Endnote 11 – Babatha’s Story

In a much earlier Aramaic divorce document (Mur 19), the man leaves the woman free to marry a gever jehudi. This document was published in Pierre Benoit, J.T. Milik and Roland de Vaux, Les Grottes de Murabba‘ât: Textes, Discoveries in the Judaean Desert 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961). Documents from this find are identified by the abbreviation “Mur” plus the number assigned to them on the official excavation list. (They were numbered in the order they were found.) Also appearing in Joseph Fitzmyer, A Manual of Palestinian Aramaic Texts (Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1978), no. 40, pp. 138–141, this document dates to the sixth year either of the First Jewish Revolt, thus 71–72 C.E., or more likely, of the existence of the Roman province of Arabia, thus 112 C.E.