Antiquitopia

The New York Times has an interesting op-ed article by Kenneth Jackson concerning religious freedoms, and their limitations (especially with regard to Quakers) in the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam in the mid-17th century. It speaks of an old document called the Flushing Remonstrance, which called for the toleration of all regardless of religious leanings, including even the Quakers. Check it out here .

I just read Foreskin's Lament: A Memoir by Shalom Auslander. It reads like a satirical autobiographical rant against his ultra orthodox upbringing, and his biting wit makes for equally very painful and very hilarious reading. I could hardly put it down. I have been reading parts of it aloud to anyone who wants to know why am laughing so hard. I especially recommend it to all the devout, formerly devout, and those caught in between! I am definitely going to check out his other book of short stories, Beware of God . It is definitely a nice break from my usual fare of dry boring academic prose.

It has been a long time since I have posted, so I thought I would show another picture from Italy. This is an aqueduct just outside of Rome. It reminds me of a scene from Monty Python's Life of Brian in which one of John Cleese's characters, the one who leads the Judaean People's Front (or is it the People's Front of Judaea?), asks, "What have the Romans ever done for us?" And a guy in the back lifts up his hand and says, "The aqueducts."

Jim Davila of St. Andrews has posted a lengthy and thoughtful review of Nadia Abu El-Haj's book, Facts on the Ground , which has of late been causing some controversy (although that has been overshadowed of late by the visit of Ahmadinejad). Check it out here .

Well...it has happened. I have now successfully defended my dissertation proposal, and so have the green light to move forward on my project. The most interesting or amazing thing about this process is that by the time the proposal is defended and accepted, and, in fact, through the process of dialogue surrounding the proposal defense and its acceptance, the proposal itself becomes instantaneously outdated. I have been tempted to post the proposal itself in the interest of the free exchange of ideas, but, in the process of discussion and research, I fear that the exact words on the page and even some broader issues will turn to dust and ashes, but, at least, out of those ashes a new formulation will arise that bears some resemblance to its former instantiation.

I feel a need to respond to a few of the comments in my last post in addition to some aspects of Lee Bollinger's speech itself. What I dislike most about all sides of the issue is the overuse of ad hominem attacks. It does not do any good, I think, to call Bollinger ignorant or a pawn of the media or whatever for his remarks yesterday. I think there are much better ways to go about discussing this issue. I do not moderate the comments made on my blog and I hope that I never have to do so, but I do ask that they evaluate the substance (or lack thereof) of what someone says and does rather than take the next step and disparage the person making those remarks (there are other places and times for such disparagements). I prefer open discussion, but resorting to ad hominem attacks usually has the effect of squelching discussion rather than promoting an exchange of ideas or information. The question, however, is whether or not, in this case, Bollinger opens himself up for ad hominem ...

Today, I sat out on Columbia's quad and watched as the speeches by Lee Bollinger and then Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were piped outside onto a megatron screen. The invitation to have the president of Iran speak as part of Columbia's World Leaders Forum, was and remains a highly controversial topic upon which everyone seems to disagree. I think that most (but as I found out today, not all) strongly oppose much of what Ahmadinejad has said and done, but the debate of whether or not Bollinger should have invited A. as a part of this larger forum revolves around the issue of free speech or to what degree we can maintaing free speech. And, in case you have not watched the news at all today, Bollinger made some very strong remarks about the Iranian President. But, instead of telling you about it, I will just show you. And, so here, for your ability to read and dissect, is the full transcript of Bollinger's opening remarks (pulled off of Columbia's website): President Lee C. Bol...

The AP has an article about a Nebraska legislator who placed a lawsuit against God for inciting terrorism, causing death and destruction upon the earth's inhabitants, etc. Evidently, God has responded to the suit, saying the Nebraska legislature does not have jurisdiction to file such a claim. And no, I am not kidding!! See the press article here .

On Monday, I was told to read the Times (that would be the New York Times for all you Londoners), because one of my professors was in it, contributing to (or commenting on) the Tenure controversy surrounding Barnard Anthropology Professor, Nadia Abu El-Haj's book, The Facts on the Ground . You can read an AP report here . It is coming down to a debate between academic freedom (for those on Abu El-Haj's side) versus shoddy scholarship (for those against). I have been avoiding reading the book for some time now so that I can plead ignorance, but it appears this tactic will no longer work. For those of you in the NYC area, Alan Segal will be giving a lecture on what we can know from biblical archaeology on Monday, Sept 17 at 7 p.m. in 304 Barnard Hall. It will, to be sure, be an extremely turbulent event. UPDATE: The event was hardly eventful. Some very prominent Middle Eastern and Asian Languages and Cultures (MEALAC) professors were there, such as Gil Anidjar. On the whole, i...

In case any of you did not know, part of my research includes Sabbath traditions, and starting Wednesday evening at sundown is the sabbatical year. That's right--beginning with Rosh Hashanah, for an entire year, according the the biblical and rabbinic mitzvah (commandment), one should leave one's field fallow for an entire year. According to a newspaper article from the Alton Telegraph (that's Alton, Illinois, for you bi-coastal people) sent to me by my mother, this is causing some concern among Israelis about bankruptcy. Since, for most farmers, a profit margin is rather minimal, an entire year without any crops could put many, especially farmers and kibbutzes with small amounts of land, too far in the red to recover. Interestingly enough, more moderate Israeli Rabbis have created a loophole: Jewish Israelis can sell their fields and orchards to non-Jews for the duration of the year. According to the article, "Under this arrangement, farmers can keep working the ...

Justin Dombrowski, a friend of mine in Columbia's history department, is putting on a Conference on Sunday, Sept 30, called, "Rome in Extremis: Outsiders and Incendiaries in the Greco-Roman World." This is a joint venture between ancient history and classics at Columbia, and it includes speakers from the religion department, JTS, and others throughout North America. It looks like a very interesting conference, and I would encourage anyone who happens to be in NYC that weekend to attend. For more information, see Justin's blog, " Ad Fontes ." Here's the schedule: 8:30 a.m.
Breakfast 9-10:20 a.m. Simon Ford (Oxford): “Quiet Riot, Imperial Responses to the ‘Religious’ Riots following the Council of Chalcedon” Stephanie Bolz (Michigan): “The Christianization of Magic in the Legal Discourse of the Theodosian Code” Break 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Joshua Ezra Burns (Yale): “Jewish Ethnicity, Christian Belief, and the Negotiation of Roman Civic Identity in the P...

Once again, I have been a bit derelict in posting as of late due to my many projects, the most important of which is my dissertation prospectus (of which some of you may have a copy and are proofreading at this very moment). Instead of posting something substantive or related to recent developments in the study of religion or antiquity, however, I here present one of the most famous sculptures from ancient Rome, which, like many ancient Roman pieces of art, is actually a copy of a Greek original. It is the famous "Dying Gaul." It is an amazing piece of work, in which the vanquished foe is depicted with startling sympathy (one might compare, in stark contrast, the representation of vanquished nations at ancient Aphrodisias). I basically went to this particular museum in Rome just to see this statue.

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education , current students and alumni from Barnard College as well as Columbia are drafting an online petition to deny tenure to Nadia Abu El-Haj, assistant professor of anthropology at Barnard. They claim that her research, particularly her book, Facts on the Ground: Archaeological Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society , distorts the evidence and is skewed against Israel. According to the Chronicle, "The petition, which has drawn just over 1,000 signatures, accuses Ms. Abu El-Haj of ignoring or mischaracterizing large parts of the archaeological record, of not being able to speak Hebrew, and of treating Israeli archaeologists unfairly in her work." If true, I think not being able to speak Hebrew would be particularly damning if that is the primary language of the work she is examining. I have not read her book, but I have heard quite a bit about it, always in a very charged context. In any case, I refrain fro...

During World War II, Erich Auerbach wrote his monumentally important study called Mimesis , while he was in exile. It begins its history of mimetic literary representation with a comparison between the revelation of Odysseus's scar in the Odyssey and the Akedah, or "binding," of Isaac in Gen. 22. This story from Genesis has reverberated throughout the centuries. You can find it in the Maccabean literature to describe martyrs, or, more accurately, to encourage martyrdom (ironically, since Isaac never died in the original story), there are hints that early Christians applied the story to Jesus, to medieval massacres of Jews in Europe (see Shalom Spiegel's fanstastic book called The Akedah ), and the story has resurfaced in a new guise today. Non Sequitur here. I have recently began to watch a new show on TNT called "Saving Grace." Grace is a cop who drinks, sleeps with married men, etc., and is basically on God's "last chance list." An ange...

Dear faithful readers of my blog. I apologize for the lack of posts as of late. I have been extraordinarily busy with my dissertation prospectus and another monumentous project. So, to satisfy you, I shall give you some eye candy of a picture or two I took in Italy this summer whenever my substantive posts become sparse. Enjoy! This picture is from the Duomo of Siena, which, by the way, is probably one of the most touristy places I have ever been (Siena as a whole, not the Duomo in particular). The Duomo is a medieval structure, and the interior, as you can see, is characterized by black and white striped stone pillars (it actually reminded me of the costume of Beetlejuice at the very end of that eponymous film starring Michael Keaton in one of my favorite movies of his). It is an absolutely beautiful building. The church also claims to have the very arm of John the Baptist with which he baptized Jesus. Although the city is extremely touristy, I was somewhat sick when I was there,...

Jonathan Klawans’s Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple: Symbolism and Supersessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism responds to evolutionary and supersessionist scholarship that has read sacrifice and the temple as things that were replaced by something better that came along later (Jesus for Christians and prayer for Jews), reading polemics that derive from Hebrews (for Christians) and Maimonides (for Jews) anachronistically back into sources, such as the prophets, the Dead Sea Sectarians, aspects of the New Testament, and Rabbinic literature. This book builds upon his earlier work, Impurity and Sin in Ancient Israel , and relies heavily upon the insights of Mary Douglas in Purity and Danger and her more recent analysis in Leviticus as Literature , depicting purity laws, sacrifice, and, with it, the temple as a “symbolic system.” Purity, sacrifice, and the temple are all interrelated: you must have ritual purity to approach the sanctuary to offer a sacrifice. After a fantastic lite...

For over two and a half decades, the Republican Party has had a virtual monopoly in mobilizing strongly religious voters. Yet, two new tendencies are apparently buckling this trend. On the one hand, there are new fissures in the relationship between evangelicals and conservative Catholics and the GOP with the rise of environmentally-conscious evangelicals and the importance of immigration reform, the minimum wage, and opposition to Iraq among conservative Catholics. Indeed, if you take abortion off the table, then many new alliances and religio-political possibilities arise. The other tendency is the stepping-up of religious language and a more comprehensive political strategy geared toward religiously-inclined voters among Democratic candidates. This latter trend is the subject of not only one, but TWO articles in the latest edition of Time Magazine . The first article discusses the religious background and the increased usage of religious language among Democratic presidential candid...

The scholarly community is in mourning as the Vatican Library closes for a THREE-YEAR rebuilding. A Columbia professor of mine who studies medieval Christianity gave me a heads up on this when I was leaving for Rome around the end of May. As Paleojudaica reports, scholars were sitting elbow to elbow with piles of manuscripts trying to finish their research before the inevitable closing. So, what do we do for the next three years? Oddly enough, a little over half of the Vatican's approximately 70,000 original docs are on microfilm at St. Louis University (a good Jesuit school), which will make St. Louis, originally my neck of the woods, of all places the new hub for those needing access to any vatican codex or manuscript for the next three years. Perhaps I will have a research-related reason to go home after all. I have also heard a rumor from a source here in NYC that there are other microfilms of much of the library in Brussels, or some northern European city, but I have not re...

Yesterday I was invited to join "Epherika" and her class to go to the Lubavitch community in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. The Lubavitch is one of many Hasidic (alt.sp. Chassidic) Jewish communities. We had an absolutely fantastic time. Two rabbis led us around, taking us to a very active and wonderfully noisy synagogue with people praying and arguing about this or that point in the Talmud. We stopped at "770." We checked out a little Judaica store with just shelves full of books, shofarim, fantastic children's toys (such as Hebrew blocks, Hebrew mats, and even Hebrew balls), and music (I almost bought a Matisyahu album--I think Matisyahu comes from Crown Heights, but I could be mistaken). We saw some rare books and scrolls that they have in their library. We went to the mikveh, where they separated the men from the women and gave us separate talks and tours. Interestingly, the women had a convert while we had one of the rabbis. And, finally, they took us to a very g...

As predicted, the Discovery Channel will be airing a special on a mummy that has recently been identified as Queen Hatshepsut based upon a tooth (see my post from June 27). The special is this Sunday, July 15, at 9 pm. Since I do not get the Discovery Channel, somone will have to tell me how it goes. But if you are like me and do not have cable (or limited cable), check out the cool website DC has set up for this.

The New York Times has a lengthy article today on Hillary Clinton and Faith. It basically gives a history of her background as a Methodist (often modified by the adjective "liberal") and how that drives her social and political activism. Much of the article talks about how her increased references to her religious background during her campaign have been interpreted (from calculated, politically motivated, and convenient to sincere). I do not think I am one to judge; only she knows her sincerity. I would say the same thing about W. Of course, faith and politics is a huge ball of yarn that is difficult to untangle, but here is question concerning just one strand of it: Cannot a politician of any persuasion have a sincere faith (whatever that means) even if it is exploited for votes? Or, put another way, just because a politician's faith is invoked to get votes, does that make her or his faith less sincere?

I have been away for the last week and was happy to see when I returned that my copy of the critical edition of the Codex Tchacos was waiting for me in the mailroom. Of course, it is entitled the "Gospel of Judas together with the Letter of Peter to Philip, James, and a Book of Allogenes from Codex Tchacos" with the Gospel of Judas in much larger print than the other titles for marketing purposes, to be sure. But I am particularly excited to read the books getting less press. Two of them, the Letter of Peter to Philip and James, are attested in the Nag Hammadi Codices, and so FINALLY we can see variant readings of the same text and begin to discuss issues of transmission history in ways that we cannot for most NHC documents. But the real gem, in my view, is the tentatively-titled "Book of Allogenes," which appears to be almost a midrash on Jesus' temptation in the desert and the Transfiguration all wrapped into one, but instead of saying "Jesus" t...

The New York Times reports that the residents of ancient city of Cologne, which hosts the greatest cathedral in Germany, is split concerning the building of a new mosque on the site of a converted factory. As the article reports, there are already dozens of mosques in Cologne, which, by the way, hosts one of the largest Muslim populations (approx. 120,000 people mostly of Turkish descent) in Germany, but they are all in tucked-away factories and warehouses that do not attract much attention. This new mosque would be Germany's largest and would give Cologne's Muslims a more conspicuous place of worship they can take pride in, and, even being Germany's largest mosque, it would not compete with the famous cathedral in proximity, size, or grandeur. More conservative elements of the population, nevertheless, have petitioned for the suspension of the project, citing the "common historical background" of non-Turkish German residents against the relatively "new...

I just finished reading Peter Schafer's new book, Jesus in the Talmud . Previous discussions on this theme have revolved around whether or not the rare appearances of Jesus in Rabbinic literature can contribute to our understanding of the "historical Jesus." Notable in this respect is the highly erudite and ultimately fruitless study by Johann Maier entitled, Jesus von Nazareth in der talmudischen Ueberlieferung . Schaefer seeks to move beyond such questions and discuss why Jesus is portrayed the way he is in the Talmud (basically, and to no one's surprise, in a very negative light). His thesis is that the Talmud's occasional discussions of Jesus--when Jesus usually is NOT the primary topic under discussion, but is merely used as an example for another point--provides a "devastating counternarrative" to the gospels. "Counternarrative," by the way, is Schaefer's favorite word in this book. To demonstrate this, he engages in close readi...

The New York Times has an article today that discusses the similarities, both flattering and not so flattering, between the U.S. Republic/Empire and the Roman Republic/Empire. These are comparisons that have been kicked around for years (centuries, actually). The original founders often compared the burgeoning government with the Roman Republic and Empire, focusing on the positive aspects and warning of the negative aspects (note, though, that some of what they viewed as positive, we would view in a more negative light, and so on and so forth). For the nineteenth-century interest, just look at the architecture in D.C.!!! Today this comparison abounds in politics, popular media, scholarship, and on the street. For example, if you ever stop and listen in the halls of Union Theological Seminary, it seems that this is almost all you hear with the important and clearly overblown and exaggerated caveat that Jesus and Paul were obviously ANTI-empire (the NT evidence is a bit more complex wit...

Gordon Brown , the new British PM, appointed several people of various degrees of opposition to the Iraq War to his cabinet. This distances Brown from both Blair and Bush (btw, it seems that lately you need to have "B" name to be the leader of an English-speaking country--the 2008 election should break that current trend), although it is a bit less of a subtle move than I had expected. This will make Brown's first diplomatic meeting with Bush very interesting indeed. Of course, they may just look for common ground in areas like troops in Afghanistan, but the message is clear: the UK under Brown's leadership is no longer going to be the US's closest ally in Iraq. But, in an undertoned manner, Brown has only verbally indicated that he would examine Britain's role in Iraq.

Zahi Hawass, the Egyptologist and secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Cairo (but you probably know him as that guy who is on every single television special about ancient Egypt), believes that a DNA analysis of a tooth proves that a particular "obese" female mummy found in the Valley of the Kings a hundred years ago is Queen Hatshepsut (r. 15th Century BCE), one of the most powerful Queens of ancient Egypt. The DNA analysis shows genetic similarities with the mummy of Ahmose Nefertari, the matriarch of the 18th Dynasty. I think the Discovery Channel will be covering this.

I am sure almost everyone who would be reading this blog (unless you accidentally stumbled upon it), knows that Tony Blair steps down today and his successor, Gordon Brown, becomes PM. He wanted to be PM ten years ago, but Blair beat him to the punch. From what information I have garnered, Brown is more intelligent than Blair, but, as I saw him give a speech on CSpan, he definitely lacks Blair's charisma, which has been so useful in foreign relations. Speaking of which, Brown's foreign relations policy seems to be pretty much the same as Blair's, at least, as pertains to Afghanistan and Iraq. I do not think there is much perceptible difference in domestic issues either, although I am not sure here. For the differences between the two, the New York Times reports (for entire article, hit the hyperlink on "Tony Blair"): "The new Prime Minister has promised accelerated domestic reform on schools, housing and public health and changes in the way Britain goes to w...

Because I have been engrossed in Coptic language, including the gritty text-critical issues, etc., for the past year, I have decided to add a few online sites (which I lifted from "Forbidden Gospels") to my sidebar. So, for all the aspiring Coptologists out there, check these sites out, and if you know of any more, please send them to me!

Last night I watched a PBS special on the search for Atlantis, that ultimate ancient place older than Egypt that was supposedly highly advanced, often used to illustrate the possibilities and ultimate failure of an aggressive utopia. Of course, the special was not all bad, because you get to see amazing past societies in the Mediterranean and S. America, what technologies we know they had, and speculation about why they could not sustain themselves (natural disasters, disease, etc.). I thought that was the end of the search for lost causes, until I started reading the blogs today. Paleojudaica has posted that someone thinks they know where the Holy Grail, the cup used by Jesus as the Last Supper, is. According to telegraph.co.uk , Alfredo Barbagallo, an Italian archaeologist, claims that it is buried under the sixth-century Basilica of San Lorenzo Fuori le Mura, one of the seven major churches pilgrims used to visit when coming to Rome. Let's not all hold our breath, though, be...

Today is the longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere! Not that it has 25 hours instead of 24, of course, but the most daylight of any day of the year (for those of lucky enough to have good weather as we happen to be having in NYC). Such an event is also an important religious holiday, especially, it seems, in the ever overcast environs of northern Europe. In case you do not know, thousands of people gather every year for the summer solstice at Stonehenge (note for full disclosure, I pulled this link off of Paleojudaica's posting), the famous stone-age site that remains a riddle to this day. So, happy summer solstice! Let's all find a way to celebrate the sun in our own ways. (I do seem to recall that "Paideia" held a winter solstice party a few years back.)

Because I love watching movies, I watched AFI's top 100 movies tonight on CBS. The American Film Institute first uncovered what it perceived as the top 100 movies 10 years ago. Of the top ten, only one movie has retained its original position from ten years ago: Citizen Kane remains number 1. In case you were wondering, the first Godfather is number 2 and Casablanca is number 3 (ten years ago Casablanca was 2 and Godfather, 3), and the most recent addition to the top 100 list is the Lord of the Rings trilogy (although not even close to top ten), largely due, I think, to its use of special effects.

Wipf & Stock has unveiled a new design for its website, one that is more user-friendly. W & S does a wonderful service to the academic community by reprinting out-of-print titles (for the most part, biblical studies, ancient near east, some Jewish studies, and Christian history and theology). As "Forbidden Gospels" has already noted, it is the only place to get the old Crum Coptic Dictionary. Perhaps even more significantly or at least more broadly applicable is that they will do custom reprints if you can generate a demand of at least 20 copies--something to think about if there is an out-of-print book you want to use for a class (and if the class has an enrollment of twenty people or more).

What an odd thing a diploma is! I just received my diploma in the mail (b/c Columbia does not give it to you on the actual day of graduation--not that I actually attended graduation anyway), and I have found several aspects of it perplexing. For instance, the entire thing reads as follows: "The trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York to all persons to whom these presents ma come greeting be it known that Jared C. Calaway having completed the studies and satisfied the requirements for the degree of master of philosophy has accordingly been admitted to that degree with all the rights privileges and immunities thereunto appertaining in witness whereof we have cause our corporate seal to be here affixed in the city of New York on the sixteenth day of May in the year two thousand and seven" Other than the complete lack of punctuation (do commas and periods make it look less formal?), I am wondering what exact immunities I now have. For that matter, what privil...

I have spent the past few weeks in the gastronomic paradise of Italia. I do not want to eat any more pasta for the next six months--enough is enough. But I do not think I could ever tire of gelato. I think my favorite combination (b/c I always ate gelato with at least two flavors) was chocolate and raspberry, which, incidentally, was the very first combination I tried. Perhaps some of the best food was in Bologna, the least touristy place I went and the city that boasts the first university in Europe (a close second goes to the University of Paris). The lasagna here was absolutely fantastic. Throughout Italy, there always seemed to be plenty of artichokes and zucchine, which, for me, was heaven since I love both. And, I have to say, the award for best olives in Italy has to go to the South (the area around Naples, the originator of pizza), but I must note that no place even approximated the olives I had in Greece. And, of course, I had the pizza. Whenever you travel in space, y...

Me at the Pantheon...how do you like my halo?

In the face of beginning to dissertate this year, I have decided to join the world of bloggers in order to remain connected to the outside world. The name of my blog reflects a combination of interests. I study antiquity, but I am also fascinated by the construction of ideal alternate realities, usually referred to as heaven or utopia, alongside their inverse, hell or dystopia. I am particularly interested in how these constructions of heaven and hell interface with claims of religious experiences, such as with religious visions and auditions and so forth. So, welcome to antiquitopia, a "no place" in time--whether it is utopic or dystopic, of course, depends upon your perspective.