As I learned more about the literature and history of my tradition, I found myself drawn to another important author, Narsai, and wondered whether someday a similarly accessible and instructive volume might be written about him. This project has been both a dream and an aspiration ever since.
Read MorePublication Preview | Two Portraits of John the Baptist
From the outset, I envisaged two clearly distinct books, one popular and the other more academic, one with fewer footnotes than the other.
Read MorePublication Preview: Hellenistic Jews and Consolatory Rhetoric
Robin Guthrie, Consolation (1969) Royal West of England Academy (RWA) copyright (©).
Robin Guthrie, Consolation (1969) Royal West of England Academy (RWA) copyright (©).
Whereas scholarship has tended to investigate this question by analyzing the development of Jewish apocalypticism, afterlife beliefs, and theodicy during the Hellenistic and early Roman periods, my analysis of consolatory rhetoric in Hellenistic Judaism offers a more comprehensive approach.
Read MorePublication Preview | Beyond the "Cessation of Prophecy" in Late Antiquity
Manichaean Homilies, CBL Pma 2.25-26, from the Chester Beatty Library
Manichaean Homilies, CBL Pma 2.25-26, from the Chester Beatty Library
To be frank, I just don’t think any of our texts say this. Or, if some of them do, alternative readings are available and perhaps more plausible. In fact, the Manichaeans themselves do not have a single model of prophethood (although they do exhibit a push for systematicity).
Read MorePursuing Joseph in Early Syriac Literature
Title and Incipit of a Syriac Joseph text included in British Library Additional 14,588, from the 9th or 10th century (Courtesy of author).
Title and Incipit of a Syriac Joseph text included in British Library Additional 14,588, from the 9th or 10th century (Courtesy of author).
These texts offered a window onto the literary creativity and inventiveness of the early Syriac tradition itself.
Read MoreRitual and Religious Experience in Early Christianities
My research contributes participates in this ongoing conversation by exploring fresh methodological approaches to uncover the ways New Testament literature bears witness to ritual practices among early Christians.
Read MorePublication Preview | A Life of Psalms in Jewish Late Antiquity
The Psalms Scroll from Qumran, image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
The Psalms Scroll from Qumran, image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
The Psalms anthologize some of the poetry that circulated in ancient Israel and the Second Temple period. They are not fun to read—let alone straight through. No narrative arc or compelling character draws one into their pages. And the poems are often repetitive, sometimes boring and nonsensical. So why did my mother—and countless others like her—find reading the Psalter as part of their life’s routine meaningful?
Read MoreBackstage with Staging the Sacred
Fresco with a theatre mask and Nilotic scene, from the Temple of Isis at Pompeii (courtesy of Wikimedia commons)
Fresco with a theatre mask and Nilotic scene, from the Temple of Isis at Pompeii (courtesy of Wikimedia commons)
In some ways, Staging the Sacred proved a thoroughly disconcerting study. As I wrote it, I was continually reminded that the texts I have spent my career learning to read are, in practical terms, far removed from the actual phenomena I so wanted to study, the experience of the ancient synagogue. The texts resemble two-dimensional, frozen echoes from which I have tried to coax ghostly traces (perhaps illusions) of more dimensions. In the end, these poems—each a gem in its own way, a stone in the gorgeous mosaic of late antique hymnody—yielded up more insight than I might have thought they would.
Read MoreTransing the Talmud or Reading the Talmud "Badly"
Max Strassfeld introduces the methodological interventions of Trans Talmud (UC Press, 2023).
Read MoreDisplaying The Literary Artistry of P
Liane Feldman explores the process of developing her edition of P in The Consuming Fire (UC Press, 2023).
Read MoreRabbis and the Reproduction of Species
Rafael Rachel Neis, Figures of Speech, pen and ink on paper, 11 in. x 17 in., 2020
Rafael Rachel Neis, Figures of Speech, pen and ink on paper, 11 in. x 17 in., 2020
“If we abide by these insights in our encounter with ancient sources, we find a (surprisingly?) queer world in which a human gives birth to a raven, a cow delivers a camel, mud generates mice, and fire begets the salamander.”
Read MoreHow the Rabbis Taught the Jews (Not) to Read the Bible
Rebecca Sharbach Wollenberg introduces her new monograph, The Closed Book (Princeton, 2023).
Read MoreMultilingualism and Translation in Ancient Judaism
Steven Fraade provides a preview of his forthcoming publication on Multilingualism and Translation in Ancient Judaism (Cambridge University Press, June 2023).
Read MoreRediscovering Enoch from the Fifteenth to Nineteenth Century
Annette Reed introduces the dynamic range of scholarship in a new edited volume discussing Enoch’s modern reception.
Read More"Going West" in Talmudic Literature | Publication Preview
Reuven Kiperwasser shares his process of writing Going West: Migrating Personae and Construction of the Self in Rabbinic Culture in his own transient state.
Read MoreChristian Monastic Life in Early Islam
Path to Mt. Sinai [Image courtesy of the author].
Path to Mt. Sinai [Image courtesy of the author].
My book attempts to address this particular historical context and argues for not only a general religious tolerance in the early centuries of Islam, but for an overlapping of sectarian boundaries throughout the period.
Read MoreAuthor’s Musings: Bringing Down the Temple House
Marjorie Lehman shares the formative context of feminist scholarship and the pandemic that guided her work on Bavli Yoma.
Read MoreEditio Princeps: The 1523 Venice Edition of the Palestinian Talmud and the Beginning of Hebrew Printing
Yakov Mayer provides a glimpse at his newest book and work on the Palestinian Talmud’s manuscript tradition.
Read MorePublication | Desire in Paul's Undisputed Epistles
My study of “desire” (epithymeō, ho epithymētēs, epithymia, hereafter “desire”) in the Roman Empire arose because of the lack – at least as far as I am aware – of a single thesis or book examining the use of these lexemes within the Greek literature of the early Roman Empire.
Read MorePublication | The Slow Fall of Babel: Languages and Identities in Late Antique Christianity
Pieter Brueghel the Elder, Right side in detail from The Tower of Babel (1563). [Wikimedia]
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Pieter Brueghel the Elder, Right side in detail from The Tower of Babel (1563). [Wikimedia]
What does it mean to be labeled a foreign language speaker in late antique Christianity? How was one’s status as a native or non-native speaker determined? Was such a person considered a heretic? A barbarian? A Christian of equal standing? A saint or a demon?
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