Queries & Comments

018

In Defense Of Jacob Neusner

To the Editor:

Your report of Morton Smith’s takeover of the SBL meeting honoring Jacob Neusner’s significant contribution to scholarship missed the mark in several ways. Instead of informing readers of papers delivered by Neusner, A. T. Kraabel, Anthony Saldarini and W. D. Davies, you restated the criticism directed at Neusner by Smith, Saul Lieberman, Hyam Maccoby and Shave Cohen, and failed to ask the obvious questions: What motivated Smith to engage in singularly unscholarly and unprofessional behavior?

When senior scholars of Smith’s generation engage in tactics of the sixties, something more must be at stake than scholarly disagreement.

Smith cited the late Saul Lieberman’s last work—published posthumously in the JAOS—a violent polemical review of Neusner’s Yerushalmi^a translation. Lieberman could not even bring himself to refer to Neusner by name and suggested that the translation (of a sacred text) best belongs in a trash can. Cohen’s piece, which first attempts a serious critique of Neusner, swiftly falls into an ad hominem attack unbefitting either the scholar or the journal, and Maccoby virtually accuses Neusner of seeking credit with Gentile scholars by defaming Pharisaic Judaism.

These accusations, which were not voiced at the SBL meeting, are cited without editorial comment while the words of praise spoken at the session are omitted—except for an occasional aside to Neusner’s brilliance. Your article did not probe why Neusner should be the subject of so violent an assault.

The answer is not found in Neusner’s personality, nor in the reported shortcomings of his scholarship. Were the issue scholarly, it would have been fought out in journals and at conferences with the civility appropriate to learned discourse.

The assault has much more to do with the sociology of Jewish scholarship than with Neusner’s scholarship. Neusner has transgressed the fundamental norm of the rabbinic world. In a charming autobiographical fragment, Midge Decter described the ethos of the Jewish Theological Seminary during the late ’40s: “In order to say something, you had to know everything.” Rabbis trained at JTS were desperately afraid of snaking an error—perhaps they had overlooked a book, missed an article, or someone else knew more. The result was a sense of scholarly inferiority, a fear of failure, and repeated delays in publication.

By his prolific writings, Neusner has violated the unspoken norm of the institution that nurtured him and of the yeshiva world that trained the JTS’s professors. 019Furthermore, he has repudiated that norm. His works are called preliminary. He expects them to be superceded. His students publish treatises while Seminary candidates are still memorizing talmudic passages. If there are errors in Neusner’s work, they are corrected. If he changes his mind, the result is another book. Within weeks of the Lieberman review, a correction was appendixed to the next volume in what will eventually be a 35-volume translation.

Neusner has become liberated from that world and he flaunts his freedom. His academic superego is shaped neither by Germanic precision nor by the yeshiva world’s matmid.^b Neusner is characteristically American: nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Furthermore, Neusner has moved the center of Jewish scholarship from the seminary into the university. His students occupy chairs in more than a score of universities, and for the past two decades the best and the brightest have journeyed from 3080 Broadway^c and even from Jerusalem to Providence, Rhode Island. He is envied for his freedom and for his students and he is unusually generous to them—working hard to find them appropriate placement.

The movement from the sacred halls of the rabbinic seminary to the ivy towers of the university secularizes Jewish studies and Neusner adds insult to injury by daring to study Judaism as a phenomenon that can be approached like other phenomena in the history of religions. He cannot be dismissed as either a self-hating or apologetic Jew, and he is taken seriously by both Jews and Gentiles beyond the halls of the academy.

He has violated the norms of the rabbinic world and played the game by his own rules. He has followed the traditions of the university and is a devout believer in that secular institution. He even admits to errors that would have silenced forever his seminary-trained colleagues. And he has raised the next generation.

Apparently some traditionalists and their allies feel that Neusner must be stopped before it is too late. And when they try, they return to the true and tried methods of the medievalists who knew how to impose silence and discipline.

And they fail.

The question still remains open: Can civilised academic discourse be held in the field of Judaic studies? Neusner and his friends have shown that it can. Smith and his colleagues have demonstrated that it cannot. The jury is still out.

018

BAR’s Coverage of the Annual Meetings

To the Editor:

I have just read your treatment of the events in Chicago involving Jacob Neusner and Morton Smith, as printed in BAR (“BARview: Annual Meetings Offer Intellectual Bazaar and Moments of High Drama,” BAR 11:02). I cannot let them pass.

In the strongest terms I must protest what you have written. As you wrote it up, it made an exciting story, but an exceedingly biased one. You may not have caught that at first. I hope after you have read what follows you will set things right.

You do not allow Neusner to speak for himself. You quote his critics only. Except for Smith, the ones you quote were not even on the program in Chicago, nor did they speak. You quote nothing positive about Neusner, although you had my manuscript (sent to you at your request), and—I suspect—you could have had Saldarini’s for the asking.

I am particularly concerned about the image of Jewish scholarship presented to your readers, most of whom will know about this area only from what you have written. Saldarini and I had sufficient to say about Neusner’s failings, but for all his faults, he is the best thing to happen in Jewish studies for the Gentile Academy in a very long time. If other Jewish scholars were covering the areas he does, and reaching the vast audiences he does, that would be one thing; but they are not. They do not wish to, nor do they wish Neusner to, and that is exceedingly unfortunate.

Your account is very much out of balance; you need to redress that balance. You owe it to your readers to set the record straight.

To the Editor:

I would like to correct one small error in your account of my warning the SBL audience against Jacob Neusner’s “translation” of the Palestinian Talmud.

Saul Lieberman’s review did not say that Neusner’s essays in this book “abound in brilliant insights,” etc. That praise (Journal of the American Oriental Society 104 [1984], p. 319) referred to Neusner’s earlier works. In the present volume he found nothing to recommend, but recommended the whole “for the wastebasket.”

Apart from this small slip, I found your account remarkably accurate and unbiased—a very difficult thing to achieve in unexpected reporting of rapid and complicated action about a controversial subject. Congratulations. And thanks for a public service, since it is a public service to alert the public to the dangers of this wretched mistranslation.

To the Editor:

Like yourself, I attended Professor David Wilmot’s paper and the response by Professor John Strugnell at the recent conference of the Society of Biblical Literature. But with some other scholars present, I felt that Professor Wilmot made an important contribution to the study of the Copper Scroll. By demonstrating conclusively that it adheres in form to contemporary bureaucratic inventory lists, Wilmot established that the consideration of genre is no longer sufficient automatically to relegate to fantasy the scroll’s inventories of treasure troves. This point may seem elementary, but proofs involving the question of genre are quite difficult to make, and Professor Wilmot acquitted himself well, drawing on material from various Mediterranean cultures with which the Jews may have had contact.

Professor Strugnell’s passing remark that some scrolls are not being published quickly “because they’re boring” brings a new twist to that question. The usual reason given for the delayed publication of Dead Sea Scrolls is that they are too important to be turned out quickly and hence with possible errors. Does 019this additional consideration mean that only fragments of middling interest and importance deserve immediate attention?

To the Editor:

This time, at least, I do not feel mistreated by your journal—even though the photo must have been over 15 years old! More important, I regret it when I am reported as saying (p. 14) that there were many contracts etc. among the Dead Sea fragments. My intention was to say “several” or a “few” … among the Qumran fragments; that would have been more rigorously accurate—but perhaps I was carried away by the heat of the discussion!

More On The Annual Meetings

To the Editor:

As always, I enjoyed your report on the annual ASOR meetings. As chairman of the ASOR Program Committee I must take the responsibility for the appalling conditions in the Palmer House Hotel. You do not mince words and your description is entirely correct. The rooms were too small and too hot, the audiovisual facilities were inadequate, such that it often was impossible to see or hear anything even if one was fortunate enough to get inside the lecture room. My sincere apologies to everyone who was unable to attend certain sessions because of the overcrowded conditions in many of the rooms. I myself was unable to hear a number of papers in which I had a special interest because I could not even get near the entrance to the lecture room!

When one takes the trouble (and expense) of attending an annual meeting, one should be able to take it for granted that all sessions will be accessible, that there will be room in the lecture hall, that the audiovisual facilities (and the slides of the speaker) will be appropriate to the size of the room, and that all sessions will start and finish at the times listed in the program. I hope that we will never again meet in the Palmer House Hotel. The jazz band during the Syria session was outrageous and totally inexcusable.

In part we were done in by our own success. The ASOR meetings are rapidly becoming the most important sessions on Middle Eastern archaeology held in the United States. The meetings are becoming more and more popular and, I believe, ever more interesting. It is also true that a meeting in Chicago naturally draws more people than almost anywhere else in the country. Yet, even taking account of all this, the facilities at the Palmer House Hotel were inadequate and, in many cases, just bloody awful. Worse, the management of the hotel refused to do anything about it. All protests made by ASOR and by SBL were ignored. Not once, during the entire meeting, did the hotel staff make any effort to deal with difficult situations or to see what could be done about the conditions in the lecture rooms. I tried all afternoon to do something about the party in progress on the other side of the thin partition wall, during the Syria session, but all the hotel manager could say was that he “was looking into the situation.” He obviously did not look very far!

Hopefully such conditions will not prevail at the Anaheim Hilton this coming November (perhaps I should send a copy of this letter to the manager of that hotel). The overcrowding of the program itself is going to be far more difficult to deal with. I realize that, often, one finds that he would like to be in four different places at the same time. What can be done? We have a limited amount of time (four days) and a growing number of scholars who want to be on the program. Furthermore, ASOR meets together with SBL and AAR, each of which is running its own full program. Simultaneous sessions are inevitable; conflicts are unavoidable.

I am very reluctant to try to limit the number of papers on the program. We could, to some extent, improve the quality of papers accepted, but at the expense of the opportunity to be on the program or even to attend the meetings (since, in many cases, a member of ASOR can get financial support from his school only if he/she is on the program). I have already added an extra day to the meetings by scheduling most of the 020business/committee meetings the day before the beginning of the sessions themselves. I really see no solution to these unfortunate conflicts; think what it would be like if there were nothing on the program worth hearing!

Work is, of course, well underway for the 1985 meeting (Anaheim Hilton, Anaheim, California, November 22–26). The organization of the program of the annual meeting is a year-round responsibility that I, and my colleagues on the Program Committee, assume on behalf of ASOR. In spite of the fact that we do this on a volunteer basis, in addition to many other activities involving our research and teaching, the cost of holding an annual meeting is escalating rapidly. Travel to California is going to put an added burden on many ASOR members. All the more reason for making the meetings as worthwhile as possible.

Should Archaeologists Sell Artifacts They Excavate?

To the Editor:

I want to add my kudos to your suggestion about selling ancient artifacts (“BARview: A Radical Proposal: Archaeologists Should Sell Ancient Artifacts,” BAR 11:01). I think this is a daring, imaginative and practical method of dealing with such archaeological problems as the plunder of ancient sites, the illicit sale of antiquities and the chronically insufficient funds for excavations and publication of results. Of course, your suggestion will not eradicate the problems but it is, at least, the beginning of a solution.

To the Editor:

I was interested to read “BARview: A Radical Proposal: Archaeologists Should Sell Ancient Artifacts,” BAR 11:01. It touches on a subject which until recently was taboo.

The sale of archaeological artifacts, by those who engage in professionally and academically oriented excavations, might well be regarded as plundering or robbery. But exactly the opposite is true.

The many years of excavation by archaeological institutions and by the Department of Antiquities [in Israel] has led to a vast accumulation of artifacts. After cleaning, sorting, classification and photographing, most of these objects (in the main, pottery that this country has been blessed with) are relegated to the dusty storerooms of museums, the Department of Antiquities and archaeological institutions. One should remember, too, that many of these artifacts are partly glued and restored and very often fall apart after a period of time. The fate of many objects is one of anonymity rather than one of display for the further dissemination of learning or for pleasure.

The sale of objects would indeed enable the various bodies engaged in excavations to fund further projects and cover their expenses. The financial potential which lies in these hundreds and even thousands of pottery objects is enormous.

Recently, there has been talk that moves are being made to curtail completely the sale of antiquities in Israel. This is a mistake for which Greece, Turkey and Italy (where there is a prohibition on sales of antiquities) are still paying a terrible price. It is proven beyond any doubt that forbidding the sale of antiquities does not prevent the ongoing plundering. The fact is that many of the archaeological treasures sold and still being sold on the world market come from those very countries where it is forbidden.

If the proper authorities were to approach this subject in the light of the above-mentioned facts they would create a more healthy situation than one where sales will be sent underground, which will undoubtedly occur with a prohibition.

The writer, now an antiquities dealer, was formerly chief restorer at the Israel Museum.—Ed.

To the Editor:

Kudos to editor Shanks for suggesting the sale of common artifacts. Many of us would be proud to contribute to the purchase of a modest collection for display at the local library if it could be assured that the money would end up in the right hands. Even the most common items would be better than no display at all. Frequent sales by the scientific community in the Near East would drive prices down, making the poacher’s job a bit less desirable and assuring a more ready cash flow for legitimate operators. It would be greedy to sell our history for filthy lucre if it went only into the coffers of the rich collector and then into the hands of poachers, but when sites are going unexplored for lack of finding it seems wasteful to hoard what is already plentiful.

The poacher is no competition for the scientific community, but archaeologists 021should realize that collectors will continue to buy, no matter what the source. Why not enter the market to try to further the ends of science?

To the Editor:

Illegal digging is a matter for the police, as is any illegal activity. But collecting and its collateral, dealing, should not be prohibited. Only those unable to travel abroad would be discriminated against. I have supplied very many artifacts of “museum quality” to the Israel Museum, the Haaretz Museum, the National Maritime Museum, to Dr. Hecht’s collection, all in Israel. But I have also supplied artifacts to a number of museums in the United States, mostly in smaller cities; for example, the University of Missouri at Columbia.

I, as most other dealers, could make a living some other way, but would not the cultural, educational and possibly religious experience of the American public, and for that matter, of many other nations be the poorer for it? Don’t misunderstand me—I am dealing for the money and the fun I get, not for doing good. But still, I am sure I contribute something to culture, as well as knowledge, abroad.

Incidentally, European art and cultural journals do carry ads for antiquities.

To the Editor:

Hurray! What a great idea for raising funds for existing and future research.

The problem here in the States is that we have been indoctrinated by “Don’t pick up a rock ’cause if everybody does it the mountain will soon disappear.” This simply does not apply in Israel, as I found out on my BAS tour a few years back. When I asked one of the archaeologists if I could pick up a sherd as a souvenir of my trip, he said, “Take all you can carry.” People simply do not realize how many tons of debris must be moved during a dig before a really significant find is made, and yet this debris is more or less datable and contains many small items like pottery sherds that are recognizable as man-made and could be sold to tourists for a small sum rather than stacked in a warehouse or debris dump.

These small things, I realize, are not what you were discussing in your articles, but I bet you could sell five hundred or a thousand identifiable pottery sherds for a buck apiece for every $500 to $1,000 for a major piece.

To the Editor:

I have in my bookcase a pottery sherd from the beach where the Greeks launched their ships for Troy. I have no idea of its age, although it is old. This small piece of clay is probably of no value to anyone except me.

There are many of us out here, archaeologists by avocation, who would love to get our hands on an artifact. This is usually impossible, and for good reason. Not only would we like to handle an artifact, some of us would even like to own one. Therein lies the problem, the selling of artifacts. I am of two minds on the subject. On the one hand, I would oppose the indiscriminate sale of artifacts, for such a practice can only lead to “pot” hunting, which is destructive to valuable archaeological sites. A case in point is the steady destruction of American Indian sites in the southwest.

Conversely, there must be artifacts that could be safely sold to private groups or armchair archaeologists. These could range from something as simple as a pottery sherd to an oil lamp—something common enough 022to be passed by or to gather dust in some museum’s basement. Personally, I would be thrilled to own a pottery sherd from any of the digs I read about in BAR.

I am not advocating that archaeologists go into the business of marketing sherds. Yet is it such a bad idea to make available to the public that which they consider worthless? In the meantime, I will look to my own sherd and dream of “wine dark seas.”

A Fundamentalist as Archaeologist

To the Editor:

I would like to comment on David Wainwright’s thought-provoking question in the November/December issue of BAR, “Can a fundamentalist be an archaeologist?” (Queries & Comments, BAR 10:06). Though I cannot call myself an archaeologist, I am a fundamentalist and will comment from that bias.

The Bible is the Word of God, infallible and inerrant. That means, it cannot be wrong! Science, including the science of archaeology, is a search for knowledge. It is not infallible, as can be seen in the pages of BAR, in every issue. One well-meaning and honest archaeologist feels perfectly at ease disagreeing with another. And so it should be. What man “knew” to be true last year will be “proven” false next year. When will we learn not to chisel our “scientific facts” in stone?

When man’s feeble search for truth disagrees with God’s awesome Revelation, guess which one this fundamentalist doubts. That’s right, I doubt science.

I’m not at all troubled when I read in BAR that the Biblical account of the falling walls of Jericho is in error because some archaeologist has found that city and it has no walls. I simply wait for the next guy at that dig to contradict him and say the place isn’t Jericho at all!

Albright has been contradicted by modern scholars. So have all the other greats of the past. But, “Forever O Lord, Thy Word is settled in heaven,” Psalm 119:89.

Can a fundamentalist be an archaeologist? Yes, in my humble and unprofessional opinion he can. But he must be very patient and tolerant.

Is a Ghost Preventing Your Car from Starting?

To the Editor:

In Queries & Comments, BAR 10:06, reader Dwight Sullivan expressed his discomfort over the fact that archaeologists rule out the supernatural in their explanation of the past. This is a common complaint about science itself, especially from the point of view of the contemporary Christian who contemplates science or archaeology.

Until the Middle Ages, the supernatural was assumed to have played some role in all events. But as time went by this attitude was replaced by the one in which we sharply distinguish faith from knowledge, spirit from matter, God from man, and the natural from the supernatural.

Aristotle was one of the first of the known philosophers to advocate a disregard of God in the observation of nature. At one of the first western universities, the University of Paris, in the 13th century scholars were required to study God. Once or twice a number of them signed a statement to the effect that they did not want to study God’s miracles but simply wanted to discuss what was natural in a natural way. For having declared this, they were either burned or imprisoned by the Christian authorities. And although science is a word which simply means knowledge, early European universities actually banned experiments in natural science to the backrooms and workshops of small craftsmen and other persons of dubious reputation. In fact, science as we know it developed rather slowly. For example, as late as the 17th 023century, the meaning of “spirit” and “gas” was the same in some European languages.

In order to explain events in a scientific sense today we must observe all the variables (or anything which changes or varies) that could contribute to or cause an event in order to predict or explain it. We know, of course, that supernatural phenomena do not need to be taken into account, and, in fact, cannot be taken into account as observable variables in order to explain events. But how do we know this?

Well, most of us are aware that this is the same approach taken by the most uneducated mechanic when he tries to find out why a car won’t start. Even if the mechanic is a religious man he knows that there is no ghost or supernatural force that is keeping the car from starting. This is what we would call simple, ordinary, everyday knowledge in the 20th century. And if there was a ghost preventing the car from starting, then how on earth would the mechanic (a) know it, or (b) explain it to his wife, let alone a scientist?

This is, in fact, the crux of the dilemma. It is not that it is impossible that a ghost is preventing the car from starting (at least hypothetically), it is that no one knows how to demonstrate or to gather evidence to prove that a ghost is doing that.

On Articles You Disagree With

To the Editor:

Evidently, from the letters published in recent issues in “Queries & Comments,” some subscribers are only interested in BAR as long as its articles and photos agree with their personal opinions, ethics, and religious practices and beliefs.

I happen to be a traditional Christian active within my church, a college teacher for many years, and a scholar. I seem to be less insecure than others in my personal ethical/religious convictions, for I have no need to see them echoed within the pages of BAR. I am also not so naive as to expect a scholarly journal that endorses no particular religious belief to mirror my own.

I don’t always agree with the views published in BAR articles, either. But I feel no necessity that I should. Isn’t that the purpose of a scholarly journal—to challenge us to think about things in ways we would not have naturally, given our limited opinions, experience, knowledge?

Rouault’s Jesus on BAR’s Cover

To the Editor:

Shame on you for such a sick choice of cover for the January/February 1985 edition of BAR.

Whoever chose the black-and-white, downbeat, turn-off rendition of Jesus on the cross has to be a very sad, negative, and yes, morbid being. Likewise Rouault.

Shame, shame, shame!!

To the Editor:

Your January/February cover of Rouault’s “Crucifixion” was extremely moving. But did you crop off the feet and hands?

No, we reprinted the entire lithograph.—Ed.

To the Editor:

I await, on the verge of laughter, to see how many of your readers ignore the 9,999 other victims of crucifixion, and immediately assume the naked body on the cover of the January/February issue is Jesus.

Rouault intended it as a depiction of Jesus.—Ed.

024

Death by Crucifixion

To the Editor:

I am an avid reader of every article you print in your excellent magazine and the one by Vassilios Tzaferis (“Crucifixion—The Archaeological Evidence,” BAR 11:01) about the remains of a victim of crucifixion is no exception. Yet there was one part in the article that left me wondering. “Christian iconography usually shows the nails piercing the palms of Jesus’ hands. Nailing the palms of the hands is impossible, because the weight of the slumping body would have torn the palms in a very short time.”

If this is true, then the Gospel of John must also be inaccurate where it says that Thomas saw the nail wounds in Jesus’ hands. It is Dr. Tzaferis’s conclusion that Jesus was crucified through the arms, just above the wrists. However, in another part of his article, he says that second-century Christian writers, Erenaeus and Justin Martyr, describe the cross of Jesus as having a sedile, or small seat. In that case, isn’t it possible that the sedile could provide the necessary support for the body of Christ and that the nails driven through the hands need only serve as a kind of brace to keep him on the cross? I would appreciate hearing Dr. Tzaferis’s answer to this question.

Vassilios Tzaferis replies:

The word used in the Gospels (Luke 24:39; John 20:27) is ceir (cheir), which indicates the entire human hand. If the evangelists had wanted to refer to the palms, they would have used the Greek word palame.

To the Editor:

I enjoyed the article “Crucifixion—The Archaeological Evidence,” BAR 11:01. The information gathered from these archaeological studies of the crucified Jew has provided students of crucifixion with very important information. This article however contains several misconceptions that require explanation.

The statement that the victim would die from muscular spasms and asphyxia in a very short time without supplementary body support, and that shortly after being raised on the cross, breathing would become difficult so that the victim would attempt to draw himself up on his arms to get his breath, is in error. This hypothesis has been propagated by Dr. Pierre Barbet in his book, A Doctor at Calvary (referenced by the author). In an endeavor to resolve this controversy, I conducted meticulous experimentation in my laboratory that included blood gases, ear oximetry, Douglas bag studies, vital capacities, blood chemistries, EKG monitoring, blood pressures, auscultatory studies, pulse rates, objective and subjective observations, etc., on numerous volunteers suspended on a very accurate cross. The results of these studies afforded the conclusion that the cause of death was not due to asphyxiation but shock. This was presented before the pathology/biology section at the 35th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences in Cincinnati, Ohio, in February of 1983, and subsequently published in the Canadian Society of Forensic Sciences Journal (17:1–13, 1984). A lay version is afforded in my book, The Cross and the Shroud, A Medical Examiner Investigates the Crucifixion (Angelus Books, 1982).

It is also important to realize that the breaking of the legs (crurifragium or skelokopia) was not used to expedite death by preventing the victim from raising himself to breathe as was postulated by Barbet to support his asphyxiation theory. The breaking of the legs in the crucifixion of Yehohanan affords indisputable proof that the legs were not broken to prevent the individual from lifting himself to breathe since the body was already in a maximum elevated position. The legs were usually broken at a time when victims were severely weakened and near death. This would rapidly hasten their death due to additional traumatic shock.

Another area that needs clarifying regards the statement that nailing the palms of the hands is impossible, because the weight of the body would have torn the palms in a very short time. This again derives from the studies of Dr. Barbet who nailed the palms of amputated arms and found that if weights in excess of 80 pounds were suspended, the hands would tear through the fingers. This is, however, only true when the nail is passed through the central aspects of the palm of the hand. I have clearly demonstrated that if the nail passes through the thenar furrow (the crease that forms when you touch your little finger to your thumb) at an angle of 10 to 15 degrees toward the wrist and slightly toward the thumb, it will pass through an extremely sturdy area created by the metacarpal bones of the index and second fingers and the capitate and lesser multangular bones of the wrist. The nail emerges at a site exactly corresponding to the impression of the hand wound shown on the Shroud of Turin. A striking photograph demonstrating this appears in my book, The Cross and the Shroud.

It is important to realize, however, that crucifixion was performed in many ways and includes passage between the bones of the forearm as depicted by the friction marks on the radial bone of Yehohanan.

To the Editor:

Vassilios Tzaferis’s article, “Crucifixion—The Archaeological Evidence,” BAR 11:01, was—quite properly!—too gruesome to be called enjoyable. But I did appreciate the sober, factual way in which this hideous material was presented.

However, I noticed one mix-up in the historical information. The article as printed states that “Alexander Jannaeus crucified 800 Jews on a single day during the revolt against the census of 7 A.D.” The date is of course impossible since Alexander Jannaeus died in 76 B.C. The footnote also appears to be wrong in my copy of Josephus this event is described in Antiquities XIII, 14, 2, rather 079than in Book XIV as printed in BAR.

Also, a question. Tzaferis implies that the Romans’ reason for breaking the legs of Jewish victims crucified in Palestine was to comply with Deuteronomy 21:22–23. This text forbids leaving a hanged (crucified? impaled?) body up overnight, and if the Romans were observing this regulation they would presumably do so regardless of what day it was. Yet John 19:31 says that this practice was for the sake of observing the Sabbath, or possibly for observing Passover, which implies that a victim crucified on other days could be left up for much longer. Is there any talmudic literature that would shed light on which of these alternatives was the actual practice in the first century? If victims’ legs were broken only on the eve of sabbaths and/or holidays, how was this explained in relation to Deuteronomy?

Vassilios Tzaferis replies:

The crucifixion by Alexander Jannaeus occurred in 88 B.C. It had nothing to do with the revolt against the census of 7 A.D. The Alexander Janneus episode and the episode during the revolt of 7 A.D. are separate examples of mass crucifixions. They were inadvertently combined when my article was edited, and I failed to catch the error when I proofread the text.

Mr. Kuenning is also correct concerning the citation to Josephus.

As for the question concerning Deuteronomy, this is of a more theological nature, and I do not want to get involved because of the many interpretations of this matter.

Defining Cult

To the Editor:

BAR does just what you said it would do. It brings the most recent information on Biblical archaeology right into my home, in high quality, too. Thanks.

But I do have a problem. You (or your authors) are using a word which means one thing to me and obviously something else in your circles.

The word is “cult,” as in “cultic center,” as talked about in the Mt. Ebal altar article (“Has Joshua’s Altar Been Found on Mt. Ebal?” BAR 11:01).

“Cult” conjures up images of evil men deceiving people and leading them off into foolish error. When I read about the Mt. Ebal altar, I don’t want Jim Jones jumping out at me.

Would you please print a definition, your definition, of “cult,” so I can at least make a deliberate attempt to understand it the way you intend it.

To the Editor:

I must comment on the fine article by Adam Zertal (“Has Joshua’s Altar Been Found on Mt. Ebal?” BAR 11:01). It’s too bad he had to ruin an otherwise excellent article by consistently referring to the Hebrew worship of the True God as cultic. Shame on him! I would like to know his definition of a cult. When you worship the true and living god, you are not engaged in a cultic ritual.

Webster’s defines cult as “a system of a worship of a deity, … hence, the rites of a religion.”—Ed.

Iron Age (Cadil)l(acs)—Or How to Reconstruct an Ancient Inscription

To the Editor:

André Lemaire’s article, “Who or What Was Yahweh’s Asherah?” BAR 10:06, was of great interest to me because of a similar type of find which I encountered on my last dig. We were excavating Tel-a-vishon and had recently recovered some interesting pieces of Iron Age pottery, two fertility figurines and a Zippo lighter, when one of my people discovered a rather unique object. The item in question was a tube-like piece of iron some 6.4 cm in diameter and about 16 cm long. Upon closer examination, it was noted that two characters were discernible on the outer surface. Being familiar with Iron Age epigraphy, I recognized the first character to be a “J” and the second a lower case “I.” Utilizing the Lemaire process, I was able to conclude that the inscription should read (Cadil)l(ac). The letters in parentheses are reconstructions and not actually in the inscription. Having deciphered the inscription, I was left with the problem of the extraneous “J.” Since “Cadillac” is not spelled with a “J,” it is obvious that whoever inscribed the object must have been working upside down in the dark and became confused and wrote the wrong letter.

There was some debate among us as to what the object might be. One of my assistants suggested that it might comprise a portion of an exhaust system and in running this to ground (no pun intended), we did find that the object would slip over the tailpipe of a Cadillac and therefore must have been part of the exhaust system of an Iron Age Cadillac. While nobody else has actually duplicated this find, one team from Indiana University did unearth a slightly curved piece of iron in Tibet which had two parallel scratches on its surface. In light of my discovery, and using the Lemaire process, it is now safe to assume that these are not two scratches, but rather the middle two letters of (Cadi)ll(ac). This proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that during the Iron Age the Hebrews puttered about in thousands of Coupe de Villes. This find has been extremely important as it clears up a formerly obscure passage in Nahum (2:4) and therefore once again proves the value of objective science to Bible study.

On Cancelling Subscriptions and Drinking Archaeologists

To the Editor:

BAR is a fine magazine, and your staff should take pride in the excellence and entertainment it brings to all of us.

I write not in regard to any particular article, but about the number of irate letters I see in the Queries & Comments section from people who cancel their subscriptions because they disagree with a certain article, thinking that it somehow contradicts or negates their religious beliefs.

I have never been able to understand people who cannot take criticism, constructive or not, of their faith. Many of them have told me that no matter what someone else says about their faith, it cannot be shaken. Obviously the people who write letters to you are not so unshakable in their faith.

I was especially surprised by the letter of Randy and Sherrene Walker in the January/February issue (Queries & Comments, BAR 11:01). They were appalled that someone in the photos might be drinking alcoholic beverages. You should tell those people that, if that is their criteria for reading something or not, they really shouldn’t read the Bible, since there is murder, incest, rape, adultery, total destruction described in it. It is a very graphic book. The Walkers, using 080their criteria, should toss their Bible away.

I admire your guts in printing both favorable and unfavorable letters.

To the Editor:

I am appalled at Appalled at Drinks.

It seems to me that somewhere in the Bible Jesus changed water into wine so that the party would not be an embarrassment to the bride and groom because of the lack of drinks. [See John 2:1–11.]

Living Through the Pages of BAR

To the Editor:

I live every page of Biblical Archaeology Review. At 71 years old, I am now too old and too poor to go on a dig. But I live the lives of those who do go through the pages of your wonderful magazine.

At Last, a Letter of Unmitigated Praise

To the Editor:

Your journal is one of the most fascinating things ever to enter our home. We read it with appreciation, awe, wonder and love.

I most particularly appreciate your nonsectarian, non-partisan editorial attitude.

A Collector Speaks Out

To the Editor:

I am a new subscriber to BAR and I enjoy the publication immensely. As an antiquities collector, however, I was disappointed to discover that BAR’s policy prohibits antiquities ads.

I collect ancient objects not because I want to encourage illegal plundering of tombs, but because there is a personal satisfaction in researching and studying each piece of the ancient world that I acquire. I would hope that accepting antiquities ads in a publication such as BAR—where understanding the ancient world is paramount—would help to foster a deeper appreciation among collectors.

I understand your decision is not an easy one. Good luck.

In Defense Of Jacob Neusner

To the Editor: