Antiquitopia

In Exod. 33:20, the LORD famously tells Moses, "you cannot see my face; for man shall not see me and live." Moses then is allowed to see God's backside (v. 23). One might compare Exod. 3:6 where Moses is afraid to look at God. Recently I was asked if I would write up a little piece on seeing God in late antique Judaism. It is quite a broad topic, and, of course, should I take up the task I will be looking at some of the Hekhalot texts. But my mind also began buzzing about something else--I wonder how Rabbinic literature, particularly the Targumim and the Midrashim, handle these passages of seeing God and living or not living. That is, even though we have this passage of God telling Moses no one can see the LORD's face and live (although perhaps God's backside), there are plenty of passages where people do see God's face and live--even Moses himself. God says he speaks to Moses face-to-face in Num. 12:8 (as opposed to everyone else to whom he speaks in dr...

Earlier I noted a typo in my particular edition of the RSV that I use for class in which the LORD says to Cain that sin is "couching" at the door (Gen. 4:7). I took it as a typo, since it would be better rendered as "crouching." It would be a simple typographical error of the omission of one letter, but would totally change the meaning of the verse from a menacing predator to sexually seductive. Kevin Edgecomb, however, noted that all the RSV editions he could find say "couching," and so it might be the actual translation choice of the RSV. I had a hard time believing this, since "couching" just did not make sense, and "crouching" does, in fact, work with the Hebrew at this point. Other translations, for example, use "lurking" (NRSV). I suggested in the notes to that post that this might be an even bigger modern scribal error--one in the base text of the RSV that never got emended. Nonetheless, Kevin's suggestion th...

Kevin Edgecomb at Biblicalia has just posted on typographical errors in his modern copy of Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History , particularly how the turning of Satan into Satin, turns a potentially powerful moment into silliness. In the Bible I use for my Lit Hum class, I also have found an interesting typographical error. It is the Meridian printing, which belongs to the Penguin Publishing group, of the RSV of Gen. 4:7. The story is of Cain and Abel. Abel's sacrifice to the LORD was accepted and Cain's was not. Cain becomes angry in response, but the LORD speaks to Cain, saying (with the typo included): Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is couching at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it. With the typo, it seems that sin is spending the night, perhaps even bedding down at the door. The language of "couching" adjacent to "desire" is sug...

There seems to be a lot of interest in Genesis 1 at the moment. In addition to my post late last night on variation in its formal elements, there is a post at Early Jewish Monotheisms on whether or not it should be read as polemic. Although it shows a lot of similarities with and adapted the Enuma Elish (and, here, I think it needs to be read in terms of the larger Priestly narrative patterns in the Pentateuch), I tend to read it as liturgy rather than polemic. Gen. 11:1-9 is polemic. And, finally, there is Mark Smith's new book completely dedicated to Genesis 1-- The Priestly Vision of Genesis 1 --which I have bought but have not read.

Years ago, Moshe Weinfeld argued (convincingly in my view) that Gen. 1:1-2:3 was originally a temple liturgy. It does come across as a tightly constructed--highly structured--hymn with, in fact, some passages that almost seem designed for antiphonal choruses. Yet, upon a close reading, there are a great many variations within this structure. Just when the structure seems established on day one, there is some literary riffing by the great artist (or group of artists--perhaps from generation to generation) that put this hymn together. Firstly, let is take care of general organization. Gen. 1:1-2 serves as a nice prologue, or introduction to the main sections of the hymn. The "In the Beginning" or "When God began" with the famous problematic first word בראשית with a shava under the first letter already sets us off into the realm of literary labyrinths of impossibilities and possibilities. Right on the heels of it is the famous rhymed pairing of תהו ובהו. It is ...

Today I purchased R. Crumb's new The Book of Genesis: Illustrated . Many bibliobloggers have been discussing the release of this book lately, showing a pre-released page or two. My local independent bookstore, Book Culture , has had this featured on their shelves for weeks now, even though it is much before its official release date of October 28. Kudos to Book Culture for being able to get this weeks before it is available elsewhere. I have merely glanced at it so far, so my comments are necessarily cursory. The illustrations are very earthy--even those of angels and God (although God appears a bit luminescent). It freely depicts what the Bible describes (e.g., Adam "knowing" Eve, or any other sex scene in Genesis with some nudity--such as bare breasts or butts, and, when not explicitly nude, nipple outlines show through clothing). I was interested in looking at Genesis 22, the binding of Isaac, which illustrates the internal turmoil of Abraham through his facial ...

Here's a scenario. A person hears a voice. They think it is God. And this voice tells them to kill their own child. And they actually decide to do it! At that point, it is time for the police, perhaps the people in white coats, and child services to step in, right? Well...that's what happens in Genesis 22, making Abraham the paragon of bad parenting, at least according to the theologians of Family Guy. I might have responded similarly!

A little over Jordan, As Genesis record, An Angel and a Wrestler Did wrestle long and hard. Till morning touching mountain, And Jacob waxing strong, The Angel begged permission To breakfast and return. "Not so," quoth wily Jacob, And girt his loins anew, "Until thou bless me, stranger!" The which acceded to: Light swung the silver fleeces Peniel hills among, And the astonished Wrestler Found he had worsted God! Dickinson sensitively interprets the ambiguity between the "man" Jacob wrestles and the culminating verse where Jacob names the place of the wrestling match Peniel, "For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved" (Gen. 32:30), turning the ambiguity of the ancient text into a moment of delayed realization by Jacob--it is here, I think, that the astonishing impact of the poem lies. She leaves out, however, the impact, import, and perhaps transformative aspect of naming in the passage as Jacob, the swindler who grabs at the ...

The serpent sets the tone--seductive but also rousing. In none of its appearances is its image simple. It bears poison within itself, but on the Aesculapian staff, healing. It is the dragon of the abyss, but, at another moment, the lightning high-above. And long after it is meant to have brought sorrow on our first parents, the sight of the serpent-idol held aloft heals the children of Israel from leprosy. Nor did it tell lies, as befitted the most cunning of all the beasts of the field, at least not in the most important point of its promise. For it promised Adam he would be like God; and when Yahweh saw him afterwards he said, "Behold, the man is become like one of us, knowing good and evil" (Gen. 3.22). What sort of sin is that, wanting to be like God and to know good and evil? So far is it from being unambiguous, indeed from being sin at all, that countless pious people from that time on would most likely have taken unwillingness to be like God as the original sin...

I have been rereading Jubilees today, mostly because I am finding it increasingly relevant to my chapter on the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice , and I found the passage on the expulsion of Adam and Eve particularly interesting (and a bit funny): And he made for them garments of skin and he dressed them and sent them from the garden of Eden. And on that day when Adam went out from the garden of Eden, he offered a sweet-smelling sacrifice--frankincense, galbanum, stacte, and spices--in the morning with the rising of the sun from the day he covered his shame. On that day the mouth of all the beasts and cattle and birds and whatever walked or moved was stopped from speaking because all of them used to speak with one another with one speech and one language. And he sent from the garden of Eden all of the flesh which was in the garden of Eden and all of the flesh was scattered, each according to its kind and each one according to its family, into the place which was created for them. But...

If you study antiquity for any length of time, you'll realize that the ancients had a fascination with serpents. Not just with the cunning serpent in Gen. 3, but throughout all ancient cultures with multiple responses: they were ambivalent creatures, capable of death and rejuvenation at the same time. One might remember in the Epic of Gilgamesh how a serpent stole the plant that gives the power of rejuvenation from Gilgamesh. They were the symbol of Asklepios (Lat. Aesculapius), the god of healing, and, in fact, remain a symbol of medicine to this very day (the serpent around the staff). In fact, if you go to my academic bio page on the right, you'll see me standing next to Asklepios at his great sanctuary in Epidauros. They were symbols of the chthonic gods--the Furies, for example, have serpentine qualities and inhabit the area beneath the Acropolis in Athens. One might notice that Athene often has serpentine imagery. The fringes of her robes in her statues in Athens ...

One of the themes I emphasized this last fall in my class is the use of deceit in literature. You can find it almost in any ancient document. It is rife in the Odyssey , Aeschylus' Oresteia , and perhaps most prominent in Genesis. You can find traces of it in the Iliad , in the Hymn to Demeter , and so on and so forth. It is probably the clearest common thread of mcuh of ancient literature. And...uh...modern behavior with all the recent scams and scandals in the news. But, we are not the only ones with the penchant for deceit. It turns out it is quite common in the animal world, particularly among other primates: In a comparative survey of primate behavior, Richard Byrne and Nadia Corp of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland found a direct relationship between sneakiness and brain size. The larger the average volume of a primate species’ neocortex — the newest, “highest” region of the brain — the greater the chance that the monkey or ape would pull a stunt like this one...

The NYTimes has an extensive article today concerning teaching evolution. It covers much of the struggle that has been occurring, particularly in areas of strong evangelical camps who take Genesis 1:1-2:3 very literally. In this evolutionary struggle to survive, when confronted with students who have been taught their whole lives that creation occurred exactly, and in every detail, as Genesis has depicted it, a bit of gentle persuasion becomes the necessary means of instruction. Evolution is not at all a controversial issue among scientists--it is one of the most established aspects of "life science" and, in fact, is often considered the cornerstone of scientific thought. Moreover, there are other ways to interpret Genesis. It is a text that has been revisited for centuries (millenia actually), sometimes read literally, sometimes allegorically, sometimes more impressionistically (getting a general impression of the meaning rather than taking every single word literally), ...

I found the following in the Chronicle for Higher Education News Blogs --something I found scary. An intro to Western Civ instructor from an Iowa community college was fired for teaching that the story of Adam and Eve was a myth rather than something that was literally true. It seems this has been something followed for a while now, but this is the first I have heard about this incident. When you get down to it, how else can you really teach many of the predeluvian stories in Genesis? This is something we run up against all the time in religious studies and biblical studies. At my orientation meeting for Literature of the Humanities, in which we will be reading Genesis, some preceptors from other departments were a bit worried about how to approach biblical materials. It is always important to define your terms: myth, from the Greek, Mythos , means "story." In terms of religious studies, it does not mean what it has come to mean in modern society--something that is fal...