity of the High-Priest of Amun at the Beginning of Akhenaten’s Reign. JAOS 83: 270–87. 1981a Interim Report on the Excavations of East Karnak, 1977–78. JARCE 18: 11–41. 1981b A Royal Speech from the Blocks of the 10th Pylon. Bulletin of the Egyptological Seminar of New York 3: 87–102. 1982 Pithom. LdÄ 4: 1054–58. 1984 Akhenaten, the Heretic King. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1986 Pharaonic King-Lists, Annals, and Day-Books. SSEA Publications 4. Mississauga: Benben. 1990 The Sea and the Godess. Pp. 824–35 in Studies in Egyptology Presented to Miriam Lichtheim 2, ed. S. Israelit-Groll. Jerusalem: Hebrew University. 1997 Textual Sources for the Hyksos Period. Pp. 1–97 in The Hyksos: New Historical and Archaeological Perspectives, ed. E. D. Oren. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum. 2000a The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. 3 vols. New York: Oxford University Press. 2000b Scribe and Speaker. Pp. 163–66 in Writings and Speech in Israelite and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy. SBL Symposium Series 10. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. 2001 The So-Called ‘Codification’ of Egyptian Law under Darius I. Pp. 135–60 in Persia and Torah: The Theory of Imperial Authorization of the Pentateuch. SBL Symposium Series 17. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. 2003 The Wars in Syria and Palestine of Thutmose III. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 16. Leiden: Brill. 2004 Excavations at Mendes 1: The Royal Necropolis. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 20. Leiden: Brill. 2006a A History of Ancient Egypt: Egyptian Civilization in Context. Dubuque: Kendall/Hunt. 2006b The Northern Wars of Thutmose III. Pp. 325–43 in Thutmose III: A New Biography, ed. E. H. Cline and D. O’Connor. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

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forthcoming a City of the Ram-Man: The Story of Ancient Mendes. Princeton: Princeton University Press. forthcoming b The Kushite-Saite Period: A History. forthcoming c The Temple of Ba-neb-djed at Mendes. In Delta Reports 1. Redford, S., and D. B. Redford 2005 The Cult and Necropolis of the Sacred Rams at Mendes. Pp. 164–98 in Divine Creatures: Animal Mummies in Ancient Egypt, ed. S. Ikram. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press. Reisner, G. 1931 Inscribed Monuments from Gebel Barkal. ZÄS 66: 90–91. Ricke, H. 1935 Eine Inventartafel aus Heliopolis im Turiner Museum. ZÄS 71: 111– 33. Ridgeway, D. 1999 The Rehabilitation of Bocchoris and Its Consequences. JEA 85: 143– 52. Robertson, N. 1982 The Ritual Background of the Dying God in Cyprus and SyroPalestine. HTR 75: 314–47. Rowe, A. 1936 A Catalogue of Egyptian Scarabs, Scaraboids, Seals, and Amulets in the Palestine Archaeological Museum. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale. Rowley, H. H. 1950 From Joseph to Joshua: Biblical Traditions in the Light of Archaeology. London: Oxford University Press. Rüterswörden, U. 1985 Die Beamten der israelitischen Königszeit: Eine Studie zu śr und vergleichbaren Begriffen. Beiträge zur Wissenschaft vom Alten und Neuen Testament, 6. Folge, Heft 17. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Ruppert, L. 1985 Pentateuchsdiskussion und Josephserzählung. BZ 29: 31–48. Russmann, E. R. 1974 The Representation of the King in the XXVth Dynasty. Monographies reine Elisabeth 3. Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum. Rutledge, S. H. 2007 The Roman Destruction of Sacred Sites. Historia 56: 179–95. Ruzicka, S. 1999 Glos, Son of Tamos, and the End of the Cypriot War. Historia 48: 23– 43. Rydberg-Cox, J. A. 2003 Oral and Written Sources in Athenian Forensic Rhetoric. Mnemosyne 56: 652–65.

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Ryholt, K. 1999 The Story of Petese, Son of Petatum, and Seventy Other Good and Bad Stories. CNI Publications 23; Carlsberg Papyri 4. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press. 2000 A New Version of the Introduction to the Teachings of ʿOnchsheshonqy. Pp. 113–40 in A Miscellany of Demotic Texts and Studies, ed. P. J. Frandsen and K. Ryholt. CNI Publications 22; Carlsberg Papyri 3. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press. 2002 An Elusive Narrative Belonging to the Cycle of Stories about the Priesthood at Heliopolis. Pp. 361–67 in Acts of the Seventh International Conference of Demotic Studies: Copenhagen, 23–27 August 1999, ed. K. Ryholt. CNI Publications 27. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press. 2006 The Petese Stories 2. CNI Publications 29. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press. Sadek, A. I. 1988 Popular Religion in Egypt during the New Kingdom. Hildesheimer ägyp­to­logische Beiträge 27. Hildesheim: Gerstenberg. Salmon, P. 1985 Les relations entre la Perse et l’Égypte du Vie au I’ve siècle av. J.-C. Pp. 147–68 in The Land of Israel: Cross-roads of Civilizations. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 19. Louvain: Peeters. Sauneron, S. 1952 Rituel de l’embaumement: Pap. Boulaq III, pap. Louvre 5.158. Cairo: Imprimerie nationale. Schade-Busch, M. 1992 Zur Königsideologie Amenophis III: Analyse der Phraseologie historischer Texte der Voramarnazeit. Hildesheimer ägyptologische Beiträge 35. Hildesheim: Gerstenberg. Schäfer, H. , and G. Roeder 1913–24 Aegyptische Inschriften aus den Koniglichen Museen zu Berlin. Leipzig: Hinrichs. Scharbert, J. 1987 Joseph als Sklave. BN 37: 104–29. Schart, A. 1990 Mose und Israel im Konflikt: Eine redaktionsgeschichtlichte Studie zu den Wüstenerzählungen. Orbis biblicus et orientalis 98. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schipper, B. U. 2005 Die Erzählung des Wenamun: Ein Literaturwerk im Spannungsfeld von Politik, Geschichte, und Religion. Fribourg: Presses Universitaires Fribourg. Schmid, H. 1986 Die Gestalt des Mose: Probleme alttestamentlicher Forschung unter Berücksichtigung der Pentateuchkrise. Erträge der Forschung 237. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchsellgeschaft.

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Schmid, K. 2007 The Late Persian Formation of the Torah: Observations on Deuteronomy 34. Pp. 237–52 in Judah and the Judaeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Schmidt, L., and A. Aejmelaeus 1986 Literarische Studien zur Josephsgeschichte. Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 167. Berlin: de Gruyter. Schmidt, W. H. 1983 Exodus, Sinai, und Mose: Erwägungen zu Ex. 1–19 und 24. Erträge der Forschung 191. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Besellgeschaft. Schmitz, B. 1984 Scheune, Scheunevorsteher. LdÄ 5: 591–98. Schneider, T. 1992 Asiatische Personennamen in ägyptischen Quellen des Neuen Reiches. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 114. Freiburg: Universitätsverlag. 1998 Ausländer in Ägypten während des Mittleren Reiches und der Hyksoszeit. Ägypten und Altes Testament 42. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2007 The First Documented Occurrence of the God Yahweh? (Book of the Dead Princeton ‘roll 5’). JANEReligion 7: 113–20. Schott, S. 1972 Thot als Verfasser heiliger Schriften. ZÄS 99: 20–25. 1990 Bücher und Bibliotheken im alten Ägypten: Verzeichnis der Buch- und Spruchtitel und der Termini technici. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Schumacher, I. W. 1998 Der Gott Sopdu: Der Herr der Fremdländer. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 79. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schwartz, J. 1949 Fouilles à Kasr-Karoun (Février-Mars 1948): Rapport préliminaire. BIFAO 48: 57–63. Schweizer, H. 1991 Die Josefsgeschichte: Konstituierung des Textes. Textwissenschaft, Theologie, Hermeneutik, Linguistik, Literaturanalyse, Informatik 4. Tübingen: Francke. Segal, J. B. 1983 Aramaic Texts from North Saqqâra, with Some Fragments in Phoenician. Excavations at North Saqqâra Documentary Series 4. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Sethe, K. 1900 Sesostris. Untersuchungen zer Geschichte und Altertumskunde Ägyptens 2. Leipzig: Hinrichs. 1923 Die Vocalisation des Ägyptischen. ZDMG 77: 145–207. 1929 Ägyptische Lesestücke zum Gebrauch im akademischen Unterricht: Texte des Mittleren Reiches. Leipzig: Hinrichs.

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Shank, R., and R. Abelson 1977 Scripts, Plans, Goals, and Understanding: An Inquiry into Human Knowledge Structures. The Artificial Intelligence Series. Hillsdale: Erlbaum. Shubert, S. 2005 Those Who Still Live on Earth: A Study of the Egyptian Appeal to the Living Texts. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Toronto. Silver, J. D. 1973 Moses and the Hungry Birds. JQR 64: 123–53. Simons, J. 1959 The Geographical and Topographical Texts of the Old Testament: A Concise Commentary in XXXII Chapters. Studia Francisci Scholten Memoriae Dicata 2. Leiden: Brill. Simpson, W. K. 1984 Sesostris III. LdÄ 5: 903–06. Ska, J.-L. 2007 From History Writing to Library Building and the Birth of the Book. Pp. 145–69 in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance, ed. G. N. Knoppers and B. M. Levinson. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Slings, S. R. 1990–92 Orality and the Poet’s Profession. Acta Antiqua 33: 9–14. Smith, H. S. 1980 The Story of Onch-sheshonqy. Serapis 6: 133–57. Smith, H. S., and W. J. Tait 1984 Saqqara Demotic Papyri 1. Texts from Excavations. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Smith, M. 2002 On the Primaeval Ocean. CNI Publications 26; Carlsberg Papyri 5. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press. 2002 Papyrus Harkness (MMA 31.9.7). Oxford: Griffith Institute. Smith, W. S. 1998 The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Smither, P. C. 1941 A Tax-Assessor’s Journal of the Middle Kingdom. JEA 27: 74–77. Sottas, H. 1921 Les Papyrus démotiques de Lille. Paris: P. Geuthner. Soyez, B. 1977 Byblos et la fête des Adonies. Études préliminaires aux religions orientales dans l’Empire romain 60. Leiden: Brill. Spalinger, A. J. 1982 Aspects of the Military Documents of the Ancient Egyptians. Yale Near Eastern Research 9. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Spencer, A. J. 1999 Excavations at Tell El-Balamun, 1995–1998. London: British Museum Press.

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Spiegelberg, W. 1912 Demotische Texte auf Krügen. Demotische Studien 5. Leipzig: Hinrichs. 1914 Die sogenannte demotische Chronik des Pap. 215 der Bibliothèque nationale zu Paris: Nebst den auf der Rückseite des Papyrus Stehenden Texten. Demotische Studien 7. Leipzig: Hinrichs. Stern, E. 1973 Material Culture of the Land of the Bible in the Persian Period, 538–332 b.c. Warminster: Aris & Phillips. 1978 Excavations at Tel Mevorakh, 1973–1976. Jerusalem: Hebrew University. 1984 The Persian Empire and the Political and Social History of Palestine in the Persian Period. Pp. 70–87 in The Cambridge History of Judaism 1: The Persian Period. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sutskover, T. 2007 The Semantic Fields of Seeing and Oral Communication in the Joseph Narrative. JNSL 33: 35–50. Taylor, J. H. 1991 Egypt and Nubia. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Thiers, C. 2004 Fragments de théologies thébaines: La bibliothèque du Temple de Tôd. BIFAO 104: 553–572. Thomas, R. 1989 Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical Athens. Cambridge Studies in Oral and Literate Culture 18. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thompson, D. J. 1988 Memphis under the Ptolemies. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Tresson, P. 1934 Mélanges Maspero 1: Orient ancien. Mémoires publiés par les membres de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire 66. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale. Tropper, J. 1995 Akkadische nuḫḫutu und die Repräsentation des Phonems /ḥ/ im Akkadischen. ZA 84: 58–66. Tuplin, C. 1991 Darius’ Suez Canal and Persian Imperialism. Pp. 237–83 in Asia Minor and Egypt: Old Cultures in a New Empire: Proceedings of the Groningen 1988 Achaemenid History Workshop, ed. H. Sancisi-Weerdenburg and A. Kuhrt. Achaemenid History 6. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Valbelle, D. 1991 Les plus anciennes listes connues de personnel auxiliaire (smdt): Les tablettes hiératiques CGC 25367 et 25368. Pp. 123–28 in Mélanges Jacques Jean Clère. Cahier de recherches de l’Institut de papyrologie et d’égyptologie de Lille 13. Lille: Université Charles de Gaulle.

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Judean Identity in Elephantine: Everyday Life according to the Ostraca André Lemaire

École Pratique des Hautes Études, Sorbonne-Paris

The editio princeps of the Clermont-Ganneau Collection by Hélène Lozachmeur (2006; see Lemaire 2007) throws new light on everyday life in the Judean community that lived on the island of Elephantine (southern Egypt, opposite Aswan). Though generally broken, incomplete, and often partly blurred, these some 300 Aramaic ostraca from the fifth-century b.c.e. (probably from the first half) are mainly short messages about everyday problems on both sides of the Nile while others are lists of names, labels, writing exercises and inscriptions on jars.1 The reference to the everyday life is obvious from the frequency of the words YWM, “day” (20 times: nos. 11, 12, 36, 44, 48, 49, 75, 98, 118, 131, 154, 157, 186, 189, 191?, 213, 226, 237?, 255, X13), and eventually YWMʾ ZNH, “this day/today” (9 times: nos. 1cc3, 18, 126, 138, 139, 169, 244, J5?, J8), ʾTML, “yesterday” (17 times: no. 52, 55, 57, 71, 78, 79, 82, 99, 125, 165?, 167, 226, 263, X7, J3, J4, J6), and MḤR, “tomorrow” (21 times: nos. 18, 20, 37, 42, 45, 57, 69, 89, 98, 102, 110, 121, 152, 157, 187, 189, 203, J2, J3, J5, J7). The messages are probably the most interesting inscriptions: they can be written on both sides of the ostracon (for instance, ostracon no. 41: 11 lines on the recto and 8 lines on the verso); they were often written to members of the same family/community situated on the other side of the Nile. These families were generally members of the Judeo-Aramaic community working mainly as mercenaries in the Persian garrison guarding the southern border of the Achaemenid Empire. The ostraca present two kinds of salutation in the introductory formula: (1) a short salutation, ŠLM + Personal Name (37 times); and (2) a few longer salutations generally containing the mention of one or several deities that should look after the welfare (ŠLM) of the addressee. 1. Our cordial thanks go to Professor Jean Leclant, “secrétaire perpétuel de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres,” for the permission to study these ostraca, kept by the Academy, and to Catherine Fauveaud for her help. Unfortunately, Lozachmeur’s publication was not taken into account by Joisten-Pruschke 2008.

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Thus, “to my lord Mikayah, your servant Gaddul, I send you welfare and life, and bless you by Yaho and Ḥnum” (no. 70); “[To my brother . . .] yah: May Yaho [Ṣebaʾot look] for your welfare all times” (no. 186). These salutations were probably also used in the streets of Elephantine. When the longer greeting was used, from the name(s) of the god mentioned, some indication of the ethnicity of the people was given. Another indication of ethnicity may be the formula of profane swearing ḤY LYHH, which appears 10 times in these ostraca (nos. 14, 20, 41, 56, 152, 174, 185, 214?, X16, J8) and was probably also heard in the streets of Elephantine. As noticed by H. Lozachmeur (2006: 528–29), this kind of profane swearing is generally followed by the conjunction HN, “if,” and eventually the negation Lʾ, “not,” for an affirmation (no. 152cc3.7). The frequency of this profane swearing had already been well underlined by A. Dupont-Sommer (1947: 188): On voit qu’en fait, dans les ostraca araméens d’Éléphantine comme dans les ostraca hébreux de Lakish, le jurement par Yahweh n’est pas reservé à des circonstances exceptionnelles; il s’emploie dans la conversation courante, comme une exclamation populaire, pour appuyer un dire de quelque importance. La fréquence relative de ce jurement dans les ostraca araméens d’Éléphantine prouve que nos colons juifs, au Ve siècle avant J.-C., étaient encore loin de manifester à l’égard du nom divin ce respect scrupuleux qui devait plus tard interdire formellement la prononciation du tétragramme sacré, même dans la prière ou dans la lecture du texte biblique. Elle prouve aussi que la foi en Yahô l’emportait chez eux sur la foi en tout autre dieu; ce serment par Yahô, si banal qu’il fût devenu, était à sa manière un hommage rendu au dieu national. (Jr 4,2; 12,16)

These short messages, however, contain mainly very practical matters: problems of food are often mentioned. In this field, the most frequent words are “barley” (ŠʿRN, 24 times: nos. 2, 4, 15, 22, 24, 25, 41, 46, 49, 52, 66, 93, 120, 122, 132, 144, 150, 152, 155, 204, 212, 232, 263, J2), “bread” (LḤM, 20 times: nos. 13, 18, 39, 44, 50, 72, 78, 112, 125, 133 bis, 154, 173, 188, 199, 268, J7; LḤMʾ: nos. 55, 60, 125),2 “flour” (QMḤ, 9 times: nos. 1, 11, 40?, 49, 97?, 169, 195, X7, X9), “fish” (NWN, 9 times: nos. 33, 46?, 55, 62, 128 bis, 164, 167, 186), “cucumber” (QṬYN/ʾ: 6 times: nos. 82, 102, 115, 140, 212?, J7). “Meat” (BŠR) is rare (3 times: nos. 2, 233, 247) and once is specified as “goose meat” (BŠR WZ: no.  233),3 while 2. Ostracon 133,2 could be tentatively read as LḤM YW[Mʾ ZNH], “[tod ]ay bread,” and ostracon J7cv8–9 as LḤM LMḤR, “bread for tomorrow.” Ostracon 33,2 is probably to be read as LḤBLʾ. 3.  The reading YWNʾ, “pigeon,” in 205,1 is uncertain.

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“cheese” (GBNH) is probably mentioned six times (nos. 22, 79cc3 [corrected reading], 114, 115, 167, J2) besides ḤLB, “milk” (3 times: nos. 36cv2, 72, 161?). However, all these kinds of food were probably the same as the ones used by local people. Furthermore, because there are very few mentions of meat, the absence of “pork” (ḤZR) is probably not meaningful. According to H. Lozachmeur (2006: 1:90), “wine” is mentioned once. It is interesting because it is apparently not Egyptian and could be connected with Palestinian/Syrian tradition. Furthermore, she reads YN (J2), which is a Phoenician/Hebrew word and not the usual Aramaic word ḤMR. However, in ostracon J2cc,6, one should probably read ʾP LHḤMH MYN, “also to heat water,” instead of ʾP LH [L]ḤMH WYN, “also, for him, the bread and wine” (Lemaire 2007: 183). However, the use of wine could well be indicated by several Phoenician inscriptions on jars, especially by no. 253 (with Ṭ indicating probably the quality of wine) and no. 209 (with the vintage: “in year 16 of the king”; Lemaire 2007: 181). Several ostraca mention also pieces of “vestment” (LBŠ, 7 times: nos. 17, 61, 70, 114, 117, 139?, X6), “tunic” (KTWN, 7 times: nos. 16, 108 bis, 159?, 237, 241, 253). See also ʾSR, ḤLṢ, and RKS (in ostracon 108cc2– 3), “shoes” (ŠʾNYʾ: 3 times: nos. 73, 112, 115). This last word is already attested in Ahiqar 206 and probably corresponds to MŠʾN, “some type of shoe” in the Elephantine papyri (Cowley 15,15, 55,8; Kraeling 2,5). In 1989–91, the last German excavations in Elephantine discovered several hoards of leather shoes. They have just been published in detail by Josefine Kuckertz (2006). She is very cautious, however, about the possibility of identification with special Aramaic words: “Es lässt sich jedoch weder aus dem Gebrauch im Aramäisches, noch aus den akkadischen Texten eine Erkenntnis gewinnen, welche genaue Form der Fussbbekleidung mit mšʿn bzw. mešnu/senu gemeint ist” (Kuckertz 2006: 147). In the present state of the documentation, though it is not impossible, we have no indication that these shoes or vestments were somehow characteristic of ethnicity. We have the same problem with the woven material: “wool” (ʿMR, twice) and “flax” (PŠT, no. 189cv,6, corrected by Lemaire 2007: 181). Because it is very difficult to judge the ethnicity from the realia, let us start again with the ethnic markers themselves. YHDY (nos. 135cv2, 182?, X11).  Unfortunately, the ostracon no. 135 is fragmentary and the context of the mention YHDYʾ very uncertain. Things are clearer in X11cc that is a list of Judean names with the title: “Those are the Judeans who received portion” (ʾLH YHWDYʾ ZY LQḤW PRS[. . .]). Ostracon 182 is fragmentary but also probably a list

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of names. Thus, it seems clear that Judeans were officially recognized as a special ethnic group in Elephantine where their ethnicity appears in everyday administrative texts. ʾRMTʾ (no.  258).  Probably “the Aramean (woman),” this word is mentioned in a small inscription on the bottom of a jar, preceded by TḤPY, an Egyptian name. Though the owner of the jar could well have been an Egyptian woman who married an Aramean, she could also be born from a mixed marriage, with still other possibilities. This example reveals that the name, alone, is not enough to be sure about the ethnicity of a person. However, this last exception confirms the general case that we have just seen above about lists of Judeans with clearly Judean names. A Judean could often be identified as such by his personal name (or the name of his father), especially with the numerous theophorous names with -YH. This is true not only of lists of names specified as “Judeans” such as ostracon X11 with the names GMRYH, YDNYH, MKYH, ʿNNYH, and HWŠʿYH, while the other names (MKY, ŠLMM) contain no other theonym. But, with a few exceptions, such as nos. 266 and 267, this is generally true also about any list of names (no.  96cc with the exception of PḤNWM; no.  143, with the exception of PSMY; no.  177, with the exception of PṬḤN[M]; no.  178; no.  181, with the possible exception of BNT; no. 208; no. 231; no. 250; no. 252 with the exception of PṬḤNM; X1/J9, X2, X4, with the probable exception of ḤPYW and ḤWR.4 This would mean that religion was one the main aspects of ethnicity for the Judeans of Elephantine who apparently did not speak and practically did not write Judean Hebrew.5 Actually, we have several Aramaic phrases that seem to pertain to the Judean religion. 1.  The Judean deity YHH alone is probably mentioned 7 times. Besides the introductory formula (see pp. 365–366 above on no.  70) and several mentions in very fragmentary contexts (nos. 30, 40, 236, X14?), we should note the 2 probable syntagms ZY YQRB ʿL YH[H], “that he 4.  No. 266: This fragmentary list of names with many uncertain readings does not seem to contain any Judean name. Nos. 267, 275, and AO 25431 are probably lists of Caspians (Lemaire 1975; 2007: 182). They do not contain any Judean name. BNT: Read ʾḤYʾ at the end of cv1 and probably MḤSY at the end of cv3. No. 208: The reading of line 2 is uncertain. X1/J9: For the corrected readings, see Lemaire 2007: 182. ḤWR: At the end of cc4, read ʾḤNW (see no. 215cv1). 5.  A letter written in 1918 mentions “un tout petit fragment d’inscription lapidaire en caractères hébraïques du type de Siloé: deux lettres en tout B K,” but there is apparently no trace of any Paleo-Hebrew inscription elsewhere, no picture, no drawing, and no publication. This mention is enigmatic. Could it be a misreading of the big letters of the Phoenician inscription on jar no. 253?

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will offer to Yah[o]” (no. 103cv,26), and Lʾ YḤṬʾ LYHH, “he will not sin against Yaho” (corrected reading of no. X8cv,4, Lemaire 2007: 183). 2.  As I said above, the Judean deity is mentioned 10 times in swearing ḤY LYHH, “by the life of Yaho” (nos. 14, 20?, 41, 56, 152, 174, 185, 214?, X16, J8). It is probably followed by a sentence beginning HN, “if,” a swearing formula, in no. 41cv,5, no. 56cc,7, and no. 152cc,7–8. 3.  The Judean deity is also mentioned 3 times in the phrase YHH ṢBʾT, “Yaho Ṣebaʾot” (no. 167cc1 [bis] and probably in nos. 186cc1–2 and 175 = J8cc,9). This is surprising because this phrase is not attested in the papyri (Porten 1968: 106–109): it reveals the popularity of this divine appellation that might have been specially appreciated by soldiers or mercenaries. However, one notes that this phrase is already attested in a Hebrew graffito from the second half of the eighth century b.c.e. (Naveh 2001; Aḥituv 2005: 203–7; Lemaire 2006: 233–34), and it could well be that it was characteristic of the Judean popular religion. 4.  Besides YHH, we have two mentions of the Egyptian deity ḤNM, “Khnum,” whose sanctuary was in Elephantine, close to the Temple of Yaho. One is in the salutation of ostracon no. 70 with a benediction by YHH and ḤNM, both gods having a temple in Elephantine. The other one is in ostracon 203, where ḤNM BMNPY, “Khnum in Memphis,” could be associated with Espemet, the boatman in Elephantine, who was probably Egyptian. Thus, there would be only one probable mention of Khnum associated with Yaho, and it could likely be explained by some marriage of a Judean with an Egyptian.7 5.  The mention of the Babylonian gods “Bel,” “Nabu,” “Shamash,” and “Nergal” in ostracon 277,3 is strange. Among the various possibilities, one should note at least two likely explanations. (1) This ostracon should be interpreted as “greetings from a pagan to a Jew” (Ginsberg 1955: 491; Porten 2002: 212), especially because, at line 2, the name of the sender YRḤW looks Aramean or North Arabic. (2) This ostracon 6. A somewhat-similar reading of Lozachmeur in J8cv,7–8 is probably to be corrected. 7.  According to Lozachmeur, On ne trouve, en revanche, dans nos ostraca pas la moindre trace des syncrétismes que suggèrent clairement certains textes sur papyrus antérieurement édités. Le dieu YHH intervient huit ou neuf fois, mais toujours seul, l’épithète YHH ṢBʾT se lit également deux fois, très vraisemblablement, de même que le dieu ḤNM à deux reprises, une fois sans doute à Yeb, une autre fois à Memphis. Un certain syncrétisme a pu s’introduire dans le culte domestique à la suite de mariages avec des étrangers ou étrangères. Nous n’avons lu nulle part pourtant sur les ostraca, à côté du nom de YHH, le nom de Anath-Yahô, ni celui des deux divinités araméennes de Ashimbethel et de Anathbethel. (2006: 1:533)

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is clearly a scribal exercise and contains two independent parts: lines 1–2 are an example of a formula for the beginning of message, “To my brother Haggay, your brother Yarhu: Shalam my brother,” and line 3 is another small scribal exercise with a list of Babylonian deities. In both cases, this ostracon should probably not be used as an argument in favor of the “syncretism” of Judeans in Elephantine. 6.  The ostraca mention special days that may be connected with ritual and feasts, a kind of calendar observed by the Elephantine Judeans. Among these specific days, the Shabbat does not appear in the papyri but is clearly present in the ostraca. Actually, the appearance of the Shabbat in the ostraca was already underlined by Dupont-Sommer in several papers (1949, 1950, 1957, 1963). Even though the interpretation of the Elephantine Shabbat as the seventh day proposed by Dupont-Sommer may be discussed because the Shabbat may well be still celebrated as the day of the full moon (Lemaire 1973), his identification of the Aramaic word ŠBH as corresponding to the Hebrew word “Shabbat” is convincing. The phrase YWM ŠBH is mentioned 3 times (ostraca nos. 44cc5, 49cc,8 [corrected reading: Lemaire 2007: 180], 186cv1), and, in 152cc2, we have the phrase MḤR BŠBH, “Tomorrow, on shabbat.” This day plays a certain role in the everyday life but, from the revised edition of ostracon 152 in TADAE D7.16 with the interpretation “Meet the boat tomorrow on Sabbath” (TADAE 1999: 4,168–69), there is no longer any precise reference to a public holy day. Actually, we do not know whether this “Shabbat” corresponded to the full moon—like during the First Temple period—or to the seventh day of a week. Although the first interpetation looks historically more probable, the text of the ostraca does not confirm it. Other days may have been indicated in the original texts of the ostraca, for instance, in no.  49cv.5–6: “on 6 [. . .] till the days [? . . .]”; in no. 154cc5: YWMN III, “days 3”; in X13cv,2: YWM I, “day 1”; but the contexts of these mentions is too fragmentary to propose a precise interpretation. There may be, however, a reference to Easter in ostracon no. 62cv4 with the word PSḤḤNTY, which H. Lozachmeur proposes to translate “mon cadeau de pâque (my Easter gift8).” Actually, Easter is explicitly mentioned in a Berlin ostracon (RES 1792 = TADAE D7.24,5) as well as in another ostracon published by A. H. Sayce (RES 1793 = TADAE D7:6) (see Dupont-Sommer 1946–47; Porten 2003: 71). However, this does not give much information about the contemporary ritual and meaning of this day. 8. Compare ḤNTʾ/ḤNTY, “gift (?)”; in TADAE D7.9,1, D7.36,2, D7.40,3.

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7.  Several ostraca may mention other rites that may have been connected with ethnicity. This could be the case with “the sacrifice (DBḤʾ)” mentioned in ostracon no. 17cv4, but the context is too fragmentary to be of any use. “The fast (ṢWMʾ)” is mentioned in ostracon no. 200cc3 but also in a very fragmentary context. “The mourning (ʾBWLH)” might be mentioned at the end of ostracon 204 in a still-enigmatic context: BXX XX X WLʾ ʾBWLH WʾNH ʾZL WLʾ ʾTH ʿD ʿRWBH

Translated by H. Lozachmeur (2006: 1:352): en 50? et pas de repas/de deuil et moi, allant et n’arrivant pas (jusqu’)au soir/avant le soir (= vendredi?).9

Furthermore, the verb QRB might be interpreted as mentioning an offering in ostracon no. 103cv2: ZY YQRB ʿL YH[H?, “that he will offer to Yah[o?,” and perhaps in no. 179? (WʾNT ʾL TQRB ʿLYH[M?), X9? and J8? This last ostracon contains also two apparent mentions of the verb KPR, “to pardon, to give compensation,” in a doubly enigmatic sentence: KPRT STRYH WKPRT KL ʾNTH, “I pardoned Setariah and I pardoned any woman” (cc10–12), KPRT being also mentioned in X8cv1. In both cases (X8 and J8), the verb KPR is not far from a mention of Yaho, with Lʾ YḤṬʾ LYHH, “he will not sin to Yaho” (X8cv4) and YBLKY YHH ṢBʾT, “Yaho Ṣebaʾot will bring you?” (J8cc9). In a more general way, one notes that J8 may contain a reference to the death: [Y]WM ZY ʾMWT, “[the d]ay when I die.” It is really very unfortunate that all these ostraca are still quite fragmentary! 8.  I should like to conlude with several references to the problem of purity and impurity that could be somewhat connected with cultural tradition and ethnicity. The verb ṬHR, “be pure,” might be mentioned in ostracon no. 107cc,4: BṬHR, “in the purity,” while the verb ṬMʾ, “to be impure,” is clearly mentioned three times: no. 97cc3, KZY ṬMʾ, “when it is impure,” apparently in connection with QLYTʾ, “the jug?”; no. 125, HLW KL BQʾ/Yʾ ṬMʾN, “Lo, every jar is impure”;10 and no. 137cc,2, ZY LṬMʾW, “that are not impure.” From the content of no. 125, it seems clear anough that the best way to protect against impurity was to seal 9. A. Dupont-Sommer (1950: 68–71) translated first ʿRWBH, “Parascève.” ʿRWBH is also attested in ostracon nos. 271cv4, X9cc4, J7cv4, and perhaps in no. 268? 10.  TADAE D7.44, with the general translation “Do not dispatch to me bread without it being sealed. Lo, all the jars are impure. Behold the bread which [you] dispatch[ed] to me yesterday is im[pure].”

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the vases. In this context, one may underline that the verb ḤTM, “to seal,” appears about 13 times in these ostraca (no. 37cv3?, 42cc,7, 60cc,3, 71cc,5, 82cv,3?, 112cc,3, 125cv,1, 164cc,4, 170cc,7, 246cc,3, 265cv,2?, X14cc,4?, and J2cc,3. See also Lozachmeur 2008).

Preliminary Conclusion The ostraca, which represent everyday-life messages, reveal that, in Elephantine, ethnicity was mainly apparent as marked by religion and ritual. These new documents should be compared with what we already know about ethnicity from the Elephantine papyri and the ostraca from other collections (Porten 1968; Stern 2007: 233–35; JoistenPruschke 2008).

Bibliography Aḥituv S. 2005 HaKetav VeHaMiktav: Handbook of Ancient Inscriptions from the Land of Israel and the Kingdoms beyond the Jordan from the Period of the First Commonwealth. The Biblical Encyclopaedia Library 21. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute. Dupont-Sommer, A. 1946–47 Sur la fête de la Pâque dans les documents araméens d’Éléphantine. Revue des Études Juives 7: 1–15. 1947 “Yahô” et “Yahô-seba’ôt” sur des ostraca araméens inédits d’Éléphantine. Comptes Rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et BellesLettres: 175–91. 1949 L’ostracon araméen du sabbat (Collection Clermont-Ganneau no 152). Semitica 2: 29–39. 1950 Sabbat et Parascève à Éléphantine d’après des ostraca araméens inédits. Pp. 67–88 in Mémoires présentés par divers savants à l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettre. Paris: Les Belles-Lettres. 1957 Un ostracon araméen inédit d’Éléphantine (Collection ClermontGanneau no. 186). Rivista degli Studi Orientali 32: 403–9. 1963 Un ostracon araméen inédit d’Éléphantine (Collection ClermontGanneau no. 44). Pp. 52–58 in Hebrew and Semitic Studies Presented to Godfrey Rolles Driver, ed. D. Winton Thomas and W. D. MacHardy. Oxford: Clarendon. Ginsberg, H. L. 1955 Aramaic Letters. Pp. 491–92 in Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, ed. J. B. Pritchard. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Joisten-Pruschke, A. 2008 Das religiöse Leben der Juden von Elephantine in der Achämenidenzeit. Göttinger Orientforschungen 3: Iranica Neue Folge 2. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

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Kuckertz, J. 2006 Schuhe aus der persischen Militärkolonie von Elephantine, Oberägypten, 6–5. Jhdt. v. Chr. Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft zu Berlin 138: 109–56. Lemaire, A. 1973 Le sabbat à l’époque royale israélite. Revue Biblique 80: 161–85. 1975 Un nouvel ostracon araméen du Ve siècle av. J.-C. Semitica 25: 87–96. 2006 Khirbet el-Qôm and Hebrew and Aramaic Epigraphy. Pp. 231–38 in Confronting the Past: Archaeological and Historical Essays on Ancient Israel in Honour of William G. Dever, ed. S. Gitin, J. E. Wright, and J. P. Dessel. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2007 C.-r. de H. Lozachmeur, La collection Clermont-Ganneau, 2006. Trans­ euphratène 34: 177–83. Lozachmeur, H. 2006 La collection Clermont-Ganneau: Ostraca, épigraphes sur jarre, étiquettes de bois. 2 vols. Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions et BellesLettres. Paris: Boccard. 2008 La vie quotidienne à Éléphantine au V  e siècle avant notre ère: De l’usage de la racine ḤTM. Pp. 167–76 in D’Ougarit à Jerusalem: Recueil d’études épigraphiques et archéologiques offert à Pierre Bordreuil, ed. C. Roche. Orient et Méditerranée 2. Paris: de Boccard. Naveh, J. 2001 Hebrew Graffiti from the First Temple Period. Israel Exploration Journal 51: 194–207. Porten, B. 1968 Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony. Berkeley: University of California Press. 2002 Aramaic Ostraca. Pp. 207–17 in The Context of Scripture, vol. 3: Archival Documents from the Biblical World, ed. W. W. Hallo. Leiden: Brill. 2003 Elephantine and the Bible. Pp. 51–84 in Semitic Papyrology in Context: A Climate of Creativity. Papers from a New York University Conference Marking the Retirement of B. A. Levine, ed. L. H. Schiffman. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 14. Leiden: Brill. Porten, B., and Yardeni, A. 1999 Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt, vol. 4: Ostraca and Assorted Inscriptions. Jerusalem: Hebrew University Press. Stern, I. 2007 The Population of Persian-Period Idumea according to the Ostraca: A Study of Ethnic Boundaries and Ethnogenesis. Pp. 205–38 in A Time of Change: Judah and Its Neighbours in the Persian and Early Hellenistic Periods, ed. Y. Levin. Library of Second Temple Studies 65. London: T. & T. Clark.

The Interaction of Egyptian and Aramaic Literature Joachim Friedrich Quack

Institute of Egyptology–University of Heidelberg

While there has been considerable discussion on the question of Egyp­ tian influence on Old Testament literature, especially wisdom texts such as the Teaching of Amenemope (Humbert 1929; Bruyce 1979; Römheld 1989; Laisney 2007) and Canticles (e.g., Fox 1985), the relation between nonbiblical Jewish literature and Egyptian compositions has been much less in the focus. The relevant compositions I intend to discuss are written in Aramaic, and this entails the methodological problem to which extent they can be classified as “Jewish”—or Jehudite—literature and thus legitimately be brought into the scope of this volume. I can point out that at least Ahiqar is archaeologically ascertained to come from the group on Elephantine Island that stylized itself as “Jews.” Obviously, this will lead to the wider question of what it meant to be a “Jew” during the Achaemenid period. As a point of comparison, Egyptian literary texts of the Late period will be used. I restrict myself to those written in the vernacular demotic language because there is no evidence that literary texts in classical Middle Egyptian language were created anew during the Late period. As a matter of fact, they even seem to have died out during that period; there is no single manuscript of a Middle Egyptian literary composition later than the Saïtic period (26th Dynasty; Quack 2003a). This restriction still leaves us with a fairly large Egyptian corpus (Quack 2005a). In order to use this corpus to the full, we have to keep in mind the chronological question. At first, it seems appropriate to limit ourselves to cases of Egyptian texts from the Achaemenid period, in keeping with the focus of this volume. However, with a closer look, this raises an important methodological issue: what exactly is an Egyptian text from the Achaemenid period? Many Egyptologists tend to base their text chronology mainly on actual attestations of manuscripts. Thus, while avoiding the pitfall of fanciful early dating that has sometimes plagued Egyptology, they incur the even greater risk of mistaking the random preservation for a structure of development (von Lieven 2007: 375

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223–54). Specifically for the demotic literature, we have to reckon with the fact that there are hardly any preserved demotic literary manuscripts from the Persian period actually known nowadays.1 By far, the greatest number of demotic literary fragments date from the Roman period. However, in many cases there are inherent arguments for attributing the original date of composition to pre-Ptolemaic times.2 Thus, I feel justified in using compositions whose actual manuscripts are post-Achaemenid as long as there are good reasons for connecting them with Imperial Aramaic texts. The best-known case of a translation from Aramaic to Egyptian is the Story and Wisdom of Ahiqar. Set at the Neo-Assyrian court and thought by several scholars actually to reflect Assyrian court milieu (Fales 1994; Koch-Westenholz 1995: 63; Dalley 2001: 153–54; Parpola 2005; Weigl 2010: 691–703), the oldest preserved manuscript, written in Imperial Aramaic, was found at Elephantine and dates from the 5th century b.c.e.3 It has been long known that this composition was, besides renderings in many other languages,4 also translated into demotic Egyptian.5 Up to now, only two demotic Egyptian fragments of the narrative frame (manuscripts dating from the Roman imperial period) have been published; several more in the same hand and probably from the same scroll remain unpublished, as well as several fragments from wisdom instructions in the same hand that are likely to constitute the maxims of Ahiqar in demotic Egyptian form. The unpublished fragments of narrative passages as well as the by-far largest fragment of the instructions (P.Berlin 15658) are nowadays at Berlin, and smaller fragments of the wisdom sayings are at Vienna.6 The provenance is not certain, but from the style of the hand it is likely to be Soknopaiou Nesos. 1.  There exists a very small fragment of certainly literary (probably narrative) nature now in Berlin (P.Berlin 23504); see Jasnow (1992: 40 n. 63). 2.  I have argued on this line in several cases (Quack 2005a). For the early history of demotic literature, see further Hoffmann (2009). 3.  Last, see Lindenberger 1985; Kottsieper 1991; Porten and Yardeni 1993: 23–53; Contini 2005; Niehr 2007; Weigl 2010. The relative position of the individual fragments can now be assured by the traces of the tax account that was first written in the scroll. 4.  The standard edition still remains Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis (1913); for a more recent treatment, see Contini and Grottanelli (2005); and the overview of the textual history in Bricquel-Chatonnet (2005). 5.  Zauzich (1976); Betrò (2005). See further Küchler (1979: 333–37), where also translations of some excerpts of the wisdom sayings (based on a provisional translation by Zauzich) are given; Ryholt (2004: 497–99). 6.  Berlin: Relevant numbers of fragments possibly belonging to Ahiqar are P.Berlin 23730, 23829, 23830, and 23831. Vienna: Actually under P. Vienna Aeg numbers 6332 and 6659.

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In order to give an objective impression of the factual basis, I will present the two published fragments of the narrative section in English translation, regardless of their bad preservation. (a) Fragment Cairo7 x + 1 . . .] Egypt(?)8 [. . . x + 2 . . .]9 the father [. . . x + 3 . . .] all [. . .] which they .[. . . x + 4 . . .] misery . . . [. . . x + 5 . . .] whom(?)?10 I will give you a palm-branch(?) [. . . x + 6 . . .] the . . . which is mentioned above totally,11 so that it happens that       she [.  .  . x + 7 . . .]. council among them(?).12 They said: “Let [. . .] give [. . . x + 8 . . .] we [. . .], we failed, we were stupid .[. . . x + 9 . . .] the army which had rebelled is it which has gone to Ni[niveh(?)13       .  .  . x + 10 . . .] in it [. . .] He found Akhiqar at the place [. . . x + 11 . . .]. Go away to your districts14 and your15 c[ities(?) . . . x + 12 . . .]. to the army which the chief Akhiq[ar . . . x + 13 . . . thou]ght about the evil thing which had happened [. . .

7.  Original publication by Sobhy (1930: pl. VII, 2: without closer study), identified as a fragment of the Ahiqar tradition by Spiegelberg (1930). Philological edition by Zauzich (1976: 182–83). 8.  Reading not secure, unfortunately. Read as . . . ntı͗ by Zauzich, but in spite of the damage to the papyrus, the best visible sign seems to be rather an m with a horizontal line above. I propose to read ˹Kmy˺. 9.  According to the determinative, a foreign name. 10.  I would read n[m] e rather than ntm, “agreeable,” proposed by Zauzich. Betrò (2005: 188 note b) has already argued correctly that the word nc̣ˇm, “agreeable,” is written differently in the P.Berlin 15658, but her own reading nmḥ fails to convince me. 11.  I read only ̣ˇcr=f where Zauzich had proposed tr=s ı͗ w gm=f. Similarly complicated groups for c̣ˇr are attested also in other manuscripts from Soknopaiou Nesos; see, e.g., the form in P.Vienna 12006 recto (Stadler 2004: 329). 12.  I propose ı͗ wṭ=w instead of Zauzich’s nꜢ.w šm=w; see the somewhat similar form in P.Vienna D. 12006 recto (Stadler 2004: 281). 13.  The alternative translation “N[adin] came” proposed by Betrò (2005: 188–89 note f) is excluded by the word order that would have to be ı͗ :  ı͗ri̯ N  [..] ı͗ yi̯, not ı͗ :ı͗ ri̯ ı͗ yi̯ N[. .]. 14.  I propose to read nꜢy=tn tš.[w], as is already held to be possible by Zauzich. 15. The n=tn is likely to be an unetymological writing for nꜢy=tn. I suppose that the formulation was analogous to, e.g., P.Krall 8, 18 and even more 9, 21. The traces at the end of the line would fit with the form of ṭmy, “city,” attested in line x + 3 of the Berlin fragment.

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(b) Fragment Berlin (P.23729), column 116 x + 1 . . . a man l]ike17 my father . . . x + 2 . . . which] you have sought for us. You have not sought sorrow18 x + 3 . . .] out of one city or the other, [. . .] . . . x + 4 . . .] chief. Nobody on earth could discover what happened to him. x + 5 . . .] man like Akhiqar who has x + 6 . . .]19 hastened to the place where Akhiqar x + 7 . . .] all [. . .]. Hasten to the chief when he seeks x + 8 . . .] the Assyrian . . . . . . x + 9 . . .] to her [. . .]

In spite of the very unsatisfactory state of preservation, we can make some guesses about the original setting. As already proposed by Zau­ zich (1976) and Betrò (2005: 178), they would fit very well with the situation when Assyria was challenged by the king of Egypt to a duel of riddles, and the Assyrian king was looking for a competent advisor to deal with them. Alternatively, Ryholt (2004: 498–99) has brought forth the (equally possible) proposal that they are from the section where Ahiqar was tricked into seemingly revolting against the king and where he was saved from execution. It is of some importance for my further discussion that the sections about the duel of riddles are not attested among the imperial Aramaic fragments from Elephantine, even though we cannot base too much on this fact, given that those fragments are only very partially preserved, with several pages being completely lost.20 I will go into fewer details about the fragments from the section of teachings because they are not yet published. At the outset, I should stress that the attribution of the wisdom fragments to a demotic Egyptian translation of Ahiqar cannot be strictly proven at the moment. An initial suspicion is based on the similarity of the hands, which points to the work of a single scribe for the wisdom fragments and for the narrative sections mentioning Ahiqar. Of course, one scribe could have 16.  Edited by Zauzich (1976: 183–84). The pitiful fragments of column 2 do not merit a translation. 17.  Here and in x+5, I would read m ʿy instead of the reading šʿy proposed by Zauzich; already Betrò (2005: 190 note a) admits that the sign is more likely to be m than š. For the meaning, I take this to be a variant of the expression m ʿ; see Quack (1996). 18.  Zauzichs reading tḥʿ is clearly correct against the proposal wʿ ʿ by Betrò (2005: 190 note b). 19.  According to the determinative, the name of a foreign person. 20.  Porten and Yardeni (1993: 23). See Strugnell (1999), who argues for the originality of this episode, pointing out also that more leaves than only those with the tax-account could have been glued together.

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copied different manuscripts. There is even one noteworthy difference: all fragments of the narrative sections have an uninscribed verso, while the fragments with wisdom sayings have on the verso a hieratic copy of the Book of the Temple.21 But it would not be too surprising if only a portion of the verso was ever used for writing (Ryholt 2005: 27). In any case, one interesting formal aspect should be noted. In all of the later Ahiqar traditions, but not in the imperial Aramaic fragments, each saying is introduced in a rather dull way, with “my son.” The demotic Egyptian fragments in question do not show any structuring of this sort, even though they contain several probable beginnings of new sayings. Unfortunately, the incomplete preservation of phrases typically has a greater impact on the understandability of wisdom discourse than on a straight narrative; and in the actually known parts of the manuscript, there is hardly any complete sentence. Still, it seems useful to mention some phrases that were quoted by Küchler (1979: 336–37) from a preliminary translation by Zauzich because they served to support the idea that these were precepts how subjects should behave toward a prince. The problem is that in a large measure this interpretation seems due to an elementary misreading. What is really written as pꜢy=k “your” was misread as pꜢ wr “the prince.” The remaining cases, mainly involving the word ḥrı͗ , “chief, superior,” are hardly characteristic for a prince and could as well refer to behavior within any hierarchical situation at the administrative level; as a matter of fact, advice for situations of this sort is quite common in Egyptian wisdom texts (Quack 1994: 152 and 184). One specific passage certainly merits discussion because it goes some way toward establishing the attribution of the fragments to Ahiqar. We have the text “I have eaten gall” (2, x + 2) followed by a lacuna. In spite of the shortness, I can note that this is a fairly unusual formulation for a wisdom text. However, it has a very good attestation in the Ahiqar tradition (Nöldeke 1913: 41). Already, the Imperial Aramaic papyrus has a saying that Porten translates as “I have tasted the bitter medlar and the [taste] is strong but there is not (anything) which is more bitter than poverty,” whereas Kottsieper understands it as “I have tasted the medlar and the gall, and the taste was strong, but there is not anything which is more bitter than poverty” (col. 6, 11 = Sachau pl. 45, 11).22 Lindenberger (1985: 501), on the basis of a slightly different restoration of a lacuna, even understands it as “I have tasted even the bitter medlar, and have eaten endives, but there is nothing more bitter than poverty.” 21.  For preliminary reports of this text see Quack (2000; 2004; 2005b; 2007). 22.  Porten and Yardeni (1993: 36–37); similar also are Contini (2005: 123–24) and Niehr (2007: 43); see also Kottsieper (1990: 20) and the discussion of this saying by Yona (2007: 37–39); Weigl (2010: 157–60).

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These slight disagreements on the precise philological interpretation of the manuscript do not have any repercussions on its similarity with the demotic Egyptian phrase. Among the later Ahiqar traditions, one of the Syriac manuscripts has it as “I have eaten bitter things and swallowed viscous matter but I did not find anything more bitter than poverty” (Nau 1919: 153 and 159, saying 42). In the Slavonic version, we have “I have tasted gall and bitterness, and it was not more bitter than poverty”; in the Armenian we have “I have eaten endive and I have drunk gall, and it was not more bitter than poverty.” The Arabic version has “I have eaten a colocynth, and swallowed aloes, and I have found nothing more bitter than poverty and scarcity” (Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis 1913: 6, saying 54; 32, saying 69; 63, saying 72; 136, saying 40). I will further mention one point that has been brought up previously (Quack 2002: 340; Betrò 2005: 180–81). There is one passage that invites a restoration in line with the later Syriac tradition. The preserved demotic text gives: “Do not love to gird23 to [. . .] occur. If beating24 [. . .].” It is at least tempting to restore the text as “Do not love to gird to s[trife! If strife occurs, beating will] occur. If beating [occurs, killing will occur].” This is, on the one hand, attested similarly as a saying in the Syriac Ahiqar tradition (but not in the preserved fragments of the imperial Aramaic version). There are slight differences in formulation. One manuscript has “Do not stand among those who quarrel. For from laughter there comes quarrel, and from quarrel there comes fighting, and from fighting comes killing” (Nau 1919: 154 and 159). Another has “Do not stand in the house of those who are on strife. For from a word there comes a quarrel, and from a quarrel is stirred up vexation, and from vexation comes killing.”25 On the other hand, we have a very similar formulation in another demotic Egyptian wisdom composition, namely, the Teachings of Khasheshonqy (normally but wrongly called “Onkhsheshonqy” in modern scholarship).26 There it runs as “Do not insult the common man. If insult occurs, beating will occur. If beating occurs, killing will occur” (22, 21–23). The Khasheshonqy saying has been connected with Ahiqar 23.  Against the translation “amare la disputa” (mr mlḫ) of Betrò (2005: 180), it should be stressed that the orthography of the manuscript shows mri̯ ml. 24.  The reading ḫpr mḫy given by Betrò (2005: 180 n. 3) is in need of correction. The actual reading of the manuscript is ḫpr ı͗ n-˹nꜢ  ˺.w mḫy [. . .]. 25.  Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis (1913: 35 and 100, saying 8). For the ramifications of this motive from the third millennium b.c.e. onward, see Quack (1994: 215–17). 26.  For the text, first edited by Glanville (1955), see Quack (2005a: 111–19); a complete German translation is Hoffmann and Quack (2007: 273–99, 365–68).

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already by Lichtheim (1983: 14–17), even without knowledge of the Papyrus Berlin 15658. I will take up the tricky question of the relation between Ahiqar and Khasheshonqy later on. In summary, from what can be ascertained at the moment, the content of the demotic Egyptian fragments of Ahiqar is closer in content to the mainstream redaction of Ahiqar (as attested, e.g., in Syriac) than to the Imperial Aramaic version, a fact that entails complex questions of the actual history of redaction and transmission as well as the date of the demotic translation. Several quite-different possibilities rise up. First, the Egyptian version could be based on some later, considerably reworked version of Ahiqar. In that case, we would lose the relation to the Achaemenid period. The other option is that, in the early times, several quite-divergent versions of Ahiqar were in circulation, and the Egyptian translation is based on one that was rather different from the only preserved imperial Aramaic copy (from Elephantine) without necessarily being chronologically younger.27 One point in favor of this supposition is that the demotic fragments of the teachings, even if taking into account possible further advances in reading and understanding, are also certainly more different from the mainstream redaction of Ahiqar than the ordinary divergences within that group (e.g., between the Syriac and the Armenian versions). Thus, I would propose to interpret the demotic Egyptian translation as testimony of a second free and “uncanonical” early redaction of Ahiqar, even if it is perhaps closer to the later Syriac version in some respects (especially the frame story) than to the Imperial Aramaic one.28 The options can perhaps be narrowed down a bit if we take the Greek Life of Aesop 29 into consideration, because the sections it took over from the Ahiqar tradition (chaps. 101–23) already contain the narrative element of the riddle duel with the Egyptian king. Thus, it presupposes a state of the frame story similar to the Syriac tradition. The Greek text is normally considered to date from the Roman imperial time, even if 27.  Fales (1994: 51–60) has stressed the differences between the Elephantine version and the later traditions, but his arguments have to be taken with caution, given the incomplete preservation of the Elephantine manuscript and especially the proof by Porten and Yardeni that several pages from it are completely lacking. See Bricquel-Chatonnet (2005: 28; 2007). 28.  Unfortunately, the wisdom sayings published by Eshel et al. (2007) are too short and fragmentary to allow a judgment regarding whether they might be considered still another early uncanonical tradition of Ahiqar. 29.  Edited by Perry (1962: 1–208); Papathomopoulos (1990). English translation in Daly (1961: 29–90); German translation by G. Poethke in Müller (1974); Italian translation of the section taken over from Ahiqar by Grottanelli and Dettori (2005: 167–75).

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there has not been much in-depth discussion (Holzberg 2003). A fragment of a Greek papyrus from the late second or early third century c.e. (P.Berlin 11628) containing parts of the text provides a secure terminus ante quem. Besides, in its content it gives an additional terminus ante quem non. By naming the Egyptian king Nectanebo as the opponent in the duel of riddles, it cannot be earlier than his reign (360–342 b.c.e.).30 In any case, the rendering of the name of the Egyptian king is in favor of a milieu that was knowledgeable of Egypt (if not actually being in Egypt);31 a takeover directly from Aramaic without any Egyptian participation would have produced a more garbled rendering. To some degree, this might even bring up the question whether this particular section of the Life of Aesop was taken over from an Aramaic version of Ahiqar at all and not via the intermediary of a demotic Egyptian one. I cannot elaborate this point here, given its complexity and the fact that nobody up to now has ever explored a possibility such as this. But in Egypt during the Roman period, a demotic Egyptian text would have had a much wider circulation and thus been a more logical candidate for influence than an Aramaic one.32 Some evidence concerning the direction and sometimes even time of loans can be gained from the phonetic form of the names. The name of the protagonist appears as Ꜣḫykl or Ꜣḫygl in the demotic Egyptian version. With the laryngeal ḫ, a form of this sort goes back to a Semitic prototype, excluding the possibility of a Greek intermediary. Besides, it should have come about at a time when the distinction between the two sounds ḥ and ḫ in Aramaic, although not indicated in the writing, was still maintained in speech.33 Furthermore, we have the development of an original Semitic velar ḳ to a demotic Egyptian k or g. This spelling is typically used when an Egyptian sound was realized with a pronunciation like the Coptic ⳓ (Quack 2005c: 323–24). The sound shift from a ḳ to 30.  Bricquel-Chatonnet (2006) has pointed out parallels for one episode of the riddle duel involving the construction of a castle in the air that would also indicate that this passage was known at least by the early third century c.e. 31. Already, Perry (1962: 2) has argued that the Greek Life of Aesop was composed by someone living in Egypt and adduced, besides the name of the king, also the important role of Isis as a helper of Aesop; Müller (1974: 8) also points out the role of strateges and nomarques, which are elements of the Hellenistic Egyptian administrative structure. I could add that in the episode of the whipped cat the Aesop romance (chap. 117) goes beyond any of the attested Ahiqar versions by making the (theologically correct) identification of the cat as sacred animal of the goddess of Bubastis. 32.  The Jewish community in Egypt was largely using Greek as their language during this time. 33.  On the date of the coalescence of the sounds, see, e.g., Beyer (1984: 101–11), who dates the coalescence of the two sounds to about the second century b.c.e.

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a ⳓ is quite regular for earlier loans from Semitic languages (Peust 1999: 107, 109 a. 112–13; 307–10) but seems to have ceased at some time during the Late Period. Both points speak against a very late (i.e., Roman period) date of the Egyptian version. In principle, it is much more likely that an Aramaic text was taken over by the Egyptians at a time when Aramaic was relatively prominent by being an official administrative language. Thus, given the phonetic evidence as well as the inherent likelihood, I would still suppose an early, probably Achaemenid, date for the adoption of the Ahiqar text by the Egyptians. One further issue must arise: in the mainstream redaction, Ahiqar regains the favor of the Assyrian king by being able to thwart an intrigue of the Egyptian king and triumphantly overcome the Egyptians in a duel of wisdom/trickery, bringing their tribute for three years back to Assyria. While there is a clear tradition of duels of sorcery in demotic Egyptian tales, e.g., in Setne II or the tale of Djoser and Imhotep against the Assyrians (Quack 2005a: 27 and 39–40), it is hard to imagine that the Egyptians would have liked a story telling of their own defeat,34 so we must ask whether they made some drastic alterations to the plotline to bring it into conformity with their own predilections. But one point to consider is that in the adaptation of this section within the Greek Life of Aesop, the Egyptian king is Nectanebo. This last king of the 30th Dynasty eventually lost his kingdom to the Persians. There is at least one demotic Egyptian narrative text dealing with him, the Dream of Nectanebo (Ryholt 2002; Quack 2005a: 64–65). Even though the end of that composition is not preserved, it can hardly have concluded with anything other than the downfall and flight of the king (perhaps coupled with a promise of return by one of his sons). It is possible that he was chosen by the Egyptians as the one under whom a defeat against superior foreign wisdom was an option. To confound matters even further, some scholars have speculated about possible Egyptian influences in the Story of Ahiqar. Already, Dalley (2001: 155) had seen a mixing of Egyptian and Akkadian literary elements in the text. Her main point was that the narrative was autobiographical and thus in a genre much en vogue in Egypt. She pointed out the Tale of Wenamun, in which, according to her, this became a literary form. By contrast, in Mesopotamia functionaries were not used to writing autobiographical texts, and thus there are no literary predecessors for Ahiqar in this respect.35 I must admit that I do not feel 34. It took conversion to Christianity to have Egyptians take pleasure in the drowning of Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea (Heinen 2007: 203–4). 35. The question of autobiographies in Akkadian texts was also taken up by Fales (1993: 144), who used its absence in cuneiform texts as one argument against

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very confident about an argument such as this. First, our knowledge of literary traditions in Northwest Semitic languages for the first millennium b.c.e. is so limited that ideas about what is “unusual” and thus in need of explanation by foreign influences are quite risky; and there actually seems to be sufficient evidence that, in first millennium Syria, high-ranking persons other than the king could also use the format of first-person biographies (Niehr 2007: 12). Second, even in Egypt it is far from normal to have a first-person narrative in a literary tale. Wenamun (using the outward form of an administrative report, not an autobiography!) is as much an exception in this as the Middle Egyptian Tale of Sinuhe (using the outward form of a funerary autobiography). All tales from Egypt attested during the first millennium b.c.e. are third-person narratives. Besides, even for a wisdom text Ahiqar would not quite conform to an Egyptian model. Whereas it is normal to give a specific name and situation to a wisdom teacher in Egyptian teachings (as well as in Near Eastern texts),36 and within the teaching he can speak in the first person,37 there is no single attestation that the frame story is couched as an autobiography. Normally, an Egyptian wisdom text does not have a long narrative introduction, and the best case in which it does have one (the Teachings of Khasheshonqy) is stylized in the third person. So I am reluctant to see in this formal trait any evidence of Egyptian influence. Others, especially Betrò (2000: 28–31; 2005: 184–87) and Contini and Grottanelli (2005: 84–88), have also pointed out specific motives in the narrative that they saw as Egyptian and proposed that the Story of Ahiqar gained its standard form in Egypt. I must admit that the elements they have brought up fail to convince me, because they tend to be too unspecific. The feigned death of Ahiqar is compared to the Late Egyptian Story of Truth and Falsehood. For the rehabilitation of a courtier, the Middle Egyptian Tale of Sinuhe is invoked. The riddle duel between kings is seen as similar to an episode in the demotic Tale of Setne II, as well as an episode reported by Plutarch, Banquet of Seven Sages about a duel between Amasis and an Ethiopian king. The motive of an impossithe theory of Luzzatto (1992), who had argued for an Akkadian original text; effort at defending her theory in Luzzatto (1994). 36.  For the Near East, see the Sumerian Instruction of Shuruppak and the Teachings of Shupeawilim; see the editions in Alster (1974), and Kämmerer (1998). The ideas of Bergman (1979: 99) about specific Egyptian reasons for giving a name to the teacher are hardly pertinent. 37.  The best case for this is the instruction preserved in P.Insinger with isolated instances of the first person within the text as well as a long “negative confession” in the first person at the beginning and the end of the text (Quack 2005a: 99 and 104).

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ble challenge countered with an even more impossible one is also found in the Late Egyptian Story of Apophis and Seqenenre. Concerning helping birds, the demotic Tale of Hi Hor is invoked. The punishment of the calumniator can be found also in the Late Egyptian Tale of Two Brothers (P.d’Orbiney). In all cases, the similarities remain in a very broad and unspecific way. It should not be difficult to point out equally similar ideas in many other cultures, and it would be bad methodology to base any conclusions about literary contacts on them. Besides the direct translation, there is also the much-debated question of possible influence of Ahiqar on other Egyptian wisdom texts, especially the Teachings of Khasheshonqy. Some similarities between sayings in the texts have been interpreted, especially by Lichtheim (1983: 13–21), as proof of actual influence. She singled out about eight or nine sayings in the Khasheshonqy text that seemed, to her, to indicate that the demotic Egyptian composition was dependent on the Aramaic one. Nowadays, opinions are still divided among Egyptologists (Houser Wegner 2001: 81–92 and 191–208). I have already mentioned one case above because it was likely to be present also in the demotic translation of Ahiqar. Of the other cases, the one with the closest correspondence in wording is the saying “Better is small wealth gathered than large wealth scattered” (Khasheshonqy 23, 9). In the Syriac Ahiqar text, this can be found in a formulation that is normally translated as “better is poverty that gathers than wealth that scatters” (Lichtheim 1983: 18; Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis 1913: 107 and Syr. *45, saying 51). But as far as I see, there is no cogent reason why the participles of the Syriac text must be considered active voice.38 Thus, a translation “Better is a poverty that is gathered than large wealth that is scattered” seems possible for the Ahiqar text as well. Furthermore, also the demotic Egyptian text is amenable to two different interpretations, given that the writing of the verbal forms could intend the infinitive (with active meaning) as well as the qualitative (with passive meaning; the one that has been preferred up to now). In any case, complete agreement between Ahiqar and Khasheshonqy is attainable. Equally good is the correspondence between “Do not prefer one of your children to another; you do not know which of them will be kind to you” (Khasheshonqy 13, 11) and “Treat not your slave better than his fellow for you know not which of them you will need in the end” (Lichtheim 1983: 18–19; Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis 1913: 106 and Syr. *43 38. See Nöldeke (1898: 104–5). Because the Syriac text as edited by Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis (1913: Syr. *45) as well as Nau (1919: 154) does not have any indication of vowels, the difference between active and passive would not show in writing.

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saying 34), especially considering that the Ahiqar tradition of this saying has some fluctuation between “child” and “slave.” A relatively close similarity in formulation can also be found between “You may trip over your foot in the house of a great man, you should not trip over your tongue” (Khasheshonqy 10, 7) and “Release not your word from your mouth until it is examined in your heart; for it is better for a man to trip with his foot than to trip with his tongue” (Ahiqar P.Berlin 165, no. 54)39 with many variants within the Ahiqar tradition (Lichtheim 1983: 19; Conybeare, Harris, and Lewis 1913: 107 and Syr. *46 saying 53). I will refrain from discussing the cases of more broad similarity in conception. Here also, if the connection holds true, the relation to the later Syriac and other traditions would be much more obvious than to the Imperial Aramaic copy.40 Compared to the total amount of text in the composition, the number of direct parallels is rather small, although this comes hardly as a great surprise.41 Houser Wegner (2001: 195–208) has tried to disprove Lichtheim’s conclusions by pointing out that the concepts in the cases in question can be illustrated in other Egyptian texts. In my opinion, an argument such as this is insufficient. Even if the concept in itself is not unattested elsewhere in Egyptian literature, the fact of the closely similar formulation in Khasheshonqy and Ahiqar should be explained, and there is nothing inherently implausible in using formulations found in foreign texts to illustrate concepts that as such are also at home in Egypt—it would even make more sense to take over ideas that are compatible with Egyptian traditions than totally strange ideas. For me, the similarity in the specific formulation is still a plausible indication that Khasheshonqy has taken over some sayings of Ahiqar, even if they do not amount to a dominating influence in his work. Future discoveries concerning the demotic translation of Ahiqar might help to gain more clarity in this area. Provisionally, we can again note that here some version of Ahiqar was available that was nearer to the later versions than to the Elephantine manuscript. To evaluate this fact, it would be useful to fix the date of the demotic Egyptian Teachings of Khasheshonqy. Unfortunately, there 39.  Nau (1919: 154 and 159 [no. 54]). This manuscript, giving “foot,” is closest to the demotic Egyptian text. Other Syriac manuscripts have “heart”; see Nöldeke (1913: 42), who has already seen the superiority of this version even without knowledge of the Egyptian text. 40.  Houser Wegner (2001: 192) adduces this fact as a problem for Lichtheim’s analysis. 41.  Thus, this fact cannot be used, contra Houser Wegner (2001: 194), as an argument against Lichtheim. See, e.g., Quack (1994: 194–205), in which even for innerEgyptian dependencies, the number of close parallels is usually quite limited.

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are some problems in this. While small fragmentary manuscripts containing sayings paralleled by the main manuscript of Khasheshonqy are attested beginning in the early Ptolemaic time (Quack 2005a: 111), the main manuscript itself is late Ptolemaic. The parallels themselves bear withess to a very fluctuating, unstable state concerning the sequence (and probably also number) of individual sayings. Thus, the sayings section of Khasheshonqy is so much an “open” text that any single date for its composition is hardly meaningful, and the frame story is also attested in a reworked second manuscript (Ryholt 2000). While I myself have presented arguments for why the original composition of the text should be dated to the late Saïtic or Persian time (Quack 2002: 336–42), this can in no way be used as a fixed term for all of its individual sayings, and thus the date when sayings from the Ahiqar tradition were taken up in an Egyptian wisdom text remains open—but at least there are no cogent arguments against an early date.42 Besides similarities in some sayings, the general situation of the frame-story with an incarcerated sage has been compared (Betrò 2000: 29), even though there are obvious differences in the details. For memory, I will recapitulate the main points of the Egyptian text: A priest called Khasheshonqy, himself living in rather humble and unsatisfactory conditions, is visiting his old friend Ramose, who has made a great career and become chief physician of the Pharaoh. But he becomes involved in a murderous complot against the king. Khasheshonqy tries to dissuade him from this, but to no avail. Because one member of the royal bodyguard overhears them, the conspiracy is revealed and thwarted by the king. Ramose is condemned to death. Khasheshonqy, because he did not warn the king, is placed in prison in a fortress, without hope of amnesty. In this situation, he writes teachings on ostraca in order to instruct his son, whom he cannot teach personally. While there are some slight, general resemblances to the Story of Ahiqar, we should not overlook the deep-seated differences. Ahiqar is not condemned to prison but sentenced to death (and only saved by a trick); and even though his hiding place might be as tight as a prison cell, it is functionally different. Khasheshonqy, in contrast to Ahiqar, is never pardoned or rehabilitated. Ahiqar delivers his teachings not in written form and at a distance but directly to his nephew Nadin. Ahiqar is completely blameless and only tricked into a situation where he seems to be a rebel, whereas Khasheshonqy’s guilt in not denouncing 42.  Lichtheim’s (1983: 24–28) efforts at a later dating are mainly based on her supposition of an influence of Greek Gnomologia on the text, but there I fail to see convincing proof.

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a conspiracy is real. If there is any influence of one text on the other, it can only have been very distant and mitigated. Perhaps more intriguing is a Greek-language papyrus fragment with a hero called Tinuphis, who is hidden in connection with a feigned execution (Haslam 1991; Quack 2005a: 121). It has been proposed by Kussl (1992) to reconstruct the fragmentary text in a way similar to an episode of the Aesop tradition, which in turn for this episode is based on the Ahiqar tradition. To make matters even more complicated, the name of Tinuphis is the same as that of the father of Khasheshonqy indicated in the frame story to the Egyptian instruction; and it is not one of the most frequent Egyptian names at that time.43 Thus, we possibly have a narrative motif that is very similar to the Story of Ahiqar but with an Egyptian setting. This can be seen as an indication that the frame story of Ahiqar was known in some form in Roman Egypt; and thus it confirms the direct evidence of the demotic translation (where this section is not preserved). I feel much less confident concerning a relation proposed recently by Betrò (2000) and accepted by Contini and Grottanelli (2005: 80–84) between the frame story of Ahiqar and a fragmentary Egyptian tale transmitted on a jar of the Roman period. To some degree, this is based on a supposed similarity of the name of the Egyptian hero, understood as Hihor—which could be understood as an effort in an Egyptian pseudoetymology for the actual name of Ahiqar, especially because “Hi” does not have a meaning as a formative part of an Egyptian name. However, the orthography of the text44 permits the reading “Hi, son of Hor,” and a close parallel to the composition in another demotic text has the hero as “Henu, son of Hor” (with a clear orthography for “son”);45 thus, the supposed similarity in name may be an illusion—“Hi” as a short form of a name is attested in Egypt (Ranke 1935: 233, no. 18). The content of the Egyptian tale shows a wise magician incarcerated at Elephan­tine. He sends out two birds that carry scrolls to the royal court, where they drop them—probably to inform the king of his problematic situation and to justify him against unjust accusations. There might be 43.  Ranke (1935: 387, 9–10, and 388, 13) gives a few examples. Lüddeckens and Thissen (2000: 1350) has 11 written forms (including the literary attestation in the wisdom of Khasheshonqy), of which 3 are from the same papyrus referring to one person, and perhaps example no. 2 (Theban, father of a witness called c̣ˇṭ-ḥr) also refers to the same person as those three examples (all about the possession rights for a Theban tomb of c̣ˇṭ-ḥr, son of c̣ˇ Ꜣi-nfr). 44. See Spiegelberg (1912: 29, no. 30) for another case on this jar in which the filiation sign is not written out. 45.  P.Heidelberg 736 recto; edited by Spiegelberg (1917); see Quack (2005a: 78).

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some broad similarities to the theme of Ahiqar, but they are far from close and convincing: Ahiqar is not imprisoned but sentenced to death, and birds or scrolls do not play any role in his rehabilitation (even if trained eagles carrying boys are used by him in the riddle duel with the Egyptian king). Another Aramaic fragment, unfortunately of uncertain origin (Porten and Yardeni 1993: 54–57; Porten 2004), contains part of a story with Hor son of Pwenesh as the hero. While it is long known that there are demotic Egyptian papyrus fragments from the Roman time showing the same hero (Zauzich 1978: 36), they have not yet been published; thus, a closer discussion is hardly possible. At least we can see that the text is about the adventures of a magician, which is a well-attested Egyptian literary motif. With some likelihood, however, the hero can be identified also with a certain Horus, son of Pneshe, attested as a master magician within the second Setne story (Quack 2005a: 40 and 62; Vittmann 2006: 583). We can suppose that a case of translation or at least free adaptation is involved. Given the clearly Egyptian setting with names and places, the direction of the borrowing is not in doubt; and this can provide an additional supporting argument concerning the problems with the date of the Egyptian Ahiqar tradition: even while direct evidence from pre-Roman time is lacking for the Egyptian side, the Aramaic documentation makes it clear that the Egyptian elements were already present in the Achaemenid time. The verso of that same papyrus contains a prophetic text giving dire prognoses of lawlessness and social upheaval. While there is no obvious indication that it belongs to the same story as the recto text (and indeed, that can be considered highly unlikely),46 it is also, from the details it mentions (e.g., the city of Tanis), set in Egypt and possibly a translation from an Egyptian text. Given its relatively early date, it might have some bearing on the early history of compositions such as the so-called Lamb of Bokchoris (preserved in a papyrus from the time of Augustus), which I have argued on internal reasons goes back to an early (Saïtic) prototype modified in later times (Quack forthcoming b). In a funerary cave near Sheikh Fadl, there is preserved a long narrative written in ink on panels of the wall (Lemaire 1995; Porten and Yardeni 1999: 286–98; Holm 2007). While there is no preserved direct parallel in the Egyptian documentation, the main characters have 46.  Porten (2004: 452–53) has speculated to which degree the appearance of the texts on two sides of one papyrus might be not coincidental. Given my experience with Egyptian papyri written on both sides with literary texts, I would say that the likelihood of a close internal relationship is not very high, even if the two texts are likely to have been used in the same milieu.

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Egyptian names and the action is set in Egypt. Mentioning the kings Taharqa and Nekho, as well as the hero Inaros,47 this composition is likely to be based on an Egyptian model and set at about the middle of the 7th century b.c.e. Inaros is well known as main figure in a cycle of tales (Quack 2005a: 44–61), and there is even some possibility that the ongoing work of reconstructing the Inaros epic might turn up some positive proof for the relation between the Aramaic text and the Egyptian composition. Besides the translations, we have also the more curious case of phonetic renderings in the other script. This also went in both directions. There is an Aramaic leather fragment at Berlin coming from Elephantine (Porten and Yardeni 1999: 137) that Vittmann (2003: 118–19) has convincingly identified as Egyptian language (Quack 2004b). It seems to contain invocations to deities of Elephantine and mentions Philae. Unfortunately, the fragment is small, with no single complete line, and a good part of the text is still not clearly understood. Even more challenging, and going in the opposite direction, is the famous papyrus Amherst 63, written in demotic script but Aramaic language and containing, inter alia, the well-known “paganized” version of Psalm 20 as well as the tale of Ashurbanipal and Shamash-Shumukin.48 These two cases as well as a possible but less-certain case involving a spell against scorpions written in demotic Egyptian but linguistically perhaps Aramaic49 bring up the question of local communities whose linguistic affiliation was no longer coeval with their graphic one. Especially for the very long Papyrus Amherst 63 (about 23 columns preserved), it has to be stressed that its dimensions go far beyond the usual case of short spells (only a few lines) transmitted in Egyptian script and foreign language in other cases, mostly from the New Kingdom (Quack 2010). The interpretation of compositions of this sort must first deal with a basic distinction: were these texts used as carriers of semantic information in the conventional sense, that is, as making statements about gods, history, and so on, or were they carriers purely of phonetic information containing a power of recitation regardless of what they actually said and potentially used by people without seman47.  For the reading of the name, I follow Lemaire (1995) and Vittmann (2003: 104–5). Porten and Yardeni (1999: 290) read Snḥrw. 48.  Among the many publications on this text, I will mention only Nims and Steiner (1983); Steiner and Nims (1984, 1985); Steiner (1991, 1995); Vleeming and Wesselius (1982, 1983–84, 1985, 1990); Kottsieper (1988, 1997); and Rösel (2000). Preliminary translation of the whole text by R. C. Steiner are in Hallo (1997: 309–27). 49.  Proposed mainly by Steiner (2001), with a slightly reserved reaction in Vittmann (2003: 119).

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tic understanding of the text? The second solution would be easier to understand, because then only the legibility of the writing would be important for the user. We could imagine, for example, an Aramaicspeaking person at Elephantine making use of what he knew to be a powerful spell of protection without bothering very much with the finer linguistic details of the spell, as long as he could read it in his own Aramaic script. Or the script could be a question of identity for him even if he knew the foreign language—there would be modern parallels such as, for example, Turkish written in Greek script or German written in Hebrew script. If an Aramaic-speaking user of the Aramaic leather fragment understood the semantics of the text, we would of course have to ask to what degree he can be understood as a Jew, given the number of Egyptian deities invoked in the text, even if there are some attestations of a coexistence of the Jewish god and the indigenous Egyptian gods, as in one greeting formula, “I have blessed you by Jaho and Khnum,” on an Aramaic ostracon from Elephantine (Porten and Yardeni 1999: 172 no. D7.21). The main problem for an interpretation such as this is of course Papyrus Amherst 63, which is way too long to be a normal case of recitation literature; and besides, the story of Ashurbanipal and Shamash-Shumukin is not even a recitation genre.50 But the obvious Near Eastern affiliation of the content would make it equally strange to think of the demotic Egyptian script as a marker of cultural identity. And while the number of groups actually used in the text is limited enough to make the writing system not much more difficult to learn than ordinary Aramaic writing, it has the drawback of not clearly differentiating between voiced, voiceless, and emphatic consonants, a distinction fundamental for Semitic languages. Thus, the writing system is hardly an objective advantage in making the text easier to understand. I must confess that I still lack a cogent explanation for the choice of the writing system in this case, but at least it evidently shows the cultural imprint of Egypt on the users of the text. Concerning those users, one important question must be asked: were they Jews or influenced by Jewish traditions? On the one hand, one of the texts of the papyrus is a variant form of the text known as Psalm 20; thus, a Jewish background looks convincing. However, I would not give too much credit to argumentation such as this. The text could have circulated in the Levantine/Syriac region quite independently of the specific religious affiliation because as a prayer for protection it would 50.  Still, it should be noted that Steiner (1991: 362–63) considers the text to be liturgical.

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fill a demand while not containing religious specialties that would limit its usability to one single religious group. On the other hand, we have to face the thorny question of who one deity invoked in the text actually is. The original idea that it was the Egyptian god Horus51 has by now been laid to rest for good. There has been a theory that the word in question should be understood as a rendering of Yahwe,52 while another understood it as El. The last solution, favored mainly by Kottsieper (1988: 224–27; 1997: 54–55), would leave many possible religious affiliations, but in my opinion, it is excluded by the actual writing.53 The second one, proposed by Zauzich and endorsed with slight modifications by Rösel (2000: 93–94), would point to a specifically Jewish identity, but in my opinion it is equally excluded by the actual writing.54 This specific deity, however, seems only addressed within a rather short section of the text (mainly cols. 12 and 13 in the numbering of Wesselius and Vleem­ing), whereas otherwise Mar or Adonai for “lord/my lord” are the most frequent words. Even though there is no direct attestation from the Achaemenid period, it seems useful to bring up also the question of the relation of a section in the Wisdom of Jesus Ben Sira to passages of the Satire of the Trades (Jäger 2004: 305–17). In that section, different craftsmen professions are derided, often with striking similarities in formulation. Because there is no certain attestation from Egypt that classical Middle Egyptian compositions continued to be copied during the Ptolemaic and Roman periods, we must, if we accept the influence of the Egyptian text on the Jewish one, reckon with the possibility that there was a (lost) intermediary dating from the Saïtic or Persian period, where either the Middle Egyptian composition was adapted in demotic Egyptian or (less likely) directly taken over into a Semitic language. This problem should be tackled in connection with the currently controversial thesis of re51.  Nims and Steiner (1983: 265); still used in Zevit (1990: 217–18). 52.  Zauzich (1985). Tentatively accepted by Vleeming and Wesselius (1985: 39– 42), even while they point out some problems. 53.  Some arguments are already brought forth by Zauzich apud Rösel (2000: 92 n. 82). Additionally, it has to be said that the demotic writing of the preposition r before a suffix always uses r or ı͗ as the first element, never Ꜣ. 54.  While an original Egyptian Ꜣ could develop into a y, the demotic writing system always handles these cases phonetically, i.e., it actually has y, while a demotic writing with the one-consonantal sign Ꜣ never stands for a phonetic y. The preposition ḥr as a writing for the consonant h would be most surprising in a text from the fourth century b.c.e. Erichsen (1954: 322), to whom Zauzich refers for the use of ḥr for h, is based on a misunderstanding; what we have there is a specific paleographic form of h attested in some Fayyumic manuscripts from the Roman period (and even there it is quite different from the form of ḥr).

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lations between Ben Sira and the demotic Egyptian wisdom text best preserved in Papyrus Insinger.55 While some similarities in formulation are evident, the direction of any contacts was in doubt due to discussions about the date of the Egyptian text. The Ben Sira composition is safely anchored in the second century b.c.e. due to the exact dates given in the colophon and historical indications in the text itself, but for the demotic Egyptian wisdom book, we are on less-safe ground. The attested manuscripts are all younger than Ben Sira, none of them going back before the first century b.c.e. But the date of the original text is quite a different matter. I have argued elsewhere from language and writing, as well as content, that we should reckon with a rather early, probably Saïtic original (Quack 2002: 332–36). Thus, if there really are cases in which the formulation has specific similarities, we should better suppose that the Egyptian side was the lender. In summary, the contact between Aramaic and Egyptian literature must have been quite intense. There is hardly any Aramaic literary fragment from the Achaemenid period from Egypt (except the copy of the Behistun inscription) that is not, in one or the other direction, relevant for contacts or even direct translations. We must ask for the reasons, especially because this phenomenon is rather distinct from the Greco-Roman period when there was translation of literary (mainly religious) texts from Egyptian into Greek (Quack 2003b: 330–32), but on a comparatively smaller scale and more unidirectional. While we do have translations from Egyptian into Greek, the opposite case is attested for administrative texts but not for literature.56 One possible reason could be the different status of the respective languages and communities. The Greeks became the rulers of Egypt, and for prestige literature, the Greek literary and philosophical tradition was highly relevant. This led to a bilingual situation in which the indigenous elites learned Greek and read these texts in their original language. On the contrary, the Jews (and other Aramaic-speaking groups) were one of many subject people groups of the Persian Empire, and their literature did not have any particular status, in spite of the fact that their language and writing was the official medium of imperial administrative communication.

55.  Lichtheim (1983: 122–87). Denied by Houser Wegner (2001: 245–61). 56.  Administrative texts: There is one unpublished letter written in hieratic script but demotic language that indicates explicitly that it was translated from the Greek. Literature: This direction of translation only becomes relevant with Coptic literature, which is to a large degree a literature of translations from the Greek.

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Zauzich, K.-T. 1976 Demotische Fragmente zum Ahikar-Roman. Pp. 180–85 in Folia Rara Wolfgang Voigt LXV. diem natalem celebranti ab amicis et catalogorum codicum orientalium conscribendorum collegis dedicata. Wiesbaden: Steiner. 1978 Neue demotische literarische Texte in demotischer Schrift. Enchoria 8,2: 33–38. 1985 Der Gott des aramäisch-demotischen Papyrus Amherst 63. GM 85: 89–90. Zevit, Z. 1990 The Common Origin of the Aramaicised Prayer to Horus and of Psalm 20. JAOS 110: 213–28.

Yehudite Identity in Elephantine Bob Becking Utrecht University

Preliminary Remark The idea of identity is recently used more and more to express the specific character of businesses, companies, universities, ethnic groups, religious movements, and the like. Political parties all around the globe are concerned about their future identities. Interestingly, research programs in religion, theology, and humanities show a tendency to focus on identity. And, of course, we all have digital identities. In many cases, the idea of identity is not always properly defined. In philosophy, identity basically refers to the sameness of two things. Inspired by Leibniz (1969), the philosophy of mathematics states that x = y is true if x is the same thing as y or, phrased differently, that x is the same as y if and only if every predicate true of x is true of y as well. In the philosophy of mind, the identity theory implies that the mind is identical to the brain (Black 1962). In mathematics, identity refers to an equality that remains true regardless of the values of any variables that appear within it (Gray 2001). The psychologist Erikson has defined identity as a description of an individual’s comprehension of him- or herself as a discrete, separate entity. During lifetime and as a result of upbringing, education, and interaction in societal roles and conflicts, the self—or the separate individual—develops a personal identity (Erikson 1959, 1971).1 This framework has been taken over as a concept in sociology and cultural anthropology to construe a group’s typology or self-esteem. This implies that identity, as a label, can be a marker from an outsider as well as a description from an insider perspective on the group’s main and distinctive virtues and values. Needless to say, the outsider and the insider perspective on a group’s identity do not have to be identical by implication. Recently, Charles Taylor has given some nice operational definitions of identity2 that will be applied here on the group of Yehudites in 1. On Erikson, see Capps 1985; Côté and Levine 2002. 2. See Taylor 1989, 2007.

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Elephantine in Egypt in the fifth century b.c.e. Identity can be described in a multidimensional matrix, the features of which can be detected by looking at a group’s attitude toward time (past, present, and future), space (sacred and/or profane), and the group itself (organization, differentiation, boundaries), and “the other.”

Yehudites at Elephantine Elephantine is the name of an island in the Nile that was at the southern border of the Persian Empire during the fifth century b.c.e.3 Written documents give evidence of the existence of a ‘Jewish’ section in the multicultural border garrison at that time. Time and again, the identity of this group is seen as “Jewish.” To give a recent example, Rosenberg wrote an article claiming to be able to trace the remains of a Jewish temple at Elephantine (Rosenberg 2004). I take him as a representative of a more general view that takes the identity of the Yehudites as Jewish. This classification, however, is problematic and needs discussion. In several of the texts on papyri and ostraca, this group is labeled—by themselves as well as by others—as yhwdyʾ. This Aramaic noun can be rendered as “Jewish” as well as “Yehudite.” Here, a question of definition as well as identity is at stake. It is possible to construe the Aramaic noun as “Jewish” (e.g., Korpel 2005). This classification, however, yields a problem regarding the continuation of its meaning. “Jewish”—referring to formative, normative, or rabbinic Judaism— seems to be an anachronism for fifth-century b.c.e. Yahwism. On the other hand, the inscriptions from Elephantine do not show a religion or religious identity that equals Yahwism, as we know it from the Hebrew Bible—as will be discussed below. In accordance with Shaye Cohen and Diana Edelman, I would like to use the classifier “Jewish” for the religion that was contructed in Hellenistic times and construe the Persian period as a transit age from Yahwism to Judaism (Edelman 1995; Nodet 2004; Cohen 1999: 25–106, 109–39). Therefore, I would like to analyze the evidence applying the matrix of identity described above.

Identity and Tradition The inscriptions from Elephantine are silent about the provenance of the Yehudites. The earliest texts date from the beginning of the fifth century b.c.e. In the famous request for the rebuilding of the devastated Temple of Yahô, the Yehudites claim that “when Cambyses came to Egypt, he found this temple built.”4 Because there are no indications 3.  Porten 1968 is still an instructive introduction. 4.  TADAE A.4.7:14; 4.8:13.

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of a Yehudite presence in Elephantine before 500, this is an example of “invented tradition.”5 In other words, from an outsider perspective, the idea that Cambyses devastated all sanctuaries in Egypt except the Temple of Yahô in Elephantine should be construed as an example of hyperbolic appropriation of history. For the insiders, the remark in the rebuilding request should be interpreted as an expression of the identity of the group. They construed themselves as living in Elephantine “from the olden days” (Porten 1968: 25–38; 1984: 378–79; Schäfer 1997: 121).6 Ahlström—building on Letter of Aristeas 13—assumes that many Judaeans moved to Egypt in the end of the seventh century b.c.e. to help Psammetich I in his battles with the Ethiopians (Ahlström 1993: 751–60). Many scholars nowadays, however, take the view that the Yehudites from Elephantine were a mixed group of persons that fled after 587 to Egypt (see also Jer 43:5–7) in combination with former polytheistic inhabitants of the Northern Kingdom of Israel (Redford 1992: 441– 45; van der Toorn 1992: 80–101; Niehr 1990: 43–45; 1998: 162; Grabbe 1999: 25; Naʾaman and Zadok 2000: 179). I do not share this view (see Becking 2003). In my opinion, the Yehudites were soldiers either from the Persian province Yehûd or from the area of al Ya-hu-du, “the city of Judah/Yehud,” and uru ša pna-šar, “the City-of-Nashar” or “Eagleton,” in Babylonia.7

Identity and the Geography of Time The “invented tradition” of the Yehudites that their living in Egypt was from the olden days features linear time. Beyond this linear dimension exists the calendrical experience of time that is an even greater identity marker. The geography of time is an important identity marker. Time as such has no divisions other than the rhythms of day and night and the four seasons. The calendrial organization of time marks the world view of a community (Zerubavel 1982). As far as I can see, the Yehudites in Elephantine adapted the local Egyptian calendar system (Neugebauer 1942; Claget 1995). The cultic calendar of Yahwism is based on the tides of the agricultural year. During and after the Babylonian Exile, the festival organization of time was slightly estranged from agricultural roots, veering instead into the priestly system (Wagenaar 5.  On this concept, see the essays in Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983. 6.  The remark in Letter of Aristeas 13 that during the reign of the Egyptian king Psammetich “Jews” served as soldiers in Egypt cannot be taken for an argument, especially because it is unclear from this relatively late time that King Psammetich is meant; see also Albertz 1992: 381. 7.  See the contributions of Laurie Pearce in this volume (pp. 267–277) and Cornelia Wunsch’s presentation at the conference (not published here).

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2005; Albani 2006). From the inscriptions from Elephantine only two elements are known: Passover/Mazzot and the Sabbath. Passover At the end of the fifth century b.c.e., a document referred to the Yehudites’ appropriate conduct at the Passover festival or during Mazzot. The so-called Passover Papyrus contains hints to Yedoniah—probably the leader of the community—for the way to celebrate this festival.8 Kottsieper argued for the connection between this letter and the Festival of Mazzot (Kottsieper 2002). The text is too broken to make a decision. The only conclusion to be drawn here is that at the end of the fifth century the Yehudites felt the need for a calendrial organization of time, especially in connection with their sanctuary (Leonhard 2003). Mazzot is not referred to in other inscriptions. The theme of Passover is present in two other ostraca. One refers to Passover but is not informative regarding the character of the festival.9 The other is written 70 to 80 years before the Passover letter and contains a question: Please inform me whether you celebrate Passover (‫)תעבדון פסחא‬.10

One can speculate about whether this seasonal festival had been a tradition of old of the Yehudites that needed some revision or whether the troublesome times at the end of the fifth century b.c.e. invited them to start this festival. Whether it was a renewal of tradition or an invented tradition, this festival functioned as an identity marker of the Yehudites. Sabbath In Judaism, the observance of the Sabbath is an important identity marker to this day. The origin of this weekly festival day is still unclear. From Old Testament scholarship, we knew that the weekly Sabbath was part of the grand design of the postexilic community in which festivals and holy days were no longer connected to the agricultural tides but were part of a world view based on order and calculated time (Grabbe 2004: 220–23; Dijkstra 2003: 97–115; Hartenstein 2003; Wagenaar 2005: 121–55).11 The inscriptions from Elephantine evidence the existence of the Sabbath institution among the Yehudites. I will display the evidence here. 8.  TADAE A4.1; TUAT 1:253. 9.  TADAE D7.24; see Porten 1968: 131. 10.  TADAE D7.6:9; see Porten 1968: 72, 131. 11. For a more traditional view, see Friedman 1982; Robinson 1988; MacKay 2001: 11–42; Veijola 2000: 61–75.

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A Request to Yedanjah on Provisions A private letter reads as follows: Greeting, Yedanjah! Now, were I to put [in] the stocks, then it would be commanded: “[Let] them [not] withhold him bread and water.” [Now . . . let] Ahutab [take] out for me. But, [. . . d]ay of the Sabbath. Now, if they did not capture Nathan there, let him go out to me and I will go grind [. . . . . . . . .] Moreover, dispatch to me . . . [. . . . . .] and I shall write [. . . . . .] and do not [. . .].12

This letter is not easily understood. The anonymous writer seems to be worried about the deliverance of food and stocks to himself. The connection with the Sabbath is unclear. On the basis of this broken text, no conclusions can be drawn as to the character of the Sabbath at Elephantine. Instructions on Vegetables, Barley, and More A second ostracon was written by a certain Islah, most probably a woman: Behold, I will send vegetables tomorrow. Meet the boat tomorrow on Sabbath, so that they will not get lost. By the life of Yahô, if not, (then) I will take your life. Do not rely on Meshullemeth or Shemaiah. Now, send me barley in return. Now, by the life of Yahô, if not, (then) you will be responsible for the account.13

This ostracon indicates that on the day of the Sabbath, there obviously existed some trade in grocery ware. It might, however, be that this was a case of emergency. The letter by Islah might have been an outcry from the midst of crisis. Problematic with this interpretation—although it defends a basically strict Sabbath observance—is that the inscription does not hint at a case of emergency. The language of apology for transgressing the Sabbath is absent. On the other hand, however, to conclude that this ostracon reflects standard procedures in Elephantine is premature. What can be adduced is the fact that at least a few Yehudites had no moral or religious problems with trade on a Sabbath.

12.  TADAE D7.10; see Porten 1968: 126.277; 1969; Grabbe 2004: 221. 13.  TADAE D7.16:1–9; see Porten 1968: 126; 1969; Grabbe 2004: 221.

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Others The other ostraca are not very informative. One inscription mentions that Sabbath came, but the context is very unclear.14 In three texts, there seems to be a rather loose connection between salt and Sabbath.15 A fragmentary letter, in which mention is made of bread, it reads: And now, bring to me on the Sabbath.16

This inscription, again, seems to imply that (economic) activities could take place on a Sabbath. Military Duties The Yehudites functioned as soldiers in the Persian army. This implies that they were supposed to be on duty all days of the week. At this point, there is a latent conflict. If the seven-day scheme involving the Sabbath as a day of complete rest was already in function in Elephantine, moral or religious problems could have been possible, because one cannot expect the Persians to have taken into account a variety of religious wishes to be free from duty. The inscriptions from Elephantine do not witness a conflict of this sort. This, however, is no proof of the absence of the Sabbath but only an indication that the Yehudites had a liberal stance toward the demand of the powers that were.17 In sum, the tiny pieces of evidence only allow a few glimpses into the reality of ancient Elephantine. It is very clear that Sabbath was not yet the weekly day of rest as it was in early Judaism. Indications for a seven-day scheme are absent from the inscriptions of Elephantine. This absence of evidence is, however, not the evidence of absence. It should be noted that also no mention is made of days such as “New Moon,” which could be seen as an indication that the weekly scheme was present in this postexilic Yahwistic community. The suspension of almost all activities—as is so important in later Jewish tradition—is not attested, nor are there clues for worship in the form of celebrations or ritual. In other words, the Sabbath was known, but no strict observation is attested.18 It should be noted, however, that an easy comparison between the formative codes as known from the Hebrew Bible and later Jewish tradition and these reports from daily life cannot be made. Both groups of texts should be classified in different dimensions. The codes should be 14.  TADAE D7.12:9; Grabbe 2004: 221. 15.  TADAE D7.28; 7.35; Grabbe 2004: 221; Lozachmeur 2006: no. 205. 16.  TADAE D7.48:4–5; Grabbe 2004: 221. 17.  1 Maccabees 2:41 later allows warfare on the Sabbath, but as I see it only as an act of defense; see Nodet 1997: 63–92. 18.  Grabbe 2004: 221.

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construed as part of the official or book religion, while the texts from Elephantine reveal the religion at the level of the household. These two levels should not be confused, but at the same time the existence of a more open-minded or liberal practice reveals that the normativity of the religious and moral codes was not always mirrored in daily life and that the reality often was more refractory that the official documents of a religion want us to believe.

Identity and the Life Cycle Important information on the identity of a group can be derived by looking at its views on the various phases in the cycle of life and the rituals involved (Capps 1985). A few aspects of the life cycle will be discussed here. Circumcision As far as I can see, no mention is made in the documents from Elephantine of the practice of circumcision, which was of great importance for the religious identity of both Yahwism and Judaism. The absence of evidence, however, cannot be taken as evidence for the absence of this ritual (Porten 1968: 251–52; Dijkstra 2003). Marriage, Divorce, and Intermarriage Among the documents from Elephantine, three marriage contracts including Yehudites were found.19 These documents have been discussed by several scholars (e.g., Yaron 1958; Porten 1968: 187–263; Fitzmyer 1971; Nutkowicz 2007). These contracts contain a set of stipulations especially regarding the extent of the dowry, the eventual distribution of the inheritance, and the unfortunate case of ending the marriage in a divorce. The agreement is made before witnesses whose names are listed. These contracts form the legal side of marriages of well-to-do Yehudites in Elephantine. They do not hint at the form of the marriage ceremony, except for the fact that the phrase “She is my wife and I am her husband from now on to eternity”20 might refer to the actual formulation of the promise in the wedding. Some documents make clear that divorces took place, although it is unknown at what scale. The marriage contracts mentioned above stipulate that both man and woman had the right to start the process leading to the dissolution of the marriage. In either case, formulaic language is 19.  TADAE B.2.6, B.3.3, and B.3.8. 20.  E.g., in TADAE B.2.6:4; the same phrase also occurs in marriage contracts in which Yehudites were not involved, e.g., TADAE B.6.1:3–4; the phrase might refer to local legal customs.

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needed. A declaration must be made śnʾty, literally, “I hate.” “Hatred” should be construed as a legal term that goes beyond the sphere of mere emotion. The verb refers to the fact that the person uttering these words is of the opinion that the marriage had lost its formal and emotional ground. He or she is willing to pay the ksp śnʾ, “hatred money,” which means that financial questions must be settled, probably by returning the dowry. The woman had to leave the matrimonial home (Nutkowicz 2007). It is interesting to note that in Elephantine intermarriage is accepted. Various texts refer to exogamous marriages. Illuminating, but probably also exceptional, is the biography of Mibtahaiah daughter of Mahseiah (Porten 1968: 240–55). She first was married to a fellow Yehudite, Jezaniah son of Uriah. Bride and groom were part of the social upper layer. After the death of her first husband, Mibtahaiah married Pia the son of Pahi, a builder of the fortress of Syene.21 Later on, she divorced the Egyptian officer to marry Ashor, the builder of the king, also an Egyptian.22 Marriages with persons from the Aramaean ethnos probably were not unknown but limited (Porten 1968: 174). Life after Death Death is the final and inevitable phase in the cycle of life. As fas as I can see, the documents from Elephantine do no contain any references to ideas about a beatific afterlife. Here too, the absence of evidence, however, cannot be taken as evidence for the absence of ideas about life after death. In view of the longstanding Egyptian traditions on this topic (Taylor 2001), it would be a surprise if the Elephantines—of whatever ethnic background—would not have speculated about “the land of no return.” Unfortunately, we are not informed about the character of their speculations. One exception, however, should be noted. As will be discussed below, one text from Elephantine hints at the existence of the marzēaḥ institution at Elephantine.23 The institution of the marzēaḥ was often, but not always, connected with the cult of the dead and the veneration of the ancestors (McLaughlin 2001). In other words, the presence of the marzēaḥ at Elephantine might indicate the existence of the veneration of diefied ancestors and hence some perception of an afterlife. It is more than interesting to note that, at least the well-to-do Yehudites made arrangements regarding inheritance. Several contracts deal 21.  TADAE B.2.8. 22.  TADAE B.2.6. 23.  TADAE D.7.29; see, e.g., Porten 1968: 179–86; McLaughlin 2001: 36–37; Becking 2005.

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with the distribution of property after the death of its owner in minute detail. These texts have been thoroughly discussed with regard to their legal aspects (e.g., Gottlieb 1981; Szubin and Porten 1983). In this connection, it is important to note that these measures were based on the concept of continuity. The settling of the inheritance not only organizes the continuation of control over property and means within the extended family but also hints at the responsibility for the continuation of the community in its entirety.

Identity and the Topography of Space A temple as sacred space should be seen as a limitation of space to qualify a specific divine presence. In Elephantine, a temple for the veneration of Yahô existed. This temple is first referred to in the prescript of an early fifth-century letter written by Oshea to his brother Shelonam: “[. . . to the (?) t]emple of Yahô in Jeb.”24 The correspondence between Yedoniah and Bagoas on the rebuilding of the temple after its destruction by a coalition of the priests of Khnum and the wicked Widranag makes clear the existence, destruction, and rebuilding of this temple. Reinhard Kratz has eminently displayed and discussed these texts (Kratz 2006). Archaeological traces of this temple are still uncertain.25 In the letter by Yedoniah to Bagoas, the Persian satrap of Yehud, he remarks that Yahô dwells in the temple of Yeb. This phrase that resembles ancient Near Eastern terminology expresses the spatial identity of the temple. The divine dwelling qualifies this secluded space. It can also be assumed that cultic gatherings functioned also as a boundary marker for the group. The cult of Yahô was, however, not completely monotheistic. The inscriptions from Elephantine refer to many other deities, such as Khnum and Nabu, El and Shamash, Bel and Nergal. They, however, were not part of the cult of Yahô. The deities Eshembethel and Anathbethel are referred to in the so-called collection account for the Temple of Yahô.26 Comparable divine names are AnathYahô and Herembethel. Their identity will be discussed below.

Identity and “the Other” Identity is quite often construed in the encounter with “the other.” Encounters such as these lead to various forms of adaptation. Our con24.  P. Padua 1 = TADAE A3.3:1. For other references to this temple apart from the Yedoniah-correspondence, see TADAE D7.18; B2.7:13–14. See Ayad Ayad 1997: 37–50. 25.  Pace von Pilgrim 1998; Rosenberg 2004. 26.  TADAE C3.15 VII:126–28; see Porten 1968: 160–64; Becking 2005.

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temporary history is full of examples of both orthodoxy and aggiornamento as reactions to shifts in the society. The Yehudites were not the only “ethnic” community in Elephantine. They generally lived quite peacefully together with the Aramaeans and with indigenous Egyptians. In general, no tendencies to isolation can be detected. The many ostraca indicate various forms of economic and religious interaction. This especially can be detected in the blessing formulas in various private letters. Yarhu wishes his brother Haggay well in the “Name of Bel and Nabu, Shamash and Nergal.”27 Sometimes, Yehudites with a Yahô-theophoric name quite often open their letters with the general wish “May all gods look after your well-being for all time.”28 The use of plural “gods” cannot be seen as evidence of a multiethnic pantheon in Elephantine. The references are too general (Niehr 1990: 48). Of great importance is the clash with the priests of Khnum and the actions of the wicked Widranag (Kratz 2006). This episode is known from a letter written by Yedoniah to Bagohi, the Persian governor in Yehud seeking authorization for the rebuilding of the Yahô Temple after its destruction caused by a conspiracy of the priests of Khnum with the temporary Persian officer Widranag. Yedoniah’s plea aims at a reconstruction of the Yahô Temple so that the cult of offerings can be continued. Bagohi, the Persian governor in Yehud, eventually decides in favor of the request of Yedoniah, that the cult be restricted to incense and the offering of vegetables, with the offering of animals no longer allowed. In other words, the clash resulted in an adjustment of the cultic identity. The restriction in the cultic offerings can be seen as a negotiated identity. It should be noted that, except from this incident, no evidence is found of clashes between the ethnic and/or religious groups in Elephantine. In other words, peaceful co-existence with others and the general acceptance of their otherness was part of the identity of the Yehudites.

Wisdom as Intercultural Identity Here, I would like to refer to Ahiqar both novel and proverbs. As is well known, the oldest-known version of both tale and wisdom collection was found at Elephantine. It should be noted that Ahiqar is neither a Yahwistic nor a Jewish text. The text represents more general ancient Near Eastern wisdom. According to Herbert Niehr in his recent translation, the wisdom of Ahiqar was rooted in the Assyro-Aramaic 27.  TADAE D7.30:2–3. 28. E.g., TADAE A3.7, A4.2. See Porten 1968: 158–60.

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kingdoms of northern Syria (Niehr 2007). In Elephantine, this text was probably in use as a schooltext for the the training of writers and officials of all local ethnic groups. Ahiqar contains a tendency to loyalty, prudence, modesty, and adaptation. This might imply that the “upper classes” of the various ethnic and/or religious groups in Elephantine were trained in a lifestyle and a world view that were characterized by the acceptance of the Persian power and an openness to negotiate the identity with “the other.”

Identity and Social Stratification With the final remark of the previous section, I implied the existence of a social stratification within the Yehudite group in Elephantine, which is also suggested by the fact that, for some Yehudites, settling arrangements for marriage and inheritance as necessary. This connection sheds light on the presence of a marzēaḥ in Elephantine. To Haggay I spoke to Ashian about the silver for the Marzēaḥ Thus he said to me: There isn’t any. Now I shall give it to Haggay or Igdal Get to him that he may give it to you!29

This institution implies the existence of an elitist group within the Yehudite community that apparently was in need of a specific identity. Elsewhere, I have argued that the so-called collection account from Elephantine—in which the donation of two shekels for the Temple of Yahô by 128 Yehudites is recorded—should be construed as the administration of the upper layer of the Yehudites of Elephantine (Becking 2005). I assume that this elitist group is roughly the same as the group that attended the marzēaḥ. At the end of the collection account, Eshembethel and Anathbethel are mentioned as deities for whom money is collected. The identity and the provenance of these divine beings are discussed among scholars (see Becking 2003). The god Eshembethel is not mentioned elsewhere. Anathbethel might be identical with Anath-Yahô, mentioned in an oath text from Elephantine.30 In the request to restore the Temple of Yahô written by Yedoniah to Bagohi, the Persian governor in Yehud, mention is made of the demolition of the ʿmwdyʾ zy ʾbnʾ, “stone pillars that were there.”31 This detail 29.  TADAE D.7.29; see, e.g., Porten 1968: 179–86; McLaughlin 2001: 36–37. 30.  TADAE B.7.3. See Porten 1968: 109, 154–56; 1983: 563–75; van der Toorn 1986. 31.  TADAE A.4.7:9 // A.4.8:8.

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indicates that the Israelite divine was represented by a standing stone in the temple at Elephantine. It should be noted that the Aramaic noun ʿmwdyʾ is plural, and therefore the pillage of several standing stones is implied. Athas has suggested that these “pillars of stone” were “sacred Bethel-stones representing the five deities mentioned specifically as revered by the Judaean community at Elephantine.”32 I would like to combine these two features, the reverence of Anathbethel and Eshembethel and the presence of “standing stones” in the Temple of Yahô, into the following proposal. The institution of the marzēaḥ was often, but not always, connected with the cult of the dead and the veneration of the ancestors (McLaughlin 2001). Quite often, protective deities were part of the inventory of a marzēaḥ. This leads to the assumption that Anathbethel and Eshembethel might have been the protective deities of the marzēah of Elephantine and were represented by the ʿmwdyʾ zy ʾbnʾ, “stone pillars that were there.”

Identity and the Military The character of one’s profession is of great importance for one’s identity. The same holds for (ethnic) groups. Most Yehudites were employed as soldiers in the border garrison. This implies a basic loyalty toward the powers that were. A copy in Aramaic of Darius’s Behistun inscription was found in Elephantine.33 This text was—like Ahiqar—in use for scribal education. In reading and writing this text, the intelligentsia from Elephantine of the various ethnic and/or religious groups were trained in the Persian imperial ideology, especially in the fact that there was no use in their revolting against the central power, as is demonstrated in Darius’s inscription. One way or another, they had integrated this ideology within their own identity, as can be proven by the fact that the Yehudites never revolted against the Persian power.

Yehudite Identity in Elephantine “Jewish” seems to be an anachronism for fifth-century b.c.e. Yahwism. The Yehudites were not (yet) Jews. What distinguishes them from “common Judaism,” for instance, is the laxity in the observation of the Sabbath. On the other hand, the inscriptions from Elephantine do not show a religion or religious identity that equals Yahwism as we know it from the Hebrew Bible. Although the Yehudites of Elephan32.  Athas 2003: 315. Athas reckons with the veneration of Yahô, Anath-Bethel/ Yahô, Eshembethel, Herembethel, and Bethel by the yehudites at Elephantine. 33.  TADAE C.2.

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tine venerated Yahô, they were not Yahwists in the “Deuteronomistic” sense of the word. This can be illustrated by the presence of a marzēaḥ. The Yehudites can be differentiated from the “Ezra group” in and around Jerusalem. In Elephantine, “mixed marriages” were accepted. There existed an openness to “the other,” and no strict fence around the community was constructed. My final question is almost unanswerable. How can we interpret this identity within the historical development of Yahwism? This question is problematic for various reasons: 1. The emergence and provenance of the Yehudites remain uncertain. 2. The evidence on the development of Yahwism is still very scanty. The Elephantine evidence hints at the following supposition. The Yehudites were the descendants of a branch, or various branches, of the poly-Yahwism that we may understand to have been in existence in Judah before the Yahweh-alone movement. Whether they fled in the age of Josiah or were recruited from the Persian province of Yehud or even from the area around Eagleton and New Jerusalem in Mesopotamia, they seem to have been able to retain their prebiblical form of Yahwism. Identity, however, is always on the move. Their fundamental attitude of openness made them able to adapt the local situation and to negotiate their identity in the polycultural setting of Persian-period Elephantine.

Bibliography Ahlström, G. W. 1993 History of Ancient Palestine. Minneapolis: Fortress. Albani, M. 2006 Israels Feste im Herbst und das Problem des Kalenderwechsels in de Exilszeit. Pp. 111–56 in Festtraditionen in Israel und im Alten Orient, ed. E. Blum and R. Lux. VWGTh 28. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Albertz, R. 1992 Religionsgeschichte Israels in alttestamentlicher Zeit. GAT 8/1–2. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Athas, G. 2003 The Tel Dan Inscription: A Reappraisal and a New Interpretation. JSOTSup 360. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Ayad Ayad, B. 1997 From the Archive of Ananiah Son of Azariah: A Jew from Elephantine. JNES 56: 37–50.

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Becking, B. 2003 Die Gottheiten der Juden in Elephantine. Pp. 203–26 in Der eine Gott und die Götter: Polytheismus und Monotheismus im antiken Israel, ed. M. Oeming and K. Schmid. ATANT 82. Zürich: Theologischer Verlag. 2005 Temple, marzēaḥ, and Power at Elephantine. Transeuphratène 29: 37–47. Black, M. 1962 The Identity of Indiscernibles. Mind 61: 153–64. Capps, D. 1985 The Beatitudes and Erikson’s Life Cycle Theory. Pastoral Psychology 33: 226–44. Cohen, S. J. D. 1999 The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley: University of California Press. Côté, J. E., and Levine, C. 2002 Identity Formation, Agency, and Culture: A Social Psychological Synthesis. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. Claget, M. 1995 Ancient Egyptian Science, vol. 2: Calendars, Clocks, and Astronomy. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society. Dijkstra, M. 2003 Religious Crisis and Inculturation: The Example of Post-Exilic Israel. Pp. 97–115 in Towards an Intercultural Theology: Essays in Honour of J. A. B. Jongeneel, ed. M. Frederiks, M. Dijkstra, and A. Houtepen. IIMO Research Publication 61. Zoetermeer: Meinema. Edelman, D. V., ed. 1995 The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms. CBETh 13. Kampen: Kok Pharos. Erikson, E. H. 1959 Identity and the Life Cycle: Selected Papers. New York: International Universities Press. 1971 Identity: Youth and Crisis. London: Faber. Fitzmyer, J. A. 1971 A Re-study of an Elephantine Aramaic Marriage Contract (AP 15). Pp. 137–68 in Near Eastern Studies in Honor of William Foxwell Albright, ed. H. Goedicke. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Friedman, T. 1982 The Sabbath in Israel: Law and Life. Judaism 31: 93–98. Gottlieb, I. 1981 Succession in Elephantine and Jewish Law: Brooklyn Museum Aramaic Papyrus 2. JSS 26: 93–203. Grabbe, L. L. 1999 Israel’s Reality after the Exile. Pp. 9–32 in The Crisis of Israelite Religion: Transformation of Religious Traditions in Exilic and Post-Exilic Times, ed. B. Becking and M. C. A. Korpel. OTS 42. Leiden: Brill.

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A History of Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period. Vol. 1. LSTS 47. New York: Continuum.

Symbols and Suggestions: Communication of Mathematics in Print. Mathematical Intelligence 23: 59–65. Hartenstein, F. 2003 Der Sabbath als Zeichen und heilige Zeit: Zur Theologie des Ruhetages im Alten Testaments. Pp. 103–31 in Das Fest: Jenseits des Alltags, ed. I. Fischer et al. JBTh 18. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Hobshawn, E. J., and Ranger, T. 1983 The Invention of Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Korpel, M. C. A. 2005 Disillusion among Jews in the Postexilic Period. Pp. 135–57 in The Old Testament in Its World, ed. R. P. Gordon and J. C. de Moor. OTS 52. Leiden: Brill. Kottsieper, I. 2002 Die Religionspolitik der Achämeniden und die Judan von Elephantine. Pp. 150–78 in Religion und Religionskontakte im Zeitalter der Achämeniden, ed. R. G. Kratz. VWGTh 22. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Kratz, R. G. 2006 The Second Temple of Jeb and of Jerusalem. Pp. 247–64 in Judah and the Judaeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Leibniz, G. W. 1969 Philosophical Papers and Letters, ed. and trans. L. Loemker. Dordrecht: Reidel. Leonhard, C. 2003 Die Erzählung Ex 12 als Festlegende für das Pesachfest am Jerusalemer Tempel. Pp. 233–60 in Das Fest: Jenseits des Alltags, ed. I. Fischer et al. JBTh 18. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Lozachmeur, H. 2006 La collection Clermont-Ganneau: Ostraca, épigraphes sur jarre, étiquettes de bois. 2 vols. Paris: de Boccard. MacKay, H. A. 2001 Sabbath and Synagogue: The Question of Sabbath Worship in Ancient Judaism. Religions in the Graeco-Roman World 122. Leiden: Brill. McLaughlin, J. L. 2001 The marzēah in the Prophetic Literature: References and Allusions in Light of the Extra-Biblical Evidence. VTSup 86. Leiden: Brill. Naʾaman, N., and Zadok, R. 2000 Assyrian Deportations to the Province of Samaria in Light of Two Cuneiform Tablets from Tel Hadid. Tel Aviv 27: 159–88. Neugebauer, O. 1942 The Origin of the Egyptian Calendar. JNES 1: 396–403.

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Niehr, H. 1990 Der höchste Gott: Alttestamentlicher Jhwh-Glaube im Kontext syrischkanaänischer Religion des 1. Jahrtausends v. Chr. BZAW 190. Berlin: de Gruyter. 1998 Religionen in Israels Umwelt. NEB Ergänzungsband 5. Würzburg: Echter. 2007 Aramäischer Aḥiqar. JSHRZ n.s. 2/2. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Nodet, E. 1997 A Search for the Origin of Judaism: From Joshua to the Mishnah. JSOTSup 248. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Nutkowicz, H. 2007 Concerning the Verb śnʾ in the Judaeo-Aramaic Contracts from Elephantine. JSS 52: 211–25. Pilgrim, C. von 1998 Textzeugnis und archäologischen Befund: Zur Topographie Elephantines in der 27. Dynastie. Pp. 485–97 in Stationen: Beiträge zur Kultur­geschichte Ägyptens Rainer Stadelman gewidmet, ed. H. Guksch and D. Polz. Mainz: von Zabern. Porten, B. 1968 Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Colony. Berkeley: University of California Press. 1969 The Religion of the Jews of Elephantine in Light of the Hermopolis Papyri. JNES 28: 116–21. 1983 An Aramaic Oath Contract: A New Interpretation. RB 90: 563–75. 1984 The Jews in Egypt. Pp. 372–400 in The Cam­bridge History of Judaism, ed. W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Redford, D. B. 1992 Egypt, Canaan and Israel in Ancient Times. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Robinson, G. 1988 The Origin and Development of the Old Testament Sabbath. BBET 21. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Rosenberg, S. G. 2004 The Jewish Temple at Elephantine. NEA 67: 4–13. Schäfer, P. 1997 Judeophobia: Attitudes towards the Jews in the Ancient World. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Szubin, H. Z., and Porten, B. 1983 Testamentary Succession at Elephantine. BASOR 252: 35–46. Taylor, C. 1989 Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2007 A Secular Age. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.

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Taylor, J. H. 2001 Death and the Afterlife in Ancient Egypt. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Toorn, K. van der 1986 Herem-Bethel and Elephantine Oath Procedure. ZAW 98: 282–85. 1992 Anat-Yahu, Some Other Deities, and the Jews of Elephantine. Numen 39: 80–101. Veijola, T. 2000 Moses Erben: Studien zum Dekalog, zum Deuterono­mismus und zum Schrift­gelehr­tentum. BWANT 149. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Wagenaar, J. A. 2005 Origin and Transformation of the Ancient Israelite Festival Calendar. BZAR 6. Wiesbaden: Harrasowitz. Yaron, R. 1958 Aramaic Marriage Contracts from Elephantine. JSS 3: 1–39. Zerubavel, E. 1982 Easter and Passover: On Calendars and Group Identity. American Sociological Review 47: 284–89.

Judean Ambassadors and the Making of Jewish Identity: The Case of Hananiah, Ezra, and Nehemiah Reinhard G. Kratz University of Göttingen

Judeans or Jews? Most modern European languages tend to distinguish between “Judeans” and “Jews.” If the term Judeans is used, it generally refers to the population of the geographical region of Judah either during the time of the preexilic Kingdom of Judah (and in opposition to the Kingdom of Israel in the north) or during the time of the postexilic province of Yehud or Judaea (in contrast to the province of Samaria). The term Jews, however, is employed when talking about all members of the people, either in the land of Palestine or in the worldwide Diaspora. The term is then used to designate what the Hebrew Bible calls “Israel” or “the people of Israel,” a group of people that is not primarily identified in political or geographical terms but rather by its religion and genealogy. Neither Hebrew nor Aramaic knows of a distinction of this sort. Both languages simply speak of ‫יהודה‬, ‫יהוד‬, “Judah,” or ‫יהודים‬, ‫יהודין‬, “Judeans,” in distinction from Israel and Israelites or Samaria and Samarians. A differentiation between “Judeans” and “Jews”—if it is at all intended—can only be derived from the context, and the same has to be said of “Israel” as a political or an ideal entity. This lack of distinction or differentiation, then, is one of the reasons why it is quite difficult to decide what kind of ethnic group is hidden behind those people, who call themselves ‫יהודין‬, “Judeans,” and sometimes even ‫ארמין‬, “Arameans,” in the Aramaic documents from Elephantine. 1 Thus, this question arises: are the texts talking about “Judeans,” “Jews,” or “Arameans?” 2 Author’s note: English translation is by Anselm C. Hagedorn. 1.  All texts from Elephantine are quoted according the edition of Porten and Yardeni 1986–99. 2.  On the general problem of identity and ethnicity, see Cohen 1999 and Mason 2007. On the biblical self-designation “Israel,” see Kratz 2000a and the following pages (422–24).

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Apparently, the labels in question can be distributed equally over the two settlements of Elephantine (Yeb) and Syene. While the “Judeans” lived at Elephantine, most of the “Arameans” did so in Syene. 3 Therefore, the “fortress of Elephantine” can also be called “Judean garrison,” and the “fortress of Syene” is labeled “garrison of Syene.” 4 Of course, there are exceptions to the rule. Even though we do not find any “Judeans of Syene,” there are several “Arameans of/in Yeb.” 5 Additionally, there are individual instances in which the same person can be called “Judaean of Yeb” and “Aramean of Syene.” 6 How this distribution must be understood has not been explained sufficiently. Bezalel Porten, following a proposal by Arthur Ernest Cowley, argued that the term ‫ ארמי‬is used to designate the population in general, whereas ‫ יהודי‬is a special label describing the majority of the people of Yeb (Cowley 1923: xvi; Porten 1968: 17, 33–34). This line of argumentation, however, does not explain the supplement ‫זי סון‬, “of Syene,” to the name of those people who are at the same time ‫זי יב‬, “of Yeb”—unless we want to argue that Syene was also used as a general term that included Yeb. If that were the case, both the Judeans of Yeb and the Arameans and Syenians of Elephantine would be subgroups of the Arameans of Syene. Another possibility is that the use of different gentilicia for one person correlates to different social relationships. Here, we can think of different treaty partners or changing military units. 7 Additionally, we have to consider the distribution of the Hebrew 3.  For (‫( יהודי זי יב )בירתא‬sg. and pl.), “Judean(s) of Yeb (the fortress),” see B 2.4:2, 2.9:2, 3.1:3, 3.6:2, 5.5:1–2; ‫ביב בירתא‬, “in the fortress of Yeb” (likely): B 2.2:3, 2.3:2; D 2.12:4; ‫( ארמי זי סון‬sg. and pl.), “Aramean(s) of Syene”: B 2.1:2, 2.6:2, 2.7:2–3, 2.8:3, 2.11:2, 3.3:2, 3.8:2, 3.9:2–3, 3.13:2, 4.5:1–2, 4.7:1; D 2.3:2, 2.10:2; ‫ארמי סונכן‬, “a Syenian Aramean”: B 5.2:2. 4.  For ‫חילא יהודיא‬, “Judean garrison,” see A 4.1:1, 10; C 3.15:1; ‫חילא זי סון‬, “garrison of Syene”: A 5.2:7; B 2.10:2–4; 3.9:2–3; D 17.1:2; ‫חילא סונכניא‬, “Syenian garrison”: C 3.14:32. 5.  For ‫ארמי זי יב בירתא‬, “Aramean of the fortress of Yeb,” see B 2.10:2, 3.8:2, 3.12:2– 3, 4.6:2, 6.1:2; ‫ביב בירתא‬, “in the fortress of Yeb”: 7.2:2–3; ‫סונכנן זי ביב בירתא‬, “Syenian in Yeb, the fortress”: B 4.10:6. 6.  Mahsaiah b. Jedaniah: B 2.2:3, 2.3:1–2, 2.4:1–2, 2.9:3 and B 2.1:2, 2.6:2, 2.7:1–2, 2.8:2–3; Koniah b. Zadak: B 2.2:8–9 and B 2.1:2; Anani b. Haggai b. Meshullam: B 3.13:1–2 and B 3.8:1–2, 3.12:2–3; Meshullam b. Zakur B 3.1:2–3, 3.6:2 and B 3.3:2. See also Jedaniah and his colleagues: A 4.7–8:22, on the one hand, and A 4.10:6, on the other. 7.  For different treaty partner, see, on the one hand, B 2.1, 2.3, 2.4, 2.9, 3.1, 3.6 and B 2.6, 2.7, 2.8, 3.8, on the other. Different are B 3.3, 3.12 and B 3.13. Depending on the addressee, the self-designation of Jedaniah changes in A 4.7–8:22 and 4.10:6. For changing military units, see B 5.5:1 (if the proposed readings and restorations

Judean Ambassadors and the Making of Jewish Identity

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and Aramaic names in the onomasticon. 8 The identity of both gentilicia is equally mysterious. If we were talking about an umbrella-term, Syria-Palestine as a whole would be the reference point for the “Arameans.” If we are talking about a gentilicium proper, we have to narrow the region to Syria and northern Palestine and this is the former Israel and the province of Samaria as well as the East Jordan territory. The latter interpretation is supported by the deities worshiped in Syene; they point to (Babylonia and) northern Syria (Porten 1968: 164–74; 2003: 461–66; van der Toorn 1992: 85–87). As far as the identity of the “Judeans” of Yeb is concerned, scholarship has offered a wide variety of explanations. Some scholars think of relics from preexilic Israel, and others favor preexilic Judah as the place of origin. 9 Porten, in an attempt to reconcile the different views, talks of “Jews, Israelites and Judahites,” who fled to Egypt during the 8th–6th centuries b.c.e. and settled there. 10 Following a different line of interpretation, Bob Becking has recently proposed that the Judeans came from neither ancient Israel nor from preexilic Judah, but rather were inhabitants of the Persian province of Yehud in the 6th–5th centuries b.c.e.—a fact that would also illuminate the circumstances there (Becking 2003: 226; see also Cowley 1923: xviii, xxviii; Bedford 1999: 12–13). Whatever their place of origin was, the Judeans of Yeb represented in any case a type of Judaism that fits neither the biblical ideal of “Israel” nor the general (scholarly) concept of Judaism. 11 Whether we should speak here of an original (prebiblical) condition or of a deviation from the (biblical) norm depends entirely on the historical origin of that norm and hinges on the question whether a norm such as this was universally acknowledged. Leaving the biblical construction of history are correct). Origin and affiliation to a military unit (‫)דגל‬, however, cannot always be reconciled in the cases mentioned in n. 6. 8.  Silverman (1969, 1970) employs a chronological differentiation and argues for a growing Aramaizing process within the Judean colony. 9. For Israel, see Meyer 1912: 32–38, 40; Wellhausen 1914: 176–78; Weippert 1997: 15; van der Toorn 1992; for Judah, see Cowley 1923: xv–xvi, xix–xx; Dion 2002: 252–53. 10.  Porten 1968: 13; Bedford 1999: 7–8. Differently, Porten (2003: 456–61), who now favors “a theory that sees the establishment of the Jewish garrison with temple at Elephantine approximately 650 b.c.e. as very similar to the establishment of the Jewish garrison with a temple in the land of Onias––a disaffected priest with prophetic support entering into the service of the king and building a temple like the one in Jerusalem” (p. 461). 11.  On the religion-historical situation at Elephantine, see Meyer 1912: 38–67; Cowley 1923: xiii–xxviii; Vincent 1937; Porten 1968, 1969; van der Toorn 1992; Bolin 1995; Stoebe 1995; Bedford 1999; Dion 2002; Becking 2003; Joisten-Pruschke 2008.

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aside—according to which this norm has been the binding concept for “all Israel” (including the Judeans) since Adam and Eve or least since Abraham and definitively since the Torah of Moses—it becomes impossible to presuppose this norm for the old, preexilic states of Israel and Judah and the provinces of Samaria and Yehud. This in turn implies that the norm cannot be claimed for the Judeans of Yeb either. Rather, the Judeans of Yeb—and the same can possibly said of the contemporary population of (Samaria and) and Yehud—had yet to experience what biblical tradition projects onto the beginnings of Israel: the metamorphosis of “Judeans” or “Yehudites” into what we would call “Jews” and what the Hebrew Bible labels “(all) Israel.” Because this metamorphosis cannot be grasped terminologically, it is advisable to investigate this transformation by looking at the relevant themes. Given that I have treated the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem and at Yeb as well as the relationship between temple and Torah in previous studies, I would like to focus in this essay on the three ambassadors, who were sent to regulate the affairs of the Judeans living within and outside Judah (Kratz 2006b [German version 2006a: 60– 78] and 2007). These ambassadors left several literary traces in either the biblical tradition or the archives from Elephantine. I am talking, of course, of Hananiah, Ezra, and Nehemiah. These three figures can be used, I think, to demonstrate how Judeans were transformed into “Jews” and how the biblical tradition thus shaped its own Jewish identity. 12 Limited space does not allow for a detailed treatment of all three characters. Therefore, I will select a series of topics that seem relevant for any comparison. I am thinking of the following three aspects: (1) the origin and status of the ambassadors, (2) their mission, and (3) the character of the (literary) sources.

The Origin and Status of the Ambassadors The documents from Elephantine mention in two instances a man called Hananiah, who must have been a person of high standing and authority with the Judean colony but, nevertheless, played a special role. One document is the so-called Passover Letter dated to the 5th year of King Darius II (419 b.c.e.). The letter is written by Hananiah himself and addressed to Jedaniah, one of the “lords” of the garrison (A 12.  To avoid unnecessary confusion, let me stress that it is not at all my intention to deny the “Judeans” their Jewishness or to separate Judaism from its Judean roots. It is equally possible to speak of different types and historic forms of Judaism as long as it remains clear that we find a prebiblical or even nonbiblical Judaism that existed next to what became “biblical” Judaism (see Knauf 2002).

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4.2; A 4.3), and the leading circles of the Judeans of Yeb. The other document that mentions Hananiah by name is a letter of recommendation written by Mauziah b. Nathan, who himself belonged to the college of leaders of the Judean colony of Yeb (A 4.3). 13 Both letters give testimony that Hananiah’s comission was backed by the Persian administration (king and satrap) and that he was only temporarily in Egypt. 14 Hananiah’s place of birth or origin is not mentioned in our sources. It seems clear, however, that he did not live on Yeb but came to Egypt from abroad. Therefore, it is quite remarkable that he calls the Judeans of Yeb his “brothers” (A 4.1:1, 10). This form of address is common in private letters but very rare in official correspondence. It emphasizes the solidarity of the colony of Yeb with Judeans outside Egypt. 15 The mediating role of Hananiah can be seen in the fact that one of the persons mentioned in Mauziah’s letter of recommendation is described as being both a servant (‫ )עלים‬of a certain Anani and a servant of Hananiah (A 4.3:4, 8). It cannot be determined from the document whether this was a successive or a parallel employment. 16 In any case, the document is another link between the Judean colony of Yeb, to which Anani belonged (A 4.3:10–11), and other Judeans living outside Egypt, as represented by Hananiah. If Anani were indeed identical with the scribe of the Egyptian satrap Arsham, (A 4.6:23) and with the brother of Ustan (Ostanes) in Jerusalem, mentioned in a different document (A 4.7–8:18–19), we would be able to make a link with the leading circles in Yehud and Jerusalem. 17 13.  Mauziah b. Nathan is attested as a scribe from 434 b.c.e. (B 2.9, 2.10, 3.5, 3.8, 6.4) and belonged to the leaders of Yeb at least until 407 b.c.e. (A 4.2, 4.10); see Porten 1968: 193, 257. 14.  The use of the formula ‫כעת‬/‫כען‬, “Now,” in nonprivate letters supports the connection between the stipulation of the Persian king sent to the satrap with the following cultic issues—mentioned by Hananiah himself—in the letter of 419 b.c.e. (A 4.1). The temporary presence of Hananiah in Egypt is supported by the phrase ‫מן זי חנניה במצרין עד כען‬, “Since Hananiah has been in Egypt until now,” in A 4.3:7. See Kottsieper 2002: 150–58; similarly, Galling 1964: 154. The reservation of Grätz (2004: 248 n. 159) against an interpretation of ‫ כעת‬such as this he refutes at 249–50. 15.  See A 4.4:1, 10; if the term brother is used in either private (A 2; A 3; D 1.1, 1.3, 1.8, 7.30, 7.33, 7.34, 7.56, 7.57) or official letters (A 4.4:7, 4.7–8:18, 6.14:5), the term designates kinship. For a possible exception from the private correspondence, see A 2.3:8 and Porten 1968: 269–72. 16. Differently, Kottsieper (2002: 154), who solves the problem diachronically. 17.  The good relationship between the Judeans of Yeb to both the Judean priests and the nobles in Jerusalem as well as to the governor of Yehud is documented in a letter to Baghoi (A 4.7–8) and in the memorandum supported by the latter (A 4.9).

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In sum, Hananiah was a Judean, who arrived in Egypt from outside and served there as diplomat for his “brothers” on Yeb. His comission was supported by a royal decree addressed to the Persian satrap in Egypt. This seems to be true not only for the cultic stipulations concerning the festival of Mazzot but for all of his activities in Egypt that later led to the hostilities of the Judean garrison with the god Khnum and his priests (A 4.3:7). The biblical counterpart to the figure of Hananiah can be found in the figures of Ezra and Nehemiah who—according to biblical tradition —appeared as contemporaries in Judah and Jerusalem under a king with the name Artaxerxes. 18 Ezra and Nehemiah—and I am not going to repeat well-known biblical facts at length here—are introduced as members of the Babylonian or Persian Golah. This means that both of them are considered to be Judeans (Ezra 7:1–6, 7:18; Neh 1:2, 2:3). It is told that both are sent by the Persian king and that their mission is supported by additional documents addressed to the local authorities (Ezra 7:11–26, 8:36; Neh 2:7–9). Just like Hananiah, the mission of both Ezra and Nehemiah will create new circumstances and will trigger hostilities with the neighboring people. These hostilities will not only be directed against Ezra and Nehemiah but also against the Judean community in general (Ezra 10:15; Neh 2:10, 19–20; 3:33–4:17; 6:1–14, 15–19). Thus far, all three persons are readily comparable. But there are differences in the portrait of the three figures too, and these differences show how the biblical tradition—despite all phenomenological analogies—emphasizes its own line of reasoning. Nehemiah is probably closest to Hananiah. In a similar vein to Hananiah, he addresses his fellow Judeans several times as “brothers” (Neh 5:1, 5, 7, 8; 13:13). 19 Like Hananiah, Nehemiah is sent to Judah on a temporary basis, while Ezra organizes a lasting return of the Babylonian exiles to Jerusalem. 20 Also, the hostilities triggered by Nehemiah’s mission to Judah call to mind the effects of Hananiah’s mission to Egypt, 18.  On the question of the exact dating, see below, pp. 433–438. 19.  Nehemiah 1:2, where he speaks of “one of my brothers” in parallel to the “men of Judah,” might also be taken into consideration. It is, however, possible that Nehemiah speaks here of his natural brother as in Neh 4:13, 5:10, 14, and 7:2. It is sometimes proposed that Hananiah has to be identical with either Nehemiah’s brother called Hanani (‫ )חנני‬or with the “commander of the fortress” (‫)שר הבירה‬ called Hananiah (‫)חנניה‬, mentioned in Neh 1:2 and 7:2 (Porten 1968: 130; different at pp. 279–80). Due to the frequency of the name, the basis for an identification such as this is slight; see already Galling 1964: 151 n. 1. 20.  See Neh 2:6, 5:14, 13:6, on the one hand, and Ezra 7:6–9, 12–26, 28, and 8:1–36, on the other.

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especially the enmity of the priests of Khnum toward the Judean colony on Yeb (A 4.3:7) and the riots against it resulting in the destruction of the Temple of Yahu. 21 Additionally, it is reported of Nehemiah that his appearance led to inner-group conflicts between the Judean “brothers” themselves. Here, hostilities from within and from the outside sometimes merge, and it is remarkable that the official title ‫פחה‬, “governor,” given to Nehemiah by the tradition is reserved for his work inside the community (Nehemiah 5 and 13). 22 Additionally, we have the text of two prayers describing the bad condition of Judah and Jerusalem not (primarily) as a result of foreign domination but in terms of one’s own transgression, the sins of the fathers, and as the will of God. These prayers move significantly beyond other pious statements uttered by Nehemiah, who quite frequently and intently commends his mission to the protection and judgment of God (Neh 1:4–11; 9:1–37). 23 Neither the conflicts between Judean “brothers” nor the confession of their sins is mentioned in the documents relating to Hananiah, even though his mission, too, was directed at internal affairs and concerned itself with the cult of the god Yahu. Of course, Hananiah is aware that his mission—as everything on earth—can only be successful with the help of God or the gods to whom he commends the well-being of his addressees. 24 The whole correspondence from the archive of Jedaniah, however, that devotes itself to the riots in the aftermath of Hananiah’s mission is free from any indication of inner-group conflicts, an awareness of sin in history or indignation at Persian rule. To the contrary, as far as we can deduce from the sources, the Judean community on Yeb was always supportive of their leaders and took part in the mourning rituals common in times of distress. Furthermore, the community frequently asseverated its absolute loyalty to the Persian government and employed every diplomatic possibility to secure harmony with the political elites in Egypt as well as with the elites in the provinces of Yehud and Samaria (A 4.5, 4.7–8, 4.10). 21.  See Neh 2:10, 19–20; 3:33–4:17; 6:1–14, 15–19; and cf. A 4.5, 4.7–8. 22.  For the relationship between external and internal enemies, see Neh 2:20, 13:4; for the title “governor,” see Neh 5:14–18, 12:26. 23.  See also Neh 2:8, 18, 20; 3:36; 4:14; 5:19; 6:14, 16; 13:14, 22, 31. 24.  See A 4.1:1, with the common greeting formula; it is not quite clear whether the plural ‫ אלהיא‬refers to “the gods” or whether it corresponds to the biblical use of ‫ האלהים‬and means the one God. The “hand of God” that protects Nehemiah (Neh 2:8, 18) and Ezra (Ezra 8:22) can be compared to A 4.3:5; here, Mauziah is freed from imprisonment by Vidranga because of the intervention by the two servants of Anani and with the “help of the God of Heaven.”

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It seems that both the internal conflicts and the relationship to the foreign rule are major differences between the portrait of Hananiah depicted in the documents from Elephantine and the portrait of Ezra and Nehemiah drawn by the biblical tradition. The significance of these differences is demonstrated by the fact that the same aspects that distinguish Hananiah and Nehemiah also play an important role for the portrait of Ezra. Here, these differences almost become the leitmotif. Ezra, too, is labeled by the tradition—speaking through the mouth of the Persian king—of belonging to the Judean “brothers” (Ezra 7:18). In contrast to Nehemiah and Hananiah, however, we also read of his pedigree. His genealogical tree is quite concerned to show that Ezra is not only of Judean but also of prominent priestly descent (Ezra 7:1–5; cf. 1 Chr 5:27–41). Therefore, he carries the double title “priest” and “scribe.” 25 Both titles distinguish him from the “governor” Nehemiah and seem to describe his mission as concerned with the religious foundation and the legal, social, and political constitution of the province of Yehud. As in the case of Nehemiah, where the title “governor” gets a new quality based on the “fear of God” (Neh 5:14–19), thus distinguishing him from other governors, the biblical portrait of Ezra transforms the traditional official titles of “priest” and “scribe” into the office of a pious official, who meditates and teaches the Torah day and night. 26 Ezra’s instructions from the Persian king also differ significantly from the king’s instructions to Hananiah and Nehemiah. In contrast to the short, unfortunately now-lost authorization of Hananiah in the so-called Passover Letter (A 4.1:2), Ezra’s authorization is documented in great detail. Here, all individual stipulations are spoken directly by the king (Ezra 7:12–26). 27 In contrast to Nehemiah, Ezra refuses a royal bodyguard for his journey and mission. Ezra’s journey and mission are placed entirely in God’s hand (Neh 2:7, 9; Ezra 8:21–23, 31). Despite Ezra’s loyalty to the Persian king, loyalty to his own God has absolute priority. This unconditional loyalty toward God is—similarly to Nehemiah’s—expressed in a confession of sins (Ezra 9) and above all dominates Ezra’s mission itself, which consists of the application and implementation of the Torah of Moses. Ezra is not (only) the Judean ambassador of the Persian king but (also and first) the ambassador of God. In this way, he differs significantly from Hananiah and even from the God-fearing Nehemiah. 25.  Ezra 7:11, 12, 21; Neh 8:9; 12:26; “the priest”: Ezra 10:10, 16; Neh 8:(1,) 2; “the scribe”: Neh 8:1, 4, 13; 12:36; his duty: Ezra 7:6, 10, 11b. 26.  On the titles in epigraphy and biblical tradition, see Kratz 2006a: 93–119. 27.  In A 4.3, the stipulations are communicated by Hananiah in his own name.

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The Mission The common ground and the differences in regard to the origin and official status of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Hananiah are confirmed when we are comparing the mission of these three Judean ambassadors. In the case of Hananiah, one thinks, of course, of the letter from the year 419 b.c.e. and the stipulations for the festival of unleavened bread stated in the document. 28 The letter attests that Hananiah’s mission was also concerned with religious matters. Because the festival was already celebrated at the temple of Yeb, Hananiah’s letter does not introduce a new religious custom but simply serves to clarify and confirm certain details of the cultic practice at the Temple of Yahu of Yeb. The second mention of Hananiah in the letter of recommendation of Mauziah (A 4.3) suggests that the mission of Hananiah was far more extensive. Otherwise, the note that “Khnum is against us since Hananiah has been in Egypt until now” (A 4.3:7) and the riots against the Judean colony following the mission of Hananiah, mentioned in the letter of recommendation itself, would not be understandable. Furthermore, it is highly unlikely that the stipulations regarding Mazzot triggered the riots of the Egyptian god Khnum and his priests against the Judean colony. 29 But what exactly was the mission of Hananiah? Neither the document from the year 419 b.c.e. nor the letter of recommendation of Mauziah—possibly written in the year 411 b.c.e.— provides any information about how long Hananiah stayed in Egypt. 30 In any case, he must have arrived in Egypt long before the letter of recommendation (411 b.c.e.). It is impossible to say whether his stay coincides with the letter from the year 419 b.c.e. In any case, something must have happened between 419 and 411 b.c.e. that was enough to 28.  On the following, see Gaß 1999; Kottsieper 2002; Kratz 2006b (German version: 2006a: 60–78); 2007: 84–86. Differently, Porten (1968: 122–33, 279–82), who interprets the texts in the light of the Bible and later Jewish tradition. 29. See Kottsieper 2002: 155–56; Kratz 2006b: 252–53 (2006a: 65). Also, the burnt offering could not have been the cause for the conflict. It was offered until the destruction of the temple and is, of course, included in the petition for the rebuilding of the temple (A 4.7–8:25–26). This means that neither Jerusalemite interests nor the biblical stipulation of the centralization of worship (Deuteronomy 12, Leviticus 17) is the reason for its exclusion (contra Grätz 2004: 246–47). An exclusion of the burnt offering out of consideration for Persian sensitivities in regard to newly established temples (Kottsieper 2002: 168–74) is possible but not certain; the temple in Jerusalem too was newly established, and here burnt offerings were, as far as we know, not excluded. See Kratz 2006b: 261–62 (2006a: 75–76). 30.  The dating is based on the title given to Vidranga, who is called “commander of the garrison (of Syene)” (A 4.3:3; see also B 2.10:2–3, 4; 3.9:2) and not yet frataraka as is the case in A 4.5:4, 4.7–8:5; see Wiesehöfer 1991; Kratz 2006b: 253 (2006a: 66).

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anger the priesthood of the Egyptian god Khnum and the Persian military official Vidranga, who sided with the priests, in such a way that Mauziah was temporarily imprisoned by Vidranga, wells were blocked, and a storeroom and finally the Temple of Yahu were destroyed (A 4.3, 4.5, 4.7–8, 4.9, 4.10). Because Hananiah’s letter of 419 b.c.e. does not suffice to explain the outbreak of hostilities, we have to look at the larger context. Here, we can utilize two supplementing hypotheses: first, we will take up the proposal offered by Ingo Kottsieper, who argued that it was Hananiah who managed to obtain the official status of ‫חילא יהודיא‬, “The Judean garrison” for the Judean colony. This would imply that the Judean community was from now on to be given parity of treatment with the “garrison of Syene” (‫חילא סונכניא‬, ‫)חילא זי סון‬. 31 In this context, several issues of the practical coexistence must have been regulated. One of these issues might have been property claims of the neighboring temples of Yahu and Khnum that were only separated by the so-called street of the king. According to Cornelius von Pilgrim, the excavator of the Temple of Yahu on Elephantine, these disputes over property were the reason for the destruction of the temple. 32 Additionally, the new status of the Judean colony might have been the reason to clarify questions regarding the cultic practice at the Temple of Yahu as attested in the letter of Hananiah from the year 419 b.c.e. All in all, the mission of Hananiah was mainly of a political nature, touching questions of property but also dealing with cultic issues of the Judean colony on Yeb. His mission triggered resistance from the neighboring Egyptians, who saw their own interests endangered and used the support of the local Persian military to push their claims. In the end, the Judeans got their way thanks to the support of the governors of Yehud and Samaria and maybe also because of the clever mediation of Hananiah. Vidranga and his accomplices were punished and the Judeans received the approval to rebuild their temple (A 4.7:16–17 [8:15–16], 4.9, 4.10, B 3.12:18–19 [402 b.c.e.]). As we can see, the conflict was a clash neither of cultures nor of religions, but simply a dispute over political, legal, and economic interests that also concerned temple and cult. This does not imply, however, that the issue had no religious or even theological significance. However, this aspect is never men31.  The designation ‫חילא יהודיא‬, “Judean garrison,” appears for the first time in the document A 4.3 from the year 410 b.c.e. Otherwise, it is only attested in a list of donations (C 3.15) dated to the year 400 b.c.e. See above, p. 422 n. 4; and Kottsieper 2002: 158; Kratz 2006b: 252–54 (2006a: 65–66). 32.  Thus, following P. Briant but including the archaeological data, von Pilgrim 2003: 312–17. For different proposals, see above, p. 429 n. 29.

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tioned explicitly and is not the main matter of the mission. Rather, it is presupposed or implied as we can see, for example, from the greeting formula of the letters. 33 With regard to the nature of his mission, Nehemiah is again closest to Hananiah. Nehemiah’s mission as reported in the book of Nehemiah focuses on the building of the walls of Jerusalem, which means the rebuilding and fortification of the destroyed city. 34 Again, it is a political mission with far-reaching implications. The fortification of the city is of strategic importance and implies a political increase of the significance of Jerusalem and the province of Yehud. Judging from what we know of Hananiah, it is hardly surprising to find reports that state this mission of Nehemiah generated resistance among the neighbors, who are labeled according to their ethnic origin. 35 The other activities of Nehemiah besides the rebuilding of the walls, namely, activities in which he is presented as “the governor” (‫)הפחה‬, seem to fit this picture very well, because they address social, legal, and cultic concerns of the life of the Judeans in Yehud and Jerusalem. Especially the settlement of individual cases reported in Nehemiah 5 and 13 call to mind the stipulations regarding the festival of unleavened bread conveyed by Hananiah to the Judeans of Yeb (A 4.1:2; cf. Neh 2:7–9). Here, however, where we find the closest parallels, the paths of Hananiah and Nehemiah part. While Hananiah is concerned with the details of an already-existing cultic practice that he never calls into question, Nehemiah’s mission aims at fundamental and radical change of the conditions within the Judean community according to the Torah of Moses. Slaves belonging to one’s own ethnic group are freed, debts are released, the temple is cleansed from foreign personnel and from other disgraces, the strict observance of the Sabbath is imposed, mixed marriages are divorced, and finally the “Judean” language is declared obligatory. All of these additional measures go far beyond the mission of Nehemiah to rebuild the walls. 33.  See A 4.5, 4.7–8, 4.10 and my earlier discussion (above). The religious activities in connection with the destruction of the temple have to be seen along similar lines; see Kratz 2006b: 261 (2006a: 75). 34.  The exposition of the theme is found in Neh 1:3 and 2:1–6 and is elaborated in detail in Neh 2:11–18, 3:(1–)38, 6:15. 35.  See above, p. 427 n. 22. For the comparison with the mission of Hananiah and its results, it is especially interesting that we hear of an accusation of disloyalty toward the Persian king voiced by Sanballat and his accomplices in Neh 2:19 and 6:5–7 against Nehemiah. It is a possible suspicion that had to be faced in a similar way by the Judeans of Yeb and that they in turn used against their opponents (see A 4.5, 4.7:13–14 [8:12–13], 4.10).

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Above all, these measures and even the building of the walls are placed in a new perspective by Nehemiah’s prayer in Neh 1:4–11. Here, the main focus of the Nehemiah’s mission is to discontinue the sins of the fathers and the transgression against the law. The addressee of the mission is Israel, who will “walk in the fear of our God” (Neh 5:9) and “separate all the alien admixture” (Neh 13:3). The differences in the religion-historical situation as well as in the relationship between the different ethnic groups of Yeb and Syene that Hananiah encountered there according to the documents from Elephantine could not be more significant. Even the stipulations concerning Mazzot conveyed by Hananiah do not correspond in every detail to the Torah. Also, the strict observance of the Sabbath as prescribed by the Decalogue and demanded by Nehemiah was unknown to the Judeans of Yeb. 36 The things that seem to be almost a by-product of Nehemiah’s original mission are the main focus of Ezra’s comission. It is his mission to establish the law of the God of heaven among the Judeans in all of Trans­ euphrates. According to the will of God written in the Torah of Moses, Ezra will promote the cult with the help of royal donations and reorganize the administration of justice (Ezra 7–8). By annulling the mixed marriages and—together with Nehemiah and the other cultic personnel—by committing the people to the Torah of Moses, Ezra’s mission is concerned not only with the marginalization of neighboring groups related to the Judeans via marriage but also with a separation within the Judean ethnic group itself (Ezra 9–10, Nehemiah 8[–10]). At a quick glance, Ezra’s mission and the legal and cultic duties of Nehemiah seem to fit the picture of a Judean ambassador, derived from the portrait of Hananiah and his mission. Just like Nehemiah’s individual actions, Ezra’s mission can be compared to the stipulations regarding Mazzot and the preceding royal decree to the satrap mentioned in the letter of Hananiah from the year 419 b.c.e. Especially the so-called Artaxerxes firman, written in Aramaic (Ezra 7:12–26), offers a significant parallel. 37 However, it is precisely that parallel that makes the differences even more obvious. Apart from the differences in form between the letter of Hananiah and the Artaxerxes firman, often noted in scholarship, it is especially the theological orientation that distinguishes the mission of Ezra from Hananiah’s comission. Hananiah simply secures an official political status for the Judean community and in the process regulates a practical 36. See Kratz 2007: 84–86; Becking 2008. On the questions of the burnt offering, see above, p. 429 n. 29. 37. See Meyer 1896, 1912; Frei 1996; and the critical view of Schwiderski 2000; Grätz 2004.

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issue regarding the proper execution of the cult. Ezra, in contrast, goes all out and—according to the biblical account following a direct order of the Persian king—places cult and the administration of justice on a new foundation: the law of the God of heaven, namely, the Torah of Moses. The same fundamental difference can also be seen in the relationship of the Judean community with other ethnic groups. Hananiah’s mission evokes the hostilities of the neighboring Egyptians against the Judeans of Yeb. Ezra’s mission in turn is to trigger these hostilities against the neighboring people and against certain members of one’s own group within the Judeans. Nehemiah seems to occupy the middle ground and unites aspects of both cases. In comparison to the mission of Hananiah, biblical tradition provides a new direction by giving both Ezra’s and Nehemiah’s missions a significant theological orientation. These biblical ambassadors do not simply represent Judean interests and try to secure them in the complicated web of Persian administration. Rather, they aim at a new definition of Judean interests and of Judean identity. Therefore, it is only logical that biblical tradition in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah prefers the self-designation “Israel,” a term missing in the documents from Elephantine. Here, Judah and Jerusalem, the province of Yehud and the Judean population are all seen as representatives of “Israel.” Ezra and Nehemiah (especially Nehemiah 8–10) are solely concerned with the restoration of a biblical ideal of “(all) Israel.” 38 It is obvious that the transformation from Judeans, wherever they may live, to “Jews” is executed here—Jews, whose identity and belonging to the people of Israel is no longer attached to origin and place of habitation or political constitution but simply identified by their relationship to the Torah of Moses and the genealogical purity prescribed in it. This is the main difference between the epigraphic and the biblical sources.

The Sources Thus far, our comparison of Hananiah, Ezra, and Nehemiah was limited to phenomenological issues of the surviving texts. This phenomenology allowed us to recognize similarities and differences as well as a fundamental change in the picture of the personality and mission of a Judean ambassador. The comparison evokes the question how this transformation happened. When answering the question, we need to differentiate the comparison historically and to evaluate the sources, 38. See Hoglund 1992; Willi 1995; Koch 1996; Karrer 2001; Reinmuth 2002; Janzen 2002. What these works describe as a historical phenomenon is an adequate paraphrase of the ideals of biblical tradition.

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because the sources are quite different. The portrait of Hananiah and his mission is based on historical reconstruction and the evaluation of so-called primary sources, which means the fragmentary documents from Elephantine. 39 As far as Ezra and Nehemiah are concerned, we are forced to rely solely on the literary testimony of the biblical tradition. This means that we are dealing here with so-called secondary sources. Bearing this in mind, we have to ask whether the subject matter behind the three cases is comparable at all and how to evaluate and interpret the differences and similarities observed. It would be one possibility to explain the differences solely in light of the different character of the sources and their Gattungen. This would allow us to regard both sorts of documents as historical sources and to evaluate them as such, as happens frequently. An approach of this sort becomes problematic when one realizes that the assumed conditions are difficult to reconcile even in those cases in which they tend to be comparable as far as genre (Gattung) and formulation are concerned. The documents from Elephantine in general and Hananiah’s mission in particular attest to close contact between the Judeans of Yeb and their “brothers” in Judah and Jerusalem during the time of Darius II. But the Judeans of Yeb do not seem to know of Ezra and Nehemiah and their particular commissions or theological concepts. Similarly, there are instances in which Nehemiah is unaware of Ezra and his close cooperation with him (Neh 8:9). Much depends on which Artaxerxes is meant and the date of Ezra and Nehemiah’s mission. 40 If they both acted under Artaxerxes II, sometime after Hananiah and the rebuilding of the temple of Yeb, the literary testimony of Ezra–Nehemiah would show an advanced religious-historical development in Jerusalem. If, however, just one of the two biblical ambassadors is located in the time of Artaxerxes I—as is generally assumed—the evidence would be very difficult to explain. 39.  For the situation of the Babylonian Golah in Neo-Babylonian and Persian times, which seems to be quite similar to what we find in the papyri of Elephantine, see Pearce 2006. 40.  According to the date given in Neh 13:6, Nehemiah can only have served under Artaxerxes I or II. If the Sanballat mentioned in Nehemiah is identified with the governor whose sons are mentioned in the documents from Elephantine (A 4.7–8), it must have been Artaxerxes I and the time between 445 and 433 b.c.e. According to biblical chronology, Ezra preceded Nehemiah and, therefore, must have arrived in Jerusalem in 458 b.c.e. (Ezra 7:8); after that, he served together with Nehemiah (Neh 8:9, 12:26). Scholarship, however, often places Ezra after Nehemiah during the reign of Artaxerxes II (397 b.c.e.) or even Artaxerxes III (353 b.c.e.); see, for instance, Donner 2001: 451–53.

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Another possibility is to stress that the different literary forms of the sources cannot be reconciled, making a comparison impossible. The figure of the Jewish emigrant serving a foreign (Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian) king is a topos of biblical literature and can be found in the Joseph novella (Genesis 37–50), the Daniel narratives (Daniel 1–6; Bel and the Dragon), in the Hebrew and Greek versions of Esther, in the book of Tobit, and in the so-called Proto-Esther (4Q550) and the Prayer of Nabonidus (4Q242). The figure is shaped according to the model of the courtier of the sapiential novel. One example of a figure of this sort is the Assyrian Aḥiqar, known in Elephantine, who had a reception history in the book of Tobit, where Aḥiqar was transformed into an Israelite. 41 In all the above cases, we have a literary, purely fictive processing of historical experiences as encountered in the primary sources from Elephantine. Following this path would mean that the Ezra and Nehemiah memoirs were to be interpreted as a purely literary product of biblical tradition. This literary product may contain some memories and some common experiences, but did not possess any historical value. If that was the case, we simply would have to ask for the historical place of the special theological issues that distinguish the literary fiction from the historical example of Hananiah. Here, it becomes clear—and scholarship generally supports such a view—that both alternatives are too narrowly defined. The biblical tradition of Ezra and Nehemiah as we have it today can neither be taken for granted and read as a report of historical facts nor simply be dismissed as purely literary fiction. A source- and literary-critical differentiation of the biblical tradition offers a solution to the riddle. Limited space does not allow for a detailed differentiation here, and it is not even necessary. Already, a phenomenological comparison allows a certain differentiation showing that the biblical tradition contains texts that are close to the mission of Hananiah and its portrait in the Elephantine documents, whereas other passages seem very far indeed from Elephentine. 42 Recent literary-critical work on the books of Ezra 41. See Kratz 1991, especially pp. 79–80; Niehr 2007: 24–25; for a comparison with Hananiah, see Porten 1968: 279–80. 42. Similarly, Williamson (2004: 271–81) detects three different “belief systems” in the book of Nehemiah and attributes them to three different authors. The first he calls “pragmatic and uncomplicated” (p. 276) and locates it in the (authentic) Nehemiah memoir (including the Sanballat texts and the internal reforms of the “governor”); the second represents a “more typical and widespread” version of the narrative (p. 279; see also Williamson 2004: 199–211) in Neh 3:1–32, 10:29–40, and 11:1–20 (here, the law serves as “supreme regulator” [p. 279]); the third “belief system” is attributed to a “final redactor” (p. 279) and is employed to join Nehemiah

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and Nehemiah confirms this impression and is able to show the differences in the texts themselves. 43 Due to the limitations of space, I will give just a short overview of the results of this analysis. As we have seen, Nehemiah and the building of the walls provide the closest parallels to Hananiah and his mission. Form-critical and literary-critical analysis confirms that the narrative of the building of the walls is authentic to the book of Nehemiah. 44 In light of the analogies to Hananiah and his mission, it is entirely possible to regard the building project as historical and to trace the report in the style of a building inscription back to Nehemiah himself, who refers to a permission granted by the Persian king. Which Artaxerxes is meant here, who—in the 20th year of his rule—granted his cup bearer a sabbatical so that he was able to organize the rebuilding of the walls of the city of his forefathers, cannot be determined from the original text of the building report. Both Artaxerxes are possible (Aratxerxes I, 445 b.c.e., or Artaxerxes II, 384 b.c.e.). In any case, Hananiah’s and Nehemiah’s missions were several years apart. Both the second half of the fifth century and the first half of the fourth century b.c.e., when Egypt was lost until Artaxerxes III conquered it again, provided ample reasons for the Persian kings to ensure the loyalty of the Judeans not only in alwaystroublesome Egypt, but also in Judah and Jerusalem, which were regarded Egyptian outposts. 45 Neither the historical documents from the archive of Jedaniah mentioning Hananiah and the consequences of his mission nor the original first-person narrative of Nehemiah provides a complete and objective portrait of the individual course of events. Rather, they contain subjective views and voice the personal interests of their authors. However, though Hananiah and with him the papyri from Elephantine were left in ruins—like most of the literary documents of Eastern antiquity—and were only discovered by chance (Honroth, Rubensohn, and Zucker 1910; with Ezra (Nehemiah 8–9; 12:44–47). On the “belief system” of the Ezra tradition, see Becking 1999: 256–75. 43. See Kratz 2005: 62–86 (German original version: 2000b: 68–92); Wright 2004. Reviews of scholarly discussion are provided by Grätz 2004 and Pakkala 2004. 44.  On the form-critical aspects of the passage, see Hurowitz 1992: 118–24, 238– 39. For a literary-critical analysis, see Kratz 2005: 62–63 (2000b: 68). The results of this analysis are confirmed and evaluated by Wright (2004: 151, 340), who identifies the following literary kernel: Neh 1:1a, 11b; 2:1–6*, 11, 15, 16a, 17, 18b; 3:38; 6:15. 45. See Donner 2001: 431–33; Briant 2002: 573–77, 652–55, 663–66, 685–88. A 4.5:1– 2 and A 4.7:13–14 (8:12–13) attest unrest during the fifth century; see Burkard 1994, 1995. The successive building over the Yahu Temple indicates that the Judean colony of Yeb was annihilated after Egypt gained independence during the fourth century (Modrzejewski 1995: 43).

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Müller 1980–84), the report of Nehemiah—maybe again by chance— was integrated into biblical tradition. Later authors have added their own memories of Nehemiah and his times to the work. These authors also supplemented the text with references to their own times and experiences so that is not always clear whether these later authors speak of Nehemiah and his time or refer to themselves and their own times. During this process, several literary pieces were added, such as the conflict between Nehemiah and his neighbors—among them Sanballat the Horonite—and the far-reaching social, legal, and cultic reforms the “governor” Nehemiah carried out in the land of Judah. Last, the Nehemiah tradition was augmented by texts that connect Nehemiah with Ezra and transform him into a figure much like Ezra, who teaches and practices the Torah of Moses. Similarly, the Ezra tradition was not generated from nothing. Here, however, it is much more difficult to identify an original or even historical kernel of the tradition. In the beginning, Ezra too may have been a Judean ambassador like Hananiah, who followed an instruction, acting with the support of the Persian king. Maybe he was an agent for the acquisition of the financial support for the temple in Jerusalem granted by Artaxerxes (I or II) and delegated by him to the administration of the satrapy of Transeuphrates (Ezra 7:21–22). 46 In the tradition grown over time from the actual memory of Ezra, he is the bearer of donations for the “glorification” of the temple and responsible for the purification of Israel as well as for the public reading and the application of the Torah of Moses. In the Ezra tradition, contemporary experience easily outweighs historical memory. Long and complex religion-historical and social processes—such as the commitment of the Golah to the Second Temple in Jerusalem, establishing the Pentateuch as Torah for all Judeans, and the genealogical demarcation of “Israel” against other na46.  For a detailed argument of this sort of view, see Kratz 2005: 75–77 (2000b: 82–83). In contrast, Grätz (2004), who thinks of a fictitious narrative from Hellenistic times here. Pakkala (2004) again takes a different approach, proposing the following literary and even historical kernel (note the series of events!): Ezra’s journey to Jerusalem (Ezra 7:1–8), the public reading of Torah (Nehemiah 8), and the solution of the marriage crisis (Ezra 10). He dates this kernel to the late fifth century b.c.e. Janzen (2000, 2002), too, regards the narrative of Ezra 9–10 and Nehemiah 8 as history and Ezra’s journey (Ezra 7–8) as fiction. The historical analogy of the Babylonian temple administration during the Persian period offered by Janzen (2000: 638–43) may illuminate the background but does not prove the historicity of the Ezra narrative (the same must be said of his analogies for Ezra 7). This is especially so, because, in my opinion, we do not find any analogy in the Babylonian documents for the use of the Torah of Moses as a basis for the organization and radical transformation of the administration.

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tions and enemies within and outside the Judean society—are placed in a historical frame in the Ezra narrative and they are traced back to the act of one man, whom biblical and postbiblical tradition—right from the beginning—regarded as a second Moses (Kratz 2008).

The Making of Jewish Identity The literary-historical differentiation of the biblical sources into a basic literary layer and its subsequent additions opens up the possibility to explain the above-stated similarities and differences in the stories of the three Judean ambassadors as an expression of a historical and literary development. All three figures—Hananiah, Nehemiah, and maybe even Ezra—appeared on the historical stage in a way the documents of Elephantine attest for Hananiah: they were all members of a global Diaspora of Judeans, who acted—with support of the Persian authority—as intermediaries or advocates for their “brothers” either in the Judean colony of Yeb in Egypt or in the province of Yehud. The earliest literary testimonies describing the historical reality are the documents from Elephantine, the original and concise building report of Nehemiah, and maybe some form or other of appointing or legitimating Ezra. From the perspective of their authors, these written sources describe the circumstances in an unadulterated manner and seem to fit the current political, social, legal, and religious reality of the Persian Empire. Similar things can be said of the reworking of the original material and the manifold additions to the Ezra and Nehemiah material in the biblical tradition: they all breathe the atmosphere of Persian times. 47 This alleged Persian setting of many passages is one of the reasons why the memoirs of Ezra and Nehemiah are still considered historically reliable by many critical scholars. The comparison with Hananiah and with the oldest building account of Nehemiah shows, however, that the reworking within the frame of biblical tradition moves significantly beyond the concrete historical examples. Historical memory, contemporary experience, and programmatic purposes are fused and the clear boundaries between historical reality and literary fiction are blurred. As far as the biblical tradition is concerned, the historical documents and oldest literary responses to the past are transformed into a basis for 47.  This is especially true for the Sanballat passages in Nehemiah (see above, p. 427 n. 22 and p. 431 n. 35) and the Aramaic Artaxerxes firman in Ezra 7:12–26. For the historical place of these passages, however, see Kratz 2005: 65–67, 75–77 (2000b: 71–73, 82–83); 2006a: 102–4, 111–18; Wright 2004: 155–57; Grätz 2004. In her way, Edelman (2005: 33–38) has also started to qualify the common historical combination of external and biblical evidence.

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a discourse on Judean identity. This discourse tries to elaborate upon the question who is or will be a Judean. Biblical tradition provides a multifaceted but definite answer: a Judean shall regard himself as part and representative of “Israel,” the people whom God once chose and who sinned against their God and were punished severely by him. These people have to make the decision whether they want to continue to walk in the “sins of the fathers” or whether they will start to walk in the “fear of God.” The standard is already set: it is the Torah of Moses. Here, God has revealed his will for his people once and for all. Therefore, the Mosiac Torah must be regarded higher than all of the political, social, legal, or cultic concerns normally addressed by Judean ambassadors. All these concerns must be regulated according to the standard set in the Torah of Moses. The result of this identity discourse in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah led to what writers employing modern European languages tend to call Judaism. The place of a discourse of this sort may have been Judah or the Diaspora, but we encounter it for the first time in the biblical tradition. This discourse always was influenced by the already-existing biblical tradition, as well as by the events and ideologies of the ruling powers, especially the Achaemenid imperial ideology and administration. 48 Once started, the discourse itself deeply influenced historical developments as well as the ongoing development of biblical tradition. Therefore, it is not always easy to state for sure whether biblical tradition reflects a historical process and event or is part of the process of the origin of ancient Judaism based on the biblical tradition and motivated by it. Possibly, we have a reflexive process of fertilization here that started in late Persian times and led to the multifaceted character of Judaism during the Graeco-Roman period that is known to us from the late texts of the Hebrew Bible, the documents of Samaritan and Hellenistic Judaism, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the New Testament, and several other Jewish and pagan sources. Much work is still to be done to understand this development that happened—so to speak—between Elephantine and the Hebrew Bible. 49 48.  This holds true especially for the self-designation as people among the nations and the role of “the law.” See Kratz 1991: 201–12, 246–55; Koch 1996: 149–53. 49.  On this development, see Knauf 2002; Kratz 2007, 2010.

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Bibliography Bedford, P. R. 1999 Jews at Elephantine. AJJS 13: 6–23. Becking, B. 1999 Continuity and Community: The Belief System of the Book of Ezra. Pp. 256–75 in The Crisis of Israelite Religion: Transformation of Religious Tradition in Exilic and Postexilic Times, ed. B. Becking and M. C. A. Korpel. OTS 42. Leiden: Brill. 2003 Die Gottheiten der Juden in Elephantine. Pp. 203–26 in Der eine Gott und die Götter: Polytheismus und Monotheismus im antiken Israel, ed. M. Oeming and K. Schmid. ATANT 82. Zürich: Theologischer Verlag. 2008 Sabbath at Elephantine. Pp. 177–89 in Empsychoi Logoi: Religious Innovations in Antiquity. Studies in Honour of Pieter Willem van der Horst, ed. A. Houtman et al. Leiden: Brill. Bolin, T. M. 1995 The Temple of ‫ יהו‬at Elephantine and Persian Religious Policy. Pp. 127–42 in The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms, ed. D. V. Edelman. Kampen: Kok Pharos. Briant, P. 2002 From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Burkard, G. 1994–95 Literarische Tradition und historische Realität: Die persische Eroberung Ägyptens am Beispiel Elephantine. ZÄS 121: 93–106; 122: 31–37. Cohen, S. J. D. 1999 The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Hellenistic Culture and Society 31. Berkeley: University of California Press. Cowley, A. 1923 Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century b.c. Oxford. Repr., Osnabrück: Zeller, 1967. Dion, P.-E. 2002 La religion des papyrus d’Éléphantine: Un reflet du Juda d’avant l’exil. Pp. 243–54 in Kein Land für sich allein: Studien zum Kulturkontakt in Kanaan, Israel/Palästina und EbirnârI Festschrift für Manfred Weippert zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. U. Hübner and E. A. Knauf. OBO 186. Fribourg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Donner, H. 2001 Geschichte des Volkes Israel und seiner Nachbarn in Grundzügen 2. ATD 4/2. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Edelman, D. 2005 The Origins of the “Second” Temple: Persian Imperial Policy and the Rebuilding of Jerusalem. London: Equinox.

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Frei, P. 1996 Zentralgewalt und Lokalautonomie im Achämenidenreich. Pp. 5–​131 in Reichsidee und Reichsorganisation im Perserreich, P. Frei and K.  Koch. 2nd ed. OBO 55. Fribourg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Galling, K. 1964 Studien zur Geschichte Israels im persischen Zeitalter. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Gaß, E. 1999 Der Passa-Papyrus (Cowl 211): Mythos oder Realität? BN 99: 55–88. Grätz, S. 2004 Das Edikt des Artaxerxes: Eine Untersuchung zum religionspolitischen und historischen Umfeld von Esr 7,12–26. BZAW 337. Berlin: de Gruyter. Hoglund, K. G. 1992 Achaemenid Imperial Administration in Syria-Palestine and the Missions of Ezra and Nehemiah. SBLDS 125. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Honroth, W.; Rubensohn, O.; and Zucker, F. 1910 Bericht über die Ausgrabungen auf Elephantine in den Jahren 1906– 1908. ZÄS 46: 14–61. Hurowitz, V. 1992 I Have Built You an Exalted House: Temple Building in the Bible in Light of Mesopotamian and Northwest Semitic Writings. JSOTSup 115. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Janzen, D. 2000 The “Mission” of Ezra and the Persian-Period Temple Community. JBL 119: 619–43. 2002 Witch-Hunts, Purity and Social Boundaries: The Expulsion of the Foreign Women in Ezra 9–10. JSOTSup 350. Sheffield: Scheffield Academic Press. Joisten–Pruschke, A. 2008 Das religiöse Leben der Juden von Elephantine in der Achämenidenzeit. GOFI n.s. 2. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Karrer, C. 2001 Ringen um die Verfassung Judas: Eine Studie zu den theologischpolitischen Vorstellungen im Esra-Nehemia-Buch. BZAW 308. Berlin: de Gruyter. Knauf, E. A. 2002 Elephantine und das vor-biblische Judentum. Pp. 179–88 in Religion und Religionskontakte im Zeitalter der Achämeniden, ed. R. G. Kratz. VWGTh 22. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Koch, K. 1996 Weltordnung und Reichsidee im alten Iran und ihre Auswirkungen auf die Provinz Jehud. Pp. 133–337 in Reichsidee und Reichsorganisation im Perserreich, ed. K. Koch and P. Frei. OBO 55. Fribourg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.

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Kottsieper, I. 2002 Die Religionspolitik der Achämeniden und die Juden von Elephantine. Pp. 150–78 in Religion und Religionskontakte im Zeitalter der Achämeniden, ed. R. G. Kratz. VWGTh 22. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Kratz, R. G. 1991 Translatio imperii: Untersuchungen zu den aramäischen Danielerzählungen und ihrem theologiegeschichtlichen Umfeld. WMANT 63. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchner Verlag. 2000a Israel als Staat und als Volk. ZThK 97: 1–17. 2000b Die Komposition der erzählenden Bücher des Alten Testaments: Grundwissen der Bibelkritik. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2005 The Composition of the Narrative Books of the Old Testament, trans. J. Bowden. London and New York: T. & T. Clark. 2006a Das Judentum im Zeitalter des Zweiten Tempels. FAT 42. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. 2006b The Second Temple of Jeb and of Jerusalem. Pp. 247–64 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. M. Oeming and O. Lipschits. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2007 Temple and Torah: Reflections on the Legal Status of the Pentateuch between Elephantine and Qumran. Pp. 77–103 in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance, ed. G. N. Knoppers and B. M. Levinson. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2008 Ezra: Priest and Scribe. Pp. 163–88 in Scribes, Sages, and Seers: The Sage in the Eastern Mediterranean World, ed. L. Perdue. FRLANT 219. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2010 Zwischen Elephantine und Qumran: Das Alte Testament im Rahmen des antiken Judentums. Pp. 129–46 in Congress Volume Ljubljana 2007, ed. A. Lemaire. VTSup 133. Leiden: Brill. Mason, S. 2007 Jews, Judeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of Categorization in Ancient History. JSJ 38: 457–512. Meyer, E. 1896 Die Entstehung des Judenthums. Halle: Max Niemeyer. Repr., Wiesbaden: Olms, 1987. 1912 Der Papyrusfund von Elephantine: Dokumente einer jüdischen Gemeinde aus der Perserzeit und das älteste Buch der Weltliteratur. Leipzig: Hinrichs. Modrzejewski, J. M. 1995 The Jews of Egypt: From Ramses II to Emperor Hadrian. Edinburgh: Jewish Publication Society. Müller, W., ed. 1980–84 Die Papyrusgrabung auf Elephantine 1906–1908. Forschungen und Berichte der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin 20/21: 75–88; 22: 7–50; 24: 41–44.

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Niehr, H. 2007 Aramäischer Aḥiqar. JSHRZ n.s. 2/2. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlags­ haus. Pakkala, J. 2004 Ezra the Scribe: The Development of Ezra 7–10 and Nehemia 8. BZAW 347. Berlin: de Gruyter. Pearce, L. E. 2006 New Evidence for Judeans in Babylonia. Pp. 399–411 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. M. Oeming and O. Lipschits. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Pilgrim, C. von 2003 Tempel des Jahu und “Straße des Königs”: Ein Konflikt in der späten Perserzeit auf Elephantine. Pp. 303–17 in Egypt: Temple of the Whole World. Studies in Honour of Jan Assmann, ed. S. Meyer. Leiden: Brill. Porten, B. 1968 Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony. Berkeley: University of California Press. 1969 The Religion of the Jews of Elephantine in Light of the Hermopolis Papyri. JNES 28: 116–21. 2003 Settlement of the Jews at Elephantine and the Arameans at Syene. Pp. 451–70 in Judah and the Judeans in the Neo-Babylonian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and J. Blenkinsopp. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Porten, B., and Lund, J. A., eds. 2002 Aramaic Documents from Egypt: A Key-Word-in-Context Concordance. Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Project Texts and Studies 1. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Porten, B., and Yardeni, A. 1986–99 Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt. 4 vols. Jerusalem: Hebrew University Press. Porten, B., et al., eds. 1996 The Elephantine Papyri in English: Three Millennia of Cross-cultural Continuity and Change. DMOA 22. Leiden: Brill. Reinmuth, T. 2002 Der Bericht Nehemias: Zur literarischen Eigenart, traditionsgeschichtlichen Prägung und innerbiblischen Rezeption des Ich-Berichts Nehemias. OBO 183. Fribourg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schwiderski, D. 2000 Handbuch des nordwestsemitischen Briefformulars: Ein Beitrag zur Echtheitsfrage der aramäischen Briefe des Esrabuchs. BZAW 295. Berlin: de Gruyter. Silverman, M. H. 1969 Aramean Name-Types in the Elephantine Documents. JAOS 89: 691– 709. 1970 Hebrew Name-Types in the Elephantine Documents. Or 39: 465–91.

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Stoebe, H. J. 1995 Überlegungen zum Synkretismus der jüdischen Tempelgemeinde in Elephantine. Pp. 619–26 in Beiträge zur Kulturgeschichte Vorderasiens: Festschrift für Rainer M. Boehmer, ed. U. Finkbeiner et al. Mainz: von Zabern. Toorn, K. van der 1992 Anat-Yahu, Some Other Deities, and the Jews of Elephantine. Numen 39: 80–101. Vincent, A. 1937 La religion des Judéo-Araméens d’Éléphantine. Paris: Geuthner. Weippert, M. 1997 Jahwe und die anderen Götter: Studien zur Religionsgeschichte des antiken Israels in ihrem syrisch-palästinischen Kontext. FAT 18. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Wellhausen, J. 1914 Israelitische und jüdische Geschichte. 7th ed. Berlin. Repr., Berlin: de Gruyter, 2004. Wiesehöfer, J. 1991 PRTRK, RB ḤYLʾ, SGN und MRʾ: Zur Verwaltung Südägyptens in achaimenidischer Zeit. Pp. 305–9 in Asia Minor and Egypt: Old Cultures in a New Empire. Proceedings of the Groningen 1988 Achaemenid History Workshop, ed. H. Sancisi-Weerdenburg and A. Kuhrt. Achaemenid History 6. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Willi, T. 1995 Juda—Jehud—Israel: Studien zum Selbstverständnis des Judentums in persischer Zeit. FAT 12. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Williamson, H. G. M. 2004 Studies in Persian Period History and Historiography. FAT 38. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Wright, J. L. 2004 Rebuilding Identity: The Nehemia-Memoir and Its Earliest Readers. BZAW 348. Berlin: de Gruyter.

Negotiating Identity in an International Context under Achaemenid Rule: The Indigenous Coinages of Persian-Period Palestine as an Allegory Oren Tal

Tel Aviv University

The two centuries of Achaemenid dominion in the Near East, from 538 until 332 b.c.e., constitute a crucial period in the history of the southern part of the fifth Persian Satrapy, Beyond the River. This period was marked by a profound transformation in the economic, political, and cultural life of the region. From the mid-fifth century b.c.e., we witness a transition in the means of payment, from the use of weighed metal to foreign coinage, first attested in the Archaic Greek world (e.g., Balmuth 2001, Kim 2001, 2002; Kroll 1998; 2001; Schaps 2004), and, subsequently, local southern Palestinian issues, which are the subject of this essay. The weighing of metal in Palestine is best witnessed in Hacksilber hoards that are dated as early as the Middle Bronze Age II, according to finds from Shechem, Nahariya, and Megiddo (Kletter 2003: 148), though evidence is meager. The use of Hacksilber as a unified form of payment is especially evident in the Iron Age II period in the southern Levant (Golani and Sass 1998; Gitin and Golani 2001, 2004; Kletter 2003, esp. table 1; 2004; Thompson 2003, esp. table 2; Schaps 2004: 53– 56). Several hoards were found wrapped in cloth, probably originally a bag (possibly the biblical ṣrwr ksp, Gen 42:35), and sealed with a device (bulla) to guarantee the contents. A fine example of the use of Hacksilber from this period is an ostracon from Ashkelon dated to the 604 b.c.e. destruction layer that mentions a possible silver payment for grain (Cross 2008: 336–39, no. 1.2). The many seventh-century b.c.e. Hacksilber hoards at Ekron and elsewhere in Palestine, it has been suggested, indicate an economic development in which silver was used as currency. In the Bible, units of silver, šqlym, are a weight standard for payment, and bṣʿ ksp may have been the biblical term for money itself (Gitin and Golani 2001: 36). This early evidence is disputed. It may rather point to a precoinage stage, an “underground economy” in Iron Age Palestine 445

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in which cut units of controlled standard weights constituted a metal economy (Kletter 2003),1 which existed in the region prior to the traditional date of the “invention” of coinage in the Greco-Lydian milieu of western Asia Minor between 630 and 600 b.c.e. (le Rider 2001: 59–67). According to Thompson (2003), Hacksilber hoards were one of the factors to influence the “invention” of the Greco-Lydian coinage, which is an adaptation of preexisting Levantine concepts. Thompson argues that the monetary use of silver proliferated throughout Cisjordan during the Iron Age and that this proliferation is linked to the overwhelming preference for silver coinages among the Greeks. In other words, the popularity of silver in the Mediterranean stimulated the Greeks to make use of their native silver sources. The Phoenicians were thus aware of the essential practices involved in coining metal, namely, using a device to indicate weight and purity verification of metal pieces. The Near East may be the region where metal economy was first initiated, which only later was modified into a proper monetary economy in Lydia and Greece. Still, the relation of Hacksilber to coins and monetary economy is far from direct, because the first coins were made of electrum, lacked explicit guarantees of authority, and their value still depended on their weight (Kletter 2004). However, there certainly was a metal (premonetary) economy in preAchaemenid Palestine.2 The notion of silver as a means of payment was used in certain types of transactions and was used for converting local weight standards into foreign ones. Hacksilber hoards were normally wrapped in cloth bags and probably sealed with a clay bulla or bullae (as is evident from the Dor and Tell Keisan hoards). The bulla thus served as a mark of ownership and a guarantee of the purity and/or the 1.  Moreover, dozens of Hacksilber pieces are found as strays in Palestine and appear frequently on the local antiquities market, and they should be taken into account when evaluating the economic role of Hacksilber. 2. The šql (e.g., Gen 23:15–16; Lev 27:3, 16; 1 Sam 9:8) was the basic unit of measurement of silver, apparently weighing 11.33 g in Iron Age II Judah, and was used as a standard for payment. Other units are also documented in the Bible, the qyqr (e.g., Exod 37:24, 38:24; 2 Kgs 5:22–23), i.e., 3,000 šqlym; the mnh (e.g., Ezek 45:12, Ezra 2:69), i.e., 50 or 60 šqlym; the bqʿ (Gen 24:22; Exod 38:26), i.e., a half-šql; and the grh (Exod 30:13; Lev 27:25; Num 3:47, 18:16; Ezek 45:12), i.e., 1⁄20 of a šql. The pym (1 Sam 13:21) formed part (about two-thirds) of the šql according to the archaeological findings, whereas the qšyth (Gen 33:19, Josh 24:32, Job 42:11) is probably an archaic (pre-Iron Age) weight standard. The agwrh (1 Sam 2:36) is a reference to a minute piece of silver, and as previously stated the term bṣʿ ksp (Judg 5:19) may have been the biblical word for money itself; see, in general, Encyclopedia Biblica 4, s.v. Midot U-Mishqolot [Hebrew]; and Schaps 2004: 53–56 and esp. pp. 227–28; DiSegni 1990: 210–18.

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weight of silver in Iron Age Palestine, as the conceptual antecedents of the “sealed” Greco-Lydian coinages. This notion—of certifying the contents of the bag by sealing it with a bulla that had a motif imprinted on it that identified the owner and assured the contents of the bag—can be seen as a step toward the sealing (striking) of the metal itself, namely the invention of the first coins. As Schaps notes of Near East precoined societies, “If Greece was the cradle of coinage and Lydia its birthplace, the societies of the Near East were its ancestors” (2004: 34). No Hacksilber hoards dating to the Neo-Babylonian period and early stage of Achaemenid rule have been found, but hoards were found that include cut pieces of silver or jewelry functioning as bullion, as well as coins. It may be that the Greek Archaic coins replaced the economic role of Hacksilber, though in much smaller quantities.3 We know that the local traditional form of weighing pieces of metal was still in use in this transitional period, as many Greek Archaic coins, and especially Athenian tetradrachms,4 are found cut into pieces in order to form fractions to be weighed on transactions (cf., e.g., Kraay and Moorey 1968). However, the fact that the first production stage of the coinage of southern Palestine shows a high degree of similarity to some of the proper Athenian and Athenian-styled issues means that some of them were locally produced and may thus be regarded as forerunners of local Philistian types or contemporaneous counterparts. These pieces are sometimes found intentionally cut into rough halves, thirds, and quarters of their original contours, and even into smaller fractions. This enabled the local societies to use smaller denominations of roughly fixed standards while also assuring the silver purity of the piece. The practice of cutting is seen also in some imported fourth-century b.c.e. coins (Gitler 2006). 3.  Greek Archaic issues dated to the mid- to late sixth and early fifth centuries b.c.e. are the earliest coins found in Palestine, either retrieved from controlled archaeological excavations or allegedly found as strays on the surface of ancient sites; for listings, see Gitler and Tal 2006a: 13–22. 4.  This actually refers to Athenian tetradrachms normally dated to the period between 454 and 413–404 b.c.e. and Athenian-styled tetradrachms (see, e.g., Mildenberg 1993) normally dated to ca. 450–350 b.c.e., for it is difficult to differentiate between authentic Athenian coins and their imitations; for listings, see Gitler and Tal 2006a: 23–30. A differentiation of this sort is normally done on stylistic grounds (level of “canonization” in the depicted motifs), but recent archaeo-metallurgy has shown that in many cases the level of silver purity and the origin of the metal ore in Laurion (Attica) is similar in both authentic and “imititative” coins, a fact that may dismiss the notion of (Eastern) imitations (Gitler, Ponting, and Tal 2009). The commonly accepted idea that the Athenian-styled issues were struck in several Eastern mints, because they show a variety of artistic styles that may imply production in different localities throughout the fifth Persian Satrapy may thus be questioned.

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This suggests that the tradition of using silver coins as bullion to be weighed in transactions remained in marginal use during late Persian times and later, side by side with a monetary economy per se.5 In what follows, I will discuss the Persian-period coinages of Judah (yhd), Samaria (šmryn), Philistia, and Edom in their social contexts; some of these coinages were extensively discussed in the scholarly literature, but in the current frame I am limiting myself to some normally overlooked aspects. We should bear in mind however that coins in earlier minting periods were produced randomly, for a limited period of time, and in fixed quantities, in order to meet specific social, political, and economic needs. The similarity and differences in the iconographical motifs of the coins of Judah (yhd), Samaria (šmryn), Philistia, and Edom stood for similarity and differences in the regions’ inhabitants’ self-definition.

The Coinage of Judah Until now, fewer than 30 Persian-period yhd coin types (meaning coins of the same type but not of the same denomination) have been documented. The total number of coin-types is in any case relatively small when compared to temporary coinages of Samaria and Philistia. Jerusalem struck small silver coins bearing the geographical name of the province yhd (and less frequently yhwd) but sometimes bearing the legends of personal names and titles yḥzqyh hpḥh, yḥzqyh, ywḥnn hkwhn, yhwdh, in Persian times and yhd, yhwdh, and yhdh in Hellenistic (Ptolemaic) times (for the latter, see, e.g., Barag 1999; Meshorer 2001; Gitler and Lorber 2006).6 Most of these coins (with the exception of the 5.  One should bear in mind that Palestine had a long history of a metal economy in which bronze, silver, gold, and different metal alloys were used in trade. Hacksilber hoards found at biblical sites in Palestine provide evidence of the use of metal for its bullion value. It would, then, be feasible that Athenian and Athenian-styled issues laid the foundations for a moneyed economy by the mid-fifth century b.c.e. in Philistia, which prevailed in the greater parts of southern Palestine by the fourth century b.c.e. 6.  The fact that Jerusalem was virtually the only mint of the Ptolemaic kingdom to strike silver fractions while the Lagids were promoting the use of bronze coinage with a similar range of values is of special interest. After the Greco-Macedonian conquest, the weight standard of the provincial coinage changed, when the grh and half-grh were replaced by fractions of the obol on the Attic weight standard with a modal weight of 0.19 g for the quarter-obol (Ronen 2003–6). These issues show a clear Ptolemaic iconographic influence (e.g., Meshorer 2001: nos. 29–35; Gitler and Lorber 2006: Group 5) and are dated from circa 301 to 261/260 b.c.e. (Gitler and Lorber 2006). Recently, Gitler and Lorber (2008) suggested that the coins bearing the personal name yḥzqyh hpḥh (i.e., Meshorer 2001: nos. 22–23) should be attributed to the period of the Diadochi (after 312 b.c.e.) because of the use of an Attic weight

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renowned British Museum yhd, “drachm” [Meshorer 2001: no. 1; see, however, in this respect, Gitler and Tal 2006a: 70, 230] and three yhd coins of 2.72 g, 2.70 g, and 2.22 g), have two weight groupings, with average weights of 0.48 g and 0.26 g. The coins of these groupings are erroneously yet customarily referred to as obols and hemiobols, rather than the grh, that is, 1/24 of Judahite šql of 11.4 g, and half-grh, that is, 1/48 Judahite šql (see, in this respect, Ronen 2003–6). There are also smaller fractions. Stylistically, the coins can be identified as Athenian-styled issues, where normally a depiction of the head of Athena appears on the obverse and the owl and olive spray, together with the paleo-Hebrew (or Aramaic) legend yhd (or yhwd) on the reverse (cf. Meshorer 2001: nos. 2–14, 20–23), or Judahite-styled issues, where more varied divinities, humans, animals, and floral-motif depictions are found (cf. Meshorer 2001: nos. 15–19, 24–28). The yhd coins’ chronology is debated.7 standard apparent from these coins (cf. Ronen 1998: 125); the considerably small number of specimens (31 coins) and, consequently, the unreliable statistical results, as well as the use of Achaemenid title, lead us to question this suggestion. Following Mildenberg (1979), who was of the opinion that yḥzqyh-type coins (without the Achaemenid title pḥh) should date to the “Macedonian period”—that is, to the period between 332–301 (namely, Macedonian-Diadochi)—Gitler and Lorber (2008) also examined the weights of yḥzqyh-type coins (Meshorer 2001: nos. 24–26). They found that, except for Meshorer’s (2001) no. 25a, these coins are on the Judahite šql/ grh standard. However, Gitler and Lorber dated Meshorer’s (2001) nos. 14, 20–23, 25a, 27–28 to the “Macedonian period” based either on statistically assumed Attic weight standards (nos. 22–23, 25a; my reservations are noted above) or on stylistic and epigraphic considerations (nos. 14, 21–22, 27–28) (2008: table 1). 7.  The Persian-period coinage of Judah is the subject of numerous studies (e.g., Mildenberg 1979, 1994; Rappaport 1981; Machinist 1994; Deutsch 1999; Goldman 2000; Meshorer 2001; Fried 2003). There is a consensus that minting began somewhere in fourth-century b.c.e. Judah but also a debate over the chronological development of the coins, that is, with regard to the date of each type, because the coins are undated, and those bearing personal names and titles can hardly be attributed to known historical figures (see discussion in Gitler and Lorber 2008: 61–65). For example, finds uncovered during “Operation Scroll” led Ariel to conclude that some of the coins attributed by Meshorer to the end of the Persian period (2001: nos. 3, 4, 6, and 8) should be down-dated to the beginning of the Hellenistic period, because they were found with other coins from this period and were believed to have belonged to refugees fleeing the armies of Alexander’s successors (Ariel 2002: 288–90, Caves VII/1 and IV/6, table 3). If Ariel is correct, these Athenian-styled issues usually attributed to the Persian period may be assigned to the beginning of the Hellenistic period. It seems, however, that the beginning of Judahite coin minting should be understood against the Achaemenid imperial policy and the reorganization of the southern frontier of the fifth Persian Satrapy once domination of Egypt came to an end, circa 400–343 b.c.e., that is, the administrative role of the (new border) province of Judah in the Achaemenid Empire (see, in this respect, Fantalkin and Tal 2006: 180–81).

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The Coinage of Samaria In 1982, Meshorer included four Samarian coins in Supplement 1 of his monograph Ancient Jewish Coinage. In the contexts of their 1991 publication of the Samaria hoard, Meshorer and Qedar were able to gather 106 different issues (1991; see also Machinist 1994), and in 1999 they published a corpus of 224 Samarian coins (Meshorer and Qedar 1999). As opposed to Philistian coin-type terminology, Meshorer and Qedar defined a “type” as coins of the same type but of a different denomination. Since 1999, new coins have appeared on the antiquities market (Gitler and Tal 2006b; Ronen 2007) and in excavations (Mount Gerizim [Magen 2007: 210–11, fig. 29] and Gan Śoreq [D. T. Ariel, personal communication]), and to date, some 200 “types” are known, that is, coins bearing different motifs. Samaria struck silver (and some silver-plated) coins (erroneously yet customarily referred to as “drachms,” “obols,” “hemiobols” and smaller fractions, rather than the rbʿ šqln [or simply rbʿ, with an average weight of 3.63 g], mʿn, that is, 1⁄6 šql [which comes to 0.61 g on average], and half-mʿn, that is, 1⁄12 šql [which comes to 0.31 g on average]. There are also smaller fractions, that is 1⁄24 šql [see in this respect Tal 2007: 20]). There are many types of Samarian coins, but most of them were struck on mʿn and half-mʿn; the rbʿ šqln are much less frequent. The earliest coin type is dated to ca. 372 b.c.e., and minting continued (though intermittently) until the Macedonian conquest.8 Several 8.  In fact, Meshorer and Qedar’s date of 372 b.c.e. for the beginning of Samarian coin minting is subjective (1999: 71). It is actually based on the idea that coins nos. 1 and 2, which bear the personal name ϹΙΑΒΡΑΦ (that is, ΦΑΡΝ[Α]ΒΑΖ[Ο]Ϲ), written in retrograde from right to left in West Semitic style, with the Greek nu replaced by an Aramaic gimel and the Greek zeta replaced by an Aramaic zayin (which may be indirect evidence for a local Semitic die engraver) and with two vowels missing, refer to the satrap Pharnabazos/us of Dascylium (northwestern Anatolia, 413–​ 388/7 b.c.e.). In fact, we do not know of any direct historical connection between the satrap Pharnabazos with the province of Samaria, and these coins’ terminus ante quem, if truly connected to the satrap Pharnabazos, should be dated to the year 388/7 b.c.e. His involvement in the Near East may be connected with the unsuccessful Achaemenid attempts at reconquering Egypt (389–387 b.c.e.), possibly with the aid of local (Palestinian) forces and supplies (Isocrates, Panegyricus 140). Unlike other southern Palestinian coinages, there are also two dated Samarian coin types bearing the motif of a seated Achaemenid satrap with the numerals IIII^ (= 14) on the obverse and the great Achaemenid king sacrificing a bull on the reverse (Meshorer and Qedar 1999: nos. 4–6). One of these coin types (no. 4) has the Aramaic letters bet and tav (‫ )בת‬together with the numerals on the obverse and the Greek legend ΒΑ/ ΓΑΒΑ/ΤΑC on the reverse. It is reasonable to assume that these numerals refer to regnal years of the great Achaemenid king similarly to the dating of the Wadi Daliyeh papyri (Gropp 2001). The personal name Βαγαβάτας (in Greek) or ‫( בת‬abbreviated in Aramaic yet reconstructed ‫ בגבת‬based on the Greek) is probably derived from the

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Samarian coins show the geographical name of the province, that is, šmryn, in full or abbreviated as šmry, šmrn, šmr, šm, šn, or just a š, written in Aramaic. Samarian coins show also a variety of private names; these can normally refer to Samarian governors and possibly prefects (both are written in Aramaic), as can be correlated from the contemporaneous historical and epigraphic sources (see, e.g., Eshel 2007). The personal names of Achaemenid satraps may also be assumed, and these are normally written in Greek (when they appear without additional names in Aramaic).9 We should bear in mind that most of the Samarian coins do not bear inscriptions. They are defined as Samarian on the basis of circulation, fabric, metrology, and especially iconography. The main artistic influence of the Samarian coinage is categorically Achaemenid (or Phoenician that had its roots in Achaemenid artform), and it can be safely deduced that more than half the Samarian coin types show Achaemenid motifs and artistic influences. Iranian baga, “deity,” which may form the name of a satrap (or local governor) but is unfortunately unknown from historical and epigraphic sources. There is no apparent reason to dismiss the possibility of year 14 of Artaxerxes II and come up with the year 390/89 b.c.e. for these coins (contra Meshorer and Qedar’s attribution of year 14 of Artaxerxes III, 346/5 b.c.e., based on these coin types’ appearance in the Nablus hoard, the burial date of which is 338/7 b.c.e. as is attested from the dated Tyrian coins; see, in this respect, Elayi and Elayi 1993: 230, where an earlier burial date, ca. 355 b.c.e., is proposed). There is no point, however, in assuming that these dated coins are the earliest Samarian coins ever minted, and the beginning of coin minting should be understood against Samaria’s suspected involvement in the Achaemenid attempts at reconquering Egypt in the early fourth century b.c.e. and its growing administrative role in the reorganization of the southern frontier of the fifth Persian Satrapy once domination of Egypt came to an end, around 400–343 b.c.e., as was the case in the province of Judah. In any case, coin minting in the Province of Samaria came to an end with the Greco-Macedonian conquest and possibly “resumed” only under the Seleucids (that is, in the days of Antiochus IX). 9.  Only few Samarian coins show Greek legends (cf. Meshorer and Qedar 1999: nos. 1–2, 4, 40, 114). The names ϹΙΑΒΡΑΦ (no. 1), ΡΑΦ (no. 2, which depicts the first four letters from the right of no. 1) and ΒΑ/ΓΑΒΑ/ΤΑC (no. 4) are discussed above (n. 8). The other name, ΙΕΥΣ (no. 40), that is, Zeus, on the obverse with a depiction of seated divinity, yet with the personal name yhwʿnh on the reverse, is obviously imitating in its obverse a Cilician coin type (cf. Meshorer and Qedar 1999: 29). Interestingly, the depiction of the first letter as Greek zeta in the form of what may appear as an Aramaic zayin (‫ )ז‬may provide even more indirect evidence for a local Semitic die engraver, as with nos. 1–2. The name ΚΛΕΥΣ (no. 114) may either be the genitive suffix of the divinity Heracles, for the obverse shows a bearded, frontally depicted divinity, or less likely the genitive suffix of another personal Greek name (such as Aristocles, Sophocles, etc.), which may hint at a name of a satrap. This coin also, however, depicts on the reverse an abbreviated form of a personal name that may be read ʿd, ʿr, or ʿw; Meshorer and Qedar provided no readings but provided readings for “two rings.”

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The Coinage of Philistia Philistian coins (the so-called Philisto-Arabian coins) are the earliest Palestinian coinage minted under Achaemenid rule (Gitler and Tal 2006a). These coins were “formally” issued by the minting authorities of Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Gaza, the three coastal cities of Philistia (southwestern Palestine), as early as the 440s b.c.e.10 It is thus in Persian-period Philistia where the development of the metal economy of Palestine from Hacksilber to coins (Archaic and Athenian) and proper local monetary economy began. Philistia’s early coinage was probably confined to silver (and some silver-plated) “large” denominations, that is, the šql, weighing 14.32 g on average (yet customarily referred to as “tetradrachm”). By the fourth century b.c.e., proper monetary economy is evident in the Philistian coinage, for each coin type is normally produced in three different denominations: the rbʿ šql or simply rbʿ (with an average weight of 3.58 g), customarily referred to as “drachm,” the mʿh (which comes to 0.60 g on average), customarily referred to as “obol,” and the half-mʿh (which comes to 0.30 g on average), customarily referred to as “hemiobol” (Gitler and Tal 2006a: 315–28; Tal 2007: 21–22). To date, some 350 Philistian coin types are known, that is, coins bearing different motifs regardless their denomination. The coins’ motifs reflect contemporary fashions, foreign influences and a broad local imagery. Philistian coins show the name of the minting authorities, that is, Ashdod (ʾšdd, šdd—with ʾ as a pictograph of a bull’s head, or in abbreviated forms, ʾd, ʾš, and šd  ) written in Aramaic; Ashkelon (ʾn or ʾ alone) written in Phoenician;11 Gaza (ʿ  zh, or in abbreviated forms ʿz, zʿ or ʿ alone) and m (denoting Marnas—Gaza’s primary deity). All are normally 10.  The revised chronology of the Philistian coins was studied in full by Gitler and Tal (2006a: 63–68). The main body of evidence for the considerable early dating of this coinage is its appearance in two hoards with burial dates of ca. 445 b.c.e. (Jordan hoard, IGCH 1482) and ca. 410 b.c.e. (Delta hoard, IGCH 1650). There is also evidence from artistic comparanda, with historical implications. Minting continued up to the Greco-Macedonian conquest and “resumed” in Gaza under Ptolemy II and in Ashkelon under Ptolemy IV. The right to mint coins in Philistia should be seen also in the contexts of the Achaemenid struggle with Egypt in the mid-fifth century b.c.e. (464–454 b.c.e.; Herodotus, III 12, 15; VII, 7; Thucydides, I 104, 110; Diodorus Siculus, XI 71, 74–75), and the use of Philistian cities as havens and “launching bases” for reorganization and supply. By granting the permission to mint coins, these cities enjoyed (partial) autonomy, for civic coins as symbols of sovereignty and independence carried political implications, which also had economic benefits. 11.  There is a noted preference for the use of Phoenician script in most legends attributed to the coins of Ashkelon; this is specifically true for the coins of Ashkelon, where ʾ appears alone. Interestingly, this is corroborated by the recently published Persian-period ostraca from the site (cf. Cross 2008: 350–65).

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written in lapidary Aramaic, but most depictions of the letter ʿ (as a full circle) are actually Phoenician script. There are also coins with isolated or two–three (Aramaic) letters the meanings of which are uncertain, but we should bear in mind that most of the Philistian coins do not bear inscriptions, nor do they bear dates. They are defined Philistian on the basis of circulation, fabric, metrology, and especially iconography. The iconography of the Philistian coinage was influenced by Western (Greek, Eastern Greek, and Southern Anatolian), Eastern (Phoenician and Achaemenid in the broad sense of the term), and Egyptian sources. However, the most striking influence on the Philistian coinage is notably Athenian. The people of Philistia observed these foreign motifs and more often than not adopted and adapted them to local use.

The Coinage of Edom A so-far unknown group of peculiar Athenian-styled Palestinian coins was recently identified as Edomite coinage (Gitler, Tal, and van Alfen 2007). These coins, including mainly rbʿ šqln (“drachms” of 4.0 g on average) and also mʿn (“obols” of 0.74 g on average), were struck from worn obverse dies (that is, dies damaged by prolonged use), which were then recut and repolished. As a result, the coins’ obverses in many cases are simply dome-shaped, with no traces of Athena’s head or helmet being recognizable, whereas the reverses normally show the owl, olive spray (and crescent), and the legend ΑΘΕ in a bad-to-fair condition. The coins’ distribution suggests that they circulated in the boundaries of what we define as Edom in the later part of the Persian period (fourth century b.c.e.) and might well have been the silver money mentioned in several of the Edomite ostraca (Tal 2007: 17–19).

Negotiating Identities It is a well-known fact that coin minting shares economic, political, and social aspects. From an economic point of view, monetizing the local economy granted the ruling authorities a fixed income from each series of coins they produced. Coined money, by virtue of its being legal tender is more valuable than uncoined metal, which was used during Iron Age II. From a political point of view, “city coins” emphasized the relative autonomy of the “minting” cities and provinces of Palestine, vouched for the status of the cities and provinces under Achaemenid rule, and were a means to control the local population. From a social point of view, early Palestinian coins were, to some extent, a token of collective definition and used shared visual art to establish a connection between function and image. In a period when identity was

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mostly indigenous, coins formed part of the shared social and cultural resources of a given urban center and/or its province. City coins are tokens of a shared identity and evidence of developed “metropolitan” life. Palestinian coins served the public needs of these cities and provinces as well as the needs of the minting authorities, as a means of political control. They were also a form of communication between the authorities and the inhabitants of their regions of circulation, transmitting information through certain motifs. If we are to compare the number of coin types in the coinage of Philistia with that of Samaria, Judah, and Edom, Philistia had twice as many coin types as Samaria (when comparison is based on the motif depicted alone and denominations are excluded), and far more than Judah and Edom. Of course, the term coin type is often used for coins of the same type but not of the same denomination (as was the case in the coinages of Judah and Samaria), but Philistian coin types are still exceedingly numerous. However, because the coinage of Philistia involved three minting authorities, and those of Samaria, Judah, and Edom apparently involved one each, ratios may be understood differently. What can be said from a social point of view of these “multicultural” or “multiethnic” coins but for ideas that without further evidence partially remain in the theoretical realm? If we are to follow the line previously stated that coins are a token of collective definition (or even self identity), for they formed part of the shared social and cultural resources, it seems that Philistian coins as iconographic, multiply influenced coins (Gitler and Tal 2006a) attest to a “cosmopolitan” Philistian society under Achaemenid rule that was “international” in its essence. The region’s geographic location as a crossroads of Palestine, Egypt, and Arabia and a maritime gateway for the Eastern Mediterranean and beyond lends support to an assumption of this sort. This is to say that, given the region’s history under the Philistines, Neo-Assyrians, and Neo-Babylonians, by the time the Achaemenids gained full control over Philistia and brought prosperity to the region, its population must have been most varied. Given the fact that the Philistian population of Persian times can be seen as groups of people whose identity may have been primarily jurisdictional (i.e., Ashdodians, Ashkelonians, and Gazaians), the coins may be the token of their collective “cosmopolitan” definition. On the other hand, can we assume that the lack of an obverse type in the Edomite coins (Gitler, Tal, and van Alfen 2007) and the idea that a single coin type was used can be related to an Edomite cult? If these coins served as temple money (or were for a “religious” head tax due in Edomite society), the appearance of a foreign deity (Athena) on the coinage might have been most unwelcome. We might also seek an explanation regarding the poles of the socioreligious and the economic,

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insofar as social and economic traditionalism might have influenced the unique aspects of these coins. We know that Hacksilber circulated alongside coins in fourth-century b.c.e. Palestine, as it had for centuries before (Gitler 2006). Because these Edomite dome-shaped coins resemble the dumpy flans found in Hacksilber hoards, it may have helped to ease the acceptance of this new form of money to those who were reluctant to use it, especially in a “fringe zone” such as late-Persian-period Edom. How does this explanation fit our social understanding of the yhd coins (Meshorer 2001)? On the one hand, some scholars accept the idea that yhd coins too are temple money per se, that is, being more oriented to temple payments (the Jewish head tax). Can Jews be considered less separatist than Edomites during the fourth century b.c.e. in this respect, because they accept foreign deities (such as Athena), animal depictions (such as owl and eagle) and the Achaemenid great king in their coins, and moreover in temple-related payments? Can we understand the Samarian coinage differently (Meshorer and Qedar 1999), as a token of Samarian loyalty to the throne based on the fact that most Samarian coins show strong Achaemenid influence? The fact that the ruling class of the city of Samaria showed loyalty to the Achaemenid king by killing Alexander’s newly appointed governor, Andromachos, on the eve of the city surrender to the Greco-Macedonian army (Rufus, History of Alexander 8–11) may point in this direction.12 These thoughts can be developed extensively, but without external evidence they will remain in the philosophical realm. The importance of the images appearing on these coins lies in the fact that “pictures are a more permanent and immediate form of communication than words, and even than writing, especially where literacy was slight. . . . What those pictures were, reflects on the society they served” (Boardman 2000: 325). The motifs chosen to be represented on these coins functioned as permanent and immediate forms of communication, especially in an age in which coins were the principal form of “mass media” and were regarded primarily as statements of municipal, dynastic, or religious power. These images reflect contemporary fashions, sometimes displaying foreign influences, but in most cases they exhibit a broad local imagery found only on these coins. 12.  There are scholars who find the reason for this act in the idea that the appointment of Andromachos brought to an end the line of (native) Samarian governors (e.g., Crown 1989: 9–10), but the current evidence at hand (Eshel 2007) does not allow us to support a view such as this. An act of loyalty to the Achaemenid throne may provide a better explanation; given the fact that Alexander was in Egypt at the time, and it was unclear from a Samaritan point of view whether the GrecoMacedonian troops would manage to win the battlefield.

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Bibliography Ariel, D. T. 2002 The Coins from the Surveys and Excavations of Caves in the Northern Judean Desert. ʿAtiqot 4: 281–304. Barag, D. 1999 The Coinage of Yehud and the Ptolemies. Israel Numismatic Journal 13: 27–38. Balmuth, M. S., ed. 2001 Hacksilber to Coinage: New Insights into the Monetary History of the Near East and Greece. New York: American Numismatic Society. Boardman, J. 2000 Images and Media in the Greek World. Pp. 323–37 in Images as Media: Sources for the Cultural History of the Near East and the Eastern Mediterranean (1st millennium bce), ed. C. Uehlinger. Freiburg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Crown, A. D. 1989 The Samaritans. Tübingen: Mohr Sibeck. Cross, F. M. 2008 Inscriptions in Phoenician and Other Scripts. Pp. 333–72 in Ashkelon 1: Introduction and Overview (1985–2006), ed. L. E. Stager, J. D. Schloen, and D. M. Master. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Deutsch, R. 1999 Five Unrecorded “Yehud” Silver Coins. Israel Numismatic Journal 13: 25–26. DiSegni, L. 1990 The Weight Systems in Palestine. Pp. 202–20 in Commerce in Palestine throughout the Ages, ed. B. Z. Kedar, T. Dothan, and S. Safrai. Jerusalem: Yad Ben Zvi and Israel Exploration Society. [Hebrew] Elayi, J., and Elayi, A. G. 1993 Trésors de monnaies pheniciennes et circulation monétaire (V e–IV e s.av. J.‑C. Paris: Gabalda. Eshel, H. 2007 The Governors of Samaria in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries b.c.e. Pp. 223–34 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O.  Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Fantalkin, A., and Tal, O. 2006 Redating Lachish Level I: Identifying Achaemenid Imperial Policy at the Southern Frontier of the Fifth Satrapy. Pp. 167–97 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Fried, L. S. 2003 A Silver Coin of Yohanan Hakkohen. Transeuphratène 26: 65–85.

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Gitin, S., and Golani, A. 2001 The Tel Miqne-Ekron Silver Hoards: The Assyrian and Phoenician Connections. Pp. 27–48 in Hacksilber to Coinage: New Insights into the Monetary History of the Near East and Greece, ed. M. S. Balmuth. New York: American Numismatic Society. 2004 A Silver-Based Monetary Economy in the Seventh Century bce: A Response to Raz Kletter. Levant 36: 203–5. Gitler, H. 2006 A Hacksilber and Cut Athenian Tetradrachm Hoard from the Environs of Samaria: Late Fourth Century bce. Israel Numismatic Research 1: 5–14. Gitler, H., and Lorber, C. 2006 A New Chronology for the Ptolemaic Coins of Judah. American Journal of Numismatics (2nd Series) 18: 1–41. 2008 A New Chronology for the Yehizkyah Coins of Judah. Swiss Numismatic Review 87: 61–82. Gitler, H., Ponting, M., and Tal, O. 2009 Athenian Tetradrachms from Tel Mikhal (Israel): A Metallurgical Perspective. American Journal of Numismatics, Second Series 21: 29–49. Gitler, H., and Tal, O. 2006a The Coinage of Philistia of the Fifth and Fourth Centuries bc: A Study of the Earliest Coins of Palestine. Milan: Ennerre. 2006b Coins with the Aramaic Legend Šhrw and Other Unrecorded Samarian Issues. Swiss Numismatic Review 85: 47–68. Gitler, H., Tal, O., and Alfen, P. van 2007 Silver Dome-shaped Coins from Persian-period Southern Palestine. Israel Numismatic Research 2: 47–62. Golani, A., and Sass, B. 1998 Three Seventh-Century b.c.e. Hoards of Silver Jewelry from Tel Miqne-Ekron. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 311: 57–81. Goldman, Z. 2000 The Sign of the Lily: Its Source, Significance and History in Antiquity, Part 2. Shnaton: An Annual for Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies 12: 105–43. [Hebrew] Gropp, D. M. 2001 The Samaria Papyri from Wadi Daliyeh. Pp. 1–116 in Wadi Daliyeh II: The Samaria Papyri from Wadi Daliyeh. DJD 28. Oxford: Clarendon. Kim, H. S. 2001 Archaic Coinage as Evidence for the Use of Money. Pp. 7–21 in Money and Its Uses in the Ancient Greek World, ed. A. R. Meadows and K. Shipton. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2002 Small Change and the Moneyed Economy. Pp. 44–51 in Money, Labor and Land: Approaches to the Economies of Ancient Greece, ed. P. Cartledge, E. Cohen, and P. Foxhall. London: Routledge.

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Kletter, R. 1998 Economic Keystones: The Weight System of the Kingdom of Judah. Sheffield: Continuum. 2003 Iron Age Hoards of Precious Metals in Palestine: An “Underground Economy”? Levant 35: 139–52. 2004 Coinage before Coins? A Response. Levant 36: 207–10. Kraay, C. M., and Moorey, P. R. S. 1968 Two Fifth Century Hoards from the Near East. Revue Numismatique (6th series) 10: 181–235. Kroll, J. H. 1998 Silver in Solon’s Laws. Pp. 225–32 in Studies in Greek Numismatics in Memory of Martin Jessop Price, ed. R. Ashton and S. Hurter. London: Oxbow. 2001 A Small Find of Silver Bullion from Egypt. American Journal of Numismatics 13: 1–20. Machinist, P. 1994 The First Coins of Judah and Samaria: Numismatics and History in the Achaemenid and Early Hellenistic Periods. Pp. 365–80 in Achaemenid History, vol. 8: Continuity and Change, ed. H. SancisiWeerdenburg, A. Kuhrt, and M. C. Root. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Magen, Y. 2007 The Dating of the First Phase of the Samaritan Temple of Mount Gerizim in Light of the Archaeological Evidence. Pp. 157–211 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Meshorer, Y. 1982 Ancient Jewish Coinage. 2 vols. Dix Hills, NY: Amphora. 2001 A Treasury of Jewish Coins: From the Persian Period to Bar Kochba. New York: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi and Amphora. Meshorer, Y., and Qedar, S. 1991 The Coinage of Samaria in the Fourth Century b.c.e. Jerusalem: Numismatic Fine Art International. 1999 Samarian Coinage. Jerusalem: Israel Numismatic Society. Mildenberg, L. 1979 Yehud: A Preliminary Study of the Provincial Coinage of Judaea. Pp. 183–96 in Greek Numismatics and Archaeology: Essays in Honor of Margaret Thompson, ed. O. Mørkholm and N. M. Waggoner. Wettern: Ancient World. 1993 Über das Münzwesen im Reich der Achämeniden. Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran 26: 55–79. 1994 On the Money Circulation in Palestine from Artaxeres II till Ptolemy I. Preliminary Studies of the Local Coinage in the Fifth Persian Satrapy, Part 5. Transeuphratène 7: 63–71. Rappaport, U. 1981 The First Judaean Coinage. Journal of Jewish Studies 32: 1–17.

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Rider, G. le 2001 La naissance de la monnaie: Pratiques monétaires de l’Orient ancien. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. Ronen, Y. 2003–6 Some Observations on the Coinage of Yehud. Israel Numismatic Journal 15: 28–31. 2007 Twenty Unrecorded Samarian Coins. Israel Numismatic Research 2: 29–34. Schaps, D. M. 2004 The Invention of Coinage and the Monetization of Ancient Greece. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Tal, O. 2007 Coin Denominations and Weight Standards in Fourth-Century bce Palestine. Israel Numismatic Research 2: 17–28. Thompson, C. M. 2003 Sealed Silver in Iron Age Cisjordan and the “Invention” of Coinage. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 22: 67–107.

Judaeans, Jews, Children of Abraham Joseph Blenkinsopp

The University of Notre Dame, Emeritus

The Continuity/Discontinuity Issue Questions about the formation of group identity in Judah and the Diaspora in the aftermath of the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple and the liquidation of the Judaean state take us directly into disputed issues connected with the origins of Judaism, the broad theme expressed by Wellhausen in the formula “aus Israel wird das Judentum.” Identifying the origins of an ethnic, national, or religious group seems to be an easy task when either a charismatic individual (e.g., Mohammed, Luther) or a defining historical moment (e.g., the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America, July 4, 1776, or the declaration establishing the State of Israel, May 14, 1948) is involved. But we could hardly claim to grasp the identity of either the United States of America or the State of Israel were we to take these events as marking absolute beginnings. In our case, there is a defining moment of this sort, the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians in 586 b.c.e. and the subsequent deportations, but these events at once raise complex issues of continuity and discontinuity. In the modern period, biblical scholarship has tended to view this “aus Israel wird das Judentum” theme refracted through ideological prisms of different kinds. Because this bit of intellectual history is well-known, it will suffice to mention one or two examples by way of illustration. In Wilhelm Vatke’s Biblische Theologie, inspired by a Hegelian view of historical development, Judaism served as the passage between the nature religion of early Israel and the absolute religion embodied in Christianity (Vatke 1935). 1 Julius Wellhausen’s reconstruction of the development of religious ideas and practice throughout the history of Israel in his Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels eventuated in Chronicles and the ritualism and legalism of the Priestly work in the Pentateuch, products of the earliest phase 1. On Vatke, see Kraus 1956: 179–82 and Rogerson 1984: 69–78.

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of Judaism (Wellhausen 1957: 509). 2 The Heilsgeschichte of Lutheran Pietists in the 18th and conservative Protestant biblicists in the 19th century represented a more explicitly Christian theological approach. The best-known representative of this approach is Gerhard von Rad, who maintained in his Theologie des Alten Testaments that the prophets proclaimed the death of Israel and that the history of interactivity between God and Israel came to an end once the law became “an absolute entity” (eine absolute Grösse; von Rad 1962: 85–92). To these, I add, at the other end of the spectrum, Yehezkel Kaufmann, the anti-Wellhausen, who, while agreeing that the history of Judaism as a religious community began with the fall of Jerusalem, contended that all the essentials were in place from the beginning of Israel’s history: monotheism, freedom from myth and magic, and a law revealed to Moses (Kaufmann 1937–56). 3 Leaving these heavily-freighted ideologies aside, I want to focus in this essay on specific issues bearing on the process of the formation of social identities in the wake of the disasters of the early sixth century b.c.e. Because I am not a sociologist, I will say little about theories of ethnicity, but because it is considered mandatory in these matters to cite Max Weber, I may at least refer to his definition of an ethnic group enunciated in typically apodictic fashion: We shall call “ethnic groups” those human groups that entertain a subjective belief in their common descent because of similarities of physical type or of customs or both, or because of memories of colonization and migration; this belief must be important for the propagation of group formation; conversely, it does not matter whether or not an objective blood relationship exists. (Weber 1978: 2, 389)

According to a more recent descriptive account, which I take to be fairly representative, an ethnic group will exhibit some or all of the following markers or diacritics: an expressive name, a myth of common ancestry, a shared history, and elements of a shared culture that normally but do not necessarily include language and religion (Hutchinson and Smith 1996: 6–7). The Judeans, who in 589–586 paid a heavy price for the rash actions of their rulers, certainly formed an identifiable ethnic and political unit. The Babylonian punitive expedition concluded with a series of acts designed to obliterate this identity: the elimination of 2.  The quotation is actually from Wellhausen’s article on “Israel” in Encyclopedia Britannica reprinted in William Robertson Smith’s translation of the Prolegomena into English. 3. An English translation and abridgement of vols. 1–7 of Kaufmann’s eightvolume work is available in Greenberg 1960, and parts of vol. 8 are in Efroymson 1970.

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the dynasty emblematic of the nation as a whole; the destruction of the temple, which provided religious legitimation for the revolt and served as the depository of the nation’s written traditions and laws; 4 and the execution or deportation of the literate and educated classes, here as elsewhere the bearers and transmitters of the traditions essential for the survival of group identity. It is not difficult to think of parallels in our contemporary world to this deliberate and systematic attempt to eradicate national and ethnic identity. If the Babylonians had followed the example of the Assyrians in the practice of cross-deportation, the story would probably have ended there; but they did not, and so the story continued. Hence, the task is to investigate the process by which new identities were formed and sustained on the other side of disaster. On this issue of continuity/discontinuity, we might begin by observing that the tendency in biblical scholarship has been to emphasize continuity rather than discontinuity, restoration rather than reformulation, a tendency summed up in the title of Peter Ackroyd’s well-known monograph Exile and Restoration (Ackroyd 1968). In this respect, scholars have followed the lead of the biblical texts. In Chronicles (2 Chr 36:20–21), the Exile is presented as a hiatus lasting a limited and relatively brief period of time rather than as a tragic event with farreaching consequences. As Sara Japhet put it, on this view “when the prescribed date arrives, everything will return to normal” (Japhet 1993: 1075). In the continuation of the history in Ezra–Nehemiah, the list of the first immigrants from the Babylonian Diaspora is rounded out with the information that, on arrival, they all dispersed to their respective towns, rather like returning home after a holiday abroad (Ezra 2:70). The idea of a restoration or a return is encapsulated in the familiar expressions ‫ ׁשוב ׁשבות‬and ‫ׁשיבת ציון‬, the latter borrowed from the textually disputed first verse of Psalm 126. But in fact there was no restoration of the kind of precarious national autonomy that existed prior to 586. The principal institutions were, of course, the monarchy and the priesthood, royal court and temple. Aspirations for and predictions of the restoration of the dynasty in prophetic texts (for example, Jer 23:1-8, Ezek 34:23-24, Amos 9:11-12) and in the P history in the Pentateuch (Gen 17:6, 16; 35:11) 5 remained unfulfilled in spite of several attempts 4.  The removal of the sacred vessels as especially emblematic of the temple is particularly significant (2 Kgs 25:13–17). Note the extraordinary importance attached in Ezra–Nehemiah to the sacred vessels of the temple as symbolic of continuity (Ezra 1:7–11; 5:14–15; 6:5; 7:19; 8:24–30, 33–34); on which, see Ackroyd 1972: 166–81. 5.  The prediction that kings would be among Abraham’s and Jacob’s descendants provides a little-noticed clue to the date of the P history in the Neo-Babylonian

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at realizing them. 6 The temple was razed to the ground, and the site remained empty for seven decades—for some scholars even longer—and when a smaller version replaced Solomon’s temple, it served not as an adjunct of the native dynasty but as an instrument of imperial control, symbolized by the requirement that prayers and sacrifices for the royal family in Susa be incorporated into the temple liturgy (Ezra 6:10). The liquidation of the state with its apparatus of control would also have deprived prophets of their patronage in court and temple. Optimistic prophets who survived the disaster—and we know of several who did not—would presumably have lost their prophetic credentials. Prophets of doom, if not also discredited for contributing to the disaster, would have been left searching for a new message. The reaction of male and female deportees to Jeremiah’s post-disaster preaching in Egypt is particularly instructive, because it presents an alternative explanation for the disaster. They claim that the disaster happened because they had been persuaded or coerced to abandon their traditional religion, and the worship of the “Queen of Heaven” in particular, which “we, our ancestors, our kings and officials practiced in the towns of Judah and the public places of Jerusalem” (Jer 44:15–19). (This is also, incidentally, perhaps the only place in the Hebrew Bible where women get to speak about religion). Prophetic terminology and some of the literary conventions continued in use after 586, but the phenomenon of prophecy was different. In brief, the prophetic role became increasingly assimilated to the functions of scribe, homilist, and exegete of earlier prophecy. The history of priestly houses in the Neo-Babylonian and early Persian periods, much discussed in recent years, will also no doubt call for attention in this connection. In the introduction to his edition of the Elephantine papyri published in 1923, Arthur Cowley commented on period or, at any rate, not later than the suppression of revolts at the beginning of the reign of Darius I and the disappearance of Zerubbabel from the scene. 6. The anti-Babylonian alliance of western states including Judah in 595 (Jer 27:3) coincided with the accession of Psammeticus II and an internal rebellion, which confronted Nebuchadnezzar in the same year (Wiseman 1961: 36–37, 72–73). The suppression of this revolt was followed by another incursion into Hatti land. Resistance to Babylon was encouraged by prophets in Judah (Jer 28:1–17) and Babylon (Jer 29:15–23, 29–32). The assassination of the Babylonian appointed viceroy (or puppet king) Gedaliah by Ishmael, a Davidite, probably in 582 (2 Kgs 25:25–26, Jer 41:1–3), only made a bad situation worse. The liberation of Jehoiachin from captivity in 562 at the accession of Amel-Marduk may indicate that this ruler intended to reinstate the Judean monarchy, but if so it came to nothing after the assassination of Amel-Marduk. Realistic expectations were finally extinguished after the suppression of revolts all over the Persian Empire by Darius I (521–519; Albertz 2003: 1–17).

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the facts that none of the priests who played a leading role in the affairs of the colony is identified with either the “sons of Aaron” or “sons of Zadok” and that, with the exception of the Priestly matter in the Pentateuch or Hexateuch and Chronicles, and one or two allusions of uncertain origin and date, the record both preexilic and postexilic is silent on Aaron qua priest and Aaronite priests (Cowley 1923: xxii–xxiii). What I have called “the mystery of the missing sons of Aaron” has been noted, and solutions have been proposed since the late 19th century if not earlier, but the matter still remains sub iudice (Kennett 1905: 161–86; Meek 1929: 149–66; North 1954: 191–99; Judge 1956: 70–74; Gunneweg 1965: 14–26, 29–37, 81–98; Cody 1969: 108–24; Blenkinsopp 1998: 25–43; 2003: 93–107). It seems to me that we should entertain the possibility that both the ‫ בני אהרן‬and the ‫ בני צדוק‬are products of the early Second Temple period and that they emerged out of the struggle for control of the cult between the destruction of the first and the construction of the second Jerusalem temples. At any rate, the relations between the houses of Aaron and Zadok would, if known, have an important bearing on the religious history of the province of Judah and the Samaria region during the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods, as well as relations between Judah and the eastern Diaspora. One of the few instances of directly-attested continuity is the role of the Shaphanid family in political and religious affairs both before and after the fall of Jerusalem. Shaphan, ‫( סופר‬Secretary of State?) to Josiah, was of Benjaminite descent. 7 He, his three sons (Ahikam, Elasah, Gemariah), and two grandsons (Gedaliah son of Ahikam, Micaiah son of Gemariah), took the lead in opposing the faction at the court favoring rebellion, thus sparing Benjaminite territory the effects of the Babylonian punitive campaign that devastated Judah. The Shaphanids were therefore, if not pro-Babylonian, certainly in favor of maintaining the status quo. After his installation at Benjaminite Mizpah, Gedaliah’s invitation to those dispersed by the Babylonian punitive campaign to submit to Babylon and accept his protection (Jer 40:9–10) is paralleled by Jeremiah’s letter to the deportees, delivered by Elasah, Shaphan’s son, to seek the well-being of the places where they had been settled (Jer 29:1–28). This was no doubt seen as appeasement by their enemies, 7.  His grandfather Meshullam has a name common among Benjaminites (2 Kgs 22:3; see 1 Chr 8:17, 9:7–8; Neh 11:7). His grandson Gedaliah, appointed viceroy of the region by the Babylonians, was established at Mizpah (Tell en-Naṣbeh) in Benjamin (2 Kgs 25:22; Jer 40:7–12), and members of the family protected Jeremiah, himself a Benjaminite, who chose to stay with Gedaliah at Mizpah “among his own people” (Jer 39:14, 40:5–6).

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but what for some is appeasement for others is political realism and pragmatism. It is clear from the account of Shaphan’s activities under Josiah that he had oversight of the temple and its personnel (2 Kgs 22:3–10), and his descendants continued to have close links with the temple priesthood (2 Kgs 22:12; Jer 29:3, 36:10). It would be natural to conclude further that he was involved in the cleansing of the temple and reform of the temple cult that followed the reading of the newly discovered law book (2 Kgs 23:1–14), to the extent that this account can be considered historically reliable. In more general terms, it seems that the Shaphanids played a leading role in promoting a reformed religion based on a written law attributed to Moses that emphasized the cult of Yhwh alone. If their views on the ideal polity of the future are reflected in Deuteronomy, it would seem that they also envisioned what we might call a constitutional monarchy, a monarchy not necessarily Davidic but one under the law interpreted by Levitical priests (Deut 17:14–20), somewhat analogous to the Iranian president who—at this writing— enjoys considerable power but is ultimately under the control of the Ayatollahs and the Sharia interpreted by them. In spite of the obvious debt of Ezra–Nehemiah to certain deuteronomic texts, especially 7:1–6 and 23:2–9, the Shaphanids, as a lay family, moved in a quite-different conceptual world from that of the priest Ezra as described in the canonical book.

Judeans or Jews? One way of addressing the continuity/discontinuity issue would be, at the most basic linguistic level, to ask once again an apparently—but only apparently—straightforward question: When is it appropriate to begin translating the gentilic ‫ יהודים‬as “Jews” (“Juden,” “Juifs,” etc.) rather than “Judeans”? The relevant data are readily available. To go back to the beginning, the designation would have applied to inhabitants of the hill country (or the wilderness, or the Negev) of Judah in the early period before the formation of the state, comparable therefore to Kenites, Kenizzites, Jerahmeelites, and others (Josh 1:16, 11:21; 1 Sam 27:10), but as it happens, this usage is not attested. In biblical texts from the time of the kingdoms, as well as in Assyrian inscriptions, 8 the term signifies ascriptive identity, membership in a nation, though not restricted to those actually resident in Judean territory. There were, 8. E.g., ha-za-qi-a-ú ia-ú-da-ai, “Hezekiah the Judaean,” in Sennacherib’s account of the punitive expedition of 701 b.c.e. on the Taylor Prism and the Chicago Oriental Institute Prism (ANET 287–88).

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for example, Judeans living in Egypt (Jer 43:9, 44:1). In this context, therefore, “Judean” belongs to the same category as “Edomite,” “Ammonite,” “Syrian,” and so on. The question that then arises can be posed as follows: When was the primary association with place left behind, or, in other words, when did the ethnic-local-national give way to the ethnic-cultural-religious connotation? The situation is by no means clear-cut. In the first Aramaic section of Ezra (4:8–6:18), the designation ‫ יהודיא‬occurs in, or in association with, cited documents of Persian officials, and the allusion is therefore to one of many ethnic groups forming a distinct unit in the Persian Empire (Ezra 4:12, 23; 5:1, 5, 14; 6:7–  8:14). Much the same usage is attested with reference to the Jewish garrison (‫ )חילא יהודיא‬in the Elephantine papyri. This last fact is of particular interest because, as far as we know, none of these people had ever set foot in Judah. Usage in Nehemiah is more complex, because in addition to designating inhabitants of Yehud in general (Neh 2:16; 5:1, 17), the term could stand for a distinctive upper-echelon social class in the province, probably the Judeo-Babylonian element. On the other hand, the ‫ איׁש יהודי‬of Zech 8:23, of uncertain date but probably late Persian period, appears in an explicitly religious context, which is clearly the case even if the hem of the garment grasped by 10 men of different nationalities is not a reference to the ‫( ציציות‬MT here has ‫)ציצת‬, the tassels prescribed in Num 15:38. It is the same in Esther, in which the first and only appearance of the verb ‫( התיהד‬8:17) testifies to the possibility of proselytism at the time of writing. This is so even if, in the context, the verb is interpreted as pretending to be Jewish in order to escape the fury of this diasporic Jewish community. There is, finally, the statement of Josephus, made in connection with Nehemiah’s repair of the city wall (Neh 3:34), that the expression ἰουδαῖοι was first used with reference to those who went up from Babylon: The name by which they have been called from the time when they went up from Babylon, is derived from the tribe of Judah; as this tribe was the first to come to those parts, both the people themselves and the country have taken their name from it. (Ant. 11:173)

In summary, then, usage seems to point to the first century of Persian rule for the emergence of the ethnic-religious connotation of ‫יהודים‬, justifying the appellative “Jew” rather than “Judean.” 9 If so, this identity 9.  Needless to say, other scholars have reached different conclusions. Shaye J. D. Cohen, for example, proposes that only as late as the latter part of the second century b.c.e. is the original meaning “Judean” supplemented by a religious and cultural meaning justifying use of the term Jew (Cohen 1999: 3, 69–106). At the other

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marker could be regarded as one aspect of a changing situation in the larger culture, even though it is of relatively low visibility on the stage of world events. For this century, which can be described as an axial period, witnessed a large-scale reshaping of the eastern Mediterranean region and the Near East. It marked the end of the great Semitic empires that had dominated and shaped that world for millennia and that would reemerge only with the rise of Islam in the seventh century c.e. It was the high point of Athenian culture in the Periclean age that witnessed the explosion of Greek intellectual and artistic achievement, achievement that continues to amaze us today. Parmenides arrived in Athens from Italy five years before Nehemiah arrived in Judah from Susa, and the Parthenon was completed three years later. Socrates was engaged in philosophical debate with his disciples at the same time that Nehemiah was rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem. More to the point, the age witnessed the formation of national and ethnic identities, especially in the Greek cities and Egypt, despite the dominant hegemonic power of the day. These movements are reflected in new forms of literary expression: the practice of citing sources precisely transcribed, heavily edited, or invented as the case may be; the writing of personal memoirs (Herodotus, Ion of Chios, Ezra, Nehemiah); and the first histories— Herodotus to 479, Xenophon to 362, Ctesias to 382, and Thucydides to 404—none of which, however, mentions either the Jewish people or Judah (Momigliano 1966, 1993).

Demography and Prosopography I want to raise, at an equally basic level, the question of demographic continuity or discontinuity. Several estimates of population density in Judah before and after the Babylonian conquest and of variations in density during the Neo-Babylonian and early Persian periods are on offer. It would certainly be useful and relevant to the theme of identity formation in the Neo-Babylonian and early Persian period to have reliable data on the numbers involved in the successive deportations (597, 586, 582 b.c.e.) relative to the size of the surviving population left in Judah, on the population of Jerusalem shortly before and after 586, and on the size of the Judeo-Babylonian element in the province during the first Persian century as a proportion of the total population. We recall that demographic estimates constituted an important element in Joel Weinberg’s Bürger-Tempel Gemeinde hypothesis which, however, also chronological extreme, Mark Zvi Brettler argues that we may speak of “Jews” from the beginnings of Israelite history (Brettler 1999: 429–47). See further Mason 2007: 457–512.

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served to illustrate the problems besetting these calculations (Blenkinsopp 1991: 22–53). Few today would subscribe to Weinberg’s estimate of 250,000 for the population of Persian-period Judah. The estimate is far too high. Unfortunately, the biblical texts give us little help with the task of assembling the data required for an even approximate estimate. These include the carrying capacity of the location in question, floor space (especially covered floor space), availability of essential resources for survival, and the average size of families (Heicksen 1975: 31–39; Hassan 1978). Many attempts have been made over the past two or three decades (Shiloh 1980: 25–35; Stager 1985: 1–35; Zorn 1994: 31–48) and continue to be made (Carter 1999: 195–205; Lipschits 2003: 323–76, 2005: 270; Faust 2007: 23–51), but so many variables enter into the calculations, and the estimates have to allow for so wide a margin of error and in fact differ so widely that, while we acknowledge the value of the attempts that have been made, it is difficult as yet to accept any of them with confidence. 10 Also relevant, but requiring no less caution, is the use of prosopographical studies bearing on ethnic origins and religious affiliation in Judah and diasporic centers, the nature of successive immigrations into the province of Judah, and the changing character of its population. We don’t need to labor the point that prosopography is not an infallible guide to social, political, and religious realities. Names can change over time, the same person can have more than one name (e.g., a nickname, a nom de guerre), and people are not always logical and consistent in naming their children. The Murašu archive, for example, lists parents with Babylonian names whose children carry Yhwh-theophoric names, for example, Nathaniah son of Beluballit (Coogan 1976: 49–53; Bickerman 1984: 356). Names nevertheless retain some memory of ethnic and religious origins and therefore should not be ignored. The available data have been assembled and cataloged comprehensively by Professor Ran Zadok, who has given us a veritable telephone directory (minus the digits) of Jewish names from the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods (Zadok 1977, 1979, 1988). This database will be expanded and no doubt new questions will arise with the anticipated publication of some 180 texts containing Northwest Semitic and Yhwh-theophoric names from āl-yāhūdu, Bīt-Našar, and Bīt Abiram, unidentified locations in the 10.  Compare, for example, Charles E. Carter’s estimate of 13,350 for the early Persian period and 20,650 for the later period (Carter 1999: 195–205) with Lipschits’s 30,125 for the Persian period as a whole, based on a calculation of the number of settled dunams (Lipschits 2003: 323–76; 2005: 270). These are, to my knowledge, the most recent, the closest, and the most carefully and thoroughly calculated estimates available.

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Nippur region (see the contribution of Laurie Pearce, pp.  267–277, and Cornelia Wunsch’s presentation at the conference, not published here). The Murašu dossier testifies to a high level of interethnicity precisely in the region where the Jewish deportees were settled, and where most of them would have taken Jeremiah’s advice to “build houses and live in them . . . take wives and have sons and daughters” (Jer 29:5–6) and, given the situation, not all the wives would have been from their own people. On the other hand, precisely this situation could have instigated a reaction contributing to the extreme form of self-segregation mandated in Ezekiel’s “temple law” (‫תורת הבית‬, Ezek 44:1–9) and enforced by Ezra and his supporters, “those who trembled at the word of God” (‫ )חרדים‬according to Ezra 9–10. It is clear, at any rate, that much still remains to be done with this extrabiblical onomasticon, but in the meantime information can also be extracted from the hundreds of names in the relevant biblical texts, in the first place Ezra–Nehemiah. One example will illustrate both the possibilities and the problems attending this work of extraction. The lay agnatic units listed in Ezra 2:2–19 and Neh 7:7–24 are presented as belonging to those who were the first to return (Ezra 2:1–2, Neh 7:5), but there is broad agreement that there was no one immigration of about 50,000 Judeo-Babylonians 11 in response to the edict of Cyrus II or at any other time. The list must have served some other purpose and must date from later in the Persian period (Blenkinsopp 1988: 79–84). Given this situation, what are we to make of the fact that, of the 17 or 18 patronymics listed here, 12 said to be of golah origin, only 4 (if we include Zak­kai and Bani as hypocoristic for Zechariah and Benaiah respectively) appear in preexilic texts and are Yhwh-theophoric, and the one with a Persian patronymic (Bigvai) is the third-largest? Because descendants of 12 of these founders of Babylonian-diasporic kinship units of the ‫ בית אבות‬type, corresponding to the Babylonian bit abim, also accompanied Ezra (Ezra 8:3–14), the names in the list may be taken to indicate that, by the time the list was compiled, the links with the deportees of 597, 586, and 582 had become exiguous to the point of disappearance. This would hardly be surprising after the passage of at least a century and a half. Whereas the destination of immigrants from Babylonia in the mid-Persian period was still Jerusalem, in the circumstances these immigrants could hardly be described as returning to Zion. On arrival in the province, with or without imperial authoriza11.  49,897 (Ezra 2:64) or 49,942 (Neh 7:66). 12.  The unit containing the names of both Pahath-Moab and Joab in Ezra 2:6 = Neh 7:11 is listed as two separate units that accompanied Ezra in Ezra 8:4, 9. 1 Esdras 5 has 21 units.

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tion, Ezra and his supporters maintained their distinctive identity as the golah assembly (‫)בני הגולה‬. We might think of them as engaged in a kind of religiously motivated colonization, a distant analogy to the pilgrim fathers in the early 17th century, driven by an ideological and basically sectarian agenda, which they brought with them. 13 It is interesting to note in this regard that the LXX translates ‫ גלה‬with ἀποικία (ἀποικεσία), the term used by Herodotus for Greek colonies (1,146; 5,124) and by Josephus for the Alexandrian Jewish Diaspora (Ap. 2:38).

Tradition and Identity: The Narrative Tradition about Abraham The core issue in the negotiation of identity in the post-disaster period, an issue that also falls under the rubric of continuity/discontinuity, may be stated as follows. In biblical texts from the period in question, the same traditional self-referential language is in use as was previously—Israel, the seed of Israel, the holy seed, the people of God, the children of Abraham—but in this period it is not unproblematically clear to whom these terms refer. There we then not only different population centers but different claimants to possess the past as mediated through traditions, written and oral, to shape it in their own image, and where necessary to invent it. Because the biblical texts favor the JudeoBabylonian claimants, it is only rarely and by chance that we hear the arguments of their opponents. A case in point is the claim attributed to the indigenous Judaeans, those not deported, to be the authentic descendants of Abraham, and therefore to hold title to the land, including the estates vacated by the deportees. The claim is based on two arguments reported at different places in the prophecies of Ezekiel, certainly a hostile witness, who addresses the Babylonian Diaspora community as “the entire household of Israel” (Ezek 11:14–16, 33:23–29). 14 The first claim—“They have gone far from Yhwh, the land has been given to us as an inheritance”—is not merely a statement of fact, as if to say possession is nine parts of the 13.  Ezra and his support group could also be seen as the predecessors of sectarian movements that, according to one hypothesis, originated in the eastern Diaspora during the Hasmonean period (Albright 1957: 19–22, 374–78; Albright and Mann 1969: 11–25; Murphy-O’Connor 1974: 215–44; 1985: 224–30; 2000: 1, 165–66; Davies 1990: 503–19 = 1996: 95–111). 14.  Ezek 11:14–16 is dated by most commentators to the last decades of the Kingdom of Judah (Zimmerli 1979: 263), though some doubts have been raised (Eichrodt 1970: 143). Ezek 33:23–29 is generally thought to be post-586, in spite of the threat addressed to people living among the ruins in Judah to turn the whole country into a wasteland (v. 28). For our purpose, the issue of dating need not be settled.

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law. An argument is implied, to the effect that the deportees have been expelled from the cult community and have therefore forfeited title to their land. What is envisaged here can be seen by reference to the threat of loss of property directed at those members of the golah who failed to take part in the assembly to resolve the marriage crisis (Ezra 10:8). A further nuance is added by the claim that the land has been handed to them as an inheritance (‫)מורׁשה‬. Used with reference to land claims, this technical term appears only in Ezekiel (33:24, 36:1–5) and in Exod 6:8, a repetition of the Abrahamic promise of land. That this was the point of the argument is apparent also in the refutation. Yhwh accepts responsibility for the deportations but adds a strange promise, that he would become their sanctuary for a while, that is, during the time of the Exile (11:16). 15 This statement corresponds to a major theme in Ezekiel symbolically expressed in the mobile sanctuary of Ezekiel’s initial vision and the movement of the “Glory” (‫)כבוד‬, the visible symbol of the invisible God, by stages from the Jerusalem temple, about to be destroyed, to the Babylonian Diaspora (10:18–19, 11:22–25). It was therefore apparent that the power and presence of the God of Israel was no longer restricted to his own land and his own house in Jerusalem. The Abrahamic promises play a more overt role in the second argument of the Judeans who remained in the land (Ezek 33:23–29). It is stated succinctly as follows: Abraham was but one yet he inherited the land; We are many; to us the land is given as an inheritance.

This seems at first glance a crude and boastful a fortiori argument: if Abraham got possession of the land on his own, we who are many can certainly do it; in fact, we have done it. But a moment’s reflection shows that this makes little sense. Abraham was promised the land for his posterity, but he himself only came into possession of a small plot of land, and he did so by purchasing it, not by inheriting it. The meaning of “the one and the many” emerges more clearly when we take account of a similar statement about Abraham in Second Isaiah: When I called him he was but one, But I blessed him and made him many. (Isa 51:2) 15.  It will not be necessary to catalog the many interpretations of the ambiguous expression ‫מקדׁש מעט‬. What at least is clear is that the worship of Yhwh can continue even after the destruction of his temple in Jerusalem and outside the land in which his writ ran. The Targum, and some rabbis, found a reference here to the origins of the synagogue. The Targum reads “I have given them synagogues second only to my holy temple because they are few in number.” See Menes 1932: 268–76.

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The contrast has the simple purpose of restating the theme of numerous descendants to be brought about, against all the odds, by the blessing bestowed on this one man, Abraham (Gen 12:2, 13:16, and so on). The indigenous Judeans were therefore claiming to be the numerous descendants promised to Abraham; and because the land promise was inseparable from the promise of descendants, it followed that they held legitimate title to the land. The refutation came in the form of a reminder that the promise of land was conditional—a point often overlooked but made repeatedly in Deuteronomy. Their sinful conduct—eating bloody meat, the cult of idols, murder, adultery—had invalidated their claim (33:25–26). The conflict of interpretations underlying these two passages illustrates the importance of creating and sustaining group identity of common ancestry or, in Weber’s terms, a subjective belief in common descent. It also illustrates how seminal at that time was the figure of Abraham for communities in both Judah and the Babylonian Diaspora. The lack of narrative tradition about Abraham datable earlier than the Neo-Babylonian period has strengthened the case of scholars who argue that we owe the rich and complex narrative about him in Genesis (11:27–25:11) not to oral tradition from before the formation of the kingdoms, much less from the Middle Bronze period, but to literary circles during the Neo-Babylonian or early Persian period. 16 But whatever date is assigned to these traditions, they make a remarkable fit with the aspirations and the actual experience of those in the Babylonian Diaspora who eventually returned to Judah. Abraham’s ‫ עליה‬or ἀποικία began in southern Mesopotamia, where the Judeans had been settled, 17 and was interrupted by a stay of indeterminate length in Haran on the Balikh river. Harran was a major center of the cult of the deity Sîn to which Nabonidus was very attached. The Judean deportees would probably have known that Nabonidus had restored the Temple 16.  Allusions to Abraham in Isaiah appear in the postexilic sections (41:8, 51:2, 63:16) with the exception of 29:22, a postexilic addendum to 29:17–24. The restorationist saying in Jer 33:23–26 comes from a time when the monarchy was no longer in existence, and mention of Yhwh’s loyalty to Abraham in Mic 7:20 concludes a passage about rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. The earliest prophetic allusion is Ezek 33:23–26, discussed earlier. Deuteronomy refers often to the triad “Abraham, Isaac, Jacob” but says nothing about the person and activities of Abraham. 17.  Canaan was the destination of Terah and his group from the beginning in Ur Kasdim (Gen 11:31). The biblical account gives no reason for Abraham’s departure from Ur Kasdim, but the omission is rectified by later authors who emphasize Abraham’s monotheistic faith and his rejection of Babylonian cults and astrology, including those cherished by Terah, his father. See, for example, Jub. 11:4–17, 12:1–8; Josephus, Ant. 1:155; Philo, On Abraham 70–80.

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of Sîn in Harran the destruction of which in 610 by the Medes was due, as Nabonidus tells us, to the anger of the native deity, in the same way that the destruction of Jerusalem was attributed to the anger of Yhwh (Beaulieu 1989: 43–65; Miller and Hayes 2006: 489–90). Because Harran is too far north to be a logical stage on the route to Palestine, there may also be some connection with whatever remained of the IsraeliteSamarian Diaspora settled in the region of Gozan (  guzānu) on the river Khãbūr, not far from Harran. 18 On his arrival, Abraham found the land, apparently under no central, local authority, inhabited by Canaanites (Gen 12:6b) and Hittites (‫בני חת‬, Gen 23:3 and so on). The former bring to mind the derogatory use of this gentilic with reference to the indigenous peoples in Ezra–Nehemiah, while the latter correspond to the description of Syria-Palestine as “Hatti land” (māt hattu) in Neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions (Wiseman 1961: 68–75). Another indication of the contemporary flavor of the narrative is the description in the “covenant of the pieces” (‫)ברית הגזרים‬ of the promised land as extending from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates (Gen 15:18), corresponding to the extent of the Transeuphrates section of the fifth Satrapy (Babirush-Ebernari) before the conquest of Egypt in 525 b.c.e. Abraham’s activities in the land and his relations with its inhabitants suggest that he could have served and was probably intended to serve as the exemplary model for the first immigrants in the late Babylonian or early Persian period. In the Priestly version of the Genesis narrative the land is ‫ארץ מגורים‬, the land in which he lived as an alien (Gen 17:8), and he himself insists that he is ‫גר ותוׁשב‬, a resident alien living among them (23:4–6). He is therefore not an intruder, a carpetbagger coming in from outside to exploit the local population or steal their land. Though entitled to take precedence, he gives Lot first choice of where to settle (13:11–12). He resolves a dispute about property peacefully by negotiating with a local ruler in the Beersheba region (21:32). He bargains for a small plot of land for himself and purchases it for a price far in excess of the going rate (23:1–20). 19 In this incident, recounted in detail by the Priestly writer, the emphasis is on the complete legality of the proceed18.  2 Kgs 17:6, 18:11; 1 Chr 5:26. On the Nimrud Prism, Sargon II claims that he settled the Samarian deportees “in the midst of Assyria” (ina qereb aššur; Cogan and Tadmor 1988: 197; Younger 1988: 201–27). 19.  With the 400 shekels offered by Ephron and accepted by Abraham, compare the 17 shekels that Jeremiah paid for a field (Jer 32:9), 50 shekels David paid for Arauna’s threshing floor, with some oxen thrown in (2 Sam 24:24), and the 6000 shekels (two talents of silver) Omri paid for the entire area covered by the city of Samaria (1 Kgs 16:24).

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ings, and it has been observed that these proceedings follow the pattern of Neo-Babylonian land contracts (Petschow 1965: 103–20; Tucker 1966: 74–84; Van Seters 1975: 98–101), another pointer to the contemporaneous relevance of the narrative. The other incident recounted at length in the Priestly version of the Abraham story, the covenant of circumcision (‫)ברית מילה‬, raises another issue of relevance at the time of composition (Gen 17:1–27). There is no question that Ishmael, born to Abraham and his proxy wife Hagar (16:15–16), enters the covenant made with Abraham and all his descendants, without exception. It is stated redundantly (17:4–6, 16) that Abraham is to be the ancestor of peoples, plural, and the circumcision of Ishmael “on that very day” (vv. 23, 26), a year before Isaac, puts the matter beyond doubt. This conclusion is only called into question after the announcement that Sarah, though 99 years old, is to give birth to a child who will take precedence over Ishmael (vv. 15–22). For this further revelation to be consistent with what has been said to that point, Ishmael and his descendants must remain within the covenant, but not in the same way and to the same degree as Isaac. 20 This could hardly fail to be of interest to a reader or hearer in Judah in the sixth or fifth century b.c.e. Kedar, “son” of Ishmael, was the leading member of a North Arabian tribal confederacy that, by the fifth century b.c.e., had displaced the Edomites from much of their territory and settled a broad swathe of land from the Transjordanian plateau to the Nile delta. They were subdued by the Babylonians (Jer 49:28) and, a few years later, assisted Cambyses in the invasion of Egypt (Herodotus Hist. 3:4, 88; Knauf 1989: 96–108). The sheik Geshem (Gashmu), head of the confederacy, belonged to the “axis of evil,” together with Sanballat and Tobiah the Ammonite, who opposed Nehemiah (Neh 2:19; 6:1–2, 16), but in the Genesis account the attitude toward Ishmael and his Arabian descendants is unreservedly positive. And, in general, neither here nor elsewhere in the Abraham narrative in Genesis do we sense hostility toward or hear denunciations of the local people and their “abominations.” In fact, Abraham does not comment on their morals at all.

Legal Interpretation and Identity Formation: Ezra and His Supporters Group identity no less than individual identity is formed by differentiation in an interactive social environment; both the group and the individual come to define themselves as separate from but not necessarily 20.  See the discussion of this issue in the contribution of Konrad Schmid in this volume, pp. 3–26.

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in opposition to others. If, in his interaction with the indigenous peoples of Canaan, Abraham can be said to represent a soft ideology, we would have to situate Ezra and his golah group (‫ )בני הגולה‬at the other ideological extreme. 21 The account of their activities illustrates the important part played by law and legal interpretation in the formation of group identity and ethos. It goes without saying (but let us say it) that the claim to interpret laws translates readily into political power, the power to establish social and religious boundaries, to coerce, and to define those who interpret the laws otherwise as out of the group. One of the clearest and at the same time the most problematic instances of legal interpretation as a central element in the formation and reinforcement of group identity, one in which we see Ezra and his supporters in action, is the crisis created by the marriage of male members of the golah to native women (Ezra 9–10). The incident is cast in both first-person and third-person discourse. It is probably a composite, because the narrative runs smoothly down to the point where Ezra administers the oath to priests, Levites, and laity (10:5) but then starts up again with Ezra praying, fasting, and mourning over the infidelity of the golah (10:6–44). It concludes with a sentence unintelligible in the MT but in 1 Esdras (9:36) states simply that “they sent them [the native women] away together with the children.” 22 Shecaniah, perhaps a leader of “those who tremble at the words of the God of Israel” (the ‫)חרדים‬, insists that the dismissal of the indigenous wives of golah men together with their children be done “according to the law” (‫כתורה‬, Ezra 10:3). The law in question would have been a combination of Deut 7:1–4 (the prohibition of intermarriage with the seven indigenous peoples) and 23:4–6 (the exclusion of four ethnic categories from entering the Israelite assembly), or perhaps the latter interpreted intertextually and expansively in light of the former. Ezekiel’s ‫( תורת הבית‬Ezekiel 40–48), with its exclusion of resident foreigners from the temple, which, in effect, excluded them from membership in the community (Ezek 44:9), probably also played a part. But what “according to the law” really means is that this drastic solution, with its inevitably disruptive and even tragic consequences, is to be carried out according to one interpretation of the law, the one elaborated within Ezra’s party, an inter21.  The language of soft and hard ideology (“ideologia morbida, dura”) is taken from Liverani 2004: 283–87. 22.  Peter R. Ackroyd suggested a combination of an Ezra and a Shecaniah account, which would be consistent with the dominant role assigned to this lay person in the story (Ackroyd 1977: 16). Shecanaiah tells Ezra that the situation is bad but not hopeless, he proposes a sworn covenant, tells Ezra to get up off the ground and discharge his responsibilities in the matter, and then disappears.

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pretation by no means self-evident, and one certainly not shared by the other characters moving about in the background of the story, nor indeed by Jewish communities elsewhere at that time. The solution also went against the grain of traditional custom. In traditional societies, endogamous marriage, marriage within the tribal and clan network, was the preferred option, but without any overlay of ritual ethnicity. Isaac and Jacob married their nieces, a type of marriage forbidden in the ritual laws of consanguinity and affinity (Lev 18:11– 13). On the other hand, Abraham married not one but two Arab women (Gen 16:15–16, 25:1–6), Moses appears to have married two Midianite (and therefore Arab) women (Exod 2:21–22, Num 12:1), 23 Joseph married the daughter of an Egyptian priest (Gen 41:45), Judah married without comment a Canaanite woman (Gen 38:1–2), and David showed no great concern for the origin of the many women with whom he had intimate relations. But the most remarkable aspect of this coercive dissolution of marriages is that, not only is nothing said about the possibility of less drastic solutions to the problem (conversion, a ritual of purification) or about the laws protecting the rights of widows and orphans, but not a word is said about the legal consequences. One might object that what was at issue was not divorce but a unique intervention of Ezra in pursuit of an important social goal. Ezra was indeed pursuing a goal of this sort, but we recall that Shecaniah insisted that it be done “according to the law,” and according to the law what happened was divorce. In all law collections from the Near East and the Levant, marriage was a contractual arrangement, and the dissolution of marriage always entailed serious economic consequences. 24 Marriage contracts from Elephantine contain a detailed inventory of the goods that the woman brought into the marriage and that were to be returned to her, together with other significant disbursements, in the event of divorce. These contracts, especially those from the archive of the thrice-married Miphtahiah, clearly a remarkable lady, also show that marriage could be with an Aramean from Syene or a local Egyptian or another Jewish member of the garrison community (Porten and Yardeni 1989: 30–33, 60–63, 78–83, 131–40; Lipiński 1991: 63–71; Collins 1997: 107–21). All of this raises serious questions about the laconic ending to the episode: “So they sent them away, women and children alike.” As for the consequences of this campaign of Ezra and his ‫ חרדים‬and their policy of strictly enforced ritual ethnicity in general, there can be 23. The ‫( אׁשה כוׁשית‬Num 12:1) was more probably from Cushan, linked with Midian in Hab 3:7, than with the region south of Egypt. 24.  E.g., Hammurapi §§128, 137–40; Eshnunna §59. The translated texts are conveniently available in Roth 1995.

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no doubt that they enjoyed only a limited success. In the short term, the campaign was directed primarily against the golah elite, lay persons and priests (Ezra 9:2), precisely the class on which the imperial authorities relied as a force for the stability and preservation of the pax persica. The court at Susa would not have appreciated a local official stirring up a hornet’s nest in a small but strategically significant province of the empire. This consideration may help to explain the abrupt conclusion to the Ezra story and the almost total absence of Ezra from the record during the later Second Temple period. The freedom with respect to marriage and other alliances exercised by the high priests Eliashib and Joiada (Neh 13:4–9, 28) was preserved and enlarged in the ranks of the Jerusalem priesthood after the transition to Ptolemaic rule, as is evident from our sources for that century and beyond. 25 By no means all Jews would have experienced the new Hellenic spirit abroad as incompatible with or necessarily compromising their religious commitments. Some of the most powerful writings from the late Second Temple period (Wisdom of Solomon, Baruch, 4 Maccabees, Aristeas) combine fidelity to the essentials of Judaism with the best in Greek philosophical and ethical thinking. If Ezra’s policy of ritual ethnicity had been in place then and had continued to be successful, Ruth the Moabite would never have married Boaz, and Achior the Ammonite (Judg 14:10) would never have been accepted into the Jewish community. Above all, we would be unable to account for the great demographic increase of the Jewish ethnos between the Persian and the Roman periods. Other understandings and expressions of Jewish identity remained and remain open. 25.  Apropos of the disputed issue of the marriage of Manasseh with Nikaso, Sanballat’s daughter, Josephus reports that “many priests and Levites were involved in such marriages” (Ant. 11: 312). He notes further that it was customary for Jerusalemites accused of Sabbath violation or similar offenses to relocate to Samaria (Ant. 11:346–47).

Bibliography Ackroyd, P. R. 1968 Exile and Restoration. Philadelphia: Westminster. 1972 The Temple Vessels: A Continuity Theme. Pp. 166–81 in Studies in the Religion of Ancient Israel. VTSup 23. Leiden: Brill. 1977 The Chronicler as Exegete. JSOT 2: 16. Albertz, R. 2003 The Thwarted Restoration. Pp. 1–17 in Yahwism after the Exile, ed. R. Albertz and B. Becking. Assen: Van Gorcum. Albright, W. F. 1957 From the Stone Age to Christianity. Garden City, NY: Doubleday.

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Albright, W. F., and Mann, C. S. 1969 Qumran and the Essenes: Geography, Chronology, and Identification of the Sect. Pp. 11–25 in The Scrolls and the New Testament, ed. M. Black. London: SPCK. Beaulieu, P.-A. 1989 The Reign of Nabonidus King of Babylon (556–539 b.c.). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Bickerman, E. J. 1984 The Babylonian Captivity. Pp. 342–58 in The Cambridge History of Judaism, vol. 1: Introduction: The Persian Period, ed. W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Blenkinsopp, J. 1988 Ezra–Nehemiah: A Commentary. Philadelphia: Westminster. 1991 Temple and Society in Achaemenid Judah. Pp. 22–53 in Second Temple Studies, vol. 1: Persian Period, ed. P. R. Davies. Sheffield: JSOT Press. 1998 The Judaean Priesthood during the Neo-Babylonian and Achaemenid Periods: A Hypothetical Reconstruction. CBQ 60: 25–43. 2003 Bethel in the Neo-Babylonian Period. Pp. 93–107 in Judah and the Judeans in the Neo-Babylonian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and J. Blenkinsopp. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Brettler, M. Z. 1999 Judaism in the Hebrew Bible? The Transition from Ancient Israelite Religion to Judaism. CBQ 61: 429–47. Carter, C. E. 1999 The Emergence of Yehud in the Persian Period. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Cody, A. 1969 A History of Old Testament Priesthood. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute. Cogan M., and Tadmor, H. 1988 II Kings: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 11. New York: Doubleday. Cohen, S. J. D. 1999 The Beginnings of Jewishness. Berkeley: University of California Press. Collins, J. J. 1997 Marriage, Divorce and Family in Second Temple Judaism. Pp. 107–21 in Families in Ancient Israel, ed. L. G. Perdue. Louisville: Westminster John Knox. Coogan, M. 1976 West Semitic Personal Names in the Murašû Documents. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press. Cowley, A. 1923 Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century b.c. Oxford: Clarendon. Davies, P. R. 1990 The Birthplace of the Essenes: Where Is Damascus? RQ 14: 503–19. 1996 Essays on Qumran and Related Topics. Atlanta: Scholars Press.

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Efroymson, C. W. 1970 The Babylonian Captivity and Deutero-Isaiah. New York: Union of American Hebrew Congregations. Eichrodt, W. 1970 Ezekiel: A Commentary. Philadelphia: Westminster. Faust, A. 2007 Settlement Dynamics and Demographic Fluctuations in Judah from the Late Iron Age to the Hellenistic Period and the Archaeology of Persian Period Yehud. Pp. 23–51 in A Time of Change: Judah and Its Neighbours in the Persian and Early Hellenistic Periods. London: T. & T. Clark. Greenberg, M. 1960 Yehezkel Kaufmann: The Religion of Israel from Its Beginnings to the Baby­lonian Exile. New York: Schocken. Gunneweg, A. H. J. 1965 Leviten und Priester. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Hassan, F. 1978 Demographic Archaeology. Pp. 49–103 in Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory, ed. M. B. Schiffer. New York: Academic Press. Heicksen, M. N. 1975 Archaeological Light on Population Problems. Bulletin of the Near Eastern Archaeological Society 6: 31–39. Hutchinson, J., and Smith, A. D. 1996 Ethnicity. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Japhet, S. 1993 I and II Chronicles. Louisville: Westminster John Knox. Judge, H. G. 1956 Aaron, Zadok and Abiathar. JTS n.s. 7: 70–74. Kaufmann, Y. 1937–56 Toledot ha-ʾemuna ʾelit mime qedem ʿad sof bet sheni (The History of Religion from the Beginnings to the End of the Second Temple). 8 vols. Tel Aviv: Bialik Institute and Devir. Kennett, R. H. 1905 The Origin of the Aaronite Priesthood. JTS 6: 161–86. Knauf, E. A. 1989 Ishmael. 2nd ed. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Kraus, H.-J. 1956 Geschichte der historische-kritischen Erforschung des Alten Testaments. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Erziehungsvereins. Lipiński, E. 1991 Marriage and Divorce in the Judaism of the Persian Period. Trans­ euphratène 4: 63–71. Lipschits, O. 2003 Demographic Changes in Judah between the Seventh and the Fifth Centuries b.c.e. Pp. 323–76 in Judah and the Judeans in the Neo-

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Babylonian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and J. Blenkinsopp. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. 2005 The Fall and Rise of Jerusalem. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Liverani, M. 2004 Oltre la Bibbia: Storia antica di Israele. 2nd ed. Rome: Laterza. Mason, S. 2007 Jews, Judaeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of Categorization in Ancient History. JSJ 38: 457–512. Meek, T. J. 1929 Aaronites and Zadokites. AJSL 45: 149–66. Menes, A. 1932 Tempel und Synagoge. ZAW 50: 268–76. Miller, J. M., and Hayes, J. H. 2006 A History of Ancient Israel and Judah. 2nd ed. Louisville: Westminster John Knox. Momigliano, A. 1966 Fattori Orientali della Storiografia Ebraica Post-Esilica e della Storiografia Greca. Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei 76: 137–46. 1993 The Development of Greek Biography. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Murphy-O’Connor, J. 1974 The Essenes and Their History. RB 92: 215–44. 1985 The Damascus Document Revisited. RB 92: 224–30. 2000 Damascus. Pp. 165–66 in vol. 1 of Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, ed. L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam. Oxford: Oxford University Press. North, F. S. 1954 Aaron’s Rise in Prestige. ZAW 66: 191–99. Petschow, H. 1965 Die neubabylonische Zwiegesprächsurkunde und Genesis 23. JCS 19: 103–20. Porten, B., and Yardeni, A. 1989 Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt, vol. 2: Contracts. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Rad, G. von 1962 Old Testament Theology, vol. 1: The Theology of Israel’s Historical Traditions. Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd (German original, 1957). Rogerson, J. 1984 Old Testament Criticism in the Nineteenth Century: England and Germany. London: SPCK. Roth, M. 1995 Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Shiloh, Y. 1980 The Population of Iron Age Palestine in the Light of a Sample Analysis of Urban Plans, Areas, and Population Density. BASOR 239: 25–35.

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Stager, L. 1985 The Archaeology of the Family. BASOR 260: 1–35. Tucker, G. M. 1966 The Legal Background of Genesis 23. JBL 85: 74–84. Van Seters, J. 1975 Abraham in History and Tradition. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Vatke, W. 1935 Die Religion des Alten Testaments nach den kanonischen Büchern entwickelt. Berlin: de Gruyter (German original, 1835). Weber, M. 1978 Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology. Berkeley: University of California Press. Wellhausen, J. 1957 Prolegomena to the History of Ancient Israel. New York: Meridian (German original, 6th ed., 1927). Wiseman, D. J. 1961 Chronicles of the Chaldaean Kings. London: Trustees of the British Museum. Younger, L. 1998 The Deportations of the Israelites. JBL 117: 201–27. Zadok, R. 1977 On West Semites in Babylonia during the Chaldean and Achaemenian Periods: An Onomastic Study. Jerusalem: Wanaarta. 1979 The Jews in Babylonia during the Chaldean and Achaemenian Periods. Haifa: University of Haifa Press. 1988 The Pre-Hellenistic Israelite Anthroponomy and Prosopography. Leuven: Peeters. Zimmerli, W. 1979 Ezekiel 1: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel Chapters 1–24. Philadelphia: Fortress (German original, 1969). Zorn, J. 1994 Estimating the Population Size of Ancient Settlements: Methods, Problems, Solutions, and a Case Study. BASOR 295: 31–48.

The Controversy about Judean versus Israelite Identity and the Persian Government: A New Interpretation of the Bagoses Story (Jewish Antiquities XI.297–301) Rainer Albertz University of Münster

In recent years, we have become more and more aware of the significance of the controversy about an exclusive Judean or Jewish versus an inclusive Israelite concept of identity permeating more or less most of the postexilic literature, be it Ezra–Nehemiah, the Chronicles, or the Hexateuch and Pentateuch redactions. This controversy included the Judean claim to leadership in all matters of Yhwh religion. A possible but so far mostly neglected piece of evidence for this controversy is given by the so-called Bagoses story transmitted by Josephus in his Jewish Antiquities 11.297–301. It sheds light not only on a bloody internal conflict of the high priestly family but also on a severe Persian intervention in the affairs of the Judean community.

The Bagoses Story of Josephus Because the story is widely unknown, I would like to cite it here in the translation of Ralph Marcus (1937): (§297a) On the death of the high priest Eliasib his son Jōdas succeeded him in the high priesthood. (b) And, when he also died, Jōannēs, who was his son, assumed this office; (c) it was through him that Bagōsēs, the general of the second Artaxerxes (ὁ στρατηγὸς τοῦ ἄλλου Ἀρταξέρξου), defiled the sanctuary and imposed tribute on the Jews, so that before offering the daily sacrifices they had to pay from the public treasury fifty drachmae for every lamb. (§298a) The reason for this was the following happening:   (b) Jōannēs had a brother named Jēsūs, and Bagōsēs, whose friend he was, promised to obtain the high priesthood for him. (§299a) With this assurance, therefore, Jēsūs quarrelled with Jōannēs in the temple and provoked his brother so far that in his anger he killed him. (b) That Jōannēs should have committed so impious a deed against his brother while serving as priest was terrible enough, but the more terrible in that neither among Greeks nor barbarians had so savage and impious a deed

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ever been committed. (§300a) The Deity, however, was not indifferent to it, and it was for this reason that the people were made slaves and the temple was defiled by the Persians. (b) Now, when Bagōsēs, the general of Artaxerxes, learned that Jōannēs, the high priest of the Jews, had murdered his own brother Jēsūs in the temple, he at once set upon the Jews and in anger began to say, “You have dared to commit murder in your own temple.“ (§301a) But, when he attempted to enter the temple, they sought to prevent him, whereupon he said to them, “Am I, then, not purer than he who was slain in the temple?” and, having spoken these words, he went in to the temple.   (b) This, then, being the pretext which he used, Bagōsēs made the Jews suffer seven years for the death of Jēsūs.

At the first glance, the story looks like a personal quarrel between a high priest and his brother, because the political and religious background of this murder is not reported. But, because this murder was induced by a Persian official, who was interested to replace the high priest with his preferred brother, and because it had severe consequences for the temple cult in Jerusalem and the whole Judean community, one is entitled to presume a more extensive conflict. In any case, the massive intervention of Bagoses in internal Judean affairs differs so remarkably from the picture drawn of the Persians in the book of Ezra–Nehemiah that it was not really integrated into the Judean history of the Persian period. In the first part of the 20th century, after the discovery of the Elephantine papyri, smaller attempts were made to connect the Bagoses story with Judean-Samarian struggle (C. Steuernagel 1909; A. Cowley 1923; R. Marcus 1937; J. Morgenstern 1935, 1938; K. Galling 1964; cf. M. Smith 1971), but they were almost not taken up by the text books of Israelite history. Apart from A. H. J. Gunneweg (1972: 139), who assumed a connection with the Elephantine affairs, and J. M. Miller and J. H. Hayes (1986: 475), who presumed an intervention of unknown reason in the late Persian period, in the histories of ancient Israel, the Bagoses story is just shortly mentioned (H. Tadmor 1978) or totally forgotten (M. Noth 1963; S. Herrmann 1973; M. Metzger 1977; A. Soggin 1991).

Historical Reliability and Setting Although Josephus’s knowledge of the Persian period is rather limited, the historical reliability of the Bagoses story is widely accepted, even by critical scholars such as Lester Grabbe (1992a: 62; 2004: 320). Hugh Williamson (2004b: 75–79) has pointed out that Josephus probably was drawing on an independent source (§§298b–301a), which he has framed by his own introduction (§§297–98a) and conclusion (§301b). We cannot prove the accuracy of this source, because other sources are

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lacking, “but the story of the murder in the temple is not likely to be simply a Jewish invention” (Grabbe 1992a: 62). The event is important enough that the source could have been handed down in the temple archive.1 There has been a long scholarly debate over with which historical person the Bagoses of the story can be identified. Before the discovery of the Elephantine papyri, according to Cowley (1923: 109), “the Bagoses of Josephus has generally been identified with the minister under Artaxerxes III (358–337), mentioned by Diodorus Siculus (XVI, 47).” But after the papyrus TAD A4.7–9 (EP 30–32) verified a Persian governor in Judah, named Bagohi, who was a contemporary of the high priest Joḥanan at the end of the 5th century (410–407), this identification was generally preferred (C. Steuernagel 1909: 5; Cowley 1923: 109; Marcus 1937: 501; Morgenstern 1935: 127; 1938: 364). However, following Torrey (1939: 300–301), Hugh Williamson (2004a: 21–23; 2004b: 81–89) questioned this identification and returned to the older solution. His main argument points to the fact that Bagoses is given the title στρατηγός not only in the frame formulated by Josephus (§297c) but also in the source itself (§300b). According to Williamson, this term points to a military office, which perfectly accords with Bagoas under Artaxerxes III as one of the military leaders who reconquered Egypt 343 b.c.e. (Diodorus, XVI.47–50) but does not go well with the office of a “governor” (‫)פחה‬, which is attested for Bagohi in TAD A4.7:1. But meanwhile, Grabbe (1992b; 2004: 320–21) has completely invalidated Williamson’s argument; on the one hand, he could show that the title στρατηγός in Hellenistic Greek could denote both military and civil offices, including the office of a provincial governor or a satrap. On the other hand, the high official under Artaxerxes III was never called a στρατηγός in the ancient sources; he was more frequently a “general,” namely a “commander over the thousands,” in charge of the king’s body guard and the chief friend of King Artaxerxes. On the contrary, there is no evidence at all that this one of the most powerful men of the late Persian Empire had anything to do with Judean affairs (Schwartz 1990: 194). Moreover, J. C. VanderKam (1991: 86) has rightly pointed out that “this Bagoas differs markedly from the modest official of Josephus’s story.” And I would like to add that a man such as this, who did not hesitate to poison two Persian kings (Artaxerxes III and Arses) in order to replace them with his favorites (first Arses, then Darius III; see Diodorus, XVII.5), would not 1.  This is probably not a Samarian but a Judean source, because the suffering of the people and the defilement of the sanctuary is regarded as a divine judgment for Joḥanan’s sin (§300a).

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have only promised to his favorite the high priesthood but would have also killed the high priest, whom he did not like, immediately. Williamson’s second argument against the traditional identification is less significant. He argues that Bagoses of Josephus’s story is apparently a Persian (cf. §300a), while the governors of Judah generally were Jews (2004a: 21; 2004b: 83–84).2 This is, however, a weak argument, because we do not know all Judean governors of the Persian period (Grabbe 1992b: 53). We know that Bagohi, the Aramaic spelling of Bagavahya (A. Lemaire 2007: 54), is clearly a Persian name without any doubt, even if Jews may have adopted it in some way (cf. Bigwai in Ezra 2:2, 14; Neh 7:7; 10:17). There is no evidence that the Bagohi of the Elephantine letters is a Jew; on the contrary, he obviously neglected Judean claims and cooperated with the Samarians (TAD A4.9). Moreover, it makes sense that the Persian king would have appointed a more neutral Persian as a governor, after the Jewish governor Nehemiah had provoked several conflicts with his harsh dissociating policy (cf. Morgenstern 1935: 128; Galling 1964: 162). Thus, Bagohi as well as Bagoses should be regarded as a Persian. Apart from this, Williamson’s historical identification leads to another problem: because the Bagoses story knows of a high priest Joannes, Williamson is forced to postulate an office holder of this name in the middle of the 4th century (2004b: 85–88), which is not attested in the biblical lists (Neh 12:10–11, 22, 23). However, for a candidate of this sort, a piece of evidence seemed to be found when D. Barag (1986–87: 10–15) interpreted the inscription of a small silver coin as “Joḥanan, the priest” and tried to connect Josephus’s story with the Tennes rebellion (350–345 b.c.e.).3 But the coin does not really mention a high priest (Rooke 2000: 233, 236–37), and it probably should be dated later (J. Dušek 2007: 508).4 Whether the Tennes rebellion, which was mostly restricted to Sidon and its environment, has any impact on Judah is highly questionable (Grabbe 2007: 129–32). Moreover, there is a growing 2.  Williamson (2004b: 83–84) points to Zerubbabel, Nehemiah, and Hezekiah, verified by coins. In addition to that, he assumes that also Shezbazzar and Hananiah, the brother of Nehemiah, were Persian governors. 3.  D. W. Rooke (2000: 234) rightly argued against Barag’s identification, pointing out the “huge discrepancy between the Yoḥanan who was in a position to issue coins and was supposedly of similar status to a provincial governor . . . and the Templebased Joannes who according to Josephus was overridden decisively by another Persian official and was unable to retaliate.” Barag’s argument concerning the Tennes rebellion (1966: 8–11) was only cautiously taken up by Williamson (2004a: 21–23). 4.  The opposite attempt of L. S. Fried (2003: 79) to date the coin earlier (378– 368 b.c.e.) and connect it with high priest Joḥanan of the Elephantine papyri (TAD A4.7:18), according to Lemaire (2007: 54), is not impossible but “far from certain.”

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consensus that the biblical list of the high priests, which knows only the high priest Jadduaʿ in the later fourth century, is complete (VanderKam 1991; R. G. Kratz 2004a: 106–11; J. Dušek: 2007: 549–98).5 Compared with the increasing number of arguments against identifying Bagoses with the high official under Artaxerxes III, the problems with identifying him with the governor of Judah attested in the Elephantine papyri are many fewer. Apart from the problem concerning the title στρατηγός already solved by Grabbe, there is only one smaller difficulty, that the Josephus story attributes Bagoses to Artaxerxes II (§§297c, 300b), whereas the papyri deal with the last years of his forerunner Darius II. But this can be explained by the fact that he was kept in office also by his successor. In any case, the juxtaposition of Bagoses and the high priest Joannes fits perfectly with Bagohi and Joḥanan in TAD A4.7–8.6 Thus, an increasing number of scholars is pleading again for this well-founded identification (Galling 1964: 162–64; D. R. Schwartz 1990: 193–94; VanderKam 1991: 81–87; Grabbe 1992a: 62–63, 141; 1992b: 54–55; 2004: 320–21; Rooke 2000: 236; Dušek 2007: 593–97).7 Therefore, the Bagoses story can possibly be dated in the late fifth century.8

A Historical Reconstruction of the Conflict Lester Grabbe has rightly pointed out: “If Josephus’s story is credible”—what he is inclined to suppose—“it helps to fill in the long gap in our knowledge of events in Yehud after the governorship of Nehemiah” (2004: 321). But so far only a few scholars actually tried to use the story for filling the gap (Morgenstern 1935: 126–32; 1938: 360–67; Galling 1964: 161–65; Gunneweg 1972: 139). Thus, I would like to make a new attempt. 5.  For reconstructing the list of the high priests, F. M. Cross (1975: 5) dated the Bagoses story in the fourth century in order to gain two additional candidates; but his attempt was refuted by J. C. VanderKam (1991: 70–89). 6.  That Joḥanan was in office in the late fifth and the early fourth centuries can be also drawn from Ezra 10:6, if one is ready to date Ezra’s mission to the reign of Artaxerxes II. 7.  Cf., with some reservations, also Lemaire (2007: 54). 8. Dated in fourth quarter of the fifth century, the possible historical background of the Bagoses story became much more vague. Miller and Hayes (1986: 474–75), who saw no possibility of connecting it with any Egyptian invasion into Syro-Palestine or the Tennes revolt, stated: “Unfortunately this little vignette provided by Josephus casts no major light on the course and shape of Jewish history.” Williamson (2004a: 23–24), however, more on general considerations, postulated the long lasting Samarian-Judean conflict in behind, although he could not make use of the data given by Elephantine papyri.

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The International Background of Late Fifth-Century Judah The ruthless intervention of the Persian governor reported by the Bagoses story, which seems to be somehow strange in our picture of the Persian provincial government, may have to do with important international changes, of which former scholars, who tried to integrate the story, were not aware: the loss of Egypt for the Persian Empire and the establishment of a Yhwh temple in the province of Samaria. Oded Lipschits has pointed out that in the early Persian period the settlement development of the Levant shows a clear distribution: “urbanization along the coast and ruralism in the hill country” (2006: 26– 30). From this result, he convincingly concluded that the Persians had only limited interest in their provinces Samaria and Judah for most of the fifth century; their main interest was directed to the coastal plain, where they built many fortresses, fostered urban life and supported the Phoenicians in order to safeguard their roads and harbors on the way to their province Egypt. But, as Lipschits demonstrated, this situation underwent a considerable change at the end of the fifth and beginning of the fourth centuries, “when the Egyptians freed themselves from the Persian yoke” (2006: 38). The province Yehud, then becoming part of the southwestern borderline of the empire, came into the Persians’ field of view and under stricter control. For the latter, we have archaeological evidence: according to Alexander Fantalkin and Oren Tal, the Persian fortress of Lachish (level I) is to be dated not in the middle but at the end of the fifth century. Together with the forts in the Negev and other fortified administrative centers in Tell Jemmeh, Tel Haror, Tel Seraʿ, Tel Ḥalif, Bet-Zur, and Ramat Raḥel, it must be seen “as a response to a new political reality: Egypt was no longer part of the Persian Empire” (2006: 186). From the historical point of view, we can add the insight that the Egyptian fight for independence was a longer process. It already started with smaller riots from 410 b.c.e. onwards, which we can notice in some of the Elephantine papyri (TAD A4.5:1; 6.7:6; 6.10:4; 6.11:2, 4); also, the encroachment on the Jewish temple in Elephantine, initiated by the Khnum priests, can be seen not only as a religious but also as a political demonstration against foreign elements in the Persian garrison.9 Especially for the troubles in Lower Egypt (TAD A6.10:4; 6.11:2, 9.  Contrast the accentuation of the loyalty of the Jewish troop with detachments of the Egyptians that had already rebelled before 410 b.c.e. in the letter of complaint to Persian satrap of Egypt Arsames or his deputy (TAD A4.5:1). The reason for the conflict with the Khnum priests cannot have been purely religious, for instance, because of their anger on the sacrifice of rams, the symbol animal of Khnum (refer to the ram cemetery found in the precinct of the Khnum temple of Elephantine;

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4), Amyrtaeus from Saïs, the grandson of one of the protagonists of the Inarus rebellion and the first pharaoh of independent Egypt, probably was already responsible. With the death of Darius II in the year 405 and the following long-lasting battles of Artaxerxes II against his brother Cyrus for carrying through his claim on the Persian throne (404–401), Amyrtaeus seized the opportunity to throw off the Persian yoke with the help of Sparta. In the year 404, his rule was acknowledged in Delta (TAD B4.6), between 402 and 400 also in Upper Egypt (B3.12; 4.6).10 The Persians never put up with the loss of Egypt. But an attack on it possibly planned in 401 was not materialized (P. Briant 2002: 619), and a serious attempt in 383 to reconquer it failed. With the end of the fifth century, the coastal plain of the southern Levant including the Phoenician cities became a bone of contention between the two rivals, both of them using different Greek powers for their advantage. All the more, it was important for the Persians to keep a tight hold on their provinces in the Palestinian hill country. In the closer environment of the province of Jehud, things changed dramatically with the fact that the Samarians built their own temple on Mount Gerizim and gained their cultic independence from Jerusalem. As the excavations on Mount Gerizim have turned out, the cultic splitting between the two communities did not happen in the late fourth century under Darius III and Alexander (336–332 b.c.e; Ant. XI.306–25),

S. G. Rosenberg 2004: 8–9), because they had already tolerated those sacrifices for more than a century. One of the main reasons seems to be that the self-confident Khnum priesthood wanted to extend their big temple area, and the much smaller Yahu Temple with its courtyard stood in the way of it (cf. TAD A4.5 I:5, II:6–8 and the archaeological evidence shown by Rosenberg 2004: 8–10). According to C. von Pilgrim (2003: 316–17), it is likely that the Khnum priests used the restoration of the main street between the two temples by a protecting wall, which forced the removal of the southeastern courtyard wall of the Yahu Temple (see the map, von Pilgrim 2003: 308), as a pretext to destroy the entire temple building. This political explanation accords with the additional information given by TAD A4.3:7 that the hostility with the Khnum priests had arisen since Hananiah had been in Egypt, because it is very probable that the mission of Hananiah on behalf of the central Persian government enhanced the public religious status of the Jewish minority in the multiethnic society of Elephantine, for example, the official acknowledgment of its holidays during the feast of Unleavened Bread (TAD A4.1; Kottsieper 2002: 150–57; Kratz 2004b: 65–67). 10.  According to Lemaire (1995: 52–54, 59–60) the Persians lost their control in Memphis not before 403 and in Elephantine not before 398, the possible year of Ezra’s mission. But this depends on ascribing two inscriptions to Artaxerxes II that have often been attributed to Artaxerxes I.

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but already in the fifth century.11 When it exactly happened is not totally clear; according to the excavator Yitzak Magen, the first temple on the Gerizim was constructed in the mid-fifth century (2007: 176). However, Magen connected Nehemiah’s expulsion of a member of the high priestly family, who married a daughter of Sanballat (Neh 13:28), the governor of the province Samaria (TAD A4.7:29), to the foundation of the temple; that would lead us to a date of around 430 b.c.e.12 Perhaps we can link the same event with Josephus’s information that a brother of the high priest, Jadduaʿ called Manasse, married Sanballat’s daughter Nikaso and was expelled from Jerusalem (Ant. 11.302, 306– 11). Then, Manasse would actually have been the son of the high priest Joiadaʿ and a brother or a nephew of the later high priest Joḥanan.13 In any case, this expulsion, which deprived Sanballat of any right to have a say in the Judean self-government (Albertz 1994: 2:530–31), constituted the reason for the decision of the Samarians to build their own temple; and if we take in our account that such an important building needed some preparations and the approval of the Persian government, the temple on Mount Gerizim was built sometime in the 20s of the fifth century. Perhaps one should date it shortly after the accession of Darius II in 424 b.c.e., because the new Persian king was certainly much 11.  In this, I must correct my older statements on the subject in Albertz (1994: 2:523–33). 12.  Nehemiah’s tenure of office is unclear. According to Neh 1:1 and 13:6, he was from the 20th to the 32nd year of Artaxerxes in Judah, which means between 445 and 433 b.c.e. But Neh 13:6 mentions a second term, the length of which is unknown. It might be that Nehemiah was removed from his office of governorship after a short period because of his severe conflict with the high priestly family (Neh 13:28) around 430, because he does not report anything about the efforts to establish a Samarian sanctuary. However, Galling (1964: 157) still assumed that he served until the death of Artaxerxes I in 425 b.c.e. 13. The genealogy of Jerusalem’s high priests remains unclear. Neh 12:10–11 reports a genealogy that contains Joshuaʿ, Joiakim, Eliashib, Joiadaʿ, Jonatan, and Jadduaʿ. But Neh 12:22 lists the sequence as Eliashib, Joiadaʿ, Joḥanan, Jadduaʿ. Here, Jonatan seems to be replaced by Joḥanan. Because Jonatan is not mentioned any more, the genealogy of Neh 12:10–11 often is corrected according to 12:22 (VanderKam, Kratz, and others). In a reconstruction of this sort, the son of Joiadaʿ, who was expelled by Nehemiah (cf. Ant. 11.297b), would be the brother of Joḥanan. However, in other passages, Joḥanan is regarded not as son of Joiadaʿ but as son of Eliashib (Neh 12:23, Ezra 10:6); therefore, one should perhaps prefer the reconstruction of Dušek (2007: 585–91), who distinguished between the genealogy, which mentions the first-born in all cases, even if he never held the rank of a high priest (Neh 12:10–11), and the list of the (later) high priests in Neh 12:22, which should not genealogically be misunderstood. Then Joḥanan is regarded as a younger brother of Joiadaʿ, and Joiadaʿ’s son expelled by Nehemiah is his nephew.

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less obliged to foster the Judean interest than his father Artaxerxes I, who had supported Nehemiah’s mission. Relating the Bagoses Story with Elephantine: The Papyri TAD A4.7–9 It was often assumed that the conflict told in the Bagoses story has something to do with letters from Elephantine (TAD A4.7–8), in which the leader of the Jewish garrison asked for support, that their Yahu Temple, which had been destroyed by local authorities, would be allowed to be rebuilt (Cowley 1923: 109; Morgenstern 1935: 128–32; Galling 1964: 162–64; Gunneweg 1972: 139). In both texts the same persons, the governor Bagohi and the high priest Joḥanan, are acting, and both letters read together with their answer (A4.9) reveal a conflict between the two. From the first draft of the letter (TAD A4.7), which is written on November 26, 407 b.c.e., we hear that a previous letter was sent three years before (410) to the governor Bagohi and to both councils of the Judean self-government, namely, the high priest Joḥanan, leader of the priestly congregation, and Ostanes, the leader of the assembly of the elders.14 But this letter was not answered (lines 18–19). After three years, Jedoniah, the priest of the Elephantine garrison, sent a second letter to Jerusalem, but directed it only to the governor Bagohi. Having repeated his petition regarding the destroyed Yahu Temple in Elephantine, Jedoniah mentioned that the garrison had sent a similar letter also to the sons of the Samarian governor Sanballat, Delaiah, and Shelemiah (line 29). This time, Bagohi acted without hesitation, together with Delaiah, who possibly acted for his old father. They formulated a message sent back to Arsames, in which both governors would support the reconstruction of the destroyed Yahu Temple (A4.9). From this difference of addresses, the conflict behind becomes apparent: as a Persian governor, Bagohi was very interested that the Jewish garrison became satisfied as we can see from his quick positive response after the second letter: the morality of Jewish mercenaries in the Persian garrison must be supported; the nationalistic Egyptian riots must be stopped. But the high priest Joḥanan and the Judean selfgovernment were obviously against the reconstruction of the Yahu Temple; for them, it was a denial of the exclusivity of the Jerusalem temple founded on the law of centralization (Deuteronomy 12). They were probably happy that this cult was destroyed, which was not controlled by a Zadokide priesthood and did not correspond to the rules of 14.  For this polity of Yehud, already derived from the address of TAD A4.7:18–19 by Galling (1964: 162–63), see Albertz (1994: 2:446–47).

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exclusive Yhwh veneration. Therefore, Joḥanan opposed the governor by claiming a Judean leadership in all matters of Yhwh religion. He obviously prevented the Judean assemblies from making any decision. As the Samarians were included in the decision, they became part of the conflict. In the past, scholars were incredulous as to why the Elephantine Jews could address their petition also to the Samarians (Herr­ mann 1973: 396–97) and supposed that they were not informed about the Judean-Samarian conflicts of the time of Nehemiah (Noth 1963: 319; Donner 1995: 2:468). Or scholars considered this address to be an indication that Judah and Samaria had not yet split (Galling 1964: 163) or even that conflicts told in the book of Nehemiah must be doubted (Kratz 2004a: 94–95).15 Today, we definitely know that the cultic separation of the Samarians had already taken place at least 10 years before the Elephantine letters were written. And rightly understood, they presuppose it.16 In their first letter, the Elephantine Jews still acknowledged the Judean claim to leadership. But after they received no response, they included the Samarians in their petition, acknowledging them as a second center of Yhwh religion. They hoped that they would have a wider understanding of Israelite identity, because they had opposed the claim of Jerusalem’s exclusivism themselves. The Elephantine Jews were very well informed about the inner Israelite rivalry, and their attempt to annul the Judean exclusivism with the help of the Samarians was successful. Thus, it is highly probable that this conflict between Judean exclusivism and Persian interest in stabilizing the Persian government against the new Egyptian unrest and in minimizing possible conflicts between their southern Levantine provinces also constitutes the background of the severe confrontation told in the Bagoses story. Reconstructing the Course of Events There are not too many possibilities of integrating the events of Josephus’s story, the murder of Joḥanan and the seven-year-long punishment of the Judean community ordered by Bagohi, into the course of events in the Elephantine letters mentioned above. The first possibility 15.  Kratz refers to Galling’s statement but tacitly generalizes it. Galling stated that the letter shows that the schism between the Judean and Samarian communities, which became manifest about 330, did not yet exist; Kratz stated that nothing points to a schism between Samaria and Judah: “Auf ein Schisma zwischen Samaria und Juda deutet nichts.” Based on the results of the excavations on Mount Gerizim, both statements turned out to be untrue. 16.  That the letter of the Elephantine Jews directed to the Samarian governor family presupposes their knowledge of the conflict between Judah and Samaria was already rightly discerned by Steuernagel (1909: 5) and Marcus (1937: 507).

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could be that they happened more than seven years before the first letter, 410 b.c.e. In this case, they perhaps could have something to do with the Persian decision to approve the Samarian temple, possibly during the years after 424. But because the high priest under Nehemiah was Eliashib, his son Joiadaʿ was probably still in office at that time and not Joḥanan as mentioned in the Bagoses story. Morgenstern presumed that the conflict broke out shortly before the first letter (412 or 411), when according to him the election of one of the brothers for the high priestly office took place (1935: 129–31 and n. 212; 1938: 60–65).17 But the address of this letter naming Bagohi and Joḥanan close together—in the first draft, TAD A4.7:18–19, simply connected with ‫ועל‬, “and to”—shows no indication of any conflict between the Persian governor and the high priest. Therefore, Morgenstern is forced to suppose that the Elephantine Jews “were not yet intimately acquainted with the new conditions which had come to obtain Jerusalem” (1935: 131 n. 212). But this assumption is rather improbable, if we take the sensation of the murder and the effectiveness of the Persian postal system into account. More probable is the conclusion that in 410 the conflict had not yet broken out. Thus, the murder could not have happened fewer than seven years before 410. The second possibility is that the murder happened after Bagohi’s and Delaiah’s decision to support a reconstruction of the Elephantine temple, in the year 407 itself or shortly after. In this case, Joḥanan felt ignored and protested against the high-handed decision of the governor in religious affairs of Jewish interests; therefore, Bagohi tried to get rid of him by promoting his brother to high priest. Because Joshuaʿ was said to be a friend of Bagohi, he probably had more sympathy for the Persian interests and supported a less exclusive concept of Judaism and a wider understanding of Israelite identity. By eliminating him cruelly, Joḥanan carried through a rigid policy similar to Nehemiah’s (for the latter, see Albertz 2006: 203–5). This kind of solution has already been proposed by Cowley (1923: 109) and Galling (1964: 164–65). It has the advantage that, according to it, one could date all or most of the seven years of punishment during the reign of Artaxerxes II (405–359), who is regarded as the governor’s lord in the Bagoses story (so explicitly Cowley). Thus, there is good reason to fix the period of punishment in the years 406–399 or 17.  Morgenstern still regards the year 411 as the date of the first letter. His assumption that Bagohi already intervened in the election of the high priest could more easily explain why the governor promised one of the candidates his support. But this solution is questioned by the fact that according to the Bagoses story Joḥanan already held the high priestly office when he killed his brother (§300b).

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405–398  b.c.e. An even later date would be problematic18 because, in this case, the period of punishment would overlap Ezra’s mission (398), so this is the latest date that should be preferred. This nice solution has only one disadvantage: it cannot explain why Bagohi did not initiate the positive decision, which we know he would like to have done, immediately after the first letter of the Elephantine Jews.19 If there were still good relations between Bagohi and Joḥanan before 407, it should have been no problem to find a compromise.20 The question remains: What is the reason for the long delay, lasting three years? Therefore, the most probable solution seems to be that the incident happened between the two letters of the Elephantine Jews (410–407). Presupposing the usual good relationship between the Persian governor and the Judean self-government, Jedoniah, the priest and leader of the Jewish garrison in Elephantine, sent a letter to Bagohi, Joḥanan, and Ostanes. Concerned by the newly started Egyptian unrest, Bagohi was interested in preventing any success of Egyptian nationalism and in strengthening the morality of the Jewish mercenaries in the Persian garrison. But the high priest Joḥanan, who probably had entered his office just before,21 refused to agree. He used the matter of the Elephantine temple as an opportunity to demonstrate the cultic exclusivity of the Jerusalem temple and the Judean leadership in all matters of Yhwh 18.  See below, pp. 497–99. 19.  Galling (1964: 163) seems to have been aware of this problem. He explains Bagohi’s policy of waiting by arguing that Bagohi knew that the satrap Arsames was still outside Egypt. But this cannot be the main reason. The Persians had a very effective postal system. If Bagohi had wanted, he could have reached Arsames anywhere in the Persian Empire; and Arsames could have given his approval for reconstructing the Jewish temple in Elephantine from any place in the empire in written form. 20.  Often the fact that Bagohi’s and Delaiah’s approval (TAD A4.9:9) only mentions meal-offerings and incense but no bloody sacrifices is seen as a compromise with the Judeans. But because bloody sacrifices were already offered at the Samarian temple of Mount Gerizim, this restriction would not help to defend the exceptional status of the Jerusalem cult. Moreover, it cannot be explained why a compromise of this sort could not already be found in response to the first petition (in 410). Thus, the restriction should rather be seen as consideration for the Persian concepts of the holiness of fire (cf. Albertz 1994: 2:648–49; I. Kottsieper 2002: 169–75). As we know from TAD A4.10:10–11, it was finally accepted by the Jewish community in Elephantine. 21.  This assumption depends on the problem that—presupposing that the lists of high priests in Neh 12:10–11, 22, 23 are complete—the last two candidates, Joḥanan and Jadduaʿ, must cover the long period between Darius II and Alexander (424–331 b.c.e.). Because Joḥanan must still have reigned in the first decades of the fourth century (down to 370; cf. at least Ezra 10:6), his reign cannot have begun long before 410, the first date on which he is attested.

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religion. As his brother Joshuaʿ verifies, among the leading priests and aristocrats there was also a party that pleaded for a wider concept of Israelite identity and for more understanding of the Persian governmental interest. However, it does not seem to have been the majority in the two councils of the Judean self-government. Thus, Joḥanan notoriously used his authority to prevent them from making any decision. Reconstructed in this way, the first letter from Elephantine can actually provide a suitable reason for the emergence of the deep conflict, reported by Josephus. Frustrated by Joḥanan’s delaying resistance, the Persian governor was no longer ready to accept that Judean religious ambitions should disturb Persian strategic interest in safeguarding the empire at its southwestern wing. Thus, he intervened in the Judean self-government. By promising Joshuaʿ his support in overtaking the high priestly office (§298b), he tried to replace Joḥanan, to change the majority in the Judean councils and to pave the way for a reasonable decision. However, this attempt failed; the priestly brothers got into an argument about their opposite political options, and provoked by Joshuaʿ ’s assurance the high priest Joḥanan killed his brother while he was serving in the sanctuary (§299a). One can imagine that Bagohi was disappointed and angry about the failure of his more indirect intervention. However, the shocking sacrilege provided him with the opportunity to teach the entire Judean community a harsh lesson: by imposing a high tax of 50 drachmae on all the daily sacrifices, which must be paid from the public treasury (§297c), the governor not only imposed a severe restriction on the steady temple cult (‫ )תמיד‬and shrank the income of the priests but also caused heavy financial losses for all the Judean community (§301b). And by defiling the sanctuary deliberately, forcing his way into the temple (§§300a, 301a), and speaking in a mocking tone about the high priest who had defiled the sanctuary with a corpse (§301a), Bagoas wanted to humiliate the Judeans and their ambitious priesthood. With all these measures, Bagoas wanted to demonstrate that, in spite of all their ambitious claims, the Judeans were subjected to the Persian government, including their temple and their priests. During the long period of seven years of punishment, they were to learn that their claim to religious leadership was very restricted and should never contradict Persian strategic interest. The murder and the beginning of the punishment could well have happened in the year 408, some time after the first letter from Elephantine and some time before the second. In this case, the period of punishment would run until 401, approximately until the end of the succession wars between Artaxerxes II and his brother Cyrus. Thus, the

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severe punishment could last that long, because the king was busy with more important affairs and had no ears for Judean complaints. During the years 408 and 407, the Jews of Elephantine heard about the serious disagreement between Bagohi and the Judean community. They regarded it as their best opportunity to push their request. Thus, they decided to write new letters, one directed to Bagoses only and the other to the sons of Sanballat, deliberately excluding the High Priest Joḥanan and the Judean councils of self-government. There is even a little indication that the Elephantine Jews actually knew about the disagreement in Jerusalem. In the second draft of the letter, TAD A4.8:17, they changed a little bit the syntax of the address of their previous letters: “We sent to our lord, ev[en] ([‫ )א]ף‬to Jehoḥanan . . . and Ostanes.” Using the emphatic particle ‫ אף‬in place of a simple copula, the writers expressed that in their present view their former address to the leaders of the Jewish councils would no longer be natural but may even be superfluous, because the leaders’ negative position had already come out. The Elephantine Jews should have written to the governor alone from the beginning; in their present view, he alone was responsible.22 It seems that Bagohi very well understood the hint given in the letter. Because of his disagreement with the Judeans he felt no longer obliged to consult the High Priest and the Judean self-government. On the contrary, he consulted his Samarian colleague Delaiah,23 whose wider concept of Israelite identity he knew. We have no sources about how Delaiah came to his positive decision; but because—as his name shows—he belonged to the believers of Yhwh, he probably would have consulted the Samarian religious community. Obviously, the latter did 22. Also Kottsieper (2002: 171–72 n. 78) considered dating the conflict between Bagohi and Joḥanan before the second letter (407), pointing to the fact that the Elephantine Jews demonstratively call themselves Bagohi’s friends who desires the best from him (TAD A4.7:23f.; verbatim: “those who are entitled of your goodness and your mercy”). But because he believes that the address ‘our lord’ (line 18) of the first letter refers not to Bagohi but to Arsames, he looses the criterion for a terminus a quo. His assumption, however, that the same phrase in line 18, without introducing a new name, should mean a different person than in lines 1–2 remains doubtful, even if the letter does not show—Kottsieper’s main argument (2002: 163)—that Bagohi has already been informed before. In order to appeal to Bagohi’s only responsibility, it is reasonable that Elephantine Jews made a new case and told him the whole incident once more. 23.  Apart from the Elephantine papyri, Delaiah is probably verified by a Samarian coin (no. 22) as governor of the province of Samaria (Eshel 2007: 228–29); according to TAD A4.9:1, it was he who made the decision together with Bagohi. His brother Shelemiah, who is probably attested by ten types of Samarian coins (nos. 61–70), seems to have followed him in office (Eshel 2007: 229, 234).

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not see any problem in allowing the Jews in Elephantine the reconstruction of their temple. Thus, Bagohi and Delaiah made their positive cultic-political decision on the Persian governmental level without any participation of the Judeans (TAD A4.9).24 Therefore, we can conclude that the Bagoses story told by Josephus perfectly accords with all details given in the Elephantine texts, if it is dated between the two letters to Jerusalem (410–407 b.c.e.). Moreover, with the story about Persian-Judean disagreement in between, a good reason can be given for why two similar letters of petition were sent to Jerusalem with different addresses in a short period. There is only one problem with this solution: Dated from 408 to 401, the period of punishment would not be restricted to the reign of Artaxerxes II, starting in 405, but would already have begun during the last years of Darius II. But, I think, this problem is minor, because the period of punishment would considerably overlap the first years of his successor. An Outlook on Ezra’s Mission In recent years, more and more scholars have pleaded on several grounds that the mission of Ezra should be dated in the 7th year not of Artaxerxes I but rather of Artaxerxes II, which means in the year 398 b.c.e. Presupposing this late date, the mission would have taken place immediately after the period of punishment for the Judean community (408–401) had ended. Already, Kurt Galling (1964: 165–78) has closely connected Bagohi and Ezra.25 According to him, during the years of punishment, the Judeans tried to lodge a complaint with Bagohi at the Persian royal court with the help of the Diaspora Jews. And as an answer, Artaxerxes and his counselors gave Ezra the task of investigating in Yehud and Jerusalem (Ezra 7:14). The cult of Jerusalem, heavily reduced by Bagohi, was supported by royal donations (7:15–17); Ezra’s investigation, however, was deliberately restricted on the cultic and 24.  The support of both governors was successful. Accepting the restriction on burning holocaust sacrifices (TAD A4.10:10–11), the Elephantine Jews were allowed to rebuild their temple. The reconstruction must have happened before 402, because the Temple of Yahu is mentioned in a contract of this year (B3.12:18–19). The second phase of the tiled floor found in the new German excavation can be probably connected with this reconstruction (Rosenberg 2004: 10). After the Persians were driven out of Upper Egypt, the temple was not destroyed but abandoned. The independence of Egypt constituted the end of the Jewish garrison in Elephantine; the last letter comes from 399 b.c.e., the year of enthronement of Pharaoh Nepherites. According to the archeological evidence, the Temple of Yahu was later used as a stable, and its floor was covered with animal dung, which is probably to be regarded as “an act of deliberate desecration” (Rosenberg 2004: 9). 25.  This is so even in the title of his famous article, “Bagoas und Esra.”

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religious realm in order to prevent any political disturbances in Judah, which—after the loss of Egypt—had become a border province of the Persian Empire. Therefore, Ezra had nothing directly to do with Bagohi. We can doubt whether the connection between the Bagohi conflict and Ezra’s mission is that close. The historical value of the Ezra tradition is difficult to determine (cf. Grabbe 2004: 324–32), and any evaluation of the Artaxerxes rescript should be more critical than Galling’s. However, his idea that Ezra’s mission constitutes some kind of reaction of the conflict between Bagohi and the Judean community is helpful, because it provides the former with some reason. In short, I would try to reconstruct the connection in the following way, taking the implementation of the divine law as the most probable element of Ezra’s mission: One can be sure that the Judeans tried to submit their complaints about Bagohi’s interference in their cultic affairs at the Persian court; but they probably did not gain hearing as long as Artarxerxes II was involved in the fights against his brother (404–401). After the wars had ended, Artaxerxes should have been very interested in restraining all possible religious and cultic conflicts in his southwestern provinces, because they recently had become the borderline against possible Egyptian attacks. Thus, there is good reason to believe that he actually induced the final redaction, publication, and implementation of a document, which, on the one hand, could help to prevent Persian interventions in Jewish cultic and religious affairs such as Bagohi’s and, on the other hand, might be able to limit the internal religious conflicts between the different Jewish groups, be it priests and laymen, Diaspora and provincial Jews, or—most important of all—Judeans and Samarians. Thus, Ezra was ordered to prepare, publish, and implement a document that can be inferred from the Artaxerxes rescript (Ezra 7:14, 25–26). This document, called “the law of the God of heaven” (v. 21), probably consists of the entire Pentateuch. If we look at the Pentateuch with regard to the Judean-Samarian rivalry, it looks like a compromise: neither Jerusalem nor Gerizim is standing in the center; both are mentioned only incidentally (Gen 14:18– 20, 22:2; and Deut 11:29, 27:12). The question of which location Yhwh would like to choose as a dwelling place for his name (12:5, 11; 14:23; 16:6, 11; 26:2) is deliberately left open to future interpretation. According to the Pentateuch, more important than the place of Yhwh’s cult were its rites properly performed by an authorized Aaronide priesthood, which was the case in both places. Thus, the Pentateuch considerably lowered the Judean claim to religious leadership; other places for legitimate Yhwh cult were possible. Likewise, a way for a coexistence of a more exclusive and a more inclusive concept of Jewish identity was

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paved. Considered in this way, the publication and implementation of the Pentateuch in the provinces Judah and Samaria, induced by the Persian king, can be seen as a religious-political device for helping to stabilize and pacify the southwestern border of the empire at the beginning of the fourth century b.c.e.

Conclusion: Jewish Identities and Persian Control Let me draw some conclusions from this historical reconstruction for the topic of this conference and integrate them into a little wider context: As far as we can see, the controversy about an exclusive or inclusive concept of Jewish identity started with Nehemiah in the middle of the fifth century b.c.e. In order to strengthen the independence of the little province of Yehud against constant interference of its much stronger Samarian neighbor, Nehemiah imposed on the Judean community a rigid concept of an exclusive Jewish identity, which had emerged among the ethnic minority of the Babylonian Diaspora (cf. Albertz 2006: 200–205). According to this concept, only believers in Yhwh who were descendants of former Judah and Benjamin belong to the Jews, be they somewhere in the Diaspora or in the province. By stigmatizing all others, including the believers in Yhwh in Samaria, as being alien or even unclean (Neh 13:7–9, 28–29), Nehemiah was able to carry through his exclusive policy against outer and inner resistance. Even a member of the high priestly family such as the son of Joiadaʿ, who married the daughter of the Samarian governor Sanballat and so stood up for a wider inclusive concept of Israelite identity, was expelled (13:28). However, this rigid, exclusive concept of Jewish identity probably provoked the cultic separation of the Samarians. Sanballat and his Zadokide son-in-law founded their independent Samarian sanctuary on Mount Gerizim at least after the accession of Darius II (424 b.c.e.). And obviously, the High Priest Joiadaʿ, who seems to have advocated a more inclusive concept of a Jewish identity, was ready to accept this fact. From this time onward, there were two different cultic centers with different concepts of Judaism. Naturally, the Samarians refused the exclusive Jewish identity and advocated a wider, inclusive concept. And in return, the new rivalry provoked an even stronger Judean claim to religious leadership. During this phase, from 445 to about 415 b.c.e., the Persians let the Judeans and Samarians do what they wanted as far as their inner affairs were involved; they were not really interested in their remote provinces of the Palestinian hill country (cf. Lipschits 2006: 29–30). Anyhow, this lack of interest underwent a considerable change in the last decade

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of the fifth and the beginning of the fourth centuries. Being confronted with new revolts in Egypt and the gradual loss of this important province during the years 410–401, the Persians tried hard to tighten their control over their border provinces in the southern Levant, including Samaria and Judah. An example of a stricter Persian rule over Judah occurred when the Jewish garrison of Elephantine wrote a letter of petition in the year 410. Their request to reconstruct their temple destroyed by the Egyptians concerned both the Persian political and the Judean religious competence; therefore, the letter is directed to the Persian governor Bagohi and the leaders of the Judean self-government, still acknowledging the religious leadership of the latter. But when the high priest Joḥanan used this matter as an opportunity to demonstrate the cultic exclusivity of Jerusalem and refused any permission, Bagohi was no longer ready to accept his claim to religious leadership. Facing new Egyptian riots, he wanted to demoralize Egyptian nationalism and strengthen the morality of the Jewish mercenaries in Persian service. Thus, he intervened in the Judean self-government and tried to replace Joḥanan with his brother Joshuaʿ, who promised to advocate a more liberal and inclusive concept of identity. In this, Bagohi, although a Persian, still acknowledged Judean authority in religious affairs. When, however, this attempt failed with the murder of Joshuaʿ, Bagohi left the Judeans with no doubt that they would be subjected to severe Persian rule. He imposed a heavy tax on all their official sacrifices for seven years, demonstratively defiled the temple, and humiliated the Judean leaders in order to cure them of their religious arrogance. After the second letter of the Elephantine Jews (in 407), he even interfered in the religious autonomy of the Judean self-government and made his own decision for approving the reconstruction of the Elephantine temple. Without consulting the Judean officials but with the consent of the Samarian governor, the Persian governor of Judah operated with an inclusive and liberal concept of Judaism in a case of strategic Persian interest. Of course, the Judeans could not accept interference of this sort in their traditional religious rights. They probably lodged a complaint with Bagohi at the Persian court but did not gain hearing as long as Artaxerxes II was involved in the succession wars (404–401). Confronted with the loss of Egypt and the task of safeguarding the new borderline of the southwest wing of his empire, Artaxerxes became personally interested in limiting religious conflicts in the provinces of Judah and Samaria as much as possible. Thus, he ordered Ezra to prepare and publish a religious document that would allow several central sanctuaries to exist and pave the way for a coexistence of a more inclusive and

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a more exclusive concept of Jewish identity. In contrast to Bagohi, Artaxerxes did not deny any Judean claim to religious leadership, but he restricted this claim to an extent that would no longer disturb Persian security policy.

Bibliography Albertz, R. 1994 A History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period. 2 vols. Old Testament Library. Louisville, KY: Westmister John Knox. 2006 Purity Strategies and Political Interests in the Policy of Nehemiah. Pp. 199–206 in Confronting the Past: Archaeological and Historical Essays on Ancient Israel in Honor of William G. Dever, ed. S. Gitin, J. E. Wright, and J. P. Dessel. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Barag, D. 1966 The Effects of the Tennes Rebellion on Palestine. BASOR 183: 6–12. 1986–87 A Silver Coin of Yoḥanan the High Priest and the Coinage of Judea in the Fourth Century b.c. INJ 9: 4–21 and pl. 1. Briant, P. 2002 From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Cowley, A. E. 1923 Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century b.c. Oxford: Clarendon. Cross, F. M. 1975 A Reconstruction of the Judean Restoration. JBL 94: 4–18. Donner, H. 1995 Geschichte des Volkes Israel und seiner Nachbarn in Grundzügen. 2 vols. GAT 4/1–2. 2nd ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Dušek, J. 2007 Les Manuscrits araméens du Wadi Daliyeh et la Samarie vers 450–332 av. J.-C. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 30. Leiden: Brill. Eshel, H. 2007 The Governors of Samaria in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries b.c.e. Pp. 223–34 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Fantalkin, A., and Tal, O. 2006 Redating Lachish Level I: Identifying Achaemenid Imperial Policy at the Southern Frontier of the Fifth Satrapy. Pp. 167–97 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Fried, L. S. 2003 A Silver Coin of Yoḥanan. Transeuphratène 26: 65–85 and pls. II–V. Galling, K. 1964 Bagoas and Esra. Pp. 149–84 in Studien zur Geschichte Israels im persischen Zeitalter. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.

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Grabbe, L. L. 1992a Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian. 2 vols. Minneapolis: Fortress. 1992b Who Was the Bagoses of Josephus (Ant. 11.7.1, §§297–301)? Trans­ euphratène 5: 49–55. 2004 A History of Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period, vol. 1: Yehud: A History of the Persian Province of Judah. Library of Second Temple Sources 47. London: T. & T. Clark. 2007 Archaeology and Archaiologias: Relating Excavations to History in Fourth-Century b.c.e. Palestine. Pp. 125–35 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Gunneweg, A. H. J. 1972 Geschichte Israels bis Bar Kochba. TW 2. 2nd ed. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Herrmann, S. 1973 Geschichte Israels in alttestamentlicher Zeit. Munich: Chr. Kaiser. Kottsieper, I. 2002 Die Religionspolitik derAchämeniden und die Juden von Elephantine. Pp. 150–78 in Religion und Religionskontakte im Zeitalter der Achämeniden, ed. R. Kratz. Veröffentlichungen der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theologie 22. Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser and Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Kratz, R. 2004a Statthalter, Hohepriester und Schreiber im perserzeitlichen Juda. Pp. 93–119 in Das Judentum im Zeitalter des Zweiten Tempels. FAT 42. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. 2004b Der zweite Tempel zu Jeb und zu Jerusalem. Pp. 60–78 in Das Judentum im Zeitalter des Zweiten Tempels. FAT 42. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lemaire, A. 1995 La fin de la première période perse en Égypte et la chronologie judéenne vers 400 av. J.-C. Transeuphratène 9: 51–61. 2007 Administration in Fourth-Century b.c.e. Judah in the Light of Epigraphy and Numismatics. Pp. 53–74 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lipschits, O. 2006 Achaemenid Imperial Policy, Settlement Processes in Palestine, and the Status of Jerusalem in the Middle of the Fifth Century b.c.e. Pp. 19–52 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Magen, Y. 2007 The Dating of the First Phase of the Samaritan Temple on Mount Gerizim in Light of Archaeological Evidence. Pp. 157–211 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

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Marcus, R. 1937 Josephus, vol. 6: Jewish Antiquities, Books IX–XI. London: Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Repr., 1958. Metzger, M. 1977 Grundriß der Geschichte Israels. 4th ed. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Miller, M., and Hayes, J. H. 1986 A History of Ancient Israel and Judah. Philadelphia: Westminster. Morgenstern, J. 1935 Supplementary Studies in the Calendars of Ancient Israel. HUCA 10: 1–148. 1938 A Chapter in the History of the High-Priesthood. AJSL 55: 1–24, 183– 97, 360–77. Noth, M. 1963 Geschichte Israels. 5th ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Pilgrim, C. von 2003 Tempel des Jahu und “Straße des Königs”: Ein Konflikt in der späten Perserzeit auf Elephantine. Pp. 303–17 in Egypt—Temple of the World. Ägypten—Tempel der ganzen Welt, ed. S. Meyer. Studies in the History of Religion 47. Leiden: Brill. Rooke, D. W. 2000 Zadok’s Heirs: The Role and Development of the High Priesthood in Ancient Israel. Oxford Theological Monographs. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rosenberg, S. G. 2004 The Jewish Temple at Elephantine. NEA 67: 4–13. Schwartz, D. R. 1990 On Some Papyri and Josephus’ Sources and Chronology for the Persian Period. JSJ 21: 175–99. Smith, M. 1971 Palestinian Parties and Politics That Shaped the Old Testament. New York: Columbia University Press. Soggin, A. J. 1991 Einführung in die Geschichte Israels und Judas: Von den Ursprüngen bis zum Aufstand Bar Kochbas. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Steuernagel, C. 1909 Bemerkungen über die neuentdeckten jüdischen Papyrusurkunden aus Elephantine und ihre Bedeutung für das Alte Testament. Theologische Studien und Kritiken 82: 1–12. Tadmor, H. 1978 Die Zeit des Ersten Tempels, die babylonische Gefangenschaft und die Restauration. Pp. 115–228 in Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes, vol. 1: Von den Anfängen bis zum 7. Jahrhundert, ed. H. H. Ben-Sasson. Munich: Beck.

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Torrey, C. C. 1939 The Two Persian Officers Named Bagoas. AJSL 56: 300–301. VanderKam, J. C. 1991 Jewish High Priests of the Persian Temple Period: Is the List Complete? Pp. 67–91 in Priesthood and Cult in Ancient Israel, ed. G. A. Anderson and S. M. Olyan. JSOTSup 125. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Williamson, H. G. M. 2004a Early Post-Exilic Judaean History. Pp. 3–45 in Studies in the Persian Period: History and Historiography. FAT 38. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. 2004b The Historical Value of Josephus’ Jewish Antiquities XI. 297–301. Pp. 74–89 in Studies in the Persian Period: History and Historiography. FAT 38. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.

Surviving in an Imperial Context: Foreign Military Service and Judean Identity Jacob L. Wright Emory University

Introduction My decision to contribute an essay on the military to a conference and volume on Judean identity in the Persian period at first may seem rather odd. If the period of concern were Judah in the Iron Age, when a native monarchy ruled with the help of an army, one would have to assign a considerable amount of space to these subjects. Yet students of Judah and Judeans during the Achaemenid period usually focus on the institutions and practices (such as the temple, cult, language, marriage, and festivals) that came to replace the role played by the army in demarcating and protecting social and political borders. To be sure, the most significant problem related to the history of Persian-period Judah is how this society took upon itself the arduous task of rebuilding identity without their native kings and armies who figure so prominently in the memories of a more bellicose bygone era. Nevertheless, as I will attempt to show in what follows, a full appreciation of the issues attending to Judean identity in the Persian period cannot afford to neglect the role of the military. For the period of Achaemenid rule, one can distinguish broadly between two roles for Judean soldiers: one protecting imperial interests and the other protecting native interests. Although these roles are mutually dependent, they are nevertheless characterized by fundamentally different political postures. The first emphasizes allegiance to foreign powers, and the other stresses the need for a territory demarcated and defended from surrounding peoples. The duality had its origins already in time of the Iron Age Judahite kingdom; but it became a more pronounced feature of Jewish identity in the Persian period and then especially in Hellenistic and Roman times. Author’s note: This essay is dedicated to Derek Penslar.

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In Achaemenid-period Judah, the phenomenon of native soldiers fighting for their homeland cannot be completely ruled out as a historical possibility. Yet the mobilization of Judean militia with cadres of professional soldiers, as described in Nehemiah 4, would have been very uncommon. And, therefore, I here focus my attention on foreign military service. I begin by surveying the evidence of foreign military service prior to Roman rule. Thereafter, I turn to examine, along the lines of a histoire des mentalités, some of the attitudes that characterized imperial military service. If in the process I pay more attention to the sources from Ptolemaic Egypt, this is because we are much better informed about Jewish military service for this time period and region. And this later evidence is directly pertinent to the study of Achaemenid times: according to Aryeh Kasher, “the Ptolemies inherited the political arrangements of their predecessors. . . . It is no wonder then that the character of military settlement, that of the Jews as well, did not change” (1985: 39).

Survey of Evidence At the outset, it is important to note that service in foreign armies does not distinguish the post-Destruction period from the earlier history of Judah. Indeed, the presence of Judahites in nonnative armies goes hand in hand with the history of the Judahite kingdom. Not only did (proto-)Judahites join the ranks of Egyptian and other foreign armies before a Judahite state emerged, but also the formation of Judahite/Judean kingdoms (in the Iron Age and during the HellenisticRoman period) is inseparable from foreign military service.1 Insofar as Judah for some part of its early history was a vassal to Israel and not solely a brother-state and ally, Judahite kings would have been required to furnish Israelian kings with men for their armies.2 Yet even as an equal ally to Israel and other states, Judahite soldiers would have fought side by side with foreign soldiers; they would have been governed either by a native commander or a foreign officer. 1.  In this essay, I distinguish between “Judahites” from the Kingdom of Judah, “Judeans” from the Persian province of Yehud and the Diaspora, and “Jews” from the Hellenistic period. The facts on the ground would have been much more complex. Our texts of course do not distinguish between Judahites, Judeans, and Jews, which requires us to reflect with Shaye Cohen (1999) on our use of these terms; see the appendix to this essay (pp. 520–522). 2.  Provision of troops is one of the most common obligations in vassal treaties and the failure to send troops could result in war; see, e.g., the 10 Year Annals of Muršili II §§8–10 and 40, and for the Neo-Assyrian Empire, see the literature cited by Yamada 2000: 307–8.

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To provide an example, it is commonly thought that Judah was a vassal to Israel during the period of Omride rule. One of the accounts of the so-called Battle of Qarqar in Shalmaneser III’s inscriptions (the Kurkh Monolith) mentions the presence of a large force led by Ahab. The high figures for Ahab’s soldiers and chariots are ultimately inexplicable, but the relative size of these forces may be explained in part as including soldiers from Judah and his other vassals. (On this approach to the figures for Ahab’s forces, see, e.g., Kelle 2002; cf., however, Niemann 2007.) If this conclusion is merited, it is significant that the Assyrian record does not enumerate the vassal armies separately.3 A clearer case of foreign military service is the presence of Judahites in the large armies of empires that ruled the Levant.4 Sennacherib claims in the so-called Rassam Cylinder that Hezekiah, upon surrender, sent his urbi and elite troops to Nineveh. (For the identity of the LÚ urbī troops, see Tadmor 1988 and Naʾaman 2000.) Assuming the factuality of this report, these soldiers from Judah probably would have been integrated into the ranks of imperial forces, as Sargon II claims to have done with respect to Samarian charioteers (see discussion by Dalley 1985; Fales 1991; Younger 1998; Kaplan 2008). The Lachish reliefs portray Judahite soldiers following their wives and children to their new homes; these scenes depict poignantly the (physical and mental) transition from service in native armies to fighting for the interests of the empire. Bustenay Oded’s work on forced migrations shows that military conscription of deportees as a means for expanding imperial influence was a major motivation for Assyrian deportation practices. It was one of the means available for the recruitment of foreign manpower (the other two being conscription as a form of tribute from vassal states and employment of mercenaries; 1979: 50). What made deportees especially suitable for military service in the imperial armies is that the bond between the deportees and their homeland had been severed and they were often very loyal to the king (see pp. 514–518 below). Deportees could serve as professional soldiers in regiments of charioteers, cavalry, infantry, shield-bearers or as personal bodyguards to the king. Many 3.  Though it is not necessary to conclude that the vassal forces were fully integrated into the armies of Ahab rather than constituting individual units answering directly to native commanders, compare statements such as ‫כמוני כמוך כעמי כעמך‬ ‫ כסוסי כסוסיך‬in the contexts of 1 Kgs 22:1–4 and 2 Kgs 3:4–7, and see Mark S. Smith’s discussion (2007) of these two passages in connection to several treaty declarations. 4. One of the earliest witnesses to contingents of foreign soldiers serving in armies stems from the archives of Shamsi-Adad; see Glock 1968: 66–89 and Sasson 1969: 7–9.

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were posted in citadels and fortresses. But, as Oded points out, a good portion of deportees serving in the military did not serve as soldiers; instead they worked in various capacities within the camps and garrisons or what we would call today “logistical operations” (1979: 51–54). During this late monarchic period, Judahites served often in the employ of foreign armies. In the seventh century, the Assyrians created a buffer zone to Egypt by building forts and garrisons throughout the South, and here Judahite soldiers would likely have been stationed. They probably would have also fought in the ranks of Esarhaddon’s armies in his campaigns against Sidon and later into Egypt. The annals of Ashurbanipal (Prism C; Borger 2006: 93; ANET 294ff.) claim that Manasseh, along with 22 other kings, accompanied the Assyrians in an Egyptian campaign. Some have suggested that the Judahite/Judean soldiers inhabiting the fortress at Elephantine during fifth and fourth centuries were originally stationed there at this period (see, e.g., Kraeling 1953: 42; Porten 1968: 8–16; and Jer 44:1). The Letter of Aristeas (line 13) claims that Jews had been employed as soldiers in the army of Psammetichus in his war against the Ethiopians; if historical, the Saitic king could have been either Psammetichus I or II (Kahn 2008). From archaeological findings and epigraphic evidence, we know that a number of Judahite soldiers were stationed along with Aegean troops in Mezad Ḥašavyahu—a fortress protecting Yavneh-Yam, one of the most important harbors on the Mediterranean coast. Comparing the evidence to that from Tel Kabri, Alexander Fantalkin (2001, 2006) makes a strong case in support of Naʾaman’s (1991) earlier suggestion that the fort was Egyptian, not Judahite (cf., however, Niemeier 2002; Wenning 1989, 2001). For the Neo-Babylonian period, the biblical accounts emphasize in their descriptions of the first deportations of Judahites during the reign of Jehoiachin that Nebuchadnezzar exiled numerous Judahite officers and soldiers; according to one statement, they numbered 7,000 (“all of them warriors trained for battle,” 2 Kgs 24:16; cf. v. 14; Jer 29:2), along with 1,000 craftsmen and smiths. While one may dispute this number, the ratio of military to civilian artisans (7:1) is noteworthy. (For the role of foreign troops in Chaldean armies, see Wiseman 1956: 64). Because the sons of soldiers usually adopted the profession of their father,5 the descendants of these Judahite soldiers likely would have fought in imperial armies for many generations thereafter. Although the region around Medina was famous for its Jewish colonies at a later point, we do not know when they were established. Some knowledge of events 5.  This general rule is confirmed by a wide range of evidence, not least the Elephantine papyri; see Porten’s comment (1968: 31 n. 13).

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at Tayma (Tema) is indicated by the “Oracle concerning Arabia” in Isa 21:13–17. Whether Judahites were present in Tayma and were brought there by Nabonidus on his military campaigns, as some have supposed on the basis of the so-called Oratio Nabonidi (4 QOrNab) and Daniel 4, awaits the findings of ongoing excavations at Tayma by the German Archeological Institute (see Müller and al-Said 2001; Hayajneh 2001). For the Persian period, the most important bodies of written evidence are closely related to Judeans serving in imperial armies. They originate from what would become the two centers of the Jewish Diaspora: Egypt and Babylonia. Whereas garrisons (Elephantine/Yeb) and later cleruchies predominate in Egypt, in Babylonia the Jewish communities (Murashû, āl-Yāhūdu, and ālu ša Našar) lived on lands that were part of the administrative ḫaṭru system.6 This system resembles more the cleruchies in which Jews served during the Hellenistic period than garrisons such as Elephantine (for a comparison of Babylonian and Egyptian systems from the perspective of Nachbürgschaft, see San Nicolò 1937; for the system itself, see Stolper 1985, Donbaz and Stolper 1997, Joannès 1990, Tuplin 1987, and Wiesehöfer 1999). The ḫaṭru could belong to the king, the royal family, satraps, or private individuals. It could comprise “bow land” (bīt qašti  ), “horse land” (bīt sīsî  ), and “chariot land” (bīt narkabti ). The recipients of the plots were required to render (military) service (ilku). One of the original purposes of the ḫaṭru was to ensure that soldiers were fit for service at all times, and even in late šaknu the armaments and training of the soldiers met the highest standards. Later the obligation to render military service was monetarized, being replaced through payments of silver and the leasing out of the lands themselves. In the Hellenistic period, service in foreign armies rose substantially (Hengel 1988: 21–32). From the references to the Transjordanian Ammanitis in the Zenon Papyri as well as from local epigraphic evidence, we know that in the mid-third century b.c.e. a Jew named Tobiah ruled a military colony (Tyros or Zur, Airaq al-Amir) inhabited by Greek-Macedonian, Persian, and Jewish soldiers and cavalry units.7 For 6.  For Elephantine, see Porten 1968. For mercenaries in Saite and Persian period Egypt, see most recently P. Kaplan 2003. For the texts from āl-Yāhūdu and Našar (TAYN) corpus, see Pearce (2006) as well as her article in the present volume, pp. 267–277 and Cornelia Wunsch’s presentation at the conference (not published here). The Murashû documents offer us sparse-yet-valuable insights into Judeans serving in the military. For example, we know of a Gedalyaw who volunteered to serve a mounted and armored archer in the place of a Murashû son (see Cardascia 1951: 179–81; 1958; Widengren 1956). 7.  This Tobiah likely stands in direct continuity with Nehemiah’s nemesis of the same name. If so, it is possible that already in the Persian period Tobiah controlled troops that were in some way linked to Judah.

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Egypt, the papyrological and epigraphic evidence indicates widespread settlement of Jews in military functions (see discussion in Kasher 1985: 38–55). For example, Papyrus Cowley 81 (c. 310 b.c.e.) refers to 10 places between Migdol and Syene where Jews resided. Hibeh Papyrus I 96 (260 b.c.e.) shows that Jewish soldiers possessed land grants in the vicinity of the towns and villages of the Fayûm (the capital Krokodilopis, Kerkeosiris, Samaria-Kerkesephis, Apias, Trikomia, and Hephaistais; see also the important reference to Jewish soldiers from the year 226 b.c.e. in CPJ I 19). Closer to the Nile, in the Herakleopolite, Jewish soldiers received smaller plots.8 For the second century b.c.e., the importance of Jewish soldiers in Egypt seems to have grown. For example, from Papyrus Hauniensis (158 b.c.e.), we know of a Jewish cavalry officer (epistates of a hipparchy) from Thebes named Iasibis/Eliyashib (see also Tebtunis Papyrus III 1019; CPJ I 29; III 1075; CPJ I 30). Josephus reports a general named Onias (most likely the fourth) who boasted of military exploits in Coele-Syria and Phoenicia before founding a temple and military colony in Leontopolis. Jewish soldiers settled between Memphis and Pelusium after receiving a grant from Philometer, as demonstrated by epitaphs from Tell el-Yehoudieh (Horbury and Noy 1992: nos. 51–182). The sons of Onias served as army commanders for Cleopatra III, and Jews still retained military importance there in the time of Hyrcanus II (Collins 2000: 69–73). For the Seleucids we lack papyrological witnesses comparable to what we have for the Ptolemies in Egypt. Josephus cites a letter purportedly written from the eastern provinces sometime between 212 and 205/4 b.c.e. in which Antiochus III announces to Zeuxis, the governor of Phrygia and Lydia, of his decision to transfer 2,000 Jewish families from Mesopotamia and Babylonia to serve as cleruchs in the fortresses and most important places in their provinces. The edict of Demetrius presented in 2 Maccabees 10 allows for up to 30,000 Jews to serve in the king’s forces with the same remuneration that is due all the king’s soldiers; the text emphasizes that they were to answer to native officers 8.  The properties, called kleroi, were granted by a Ptolemaic basileus to Jewish cleruchs as a reward for military service. Originally revocable, the grants of tenure became with time transferable and inheritable and thus contributed to growing fortunes. The size of the plot was directly related to a cleruch’s social standing, and they ranged between 20 and 100 arouras (51⁄2 and 100 hectares). The cleruchies in the hands of Jewish soldiers probably ranged in all sizes (the largest one we know was 80 arouras), which suggests that they were treated equally to Greek-speaking immigrants. The fact that Jews received these land grants made them the target of the same animosities that the native Egyptian peasants directed at other Greek-speaking minorities; see Modrzejewski 1995: 83–87; Kasher 1985: 105–67 and older literature cited in Hengel 1988: 23–25).

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and be allowed to live after their own laws (vv. 36–37). Similarly, 2 Macc 8:20 tells that 8,000 Jews fought in Babylonia alongside 4,000 Macedonians; while legendary, the statement may have some historical basis. From the time of Herod, we hear of a certain Babylonian Jewish warrior named Zamaris who crossed the Euphrates with 500 mounted archers. He requested a dwelling place from the Roman governor of Syria and later received from Herod a city (Bathyra) that he garrisoned (see Josephus, Ant. 17.2.1–3; the archeological evidence cited in Kasher 1985: 301 n. 120; and the most recent discussion in Rocca 2008: 188–90). Although one cannot accept these numbers at face value, the question nonetheless poses itself: why would such a large number of Jews have served in the imperial armies of the Hellenistic Age? Many scholars agree that Ptolemy I followed his Saitic and Persian predecessors by bringing Jews to Egypt in order to serve as soldiers. A sizeable portion of these Jews may have been forcibly deported and conscripted in the aftermath of the Syrian wars of 320, 312, and 302 b.c.e. According to Letter of Aristeas 22–25, Ptolemy II Philadelphus ordered the Jewish captives to be released, which led a large number to take up military service. The Ptolemies were much more reticent to employ indigenous Egyptians in the army than in civil administration (Kasher 1985: 58). Many Jews would have volunteered for socioeconomic reasons. In the third century b.c.e., Judea witnessed sustained population growth yet still lacked an infrastructure conducive to the creation of widespread wealth. Hence, the military was an attractive option both for elites and for the poor. The former would have deemed their chances of upward mobility to be greater in the imperial armies than back home in Judea (see comments by Kasher 1992: 106–7), whereas the latter would have been motivated simply by hungry stomachs. (The Judean and Samarian hill country has a long history of social groups—ranging from the Habiru in the LB to the urbi in the time of Hezekiah and various groups mentioned in biblical literature [Naʾaman 2000]—who lived on the fringes of society and took by force what they needed from the settled population.9) Perhaps the most basic reason for the number of Jews in the Ptolemaic and Seleucid armies is that they had already been serving in imperial forces during the Persian period. Whatever the case may be, it seems safe to say that foreign military service constituted a major factor in the rise of Jewish diasporas (Hengel 1988: 30). 9.  Martin Hengel (1988) compares Judeans in the Hellenistic period to the Swiss “Reislaufen” from the 15th century c.e.: both were employed in foreign armies because their hilly, rocky lands could not feed their growing populations.

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Ideologies and Attitudes Accompanying Foreign Military Service In contrast to the more individualist and quotidian reasons that motivated foreign military service, Jewish literary sources emphasize collective allegiance to the empire. This emphasis in Hellenistic literature is especially pronounced. While Agatharchides (mid-second century b.c.e.) had reported that Ptolemy I Soter captured Jerusalem and treated its inhabitants cruelly, other writers emphasized a harmonious relationship. Josephus cites a passage from (Pseudo-)Hecataeus of Abdera in which after the battle of Gaza many Judeans, hearing of the kindness and humanity (philanthrōpia) of Ptolemy I Soter, flocked to Soter after his victory at Gaza and expressed their desire to take up residence in his country. The leader of this eisodus into Egypt is referred to as the 66-year-old high priest Hezekiah, whom some identify with the governor of Judea by the same name during the final years of Achaemenid hegemony.10 Pseudo-Hecataeus also recounts the story (CA 1.200–204) of the Jewish cavalry who accompanied the armies on their way to the Red Sea. A Greek seer was observing the movement of a bird in order to divine the directions for the army. When the Jewish archer Mosollamos learned of this reason for the delay of the army’s advance, he shot the bird, explaining that if the avian creature could forecast the future, it should have been able to avoid his arrow. The moral seems to be the contrast between Jewish military skill and common sense, on the one hand, and the superstitious behavior of other nations represented in Ptolemy’s army, on the other. As Eric Gruen writes, “This is no critique of the Hellenistic ruler. Quite the contrary. It indirectly confirms his sound judgment, like that of Alexander before him, in recruiting Jewish fighters for his forces: they are loyal, accomplished, and smart” (1998: 206). In a passage not attributed to Hecataeus yet probably drawn from a source (Ant. 11.339; see Wright 2004: 262–68), Josephus claims that, when Alexander visited Jerusalem, he offered Jews a place in his army and received an enthusiastic response. Similarly, in J.W. 2.487 he asserts that Jews fought valiantly for Alexander in his campaign against Egypt. In recognition of their loyal military service, the Jews were granted civic privileges on par with Greeks and Macedonians. Although Egypt

10.  The connection is based not least on the early Jewish coins of “Hezekiah the governor,” a figure who seems to be the last governor at the end of Achaemenid rule and may have been of high-priestly descent; see first the publication by Rahmani (1971) and the lengthy discussion by Bar-Kochva (1996: 255–71).

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surrendered to Alexander without a fight, “the historical facts did not discourage Jewish creativity” (Gruen 1998: 199). The author of the Letter of Aristeas was more subtle. While admitting that the Ptolemy I Soter, during his invasion of Coele-Syria, had captured and deported to Egypt 100,000 Jews, he emphasizes that they were skilled soldiers. As a sign of appreciation for their military skills, they were stationed in garrisons throughout the land, remunerated with a sizeable pay, and fortified the rights of the Jews already living in Egypt. Responsibility for those sold into slavery is deflected from the founder of the Ptolemaic dynasty and ascribed to the ill will of his troops (12–14; cf. Josephus, Ant. 12.11–33). The Egyptian Jewish communities viewed Moses as their paragon and, not surprisingly, they claimed for him impressive feats as a military leader. The account of Hecataeus of Abdera as transmitted in Diodorus (40.3.3–8) ascribes to Moses an array of political, religious, social and economic innovations that included not least an emphasis on training Jewish youth in the art of warfare. The little-known Artapanos (second century b.c.e.) goes so far as to claim that Moses invented the weapons and war machines of the Egyptian army and for ten years successfully waged war against the Ethiopians with a militia of 100,000 men whom he personally trained (Eusebius, Praep. ev. 9.27.3–10). For the origins of this legend of Moses as a skilled tactician, Donna Run­nalls’s thorough study points to “the use by Ashurbanipal of Manasseh’s forces in his military campaign against Egypt, Nubia and Cush and the fact that there was a Persian military colony of Jewish mercenaries in Elephantine which was to defend Egypt’s southern border” (1983: 149).11 One could also mention here the passage in the Letter of Aristeas 13, referred to above, in which Judahites are said to have fought in the armies of Psammetichus against the Ethiopians. At about the same time Egyptians are remembering Moses as a skilled military leader, Mesopotamian Jews—perhaps those connected to the military—seem to have been imagining their hero, Abraham, as a valiant warrior. One product of this legend creation is, I would suggest, the story of the battle of four against five in Genesis 14. This 11.  More recently, Thomas Römer has agreed with this conclusion: “One may speculate that this development of the image of Moses might have taken place among Jewish mercenaries, in Elephantine or elsewhere. These mercenaries were likely eager to refer to Moses as the inventor of military art and excellence” (2008: 11; see also 2007). It should be noted that the story of Moses’ Ethiopian campaign, while absent in biblical tradition, is set forth also in later Jewish sources: from the Divrei ha-Yamim shel Moshe it was picked up in the anthologies Sefer ha-Yashar, Sefer ha-Zikhronot, and Yalqut Shimʿoni.

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text ascribes to the patriarch a remarkable victory over ancient Mesopotamian kings when he fights—in keeping with a diasporic ethos of solidarity—to defend his neighbors from an eastern military alliance headed by an Elamite king. The strange account is generally considered a very late addition to the Abraham narratives; the most recent treatment by Benjamin Ziemer (2005: 135–36) argues for a fifth-century date. See also the brilliant treatment of the passage by Yochanan Muffs (1982). Against the backdrop of this later literature, we are in a better position to appreciate the emphasis on a special relationship to the king in Persian-period texts. Thus, the letter (TAD A.4.7/8) sent in the 14th year of Darius II from the military colony at Elephantine to the governor of Yehud affirms the preferential treatment enjoyed by the temple in Yeb when Cambyses entered Egypt. “And they overthrew the temples of the gods of Egypt, all (of them), but one did not damage anything in that temple.” In the context of the letter, the statement functions to establish the antiquity and importance of the temple. Yet it may well reflect early Persian policy in Egypt. It is not unlikely that Cambyses (as well as his Persian, Hellenistic, and Roman successors) would have granted special favors to Judean/Jewish soldiers because they—as a non-native population—would have been perceived as useful intermediaries between their own rule and the native Egyptians. As Geo Widengren wrote, “the Jews were in the service of Persia and were thus an arm of the foreign oppressor. . . . [They] were loyal to the Persian crown and could therefore be used by the satrap against the Egyptians when they rebelled, as they did repeatedly” (1977: 531). This go-between role would become a common feature of Jewish history. Identified as “the characteristic quality or trait of Jews in European history” (Hensel 1983: 93; see also Rosman 1990), it was also a typical function for Jews in Muslim lands and seems to have been adopted later by Christian rulers from their Muslim predecessors (see the discussion throughout Robert Mantran’s magisterial Istanbul [1962], as well as Baron 1972, the remarks by Cohen in his edition of Abraham Ibn Daud’s The Book of Tradition [1966–67: 263–89], and R. I. Burns 1975: 272 and passim). The precursor to these financial and administrative functions in the Middle Ages and early Modern period is military service, as we witness in evidence from Persian-Hellenistic Egypt.12 12.  Admittedly, the mantle worn by the three leading imperial representatives in biblical literature (Joseph, Daniel, and Mordechai) is that of an administrator/ governor, not a high-ranking military officer. However, these biblical depictions may have to do less with any conscious denial of the importance of foreign military service for Judean/Jewish communities than with an attempt to portray the heroic

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Viewed from the perspective of Judean/Jewish communities, allegiance to the emperor was strengthened by the growing consciousness that the foreign ruler was responsible for and was indeed genuinely interested in the welfare of his conquered peoples. Already the Assyrian kings, who were the first rulers to deport large numbers of Judahites, present themselves as the direct overlords of the deportees. The Lachish reliefs present captives from Hezekiah’s former territories filing past Sennacherib. These scenes did not just illustrate the king’s direct involvement in the conquest but also express the legal jurisdiction of the POWs: they were officially the king’s possession, and he decided their fate. Hence, many of the letters dealing with various matters of the refugees’ welfare (from physical provisions such as shoes, clothes, oil, and water bags to familial and psychological issues) are addressed directly to the king (Oded 1979: 36–40). Official imperial oversight of deportees and their descendants provides the necessary framework for interpreting much of the literary evidence from the Persian period, whether it be biblical literature or the archives from the imperial garrison at Elephantine or cuneiform documents from Murashû, āl-Yāhūdu, and Našar. Indeed, the special protection offered by high rulers (emperors or kings or popes or archbishops) comes to define Jewish experience up until the modern period. In medieval England and France, Jews were known as the “the king’s Jews” and “Juifs du roi.” Similarly, the Worms charter of 1157 claimed exclusive imperial authority over Jewish communities. This is what Baron (1952–83: 4:36–43) called “the royal alliance,” and his student Yosef H. Yerushalmi (1976, 1995) has helpfully charted the origins and history of this alliance between kings and Jews that exerted such a powerful influence on Jewish self-understandings for centuries.13 While the prehistory of this alliance can be found, I suggest, in the earliest experiences of Judahites with conquest and deportation during the reign of Hezekiah and Sennacherib, the first formulations of the alliance itself may be traced to the Persian period. For it is at this time that we witness various endeavors to legitimate theologically and ideologically a new role for the foreign king: the divinely ordained successor to the Davidic king (see Wright 2008: 282–83 and literature cited there). figures receiving unsurpassable honors and rising to the highest offices in the imperial courts. 13.  One of the clearest expressions of the mentality that accompanied imperial protection was formulated by Bahya ben Asher of Sargossa: “He who is a vassal of one of the king’s nobles is not of such high station as though he were vassal of the king, for the vassal of the king is feared even by the nobles and ministers, out of fear for the king himself” (Perush ʿal ha-Torah, Deut 28:10).

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In the new situation of statelessness or severely confined territorial autonomy, an ideal figure of Jewish identity was the savvy, god-fearing courtier who through various means manages to survive and succeed in an environment of never-ending palace intrigues and antagonism. What stimulated the composition of court tales of this sort would have been their appeal not solely to individual elites but also—and perhaps even more so—to whole communities who saw themselves personified in these figures. In Ezra 4, the adversaries of Judah resort to bribery, letter writing, and other machinations in order to incite the imperial court to prohibit— “through force of arms”—the construction of the Jerusalem temple. While the factuality of this account is called into question by various considerations (not least by the inner opposition to temple construction as reflected in Haggai 1), the scenario is fully plausible. Bribery and malicious letter writing are referred to repeatedly in the archive from Elephantine (see Porten 1968: 282–83), and in the letter quoted above, activities of this sort led to a violent destruction of the Temple of Yhw. Whatever the real cause for the incident may have been (see Kraeling 1953: 1, 2, 4; Briant 1996; and Lindenberger 1994: 63–68), the writers of the letter—as the authors of Ezra 4—are clearly convinced of the deepseated malicious intentions of their neighbors: they accuse Vidranga, the Khnum priests, and the Egyptians of looting precious items, smashing the pillars, and setting the building ablaze. One passage seems to be a call for revenge against those who had plotted the evil (Lindenberger 2001). In this situation, it is easy to understand why the assaulted community at Elephantine not only turned to their homeland by writing letters to Samaria and Jerusalem but in their letter to Jerusalem also held high the memory of the Persian king—the one whom they served and whose favor they needed in these times of crisis. As representatives of Persian rule in Egypt, the Judean garrison knew that it—despite being well-armed and trained—was exposed and vulnerable, especially in times of rebellion against the empire.14 It is 14. Compare Bustenay Oded’s comments on deportees in the Neo-Assyrian evidence: “The hostility between the deportees and the local population increased whenever the national sentiment of the local population, and their desire to throw off the Assyrian yoke, grew. The deportees did not share the national aspirations of the local population. Liberation from Assyrian rule could only be detrimental to them, since they had been brought to the country and settled there by the king of Assyria. These deportees were therefore compelled to support the local Assyrian governor, not out of gratitude for the king for the fields and property he had bestowed upon them, but out of fear for their lives” (1979: 46). See his further comments on the protection offered by the king and the settling of deportees in border towns and sensitive border areas (1979: 46–48), which are important as an imperial

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not unlikely that the disappearance of evidence for a Judean garrison at Elephantine after 399 b.c.e. dates directly to reestablishment of native Egyptian rule (the 28th Dynasty). Indeed, the first destruction of the temple and the stopping up of the well of water in the garrison (TAD A.4.5) are significantly dated by the writers of the letters to a time when the king’s closest representative (the satrap Arsames) had left Egypt for an extended period. I began this essay by distinguishing between two roles for Judean soldiers: one protecting imperial interests and the other protecting native interests. The contrast in political stance between native and foreign military service during the Persian period is perhaps most manifest when we compare the scene of an imperial garrison of well-armed professional soldiers at Elephantine passively standing by and witnessing the destruction of their temple, on the one hand, to the scenario of Nehemiah hearing a rumor of an attack and then seizing the opportunity to mobilize the builders into a militia, on the other. The Nehemiah memoir defends a model of polity according to which Judeans live in their homeland and are prepared to defend their borders through martial means. This model faces, not surprisingly, accusations of rebellion against the empire (2:19–20 and 6:5–9; cf. 9:36–37). In this and other respects, one can trace a line of continuity between the ideals set forth in Nehemiah 1–13 and the political developments under the Maccabees and Hasmoneans (who probably esteemed Nehemiah’s name; see Sir 49:13 and 2 Macc 1:10–2:18). Nehemiah’s account, in its fundamental orientation, departs from the nonmilitary modus operandi that we witness in the archives from Elephantine. In the latter, we can observe Judeans working within the confines of the imperial political process, which is manifested materially in the numerous letters being sent back and forth between their community and offices within the imperial bureaucracy (whether they be local satraps or more distant officials such as Sanballat and Bagohi who could potentially offer political support). Ezra 1–6 also depicts this political-bureaucratic practice of letter-writing, and although it critiques the practice, it is ultimately sanguine about the imperial political process and its benefits for Judah (see Wright 2008: 279–85). In contrast to this model in Ezra 1–6 (and 7–8), with its emphasis on the temple in Jerusalem as the conduit of imperial benefaction, Nehemiah’s account presents a transition to self-government and shift of purview from the cultic center (the altar and temple) to the periphery administrative context for understanding the evidence for Judean settlements in the Achaemenid period.

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(the wall). Nehemiah makes a move from Susa to Jerusalem that is not only geographical but also conceptual: He sets out with letters from the king, as well as officers of the imperial army and cavalry (2:7–9). Yet when faced with hostility from his neighbors, he does not draw on these troops or the documents, nor does he write letters of complaint to the court, as in Ezra 4–6. Instead, he takes matters into his own hands and forms an army consisting of native Judeans ready and willing to “fight for [their] brothers, sons, daughters, wives, and homes” (4:8; cf. 1 Macc 3:21, 5:31, and passim).15 Although Nehemiah’s account poses many problems with respect to historical factuality, it draws into sharp relief the ethos of diasporic communities and the many Judeans who earned their livelihoods fighting in the ranks of imperial armies. These two poles—the one affirming loyalty and allegiance to foreign governments and the other affirming the need for well-defended homeland—represent the bookends in which a history of the Second Temple can be written.

Concluding Remarks The evidence relating to Judeans serving in foreign armies could be interrogated from different vantage points from the ones I have chosen here. My aim in this essay has been, first and foremost, to demonstrate that in the study of Judean identity during the Persian period, war and the military deserve a place along other more commonly treated “religious” topics. Foreign military service not only has a long history that predates the Babylonian destruction but was also one of the major factors that propelled the growth of Judean diasporas. Moreover, I have argued that Judean soldiers represent the direct antecedent of the Jewish financial and administrative mediators from the Middle Ages. 15. Later, Nehemiah appoints guards in Jerusalem and introduces additional security measures. Upon completion of the wall, he appoints gatekeepers (7:1) and assigns Hananiah, the captain of the fortress (‫)שר הבירה‬, the office of oversight in Jerusalem (v. 2). He also issues strict orders pertaining to the times and procedures for opening and closing the gates (v. 3a). The inhabitants of Jerusalem were all to serve as guards, some at watch posts and others before their own houses (v. 3b). The city is, however, sparsely inhabited, so Nehemiah sets about the task of repopulating it (vv. 4–72). When, after a lengthy digression (chaps. 8–10), the theme of the repopulation of Jerusalem resumes, we are told that “the captains of the militia” (‫ ;שרי העם‬cf., e.g., 1 Chr 21:2 LXX) resided in the city, and the rest of the people cast lots (a popular military method) to determine which tenth of the population would resettle in the capital (11:1–2). The following list identifies among these residents 468 valorous men (‫ )אנשי חיל‬from the Judean clan of Perez (v. 6) and 128 valorous warriors (‫ )גבורי חיל‬of priestly lineage (v. 13). Cf. also 13:19–22.

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Foreign military service was not divorced from political interests. With respect to ideology, it had a direct impact, as we have seen, on the formation of legends that ascribe exemplary military virtues to Judean soldiers and their forefathers, such as Moses and Abraham. In this essay, I have drawn attention to the emphasis on the special relationship between royal courts and communities of imperial soldiers. It remains now to situate my observations in the larger context of military service and political agendas. One of the most popular ways for individuals and political communities to claim rights and privileges is to affirm that they are soldiers or have a history of fighting in defense of collective—whether it be the empire, a kingdom, or in more modern times, the nation-state. Nothing is more politically effective than the message that one is willing to sacrifice his or her life—or belongs to a family or community that has shed its blood for the sake of a ruler or a people. For the ancient world, the Persian War memorials at Athens offer us some of the richest material for study (Derderian 2001: 102–13). From contemporary history, one can cite many cases of women, ethnic minorities, and other social groups who have sought political and cultural advancement by reminding others of their sacrifices in the wars fought by the nation (see Ashplant, Dawson, and Roper 2000). Thus, one could examine the number of U.S. memorials since the 1960s that commemorate African American military service.16 In the same way, Jewish Americans have claimed political rights and social integration by pointing to a history of military service (see, e.g., Deborah Dash Moore’s GI Jews [2004]). In Washington, D C, one can even visit a National Museum of Jewish Military History. Against the backdrop of projects of collective memory and war commemoration such as these, we can better appreciate the political stance of Judeans in the Second Temple period fighting in foreign armies and constructing memories of faithful military service in earlier days (e.g., in Egyptian communities, back in the times of Psammetichus, Alexander the Great, and Ptolemy I Soter). That political rights and status in Jewish history go hand in hand with military service in foreign armies can be seen from the prohibition Theodosius II placed on Jews on all military posts of honor (honos militia et administrationis) and the laws, 16. Rebecca Kook discusses a memorial erected in Baltimore Maryland in which an African American soldier is depicted reading a scroll inscribed with the dates of the wars fought by African Americans. This memorial is especially significant because “it both commemorates and attests to the lack of previous commemoration. . . . The symbolic reading of the dates can be taken as a public condemnation of the historic exclusion of African American soldiers from war memory” (2002: 116–17).

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beginning in the fourth century c.e., which excluded Jews from carrying arms and military service.17 Although many cases are known of Jews fighting valiantly for their cities and lands during the Middle Ages and early Modern period, the program for “The Civil Improvement of the Jews” (Über die bürgerliche Verbesserung der Juden) set forth in 1781–83 by Christian Wilhelm Dohm faced its greatest resistance on the issue of permitting Jews to join the armies of Germany. As the chief respondent to Dohm’s proposal, the well-known scholar of oriental and biblical studies, Johann David Michaelis, claimed that Jews could not be allowed to fight because of their Sabbath and Kashrut laws, their poor physical constitution, and their unwillingness to drink beer with Germans in the taverns (see von Dohm 1973). The differences between the Achaemenid Empire and the states of pre-modern Germany are undeniable. Yet the principle remains the same, and for Michaelis it was clear: If Jews were allowed to serve in the military, they could lay claims to political and civil rights. The history of this Kulturkampf and the relationship between the reemergence of Jewish national armies and foreign military service, must of course be treated elsewhere. Yet it is important to acknowledge the similar dynamics that persistently shape the long history of foreign military service and identity—from both before and after the Persian period.

Appendix: Ethnic Identity and Designations for Military Detachments In his book, The Beginnings of Jewishness, Shaye J. D. Cohen draws attention to a distinct meaning of the term Ioudaios in the papyri of Ptolemaic Egypt that he refers to as “a designation of a military status” (1999: 102). He begins by noting that Ioudaios is “functionally indistinguishable from the other ethnic terms [Achaean, Athenian, Carian, Macedonian, Persian, etc.], and consequently should always be understood in an ethnic geographic sense: ‘Judaean’ and not ‘Jew’” (1999: 101). Yet, as he points out, many of the ethnic-geographic terms changed their meanings over time. Thus, the designations for the cavalry units of the Ptolemaic army (“Thessalians and other Greeks,” “Thracians,” “Mysians,” “Persians,” and “Macedonians”) only denote the earliest ethnic origins. Later they represent “pseudo-ethnics” because they comprised many soldiers from other nationalities. (The phenomenon can be witnessed throughout military history; for example, the Irish, Welsh, and Scottish regiments of the British army retained their names long after these 17.  In his commentary on Isaiah, Jerome pointed to this exclusion as the fulfillment of prophecy.

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regiments included soldiers of other ethnicities.) Therefore, one would expect Jews to have been included in military detachments named after other ethnicities. And this expectation is borne out by the evidence of the papyri.18 The flipside of this coin is that everyone who is designated as a Jew in the papyri may not have been one. With respect to the phrase tēs epigonēs that often modifies ethnic terms, Tcherikover noted that soldiers who had been settled in cleruchies intermarried with the native population and gave birth to new generations in their settlement that followed in the military tradition of their fathers. These epigonē served “as a permanent source for new enlistments” and the term came to mean “army of reserves.” When soldiers stated their names for official purposes, they specified their origins (Macedonian, Thracian, Mysian, Persian, etc.), the details of their detachment, and whether they belonged to the epigonē (1957: 13). Hence, not every Ioudaios tēs epigonēs would have been a Jew.19 For the Ptolemies, Cohen writes: “[W]e must allow for the possibility that individuals might be known as Judaeans not because they are ethnic or geographic ‘Judaeans’ or ‘Jews,’ but simply because they are member of a certain troop of soldiers that had once consisted of Judaeans and therefore kept the name ‘Judaean’ even after its ethnic composition had changed. The Judaean group bestowed the Judaean name on all its members” (1999: 82).20 Moreover, the practice noted by Cohen parallels what we observe in the Elephantine papyri. Bezalel Porten argues that “the Jewish troop” were originally settled in Elephantine, while the Arameans were stationed in Syene. The argument is based on the recurrent term Aramean of Syene and the presence in Syene of temples to Nabu, Banit, Bethel, and Malkat-Shamayin. However, many documents refer to a Jew as an “Aramean of Elephantine” or as an “Aramean of Syene” (see Porten 1968: 33). Naomi J. Cohen (1966–67) and R. Yaron (1964) studied this evidence and concluded that Jews saw themselves as Arameans while others saw them as Jews. They come to this conclusion by showing that, in 10 out of 11 contracts in which Jews are called “Arameans,” both 18. That at least in one instance Jews are listed in Macedonian detachments (Hengel 1988: 30 n. 91) may provide a clue to anyone who would endeavor to trace Jewish soldiers during the transition from Achaemenid to Lagide and Ptolemaic Egypt. 19.  This statement may also apply to the Regii Emeseni Iudaei in the Roman army; see Woods 1992. 20.  At the 2008 Egyptology conference in Leiden, Katelijn Vandorpe presented a paper that looked at the problem of the tēs epigonēs and showed the possibility that it may refer to reserve soldiers who were not needed for active duty.

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parties are Jews. On the other hand, in 2 out of 3 contracts in which one of the parties was non-Jewish, the other was referred to as a “Jew.” From this, it seems that Jews normally referred to themselves as Arameans, while others referred to them as Jews. In response to Cohen and Yaron, Porten argues that the designation “Aramean” should be explained by “the fact that the Jews were considered members of the larger Aramaic-speaking group” (1968: 33). While the point is valid, it does not account fully for the problem. I suggest that the evidence may be better interpreted in light of what we witness later in the Greek papyri. The term “Jew” and “Aramean” accordingly may have been a function of membership in distinct military detachments, rather than a designation of national origins. The question “Are you a Jew or an Aramean?” insofar as it was ever asked, may have been understood often as a question of to what garrison one belonged.21 21.  Related to this point, intermarriage may have been no more of a problem for the soldiers in Elephantine-Syene than it was for other military colonies. The practice was so common in Syria and Phoenicia, for example, that the concubines from the native populations belonging to soldiers were granted a nonslave status (Papyrus Rainer).

Bibliography Ashplant, T. G.; Dawson, G.; and Roper, M. 2000 The Politics of War Memory and Commemoration. London: Routledge. Bar-Kochva, B. 1996 Pseudo-Hecataeus, “On the Jews”: Legitimizing the Jewish Diaspora. Hellenistic Culture and Society 21. Berkeley: University of California Press. Baron, S. W. 1952–83 A Social and Religious History of the Jews. 2nd ed. 18 vols. New York: Columbia University Press. Baron, S. W., and Feldman, L. A. 1972 Ancient and Medieval Jewish History. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. Borger, R., and Berger, C. 2006 Babylonisch-assyrische Lesestücke, vol. 1: Die Texte in Umschrift. 3rd ed.; Analecta Orientalia 54. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute. Briant, P. 1996 Une curieuse affaire à Élephantine en 410 av. n.é.: Widranga, le sanctuaire de Khnûm et le temple de Yahwey. Méditerranées 6–7: 115–35. Burns, R. I. 1975 Medieval Colonialism: Postcrusade Exploitation of Islamic Valencia. Prince­ton: Princeton University Press.

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Cardascia, G. 1951 Les archives des Murašû: Une famille d’hommes d’affaires babyloniens à l’époque perse. Pp. 455–403 av. J.-C. Paris: Imprimerie nationale. 1958 Le fief dans la Babylonie achéménide. Pp. 55–88 in vol. 1 of Recueils de la Société Jean Bodin. 2nd ed. Brussels: Libraire Internationale. Cobben, A. 1969 The Nation State and National Self-Determination. New York: Crowell. Cohen, G. D. 1958 Abraham ibn Daud’s Sefer ha-qabbalah: A Critical Edition with an Introduction and an Annotated Translation of the First Part. Ph.D. diss. Columbia University. Cohen, N. J. 1966–67 Historical Conclusions Gleaned from the Names of the Jews of Elephantine. Lešonenu 31: 97–106, 199–210. [Hebrew] Cohen, S. 1999 The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley: University of California Press. Collins, J. J. 2000 Between Athens and Jerusalem: Jewish Identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Dalley, S. 1985 Foreign Chariotry and Cavalry in the Armies of Tiglath-Pileser III and Sargon II. lraq 47: 31–48. Derderian, K. 2001 Leaving Words to Remember: Greek Mourning and the Advent of Literacy. Mnemosyne Supplementa 216. Leiden: Brill. Dohm, C. C. W. von 1973 Über die bürgerliche Verbesserung der Juden: 2 Teile in 1 Bd. Hildesheim: Olms. [Original, Berlin: Berlin U. Stettin 1781–83; and Kaiserslautern 1891.] Donbaz, V., and Stolper, M. W. 1997 Istanbul Murashu Texts. Leiden: Nederlands Historisch—Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul. Fales, F. M. 1991 West Semitic Names in the Assyrian Empire: Diffusion and Social Relevance. Studi epigrafici e linguistici 8: 99–117. Fantalkin, A. 2001 Mezad Hashavyahu: Its Material Culture and Historical Background. Tel Aviv 28: 3–166. 2006 Identity in the Making: Greeks in the Eastern Mediterranean during the Iron Age. Pp. 199–208 in Naukratis: Greek Diversity in Egypt, ed. Alexandra Villing and Udo Schlotzhauer. London: British Museum. Glock, A. E. 1968 Warfare in Mari and Early Israel. Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan. Goetze, A. 1967 Die Annalen des Mursilis. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche.

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Gruen, E. 1998 Heritage and Hellenism: The Reinvention of Jewish Tradition. Berkeley: University of California Press. Hayajneh, H. 2001 First Evidence of Nabonidus in the Ancient North Arabian Inscriptions from the Region of Tayma. Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 31: 81–95. Hengel, M. 1988 Judentum und Hellenismus. 3rd ed. Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hensel, J., and Löwe, H.-D. 1983 Polnische Adelsnation und jüdische Vermittler, 1815–1830: Über den vergeblichen Versuch einer Judenemanzipation in einer nicht emanzipierten Gesellschaft. Forschungen zur osteuropäischen Geschichte 32. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Horbury, W., and Noy, D. 1992 Jewish Inscriptions of Graeco-Roman Egypt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Joannès, F. 1990 Pouvoirs locaux et organisations du territoire en Babylonie achéménide. Transeuphratène 3: 173–89. Joannès, F., and Lemaire, A. 1999 Trois tablettes cunéiformes à onomastique ouest-sémitique (collection Sh. Moussaïeff). Transeuphratène 17: 17–34. Kasher, A. 1985 The Jews in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt: The Struggle for Equal Rights. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. 1992 The Civic Status of Jews in Ptolemaic Egypt. Pp. 100–121 in Ethnicity in Hellenistic Egypt, ed. Per Bilde et al. Studies in Hellenistic Civilization 3. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press. Kahn, D. 2008 Some Remarks on the Foreign Policy of Psammetichus II in the Levant (595–589 b.c.). Journal of Egyptian History 1: 139–57. Kaplan, P. 2003 Cross-Cultural Contacts among Mercenary Communities in Saite and Persian Egypt. Mediterranean Historical Review 18: 1–31. Kaplan, Y. 2008 Recruitment of Foreign Soldiers into the Neo-Assyrian Army during the Reign of Tiglath-Pileser III. Pp. 135–52 in Treasures on Camels’ Humps: Historical and Literary Studies from the Ancient Near East Presented to Israel Ephʿal, ed. M. Cogan and Danʾel Kahn. Jerusalem: Magnes. Kelle, B. E. 2002 What’s in a Name? Neo-Assyrian Designations for the Northern Kingdom and Their Implications for Israelite History and Biblical Interpretation. JBL 121: 639–66.

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Kook, R. B. 2002 The Logic of Democratic Exclusion: African Americans in the United States and Palestinian Citizens in Israel. Lanham, MD: Lexington. Kraeling, E. G. 1953 The Brooklyn Museum Aramaic Papyri. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Lindenberger, J. M. 1994 Ancient Aramaic and Hebrew Letters. Writings from the Ancient World. 2nd ed. Vol. 4. Atlanta: Scholars Press. 2001 What Ever Happened to Vidranga? A Jewish Liturgy of Cursing from Elephantine. Pp. 134–57 in vol. 3 of The World of the Aramaeans: Studies in Honour of Paul Eugène Dion, ed. P. M. Michèle Daviau, John H. Wevers, and Michael Weigl. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Mantran, R. 1962 Istanbul dans la seconde moitié du XVIIe siècle: Essai d’histoire institutionnelle, économique et social. Paris: Maisonneuve. Modrzejewski, J. 1995 The Jews of Egypt: From Rameses II to Emperor Hadrian. New York: Jewish Publication Society. Moore, D. D. 2004 GI Jews: How World War II Changed a Generation. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Muffs, Y. 1982 Abraham the Noble Warrior: Patriarchal Politics and Laws of War in Ancient Israel. JSS 33: 81–107. Müller, W. W., and al-Said, S. F. 2001 Der babylonische König Nabonid in tay-ma-nischen Inschriften. Biblische Notizen 107–8: 109–19. Naʾaman, N. 1991 The Kingdom of Judah under Josiah. TA 18: 1–69. 2000 Habiru-Like Bands in the Assyrian Empire and Bands in Biblical Historiography. JAOS 120: 621–24. Niemann, H. M. 2007 “Wagen Israels und sein(e) Lenker” (2 Kön 2,12): Neue Erwägungen zur Militär—und Wirtschaftspolitik der Omriden. Pp. 15–35 in Ein Herz so weit wie der Sand am Ufer des Meeres. Festschrift für Georg Hentschel, ed. Susanne Gillmayr-Bucher et al. Wuerzburg: Echter. Niemeier, W.-D. 2002. Greek Mercenaries at Tel Kabri and Other Sites in the Levant. Tel Aviv 29: 328–31. Oded, B. 1979 Mass Deportations and Deportees in the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Wiesbaden: Reichert.

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Pearce, L. E. 2006 New Evidence for Judeans in Babylonia. Pp. 399–411 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. Oded Lipschits and Manfred Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Porten, B. 1968 Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony. Berkeley: University of California Press. Rahmani, L. Y. 1971 Silver Coins of the Fourth Century b.c. from Tel Gamma. IEJ 21: 158–60. Rocca, S. 2008 Herod’s Judaea: A Mediterranean State in the Classical World. Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 122. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Römer, T. 2007 La construction de la figure de Moïse. Paris: Gabalda. 2008 Moses Outside the Torah and the Construction of a Diaspora Identity. JHS 8/15: 2–12. Rosman, M. J. 1990 The Lord’s Jews: Magnate-Jewish Relations in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth during the 18th Century. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Runnalls, D. 1983 Moses’ Ethiopian Campaign. JSJ 18: 135–56. San Nicolò, M. 1937 Zur Nachbürgschaft in den Keilschrifturkunden und in den gräko-ägyptischen Papyri. Sitzungsberichte der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Phil.-hist. Abt. 6. Munich: Verlag der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Sasson, J. M. 1969 The Military Establishments at Mari. Studia Pohl 3. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute. Smith, M. S. 2007 Your People Shall Be My People: Family and Covenant in Ruth 1:16– 17. CBQ 69: 242–58. Stolper, M. W. 1985 Entrepreneurs and Empire: The Murashu Archive, the Murashu Firm, and the Persian Rule in Babylonia. Leiden: Nederlands Historisch—Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul. Tadmor, H. 1975 Assyria and the West: The Ninth Century and Its Aftermath. Pp. 36– 48 in Unity and Diversity, ed. H. Goedicke and J. J. M. Roberts. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 1988 The urbi of Hezekiah. Beer-sheva 3: 171–78. [Hebrew] Tcherikover, V., et al. 1957 Corpus Papyrorum Judaicarum. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

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Tuplin, C. J. 1987 The Administration of the Achaemenid Empire. Pp. 109–66 in Coinage and Administration in the Athenian and Persian Empires, ed. Ian Carradice. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports. Wenning, R. 1989 Mesad Hashavyahu: Ein Stützpunkt des Jojakim? Pp. 169–96 in Vom Sinai zum Horeb: Stationen alttestamentlicher Glaubensgeschichte, ed. F. L. Hossfel. Würzburg: Echter. 2001 Griechische Söldner in Palästina. Pp. 257–68 in Die Beziehungen zu Ostgriechenland, Ägypten und Zypern in archaischer Zeit: Akten der Tabler Ronde in Mainz, 25.–27.11.1999, ed. U. Höckmann and D. Krei­ ken­bom. Möhnesee: Wamel. Wiesehöfer, J.­ 1999 Kontinuität oder Zäsur? Babylon under den Achaimeniden. Pp. 167–​88 in Babylon: Focus Mesopotamischer Geschichte, Wiege früher Gelehrsamheit, Mythos in der Moderne, ed. J. Renger. Saarbrücken: Saarbrücken Druckerei und Verlag. Widengren, G. 1956 Recherches sur le feodalisme iranien. Orientalia Suecana 5: 150–53. 1977 The Persian Period. Pp. 489–538 in Israelite and Judean History, ed. John H. Hayes and J. Maxwell Miller. London: SCM. Wiseman, D. J. 1956 Chronicles of the Chaldean Kings (626–556 b.c.). London: Trustees of the British Museum. Wolf, C. 1970 Garrison Community: A Study of an Overseas American Military Colony. Westport, CT: Greenwood. Woods, D. 1992 A Note Concerning the ‘Regii Emeseni Iudaei.’ Latomus 51: 404–7. Wright, J. L. 2004 Rebuilding Identity: The Nehemiah Memoir and Its Earliest Readers. BZAW 348. Berlin: de Gruyter. 2008 Seeking—Finding—Writing. Pp. 277–305 in Unity and Disunity in Ezra–Nehemiah: Redaction, Rhetoric and Reader, ed. Mark J. Boda and Paul L. Redditt. Hebrew Bible Monographs 17. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix. Yamada, S. 2000 The Construction of the Assyrian Empire: A Historical Study of the Inscriptions of Shalmanesar III (859–824 bc) Relating to His Campaigns to the West. CHANE 3. Leiden: Brill. Yaron, R. 1964 Who Is Who at Elephantine. Iura 15: 167–72. Yerushalmi, Y. 1976 The Lisbon Massacre of 1506 and the Royal Image in the Shebet Yehudah. Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College.

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1995 “Diener von Koenigen und nicht Diener von Dienern”: Einige As­ pekte der politschen Geschichte der Juden. Munich: Stiftung. Younger, K. L. 1998 The Deportations of the Israelites. JBL 117: 201–27. Ziemer, B. 2005 Abram-Abraham: Kompositionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu Genesis 14, 15 und 17. BZAW 350. Berlin: de Gruyter.

ʾel-mĕdînâ ûmĕdînâ kiktābāh: Scribes and Scripts in Yehud and in Achaemenid Transeuphratene David S. Vanderhooft Boston College

Introduction Aramaic emerged by the seventh century b.c.e. as the lingua franca in the Assyrian and Babylonian empires. Thus, at the beginning of the Achaemenid era in the mid-sixth century, Aramaic played a prominent role in communications across ancient western Asia (Tadmor 1982, 1991; Greenfield and Naveh 1984; Beaulieu 2006; Schniedewind 2006). During the Achaemenid period, the further consolidation of Aramaic as the language of regional administration (Greenfield 1985: 698–700; Ephʿal 1998), along with geopolitical reorganization of the territories of Transeuphratene (Briant 2002: 31–164), affected the persistence of local vernaculars such as Hebrew. 1 This emergence of Aramaic for use in regional administrations affected habits of scribal training and encouraged the rapid diffusion of the Aramaic script, a technology that spread into local chanceries throughout the empire. After the emergence of the Achaemenid Empire in the mid-sixth century, Judean scribal training in Hebrew fell into abeyance or was drastically reduced, if the epigraphic record is indicative. 2 This essay explores the administrative consequences of these developments along several lines. (1) It highlights several instances that point to expanding roles for scribes among Judean and other West Semitic groups in the Levant and throughout western Asia during the Achaemenid era. (2) It outlines the character of the rather uniform 1. The debate about whether Hebrew persisted in widespread use as a vernacular in Judah shows no signs of abating. Greenfield (1995: 1) argues in favor of persistence; Kottsieper (2007) argues against. For surveys of the the problem with literature, see also Schniedewind 2006; Polak 2006. 2.  Lemaire 2006: 188–89 and n. 46 with bibliography; Schniedewind 2006: 141– 44; Goodblatt 2006: 49–70; for a recent, concise survey of Iron Age Judean scribal craft, see Rollston 2006: 47–74.

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Aramaic lapidary script and posits a date for the introduction of that script into the Judean chancery for administrative purposes. And (3) it asks, in connection with studying the problem of “identity formation,” whether scribes viewed scripts, which were graphic technologies, according to categories that modern historians might associate with ethnic self-consciousness.

Background: Judean Scribal Education In his 1981 book, Lemaire argued that schools were quite widespread in Iron Age Israel and Judah, even if it was necessary for him to concede that the extent of scribal training in terms of curriculum and locus remained hypothetical. 3 In a more circumscribed way, Rollston, in his analysis of the Iron Age Hebrew script, has recently confirmed the view that “formal, standardized scribal training” was prevalent during the late Iron Age in Israel and Judah (Rollston 2006: 58). The key element in this argument about the Hebrew script—in technological terms—is that the empirical data from the epigraphic corpus are best explained by positing a formal scribal education. Three observations in particular support the view that this kind of formal, standardized education existed: first, the script morphology and ductus of Iron Age Hebrew, although it evolved over time and had both more- and lessformal exemplars, is remarkably homogenous; second, the high degree of orthographic consistency did not result from free variation in usage (see Cross and Freedman 1952); and third, the use of Egyptian hieratic numerals points to adoption of a fairly uniform accounting system, which became part of scribal training in Israel and Judah. According to several scholars, the system of Egyptian hieratic signs used for numeration entered Hebrew usage perhaps as early as the ninth century, or, if Fox is correct, it was part of the indigenous scribal craft already in the early Iron Age (Fox 2000: 250–59, 279; Goldwasser 1991). Whatever its origins, it persisted during the era of the monarchies as part of the formal training of scribes in Hebrew, although it was subject to innovative application within the Israelite and Judean spheres (Fox 2000: 256, 279; Naʾaman 1996: 170–75; King and Stager 2002: 311; Emerton 2006: 45–46). Whether the primary locus for scribal education that included features of this sort was the royal court, regional administrative centers associated with the crown, or, perhaps, the temple, as van der Toorn has re3.  The literature on literacy and schools in Judah has grown enormously; see, for recent overviews, Schniedewind 2004; Schaper 2005: 324–42; van der Toorn 2007: 59ff.

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cently advocated, remains less clear. 4 No doubt scribes were attached to a variety of institutions and loci, and there may well have been others. I would simply emphasize, like Rollston, that the synchronic uniformity and diachronic development of the Hebrew script and orthography seen in the epigraphic record suggest that scribes shared elements of a formal training. The script and its technical use constituted a significant component in the technical scribal repertoire.

Emerging Opportunities for Scribes Tadmor’s influential assessments of the Aramaization of the Assyrian Empire help place the question of scribal practice in a wider framework (Tadmor 1982, 1991; recently Beaulieu 2006). Bilingualism and multilingualism flourished along with institutional requirements for the development of scribal skills in local polities (Lemaire 2006: 177– 84). The Assyrian term sēpiru, “alphabet-scribe” or “parchment scribe” (Zadok 1984: 12; Tadmor 1982, 1991; Pearce 2000: 356; Beaulieu 2006: 198), finds its first textual—as opposed to artistic—expressions in the seventh century. In a study of the term, Pearce has argued that, in the Mesopotamian heartland, these sēpiru scribes, or ṭupšar armāʾū, “Aramaic scribes,” tended to produce administrative documents, not literary or “canonical” texts, and that they functioned in association with central administrative officials (Pearce 2000: 361–66). During the Babylonian and Achaemenid eras, this phenomenon continued to develop, and the options increased for administrative activity using Aramaic in the spheres of statecraft, administration, and commerce. This began already in the Iron Age in the eastern Mediterranean region. The Adon papyrus from Philistia (Porten 1981), addressed to the Egyptian pharaoh at the end of the seventh century, is a classic case illustrating the diffusion of Aramaic into local chanceries. 5 Aramaic was also beginning to play a role as a spoken language quite widely in the imperial milieu. Beaulieu has suggested that, in the Neo-Babylonian period, “Aramaic was gaining increasing ground and was well on its way to becoming the sole vernacular of Babylonia” (2006: 198). 6 In the Achaemenid period, 4.  Van der Toorn 2007: 75–108 has argued for the temple as the locus of scribes responsible for most biblical texts. I see no fundamental reason to think it must have been exclusively one or the other. 5.  The biblical text, famously, highlights the use of Aramaic for diplomatic negotiations already in the case of Sennacherib’s campaign to Judah in 701 b.c.e. (2 Kgs 18:26, Isa 36:11). 6.  For a salutary warning about using written texts for measuring the diffusion of a language as a vernacular, see Schniedewind 2006.

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this process accelerated. With it came the development of an intellectual marketplace where scribal skill in Aramaic represented a form of intellectual capital. The two trends just described—formal scribal training in the technology of the Hebrew script in late Iron Age Judah and the continued expansion of Aramaic for administrative purposes under the respective empires—collided beginning in sixth-century Judah. The collision was no doubt intensified under the influence of population transfers associated with Babylonian assaults in the Levant (Vanderhooft 1999; Lipschits 2005; Schniedewind 2006). During the sixth century and later, the number of attestations for West Semitic and Judean scribes grew throughout the Achaemenid Empire. Biblical texts, of course, make numerous references to scribes already during the monarchic era (Fox 2000: 96–110; Avishur and Heltzer 2000: 54–62). These scribes are identified in the texts predominantly as royal functionaries associated with the court. The same can probably be said for the few scribes whose seals we know from Judah and surrounding polities of the late Iron Age. 7 In the Achaemenid era, scribes from minority groups were increasingly attached to administrative officials or to the imperial court. Schaeder long ago understood the role of Ezra to reflect a specific administrative role vis-à-vis the Jews in the Persian administration (Schaeder 1930: 48– 57; see also Hoglund 1992: 227–28). This hypothesis retains some influence among scholars, although it is overly categorical. Precise evidence for the attachment of Jewish scribes to regional Persian officials comes from reference to a scribe with a Hebrew name in a Neo-Babylonian tablet from 486 b.c.e., published by Stolper (1989). The tablet mentions the governor of the Persian Satrapy of “Babylon and Ebir Nari,” but the governor’s name is not fully preserved. The text does, however, name two scribes associated with the governor. One of them was a certain Igada-la-a-ma A-šú šá Iba-a-na-dBE, “Gadalyaw son of Banna-Ea,” whose title Stolper translates “scribe chancellor” (lúsēpiru bēl ṭēmi). The name Gadalâma is a transcription of Hebrew Gadalyaw (gdlyw), with the characteristic theophoric termination of the God of Israel, -yw, reflected in the cuneiform -iâma. 8 Gadalyaw, the “chancellor scribe”—whose father, Banna-Ea, possessed a good Akkadian name—was evidently recruited into the administration of the Satrapy of Babylon and Ebir Nāri 7.  Numerous unprovenanced exemplars exist among Northwest Semitic seals: see, e.g., WSS 21, 22, 720, 754, 862, 1007, 1008, 1009, 1010. 8.  The verbal root gdl produces names in Hebrew but not in Aramaic, where the root is rare and late (Zadok 1979: 14–15). For a fuller analysis of the theophoric element, see Tropper 2001; Vanderhooft 2003.

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from among the Judean population of Babylonia. In Stolper’s opinion, such a scribe would have “held and invoked the satrap’s authority to effect routine transactions within the satrapy” (1989: 299–300). Thus, Gadalâma, the sēpiru bēl ṭēmi, certainly had to master, among other things, technical and curricular requirements in Aramaic. 9 Numerous other scribes in the satrapal and local administrations of the western part of the empire can be cited. In the fifth century, the Elephantine texts mention “scribes of the province” (spry mdyntʾ, TAD A6.1:1, 6) and “scribes of the treasury” (spry ʾwṣrʾ, TAD B4.4:12, 14). In Samaria, according to the book of Ezra, Rehum is called a bĕ ʿēl-ṭĕ ʿēm (on the title, see Dušek 2007: 509–10), while Shimshai is labeled a sāprāʾ (Ezra 4:8). In Judah, Nehemiah is said to have appointed a scribe (sōper), Zadok, along with others to administer the collection and storage of tithes in the ʾôṣārôt, “treasuries,” of Yehud (Neh 13:13). In this instance, we have a functional parallel to the Elephantine title “scribe of the treasury.” 10 No doubt, the scribes who produced the many Aramaic ostraca and papyri from the Persian period would likewise have earned professional appellations. The scribal functions of these figures were diverse, but mastery of the basic technology of the scribe, namely, the Aramaic script, would have been an important skill. Judeans in other parts of the Mediterranean during the Achaemenid era, however, could adapt equally well to the predominant scripts in those areas. Consider those Jews who settled on Cyprus, near Kition, in the fifth or fourth century, where processes of acculturation proceded along different lines from those in Judea (Heltzer 1989: 204). DupontSommer edited several burial stelae excavated in 1979 at Ayios Georghios, near Larnaca-Kition, several of which belonged to Jews (Hadjisavvas and Dupont-Sommer 1984). 11 The texts were written in Phoenician. The inscription on stela no. iv reads lšlm bn ʾspyhw, “belonging to Shillem/ Shallum, son of Asaphyahu” (Hadjisavvas and Dupont-Sommer 1984: 108 and pl. xx:3, 4). The patronym is unambiguously Yahwistic. A second inscription, on the base of stela no. i, reads lmtnʿštrt bn ʿzryhw bn mtn 9.  Compare the later, literary reflection of this phenomenon when Nebuchadnezzar is said to have recruited Judean youths to his court ‫ללמדם ספר ולׁשון כׂשדים‬, “to teach them the curriculum and language of the Chaldeans” (Dan 1:4; Collins 1993: 137–39). 10.  If the Judean site of Ramat Rahel was as an administrative center exploited in part for warehousing regional products such as wine and oil (Lipschits and Vanderhooft forthcoming), we may assume that “treasury scribes” also functioned in these places. 11.  I am grateful to P. Kyle McCarter for bringing these inscriptions to my attention.

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bn šlm rb hsprm, “Belonging to Mattan-Ashtart, son of Azaryahu, son of Mattan, son of Shillem/Shallum, chief of the scribes” (Hadjisavvas and Dupont-Sommer 1984: 103 and pl. xix:1–2). Thus, Mattan-Ashtart, whose father has a good Yahwistic name, ascended to the level of chief of the scribes, where Phoenician, not Aramaic or Hebrew, was evidently the preferred script. The original paleographical assessment of the stelae by Lozachmeur points to a fifth- or fourth-century date for stela iv, a fourth-century date for stela i (Lozachmeur, cited by Hadjisavvas and Dupont-Sommer 1984: 111–15). Given that stela i names four members of Mattan-Ashtarte’s lineage, it would seem that the settlement was not a phenomenon of the late Persian period, although the precise time and circumstances of the family’s arrival on Cyprus remain uncertain. Of course, the title rb sprm does not provide us any clear indications of the administrative functions held by this scribe, although the title is known from elsewhere in the Phoenician and Punic record, as Heltzer has pointed out (1989: 193; for references, see DISO 2:799, s.v. spr2). But it does suggest that the descendant of a Judean family that settled on Cyprus perhaps as early as the fifth century functioned in a relatively high administrative role that evidently included the habitual use of the Phoenician script. The anecdotal evidence presented above in a selective way clearly shows that scribes in regional chanceries adjusted very rapidly to master the technology, including morphology and ductus, of new scripts in whatever language dominated the administrative and commercial spheres of the region.

Replacement of Hebrew by Aramaic for Administrative Purposes We must conclude that these very scribes, who emerged as functionaries associated with various officials at various levels throughout the empire, were the ones who transmitted the Aramaic script and its ductus to local polities with which they communicated. As the Adon papyrus demonstrates, this process was underway in the region already during the late Iron Age. When, precisely, did this begin to happen for Aramaic in the case of Judah? The epigraphic data from Judah point to the conscious adoption of the lapidary Aramaic script for use on official seals already in the sixth century. The paleographic typology of the earliest Judean seal impressions in Aramaic is decisive in this respect. A systematic study of the jar stamp impressions of the early Persian period excavated throughout Judah provides a reasonably full repertoire of letter forms for paleographical analysis (fig. 1:1). Both the Mosah jar stamps (Zorn,

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Yellin, and Hayes 1994) and the various early yehud stamp impressions (Vanderhooft and Lipschits 2007: 13–25; forthcoming)—which cannot date to the Iron Age on the basis of their stratigraphic contexts—provide the earliest sample of lapidary Aramaic inscriptions from Judah. 12 The use of the lapidary Aramaic script in the yehud and Mosah stamp impressions represents an innovation beyond the exclusive use of the Hebrew script on seals of the late Judean kingdom. Seals and seal impressions from Judah that date to the last decades of the kingdom are well attested and are uniformly in Hebrew script (Avigad and Sass 1997; Shoham 2000). The appearance of official seals with Aramaic script and language thus represents a sudden change (Avigad 1976; cf., for the Transjordan, Lemaire 1994b). This change can hardly have happened before the collapse of the Judean kingdom. A close look at the typology of the script of the earliest Aramaic stamp impressions on jars found in Judah indicates that this script change happened already in the sixth century (see fig. 1). The script of the earliest yehud and Mosah stamp impressions shows strong similarities with that of the seventh–sixth-century lapidary, not the classic Aramaic of the Persian era that crystallized in the fifth and fourth centuries (Naveh 1970: 19). 13 Numerous conservative and archaic forms appear in the script of the yehud stamp impressions that Lipschits and I judge to be among the earliest (fig. 1; cf. Vanderhooft and Lipschits 2007: 13–19 on stamp impression types 1–5). Some letters in these stamp impression types only appear in conservative lapidary forms characteristic of the seventh and sixth centuries: for example, ʾalep, mem, and reš. Other letters are known in their conservative seventh–sixth-century forms in one yehud stamp impression type but appear in more developed, “classic” forms of the Persian-period lapidary in others: for example, dalet, waw, and yod. This phenomenon of the coexistence of conservative and advanced forms is apparent also in Aramaic texts from elsewhere in western Asia from the sixth century (Naveh 1970: 15; Avigad 1976). During the fifth century, however, the “classic” forms replaced the more archaic ones and became completely 12.  The bullae and seals published by Avigad (1976) are left out of consideration here, given the impossibility of verifying their authenticity. Note that not one of Avigad’s examples represents a stamp impression on a jar handle, of which we have nearly 600 from archaeological excavations (Lipschits and Vanderhooft forthcoming). Because handles were impressed before firing, they were extremely difficult to forge. The whereabouts of the single yhd seal presented in Avigad’s corpus is not known. 13.  A fuller presentation of the paleography of the entire corpus will appear in Lipschits and Vanderhooft forthcoming.

Fig. 1.  Lapidary Aramaic scripts, mid-seventh to early fifth centuries.

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dominant. This shows that Judean chancery scribes adopted the Aramaic lapidary script for use in the provincial system of administration already in the sixth century. If the script was brought into use in the sixth century, the natural end of the use of the lapidary Aramaic script in Palestine now receives clear illumination in the fourth- and third-century Mt. Gerizim monumental stone inscriptions excavated by Magen (Magen, Misgav, and Tsfania 2004; see also Naveh 1995). The script model introduced into the Judean chancery in the sixth century and used for the early yehud seals is absolutely different from the lapidary Aramaic script found in the stone inscriptions (see Magen, Misgav, and Tsfania 2004: 36–39 and figs. 17–18). Script and Identity Did those who produced the earliest yehud seals for local Judean administrators attribute any significance to the shift from Hebrew to Aramaic script? Did it have any ideological valence? Close analysis of the form and content of the earliest yehud stamp type illuminates this question and offers an empirical approach to assessing this aspect of the scribal craft. The earliest of the official yehud seals used to stamp the handles of storage jars reads ‫פחוא‬//  ‫לאחיב‬, “belonging to Ahiab, the governor” (Vanderhooft and Lipschits 2007: 14–16; Lipschits, Vanderhooft, Gadot, and Oeming 2008: 9–12). Several distinctive formal features characterize the seal that produced the 18 known impressions of this type. 1.  The Aramaic script of the seal is conservative and shows affinities with the seventh- and sixth-century Aramaic lapidary script more than with the classic lapidary Persian script characteristic of the fifth and fourth centuries. Both examples of ʾalep are characteristic of the prefifth century Aramaic lapidary sequence, with two short oblique crossbars that form a “v” and meet at a point to the left of the vertical down stroke. Also important diagnostically is the head of waw. In the eighth and seventh centuries, a cup-shaped concave head joined the vertical at the right slightly below the top and forms a distinct right shoulder (for example, fig. 1, Neirab II). The form of waw with a sharply squared, two-stroke head is archaic. Cross initially disputed the reading ‫ פחוא‬in the Judean stamps where this type of waw appears precisely because the pronounced shoulder seemed too archaic for its apparent Persianperiod provenance. He later abandoned this view but was correct to argue that “waw loses its right shoulder beginning in the seventh century, an evolution complete by about 500 b.c. in the Aramaic lapidary script” (1969a: 143 n. 43). It was replaced by a simple horizontal stroke,

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sometimes with an upward tick at its left edge (Cross 1986: 388–89); the horizontal joined the vertical at the top. Avigad also concluded that the type of waw in the present stamp should date to about the second half of the sixth century or first half of the fifth (1976: 15). The curving head and down stroke of pe in the second line is also a relatively archaic form, which gave way to a more sharply angled “figure-7” form in the lapidary of the fifth century. The seal is thus comfortably dated in the late sixth or early fifth century. 2.  The double-line field divider is a classic element of Northwest Semitic and especially Hebrew seals in the late Iron Age II. It appears once more in Yehud in an official seal reading ‫ יהוד‬// ‫למלכיו‬, “belonging to Malkiyaw, Yehud,” which we would also date to the late sixth or early fifth century (Vanderhooft and Lipschits 2007: 17). 3.  The specific morphology of the ‫ פחוא‬// ‫ לאחיב‬seal—prepositional lamed, personal name, double line field divider, and title (now in Aramaic)—appeared widely in the late Iron Age. 14 4.  The absence of glyptic devices is normal for the large number of late Iron Age II private Judean seals, although this is also true of other Northwest Semitic seals. Thus, except for the Aramaic script and Aramaic title of Ahiab, the single seal used for the 18 jar handle impressions of this type could be a classic seal of late Iron Age Judah. Moreover, elements one through three above faded away in the southern Levant in the early Persian period. Thus, we may affirm that Ahiab’s craftsman fashioned the seal according to a model that had long persisted in the region and that has good Iron Age parallels not only in Judah but, for example, in Ammon and Edom. Yet the seal was inscribed now in Aramaic rather than Hebrew. Judean craftsmen seem to have gone about their business as usual, changing scripts in a short time for functional reasons, but retaining an older cultural model for seal production. The integration of Yehud into the Achaemenid imperial system in the sixth century accounts for the suddenness of the appearance of the Aramaic script to the apparent exclusion of Hebrew in epigraphs intended for administrative use or public display. Yet as sudden as this technological innovation may appear, it is not clear that the change from Hebrew to Aramaic script tells us much about ethnic self-consciousness or ideology in Achaemenid Judah.

14.  See, e.g., Avigad and Sass 1997: nos. 2–10, 20 (face B), 21–22, 28–30, 754– 55, 1008–11, 1049–52.

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Paleo-Hebrew Script: A Revival with a Difference Yet we do know that toward the end of the Persian period, the paleoHebrew script appears again in both Judea and Samaria. Coins and seal impressions in late Persian-period Judah were increasingly inscribed with paleo-Hebrew. Some Yehud coins of the fourth century were inscribed with Aramaic (Meshorer 2001: nos. 1, 12; cf. Gitler and Tal 2006: 305–11). In the late Persian and Ptolemaic era, Yehud coins were more often incised in paleo-Hebrew. These include the Hezekiah and Yohanan issues (Meshorer 2001: no. 20 and nos. 22–26; Gitler 2006; Gitler and Lorber 2006). The same is true for the Hasmonean yehud jar stamps that are also incised in paleo-Hebrew (Vanderhooft and Lipschits 2007: 30). To these examples we can add the monumental stone inscriptions from Mt. Gerizim, a few of which were also incised in paleo-Hebrew (Magen, Misgav, and Tsfania 2004: 30–35). The editors of these texts have suggested that they constitute proof for the continuous use of the old Hebrew script through the Persian period, but this is not clear. The forms of some of the letters look decidedly as though they are revivals of an old hand, not part of the organic process of development of Hebrew over the centuries. Among other forms, waw, nun, dalet, and šin show substantial differences from the monumental Hebrew script of the Iron Age, as though they are imitated. At this point, I think, as Cross and others have proposed before, that we have arrived at a point where the Hebrew script was revived in association with a project of expressing identity (Cross 1961; Yardeni 2000: B: 151–57; Schniedewind 2006; Geva 2007; Lipschits and Vanderhooft 2007). In any case, the revival of the archaic Hebrew script was not part of the organic process of continuous usage and production that initially pushed Hebrew aside in favor of Aramaic. That earlier process, moreover, had little to do with ethnicity or group identity but was rather simply functional, a technological adjustment to a changing international marketplace and the exigencies of the Achaemenid imperial system. Different motivations connected with group identity may have been relevant in the Judah and Samaria of the Hellenistic period, but these motives had not yet emerged when Ahiab requisitioned his governor’s seal in the late sixth century. 15 15.  To indulge in a bit of fancy, we may imagine that when Haggai records an oracle about God’s intention to transform Zerubbabel into his ‫חותם‬, “seal,” at the time of the rebuilding of the temple in the late sixth century (Hag 2:23), that seal would have been cut to the formal specifications of the old Judean model but inscribed with the Aramaic script.

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Bibliography Ariel, D. T., and Shoham, Y. 2000 Locally Stamped Handles and Associated Body Fragments of the Persian and Hellenistic Periods. Pp. 137–71 in Excavations at the City of David 1978–1985, Directed by Yigal Shiloh, vol. 6: Inscriptions, ed. D. T. Ariel; Qedem 41. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology–Hebrew University. Avigad, N. 1976 Bullae and Seals from a Post-exilic Judean Archive. Qedem 4. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology–Hebrew University. Avishur, I., and Heltzer, M. 2000 Studies on the Royal Administration in Ancient Israel in Light of Epigraphic Sources. Tel Aviv: Archaeological Center. Barr, J. 1989 Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek in the Hellenistic Age. Pp. 79–114 in vol. 2 of The Cambridge History of Judaism, ed. W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Beaulieu, P.-A. 2006 Official and Vernacular Languages: The Shifting Sands of Imperial and Cultural Identities in First-Millennium b.c. Mesopotamia. Pp. 191–220 in Margins of Writing, Origins of Culture, ed. Seth L. Sanders. Oriental Institute Seminars 2. Chicago: Oriental Institute–University of Chicago. Briant, P. 2002 From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire, trans. Peter T. Daniels. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Caquot, A. 1971 Une inscription araméenne d’époque assyrienne. Pp. 9–16 in Hommages a André Dupont-Sommer, ed. E. Bresciani. Paris: Maisonneuve. Collins, J. J. 1993 Daniel. Hermeneia. Philadelphia: Fortress. Cross, F. M. 1961 The Development of Jewish Scripts. Pp. 133–202 in The Bible and the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of William Foxwell Albright, ed. G. Ernest Wright. Garden City, NY: Doubleday; repr., Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1981. 1968 Jar Inscriptions from Shiqmona. IEJ 18: 226–33. 1969a Judean Stamps. ErIsr 9 (Albright Volume): 20*–27*. 1969b Two Notes on Palestinian Inscriptions of the Persian Age. BASOR 193: 19–24. 1974 The Papyri and Their Historical Implications. Pp. 17–29 in Discoveries in the Wâdi ed-Dâliyeh, ed. P. W. Lapp and N. L. Lapp. Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research 41. Cambridge, MA: American Schools of Oriental Research. 1975 A Reconstruction of the Judean Restoration. JBL 94: 4–18.

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An Aramic Ostracon of the 3rd Century b.c.e. from Excavations in Jerusalem. ErIsr 15 (Aharoni Volume): 67–69. 1986 A New Aramaic Stele from Taymāʾ. CBQ 45: 387–94. Cross, F. M., and Freedman, D. N. 1952 Early Hebrew Orthography: A Study of the Epigraphic Evidence. American Oriental Series 36. New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society. Degen, R.; Müller, W. W.; and Röllig, W. 1972–78 Neue Ephemeris für Semitische Epigraphik. 3 vols. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Dušek, J. 2007 Les manuscrits araméens du Wadi Daliyeh et la Samarie vers 450–332 av. J.-C. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 30. Boston: Brill. Emerton, J. A. 2006 The Kingdoms of Judah and Israel and Ancient Hebrew History Writing. Pp. 33–49 in Biblical Hebrew in Its Northwest Semitic Setting: Typological and Historical Perspectives, ed. S. E. Fassberg and A. Hurvitz. Jerusalem: Magnes / Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Ephʿal, I. 1998 Changes in Palestine during the Persian Period in Light of Epigraphic Sources. IEJ 48: 106–19. Fox, N. 2000 In the Service of the King: Officialdom in Ancient Israel and Judah. Cincinnati, OH: Hebrew Union College. Geva, H. 2007 A Chronological Reevaluation of Yehud Stamp Impressions in Palaeo-Hebrew Script, Based on Finds from Excavations in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. Tel Aviv 34: 92–103. Gitler, H. 2006 A Hoard of Persian Coins from the Environs of Ramallah. Numisma 250: 319–24. Gitler, H., and Lorber, C. 2006 A New Chronology for the Ptolemaic Coins of Judah. American Journal of Numismatics 18: 1–41. Gitler, H., and Tal, O. 2006 The Coinage of Philistia of the Fifth and Fourth Centuries bc: A Study of the Earliest Coins of Palestine. Collezioni Numismatiche 6. Milan: Edizioni Ennerre / New York: Amphora. Goodblatt, D. 2006 Elements of Jewish Nationalism. New York: Cambridge University Press. Goldwasser, O. 1991 An Egyptian Scribe from Lachish and the Hieratic Tradition of the Hebrew Kingdoms. TA 18: 248–53. Greenfield, J. 1985 Aramaic in the Achaemenian Empire. Pp. 698–713 in vol. 2. of The Cambridge History of Iran, ed. I. Gershevitch. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Aramaic and the Jews. Pp. 1–18 in Studia Aramaica: New Sources and New Approaches, ed. M. J. Geller, J. C. Greenfield, and M. P. Weitzman. Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement 4. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Greenfield, J., and Naveh, J. 1984 Hebrew and Aramaic in the Persian Period. Pp. 115–29 in vol. 1 of The Cambridge History of Judaism, ed. W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Greenfield, J. C., and Porten, B. 1982 The Bisitun Inscription of Darius the Great: Aramaic Version. Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum 1/5. London: Humphries. Herr, L. 1978 The Scripts of Ancient Northwest Semitic Seals. Harvard Semitic Monographs 18. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press. Hadjisavvas, S., and Dupont-Sommer, A. 1984 Cinq Stèles funéraires découvertes sur le site d’Ayious Georghios à Larnaca-Kition, en 1979. Report of the Department of Antiquities, Cyprus: 101–15. Heltzer, M. 1989 Epigraphic Evidence Concerning a Jewish Settlement in Kition (Larnaca, Cyprus) in the Achaemenid Period. Aula Orientalis 7: 189–206. Hoglund, K. 1992 Achaemenid Imperial Administration in Syria-Palestine and the Missions of Ezra and Nehemiah. SBLDS 125. Atlanta: Scholars Press. King, P. J., and Stager, L. E. 2001 Life in Biblical Israel. Louisville: Westminster John Knox. Kottsieper, I. 2007 “And They Did Not Care to Speak Yehudit”: On Linguistic Change in Judah during the Late Persian Era. Pp. 95–124 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lemaire, A. 1981 Les écoles et la formation de la Bible dans la ancien Israël. Fribourg: Editions universitaires / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 1989 Les inscriptions palestiniennes d’époque perse: Un bilan provisoire. Transeuphratène 87–105. 2006 Hebrew and Aramaic in the First Millennium b.c.e. in the Light of Epigraphic Evidence (Socio-Historical Aspects). Pp. 177–96 in Biblical Hebrew in Its Northwest Semitic Setting: Typological and Historical Perspectives, ed. S. E. Fassberg and A. Hurvitz. Jerusalem: Magnes / Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lipschits, O. 2005 The Fall and Rise of Jerusalem: Judah under Babylonian Rule. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lipschits, O., and Vanderhooft, D. S. 2007 Yehud Stamp Impressions of the Late Persian and Early Hellenistic Periods: A Time of Administrative Consolidation? Pp. 75–94 in Judah

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and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Forthcoming  Yehud Stamp Impressions: A Corpus of Inscribed Stamp Impressions from the Persian and Hellenistic Periods in Judah. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lipschits, O.; Vanderhooft, D.; Gadot, Y.; and Oeming, M. 2008 Twenty-Four New YEHUD Stamp Impressions from the 2007 Excavation Season at Ramat-Rahel. Maarav 15: 7–25 (and plates on pp. 97–103). Magen, Y.; Misgav, H.; and Tsfania, L. 2004 Mount Gerizim Excavations, vol. 1: The Aramaic, Hebrew and Samaritan Inscriptions. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquity Authority. Meshorer, Y. 2001 A Treasury of Jewish Coins. Nyack, NY: Amphora. Naʾaman, N. 1996 Sources and Composition in the History of David. Pp. 170–86 in Origins of the Ancient Israelite States, ed. V. Fritz and P. R. Davies. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement 228. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Naveh, J. 1970 The Development of the Aramaic Script. Proceedings of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities 5/1. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Science and Humanities. 1995 The Inscriptions from Failaka and the Lapidary Aramaic Script. BASOR 297: 1–4. Pearce, L. 2000 Sepīru and lúa.ba: Scribes of the Late First Millennium. Pp. 355–68 in Languages and Cultures in Contact: At the Crossroads of Civilizations in the Syro-Mesopotamian Realm, ed. K. van Lerberghe and G. Voet. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 96. Leuven: Peeters. Polak, F. 2006 Sociolinguistics and the Judean Speech Community in the Achaemenid Empire. Pp. 589–628 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Porten, B. 1981 The Identity of King Adon. BA 44: 36–52. Rollston, C. 2006 Scribal Education in Ancient Israel: The Old Hebrew Epigraphic Evidence. BASOR 344: 47–74. Schaeder, H. H. 1930 Esra der Schreiber. Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 5. Tübingen. Schaper, J. 2005 Exilic and Post-Exilic Prophecy and the Orality/Literacy Problem. VT 55: 324–42. Schniedewind, W. M. 2004 How the Bible Became a Book: the Textualization of Ancient Israel. New York: Cambridge University Press.

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Starcky, J. 1960 Une tablette araméene de l’an 34 de Nabuchodonosor (AO, 21.063). Syria 37: 99–115. Stolper, M. 1989 The Governor of Babylon and Across-the-River in 486 b.c. JNES 48: 283–305. Tadmor, H. 1982 The Aramaization of Assyria: Aspects of Western Impact. Pp. 449–70 in vol. 2 of Mesopotamien und seine Nachbarn, ed. H. J. Nissen and J. Renger. Berlin: Reimer. 1991 On the Role of Aramaic in the Assyrian Empire. Near Eastern Studies Dedicated to H. I. H. Prince Takahito Mikasa on the Occasion of His Seventy-Fifth Birthday, ed. M. Mori, H. Ogawa, and M. Yoshikawa. Bulletin of the Middle Eastern Culture Center in Japan. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Toorn, K. van der 2007 Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Tropper, J. 2001 Der Gottesname *Yahwa. VT 51: 81–106. Vanderhooft, D. S. 1999 The Neo-Babylonian Empire and Babylon in the Latter Prophets. Harvard Semitic Monographs 59. Atlanta: Scholars Press. 2003 New Evidence Pertaining to the Transition from Neo-Babylonian to Achaemenid Administration in Palestine. Pp. 219–35 in Yahwism after the Exile—Perspectives on Israelite Religion in the Persian Period, ed. Rainer Albertz and Bob Becking. Studies in Theology and Religion 5. Assen: Van Gorcum. Vanderhooft, D. S., and Lipschits, O. 2007 A New Typology of the Yehud Stamp Impressions. Tel Aviv Journal of the Institute of Archaeology 34: 12–37. Yardeni, A. 2000 Textbook of Aramaic, Hebrew and Nabataen Documentary Texts from the Judeaean Desert. Vols. A–B. Jerusalem: Ben-Zion Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History–Hebrew University. Zadok, R. 1979 The Jews in Babylonia during the Chaldean and Achaemenian Periods, according to the Babylonian Sources. Studies in the History of the Jewish People and the Land of Israel 3. Haifa: University of Haifa Press. 1984 Assyrian, Chaldean, and Achaemenian Babylonia. Assur 4/3. Malibu, CA: Undena. Zorn, J. R.; Yellin, J.; and Hayes, J. 1994 The M(W)ṢH Stamp Impressions and the Neo-Babylonian Period. IEJ 44: 161–83.

Jewish Identity in the Eastern Diaspora in Light of the Book of Tobit Manfred Oeming University of Heidelberg

Introduction Our conference was guided by questions central to much current research in the history of religion: how do communal norms develop in specific groups? How are they stabilized and spread, especially when the group is dispersed throughout an international context? For example, this issue is currently discussed with great intensity with regard to the question of how the early church was able to develop stable communal norms within a multinational and multicultural context (van der Watt 2006; Frey 2007; LiDonnici 2007; Zangenberg 2007). We are faced with a similar issue regarding the Jews in the Achaemenid period. Because of our scarcity of sources, the Persian age is surrounded by darkness. The problems involved in getting a clear picture, or any kind of picture, of the Jews in this period are clear to all of us. The most important question is particularly difficult to answer. Why did Judaism emerge specifically during this period in time? Everything stood against this happening. Following the events of the sixth century b.c.e., Judah faced a threat to its very existence. After the Babylonian conquest, the inhabitants were dispersed over a wide area: not only in Babylon but from Elephantine in Upper Egypt to Rages in northern Kurdistan, from northern Syria to Persepolis in the East. Judah’s central traditions had been interrupted: the temple cult in Jerusalem, the system of royal administration, the judicial system, and the scribal schools. Jerusalem, the administrative center of the kingdom, lay in ruins and was populated by very few inhabitants—hardly the basis for the widespread production and distribution of literature! In addition, tension existed between various traditions (priestly, prophetic, or wisdom) and various groups (Babylonian exiles, Palestinian Judahites, Egyptian exiles), not to mention the rivalry between Judeans and Samarians. All this would have made the immanent end of this group more than probable. In the face 545

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of these difficulties, how then was it possible that this group of people succeeded in shaping and maintaining an identity as “the people of God”? The emergence of Jewish identity is an enigma within the history of religion. After listening to all of the lectures of our conference, it has become even more of an enigma to me. The few sources we have seem to point more toward an assimilation of Judaism than to the emergence of a specific Jewish profile. In this context, I wish to turn to the book of Tobit. Can this book contribute anything to our questions regarding Jewish identity in the Persian period? It is not possible to know when exactly the book of Tobit was written. 1 The text tells us of the last phase of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, sometime after 750 b.c.e., of the destruction of Samaria (722 b.c.e.), and the first decades of the exile of the inhabitants of the Northern Kingdom. The text also emphasizes that Jerusalem could not be conquered by Sennacherib in 701 b.c.e. This led to a brutal treatment of the Diaspora Jews in his kingdom, including the prohibition of burying their dead. The book closes with a narration of the fate of a Jewish family in Nineveh, Rages, and Ecbatana, in the northeastern part of the Assyrian kingdom. 2 This narration is colored by the hope for the immanent collapse of Assur and a return from exile. The narrated time thus reaches from 750 to about 609; this, however, says nothing of the book’s date of writing. We know nothing about the book’s authors, even if the command of the angel Raphael to write the events down immediately (12:20) tells the reader that Tobit and Tobias themselves wrote this text in the eighth century. This would fit with the first-person narratives in chaps. 1–3, but the shift to third-person narration in the rest of the book and especially the various inner tensions and the theological content give us good reason to assume that the book was not written as a literary unit but that it grew over time (cf. Deselaers 1983; Rabenau 1994). Scholars have discussed various proposals; for our purposes it is beneficial to exclude the extreme positions. The book was not written as early as the Assyrian period (Wojciechowski 2007) and not as late as the Roman or Christian period (Hitzig 1860; Zimmermann 1958). The latter option is disproven by the Qumran evidence. Richard Bauckham’s recent study 3 suggests a date within the Persian period in northern Mes1.  For surveys of current research, see Spencer 1999; Grabbe 2003; Knauf 2004; Engel 2008. 2.  For an interpretation of the book’s intention in light of the “northern perspective,” see Bauckham 2006. 3.  Bauckham (2006) interprets Tobit as a parable for the destiny of the exiles of northern Israel.

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opotamia (Adiabene)—also because of the strong presence of Persian culture and religion, for instance, in the primary plot location of Ecbatana and Rages in Media; both regions border on “wild Kurdistan.” 4 Ecbatana (the old Persian Ha(n)gmatana, today Hamadan) was the capital of Media. It is close to Behistun, about 250 km southwest of Tehran in the Iranian highlands. This city was captured by Cyrus in 550 b.c.e. and became a royal summer residence and administrative center during the Achaemenid Empire with flourishing trade and exchange of artisans. Rages (Tel Ray) is about 250 km away (today it is a southern part of the city of Tehran). Due to the many intertextual connections to other biblical books (primarily Genesis, Job, and Psalms), I believe, however, that we should locate this text later, probably during the Greek period before the Maccabees between 250 and 170 b.c.e. (compare Rabenau 1994; Ego 2002, 2005; Fitzmyer 2003) within the eastern Diaspora (compare Greenfield 1981, Ego 2005, and Nicklas 2003). During this time, Ecbatana became famous once more because of Alexander’s conquest in 330 and the cessation of his campaign of vengeance against the Persians. It grew to become a center of Hellenism; even the Seleucids maintained a royal palace here. Nevertheless, for the question as to how Jewish identity was constructed in the Diaspora, nothing substantial would have changed in this area between 400 and 200. One issue that complicates the attempt to analyze the historical merit of the book of Tobit is the highly divergent and complex textual tradition, which recently has been systematically edited and presented by Wagner (2003) and Weeks, Gathercole, and Stuckenbruck (2004). These resources have not, however, provided a definitive answer as to the Urtext, or oldest text, of Tobit (Spencer 1999; Nicklas and Wagner 2003). With respect to the construction of Jewish identity (Ego 2002, 2005), we must state two opposing paradigms as our starting point. On the one hand, Jews are respected, and they are able to achieve respectable careers. Both Tobit and Aḥiqar attain leading administrative positions in the Assyrian Empire (similar to Joseph in Egypt or Mordechai in Persia). Both are quite wealthy. This is encouraging. On the other hand, Jews are subject to the whims of the ruling class. They are punished for their success with harsh and inhumane penalties, such as the prohibition to bury their dead. They are dispossessed and forced to flee. The dominant surrounding culture puts a lot of pressure on its Jewish population to abandon their religion or at least to hide their religious practices. 4.  Durch das wilde Kurdistan is the title of a very famous novel of Karl May. The setting of this novel is described as a wholly untamed and dangerous area. In German, “wildes Kurdistan” became a popular saying.

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The book sketches the dynamic but precarious, dangerous, and oppressive circumstances for Jewish life. One of the book’s intentions is to provide a model for ideal existence in the Diaspora (especially chaps. 1 and 4). In general, we can state that this ideal of Jewish existence comes quite close to the theology of the Chronistic School. This close connection between the Chronicler and Tobit has not yet been discussed adequately. Allow me to show in a brief interpretation of chapters one and four how the book of Tobit sketches the image of the ideal Jew.

Analysis of Tobit 1 This book tells the story of Tobit, son of Tobiel, son of Hananiel, son of Aduel, son of Gabael of the family of Asiel, of the tribe of Naphtali, who during the reign of Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, was taken captive from Thisbe, which is south of Kedesh Naphtali in upper Galilee, above and to the west of Asser, north of Phogor. I, Tobit, have walked all the days of my life on the paths of truth and righteousness. I performed many charitable works for my kinsmen and my people who had been deported with me to Nineveh, in Assyria. 5 When I lived as a young man in my own country, Israel, the entire tribe of my forefather Naphtali had broken away from the house of David and from Jerusalem. This city had been singled out of all Israel’s tribes, so that they all might offer sacrifice in the place where the temple, God’s dwelling, had been built and consecrated for all generations to come. All my kinsmen, like the rest of the tribe of my forefather Naphtali, used to offer sacrifice on all the mountains of Galilee as well as to the young bull which Jeroboam, king of Israel, had made in Dan. 6 I, for my part, would often make the pilgrimage alone to Jerusalem for the festivals, as is prescribed for all Israel by perpetual decree. Bringing with me the first fruits of the field and the firstlings of the flock, together with a tenth of my income and the first shearings of the sheep, I would hasten to Jerusalem and present them to the priests, Aaron’s sons, at the 5.  The Vulgate does not contain a first-person report but formally unifies the narrative frame and its center. According to the Latin tradition, the name of the hero and that of his son is Tobias. This Greek version of a Hebrew name carries the same meaning as the name of the father: “God/Yahweh is good.” The genealogy is reduced from five generations to the father and is thus of lesser importance. The father educates his son himself. The parallels between Tobias and Job are quite noticeable, especially in v. 9: timere Deum docuit et abstinere ab omni peccato // timens Deum et recedens a malo (compare Job 1:1–8). This parallel indicates from the very beginning that Tobias is a “suffering but just servant” (cf. Ruppert 1972). 6.  In the short text of Tobit, the identification of the golden calf of Dan with Baal (v. 5) has no parallel. The OT otherwise does not negate the identification of this cultic image with Yahweh; it only criticizes this identification. This variant points to increased polemics against images as idols.

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altar. To the Levites who were doing service in Jeusalem I would give the tithe of grain, wine, olive oil, pomegranates, figs, and other fruits. And except for sabbatical years, I used to give a second tithe in money, which each year I would go and disburse in Jerusalem. The third tithe I gave to orphans and widows, and to converts who were living with the Israelites. Every third year I would bring them this offering, and we ate it in keeping with the decree of the Mosaic law and the commands of Deborah, the mother of my father Tobiel; for when my father died, he left me an orphan. 7 When I reached manhood, I married Anna, a woman of our own lineage. By her I had a son whom I named Tobiah. Now, after I had been deported to Nineveh, all my brothers and relatives ate the food of heathens, but I refrained from eating that kind of food. Because of this wholehearted service of God, the Most High granted me favor and status with Shalmaneser, so that I became purchasing agent for all his needs. Every now and then until his death I would go to Media to buy goods for him. I also deposited several pouches containing a great sum of money with my kinsman Gabael, son of Gabri, who lived at Rages, in Media. But when Shalmaneser died and his son Sennacherib succeeded him as king, the roads to Media became unsafe, so I could no longer go there. During Shalmaneser’s reign I performed many charitable works for my kinsmen and my people. I would give my bread to the hungry and my clothing to the naked. If I saw one of my people who had died and been thrown outside the walls of Nineveh, I would bury him. I also buried anyone whom Sennacherib slew when he returned as a fugitive from Judea during the days of judgment decreed against him by the heavenly King because of the blasphemies he had uttered. In his rage he killed many Israelites, but I used to take their bodies by stealth and bury them; so when Sennacherib looked for them, he could not find them. But a certain citizen of Nineveh informed the king that it was I who buried the dead. When I found out that the king knew all about me and wanted to put me to death, I went into hiding; then in my fear I took to flight. Afterward, all my property was confiscated; I was left with nothing. All that I had was taken to the king’s palace, except for my wife Anna and my son Tobiah. But less than forty days later the king was assassinated by two of his sons, who then escaped into the mountains of Ararat. His son Esarhaddon, who succeeded him as king, placed Ahiqar, my brother Anael’s son, in charge of all the accounts of his kingdom, so that he took control over the entire administration. Then Ahiqar interceded on my behalf, and I was able to return to Nineveh. For under Sennacherib, king of Assyria, Ahiqar had been chief cupbearer, keeper of the seal, administrator, and treasurer; and Esarhaddon reappointed him. He was a close relative—in fact, my nephew.

7.  The comparison between Moses and Deborah from v. 8 is absent in the short text of Tobit.

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This sketch shows how much the theological ideals of the Chronistic history influenced Jewish self-understanding in the fourth–third centuries b.c.e. (or how intensively these ideals were being promoted during this time): Tobit completely fulfills the three criteria for inclusion in “the true Israel” established by the genealogical prologue in 1 Chronicles 1–9.  8 His ancestry proves him to be a true Israelite. His extensively narrated lineage spanning five generations shows the high importance of genealogy (see also 4:12, 5:11, 7:6). To understand an individual, you have to know who his parents and grandparents were. The name Tobit is probably a Greek version of the name Tobiah (see 2 Chr 17:8; Ezra 2:60; Neh 2:10; 2 Macc 3:11), “Yahweh is good.” The other names in Tobit’s family also resonate with hymnic sounds: Tobiel, “God is good”; Hananel, “God is merciful”; Aduel, “God is magnificent”; Gabael, “God is exalted”; Raphael, “God heals”; and Raguel (not clear), “God is my friend” (see Gen 36:13, Num 10:29). This list of family members already summarizes a song of praise and thus preludes the main theological statement of the book. Tobit also fulfills the other criteria for “true Israel” established by Chronicles. Following the title in vv. 1–2, a first-person report starts in v. 3, in which Tobit proudly emphasizes his religious qualities: his observance of Torah is exemplary. This is circumscribed by the expression “to travel on the paths of truth” (v. 3). These divine instructions find their center in generous charity, beyond that of his people (ἐλεημοσύνη and its derivatives are central motifs of the entire book). Tobit shows exemplary loyalty to the house of David and believes the Jerusalem Temple to be the only true cultic center (v. 4)—and this, even though he comes from the Northern Kingdom! He phrases his confession of faith in classic Chronistic fashion. 9 He radically opposes the state cult of the Northern Kingdom, the golden calf of Jeroboam I in Dan (Bethel is not mentioned!). Instead, he goes on pilgrimages to Jerusalem for the main festivals. The fact that he goes “alone” emphasizes the rebellion of the northern tribes, against which he stands as a solitary light. Full of joy for the divine commandments, he “hurries” to Jerusalem with rich offerings. The threefold tenth probably refers back to Deut 14:22–29: the alternatives mentioned there—natural produce or money once every three years—are interpreted additively by Tobit: every year natural produce and silver and the third tenth for every third year. Here we can already see the later rabbinic tendency 8. See Oeming 1990. This prologue establishes the cornerstones of the genealogical, territorial, and salvific vision for Israel. 9.  On the election of David, see 1 Chr 28:4ff., 2 Chr 6:5. On the sole legitimacy of the Jerusalem temple, see 1 Chr 23:25, 29:21; 2 Chr 6:6, 12:13, 33:7).

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to create a “fence” around the Torah” (Pirque Abot 1,1), according to which it is better to go beyond what the Torah commands rather than risk neglecting or transgressing even one commandment. The first beneficiary of his charity—again in complete coherence with Chronistic categories—is the group of the Aaronide priests and the Levites (v. 7). Beyond this group, Tobit cares for “widows, orphans, and strangers” (v. 8)—the classic triad of personae miserae. The last of these three groups, however, is modified significantly. Tobit only aids the “god-fearing,” who are loyal to Israel—this probably refers to those who have been circumcised and uphold the Torah (see also 4:17 “Do not give anything to the sinner!”). The instructions of the religious teacher Deborah are compared to those of Moses—quite an honor, which may be traced later to the Talmudic statement that only someone with a Jewish mother is recognized as a Jew; the ability to be certain about who is the mother is likely to have played a role in this development. In general, the book of Tobit values women very highly, and thus it particularly emphasizes the aspect of religious education and socialization that is carried by the mother or grandmother. Finally, Tobit practices endogamy (v. 9; see 4:12; Ezra 9–10) and is most certainly only married to a woman of pure Jewish lineage. To contextualize Tobit’s exemplary behavior in captivity (1:10–22), it should be noted that Nineveh is located on the upper arm of the Tigris (located in present-day Iraq about 1000 km from Jerusalem). Even far from home, Tobit is the only one who maintains his purity. According to the Chronistic scheme of action and consequence, he is rewarded by God with a high office and wage. He is a solitary light in the mass of the lost inhabitants of the Northern Kingdom. On a trip to Rages (about 700 km from Nineveh), he stashes a large “treasure” (about 410 kg of silver) with a relative. This treasure becomes important later when he himself falls into destitution (4:20). Regarding 1:16–21a, the narrative jumps ahead to the year 701 b.c.e. The comparatively favorable situation of the Jews in Assyria takes a turn for the worse and is described using dark images. Most inhabitants are already brought down by misery and hardship; even their dead cannot be buried. This anti-Judaistic attitude grows worse once Sennacherib returns in frustration, after trying in vain to conquer Jerusalem (2 Kings 18–19 // Isaiah 36–37). 10 In his anger, Sennacherib initiated a series of pogroms against the Israelites. (Perhaps the book here reflects experiences from the time of its writing in Alexandria?) The 10.  It is not clear why the siege of Jerusalem did not lead to conquest: did the plague afflict the Assyrian army? Was there an insurrection against the Assyrian king at home? Or did Jerusalem pay high tribute as ransom?

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prohibition to bury dead Jews is the high point of ancient anti-Judaism. Failure to be buried was considered the greatest disaster and is feared as punishment of war or a divine curse (Deut 28:26; 2 Kgs 9:36–37; Ps 79:2; Isa 34:3–4; Jer 7:33; and more). Even though the OT statements are very vague on this issue, it seems that life after death was somehow connected to the body. In Greek literature, we also find the prohibition to bury the dead as a measure of harassment and punishment. Tobit does not succumb to this pressure but resists by burying the dead in honor. This loyalty to God’s word almost costs him his life. In contradiction to the Assyrian sources that refer to Sargon II (722–705) as the son of Shalmanassar V and that date Sennacherib’s reign from about 705 to 681 b.c.e, the book of Tobit—according to the Chronistic paradigm of immediate retribution—has Esarhaddon (681–669) murder and thus punish his father Sennacherib for the oppression of the Jews only seven weeks after the (supposed) pogroms of 701/700. These historical inaccuracies show clearly that the book of Tobit uses history as a pedagogical tool.

Analysis of Tobit 4 That same day Tobit remembered the money he had deposited with Gabael at Rages in Media, and he thought, “Now that I have asked for death, why should I not call my son Tobiah and let him know about this money before I die?” So he called his son Tobiah; and when he came, he said to him: “My son, when I die, give me a decent burial. Honor your mother, and do not abandon her as long as she lives. Do whatever pleases her, and do not grieve her spirit in any way. Remember, my son, that she went through many trials for your sake while you were in her womb. And when she dies, bury her in the same grave with me. Through all your days, my son, keep the Lord in mind, and suppress every desire to sin or to break his commandments. Perform good works all the days of your life, and do not tread the paths of wrongdoing. For if you are steadfast in your service, your good works will bring success, not only to you, but also to all those who live uprightly. Give alms from your possessions. Do not turn your face away from any of the poor, and God’s face will not be turned away from you. Son, give alms in proportion to what you own. If you have great wealth, give alms out of your abundance; if you have but little, distribute even some of that. But do not hesitate to give alms; you will be storing up a goodly treasure for yourself against the day of adversity. Almsgiving frees one from death, and keeps one from going into the dark abode. Alms are a worthy offering in the sight of the Most High for all who give them. Be on your guard, son, against every form of immorality, and above all, marry a woman of the lineage of your forefathers. Do not marry a stranger who is not of your father’s tribe, because we are

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sons of the prophets. My boy, keep in mind Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, our fathers from of old: all of them took wives from among their own kinsmen and were blessed in their children. Remember that their posterity shall inherit the land. Therefore, my son, love your kinsmen. Do not be so proudhearted toward your kinsmen, the sons and daughters of your people, as to refuse to take a wife for yourself from among them. For in such arrogance there is ruin and great disorder. Likewise, in worthlessness there is decay and dire poverty, for worthlessness is the mother of famine. Do not keep with you overnight the wages of any man who works for you, but pay him immediately. If you thus behave as God’s servant, you will receive your reward. Keep a close watch on yourself, my son, in everything you do, and discipline yourself in all your conduct. Do to no one what you yourself dislike. Do not drink wine till you become drunk, nor let drunkenness accompany you on your way. Give to the hungry some of your bread, and to the naked some of your clothing. Whatever you have left over, give away as alms; and do not begrudge the alms you give. Be lavish with your bread and wine at the burial of the virtuous, but do not share them with sinners. Seek counsel from every wise man, and do not think lightly of any advice that can be useful. At all times bless the Lord God, and ask him to make all your paths straight and to grant success to all your endeavors and plans. For no pagan nation possesses good counsel, but the Lord himself gives all good things. If the Lord chooses, he raises a man up; but if he should decide otherwise, he casts him down to the deepest recesses of the nether world. So now, my son, keep in mind my commandments, and never let them be erased from your heart. And now, son, I wish to inform you that I have deposited a great sum of money with Gabri’s son Gabael at Rages in Media. Do not be discouraged, my child, because of our poverty. You will be a rich man if you fear God, avoid all sin, and do what is right.

Following the command to bury one’s dead we read the command to honor one’s mother, an action that expresses itself in compassion, care in old age, and obedience. This high esteem is justified by the hardship of the mother in childbirth. 11 The passage is concluded in chiastic fashion with the command to also bury one’s mother—including the culminating statement εν ενι ταφω (“in the same grave”) with the husband. Here we encounter the high esteem of the marital bond even unto death. Verses 5–6 express a basic concept as Lex generalis, which forms an inclusion with the closely related v. 21b: “Revere the Lord all your days, my son, and refuse to sin or to transgress his commandments. Live uprightly all the days of your life, and do not walk in the ways of 11.  “Just as the mother carried the burden of pregnancy and birth, the children should, where necessary, carry the burden of the parent’s old age” (Deselaers 1990: 86).

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wrongdoing; 12 if you act in accordance with truth you will prosper in all your activities.” 13 Everything depends on practicing justice and truth (δικαισοσυνη / αλητειαν ποιειν). 14 Verses 7–19b explicate what this means. The first emphasis of vv. 7–11 is mercifulness (ελεημοσυνη). The text demands that this virtue be exercised generously. It is interpreted as a “sensible provision” in case of personal need and placed under the blessing of God. Verse 6b is quite noticeable as it restricts the recipients of mercifulness to those who do justice. 15 Supporting those in need seems to be connected to this prerequisite. Verse 17 states the case clearly: solidarity only for those who have acted in solidarity! The second focus is found in vv. 12–13. Here we read the admonition to remain endogamous. Genealogies, which honor the family and the tribe and are of utmost importance in late texts, play a central role for the book of Tobit. A genealogy introduces Raphael as the ideal companion for Tobit (5:10–14) and Tobias as the ideal son-in-law for Raguel (7:3–10). In order to escape death by ethnic dissolution, Israel was forced to secure its own identity by enforcing marriage only within one’s own tribe. Any breach of this rule was branded as porneia and punished with extreme measures. The pride of the people as the elect of God is quite apparent when we read: “We are sons of the prophets!” and when the patriarchs are idealized as role models. Several loosely connected sayings follow at this point, all connected to the central themes of justice and mercifulness. Verse 14a admonishes the righteous to pay wages immediately because God will repay an individual as he pays another. This principle of reciprocity is the basis for the ethical system of the entire chapter: “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” We can see this most clearly in the so-called Golden Rule, which occurs in the OT only here as a negative statement: “All things that you do not want done to yourself do not to unto others!” 12.  The strict parallelism of vv. 5a and 5b excludes any division of this verse (against Deselaers). The structure of the list does not seem very logical. I cannot, however, follow the logic of Deselaers’s (1982: 380; 1990: 80) literary-critical operation and the resulting chiastic structure, especially because v. 5a connects not to v. 19a but to v. 21b. 13.  Codex Sinaiticus reads a legal precept in the 3rd person: “for those who act in accordance with truth will prosper in all their activities.” This manuscript omits vv. 7–18. 14.  Weigl (2006: 56) calls this “die rettende Macht der Solidarität” and “gelebte Barmherzigkeit.” 15.  In his Septuagint edition, Tischendorf (1887: 637) combines v. 6b with 6a: “you and all who do justice will prosper in their activities.” In this case, the restriction disappears. Syntactic reasons stand against this dogmatic modification; one would expect a genitive.

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(see Matt 7:12 for the positive version of this saying). This evident ethical principle is internationally accepted and is the basis of moral action until today. The warning against excessive enjoyment of alcohol seems odd next to this fundamental ethical principle, but such alternations seem to be typical for this genre of ethical lists. With a strong allusion to Isa 58:7, v. 16 leads the reader back to the topic of generous mercifulness (vv. 7–11), and v. 17 reiterates the topic of burial (vv. 3–4). 16 The structure of the chapter, however, is not chiastic, because vv. 18–19a break the symmetry. They admonish the well“educated” (πεπαιδευκος) 17 young man (v. 14) to keep an open ear for the wise advice of others—well in keeping with Old Testament wisdom in its Hellenistic phase. The young man should especially remember that nothing is accomplished by means of worry and planning; everything “must be asked for.” God alone is the universal ruler over all peoples; he distributes success and failure according to his own sovereign will (v. 19). This accumulation of ethical principles is closely intertwined with the narrative: the command to bury the dead refers back to Tobit’s courageous dedication to the dead; the emphasis on mercifulness with its promise of future reward connects to Tobit’s mercifulness in the past and his liberation in the future; the command to remain endogamous points to Tobias’s marriage to Sara; the admonition to prove one’s good education and listen to the advice of the wise preludes Tobit’s actions when allows himself to be counseled by the wise Raphael; the invitation to humble prayer alludes to the prayers of Tobit and Sara (3:1–6, 11–15); the two versions of the Lex generalis vv. 5 and 21 summarize the basic theme of the whole book: “Much is given to you, if you fear God.” It seems that these connections to the story are the criteria for selecting the items in the list. We may even be able to say that the story serves no purpose other than to illustrate and confirm the ethical system outlined in chap. 4. In this case, the story would be a paradigmatic instruction in ethics. We can, in summary, characterize the ethics of this chapter as follows: 18

16.  The verse probably refers to the custom of bread for mourning, found also in 2 Sam 1:12, 3:35; Jer 16:7; and Ezek 24:17. It was considered to be a special act of mercy to bring this to those who were mourning (Gross 1987: 27–28). 17.  For more information on the ideal of Hellenistic education, see Jaeger (1959). 18. For more details, see Engel 1993; Oeming 1994; Hofmann 2003; Christian 2006.

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1. The chapter contains no casuistic instructions on trifling matters; instead, it focuses on basic values that allow much freedom in application, such as the “Golden Rule.” 2. The family, especially elderly parents and monogamous marriage until death, is held in high regard. 3. Moral action knows clear boundaries: no mixed marriages and no mercy for the unmerciful. 4. Human action is intimately connected to God’s action. A principle of reciprocity exists. 5. The concept of judgment plays a lesser role (contrast Job 31); instead, the text emphasizes the promise of reward. 6. There are no cultic requirements. The chapter demands only continual prayer that is conscious of the greatness and power of God. The text does contain criticism of cultic practices from a wisdom perspective (see Prov 15:8; 16:6; 21:3, 27). 19 In order to survive, Tobit develops a very particular way of life, which we first can describe in a positive manner. Family, including honoring the aged parents, is very important. Jewish history is family history. Accordingly, we find a lot of emphasis on endogamy. 20 This command forms the hard core of the Jewish survival strategy (4:12). Abraham’s chosen seed forms a group that must remain pure. The various family branches that are connected genealogically are bound together by obligatory mutual care and aid. If the welfare of the “larger family” is threatened by the powers that be, then the individual must display civil courage even in the face of inhumane royal decrees. The book demands an ethics based solely on duty to do good and not on individual happiness. This basis leads to an ethical freedom from personal needs as a guide to action and a freedom to protect the weak: ὅτι ἐλεημοσύνη ἐκ θανάτου ῥύεται καὶ οὐκ ἐᾶι εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὸ σκότος (4:10). God’s judgment, on the other hand, is of much lesser importance in motivating action; it is replaced by the promise of righteous reward! Certain cultic practices are emphasized. Prayer seems to be the most important religious activity. The ideal is constant dialogue with God, such as with Nehemiah and the heroes of Chronicles (Royar 2005)— even in the context of or perhaps despite the depressing situation of the Diaspora. Other important religious practices are •  appropriate burial of the dead •  kosher food preparation •  avoidance of common meals with non-Jews (the only possible exception is Ahiqar) 19.  Compare the dissertation by Ernst 1994. 20.  For this phenomenon in its broader context, see Hieke 2005.

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•  respecting the cleanliness laws with respect to the dead •  pilgrimages to Jerusalem •  monetary tithing for Jerusalem •  itinerant preaching (1,15: pergebat ergo per omnes qui erant in captivitate et monita salutis dabat eis) I believe that Beate Ego was correct in emphasizing that the book of Tobit also aims to portray the Diaspora as a temporary state of affairs. Tobit conveys an eschatological hope that all of Israel will once again be gathered in the land of the fathers under the law of God and under a Davidic king. It is also very important what the book does not mention as a necessary prerequisite for ideal Diaspora existence. The text does not mention that Tobit owns or has access to any kind of scrolls. The “portable fatherland” (Heinrich Heine), the canon of biblical books, is never mentioned in the book of Tobit! Tobit is not someone who constantly studies in his private library seeking direction and edification. Does Tobit only have access to oral traditions? Did he already memorize the texts as a child and take this complete knowledge along into exile? We might assume this on the basis of reference to a normative “law of Moses” (Fassbeck 2005; Christian 2006). Did he access the texts on his many journeys to Jerusalem? The book makes no mentions of synagogues. Tobit as a traveling salesman is also an itinerant preacher, but he seems to speak only in private homes. The only legitimate sanctuary seems to be the temple in Jerusalem. Cultic gathering places, places of reading and communal prayer, or even of singing, do not seem to be a part of the eastern Diaspora. Their existence must be later. As a third point, the book says nothing of schools and teachers. It remains quite unclear from where the knowledge of the law comes. The book also makes no mention of schools. Education takes place in the private houses, and one function of the family home is to serve as a classroom.

Conclusions I suggest that the book of Tobit provides us with the following answers to my initial questions regarding the emergence and distribution of a normative Judaism. 1.  A clear ethical monotheism was a convincing model. 2.  A powerful boundary was created by the harsh separation between Jews and non-Jews, especially with the central law of endogamy. 3.  We may assume the existence of a small elite of “traveling salesmen,” who were engaged in preaching and promoting orthodox and orthopractical norms among those who were in danger of being assimilated. Yet, we can also observe a little freedom to adjust the Torah to the

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local circumstances (see esp. Christian 2006; Kiel 2008; Dimant 2009). A symbol for this “enculturation” and for this very positive relationship with the righteous among the nations is—maybe—the figure of Ahiqar. 21 These elites were working in the private atmosphere of domestic education. 4.  Jerusalem existed as the spiritual center. The temple, especially, was the focus of a well-developed system of pilgrimage and donation. 5.  The political hope for a new Davidic kingdom was a strong motivating force (but only in the background). 6.  An eschatological perspective containing the hope for reward for all obedient believers was a strong motivation to carry on. 21.  “Gott ist mit Tobit, dem über die Maßen treuen Juden, der trotz Macht—und Ehrverlust, sozialer Deklassierung, politischer Repressalien, doppelter Entwurzelung—durch die Deportation aus der Heimat, dann durch die Flucht aus Assyrien— Hungersnot und Erblindung unerbittlich an seiner Rechtschaffenheit festhielt. Tobit ist der um seine Nachkommenschaft besorgte Patriarch—er ist Abraham, Isaak und Jakob; er ist der leidende Gerechte, der unanfechtbar an seiner Integrität festhält—er ist Ijob; er ist der weise Höfling im Dienste einer Großmacht—er ist Josef und Daniel. Er verkörpert die humanisierte, gelebte Tora, die seinen Lebensraum bis in die letzte und verborgenste Dimension hinein gestaltet. Gott ist mit Tobit, weil er sein Leben lang den Weg der Wahrheit und der Gerechtigkeit ging und aus Solidarität seine Brüder nicht vergaß. Zu guter letzt erwies sich an ihm die rettende Macht der Barmherzigkeit—Gottes Geschenk und Auftrag zugleich. Gott ist aber auch mit Achikar, dem Aramäer. Er weiß nichts von den Patriarchen, er leidet nicht wie Ijob, er ist weder aufgrund seiner Pietät deklassiert, noch muss er im Exil leben. Die Tora ist ihm fern und unbekannt. Dennoch: Er partizipiert, ohne es zu wissen, am Handeln Gottes, weil er die Diasporagemeinde durch mutige politische Intervention an höchster Stelle rettet (1,21b–22), sie mit dem Lebensnotwendigen versorgt (2,10) und mit ihr sieben Tage lang vor Gott feiert (11,19). Entgegen aller historischen Evidenz und in Abrogation der religiösen Barriere, die zwischen seiner und der jüdischen Tradition steht, tritt er allein deshalb in die jüdische Großfamilie als ‘Bruder’, ja mehr noch als nachahmenswertes Vorbild ein und kann fortan zur Familie und zur ‘Sippe’ Tobits gerechnet werden” (Weigl 57).

Bibliography Bauckham, R. 2006 Tobit as a Parable for the Exiles of Northern Israel. Pp. 140–64 in vol. 1 of Studies of the Book of Tobit: A Multidisciplinary Approach, ed. Mark Bredin. London: T. & T. Clark. Repr., pp. 433–59 in The Jewish World around the New Testament. Collected Essays, by R. Bauckham. WUNT 233. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Christian, M. A. 2006 Reading Tobit Backwards and Forwards: In Search of “Lost Ha­ lakhah.” Henoch 28: 63–95.

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Dimant, D. 2009 The Book of Tobit and the Qumran Halakha. Pp. 121–43 in The Dynamics of Language and Exegesis at Qumran, ed. Devorah Dimant and Reinhard G. Kratz. Forschungen zum Alten Testament 2/35. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Deselaers, P. 1982 Das Buch Tobit: Studien zu seiner Entstehung, Komposition und Theologie. OBO 43. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht / Freiburg: Universitätsverlag. 1990 Das Buch Tobit. GS 11. Düsseldorf: Patmos-Verlag. Ego, B. 2002 Heimat in der Fremde: Zur Konstruierung einer jüdischen Identität in der Diaspora. Pp. 280–93 in Die Jüdischen Schriften aus hellenistisch-römischer Zeit in ihrem antik-jüdischen und urchristlichen Kontext (Studien zu den Jüdischen Schriften aus hellenistisch-römischer Zeit 1). Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. 2005 The Book of Tobit and the Jewish Diaspora. Pp. 41–54 in The Book of Tobit: Text, Traditions, Theology, ed. Geza Xeravits and Jozsef Zwengeller. JSJSup 98. Leiden: Brill. Engel, H. 1993 Auf zuverlässigen Wegen und in Gerechtigkeit: Religiöses Ethos in der Diaspora nach dem Buch  Tobit. Pp. 83–100 in Biblische Theologie und gesellschaftlicher Wandel, ed. Georg Braulik and Walter Groß. Freiburg: Herder. 2008 Das Buch Tobit. Pp. 278–88 in Einleitung in das Alte Testament, ed. Erich Zenger. Kohlhammer-Studienbücher Theologie 1/1. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Ernst, A. B. 1994 Weisheitliche Kultkritik Zu Theologie und Ethik des Sprüchebuchs und der Prophetie des 8. Jahrhunderts. BThS 23. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Fassbeck, G. 2005 Tobit‘s religious Universe between Kinship Loyalty and the Law of Moses. Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic and Roman Period 36: 173–96. Fitzmyer, J. A. 2003 Tobit. CEJL. Berlin: de Gruyter. Frey, J., ed. 2007 Jewish Identity in the Greco-Roman World. Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 71. Leiden: Brill. Grabbe, L. L. 2003 Tobit. Pp. 736–47 in Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible, ed. James D. G. Dunn and John W. Rogerson. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Greenfield, J. C. 1981 Ahiqar in the Book of Tobit. Pp. 329–36 in De la Tôrah au Messie: Études d’éxégèse et d’herméneutique biblique offertes à Henri Cazelles pour ses

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Groß, H. 1987 Tobit, Judit, ed. Josef G. Plöger. NEchtB 19. Würzburg: Echter. Hallermayer, M. 2008 Text und Überlieferung des Buches Tobit. Deuterocanonical and cognate literature 3. Berlin: de Gruyter. Hieke, T. 2005 Endogamy in the Book of Tobit, Genesis, and Ezra–Nehemiah. Pp. 103–19 in The Book of Tobit: Text, Tradition, Theology. JSJSup 98. Leiden: Brill. Hitzig, F. 1860 Zur Kritik der apokryphischen Bücher. Pp. 240–73 in Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie. Vol. 3. Frankfurt am Main: Diesterweg. Hofmann, N. J. 2003 Die Rezeption des Deuteronomiums im Buch Tobit, in der Assumptio Mosis und im 4. Esrabuch. Pp. 311–42 in Das Deuteronomium, ed. Georg Braulik. Österreichische biblische Studien 23. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Jaeger, W. 1959 Paideia: Die Formung des griechischen Menschen. 4th ed. 3 vols. Berlin: de Gruyter. Kiel, M. D. 2008 Tobit and Moses Redux. Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 17: 83–98. Knauf, E. A. 2004 Tobit. Pp. 637–42 in Introduction à l‘Ancien Testament, ed. Thomas Römer and Jean-Daniel Macchi. Le Monde de la Bible 49. Genève: Labor et Fides. LiDonnici, L. R., and Lieber, A., eds. 2007 Heavenly Tablets: Interpretation, Identity and Tradition in Ancient Jerusalem. JSJSup 119. Leiden: Brill. Nicklas, T., and Wagner, C. J. 2003 Thesen zu textlichen Vielfalt im Tobitbuch. Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic and Roman Period 34: 141–59. Oeming, M. 1990 Das wahre Israel: Die „genealogische Vorhalle“ 1 Chronik 1–9. BWANT 128. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. 1994 Ethik in der Spätzeit des Alten Testaments am Beispiel von Hiob 31 und Tobit 4. Pp. 159–73 in Altes Testament—Forschung und Wirkung: Festschrift für Henning Graf Reventlow, ed. Peter Mommer. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Rabenau, M. 1994 Studien zum Buch Tobit. BZAW 220. Berlin: de Gruyter.

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Royar, S. 2005 „Denn der HERR, euer Gott, ist gnädig und barmherzig”: Die Gebete in den Chronikbüchern und ihre Bedeutung für die chronistische Theologie. BVB 10. Münster: Lit Verlag. Ruppert, L. 1972 Der leidende Gerechte: Eine motivgeschichtliche Untersuchung zum Alten Testament und dem zwischentestamentlichen Judentum. FB 5. Würzburg: Echter / Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk. Spencer, R. A. 1999 The Book of Tobit in Recent Research. Pp. 147–80 in vol. 7 of Currents in Research: Biblical Studies. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Tischendorf, K. von 1887 Vetus Testamentum Graece iuxta LXX interpretes. Leipzig: Brockhaus. Wagner, C. J., ed. 2003 Polyglotte Tobit-Synopse: Griechisch, lateinisch, syrisch, hebräisch, aramäisch. Mit einem Index zu den Tobit-Fragmenten vom Toten Meer. Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen, Philologisch-Historische Klasse 3/258. MSU 28. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Watt, J. G. van der, ed. 2006 Identity, Ethics, and Ethos in the New Testament. BZNW 141. Berlin: de Gruyter. Weeks, S.; Gathercole, S.; and Stuckenbruck, L., eds. 2004 The Book of Tobit: Texts from the Principal Ancient and Medieval Traditions, with Synopsis, Concordances, and Annotated Texts in Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and Syriac. FoSub 3. Berlin: de Gruyter. Weigl, M. 2006 „Inkulturation“ im Buch  Tobit: Gemeinde im Ghetto? Pp. 39–62 in Inkulturation: Historische Beispiele und theologische Reflexionen zur Flexibilität und Widerständigkeit des Christlichen, ed. Rupert Klieber and Martin Stowasser. Theologie: Forschung und Wissenschaft 10. Wien: Lit Verlag. Wojciechowski, M. 2007 Assyrian Diaspora as Background of the Book of Tobit. Collectanea Theologica 77: 5–19. Zangenberg, J., ed. 2007 Religion, Ethnicity and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition. WUNT 210. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Zimmermann, F. 1958 The Book of Tobit. Jewish Apocryphal Literature. New York: Harper.

The Identity of the Idumeans Based on the Archaeological Evidence from Maresha Amos Kloner Bar-Ilan University

The excavations at Maresha have revealed evidence of the cultic, religious, and ethnic characteristics of the population resident at Maresha in the fifth–second centuries b.c.e., the Persian and Hellenistic periods. Though no historical evidence has been found that can supply information concerning the beliefs, customs, cult, and divine representations specifically used by the Idumeans, the archaelogical findings from Maresha, for the first time, can supply some evidence of the characteristics of this ethnic and religious group. The excavations in 1900 by Bliss and Macalister (1902) and Peters and Thiersch (1905) and the modern excavations conducted in 1989–2000 (Kloner 2003) all confirm the extent of Hellenic and Alexandrian influences on the local population at Maresha (Erlich and Kloner 2008; Kloner 2008, forthcoming). However, this essay will not address these issues; rather, it addresses the local indigenous religious and cultural identity of the population and will survey from several different aspects of this new evidence. See figs. 1 and 2.

Epigraphy In the 66 Aramaic ostraca dated to the Persian and Hellenistic periods found at Maresha in the 1990s (Kloner, Eshel, and Korzakova forthcoming), and in many others found in recent years (still under study), the name of the Idumean deity Qos is used as a theophoric in Idumean names. These theophoric names constitute the evidence for the presence of Idumeans at the site and for the cult of Qos. The very rich variety of names from Aramaic ostraca of the fourth century b.c.e. in Idumaea has been published in the last 15 years (Ephʿal and Naveh 1996; Lemaire 1996; 2002; 2006: 413–56; Porten and Yardeni 2004: 161–84; 2006: 457–58). About 60% of the private names from “unknown provenences” (probably Khirbet el-Kom/Maqqeda) from the fourth century b.c.e. are Idumean and Arabic names. Another 28% of the names from “unknown provenences” are Western Semitic in their ethnic origin and might also 563

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Fig. 1.  Hellenistic and Early Roman sites in central Israel.

originate in this Idumean and Arabic culture (Kloner and Stern 2007: 139–44; Porten and Yardeni 2006; Stern 2007). For comparison, a very similar, albeit slightly smaller percentage is found among the names from Maresha: 30% Arab, 26% Idumean, and 27% Western Semitic (Eshel 2007: 145–56; Kloner, Eshel, and Korzakova forthcoming). In the Idumean marriage contract found at Maresha and dated to 176 b.c.e. (Eshel and Kloner 1996: 1–22), all the male names are theophoric Idumean (see fig. 3). The Idumean wisdom texts inscribed on bowls found at Maresha (Eshel, Puech, and Kloner 2007: 39–62) testify to the importance of the literary, cultural, and religious heritage of the Idumeans at Maresha (see figs. 4–7). This evidence has not been found before and is vitally important. Wisdom was connected with Edom even in ancient periods: “Concerning Edom, thus said the Lord of Hosts: Is there no more wisdom in Teman?” (Jer 49:7, njpsv). Obadiah prophesies that “in that day I will make the wise vanish from Edom” (v. 8, njpsv). It was said of King Solomon that “he was the wisest of all men: [wiser] than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman” (1 Kgs 5:11, njpsv). These last two named men are presumed to have been related to Zerah, from an

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Fig. 2.  Aerial view of Maresha from the west.

Edomite clan (Genesis 36) and are associated (in the superscriptions) with Psalms 88 and 89, respectively. As these above-mentioned wisdom texts were found at Maresha, we relate to them as Idumean—the Greek term for those residing at Maresha and southern Judea, who originally came from Edom—rather than as Edomite texts.

Purification Installations Clear archaeological evidence for the custom of bodily purification and ritual water cleansing were found at Maresha (Kloner 2003: 15–16). This observation is based on three kinds of installations found during the excavations. First, at least two stepped installations, plastered and sealed like miqvaot, were found in the Upper City of Maresha in the excavation of Bliss and Macalister in 1900 (1902: 56, pl. 17) and were identified as miqvaot in the past by Reich (1990) and dated to the time after John Hyrcanus I . A similar purification installation was found in Area 53 in the Lower City (Kloner 1992: 81; 2003: 16; see fig. 8). This installation had already gone out of use by the time of the Hasmonean occupation of Maresha at the end of the second century b.c.e., evidence that it had been used by the inhabitants of Maresha prior to the Hasmonean occupation. For this reason, and as a result of stratigraphic studies of the

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Fig. 3.  An Aramaic ostracon recording an Idumean marriage contract from Maresha, dated 176 b.c.e.

remains of the Upper City (the Mound), the three stepped installations mentioned above are also dated to the second century b.c.e. Second, small rock-cut chambers in which the bather sits on a small bench were discovered. Water was poured over the bather, either by hand or from a drainspout cut in the wall, and drained directly into a cistern below the chamber. This type of small room is common in the Lower City of Maresha; about 20 of these installations have already been documented. These chambers were first identified in 1900 in Macalister’s survey of the caves of Maresha and called by him “filter chambers” (Bliss and Macalister 1902: 209). These small “filter chambers” were cut in the upper part of the staircases leading to the subterranean systems; they also appear to have some connection to related olive oil presses and other industrial activities (Kloner 2003: 66–67). This type of bodily purification is reminiscent of the ancient Jewish custom of “9 kabim”—the amount of water poured over a person in a ritual purification process still used among certain orthodox Jewish groups today. Third, several rock-cut “bathtubs” were hewn in the bedrock below residences in the Lower City, in which a person sat in a comfortable bath, long enough for the bather’s legs to be fully outstretched. Water was poured onto the bather from a drainspout cut in the wall, which carried water to the tub through a cut channel in the rock. This

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Fig. 4.  Idumean wisdom text from Maresha; bowl A exterior.

Fig. 5.  Idumean wisdom text from Maresha, bowl A, inscription nos. 1 and 2.

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Fig. 6.  Idumean wisdom text from Maresha, bowl B exterior.

Fig. 7.  Idumean wisdom text from Maresha, bowl B, inscription nos. 4 and 5.

purification system appears to be a combination of the previous two types of installations: ritual purification through the pouring of water from a spout onto a bather and a ritual bath (Kloner and Arbel 1998: 157–62).

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Fig. 8.  Schematic drawing of Subterranean Complex no. 53 at Maresha.

While there may have been a few Jewish residents of Maresha who could have used some of these installations, this does not justify the large numbers of purification installations found at Maresha, all dated most probably prior to the end of the second century b.c.e. Therefore, these purification installations are evidence, for the writer, that bodily purification was a custom practiced by the Idumeans residing at Maresha.

Circumcision (Milah) In the Zenon papyri dated 259 b.c.e. (P.Cairo 59006, 59015, 58537), the Egyptian writer states that runaway slave boys bought in Maresha and taken to Egypt can be identified by the fact that they were circumcised. Circumcision was practiced by some non-Jewish populations of the time, and these papyri—using circumcision as an identity marker for boys from Maresha and other places in Idumaea—identify the local population (i.e., the Idumeans) as one of these groups. During our excavations in the Lower City, we have found at least four phalli carved from the local limestone, which are probably circumcised. 1 1. According to Jer 9:25, the Edomites of the sixth century b.c.e. are among the circumcised: “ ‘The time is coming,’ says the Lord, ‘when I will punish all the circumcised, Egypt and Judah, Edom and Ammon, Moab and all who haunt the fringes of the desert.’”

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Fig. 9 (above).  Cross-shaped figure from Subterranean Complex 51 at Maresha. Fig. 10 (right).  Carved figure from Subterranean Complex no. 89 at Maresha (0.9 m. high.

Aniconic (Nonfigurative) and Schematic Representations of Divinity Maresha was characterized by a variety of ethnic and religious populations during the Hellenistic period. Idumeans and Arabs were in the majority, but we also have evidence from burial inscriptions, dedicatory inscriptions (Bliss and Macalister 1902: 68–70), ostraca, and limestone tablets (Bliss and Macalister 1902: 158–78) of Phoenicians (Sidonians), Greeks, Egyptians, “Ashdodites” (residents of the Coastal Plain) and even a few Jews (because of the use of “Yahu” as a theophoric in their names). The population was influenced by the contemporary Hellenic culture and had Sidonian influences as well. The expression of deity among the Idumeans is clearly schematic. Several figures, in which no details are recognizable, were found in stone reliefs and incised in the walls of subterranean complexes of the Lower City. The most impressive example is found in Subterranean Complex 51, which has the appearance of a large cross-shaped figure with its two arms outstretched to the sides and with eyes marked on its upper portion (Kloner 1991: 73; see fig. 9). A few dozen other schematic figures, some human, are incised on walls and entrances of various subterranean complexes, such as Subterranean Complex 89, published by Bliss and Macalister (1902: 241–42, fig. 90; see fig. 10). These figures,

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Fig. 11.  Chalk bust from Subterranean Complex no. 86 at Maresha (9.2 cm high).

carved in the third or even second century b.c.e., are clearly earlier than later Nabatean figures. Small statuettes carved from the local chalk, of very schematic human figures (including heads and torsos) without details, have been found at Maresha (see fig. 11). All these may be representations of the Idumean deity Qos. About 120 clay figurines from the Persian period and about 600 from the Hellenistic period have been found at Maresha (Erlich and Kloner 2008). Representations of gods and goddesses with Hellenic origins are included in these figurines, mainly from the Hellenistic period, but these figurines represent local popular beliefs as part of the process of Hellenization. One group, the “pillar figurines,” can also be related to the Idumean tradition, in that they are schematic.

Burial Practices In one third-century b.c.e. burial system at Maresha (T561 in the eastern necropolis, the only undisturbed burial cave so far found at the site), there is clear evidence for the practice of bone collection. Of the 10 kokhim in this tomb (7 regular length and 3 shorter), one of the shorter kokhim contained the remains of 9 adults and 2 children. A few bones were found in other kokhim that belonged to the remains of inhumated persons who were first buried in the other kokhim and their bones were not yet gathered here (Kloner 2003: 26–27). This burial chamber is dated to the third century b.c.e, according to the 10 pottery vessels found in it (Regev 1994: 272). It is important to mention that all the 50 burial complexes from Maresha dated to the Hellenistic period are gabled kokh

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systems, originally an Alexandrian influence (contra Tal 2003: 288–307), and all the inscriptions found in them are Greek, including names with the theophoric Qos. The five subjects dealt with above, among others, are clear evidence that the Idumean population residing at Maresha had several unique religious and ethnic customs. This is the first time that this type of evidence has been found in an Idumean site dated to the Persian or Hellenistic period. In many details, there are parallelism and close modeling between these customs and those of their neighbors, the Jews of the time. In certain chronological aspects, the findings from Maresha even predate those found among the Jews. The archaeological evidence from Maresha sheds light on the fact that the Idumeans were the ruling and majority ethnos of Maresha and were the most important ethnic group in the administrative unit called Idumaea.

Bibliography Bliss, F. J., and Macalister, R. A. S. 1902 Excavations in Palestine during the Years 1889–1900. London. Ephʿal, I., and Naveh, J. 1996 Aramaic Ostraca of the Fourth Century bc from Idumaea. Jerusalem: Magnes. Erlich, A., and Kloner, A. 2008 Maresha Excavations Final Report, vol. 2: Hellenistic Terracotta Figurines from the 1989–1996 Seasons. IAA Reports 35. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority. Eshel, E. 2007 The Onomasticon of Mareshah in the Persian and Hellenistic Periods. Pp. 145–56 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Eshel, E., and Kloner, A. 1996 An Aramaic Ostracon of an Edomite Marriage from Maresha, dated 176 b.c.e. IEJ 46: 1–22. Eshel, E.; Puech, E.; and Kloner, A. 2007 Aramaic Scribal Exercises of the Hellenistic Period from Maresha: Bowls A and B. BASOR 345: 39–62. Kloner, A. 1991 Maresha. Qadmoniot 95–96: 70–85. 2003 Maresha Excavations Final Report, vol. 1: Subterranean Complexes 21, 44, 70. IAA Reports 17. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority. 2008 Maresha in the Reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus. Pp. 171–81 in Ptolemy II Philadelphus and His World, ed. P. McKechnie and P. Guillame. Leiden: Brill.

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Forthcoming The Introduction of the Greek Language and Culture in the Third Century b.c.e., according to the Archaeological Evidence in Idumea. In Judah between East and West: The Transition from Persian to Greek Rule (ca. 400–200 b.c.e.), ed. L. L. Grabbe and O. Lipschits. London: T. & T. Clark. Kloner, A., and Arbel, Y. Maresha: Area 61 (Subterranean Complex). ESI 17: 157–62. 1998 Kloner, A.; Eshel, E.; and Korzakova, H. Forthcoming Epigraphy from Maresha. IAA Reports. Kloner, A., and Stern, I. Idumaea in the Late Persian Period (Fourth Century b.c.e.). Pp. 139– 2007 44 in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century b.c.e., ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knoppers, and R. Albertz. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lemaire, A. Nouvelles inscriptions arameennes d’Idumee du Musee d’Israel. Trans­ 1996 euphratène Supplement 3a. Paris: Gabalda. Nouvelles inscriptions arameennes d’Idumee, vol. 2: Collections Mous2002 euphratène Supplement 9a. saieff, Jeselsohn, Welch et divers. Trans­ Paris: Gabalda. New Aramaic Ostraca from Idumea and Their Historical Interpre2006 tation. Pp. 413–56 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Peters, J. P., and Thiersch, H. Painted Tombs in the Necropolis of Marissa. London: Palestine Explora1905 tion Fund. Porten, B., and Yardeni, A. On Problems of Identity and Chronology in the Idumaean Ostraca. 2004 Pp. 161–84 in Teshurot Lavishur Studies in the Bible and the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Heltzer and M. Malul. Tel Aviv. Social, Economic, and Onomastic Issues in the Aramaic Ostraca of 2006 the Fourth Century b.c.e. Pp. 457–58 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Regev, D. The Transitional Phase between the Persian and Hellenistic Periods 1994 at Marissa. Pp. 272–74 in Third Scholarly Conference on Hellenistic Pottery, Thessalonika, September 1991, ed. S. Drougou. Athens. Reich, R. Jewish Ritual Baths in the Second Temple Period and in the Mishnaic and 1990 Talmudic Period. Ph.D. dissertation. Hebrew University. [Hebrew] Stern, I. 2007 The Population of Persian-Period Idumea according to the Ostraca: A Study of Ethnic Boundaries and Ethnogenesis. Pp. 205–38 in A Time of Change, ed. Y. Levin. LSTS 65 / CQS 8. London: T. & T. Clark. Tal, O. On the Origin and Concept of the Loculi Tombs of Hellenistic Pales2003 tine. Ancient West and East 2: 288–307.

Index of Authors Abd el-Razik, M.  287, 297 Abelson, R.  295 Abraham, K.  269, 274 Achenbach. R.  46, 97 Ackerman, S.  84, 85 Ackroyd, P. R.  128, 154, 463, 476 Adamthwaite, M. R.  330 Aelian  230, 311, 312, 320 Aeschylus 50 Aguilar, M.  196 Aguirre, B. E.  193 Aḥituv, S.  369 Ahlström, G. W.  405 Ahn, G.  53 Albani, M.  406 Alba, R. D.  196 Albertz, A.  42 Albertz, R.  79, 80, 95, 128, 129, 132, 134, 146, 154, 164, 165, 405, 464, 490, 491, 493, 494, 499 Albright, W. F.  291, 471 Alfen, P. van  453, 454 Alster, B.  384 Altenmüller, H.  297 Alter, R.  326 Altmann, P.  3 Andiñach, P. R.  158 Andrews, C. A. R.  300 Anthes, R.  329 Aperghis, G. G.  289 Apollodorus  332, 333 Arbel, Y.  568 Ardener, E.  193 Ariel, D. T.  449, 450 Aristocles 451 Aristotle 200 Armstrong, J.  193 Arnold, D.  319 Ashplant, T. G.  519 Assmann, J.  33, 34, 35, 285, 309 Astour, M. C.  313 Atkinson, M. P.  192 Attridge, H. W.  290, 291, 313

Aufrère, S. H.  284, 306, 313 Avigad, N.  535, 538 Avishur, I.  270, 532 Ayad Ayad, B.  411 Bagh, T.  331 Bahar, S.  327 Baines, J.  308, 323 Baker, H. D.  246 Bakhtin, M.  185 Bal, M.  295 Balmuth, M. S.  445 Banks, M.  195 Barag, D.  448, 486 Bardtke, H.  50, 51 Bar-Efrat, S.  326 Barguet, P.  286, 311 Bar-Kochva, B.  512 Baron, S. W.  514, 515 Barron, M. L.  192, 195 Barstad, H. M.  143 Barta, W.  280 Barth, F.  127, 130, 190, 192, 194, 195 Bartlett, J. R.  198 Batten, L. W.  196, 198 Bauckham, R.  546 Bauks, M.  3, 4, 8, 19 Baumann, R.  294 Baumgartner, W.  300 Bautch, R. J.  197, 201, 205 Beaulieu, P.  226, 227, 252, 254, 256, 260, 474, 529, 531 Becking, B.  196, 199, 201, 405, 410, 411, 413, 423, 432, 436 Beck, M.  157 Bedford, P. R.  67, 129, 137, 138, 196, 204, 206, 423 Beeker, C.  194 Beinlich, H.  290 Bennett, W. J., Jr.  319 Ben Zvi, E.  127, 197, 198, 285, 322 Bérard, J.  332 Berger, P. R.  226

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Index of Authors

Berges, U.  69, 70, 71, 72, 74, 77, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91 Bergman, J.  384 Berlin, A.  50, 51, 55 Berman, J.  323 Berquist, J. L.  28, 69, 130, 196, 197 Besanceney, P. H.  192 Betròm, M. C.  376, 377, 378, 380, 384, 387, 388 Beuken, W. A. M.  83, 88, 154 Beyer, K.  382 Bhabha, H. K.  203 Bianchi, R.  317 Bickel, S.  309 Bickerman, E. J.  469 Bierbrier, M. L.  236 Bietak, M.  330 Bing, J. D.  304 Black, J. A.  285 Black, M.  403 Blakely, J. A.  319 Blau, P. M.  189, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 200, 202, 207, 208 Bleeker, C. J.  314 Bleiberg, E.  310 Blenkinsopp, J.  4, 5, 35, 67, 68, 69, 72, 78, 79, 80, 83, 85, 88, 89, 91, 92, 96, 113, 123, 129, 131, 134, 135, 138, 176, 189, 190, 196, 319, 465, 469, 470 Bliss, F. J.  563, 565, 566, 570 Block, D. I.  143 Blum, E.  7, 9, 14, 18, 19, 20, 24, 45 Blumenthal, E.  282 Blum, T. C.  193, 194, 196 Boardman, J.  455 Boda, M. J.  205 Boecker, H. J.  279 Boedeker, D.  41 Boiy, T.  237 Bolin, T. M.  296, 322, 423 Bommas, M.  297 Bonhême, M. A.  282 Boorn, G. P. F. van den  288 Borchardt, L.  237 Borger, R.  228, 508 Bosshard-Nepustil, E.  153, 154, 159 Bothmer, B. von  237 Boylan, P.  314 Braudel, F.  296 Braulik, G.  30, 31 Braun, M.  314

Bresciani, E.  300, 316, 320, 321 Brettler, M. Z.  468 Brett, M. G.  16, 197 Briant, P.  227, 230, 231, 310, 316, 319, 320, 430, 436, 489, 516, 529 Bricquel-Chatonnet, F.  376, 381, 382 Brockington, L. H.  190 Brubaker, R.  52 Brugsch, E.  305 Brunner, H.  296 Bruyce, G. E.  375 Bryan, B. M.  310 Budge, E. A. W.  287 Bultmann, C.  197 Burchard, C.  308 Burkard, G.  284, 436 Burns, R. I.  514 Burstein, S. M.  313 Byrne, D.  191 Calderini, A.  303, 306 Calmeyer, P.  316 Caminos, R. A.  281, 282, 288, 293, 302, 303 Campbell, D. A.  40 Capps, D.  403, 409 Cardascia, G.  272, 509 Carr, D.  324 Carrez-Maratray, J. Y.  306 Carroll R., M. D.  196 Carroll, R. P.  130, 143 Carter, C. E.  43, 44, 196, 197, 202, 469 Cassirer, E.  180, 181 Casson, L.  297 Cataldo, J.  196 Causse, A.  200 Cavan, R. S.  191 Cavigneaux, A.  252 Cawkwell, G.  40 Černy, J.  293, 300 Chalcraft, D. J.  196 Chapman, M.  197, 200, 205 Chauveau, M.  289, 316 Chevereau, P. M.  305, 317 Christian, M. A.  555, 557, 558 Claget, M.  405 Clines, D. J. A.  49, 189, 203 Coats, G. W.  279, 308 Cody, A.  117, 465 Cogan, M.  228, 474 Coggins, R. J.  154

Index of Authors Cohen, A. P.  192, 195, 197 Cohen, G. D.  514 Cohen, N.  248, 521 Cohen, S.  29, 30, 36, 69, 82, 83, 93, 404, 421, 467, 506, 520, 521, 522 Collins, J. J.  477, 510, 533 Collombert, P.  305 Contardi, F.  286 Contini, R.  376, 379, 384, 388 Conybeare, F. C.  376, 380, 385, 386 Coogan, M. D.  250, 251, 469 Cook, S. L.  77 Copenhaver, B. P.  313 Cornell, S.  205 Corò, P.  257 Côté, J. E.  403 Cowley, A.  165, 300, 316, 318, 422, 423, 464, 465, 484, 485, 491, 493 Crenshaw, J. L.  158 Cross, F. M.  68, 445, 452, 487, 530, 537, 538, 539 Crown, A. D.  455 Ctesias  55, 468 Dalley, S.  49, 376, 383, 507 Daly, L. W.  381 Dandamaev, M.  272 Danforth, L. M.  52 Daressy, G.  306, 312 Dassow, E. von  270 Daumas, F.  322 David, R.  236 Davies, N. de G.  293 Davies, P. R.  471 Davis, K.  191, 192, 193 Davison, J. M.  332 Davison, R.  190 Davoli, P.  302 Dawson, G.  519 Day, P. L.  142 Denis, A.-M.  314 Derchain, M. T.  313 Derchain, P.  290, 313 Derderian, K.  519 Deselaers, P.  546, 553, 554 Dettori, E.  381 Deutsch, R.  449 Dewald, C.  236 Dijkstra, M.  308, 406, 409 Dillery, J.  314 Dimant, D.  558

577

Diodorus  311, 312, 316, 317, 319, 320, 322, 323, 332, 452, 485, 513 Dion, P.-E.  423 Dirksen, P.  232 DiSegni, L.  446 Dobbs-Allsopp, F. W.  143 Dodson, A.  298 Döhling, J. D.  279 Dohm, C. C. W. von  520 Donadoni, S.  316 Donbaz, V.  509 Donner, H.  69, 75, 162, 164, 165, 434, 436, 492 Dor, Y.  49, 136, 174, 178, 184, 190 Douglas, M.  49, 189, 201, 203 Dowden, K.  332 Doxey, D. M.  291 Dozeman, T.  3 Driel, G. van  272, 273 Driota, E.  297 Drioton, E.  309 Driver, G. R.  51, 300 Dufoix, S.  52 Duggan, M. W.  197 Duhm, B.  106 Dupont-Sommer, A.  366, 370, 371, 533, 534 Dušek, J.  255, 486, 487, 490, 533 Dyck, J. E.  197, 199 Eagleton, T.  295 Edel, E.  291, 303 Edelman, D.  196, 197, 249, 404, 438 Edrei, A.  50 Edwards, I. E. S.  281 Edwards, M. J.  291 Edwards, R. B.  332 Efroymson, C. W.  462 Ego, B.  547, 557 Eichler, S. S.  288 Eichrodt, W.  10, 471 Elayi, J.  319 Eldamaty, M. M.  297 Eliade, M.  181 Elizur, A.  182 Elliger, K.  154, 158 el-Sawe, A.  307 Emerton, J. A.  530 Engel, H.  546, 555 Enger, P. A.  69, 70, 72, 75, 76, 82

578

Index of Authors

Ephʿal, I.  267, 269, 270, 272, 318, 320, 529, 563 Epstein, E.  191 Epstein, L. M.  190, 193 Erichsen, W.  300, 302, 306, 392 Eriksen, T. H.  195, 200, 203 Erikson, E. H.  34, 403 Erkelenz, M.  40 Erlich, A.  563, 571 Ernst, A.  556 Eshel, E.  318, 381, 563, 564 Eshel, H.  451, 455, 496 Eskenazi, T. C.  68, 189, 190, 193, 197, 198, 203 Esler, P. F.  43, 196, 197 Eusebius  290, 312, 314, 327, 331, 513 Ewald, H.  5 Falck, C.  326 Fales, F. M.  376, 381, 383, 507 Falk, D. K.  205 Fantalkin, A.  319, 449, 488, 508 Farnea, E. W.  55 Fassbeck, G.  557 Faust, A.  197, 469 Figueras, P.  306 Finlay, T. D.  47 Finnegan, R.  294 Firchow ,O.  298 Fischer, H. G.  322 Fischer, I.  18 Fishbane, M.  30, 69, 75, 76, 77, 92 Fitzmyer, J. A.  300, 409, 547 Fitzpatrick, K. M.  194 Forde, D.  201 Fortes, M.  200 Fowler, J. D.  245, 251, 252 Fox, M. V.  49, 52, 279, 375 Fox, N. S.  300, 530, 532 Fox, R.  201 Frankfurter, D.  283 Freedman, D. N.  530 Frei, P.  432 Frevel, C.  4 Frey, J.  545 Fried, L. S.  134, 189, 196, 197, 449, 486 Friedman, T.  406 Friedrich, R.  295 Froidefond, C.  298 Fulton, D. N.  200

Gadamer, H.-G.  296 Gadot, Y.  537 Gager, J. G.  313 Galling, K.  165, 425, 426, 484, 486, 487, 490, 491, 492, 493, 494, 497, 498 Gardiner, A. H.  247, 282, 288, 290, 291, 293, 331 Garr, W. R.  18 Garstad, B.  332 Gärtner, J.  71, 74, 157 Gathercole, S.  547 Gauthier, H.  302, 303, 320 Geertz, C.  178, 197 Gehman, H. S.  55 Gennep, A. van  184 Gershenson, D. E.  332 Gerstenberger, E. S.  43 Gertz, J. C.  3, 4, 7 Gesche, P.  252 Gese, H.  80 Geva, H.  539 Ghalioungui, P.  290 Gill, D.  311 Ginsberg, H. L.  369 Gitay, Y.  197 Gitin, S.  445 Gitler, H.  447, 448, 449, 450, 452, 453, 454, 455, 539 Glanville, S. R. K.  283, 380 Glass, B. L.  192 Glassner, J.  226, 227, 249, 268 Glazer, N.  195, 197 Glock, A. E.  507 Gmirkin, R. E.  309 Godley, A. D.  54 Goedicke, H.  287 Golani, A.  445 Golden, R. M.  196 Goldenstein, J.  70, 71, 72, 73, 88, 109, 110 Goldingay, J.  20 Goldman, Z.  449 Goldwasser, O.  530 Gomaà, F.  302 Goodblatt, D.  529 Goody, E. N.  201 Goody, J.  35, 36 Goossens, G.  313 Gordon, A. I.  190, 191 Gordon, C. H.  281, 302 Gordon, M. M.  192

Index of Authors Görg, M.  19, 24, 307 Gosse, B.  84, 25 Gottlieb, I.  411 Gough, K.  190 Goyon, G.  298, 307, 310 Gozzoli, R. B.  309 Grabbe, L.  43, 48, 130, 136, 162, 164, 165, 174, 177, 179, 189, 190, 196, 197, 405, 406, 407, 408, 484, 485, 486, 487, 498, 546 Graf, D.  318 Grapow, H.  291, 293 Grätz, S.  425, 429, 432, 436, 437, 438 Graupner, A.  44 Gray, G. B.  245, 308 Gray, J.  403 Grayson, A. K.  226, 268 Greeley, A. M.  197 Green, B.  283 Greenberg, M.  325, 462 Greenfield, J.  529, 547 Green, W. S.  130 Grelot, P.  253, 316, 317, 318 Griffith, F. L.  283 Griffiths, J. G.  298, 306, 312, 314, 332 Grimal, N.-C.  281, 282, 314, 315 Groll, S. I.  302 Gropp, D. M.  450 Grosby, S.  197 Grossfeld, B.  53 Gross, H.  555 Groß, W.  18, 20 Grottanelli, C.  376, 381, 384, 388 Gruen, E. S.  57, 512, 513 Grünwaldt, K.  14, 20 Guenther, A.  190, 204 Guillaume, P.  4, 16, 24, 322 Gundlach, R.  280, 309 Gunkel, H.  9, 10, 44 Gunneweg, A. H. J.  51, 165, 198, 206, 465, 484, 487, 491 Guttman, R.  191 Haag, E.  49 Habachi, L.  290 Hacham, N.  50 Hadjisavvas, S.  533, 534 Hagedorn, A. C.  44 Hall, E.  42 Hall, J. M.  42 Hallo, W. W.  390

579

Halpern, B.  227 Hancock, R.  331 Hannig, R.  287, 329 Hänsel, L.  31, 32 Hanson, P. D.  69, 70, 73, 89, 97, 106, 117, 119, 157 Harari, A.  292 Harbottle, G.  331 Harrington, H. K.  201, 202, 203 Harris, J. R.  376, 380, 385, 386 Hartenstein, F.  406 Hartman, L. F.  129 Harvey, G.  198 Haslam, M. W.  388 Hassan, F.  469 Hayajneh, H.  509 Hayes, C. E.  79, 80, 81, 199, 201, 202 Hayes, J. H.  474, 484, 487, 535 Hayes, W. C.  289, 292 Hays, C. B.  176, 185 Hays, C. E.  197 Heally, J. F.  291 Hearon, H. E.  294 Heer, D. M.  193 Heicksen, M. N.  469 Heine, H.  557 Heinen, H.  383 Heinz, S. C.  305 Helck, W.  286, 287, 288, 292, 293, 297, 302, 329, 332 Heltzer, M.  270, 532, 533, 534 Hengel, M.  509, 510, 511, 521 Hensel, J.  514 Herberg, W.  192, 197 Herodotus  39, 40, 41, 42, 50, 54, 57, 190, 229, 235, 236, 237, 283, 284, 303, 304, 306, 312, 315, 332, 452, 468, 471, 475 Herrmann, S.  484, 492 Herzfeld, M.  39 Hess, R.  249 Hieke, T.  8, 556 Himmelfarb, M.  201 Hitzig, F.  546 Hobsbawm, E.  182, 200, 405 Hoch, J.  302, 304, 312, 331 Hodge, R.  325, 326 Hoffmann, F.  376, 380 Hoffmeier, J. K.  304 Hofmann, B.  280, 292 Hofmann, N. J.  555

580

Index of Authors

Hoglund, K. G.  196, 433, 532 Hölbl, G.  323 Holladay, C. R.  314 Holladay, J. S., Jr.  303, 331 Holm-Rasmussen, T.  316 Holm, T. L.  389 Hölscher, M.  246 Holzberg, N.  382 Holzinger, H.  9, 10 Homer 54 Hopfner, T.  320 Horbury, W.  510 Hornblower, S.  40 Horovitz, J.  309 Horowitz, E.  49, 130 Horst, P. W. van der  309 Houser Wegner, J.  385, 386, 393 Houtman, C.  283, 302, 306 Hugenberger, G. P.  190 Hughes, G. R.  284, 300 Humbert, P.  13, 14, 375 Hunger, H.  225, 237, 259 Hutchinson, J.  195, 205, 462 Hwang, S.  193 Ibn Daud, A.  514 Inowlocki, S.  313 Instone-Brewer, D.  190 Ishida, T.  140 Isocrates  42, 317, 450 Ito, N.  193 Ivantchik, A. I.  299 Iverson, R. M.  285 Jacob, B.  20 Jacquet-Gordon, H. K.  281 Jaeger, W.  555 Jäger, S.  392 Janes, G.  317 Jannssen, E.  128 Janowski, B.  4, 5, 9 Jansen-Winkeln, K.  281, 282 Janssen, J. J.  300, 311 Janzen, D.  49, 196, 197, 198, 202, 204, 433, 437 Japhet, S.  49, 68, 69, 82, 129, 131, 133, 135, 137, 174, 196, 197, 198, 202, 204, 206, 231, 463 Jasnow, R.  376 Jay, P.  331 Jenkins, R.  195

Jericke, D.  23, 26 Joannès, F.  250, 269, 270, 273, 274, 509 Johnson, J.  298, 316, 323 Johnson, W. M.  197 Johnson, W. R.  310 Joisten-Pruschke, A.  423 Jones, D.  286, 287 Josephson, J.  296, 297 Josephus  165, 204, 314, 324, 326, 327, 332, 467, 471, 473, 478, 483, 484, 485, 486, 487, 490, 492, 495, 497, 510, 511, 512, 513 Joyce, P. M.  139 Judd, E. P.  68, 189, 193, 197, 198 Judge, H. G.  465 Jursa, M.  246, 268, 271 Justin 319 Kahl, J.  323 Kahn, D.  508 Kakosy, L.  307, 312 Kallai, Z.  301 Kalmijn, M.  191 Kalmin, R.  50 Kamal, A.  298, 305 Kämmerer, T. R.  384 Kaplan, P.  509 Kaplan, Y.  507 Kaplony, P.  287 Karrer, C.  198, 201, 202, 205, 433 Kasher, A.  506, 510, 511 Katary, S. L. D.  299 Katzenstein, H. J.  318 Kaufmann, Y.  69, 82, 176, 462 Kees, H.  298, 314 Kelle, B. E.  507 Keller, C. A.  157 Kendall, D.  119 Kennedy, R. J. R.  192, 197 Kennett, R. H.  465 Kent, R. G.  50 Kertzer, D. I.  178, 180, 184 Kessler, J.  67, 129, 136, 137, 196, 197, 322 Kessler, K.  256 Kessler, R.  167 Kiefer, J.  52 Kiel, M. D.  558 Kienitz, F. K.  319 Killebrew, A. E.  197

Index of Authors Kilwing, N.  22 Kim, H. S.  445 King, P. J.  530 Kitchen, K. A.  296, 297, 309, 331 Klengel, H.  318 Kletter, R.  445, 446 Klingbeil, G. A.  47, 49, 197 Klinkott, H.  289 Kloner, A.  256, 563, 564, 565, 566, 568, 570, 571 Klostermann, A.  154 Klug, A.  280, 282, 292, 309 Knauf, E. A.  4, 7, 16, 17, 24, 318, 25, 26, 26, 26 Knierim, R. P.  308 Knoppers, G. N.  39, 49, 67, 68, 175, 197, 199, 206, 231, 232, 233, 234 Knowles, M. D.  197 Koch, K.  433, 439 Koch-Westenholz, U.  376 Köckert, M.  3, 4, 9, 15, 20, 23, 24, 44, 45, 47, 48 Kock, H.  289, 316 Koehler, L.  300 Koemoth, P. P.  303 Koenen, K.  68, 69, 71, 72, 76, 88, 93, 105, 106, 328 Koenig, Y.  282 König, F. W.  55 Konkel, M.  77, 80, 81 Kook, R. B.  519 Koole, J. L.  117 Korpel, M. C. A.  404 Korzakova, H.  563, 564 Kossmann, R.  50, 52 Kottsieper, I.  51, 54, 183, 376, 379, 390, 392, 406, 425, 429, 430, 489, 494, 496, 529 Kozloff, A. P.  310 Kraay, C. M.  447 Kraeling, E. G.  316, 318, 508, 516 Krahmalkov, C. R.  290, 300, 304, 331 Krall, J.  311 Kratz, R. G.  3, 14, 15, 19, 20, 24, 43, 45, 105, 411, 412, 421, 424, 428, 429, 430, 431, 432, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439, 487, 489, 490, 492 Kraus, H.-J.  105, 461 Krauss, R.  309 Kroll, J. H.  445 Kruchten, J.-M.  292

581

Küchler, M.  376, 379 Kuckertz, J.  367 Kuhrt, A.  196, 228, 269 Kunz, A.  279 Kurth, D.  311 Kussl, R.  388 Kutsch, E.  15 Lacau, P.  287 Laisney, V.  375 Lambert, W. G.  237, 250, 274 Lamb, W. R. M.  42 Laming MacAdam, M. F.  294 Lanckau, J.  46 Lange, K.  298 Lang, E. P.  196 Laniak, T. S.  54 Lau, W.  70, 75, 77, 88 Lawrence, L. J.  196 Leach, E. R.  190 Leclant, J.  282, 296, 305, 313, 365 Leclerc, T.  111, 112, 119 Lefebvre, G.  321, 323 Leibniz, G. W.  403 Leitz, C.  298, 309 Lemaire, A.  67, 97, 128, 248, 250, 254, 256, 269, 270, 273, 274, 316, 365, 367, 368, 369, 370, 389, 390, 486, 487, 489, 529, 530, 531, 535, 563 Lemaire, G.-G.  55 Lemche, N. P.  300 Lenfant, D.  55 Lenzo Marchese, G.  286 Leonhard, C.  406 Levenson, J. D.  49, 52, 53, 70 Levin, C.  46, 48 Levine, C.  403 Levinson, B. M.  36, 76 Levin, Y.  197 Lévi-Strauss, C.  191, 201 Levy, A.  52 Lewis, A.  376, 380, 385, 386 Liang, Z.  193 Lichtheim, M.  300, 381, 385, 386, 387, 393 LiDonnici, L. R.  545 Lieberson, S.  192, 193, 194 Lieven, A. von  375 Lincoln, B.  53 Lindenberger, J. M.  376, 379, 516 Lipiński, E.  190, 300, 320, 477

582

Index of Authors

Lipschits, O.  39, 43, 68, 129, 196, 197, 319, 469, 488, 499, 532, 533, 535, 537, 538, 539 Liverani, M.  301, 476 Lloyd, A. B.  235, 303, 304, 312, 315, 316, 328 Loader, J. A.  54 Lobel, E.  312 Lohfink, N.  4, 5, 7, 180 Longacre, R. E.  279 Loprieno, A.  303 Lorber, C.  448, 539 Lozachmeur, H.  365, 366, 367, 369, 370, 371, 372, 408, 534 Luckenbill, D.  230 Lüddeckens, E.  315, 321, 388 Luft, U.  307 Lundbom, J. R.  248 Lust, J.  303 Luther, M.  461 Lux, R.  154 Luzzatto, M. J.  384 Lydus 331 Lysias 42 MacAlister, R. A. S.  319, 563, 565, 566, 570 Macchi, J.-D.  154 Machinist, P.  449, 450 MacKay, H. A.  406 Magen, Y.  450, 490, 537, 539 Malaise, M.  298 Malek, J.  323 Malinine, M.  287, 311 Mankowski, P. V.  43 Mann, C. S.  471 Mantran, R.  514 Manuelian, P. der  291, 296 Marcson, S.  191 Marcus, R.  483, 484, 485, 492 Marín, J. A. B.  320 Marti, K.  157 Martin, G. T.  331 Mason, R.  157 Mason, S.  43, 93, 421, 468 Maspero, G.  299 Mattha, G.  300 May, K.  547 McCarter, P. K.  533 McCarthy, D. J.  325 McDonald, M.  197, 200, 205

McEvenue, S. E.  14 McEwan, G. J. P.  225, 238 McGovern, P. E.  331 McLaughlin, J. L.  410, 413, 414 McMahon, G.  8 Meeks, D.  288, 290 Meek, T. J.  465 Meinhold, A.  49, 50, 51 Melamed, E. Z.  112 Mendels, D.  50 Menes, A.  472 Menu, B.  311 Merton, R. K.  191, 192, 193, 208 Meshorer, Y.  448, 449, 450, 451, 455, 539 Messner, S. F.  192, 196 Mettinger, T. N. D.  300 Metzger, M.  484 Meulenaere, H. de  311 Meyer, E.  309, 312, 423, 432 Meyer, R.  298, 323 Meyers, C. L.  137, 154, 324 Meyers, E. M.  137, 154 Michalowski, P.  143, 247 Middlemas, J.  69, 71, 85, 89, 91, 93, 106, 107, 108, 109, 116, 121, 122, 189 Mildenberg, L.  447, 449 Milgrom, J.  80, 201 Miller, F.  39 Miller, J. C.  196 Miller, J. M.  474, 484, 487 Miller, M. C.  55, 56, 57 Minchin, E.  295, 326 Misgav, H.  537, 539 Mitchell, J. C.  193, 194, 195 Modood, T.  202 Modrzejewski, J. M.  436, 510 Moftah, R.  280 Mohammed  24, 461 Momigliano, A.  468 Montet, P.  306, 311, 331, 332 Moore, C. A.  53 Moore, D. D.  519 Moorey, P. R. S.  447 Moor, S. F.  178 Moret, A.  305, 311 Morgan, C.  228 Morgenstern, J.  484, 485, 486, 487, 491, 493 Morris, I. M.  42 Mosher, M.  297

Index of Authors Moss, R.  307 Moynihan, D. P.  195, 197 Mozart, W A.  55 Muffs, Y.  514 Muhs, B.  300 Muir, E.  178 Müller, W.  381, 382, 437, 509 Murphy-O’Connor, J.  471 Murray, O.  298, 314 Murtonen, A.  300, 302 Myerhoff, B. G.  178 Myers, J. M.  190 Myśliwĩec, K.  303 Naʾaman, N.  405, 507, 508, 511, 530 Nagy, I.  297 Nau, F.  380, 385, 386 Naumann, T.  16, 17, 22 Naveh, J.  369, 529, 535, 537, 563 Naville, E.  305 Needham, R.  190, 201 Neugebauer, O.  405 Neusner, J.  308 Newman, J. H.  205 Nicholson, E. W.  134 Nicklas, T.  547 Niehr, H.  376, 379, 384, 405, 412, 413, 435 Niemann, H. M.  507 Niemeier, W.-D.  508 Niesiolowski-Spanò, L.  322 Nihan, C.  3, 84, 85 Nims, F.  390, 392 Nock, A. D.  29 Nodet, E.  404, 408 Nogalski, J.  153, 154 Nöldeke, T.  379, 385, 386 North, F. S.  465 Noth, M.  245, 308, 484, 492 Novak, M.  197 Noy, D.  510 Nutkowicz, H.  409, 410 Nylander, C.  316 Obsomer, C.  298 O’Connor, D.  280 Oded, B.  507, 508, 515, 516 Oden, R. A., Jr.  290, 291, 313 Oeming, M.  39, 537, 550, 555 Olmstead, A. T.  231

583

Olyan, S. M.  80, 165, 203 Oppenheim, A. L.  226 Osing, J.  299, 303 Otto, E.  3 Overholt, T. W.  196 Pakkala, J.  436, 437 Papathomopoulos, M.  375 Parker, R. A.  284, 293, 318 Parkin, R.  201 Park, K.-C.  69, 74, 76, 77 Park, R. E.  192 Parpola, S.  376 Patanè, M.  297 Paul, S. M.  128, 147 Pauritsch, K.  105, 109, 113 Peach, C.  192, 194 Pearce, L.  250, 251, 269, 270, 271, 274, 405, 434, 470, 509, 531 Pearson, L.  235 Pedersén, O.  249, 268, 297 Peet, T. E.  289 Perdu, O.  307 Perlitt, L.  160 Perry, B. E.  381, 382 Petersen, D. L.  137, 157 Peters, J. P.  563 Peterson, B. O.  205 Petschow, H.  475 Peust, C.  383 Pfeiffer, R.  291 Pfister, F.  299 Philo  331, 473 Piacentini, P.  287 Pichon, C.  197 Pike, D.  245 Pike, K.  193 Pilgrim, C. von  411, 430, 489 Plato 230 Plutarch  50, 312, 315, 320, 384 Polak, F.  529 Pola, T.  3, 154 Polignac, F. de  42 Ponting, M.  447 Porten, B.  67, 308, 316, 318, 369, 370, 372, 376, 378, 379, 381, 389, 390, 391, 404, 405, 406, 407, 409, 410, 411, 412, 413, 421, 422, 423, 425, 426, 429, 435, 477, 508, 509, 516, 521, 522, 531, 563, 564 Porter, B.  307

584

Index of Authors

Posener, G.  282, 283, 293, 300, 308, 311, 323 Posener-Kriéger, P.  287 Preisigke, F.  307 Procksch, O.  11 Puech, E.  564 Pury, A. de  7, 8, 16, 17, 19, 21, 23, 24, 26 Qedar, S.  450, 451, 455 Quack, J. F.  290, 375, 376, 378, 379, 380, 382, 383, 384, 386, 387, 388, 389, 390, 393 Quaegebeur, J.  283, 313 Rabenau, M.  546, 547 Radcliffe-Brown, A. R.  201 Rad, G. von  5, 6, 12, 13, 14, 15, 28, 462 Radner, K.  246 Radwan, A.  280 Raglan, L.  180 Rahmani, L. Y.  512 Rajak, T.  314 Ranger, T.  182, 200, 405 Ranke, H.  303, 304, 314, 388 Rappaport, R. A.  179, 180 Rappaport, U.  449 Ray, J. D.  283, 311, 316, 317, 320, 321, 323 Redditt, P. L.  154 Redford, D. B.  236, 237, 283, 286, 288, 290, 291, 292, 294, 297, 298, 302, 303, 306, 309, 310, 311, 312, 316, 318, 319, 320, 322, 323, 328, 330, 331, 405 Redford, S.  298, 318 Regev, D.  571 Reich, R.  565 Reinmuth, T.  433 Reisner, G.  282 Rendtorff, R.  111, 197 Reventlow, H. G.  157 Ricke, H.  307 Rider, G. le  446 Ridgeway, D.  311 Rivière, P. G.  190 Roberts, C. H.  312 Roberts, J. J. M.  158 Roberts, M.  55 Robertson, N.  330 Roberts, R. E. T.  193 Robinson, G.  406

Rocca, S.  511 Roeder, G.  305 Rofé, A.  68, 69, 72, 88, 89, 90, 91, 93 Rogerson, J.  461 Rollston, C.  529, 530, 531 Romain, J.  194, 207 Römer, T.  513 Römheld, D.  375 Rom-Shiloni, D.  139, 140, 141, 144, 203 Ronen, Y.  448, 449, 450 Rooke, D. W.  486, 487 Roper, M.  519 Rösel, M.  390, 392 Rosenberg, S. G.  404, 411, 489, 497 Rosenthal, L.  50 Rosman, M. J.  514 Roth, M.  477 Rowe, A.  319 Rowley, H. H.  196, 305 Royar, S.  556 Rubin, N.  180 Rudolph, W.  157, 158, 196 Rufus 455 Ruppert, L.  44, 47, 279, 548 Russmann, E. R.  296 Ruszkowski, L.  68 Rüterswörden, U.  300 Rutherford, I.  40 Rutledge, S. H.  322 Ruzicka, S.  319 Rydberg-Cox, J. A.  294 Ryholt, K.  283, 284, 290, 307, 376, 378, 379, 383, 387 Ryou, D. H.  157 Sadek, A. I.  292 Sæbø, M.  157 Saenz, R.  193 Said, S. F. al-  509 Salmon, P.  317, 318, 320 San Nicolò, M.  509 Sarna, N. M.  45, 47 Sass, B.  445, 535, 538 Sasson, J. M.  507 Sauneron, S.  295 Sayce, A. H.  370 Schade-Busch, M.  309 Schaeder, H. H.  532 Schäfer, H.  305 Schäfer, P.  58, 405

Index of Authors Schaper, J.  28, 30, 74, 75, 76, 77, 202, 204, 530 Schaps, D. M.  445, 446, 447 Scharbert, J.  279 Schart, A.  153, 154, 159, 308 Schipper, B.  290 Schmid, H.  308 Schmid, K.  3, 4, 7, 8, 48, 49, 154, 26, 25 Schmidt, L.  4, 279 Schmidt, W. H.  6, 308, 325 Schmitt, H.-C.  154 Schmitt, R.  229 Schmitz, B.  288 Schneider, T.  309, 331 Schniedewind, W. M.  109, 252, 259, 529, 530, 531, 532, 539 Schoen, R.  193 Schott, S.  285, 286, 313, 322 Schramm, B.  30, 69, 70, 71, 75, 76, 81, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 96, 106, 107, 109, 111, 116, 117, 119 Schultz, C.  173, 184 Schulz, H.  160 Schumacher, I. W.  302 Schwartz, D. R.  91, 485, 487 Schwartz, J. E.  193, 194, 196, 321 Schweizer, H.  279 Schwesig, P.-G.  157 Schwiderski, D.  432 Seebass, H.  14, 44, 46 Segal, J. B.  304 Sehmsdorf, E.  69 Sekine, S.  69, 105, 106, 109, 117 Sellin, E.  157 Sethe, K.  287, 291, 292, 293, 299, 304 Seybold, K.  158, 160 Shank, R.  295 Shaver, J. R.  31 Shelley, P. B.  40 Shiloh, Y.  469 Shils, E.  197 Shoham, Y.  535 Shubert, S.  292 Sider, D.  40, 41 Sifneos, E.  52 Silver, J. D.  314 Silverman, D. P.  280 Silverman, M. H.  253, 423 Simmel, G.  194 Simonides  40, 41, 42 Simons, J.  302

585

Simpson, W. K.  298 Ska, J.-L.  4, 5, 44, 285 Slings, S. R.  294 Smend, R.  10, 44, 45 Smith, A. D.  195, 197, 205, 462 Smith-Christopher, D.  49, 67, 68, 106, 108, 189, 193, 196, 197, 198 Smith, D.  138, 197, 203 Smither, P. C.  288 Smith, H. S.  283, 284 Smith, J. Z.  130, 178, 179 Smith, M.  69, 70, 290, 484 Smith, M. S.  507 Smith, P. A.  69, 71, 84, 88, 89, 90, 105, 106, 108, 110, 112, 113, 117, 119, 120 Smith, W. R.  462 Smith, W. S.  296 Snyder, Z.  39 Sobhy, G. P. G.  377 Soggin, A.  484 Soggin, J. A.  14 Sommer, B.  70, 76, 77, 92, 147 Sonnet, J.-P.  35 Sophocles  200, 451 Sottas, H.  321 South, S. J.  192, 196 Soyez, B.  330 Spalinger, A. J.  282 Spar, I.  270 Sparks, K. L.  130, 197 Speiser, E. A.  20 Spek, R. J. van der  269 Spencer, A. J.  323 Spencer, R. A.  546, 547 Spickard, P. R.  193, 194 Spiegelberg, W.  283, 323, 377, 388 Spronk, K.  160 Stadler, M.  377 Stager, L.  469, 530 Stamm, J. J.  246 Steck, O. H.  6, 69, 70, 71, 72, 86, 87, 89, 105, 26 Steen, G. van  42 Steiner, R. C.  390, 391, 392 Stern, E.  164, 197, 319 Stern, I.  256, 564 Steuernagel, C.  10, 11, 15, 19, 484, 485, 492 Stipp, H.-J.  24 Stoebe, H. J.  423

586

Index of Authors

Stolper, M. W.  250, 272, 273, 274, 509, 532, 533 Stone, L.  201 Strawn, B. A.  82 Stronach, D.  228, 229 Stronk, J. P.  55 Strugnell, J.  378 Stuckenbruck, L.  547 Studevent-Hickman, B.  228 Sutskover, T.  279 Sweeney, M. A.  70, 72, 93, 96, 157 Syrén, R.  17, 18, 24 Szubin, H. Z.  411 Tadmor, H.  226, 227, 474, 484, 507, 529, 531 Tait, W. J.  284, 285 Talmon, S.  49, 69 Tal, O.  68, 319, 447, 449, 450, 452, 453, 454, 488, 539, 572 Talshir, Z.  198 Tatian 332 Taylor, C.  193, 403 Taylor, J. H.  297, 410 Thiers, C.  290 Thiersch, H.  563 Thissen, H.-J.  388 Thomas, D. W.  127 Thomas, R.  295 Thompson, C. M.  445, 446 Thompson, D. J.  321 Thucydides  452, 468 Tiemeyer, S.  89, 90 Tischendorf, K. von  554 Tollington, J. E.  154 Tonkin, E.  197, 200, 205 Toorn, K. van der  36, 405, 413, 423, 530, 531 Torrey, C. C.  196, 485 Tresson, P.  305 Tropper, J.  331, 532 Tsfania, L.  537, 539 Tucker, G. M.  475 Tuell, S. S.  75, 77, 78, 79, 92 Tuplin, C.  229, 230, 318, 509 Turner, E.  180 Turner, V.  180, 203 Valbelle, D.  300 Valeton, J. J. P.  5

Vanderhooft, D.  196, 226, 319, 532, 533, 535, 537, 538, 539 VanderKam, J. C.  485, 487, 490 Vandier, J.  283, 284, 285, 308, 309, 329 Vandorpe, K.  521 Van Seters, J.  15, 44, 45, 300, 308, 326, 475 Vatke, W.  461 Vaux, R. de  330 Veenhof, K. R.  164 Veijola, T.  406 Vercoutter, J.  311 Vergote, J.  302, 303, 307 Verhoeven, U.  284 Vermeylen, J.  74 Vernus, P.  281 Vet, T. de  294 Vickers, M.  311 Vidal-Naquet, P.  42 Vincent, A.  423 Vittmann, G.  389, 390 Vleeming, S. P.  390, 392 Vogelsang, F.  291 Vogt, H. C. M.  198 Volokhine, Y.  313 Volten, A.  293 Volz, P.  70, 74, 85, 88 Waddell, W. G.  287, 297, 303, 304, 311, 314, 330, 332 Waerzeggers, C.  256 Wagenaar, J. A.  405, 406 Wagner, C. J.  547 Wahl, H. M.  49 Walbank, F. W.  42 Wallenfels, R.  257 Wallman, S.  194, 195, 200, 207 Warburton, D. A.  299, 300 Warning, W.  24 Warraq, I.  55 Waters, M. C.  192, 193, 194 Watt, J. G. van der  545 Weber, H.  280 Weber, M.  191, 462, 473 Weeks, S.  205, 547 Weidner, E. F.  249, 269 Weigl, M.  554, 558 Weimar, P.  4, 23, 24, 279 Weinberg, J.  255, 468, 469 Weinfeld, M.  8 Weinstein, J. M.  331

Index of Authors Weippert, M.  423 Weisberg, D. R.  257 Weiser, A.  158 Weissbach, F. H.  230 Wellhausen, J.  5, 10, 44, 157, 423, 461, 462 Wells, R. D., Jr.  70, 73, 75, 77 Wenham, G. J.  14, 20 Wénin, A.  14, 279 Wenning, R.  508 Werbner, P.  202 Werline, R. A.  205 Wesselius, J. W.  390, 392 Wessetszky, W.  298, 323 Westbrook, R.  190 Westendorf, W.  302, 306 Westermann, C.  14, 15, 18, 19, 20, 70, 73, 75, 91, 93, 105, 109, 110, 119, 279, 303 West, S. R.  235 Wettengel, W.  332 Wevers, J. W.  23 Widengren, G.  509, 514 Wiesehöfer, J.  429, 509 Wigham, P.  331 Wilcoxen, J. A.  326 Wildung, D.  281, 309, 310 Williamson, H. G. M.  51, 68, 109, 110, 128, 132, 134, 135, 136, 165, 177, 189, 196, 199, 201, 205, 231, 435, 484, 485, 486, 487 Willi-Plein, I.  183, 197 Willi, T.  67, 68, 82, 197, 198, 433 Wilson, L.  279 Wilson, P.  282, 290, 300, 306, 309 Wilson, R.  226, 230, 231, 233, 237 Winkle, D. W. van  113 Winnett, F. V.  318 Winnicki, J .K.  322 Wiseman, D. J.  464, 474, 508 Wöhrle, J.  153, 154, 155, 162 Wojciechowski, M.  546 Wolff, H. W.  158 Woods, D.  521 Wooldredge, J.  193 Wreszinski, W.  292

587

Wright, J. L.  131, 133, 174, 201, 202, 436, 438, 512, 515, 517 Wright, J. W.  197 Wunsch, C.  250, 269, 270, 274, 405, 470, 509 Xenophon  50, 316, 317, 319, 468 Yamada, S.  506 Yamauchi, E.  190 Yardeni, A.  67, 308, 316, 376, 378, 379, 381, 389, 390, 391, 421, 477, 539, 563, 564 Yaron, R.  409, 521, 522 Yaumagata, N.  294 Yeazell, R .B.  55 Yellin, J.  535 Yelvington, K.  195 Yerushalmi, Y.  515 Yinger, J. M.  192 Yona, S.  379 Younger, K. L.  474, 507 Yoyotte, J.  296, 305, 315 Yuval-Davis, N.  193 Zadok, R.  77, 81, 249, 250, 251, 252, 253, 269, 270, 271, 304, 405, 469, 491, 531, 532, 533 Zangenberg, J.  545 Zangwill, I.  192, 197 Zapff, B. M.  69, 70, 71, 72, 88, 90, 91, 159 Zauzich, K.-T.  376, 377, 378, 379, 389, 392 Zehnder, M.  67, 70, 78, 93 Zenger, E.  3, 6, 154 Zenger, P.  6 Zerubavel, E.  405 Zevit, Z.  245, 392 Ziemer, B.  9, 16, 514 Zimmerli, W.  5, 74, 80, 139, 471 Zimmermann, F.  546 Zivie-Coche, C.  305 Zlotnick-Sivan, H.  197, 201, 204, 322 Zorn, J.  469, 534

Index of Scripture Genesis 9  5, 8, 12 9:9  19, 199 10:14 304 11:27–19:38 44 11:27–25:11  44, 473 11:31 473 12  45, 47, 48, 295 12–36  9, 301 12:2 473 12:5 19 12:6 474 12:7 199 12:10  45, 48 12:10–20  45, 46 12:10–26 47 12:17 199 13:2 44 13:5 44 13:7–11 44 13:11–12 474 13:12 19 13:16 473 14 513 14:18–20 498 15 300 15:5 199 15:16 332 15:18 474 16 45 16:1 18 16:3 18 16:15–16  475, 477 17  8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 83, 17, 18, 19, 20, 23, 24, 25, 26, 26 17:1–8 18 17:1–27 475 17:2  18, 24 17:4 18 17:4–6  17, 475 17:6  24, 463 17:7  9, 18

Genesis (cont.) 17:7–8  18, 19, 23, 25 17:8  19, 199, 474 17:10–14 83 17:12 10 17:12–13 20 17:13 10 17:14 24 17:15–21  14, 24 17:15–22  20, 475 17:16  463, 475 17:17 45 17:18  20, 25 17:19  9, 10, 22 17:19–21  9, 17 17:20  24, 26 17:21  9, 10, 22 17:23 475 17:23–27  9, 10, 17, 20 17:26 475 18:1–16 44 18:12 45 18:20–22 44 18:22–32 46 18:23–26 46 18:28 46 18:33 44 19 44 20  43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 51, 52, 57, 58 20–22 45 20:1  44, 45, 48 20:1–3 48 20:1–18  44, 45 20:1–20 46 20:1–22:19 44 20:2 45 20:4  46, 47 20:7 46 20:7–8 48 20:9 48 20:11 48 20:12 47 20:14–15 48

588

Genesis (cont.) 20:15 45 20:17 46 20:18 44 21 47 21:1–7 44 21:2 47 21:22–34 48 21:23 45 21:24 45 21:27 48 21:32 474 21:34  45, 48 22:2 498 22:20–25:11 44 22:24 304 23  19, 481 23:1 19 23:1–20 474 23:3 474 23:4–6 474 23:7 53 23:15–16 446 23:17 19 23:19 19 24:22 446 25:1–6 477 25:9 19 25:12–18 8 25:13–17 14 25:20 19 26  47, 48 26:1 45 26:1–11 47 26:3 45 26:6 45 26:11 47 26:14 45 26:34 8 27:29 53 27:46 8 28:1–5 8 28:3 7 28:6–9 8

Index of Scripture Genesis (cont.) 29:19 190 29:28 190 29:34 92 30:4 190 30:9 190 31:18 19 33:19 446 34:9  190, 204 34:16 190 34:21 190 35:11  7, 463 35:12  6, 19 35:27 19 36 565 36:4–14 8 36:12 182 36:13 550 37 279 37–50  240, 435 38:1–2 477 39  307, 308 39:1 300 39–41 285 41:34 300 41:45  190, 307, 308, 477 42:21 22 42:35 445 45:10 302 46:6–7 19 46:34 302 47 302 47:4 45 47:11 304 47:22 299 47:26 299 48:4  7, 19 50:8 302 Exodus 1 296 1–14  325, 326, 328 1:7 325 1:10 328 1:11  302, 303, 304 1:17 47 1:21 47 2:15 327 2:21–22 477 3 325

Exodus (cont.) 3:1 328 3:2 325 3:4 325 3:10 325 3:11 324 4:6 45 4:19 325 4:24 325 5:1 325 6 325 6:2–8 25 6:4 22 6:7 9 6:8  25, 25 6:11 325 6:12  20, 21 6:14–26 325 6:26–27 326 6:29 325 6:30 20 7:2 325 7:20–8:6 325 7:22 325 8:3 325 8:7 325 8:18  302, 325 8:22 325 8:26 328 9:6 325 9:7 325 9:8–10 328 9:10–11 328 9:19–20 325 9:25 325 9:26 302 10:12 325 10:23 325 10:28–29 325 11:3 328 11:9–10 325 11:16 472 12 183 12:2–20 325 12:3 325 12:12 8 12:31 325 12:32 325 12:38 327 12:43–49 83 12:48 83

589 Exodus (cont.) 13:1–16 325 13:21 325 14:2 306 14:19 325 15  279, 295 16 31 17:8–16 54 19 91 19:4 91 19:5–6 94 19:6  91, 94, 199 20:1–5 53 20:5 53 23:23–24 135 23:23–26 140 24:3 176 27:21  20, 21 28:12 20 28:30 20 28:35  20, 21 28:38 20 28:43 19 29 3 29:42  20, 21 29:43–46 6 29:45–46 9 30:13 446 30:16 20 31 73 31:12–17 73 31:14 73 31:16 73 31:17 83 34:9 137 34:11–16 135 37:24 446 38:26 446 40  3, 4 40:22–25 21 40:23 20 40:25 20 40:34–35 6 Leviticus 5:15 201 6:2 201 9 3 9:23–24 6 10:10 202 11:16–20 142

590 Leviticus (cont.) 12:2 183 13:46 183 13:48–59 202 15:19–33 183 16 3 16:21–22 183 17 429 18 141 18:1–5 135 18:3–4 141 18:6 47 18:6–23 141 18:9 47 18:11 47 18:11–13 477 18:14 47 18:19  47, 203 18:24–26 203 18:24–30  140, 141 18:27 142 18:30 141 19:19  199, 202 19:30 81 20 141 20:2–6  141, 142 20:3 80 20:5 142 20:9–21 142 20:10–21 141 20:16 47 20:17 47 20:22 141 20:22–23 142 20:22–24 140 20:22–26 76 20:23–24 142 20:26 142 21:7 201 21:14–15 201 21:16–23 94 22:9–11 202 22:13 201 22:20–24 141 23:5–8 31 24:8 73 25 31 26 4 26:2 81 26:14–38 144 26:40 201

Index of Scripture Leviticus (cont.) 27:3 446 27:16 446 27:25 446 27:30 199 Numbers 3:47 446 5:2–4 183 5:6 201 5:28 199 10:29 550 11:2 46 12:1  307, 308, 309, 314, 315, 477 12:3 312 13:22 304 15:38 467 18 92 18:1–7  92, 94 18:2 92 18:16 446 21:7 46 22:8 46 22:9–12 46 22:13 46 22:20 46 24:20 54 25:1–18 182 25:13 19 28–29 31 28:16–25 31 33:7 306 Deuteronomy 1:8 19 3:28 137 4:2 36 4:37 19 7:1–3 182 7:1–4  135, 476 7:1–6  140, 466 7:1–7 204 7:3 204 7:3–4  190, 204 7:4  198, 204 7:6–7 199 7:7 48 9:14 160 9:20 46 9:26 46

Deuteronomy (cont.) 10:15 19 11:8 203 11:29 498 12  429, 491 12:5 498 12:11 498 13:1 36 14:22–29 550 14:23 498 16:1–8 31 16:6 498 16:11 498 17:14–20 466 18:9–14 48 21:16 137 22:14 47 22:16 190 22:21 183 22:22 47 23  28, 30, 75, 76, 77, 95, 112, 119 23:2–4 33 23:2–9  29, 30, 75, 76, 466 23:3  198, 204 23:3–6 204 23:4–6  31, 476 23:4–8 135 23:4–9 135 23:6  198, 204 24:1–4 216 25:17–19 54 26:2 498 27:12 498 27:22 47 28 119 28:10 515 28:26 552 28:36  142, 144 28:63  142, 144 33:25–26 473 34 4 Joshua 1:6 137 1:16 466 7:24 183 8:31 31 10:41 301 11:16 301

Index of Scripture Joshua (cont.) 11:21 466 15:51 301 23:3–13 48 23:12  190, 204 24:3 19 24:16–28 176 24:32 446 Judges 3:6 190 3:8 53 5:4 159 5:19 446 9 182 13–16 182 14:10 478 Ruth 1:1 45 1:7 30 1:16 30 1 Samuel 2:36 446 9:8 446 13:21 446 15:8 53 15:9 53 15:20 53 15:32 53 15:33 53 18:21–23 204 18:26–27 204 24:22 19 26:19 142 27:10 466 2 Samuel 1:12 555 2:1–4 44 3:35 555 5:12–15 44 7:12 19 13–18 182 14:5 22 15:7 44 15:9 44 22:8 159 24:24 474

1 Kings 1:31 53 1:43 22 2:3 31 2:17 190 3:1 204 3:12–13 135 5:11 564 8:41–43 82 11:1–6 135 11:1–10 182 11:14 199 11:19–20 304 16:24 474 17–21 182 22:1–4 507 2 Kings 3:4–7 507 4:14 22 5:22–23 446 8:2 45 9:30–37 182 9:36–37 552 14:6 31 17:6  43, 474 17:14 304 17:24–41 134 18–19 551 18:11  43, 474 18:26 531 22:3 465 22:3–10 466 22:12 466 23:1 205 23:1–14 466 23:21 31 24:12 267 24:14 508 24:16 508 25:13–17 463 25:22 465 25:25–26 464 25:30 269 1 Chronicles 1–9 550 2 231 2:35 190 3:1–24 231 3:17–24 231

591 1 Chronicles (cont.) 5:26 474 5:27–41  233, 428 6:1–38 234 6:18–33 234 8 232 8:1–8 232 8:1–32 232 8:17 465 8:33–40  231, 232 8:40 232 9:7–8 465 16:19 45 17:11 19 21:2 518 23:25 550 28:4 550 29:21 550 2 Chronicles 1:4 22 3:1–24 231 6:5 550 6:6 550 7:3 53 12:13 550 17:8 550 18:1 204 19:3 22 23:18 31 25:4 31 26:16 201 30:1 31 30:3 31 30:5 31 30:18 31 31:3 31 33:7 550 33:17 22 35:12 31 35:26 31 36:6 129 36:20 43 36:20–21  138, 463 36:22 43 36:23 43 Ezra 1–6  133, 134, 517 1:1  43, 201 1:2 43

592 Ezra (cont.) 1:4  51, 131 1:5  51, 132 1:5–7 196 1:7–11 463 1:8 43 1:11  196, 206 2 94 2:1  131, 132, 206 2:1–2 470 2:1–70 196 2:2  51, 132, 205, 486 2:2–19 470 2:2–61 175 2:6 470 2:14 486 2:19 175 2:43–58 79 2:59 205 2:59–62 175 2:60 550 2:61–62 201 2:62  196, 199, 203, 234 2:64 470 2:69 446 2:70  132, 205, 463 3 133 3:1  132, 205 3:2  31, 231 3:3  67, 134 3:4 31 3:7 43 3:8  131, 132, 206 3:11–13 132 3:12 132 4 516 4–6 518 4:1  51, 131, 175, 206 4:1–3 201 4:1–4  134, 198, 202 4:2 201 4:3  43, 134 4:4  67, 132, 134 4:5 43 4:6 132 4:7 43 4:8  518, 533 4:8–6:18 467 4:9–10 134 4:12  131, 467

Index of Scripture Ezra (cont.) 4:12–16 175 4:17 134 4:23 467 4:27 43 5:1  132, 137, 467 5:2 231 5:5  132, 467 5:11–16 131 5:14 467 5:14–15 463 5:14–16 196 6:5 463 6:7 132 6:7–8:14 467 6:8 132 6:10 464 6:13–22 133 6:14  43, 132, 137, 201 6:16  131, 132, 205, 206 6:18 32 6:19 131 6:19–20 206 6:19–21  133, 175 6:19–22 202 6:20  131, 132, 203 6:21  67, 80, 82, 95, 96, 131, 184, 202, 205, 206 7 437 7–8  48, 432, 437 7–10 135 7:1 43 7:1–5  233, 234, 428 7:1–6 426 7:1–8 437 7:6  31, 131, 428 7:6–9 426 7:7  132, 205 7:8  434, 517 7:8–10 196 7:10  31, 428 7:11 428 7:11–12 428 7:11–26 426 7:12–26  426, 428, 432, 438 7:13  132, 205 7:14  497, 498 7:15–17 497

Ezra (cont.) 7:18  426, 428 7:19 463 7:21 428 7:21–22 437 7:24 132 7:25–26 498 7:27 176 8:1 131 8:1–36  196, 426 8:3–14 470 8:4 470 8:9 470 8:15 31 8:21–23 428 8:22 427 8:24–30 463 8:25 205 8:29 132 8:31 428 8:33–34 463 8:35  131, 174, 175 8:36 426 9  75, 76, 106, 428 9–10  34, 47, 49, 65, 68, 69, 72, 76, 93, 95, 135, 165, 174, 179, 185, 189, 193, 196, 197, 201, 207, 208, 432, 437, 470, 476, 551 9:1  33, 67, 76, 132, 135, 175, 179, 189, 198, 202, 205, 207 9:1–2  135, 207 9:1–10:1 173 9:2  67, 68, 135, 174, 179, 190, 199, 201, 202, 478 9:3  180, 207 9:3–7 180 9:4  68, 72, 88, 123, 131, 174, 201, 205, 206 9:4–5 179 9:6–7 207 9:6–15 179 9:7 201 9:8  131, 201, 206 9:9  43, 176 9:10  179, 207

Index of Scripture Ezra (cont.) 9–10:1 178 9:11  67, 135, 179, 183, 203, 206, 207 9:12  180, 190, 198, 204, 207 9:13–15  131, 206 9:14  135, 183, 190, 198, 202, 204, 205, 207 9:15 207 10  179, 437 10:1  179, 198, 204, 205, 207 10:2  67, 179, 189, 190, 201, 207 10:2–3 27 10:2–6 178 10:3  31, 72, 88, 123, 135, 202, 476 10:4 179 10:5  132, 179, 205, 206, 476 10:6  68, 131, 174, 179, 201, 206, 487, 490, 494 10:6–8 206 10:6–44 476 10:7  68, 174, 175, 205, 206 10:7–8 207 10:7–44 178 10:8  68, 131, 174, 189, 198, 202, 204, 206, 472 10:9  179, 205 10:10  190, 201, 207, 428 10:10–11 189 10:11  67, 76, 135, 189, 202 10:12  198, 204, 205 10:12–13  176, 179 10:13 22 10:14  176, 189, 190, 198, 204 10:14–44 176 10:15  205, 426 10:16  68, 174, 202, 206, 428 10:17 135

Ezra (cont.) 10:17–18  189, 190 10:18–43 183 10:19  179, 201, 202, 207 10:35 31 10:37 31 10:43 177 10:44  135, 189, 190 12:28 426 13:23 175 14 174 25–32 157 38:24 446 Nehemiah 1 131 1–13  135, 517 1:1  50, 436, 490 1:1–3 131 1:2  131, 132, 426 1:3  206, 431 1:4–11  427, 432 1:6 132 1:11 436 2:1–6  431, 436 2:3 426 2:6 426 2:7 428 2:7–9  426, 431, 518 2:8 427 2:9 428 2:10  132, 135, 426, 427, 550 2:11 436 2:11–18 431 2:15–18 436 2:16  132, 467 2:18 427 2:19  135, 175, 431, 475 2:19–20  426, 427, 517 2:20  201, 427 3 255 3–4 133 3:1–32 435 3:33–4:17  426, 427 3:33–34 132 3:34 467 3:36 427 3:38  431, 436

593 Nehemiah (cont.) 4 506 4:1–2 135 4:6 132 4:7–8 132 4:8  132, 201 4:10 132 4:13  132, 426 4:14 427 4:16 132 5  133, 201, 427, 431 5:1  132, 426, 467 5:5 426 5:7–8 426 5:8  132, 134 5:9 432 5:10 426 5:13 174 5:14 426 5:14–18 427 5:14–19 428 5:15 132 5:17  132, 134, 467 5:19  132, 427 6:1–2 475 6:1–9 135 6:1–14 426 6:1–19 427 6:5–7 431 6:5–9 517 6:6  132, 175 6:11–19 135 6:12 201 6:14  201, 427 6:15  431, 436 6:15–19 426 6:16  427, 475 6:17–19 175 6:18–19 201 7 94 7:1 518 7:2 426 7:4 132 7:4–5 132 7:4–72 518 7:5  132, 470 7:5–6 131 7:6  131, 132, 206 7:6–63 175 7:6–72 132 7:7  51, 486

594 Nehemiah (cont.) 7:7–24 470 7:11 470 7:46–60 79 7:61 205 7:61–65 175 7:63–64  201, 234 7:64  196, 199, 203 7:66  174, 470 7:72 132 8  133, 179, 432, 437 8–9  131, 436 8–10 433 8:1  31, 132, 133, 428 8:1–12 133 8:2  31, 428 8:3  31, 132 8:4 428 8:5 132 8:6–7 132 8:7–9 31 8:9  132, 428, 434 8:11–13 132 8:13  31, 132, 133, 428 8:13–18 133 8:14  31, 132 8:16 132 8:17  131, 132, 175, 206 8:18 31 9  87, 151 9:1–2 132 9:1–3  174, 178 9:1–4 179 9:1–5  132, 133 9:1–37 427 9:2  135, 177, 179, 181, 189, 199, 201, 202, 205 9:3  31, 133 9:3–1 179 9:6–37 128 9:7 131 9:14  31, 68, 133 9:24 67 9:25 31 9:29 31 9:30 67 9:34 31 9:36–37 517 10 133

Index of Scripture Nehemiah (cont.) 10–11 106 10:1 132 10:2–34 132 10:9 132 10:13 132 10:17 486 10:28  189, 201, 202 10:29  31, 67, 76, 82, 95, 96, 132, 184 10:29–31 93 10:29–40 435 10:30  31, 201 10:31  67, 68, 190, 201, 202 10:31–32 135 10:32 67 10:33 68 10:35  31, 32, 132 10:35–40 132 10:37 31 11:1  132, 201 11:1–2 518 11:1–20 435 11:1–36 196 11:2 132 11:3 132 11:3–36 132 11:7 465 11:18 201 12:1 231 12:1–26 196 12:1–47 132 12:10–11  486, 490, 494 12:22 490 12:22–23  486, 494 12:23 490 12:26  427, 428, 434 12:30  132, 203 12:36 428 12:38 132 12:44 31 12:44–47  133, 436 13  31, 34, 75, 76, 79, 80, 81, 95, 427, 431 13:1  132, 133, 204 13:1–3  76, 133, 174, 179, 180, 198, 202 13:1–13  133, 135

Nehemiah (cont.) 13:3  177, 181, 189, 202, 205, 432 13:3–1 178 13:4 427 13:4–9  76, 79, 80, 478 13:6  426, 434, 490 13:7–8 201 13:7–9  175, 499 13:9  183, 203 13:11 133 13:11–12 133 13:13  426, 533 13:14 427 13:15–22  68, 133 13:16–22 201 13:17 133 13:19–22 518 13:22 203 13:23  135, 190 13:23–27  165, 197, 198, 202 13:23–30 178 13:23–31  68, 93, 201 13:24  135, 183 13:25  179, 180, 190 13:25–27 179 13:26 189 13:27  190, 201 13:28  177, 478, 490, 499 13:28–29 499 13:28–30  133, 181 13:28–31 133 13:30  183, 203 13:31 427 16:22 427 23–30 174 Esther 1:1 50 1:2 50 1:3 49 1:5 50 1:10 57 1:13–14 50 1:14 49 1:18 49 1:19 49 1:21–22 50

Index of Scripture Esther (cont.) 2:3 50 2:4 147 2:5  50, 51, 52, 54 2:5–6 51 2:6  51, 52, 206 2:8 50 2:10 52 2:15 54 2:16 50 2:17 50 2:20 52 3:1–15 53 3:4  52, 53 3:6 52 3:7 49 3:8  50, 54, 58 3:8–15 53 3:10 52 3:13 52 3:15 50 4:4  52, 53 4:7 52 4:8 50 4:13 52 4:14 52 4:16  50, 52 5:4 52 5:5 57 5:13 52 6:9 55 6:10 52 6:13 52 7:2 57 7:4 52 8:1 52 8:3 52 8:5 52 8:7–9 52 8:9 50 8:11 52 8:13 52 8:14 50 8:15 50 8:16 52 8:17  52, 467 9:1–3 52 9:2 52 9:5 52 9:6  50, 52 9:10 52

Esther (cont.) 9:10–20 52 9:11 50 9:12  50, 52 9:13 52 9:13–15 50 9:15 52 9:16 52 9:18  50, 52 9:20–32 49 9:22–25 52 9:27 82 9:27–31  52, 199 10:2 49 10:3 52 Job 1:1–8 548 31 556 42:11 446 Psalms 20  390, 391 22:30 53 35:18 160 68:9 159 78:12  302, 330 78:43  302, 330 79:2 552 82:8 137 88 565 89 565 95:6 53 105:12 45 105:15 46 105:23 45 106:35 202 126 463 Proverbs 8:21 137 15:8 556 16:6 556 21:3 556 21:27 556 31:4 57 Isaiah 1  71, 72 1:2  111, 112

595 Isaiah (cont.) 1:4 117 1:29–30 86 2:2–5 71 2:3 33 2:16 304 5:24 33 6:13 199 8:3 47 8:16 33 10:6 117 10:20–22 206 10:26 329 11:11 304 11:15–16 329 11:16 329 13–23 157 13:12 74 13:13 159 13:17 43 14:1 81 21:2 43 21:13–17 509 29:17–24 473 29:22 473 30:4 304 30:9 33 34:3–4 552 36–37 551 36:11 531 40–48  128, 129 40–66 128 40:1 111 40:5–6 71 41:8 473 42:4 33 42:21 33 42:24 33 49–66  128, 129 49:15–21 146 49:26 71 51:2  472, 473 51:4 33 51:7 33 51:12 74 55:3 31 55:6–7 87 55:12–13 83 56  68, 70, 73, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 81, 82, 83, 89

596 Isaiah (cont.) 56–66  33, 67, 68, 72, 95, 97, 105, 119, 123, 124 56:1  84, 112 56:1–2  74, 111, 112 56:1–7 74 56:1–8  29, 30, 34, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 81, 82, 83, 84, 87, 89, 92, 94, 95, 96, 114, 119, 120, 121 56:1–59:21 110 56:2  68, 71, 74, 92, 118 56:3  27, 76, 83, 97, 114, 189 56:3–6 189 56:3–7 112 56:3–8  30, 73, 74, 78, 93, 94, 96, 97 56:4  31, 68, 71, 72, 73, 74, 83, 92, 93, 118 56:4–5 114 56:4–8 76 56:5  70, 84 56:5–6 81 56:6  68, 71, 73, 74, 77, 79, 83, 84, 86, 92, 93, 113, 118 56:6–7  27, 77, 114 56:6–8  31, 189 56:7  71, 72, 82, 84, 98 56:7–8 84 56:8  71, 74, 82, 114 56:9–12 71 56:9–57:13 71 56:9–59 87 56:9–59:20  72, 87, 95 56:9–62:12 95 57 85 57:3  115, 199 57:3–13  84, 93, 116 57:4 115 57:5 118 57:6 85 57:6–10 118 57:7 84 57:8  84, 85 57:11 118

Index of Scripture Isaiah (cont.) 57:12–13 84 57:13  85, 87, 114, 115 57:14  114, 115 57:20–21 115 58 87 58:1  115, 117, 118 58:1–2 117 58:2  116, 118 58:7 555 58:13 118 58:13–14  68, 92 59 118 59:1–16 115 59:2 118 59:4 118 59:5 107 59:7 118 59:8 118 59:12  118, 119 59:13 118 59:15–20 120 59:18 95 59:19 95 59:20  114, 118 59:21  31, 72 60 82 60–62  72, 91, 95, 105, 108, 110, 115, 116, 120 60–63:6 105 60:1–6 189 60:1–63:6 110 60:4 114 60:5 110 60:7  113, 114 60:10  113, 189 60:10–16 95 60:11 110 60:12 110 60:16 110 60:21 87 60:22 160 61  92, 98 61:1 108 61:1–3 108 61:2 108 61:3 108 61:5–6  91, 94, 95 61:6  92, 110 61:8 31

Isaiah (cont.) 61:9 110 61:11 110 62:2 110 62:9 114 63:1–3 108 63:1–6  72, 108, 109, 116, 120 63:3 110 63:6 110 63:7 109 63:7–14 109 63:7–64:11  72, 85, 86, 87, 95, 108, 109, 110, 115, 116, 117, 118 63:8  109, 118 63:11 329 63:12 329 63:14 109 63:14–64:6 109 63:16  85, 109, 473 63:17  71, 109 63:18 109 64:1 110 64:7 109 64:7–8 110 64:7–11 109 64:8  87, 109 65  88, 90, 119 65–66  68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 83, 85, 86, 87, 89, 90, 98, 110, 116 65:1  86, 117, 118 65:1–2  86, 89, 90 65:1–3 90 65:1–7  85, 86 65:1–66:17 115 65:1–66:24 110 65:2  115, 117, 118 65:3  86, 89, 118 65:3–5 89 65:4  89, 118 65:5  88, 89 65:5–7 86 65:7 118 65:7–12 86 65:8  86, 114 65:8–16  86, 90 65:9  71, 86, 87, 114 65:10  114, 118

Index of Scripture Isaiah (cont.) 65:11  115, 118 65:11–15  87, 93 65:12  72, 88, 89, 118 65:13  71, 72, 115 65:13–14 123 65:13–15  86, 114 65:13–25 86 65:14 71 65:15  71, 114 65:16–25  86, 87, 91 65:17 73 65:18 114 65:19 114 65:22 114 65:23 114 66  89, 96, 121 66:1  89, 120 66:1–4  86, 88 66:1–6  69, 85, 86, 88, 90, 120, 121 66:1–24 114 66:2  90, 114, 115, 121, 123 66:3  72, 88, 90 66:4  72, 89, 118 66:5  88, 90, 97, 121, 123 66:5–6 86 66:5–24 86 66:6  86, 89 66:7–14 86 66:10 72 66:11 71 66:12  71, 114, 116 66:14  71, 86, 114, 115 66:15–17  86, 93 66:16 71 66:17  86, 89, 118 66:18  71, 114, 189 66:18–20 116 66:18–24  68, 70, 71, 73, 74, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 90, 91, 93, 94, 114 66:19 71 66:20  71, 90, 91, 94, 115 66:20–21 91 66:20–22 94 66:21  90, 91

Isaiah (cont.) 66:22  70, 73, 83, 91 66:23  71, 86 66:23–24  68, 71, 89, 92, 94, 98 66:24 118 Jeremiah 1–20 264 2:6 329 2:20–28 140 7:21 330 7:33 552 9:9–11 143 11:7 330 15:1 329 16:7 555 23:1–8 463 25:11 138 25:12 201 25:25 43 27:3 464 28:1–17 464 29:1–28 465 29:2 508 29:3 466 29:5–6 470 29:6 190 29:10 201 29:15–23 464 29:29–32 464 30–31 201 31:32  77, 330 32:9 474 32:20–21 329 33:23–26 473 34:13 329 36:10 466 39:14 465 40:5–6 465 40:7–12 465 40:9–10 465 41:1–3 464 43:5 45 43:5–7 405 43:7–9 304 43:9  51, 467 44:1  467, 508 44:15–19 464 46–51 157 49:7 564

597 Jeremiah (cont.) 49:18 45 49:28 475 50:5 81 50:40 45 51:11 43 51:26 143 51:28 43 51:62 143 52:28 267 52:28–30 139 52:31–34 269 Ezekiel 1:1–2 139 1:1–3 139 2:3 139 2:4 139 2:5–6 139 2:8 139 3:1 139 3:4 139 3:9 139 3:11 139 3:26–27 139 5:17 31 6:11–14 142 8:1 139 9:8 140 10:18–19 472 11:13  140, 206 11:13–18 206 11:14–16 471 11:15 139 11:15–21 139 11:16 254 11:17–20 143 11:17–21 143 11:22–25 472 12:2 139 12:3 139 12:19–20 142 12:21 140 12:25 139 14:1 139 14:1–11 139 14:13 142 14:15 142 14:17 142 14:19 142 14:21–23 143

598 Ezekiel (cont.) 15:8 142 16:1–43  140, 141 16:2–8 141 16:3 140 16:20 141 16:38 142 16:38–41 142 16:43–51 206 16:44–58 140 16:61 190 17:12 139 18:2 140 18:6 47 20 73 20:1 139 20:1–38 140 20:5 141 20:5–23 330 20:5–31 139 20:10 329 20:12 73 20:21 73 20:32 144 20:32–44 143 20:33 141 21:1–5 142 22:8 81 23:1–49 140 23:8 329 23:19 329 23:21 329 23:27 329 23:38 81 23:38–39 80 24:1 139 24:1–15 140 24:3 139 24:15–25 143 24:17 555 25:5 143 25:13 143 26:1 139 27:10 43 29:1 139 29:17 139 30:15 304 30:17 304 30:20 139 31:1 139 32:1 139

Index of Scripture Ezekiel (cont.) 32:17 139 33:10 144 33:10–20 139 33:21 139 33:23–26 473 33:23–29  141, 471, 472 33:24 472 33:24–29 141 33:27–29 142 33:30–32 139 34:23–24 463 35:3–4 143 35:7–9 143 36:1–5 472 36:5–12 142 37:1–14 139 37:11 144 37:15–28 143 38:5 43 38:8 142 40–48  80, 81, 106, 123, 476 40:1 139 42:20 202 43:7 89 44  75, 76, 77, 79, 80, 81, 82, 89, 97 44:1–9 470 44:4–14 30 44:6 139 44:6–8 77 44:6–9  30, 203 44:6–16  73, 77, 79, 80, 81, 83, 96 44:7  77, 80 44:8 77 44:9  80, 476 44:22 201 45:12 446 45:21–24 31 Daniel 1–6 435 1:1 129 1:4 533 2:25 51 4 509 5:28 43 6:9 43

Daniel (cont.) 6:13 43 6:16 43 8:2 50 8:20 43 9:1 43 10:1 43 10:7 22 10:13 43 10:20 43 10:21 22 11:2 43 Hosea 4:6 33 8:1 33 8:12 33 12:13 329 Joel 1–2 158 1:1–20  163, 164 1:1–2:11 155 1:1–2:17 160 1:4 160 1:6–7 160 1:7 160 2:1–11  158, 160 2:1–27  163, 164 2:2 167 2:4  160, 161 2:5 161 2:6 161 2:7 161 2:9 161 2:11  158, 161, 167 2:12–27 153 2:15–17 155 2:17 166 2:18–27  155, 161 2:18–4:17 160 2:19  157, 166 2:20  159, 161 2:20–21 166 2:25  158, 159, 160, 161 2:27 167 4 155 4:1 168 4:1–17  158, 163, 164 4:2  157, 158, 168

Index of Scripture Joel (cont.) 4:2–3 164 4:9  157, 162 4:9–11 162 4:9–17 158 4:10 167 4:11 158 4:11–12 157 4:16 159 4:16–17  157, 159, 162, 165 4:17  155, 167 Amos 1–2 157 1:3 111 2:4–5 112 2:6–16 112 2:10 329 4:9 160 4:10 329 5:25 330 7:1–3 160 9:7 329 9:11–12 463 Obadiah 1:1 111 Jonah 1:15 183 Micah 1:2 157 4 158 4–5  156, 160 4:6  159, 167 4:6–7  158, 159, 164 4:7 160 4:9–10 153 4:9–14 158 4:12 158 4:12–13 167 4:13  157, 159, 167 4:14 153 5:2 153 5:7  157, 160, 164 5:14 157 6:4–5 329 6:6–8 330 7 156

Micah (cont.) 7:7–10 153 7:10–17 158 7:13 157 7:15 329 7:16 157 7:20 473 Nahum 1:1 153 1:2–8 156 1:2–10 153 1:9–14 156 1:12  157, 158, 167 1:12–13 153 2–3  156, 158, 160 2:1 153 2:4 161 2:5  160, 161 2:6 161 2:8 161 2:10 159 2:11 161 3:2  160, 161 3:3 161 Habakkuk 1:12 153 2:5–17 153 3:2–19 153 3:7  308, 477 Zephaniah 2 157 2:4–15  156, 157 2:7 159 2:8 166 2:9  117, 158 2:9–10 159 2:10 166 2:13  159, 161 2:13–15  153, 156, 159 2:15  166, 167 3:8  156, 157, 158 3:18  157, 166 3:18–19  156, 157, 158, 159, 164 3:19  159, 167 Haggai 1 516

599 Haggai (cont.) 1:1  137, 231 1:2 111 1:2–14 137 1:12 231 1:14 231 2:1–9 137 2:2 231 2:6 159 2:6–8 156 2:7  157, 158 2:7–8  159, 161 2:10–19 137 2:21 159 2:21–22 156 2:21–23 176 2:22 157 2:23  231, 539 2:23–27 147 Zechariah 1–8  123, 128, 129, 130, 136, 138, 145, 163, 164 1:3 111 1:7–17 137 1:15 138 1:16–17 137 1:17 137 2:10–11 153 2:12 138 2:14 153 2:14–16 137 2:15 81 2:16 137 3–4 137 3:1 136 4:9  136, 137 5:1–11 138 6:9–14 137 7:1–7 137 7:14 137 8:1–3 137 8:1–6 153 8:1–15 146 8:4–8 137 8:6–8 137 8:9 137 8:12 199 8:18–19 137 8:23  51, 467

600 Zechariah (cont.) 9–14  163, 164 9:14–16  157, 158 10:3 162 10:3–5  157, 158 10:4–5 162 10:5  158, 162, 167 10:11  166, 329 12:2–3 158 12:3–9 158 12:6  157, 158

Index of Scripture Zechariah (cont.) 12:9 157 14 158 14:2 158 14:3–14 158 14:11  156, 159, 162 14:11–21  163, 164 14:12 157 14:12–15 162 14:14  157, 159

Zechariah (cont.) 14:20–21  157, 159, 162, 165 14:21 157 Malachi 1:4–5 198 2:4–9 89 2:10–16  68, 165 2:11 79 2:15 199 4:4 329

New Testament Matthew 1:12 231 7:12 555

Luke 3:27 231

Deuterocanonical Literature 1 Esdras 4:45 198 5 470 5:38 201 8:66 198 9 179 9:36  177, 476 Judith 5:5–21 30 14:5–10 30 1 Maccabees 2:41 408 3:21 518 5:31 518

2 Maccabees 1:10–2:18 517 3:11 550 8:20 511 10 510 Sirach 49:13 517 Tobit 1:1–2 51 1:10–22 551 1:16–21 551 3:1–6 555 3:11–15 555 4 560 4:3–4 555 4:5–6 553

Tobit (cont.) 4:7–11 555 4:7–18 554 4:7–19 554 4:10 556 4:12  550, 551, 556 4:14 555 4:16 555 4:17  551, 555 4:18–19 555 4:20 551 4:21 553 5:10–14 554 5:11 550 7:3–10 554 7:6 550 12:20 546