Queries & Comments

012

BAR Charged With Slander

To the Editor:

I was disappointed to read the article regarding the joint national convention of the Society of Biblical Literature, the American Academy of Religion, and the American Schools of Oriental Research (BARlines, BAR 09:02). I found the article to be rather slanderous in nature and to reflect the opinion of one who is preoccupied with narrow interests.

As a student of classical archaeology who has excavated at various sites in Greece and has attended a number of archaeology conferences, I have become familiar with the processes involved in archaeological analysis and interpretation. These activities are painstaking ones and can result in a “substantive” paper only after many seasons of excavation and a proportionate amount of time to “digest” the data. A season’s fieldwork, in the form of an excavation report, is never the source for the “larger concept” which you speak of. To label these manuscripts as “boring” serves only to betray one’s general unfamiliarity with the discipline of archaeology.

What you have written off as “boring” are the important and in fact vital steps in the archaeological process. Surely, for a scholar to “consider the larger question” by means of sweeping generalizations, based on mere assumption, is absurd.

Finally, I find it highly distasteful to delineate a roster of “those who failed to present substantive papers”—especially when your definition of “substantive” is questionable.

The program chairman for the national ASOR (American Schools of Oriental Research) meetings will be held next December in Dallas, Texas, issued a call for papers which contained the following caveat with respect to “Reports on Current Excavations and Surveys”: “Emphasis should be placed on interpretation of results, not mere descriptions.”

In a separate note, the program chairman stated: “I would hope that in the years ahead we could move away from papers that are purely descriptive and place far greater emphasis upon interpretation and analysis. Reports upon the past season of excavation are often of interest only to those who took part in the excavation and are best confined to a workshop devoted to the excavation in question. Even worse is the report on a survey that only describes the sites identified, period by period. Any project report delivered at the Annual Meeting of ASOR must emphasize the reasons for undertaking the project, the questions to be answered, and the methodology chosen for developing the necessary data, and the progress to date.”

We are pleased that the new Program Committee is moving on a variety of fronts to make the papers at the Annual Meetings more relevant, meaningful, analytical and exciting.—Ed.

Christians in Space and Jews in Time

To the Editor:

The review of Egeria’s Travels to the Holy Land by A. T. Kraabel (Books in Brief, BAR 09:02) may well be a comprehensive description of the contents included by John Wilkinson, but I must take exception to some of his conclusions. If I understand correctly, the reviewer implies that Jews and Christians are different in their religious attitudes to time and space, the Jews being concerned with time and the Christians with space. I do not agree.

Being a Christian has no dependence on making a pilgrimage to the Holy Land or any other shrine. Despite the thousands of Christians who do visit all these places, millions more do not and are not less Christian for it. Furthermore, Easter, Pentecost and Christmas are times which all Christians celebrate wherever they are, and the Lord’s Day every week. In fact, Abraham Heschel’s work on the Sabbath makes an excellent book for Christians to contemplate in reference to our use of Sunday. It is the same with his book on prayer, Quest for God.

Moreover, when Jews make their pilgrimages to Jerusalem for their festivals, they also focus on a place, the site of the Temple, not just any place in the city. That was true in David’s time, in Jesus’s time, and in our own day. The existence of the modern state of Israel is eloquent testimony to the importance of place to the Jews, at least to many of them. Yet those Jews who are in the diaspora and who do not make pilgrimages to Jerusalem are 013no less Jews, and good ones too. For both of us, God is in the heart of man. If Mr. Kraabel has not yet done so, he should read The Gospel and the Land by W. D. Davies, University of California, Berkeley, 1974. It is unfortunate that his review of Egeria’s Travels took such a divisive tone.

Of course, there is a powerful attraction to visiting places where famous people lived and history-making events took place, especially concerning religion, which reaches the depths of a person. It seems to be a common trait of human beings. I have felt it seeing ancient papyri of the New Testament and visiting the catacombs in Rome. There is a definite feeling of community with all those who have gone before us; they were people like ourselves, not merely names in a book. They are our spiritual ancestors. Archaeology has played a tremendous role in this. As Philip King expressed it: “Archaeology prevents the Bible from being mythologized by keeping it in the realm of history.” (“The Contribution of Archaeology to Biblical Studies,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, January 1983).

Pilgrimage and tourism are universal human activities, no modern inventions. Their history is fascinating. Egeria wrote not only of places but of special times, too, and her account appeals to the pilgrim-tourist in all of us. Why not enjoy her journey of so many years ago just as it was to her?

A. T. Kraabel replies:

I am delighted to see that you enjoy some of the same authors that I do! Davies’s 1974 book has been most valuable in my work, and Phil King’s 1983 CBQ article I found very useful, although I would have appreciated more about the archaeology of the New Testament.

I do believe, however, that the association of Christians with the category of space and Jews with the category of time is in accord with the evidence, at least for the Biblical period and late antiquity. The Israelites are commanded to make their pilgrimages at specific dates annually in the Hebrew Bible. Christian pilgrimage is a post-Biblical idea, and the writings of Egeria and many other pilgrims show how important particular places were. These conclusions are drawn from the literary and archaeological evidence, and I do not find them divisive. (You may, of course; that’s your judgment.) My own attitude on that matter you will find clearly reflected in the last two paragraphs of the review.

Thank you for writing. Please do it again whenever something you read in BAR does not sit right with you.

014

Where the Temple Stood

To the Editor:

The article by Asher S. Kaufman entitled “Where the Ancient Temple of Jerusalem Stood,” BAR 09:02, was one of the most exciting and interesting articles I have ever read. Having recently photographed some of the same areas Kaufman discussed, out of general interest without realizing the significance, I found new exhilaration in reading the scientific, well-documented and literate discussion.

To the Editor:

I found Mr. Kaufman’s theory fascinating and, in all probability, accurate.

To the Editor:

I had to write to thank you for that fine article entitled “Where the Ancient Temple of Jerusalem Stood,” BAR 09:02, by Asher S. Kaufman. The topic was exciting and the content well organized and clearly written. This made it easily understood by us “armchair” archaeologists!

To the Editor:

I would like to congratulate you and Dr. Kaufman for the excellent article on the placement of the Temple. It seems incredible that these clues were not noticed by previous investigators. This article, along with James Fleming’s on the Golden Gate (“The Undiscovered Gate Beneath Jerusalem’s Golden Gate,” BAR 09:01), has greatly added to my knowledge of the Temple Mount.

It is just a shame that the map, although otherwise accurate, misplaces the Dome of the Tablets, which is the focus of the article.

A shame indeed—and we feel terrible! The Dome of the Tablets should have been placed on the northwest corner of the platform on which the Dome of the Rock is located, rather than, as we mistakenly placed it, on the northwest corner of the Temple Mount.

For a further correction to a plan in Dr. Kaufman’s article, see BARlines.—Ed.

To the Editor:

Professor Kaufman’s article about the location of the Temple was very interesting. After reading it, I was looking through Benjamin Mazar’s The Mountain of the Lord, and the top picture facing page 176 caught my eye. In the center left of the picture, the excavation examined by Dr. Yeivin in November 1970 can be seen. The water reservoir has been placed in the hole, and water lines laid, but the hole and trenches have not been refilled.

To the Editor:

Professor Kaufman’s work should be followed up with research in another angle of the story. First, a report on the history, architecture and naming of all structures (buildings, cupolas, arches, staircases) on the Temple Mount. Then zero in on the person(s) who chose the site and built the cupola known as the Dome of the Tablets/Dome of the Spirits. It would be interesting to know not only his name but his biography and genealogy.

Asher Kaufman replies:

In recent years, Miriam Rosen-Ayalon, professor of Islamic art and archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has been conducting a survey of Islamic architecture on the Temple Mount. In 1980, A. G. Walls and A. Abul-Hajj published a booklet entitled Arabic Inscriptions in Jerusalem: a Handlist and Maps (World of Islam Festival Trust: London). This includes a survey of structures on the Temple Mount, with recent discoveries following works of restoration. In 1976, the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem published The Architecture of Islamic Jerusalem.

Information on the Dome of the Tablets or of the Spirits is scant, however I have inquired of local Islamic scholars who have been unable to shed any light. There is no inscription.

Conrad Schick in his book Die Stiftshutte, der Temple in Jerusalem (1896, p. 256) wrote that the cupola must have been of significance from time immemorial. C. R. Conder (The City of Jerusalem [1909], p. 253) added that it “is not noticed in early accounts”; for example, it is not mentioned in the description of the Temple Mount by Mukaddasi, about the tenth century.

Dr. Y. H. Priebatsch of Jerusalem sent me an interesting note in 1980. A local Moslem who 072showed him the Temple Mount in 1967 named the Dome of the Spirits the Prison of the Genii. Dr. Priebatsch thought he said in Arabic Sign al ginn. On inquiring as to the meaning of this name, the Moslem informed him that King Solomon imprisoned the genii there. For King Solomon’s association with demons and the Temple, see the Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 68a.

The visit of Caliph Omar to the Temple Mount after the capitulation of Jerusalem to the Moslems in 635 is recorded in the narratives of medieval Christians and Moslems. Perhaps an earlier record is that found in the Cairo Genizah. It states that Omar ordered a group of Jews to cleanse the Temple site from the rubbish that had accumulated there. From time to time, as a section of the area was cleared, he would inquire if that section was the Foundation Stone. When eventually this was revealed, Omar ordered that the Temple wall be rebuilt and that a gilded dome be erected over the revealed rock.

The Dome of the Rock was not built at that time; it was completed in 691/692. I addressed the following question to two local Islamic scholars: “Would you oppose the suggestion that the Dome of the Spirits was built in the seventh century?” The independent answer in both cases was: “No.”

Information on the Book of Jasher

To the Editor:

I earnestly need your assistance. I am currently incarcerated at Fairbanks Correctional Center and I have no one to refer to. I recently received a book that is mentioned in the Old Testament that I have no knowledge of. It is The Book of Jasher. I would be very grateful for any information you could give.

Thank you kindly.

Myron M. Weinstein, Head, Hebraic Section, Library of Congress, replies:

The production that Mr. Stephens refers to is a literary hoax perpetrated by Jacob Ilive in London in 1751 and further embellished in a publication by C. R. Bond which appeared in Bristol in 1829. The latter has been reissued in this country several times under the imprint of “The Rosicrucian Order, A.M.O.R.C.” A detailed refutation of this pastiche may be found in Rev. Thomas Hartwell Home’s Bible handbook, An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, 11th ed. (London, 1863), Vol. 4, pp. 741–46, in which he concludes that “the pretended Book of Jasher is a gross and shameless literary forgery, which has no claim whatever to ‘credence,’ and which is utterly destitute of authenticity.”

The “Book of Jasher” mentioned in the Bible in Joshua 10:13 and 2 Samuel 1:18 has not survived.

Where Is King David’s Tomb?

To the Editor:

When I was in Israel in 1979 and 1980 I visited the so-called “Tomb of David” on Mt. Zion.

There is a large sarcophagus, along with flags and a few other “decorations,” but I felt there was something phony about its location, its presence. Is this the real tomb of David or a new location, or what?

In Chronicles and Kings it refers to David’s death and that he was buried in the “City of 073David,” which if true would be south of the Temple site and on Mt. Ophel.

I cannot give precise references but I believe that Josephus says that Herod the Great looted the tomb while he was building the new Temple.

Professor Dan P. Cole of Lake Forest College replies:

Archaeological work within the past generation has provided Mr. Woodgates with two good reasons to suspect the authenticity of the “Tomb of David” on Mount Zion. (1) It appears not to be located in the right place, and (2) it does not seem to have been a tomb.

The shrine is located on the western ridge of Jerusalem, now commonly called Mount Zion. But recent excavations by Benjamin Mazar, Nahman Avigad and others have shown that the “City of David” was restricted to the eastern ridge, Ophel Hill, until late in the eighth century B.C., over two centuries after David’s death.

The Biblical historians specifically say that David was buried in the city (1 Kings 2:10). Solomon and the later kings of Judah are also recorded as having been buried with David “in the City of David” (1 Kings 11:43; 1 Kings 14:31, etc.).

Excavations at the south end of Ophel Hill by Raymond Weill in 1913–14 revealed huge barrel-vaulted chambers hewn into the bedrock which many scholars think might have been the royal tombs referred to in the Bible. At least this area was within the earliest Israelite city walls, and no better candidate for a royal necropolis has come to light. Unfortunately, deep quarry cutting in the area by Hadrian’s engineers during the building of Aelia Capitolina in 130–135 A.D. removed any facades which might have held inscriptions or stylistic decoration to date or identify these chambers with more certainty.

Meanwhile, back at the so-called “Tomb of David” on the western ridge, a shell explosion in 1949 during the Arab-Jewish War led to the discovery of an apse in the wall behind the supposed “sarcophagus” of David. The apse is oriented northeast, directly toward the Temple Mount, and there is a niche in the apse several feet above the floor, presumably for a Torah scroll. Other evidence combines with this to identify the room of David’s “Tomb” as originally having been a synagogue of the late Roman Age (second–third centuries A.D.). (See Hershel Shanks, Judaism in Stone, pp. 45f.)

Just when and why this site on Mount Zion became revered as David’s tomb we cannot be sure. We do know that this area of the western ridge was inside the city walls of the Byzantine period, from the fifth century on. It was probably some time thereafter that Jewish pilgrims began to revere the spot, perhaps influenced by the presence of synagogue remains here.

This “Tomb of David” gained special importance in the years between 1948 and 1967, when it was the nearest “ancient” Jewish shrine to the Temple Mount that was accessible to Jews following the U.N. armistice partition.

As for Herod, Josephus did describe him as having looted David’s tomb: “ … as he had before heard that Hyrcanus, who had been king before him, had opened David’s sepulchre, and taken out of it three thousand talents of silver, and that there was a much greater number left behind, and indeed enough to suffice all his wants, he had a great while an intention to make the attempt; and at this time he opened that sepulchre at night, and went into it, and endeavored that it should not be at all known in the city, but took only his most trusted friends with him. As for any money, he found none … ” (Antiquities XVI.vii.4.). In none of these references, however, did Josephus leave us any clues to help locate the place of David’s tomb.

The Jerusalem Cardo—Roman and Byzantine

To the Editor:

Isn’t your note about the Jerusalem cardo in the July/August 1982 “Scholars’ Corner,” BAR 08:04, a bit incomplete? I was told last summer that the most recent excavations near the Damascus Gate have turned up traces of the Roman cardo in that part of the city, i.e., the northern part. This might mean that the Roman rebuilding of Jerusalem [after the Second Jewish Revolt, 132 A.D.–135 A.D.] was limited to the northern part of the present old city (perhaps to the line of King David Street), with a camp of the Roman army to the south. Then, when the city was expanded in the Byzantine period, the line of the Roman cardo was extended to the south through what is now the Jewish Quarter. This Byzantine extension is what Avigad found. Perhaps this is still conjectural, but I would be interested in seeing an update from BAR.

Nahman Avigad of Hebrew University replies:

Dr. O’Connell is quite correct in his observations about the Cardo in Jerusalem. There is nothing much to add to the information which has already been published.

Ever since the Cardo Maximus was uncovered in the Jewish Quarter Excavations [which 074Professor Avigad directed], I was of the view that this Cardo was a Byzantine extension to the south of the Roman Cardo, which presumably existed in the northern part of the present Old City. Indeed, recent excavations near the Damascus Gate confirmed the existence of the Roman Cardo in the northern part of the Old City, while continued excavations in the south revealed an additional segment of the street, confirming its Byzantine date.

The excavations in the Jewish Quarter revealed that the area covered by this quarter was not inhabited in the Roman period except for some barracks of the Tenth Roman Legion. Roman Aelia Capitolina was limited to the northern part of the present Old City, north of David Street and the Street of the Chain. There was no reason for the Romans to extend their Cardo south of this line, whereas the Byzantines, who rebuilt this area with magnificent buildings such as the famous Nea Church, had good reason to do so.

St. Peter’s Bones

To the Editor:

Regarding Robert Wild’s review of a book claiming that the apostle Peter’s remains may have been found in the Vatican (The Bones of St. Peter, Books in Brief, BAR 09:01), my reading of the New Testament leads me to believe that the disciple Peter never went to Rome to preach Christ’s message, but traveled north of Jerusalem to spread the Gospel. It was Paul, a Roman by birth, who went to Italy and Rome.

I cannot find the Bible chapter and verse at this moment which states very plainly that Peter and Paul decided to divide up the areas of ministry according to the birthplace of each. For this reason, Paul went to Italy and Rome and Peter traveled north of Jerusalem, his birthplace.

I find it difficult to understand why so much has been written about finding Peter’s body buried in Rome, when nothing written in the Bible would suggest Peter ever went to Rome.

Robert A. Wild replies:

Admittedly, Biblical evidence for the presence of the Apostle Peter in Rome is quite scanty. If Peter himself actually wrote the First Letter of Peter, he wrote from Rome. The reference to “Babylon” in 1 Peter 5:13 as the Christian congregation which joins in the authors greetings can only be a codeword for Rome. The book of Revelation makes this usage clear—see Revelation 17:5 and 18:2, 10, and 21 and note how the reference to “the seven hills” in 17:9 identifies “Babylon.” However, since many scholars, myself included, believe that the Apostle did not write 1 Peter, the most that can be said is that the disciple who wrote under his name (a common and in no way deceptive Greco-Roman practice) believed that Rome was the proper place in which to locate Peter.

Yet even if the New Testament does not clearly situate Peter in Rome, historians are also faced with other quite early Christian evidence for Peters sojourn and martyrdom in that city. I would point particularly to the First Letter of Clement 5–6 and to Ignatius of Antioch’s Letter to the Romans 4:3. These texts do not finally decide the matter but they do lend considerable support to the tradition that Peter met his death at Rome.

Were the Goliaths a Family of Priests?

To the Editor:

Rachel Hachlili and Ann Killebrew are to he commended for their fascinating description of the Goliath tomb (“The Saga of the Goliath Family—As Revealed in Their Newly Discovered 2,000-Year-Old-Tomb,” BAR 09:01). However, the suggestion at the end of the article that the Goliath family was made up of priests seems highly unlikely based on even a superficial reading of rabbinic sources. Despite the presence of a mikveh, a ritual bath, outside the burial chamber, there is little reason to assume that this was a priestly burial area. Priests are emphatically prohibited from entering not only a cemetery, but even a field suspected of once having been used for burial (see Leviticus, 21:1–6 and Mishnah-Ohalot, Chapters 17–18). The only exception to this rule was for the burial of immediate family; priestly visitation after the fact certainly would have been forbidden. Furthermore, a priest who found himself in the middle of the Jericho cemetery would have had little use for a mikveh since the purification ritual takes seven days and must be conducted in an area of absolute purity (see Ohalot 1:1). A mikveh in a cemetery would have served little purpose since purification was impossible in such a locale! Finally it is hard to believe that a priestly family would have ignored a Biblical injunction against contact with the dead 075while showing such concern for the importance of ritual immersion. It would be interesting to know, however, if there are any other examples of ritual baths connected to burial areas.

Hachlili and Killebrew also argue that the “monumental nature of the tomb … suggests that this was a priestly family.” I can only point out that there was a proclivity toward elaborate burial sites among Jews in Talmudic times. The Talmud points out that, “Jewish tombstones are fairer than royal palaces” (see Sanhedrin 96b). The early Christians criticized their Jewish neighbors for elaborate burial sites as well (see Matthew 23:29). Apparently, beautiful burial chambers like that of the Goliath family were not limited to priests.

This reader can only wonder why a ritual bath would appear in such close proximity to a burial chamber and a cemetery. Possibly it was somehow connected with the purification rituals used for the dead among Jews. The entire matter deserves to be studied more closely by archaeologists Hachlili and Killebrew. I would strongly encourage these researchers to familiarize themselves with the wealth of material in rabbinic literature. This is crucial to the archaeologist who wishes to understand life in classical Palestine.

I end this letter by complimenting the entire staff of BAR for creating such a fine publication. Since my own subscription began less than a year ago, I have read every issue from cover to cover. I look forward to reading many more thought provoking and enlightening issues in the future.

Finding the Mithraeum

To the Editor:

I am a tour guide in Israel and am very interested in locating the Mithraeum at Caesarea mentioned in “Caesarea Maritima: the Search for Herod’s City,” BAR 08:03, by Robert Bull. I have looked in vain for the vault pictured and described in the article. I asked a member of nearby kibbutz Sdot Yam if he knew of its location and he thought that it was inside the Crusader City but has been bricked up. I would be very obliged to hear if it can in fact be seen and how one locates it.

I would like to take the opportunity to state how much I appreciate BAR and how useful I find it in my guide work.

Robert Bull replies:

The third-century A.D. Mithraeum is located immediately south of the Crusader city’s southern moat, within 20 meters of the shoreline. It was originally a warehouse vault built by Herod the Great, 96 feet long, 16 feet wide and 15 feet high. Sometime after the seventh century, it partially collapsed and became almost completely filled with sand and other debris. The Joint Expedition to Caesarea spent almost two years excavating this vault and discovered the remains of the Mithraeum, the first Mithraeum ever found in Israel. Because the western end of the vault was open to wind and potential vandalism, the Joint Expedition, by agreement with the Israel Department of Antiquities, sealed up its entrance.

The Joint Expedition and Caesarea World Monument (which you can also read about in the sidebar “Caesarea World Monument,” BAR 08:03) hope eventually to raise funds to restore and preserve the Mithraeum and other significant features of this magnificent city.

BAR Charged With Slander

To the Editor: