Queries & Comments

008

You Lost Me

I will not be renewing again. I look for articles dealing with dig reports, archaeology and history. The never-ending, overly personal bleating and sooking from your contributors has finally defeated me.

Menorah

A Mythical Quest

My good friend Steven Fine, normally a careful and sober scholar, seems unable to free himself from the seductive power of myth (“The Temple Menorah—Where Is It?” July/August 2005). Many American Jews believe that the Temple Menorah is hidden somewhere in the Vatican. Steven knows that this is a “Jewish urban legend” devoid of any claim to historicity but nevertheless persists in pretending that it might be true. However, it is not true. There is abundant scholarly literature on the topic, including a 1716 treatise by Adriaan Relant (1676–1718), a short article by Yohanan (Hans) Lewy in 1945 and a long footnote in the revision of Emil Schürer’s The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ by Geza Vermes (1973). These scholars assemble various Byzantine and medieval testimonies to show that the Temple vessels were taken from Rome in the depredations of the fifth century and ultimately reached Constantinople via Carthage. Some vessels were taken from Constantinople back to Jerusalem in the sixth century in order to be deposited in a church being built there by the Emperor Justinian. These vessels were probably plundered by the Parthians in 614, or disappeared in an earthquake of the late seventh century. The Menorah, however, was not transferred to Jerusalem; it remained in Constantinople and was still there in the tenth century, in the time of the emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos. At this point the trail goes cold. Lewy speculates that if the Menorah was indeed in Constantinople, it, like so many of the city’s other precious treasures, would have been plundered by the Venetians in 1204 (in a war known as the Fourth Crusade).

In sum: There is no reason whatever to believe that the Temple Menorah is in the Vatican. Perhaps it is somewhere in Venice, perhaps it is somewhere in Constantinople (Istanbul), or, what is most likely, perhaps it no longer exists, having been melted down long since. Jews may dream of finding the holy vessels of the Jerusalem Temple, just as Christians may dream of finding Christ’s Holy Grail. Neither dream is likely to be realized.

Steven Fine responds:

Many thanks to my friend and colleague Shaye Cohen for taking my article so seriously, and to BAR for publishing both my piece and Cohen’s response. In my popular presentation in BAR, I discussed a uniquely 010modern Jewish urban legend and a fascinating group of rabbinic sources, providing some of the contexts for understanding each. In no way do I claim that the Menorah is now in Rome (in fact, I claim the opposite).

The sources Dr. Cohen cites are well-known and reflect just some of the pre-modern Christian material and a small percentage of modern scholarship on the history of the Menorah after the fall of Rome. Shaye has done a service in widening the discussion and bringing this material to the attention of BAR’s readership. As he must surely know, the Christian sources that he cites are strongly theological in tone and interest. How much they reflect “real” history is ripe for renewed discussion.

The Church Isn’t Hiding It

Steven Fine’s article on the myth that the Temple Menorah is hidden in the Vatican is well done and, unfortunately, timely. This is an urban legend of some magnitude, as Fine rightly notes. Yes, the spoils of the Temple were taken to Rome as the illustration on Titus’s triumphal arch shows to this day. But that took place several centuries and a couple of sacks of the city before the Church had any real control over the pagan cult sites in which it would have been displayed. There is no real evidence, as Fine also shows, that the Menorah was still in existence in post-Constantine Rome, much less that the Church somehow obtained it. The link of the belief in the legend to the hope for the coming of the Messiah that Fine makes at the end is a helpful one in understanding why the legend has endured so many reality checks. There would be no reason for Church authorities in Rome over the centuries not to have put it on display if they had it, as they did with so many other antiquities that did survive the fall of the Western Empire.

The Titus Legend

The sidebar on Titus’s brain in “The Temple Menorah—Where Is It?” cites an account in Genesis Rabbah 10.7 of Titus’s defilement of the Temple and his punishment by means of an insect that entered his nose and consumed his brain. Numbers Rabbah 18.22 adds that Titus’s sword became bloody when he hacked the Torah scroll, while Leviticus Rabbah 20.5 and the Babylonian Talmud (Gittin 56b) say that when he struck the Temple curtain with his sword, blood came out.

The story of the insect is also known from Muslim tradition, which, however, names Nimrod as the king whose brain was consumed by an insect. The account is found in the Qisas al-Anbiya’ literature. As is often the case with such accounts, it is likely that it was borrowed from Jewish tradition.

Is It Still There?

I was dismayed that in the article “The Temple Menorah—Where Is It?” author Steven Fine did not explore the curiosities of the facts and images he pointed out. First, there is the question as to whether the sculptor of the Menorah on the Arch of Titus saw the triumphal procession bearing the Judean treasure or merely heard of the procession because the Menorah, as displayed on the Arch of Titus, exhibits a base composed of various square stepbacks. This display is in contradiction to the description in Josephus’s account, which describes the Menorah standing on a tripod base. The picture of first-century graffiti on page 22 is in keeping with the description given by Josephus.

012

This leads an inquiring mind, but not the author, to wonder if the sculptor saw what he chiseled.

Jerusalem Rebuilt

Restored to Its Former Glory

David Ussishkin’s article “Big City, Few People: Jerusalem in the Persian Period” (July/August 2005) was a most enjoyable discussion of the dimensions of Jerusalem after its walls were rebuilt by those returning from Babylonian Exile.

Frankly, I’m puzzled that there exists any “minimalist/maximalist” division among scholars. If one reads the Biblical Book of Nehemiah carefully, as Professor Ussishkin obviously has, one cannot miss the fact that the repairs documented by Nehemiah encompass eighth-century B.C.E. Jerusalem. Two examples suffice: Nehemiah 3:8 speaks of work done in Jerusalem as far as the Broad Wall, and Nehemiah 3:13 speaks of a distance of 1,000 cubits (1,453 feet) between the Valley Gate and Gate of the Ash-heaps (Potsherds).

These known locations mentioned by Nehemiah point to a rebuilt Jerusalem of pre-Exilic dimensions. For returnees having come out from under the Babylonian yoke, nothing less would do!

Correction

In David Ussishkin’s “Big City, Few People: Jerusalem in the Persian Period” (July/August 2005) the plan on p. 35 includes the Temple Mount within King Solomon’s Jerusalem. While this is the common view among scholars, it is not Professor Ussishkin’s view. He contends that the Temple Mount was outside the city until the eighth century B.C.E. He nevertheless recognizes that King Solomon may have built a temple on the Temple Mount as part of his royal compound outside the city. Ussishkin says that as an archaeologist, he will deal only with the archaeological evidence. Unfortunately, the archaeological evidence, he says, cannot enlighten us further.—Ed.

Update—Finds or Fakes?

Caught in the Act?

In “Is the New Royal Moabite Inscription a Forgery?” (Update, July/August 2005) you incorrectly refer to Christopher Rollston. He is on the faculty of Emmanuel School of Religion, not Emanuel College of Religion. Does this mistake suggest your article is a forgery?

Publish to Your Heart’s Content

In our July/August 2005 Queries & Comments (p. 12), Victor Sasson criticized comments made by Victor Hurowitz that had been quoted by BAR editor Hershel Shanks. Hurowitz said that any scholar could publish on the Jehoash inscription even though the inscription had been deemed a forgery by a committee appointed by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) (a committee on which Hurowitz served). Sasson wrote to say that he had an article of his rejected by a scholarly journal because the inscription had been “officially” pronounced a fake. Hurowitz here replies to Sasson.—Ed.

014

I am not presently an active participant in the question of the Jehoash inscription’s authenticity, a controversy being kept alive by the Biblical Archaeology Society and a few scholars, including some reputable ones such as yourself. Nonetheless I feel obligated to respond to your recent letter to BAR in which you take issue (1) with a statement of mine cited in BAR and (2) with my qualifications to have served on the IAA committee that determined the inscription to be a forgery.

(1) I stand by my statement cited by Hershel Shanks that the official verdict cannot prevent anyone else from examining the inscription and deciding for him or herself whether it is authentic, or anything else about it. The fact of the matter is that you yourself are not convinced by the verdict and are not deterred from investigating further, and you have not been arrested for engaging in any illegal activity by doing so. If the editor of this journal or that felt constrained by the official verdict, that is his or her prerogative as editor; although I would hope that he or she rejected your article because he or she was more convinced by the arguments of the committee than by your own arguments (that’s called scholarship). But I’m not on the editorial board of a journal that rejected your article, so you should kindly leave me out of this. We all have had experience with rejected articles, but this does not mean we cannot pursue our research, and many articles rejected by one journal are accepted immediately and published by another as seems to be your case. Ugarit Forschungen [where Sasson’s article subsequently appeared—Ed.] is certainly a reputable journal so you should be happy they are willing to publish your study. By the way, there is also an article about the inscription in the most recent issue of Vetus Testamentum, showing that not only you and the editors of Ugarit Forschungen are still hearing arguments and don’t feel as if they have to answer to the IAA.

(2) As for my qualifications to be on the committee, I hold M.A. and PhD degrees from the Hebrew University in Bible, with Assyriology as a minor, so I am by training first a Biblical scholar and only secondarily an Assyriologist. As such I should at least know a bit of Biblical Hebrew, and be familiar with some Biblical stories, and even you will have to admit that the inscription has very important Biblical connections. [We omit Prof. Hurowitz’s research in ancient royal building inscriptions, which the Jehoash inscription purports to be.—Ed.]

I readily admit that I am not a fulltime Northwest Semitic epigrapher (that function was filled on the IAA committee by my colleague Professor Shmuel Ahituv), and I certainly have not spent as much time as you on Northwest Semitic epigraphic finds. Nonetheless I have had experience with such material, and I have certainly acquired a bit of familiarity with the genres and themes involved. So my selection to serve on the committee may not have been the best, and Israel certainly has others (such as Ahituv) who might be more to your liking, but it certainly was not without justification. So, my dear friend and namesake, go pursue your scholarship on whatever you wish to study and publish it in whichever journal finds it worthy; but your task is to overcome my published arguments and not waste time overcoming some assumed authority of a committee on which I worked.

070

Noah’s Ark

A Boatload of Information

Thank you for the May/June 2005 BAR, which arrived while I was abroad. In “Was Noah’s Ark a Sewn Boat?” Ralph Pedersen has helpfully pointed to current practices that may shed light on descriptions in ancient texts. It is worth adding that the practice was well known in ancient Egypt. There the word often used for boat-building is the verb sh-p-t (to sew). That is represented in many ways and most visibly in the Cheops boat from about 2640 B.C., beside the Great Pyramid. Although mortise-and-tenon joints joined the planks to keep the shape, over one mile of rope was used to lash the planks together. Details can be found in C.A. Ward, Sacred and Secular: Ancient Egyptian Ships and Boats (Philadelphia: University Museum, 2000), pp. 45–58.

Tall Tales

“Was Noah’s Ark a Sewn Boat?” is a fine summation of evidence that boats of the second millennium B.C.E. and earlier were sewn boats, and that the Gilgamesh and Noah stories include fragmentary descriptions of such craft.

What the article does not address is the sizes given: 300 cubits long, by 50 broad, by 30 high, or approximately 450 feet long, 75 broad, and 45 high, with some allowance for the exact size of a cubit, in the Noah version, and 120 cubits, or 180 feet high, with other dimensions in proportion in the Gilgamesh version. It was extremely difficult for builders of oak ships with fastenings of wooden dowels and massive iron bolts to build ships approaching 300 feet in length, even in the late 19th century, because of the problems of structural integrity and longitudinal flexing. The far more flexible ships fastened with rope could not reach dimensions much larger than 100 feet in length. The dimensions in the Noah and Gilgamesh stories must be seen as literary creations.

You Lost Me

I will not be renewing again. I look for articles dealing with dig reports, archaeology and history. The never-ending, overly personal bleating and sooking from your contributors has finally defeated me.