Facing the Facts About the “Face of God”
A Critical Response to Yosef Garfinkel
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Footnotes
1. Yosef Garfinkel, “Face of Yahweh?” BAR, Fall 2020.
2. See Shua Kisilevitz and Oded Lipschits, “Another Temple in Judah! The Tale of Tel Moẓa,” BAR, January/February 2020.
3. See Amihai Mazar and Nava Panitz-Cohen, “To What God? Altars and a House Shrine from Tel Rehov Puzzle Archaeologists,” BAR, July/August 2008.
Endnotes
1.
Garfinkel published this claim earlier in his excavation report. See Yosef Garfinkel, “The Iron Age Clay Figurine Head,” in Yosef Garfinkel, S. Ganor, and M. G. Hasel, eds., Khirbet Qeiyafa Vol. 4, Excavation Report 2009–2013: Art, Cult and Epigraphy (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2018), pp. 143–163.
2.
Shua Kisilevitz, “The Iron IIA Judahite Temple at Moẓa,” Tel Aviv 42 (2015), pp. 156–161; Shua Kisilevitz, “Terracotta Figurines from the Iron IIA Temple at Moẓa, Judah,” Les Carnets de l’ACoST 15 (2016). In light of the foregoing, Garfinkel’s declaration that the only source of information for the description of the figurines from Moẓa are photographs of the large horse figurine and the two anthropomorphic heads while the small horse figurine was not illustrated at all (Garfinkel 2018: 147–148), are baffling and misinforming.
3. For Ashdod, see David Ben-Shlomo, “Material Culture,” in Moshe Dothan and David Ben-Shlomo, eds., Ashdod VI: The Excavations of Areas H and K (1968–1969), IAA Reports 24 (Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2005), p. 161, fig. 3.62:1. For Kinrot, see Stefan Münger, Jürgen Zangenberg, and Juha Pakkala, “Kinneret—an Urban Center at the Crossroads: Excavations on Iron IB Tel Kinrot at the Lake of Galilee,” Near Eastern Archaeology 74 (2011), p. 85, fig. 23. For Tell el-Far‘ah (N), see Roland De Vaux, “La quatrième campagne de fouilles à Tell el-Far‘ah, près Naplouse,” Revue Biblique 59 (1952), pp. 551–583, Pl. XV:1; Alain Chambon, Tell el-Far‘ah I: L’âge du fer (Paris: Editions Recherche sur les Civilisations, 1984): plate 65:1; Miyoung Im, Horses and Chariots in the Land of Israel During the Iron Age II (1000–586 BCE), Ph.D. Diss. (Bar Ilan University, 2006), p. 90, cat. no. 7. For Tel Reḥov, see Katri Saarelainen and Raz A. Kletter, “Iron Age II Clay Figurines and Zoomorphic Vessels,” in Amihai Mazar and Nava Panitz-Cohen, eds., Tel Reḥov, A Bronze and Iron Age City in the Beth-Shean Valley, Vol. 4, Pottery Studies, Inscriptions and Figurative Art, Qedem 62 (forthcoming): fig. 34.4:28, photo 34.26.
4.
For a discussion regarding horse figurines in the southern Levant throughout the Iron Age, see Im, Horses and Chariots, especially pp. 88–93. For horse-and-rider figurines, see Raz Kletter and Katri Saarelainen, “Horses and Riders and Riders and Horses,” in Rainer Albertz et al., eds., Family and Household Religion: Toward a Synthesis of Old Testament Studies, Archaeology, Epigraphy, and Cultural Studies (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2014), pp. 197–224; Amihai Mazar, “Clay Figurative Art and Cult Objects,” in Nava Panitz-Cohen and Amihai Mazar, eds., Excavations at Tel Beth-Shean 1989–1996, Vol. 3 (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2009), pp. 530–555, especially p. 554 on the association with the popularity of cavalry and horse-driven chariots; Deborah O’Daniel Cantrell, The Horsemen of Israel: Horses and Chariotry in Monarchic Israel. History, Archaeology, and Culture of the Levant 1 (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2011) on the appearance and significance of horses and chariotry in the Kingdom of Israel during the ninth-eighth centuries B.C.E.
5.
The study of Iron Age figurines in Judah has intensified in the last three decades because of the surge in figurines found in Judah and particularly the astounding amount (more than a thousand fragments) found during Shiloh’s City of David excavations. Horse figurines appear along with the Judean Pillar figurines, depicting females, and various animal figurines and models of beds. See, inter alia, Raz Kletter, “Pots and Polities: Material Remains of Late Iron Age Judah in Relation to Its Political Borders,” BASOR 314 (1999), pp. 19–54; Erin D. Darby, Interpreting Judean Pillar Figurines: Gender and Empire in Judean Apotropaic Ritual (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014); Erin D. Darby, “Seeing Double, Viewing and Reviewing Judean Pillar Figurines Through Modern Eyes,” in Stephanie M. Langin-Hooper, ed., “Figuring Out” the Figurines, Occasional Papers in Coroplastic Studies I (Association for Coroplastic Studies of the Ancient Near East, 2014), pp. 13–24; and David Ben-Shlomo and Erin Darby, “A Study of the Production of Iron Age Clay Figurines from Jerusalem,” Tel Aviv 41 (2014), pp. 180–204, on the production of the figurines; Othmar Keel and Christopher Uehlinger, Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God in Ancient Israel (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), pp. 164–166.
6.
Garfinkel, “Figurine Head,” pp. 143–163, figs. 9.6–9.8, and particularly 9.12; these drawings ignore the scale accompanying the illustrated anthropomorphic heads from Moẓa (Kisilevitz, 2015: figs. 5–7).
7.
P.R.S. Moorey, Idols of the People: Miniature Images of Clay in the Ancient Near East (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2003); Timothy Insoll, ed., The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Ritual and Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). Regarding the Iron Age southern Levant, see, inter alia, J. Glen Taylor, Yahweh and the Sun: Biblical and Archaeological Evidence for Sun Worship in Ancient Israel, Old Testament Studies 111 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1993), p. 59; Garth H. Gilmour, The Archaeology of Cult in the Southern Levant in the Early Iron Age: An Analytical and Comparative Approach, Ph.D. diss. (University of Oxford, 1995), p. 245; Ziony Zevit, The Religions of Ancient Israel (London and New York: Continuum, 2001), pp. 272–274.
8.
Zainab Bahrani, Women of Babylon: Gender and Representation in Mesopotamia (London and New York: Routledge, 2001); Stephanie L. Budin, Images of Woman and Child from the Bronze Age: Reconsidering Fertility, Maternity, and Gender in the Ancient World (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2011). Regarding the famous “Judean Pillar Figurines” of the late Iron Age, see Ian D. Wilson, “Judean Pillar Figurines and Ethnic Identity in the Shadow of Assyria,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 36.3 (2012), pp. 259–278; Darby, Interpreting Judean Pillar Figurines; Darby, “Seeing Double,” pp. 13–24.
10.
Inter alia, harnessed horse and horse-and-rider figurines, along with cultic artifacts, were found from Cave 1 in Jerusalem; Thomas A. Holland, “A Study of Palestinian Iron Age Baked Clay Figurines, with Special Reference to Jerusalem: Cave 1,” Levant 9 (1977), pp. 121–155.
11.
Amihai Mazar, “Religious Practices and Cult Objects During the Iron Age IIA at Tel Reḥov and Their Implications Regarding Religion in Northern Israel,” Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 4.1 (2015), pp. 25–54, especially pp. 43–45; Tallay Ornan, “Gods and Symbols in the Art of Israel/Palestine c. 1000–600 BCE,” in Menahem Kister, Joseph Geiger, Nadav Naaman, and Shaul Shaked, eds., Ancient Gods: Polytheism in Eretz Israel and Neighboring Countries from the Second Millennium BCE to the Islamic Period (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 2008) (Hebrew); see Ornan’s recent discussions on the iconographic and physical depictions of Yahweh in glyptic art: Tallay Ornan, “The Throne and the Enthroned: On the Conceived Human Image of Yahweh in Iron II Jerusalem,” Tel Aviv 46 (2019), pp. 198–210; Tallay Ornan, Shlomit Weksler-Bdolah, Shua Kisilevitz, and Benjamin Sass, “‘The Lord Will Roar from Zion’ (Amos 1:2): The Lion as a Divine Attribute on a Jerusalem Seal and Other Hebrew Glyptic Finds from the Western Wall Plaza Excavations,” ‘Atiqot 72 (2012), pp. 1*–13*.
12.
See Izak Cornelius, The Iconography of the Canaanite Gods Reshef and Baal. Late Bronze and Iron Age I Periods (c 1500–1000 BCE), Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 140 (Academic Press Fribourg; Güttingen: Vandenhoeck Ruprecht, 1994), pp. 209–211; Izak Cornelius, The Many Faces of the Goddess: The Iconography of the Syro-Palestinian Goddesses Anat, Astarte, Qedeshet, and Asherah c. 1500–1000 BCE, Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 204 (Academic Press Fribourg; Güttingen: Vandenhoeck Ruprecht, 2008), pp. 40–41, 73, 77–78, 89, plates 4.1–4.20.
13.
For ancient Near Eastern storm gods and their chariots, see Moshe Weinfeld, “‘Rider of the Clouds’ and ‘Gatherer of the Clouds’,” JNES 5 (1973), pp. 421–426; Daniel Schwemer, “The Storm-Gods of the Ancient Near East: Summary, Synthesis, Recent Studies: Part I,” Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions 7.2 (2007), pp. 121–168; Daniel Schwemer, “The Storm-Gods of the Ancient Near East: Summary, Synthesis, Recent Studies: Part II,” Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions 8.1 (2008), pp. 1–44.
14. See William F. Albright, “The Psalm of Habakkuk,” in H. H. Rowley, ed., Studies in Old Testament Prophecy (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1950), pp. 1–18; Frank Moore Cross, Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic (Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1973), pp. 70–71; Theodore Hiebert, God of My Victory: The Ancient Hymn in Habakkuk 3, HSM 38 (Decatur, GA: Scholars Press, 1986), pp. 284–289.