The Use of Glossaries by the Translators of the Septuagint

Textus ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 157-177
Author(s):  
Sarah Yardney
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Word Lists

Abstract This article proposes that the Septuagint translators made and used limited Hebrew-Greek glossaries. While these documents are not extant, this proposal explains the perplexing inconsistency of lexemic knowledge in the Septuagint of Samuel, and suggests a possible resolution to the scholarly debate regarding the translators’ use of the Pentateuch as a lexicon. Evidence of bilingual word lists from the ancient Near East and the Greco-Roman world supports the plausibility of the Septuagint translators having such tools as well.

Laying Out the Fleece

2019 ◽  
pp. 67-89
Author(s):  
Kelly J. Murphy
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Near East ◽  
Early Christianity ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Different Cultures

Chapter 3 approaches Gideon’s story in three different ways: the role of divine signs in the ancient Near East; the portrait of Gideon as a hesitant solider in need of divine assurance in the biblical stories of Judg 6:36–40, 7:1–8, and 7:9–15; and the ways that early Christian exegetes interpreted Gideon’s requests for divine assurance. The chapter continues to trace how masculinity is constructed in different cultures, including the Greco-Roman world of early Christianity, where men were encouraged to fight spiritual battles rather than physical battles. These interpretations serve as a powerful reminder that masculinity is always “in crisis,” tending toward transformation and change, depending on cultural context.

scholarly journals Bitenosh’s Orgasm, Galen’s Two Seeds and Conception Theory in the Hebrew Bible

2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-63
Author(s):  
Laura Quick
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Near East ◽  
Sexual Pleasure ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Rhetorical Strategy ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Medical Issues ◽  
Genesis Apocryphon

Abstract In the Genesis Apocryphon, Lamech worries that his son is illegitimate and accordingly confronts his wife about her fidelity. Bitenosh answers these accusations with a surprising response: she asks her husband to recall the sexual pleasure that she experienced during their intercourse. Scholars have clarified this rhetorical strategy by connecting the episode to Greco-Roman theories of embryogenesis, in which a woman’s pleasure during intercourse was taken to indicate conception. While this provides a convincing explanation for Bitenosh’s argumentation, in this essay I argue that rather than deriving these ideas from the Greco-Roman world, the conception theory which informed the Genesis Apocryphon is in fact consistent with notions that can already be found in the Hebrew Bible and the wider ancient Near East. By exploring the concept of conception in biblical and ancient Near Eastern texts, I uncover a belief in the necessity for female pleasure during intercourse as well as the existence of female “seed.” These ancient authors were able to develop and promote significant reflections upon medical issues such as conception, and this is recalled in Bitenosh’s speech. This essay therefore has significant implications for understanding concepts of sex and conception in the Genesis Apocryphon, as well as in the Hebrew Bible and the wider ancient Near East more generally.

Is There Anything New under the (Mediterranean) Sun? Expressions of Near Eastern Deities in the Graeco-Roman World

2014 ◽  
Vol 20 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 345-370
Author(s):  
Daniel R. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Geographic Region ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Prominent Feature ◽  
Roman Religion ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Roman World ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Heuristic Device

Abstract The concept of divine translatability was a prominent feature of Graeco-Roman religion. Major deities of the Greek and Roman pantheons had their origins in the ancient Near East, and the Greeks and Romans equated members of their pantheons with ancient Near Eastern divinities having similar characteristics and functions. This study employs salient examples of equations and correspondences between the Graeco-Roman and ancient Near Eastern pantheons, as well as attestations of multiple manifestations of the same deity based on function or geographic region, as a heuristic device for problematizing the issue of divine translatability in general. It is asserted that a deity is but a projection of human will, a signifier without a signified. This, in turn, locates the phenomenon of divine translatability within the realm of the subjective, making any reasonable “translation” of two or more deities as valid as any other, with no external adjudication of the matter possible.

Greek and Roman Slaving in Comparative Ancient Perspective

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Jursa ◽  
Sven Tost
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
The State ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Diachronic Change ◽  
Institutional Sector ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Traditional Image

This chapter surveys the evidence for dependent labour in the Ancient Near East, particularly in the state or institutional sector of the economy, comparing the findings to pertinent institutions and structures known from the Graeco-Roman world. There is a focus on diachronic change within the Ancient Near East, where the role of dependent labour evolved significantly over time. The chapter highlights similarities as well as differences and points to some pathways for causation. The ‘traditional’ image (often associated with views expressed by Moses Finley) of the Ancient Near East as being characterized by a labour regime relying nearly exclusively on compelled dependent (but not slave) labour and thus being fundamentally different from ‘the’ Graeco-Roman world is nuanced considerably.

Slavery

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Byron
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Vital Part ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Religious Text ◽  
The World ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Accepted Part ◽  
Insight Into

Slavery was an accepted part of the world in which the biblical authors lived and wrote. It was a vital part of the empires in the ancient Near East and the Greco-Roman West. The Hebrew Bible condones slavery, contains laws regulating it, and even uses it as a metaphor to describe God’s relationship with Israel. The New Testament, entrenched in the Greco-Roman world, accepts the fact of slavery, commands slaves to obey their masters, and even recounts the return of a slave to his master. But as attitudes began to change and abolitionism became a motivating force, biblicists were challenged to reexamine the Bible in light of the new worldview. The Bible was used both to support and to condemn slavery. More recently, the descendants of former slaves have asked how the Bible, used to subjugate their ancestors, can still be a valuable religious text. These shifts in attitude have led to a reevaluation of how slavery is studied. Scholars have moved away from legal definitions of slavery, which view the institution from the owner’s perspective, to sociological definitions that provide insight into how the institution was experienced by the enslaved.

scholarly journals Pilgrimage and Festivals

2018 ◽  
pp. 301-318
Author(s):  
Laura Feldt
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Theory ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Near East ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Theoretical Development ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Available P ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Theoretical Approaches

This chapter discusses key theoretical approaches to pilgrimage and festivals and surveys the most prominent types in the ancient Mediterranean ritual world. The first section discusses the cross-disciplinary, definitional problems and argues in favour of broad concepts as a sine qua non for cross-cultural discussion and comparison. It outlines key approaches from the 1970s until today, reflects on comparable cultural practices, and suggests directions for theoretical development from the aesthetics of religion, spatiality theory, cognitive theory, and theories of fantastic narratives. The second section surveys key forms of pilgrimage and festivals from the ancient Near East and the Graeco-Roman world, and turns to Hebrew Bible and Jewish forms of pilgrimage and festivals. Finally, the chapter discusses early Christian types of pilgrimage from travel to places associated with the life of Christ, to travel to living saints and ascetics, and to relics, icons and images. For each area, the chapter touches upon categorization and the types of sources available.

Taxation in the Greco-Roman World

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noah Kaye
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Asia Minor ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Greco Roman

This article surveys taxation in the Hellenistic kingdoms of Asia Minor in the Near East, focusing on the Seleukid Empire and the Attalids of Pergamon. It argues that the study of Hellenistic systems and habits of taxation can tell us much about the distribution of sovereignty in these composite, multiscalar kingdoms. The negotiation of fiscal rights and privileges in these kingdoms drew cities, kings, courtiers, priests, and soldiers into frequent, even ritualized interactions. The article discusses taxation’s role in the competition over territory and resources, both interstate and internal, while also highlighting the role of taxation in the articulation of each state’s sovereignty claims on communities and individuals. Key sources are reviewed, both epigraphic and archaeological, including cuneiform documents from Hellenistic Babylonia and Greek inscriptions from Asia Minor (Anatolia) and Coele-Syria (Levant).

The Anonymity of the New Testament History Books: A Stylistic Device in the Context of Greco-Roman and Ancient Near Eastern Literature

2008 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 120-142
Author(s):  
Armin Baum
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Near East ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Prophetic Literature ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Books ◽  
Stylistic Device

AbstractThe anonymity of the NT historical books should not be regarded as peculiar to early Christian literature nor should it be interpreted in the context of Greco-Roman historiography. The striking fact that the NT Gospels and Acts do not mention their authors' names has its literary counterpart in the anonymity of the OT history books, whereas OT anonymity itself is rooted in the literary conventions of the Ancient Near East. Just as in the OT, where the authors of books that belonged to the genre of wisdom and prophetic literature were usually named while historical works were written anonymously, only the NT letters and the Apocalypse were published under their authors' names while the narrative literature of the NT remained anonymous. The authorial intent of the Gospels' anonymity can also be deduced from its ancient Near Eastern and OT background. Unlike the Greek or Roman historian who, among other things, wanted to earn praise and glory for his literary achievements from both his contemporaries and posterity, the history writer in the Ancient Near East sought to disappear as much as possible behind the material he presented and to become its invisible mouthpiece. By adopting the stylistic device of anonymity from OT historiography the Evangelists of the NT implied that they regarded themselves as comparatively insignificant mediators of a subject matter that deserved the full attention of the readers. The anonymity of the Gospels is thus rooted in a deep conviction concerning the ultimate priority of their subject matter.

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