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"Elephantine"
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Elephantine revisited : new insights into the Judean community and its neighbors
\"A collection of essays examining the fifth-century BCE Judean community in Elephantine in southern Egypt. Provides new insights into the origin and identity of the community as well as archaeology, criminal and family law, religious life, the Bible, and the Aramaic language\"-- Provided by publisher.
BOOK
Identity in Persian Egypt
No detailed description available for \"Identity in Persian Egypt\".
eBook
Yedaniah’s Identity as Priest or Layperson and the Rhetoric of the Letter from the Judean Garrison of Elephantine to Bagavahya
Scholars disagree as to whether Yedaniah, the leader of the Judean community of Elephantine at the end of the fifth century BCE, was a priest or layperson. This article argues that the letter from the Judean garrison of Elephantine to Bagavahya (TAD A4.7, 8) is the key to answering this question. The first draft of the letter (A4.7) makes a distinction between Yedaniah and the priests, indicating that Yedaniah was a layperson. Nevertheless, the second draft explicitly identifies him as a priest according to the reconstruction of the first line (A4.8:1) by Bezalel Porten and Ada Yardeni. Although the fragmentary nature of the second draft poses problems, this reconstruction remains the most likely original reading. Yedaniah's inclusion in the priesthood in the first line of the second draft parallels other instances in the second draft that erase the distinction between Yedaniah and the priesthood. In order to understand why Yedaniah portrays himself as a priest in the second draft even though he was in fact a layperson, one must attend to the rhetorical situation of the letter. The letter in both drafts contains sophisticated rhetorical techniques, with the second draft further enhancing the persuasive power. As part of the rhetorical strategy of the letter, both drafts implicitly draw parallels between the Elephantine Judean community and that of Jerusalem. Yedaniah's identification as a priest in the second draft bolsters these comparisons by rhetorically presenting Yedaniah as the counterpart of Yehohanan, the high priest of Jerusalem.
Journal Article
YHW the God of Heaven: An interpretatio persica et aegyptiaca of YHW in Elephantine
Abstract
The article discusses the background and implications of the title \"the God of Heaven\" used as an epithet for YHW in Elephantine. It argues that one should look for the background in the winged symbol used in both Achaemenid and Egyptian iconography. In the Achaemenid-Egyptian context, the title \"the God of Heaven\" worked as a transmedial, textual reference to the winged symbol that was common to both Achaemenid and Egyptian iconography. In Egypt during the Achaemenid period, the reference of the winged symbol and the title \"the God of Heaven\" was ultimately the Achaemenid dynasty god Ahura Mazda and perhaps the Egyptian king-protector Horus-Behdety. In the identification of YHW with \"the God of Heaven,\" we witness an interpretatio persica et aegyptiaca of YHW into the supreme gods of the Achaemenids and the Egyptians.
Journal Article
The Aramaic and Egyptian Legal Traditions at Elephantine
This is a study of the interrelationships between the formulary traditions of the legal documents of the Jewish colony of Elephantine and the legal formulary traditions of their Egyptian counterparts.ÃÂ The legal documents of Elephantine have been approached in three different ways thus far: first, comparing them to the later Aramaic legal tradition; second, as part of a self-contained system, and more recently from the point of view of the Assyriological legal tradition. However, there is still a fourth possible approach, which has long been neglected by scholars in this field, and that is to study the Elephantine legal documents from an Egyptological perspective. In seeking the Egyptian parallels and antecedents to the Aramaic formulary, Botta hopes to balance the current scholarly perspective, based mostly upon Aramaic and Assyriological comparative studies.
eBook
Previously, at Elephantine
This article looks at the evidence for a turbulent episode in the life of the Jewish community at Elephantine. In the months leading up to the destruction of the Yaho temple, the summer of 410 BCE, Jews and Egyptians found themselves at loggerheads in a conflict about a precious stone. The stone had been stolen from the Egyptians and then turned up in the hands of Jewish traders. Six letters from the Elephantine archives document the affair. Their analysis leads to the reconstruction of a crucial period in the relations between Persians, Jews, and Egyptians in the late Achaemenid era.
Journal Article
Imitatio Dei, Imitatio Darii: Authority, Assimilation and Afterlife of the Epilogue of Bīsotūn (DB 4:36–92)
The Bīsotūn inscription of Darius I (DB) is a masterpiece of ancient literature containing descriptions of historical events, imperial propaganda, cultic statements, ethical instructions, wisdom insights, blessings and curses, and engagements with posterity. It was disseminated far and wide within the empire and left a lasting impression on the cultures with which it came into contact. However, a specific section of this royal inscription (DB 4:36–92), carefully crafted to address future audiences in the second person, stands out sharply from the rest of the text. This passage has made a striking, profound, and durable impression on future generations—which extended over the longue durée in both time and space. This article focuses on the decisive cultic theme undergirding DB in general and its fourth column in particular namely, the king’s profound sense of imitatio dei in the cosmic battle against “the Lie,” complemented by his appeal to an imitatio Darii by all future audiences of his words. The impact of this call can be traced in later literature: in a DB variant found at Elephantine and, most notably, a hitherto unknown exegetical legend found in Qumran, which seeks to explain this portion of DB through an Achaemenid court tale.
Journal Article
Justice at the House of Yhw(h): An Early Yahwistic Defixio in Furem
What was the nature of ritual in ancient Yahwism? Although biblical sources provide some information about various types of cultic activity, we have thus far lacked any extra-biblical ritual texts from Yahwistic circles prior to Greco–Roman times. This article presents such a text—one that has been hiding in plain sight for almost a century on a small ostracon found on the island of Elephantine. It has variously been interpreted as dealing with instructions regarding a tunic left at the “house of Yhw”—the temple to Yhw(h) that flourished on the island from the middle of the sixth to the end of the fourth century BCE. While there is little debate regarding the epigraphic reading of this text, it has hitherto failed to be correctly interpreted. I present an entirely new reading of this important document, revealing it to be written in poetic form and to match the characteristics of a “prayer for justice” curse ritual. It is, in fact, the oldest known example of this genre; its only known specimen in Aramaic, its unique witness in a Yahwistic context, and the sole record of any ritual performance at a temple to Yhw(h). Significantly, it is administered by a priestess.
Journal Article
Berlin Papyrus P. 13447 and the Library of the Yehudite Colony at Elephantine
Berlin Papyrus P. 13447 was found along with a number of other papyri during the 1906-1908 German excavations at Elephantine. The papyrus was first published by Eduard Sachau in 1911; its first English language edition was A. E. Cowley's 1923 Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century B.C. In the 1970s and early 1980s, more pieces were assigned to the papyrus, culminating in the Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum edition of 1982. The current standard edition is the Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt (TAD). There are two texts on the papyrus. The recto and first two columns of the verso contain an Aramaic version of Darius I's Bisitun inscription. The remainder of the verso contains a set of memoranda. Although the texts on the papyrus have been well-studied and published, especially in Cowley's edition and TAD, these publications obscure the composite nature of the papyrus scroll: the texts on the scroll have been presented in separate sections of the publications. Here, Mitchell highlights the relationship between the texts on the scroll, which is not well presented in either TAD or Cowley's work.
Journal Article
Dimensions of Yahwism in the Persian Period
What was Judaean religion in the Persian period like? Is it necessary to use the Bible to give an answer to the question? Among other things the study argues that
• the religion practiced in the 5th c. BCE Elephantine community and which is reflected in the so-called Elephantine documents represent a well-attested manifestation of lived Persian period Yahwism,
• as religio-historical sources, the Elephantine documents reveal more about the actual religious practice of the Elephantine Judaeans than what the highly edited and canonised texts of the Bible reveal about the religious practice of the contemporary Yahwistic coreligionists in Judah, and
• the image of the Elephantine Judaism emerging from the Elephantine documents can revise the canonised image of Judaean religion in the Persian period (cf. A. Assmann).
The Elephantine Yahwism should not be interpreted within a framework dependent upon theological, conceptual and spatial concepts alien to it, such as biblical ones. The study proposes an alternative framework by approaching the Elephantine documents on the basis of N. Smart's multidimensional model of religion. Elephantine should not be exotified but brought to the very centre of any discussion of the history of Judaism.
eBook