Josephus attests several times to a Jewish aversion to the use of Gentile olive oil. In m. ‘Abod. Zar. 2:6, this practice is first advocated and then immediately reversed by Rabbi and his court. What is the rationale for this sudden leniency with regard to Gentile olive oil? In a well-known article entitled “Kosher Olive Oil in Antiquity,” Marti…[Read more]

In the tannaitic corpus, a novel innovation appears: sharing bread is understood to lead to sharing a bed. As such, the Tannaim problematise and marginalise commensal interactions between Jews and non-Jews. In several instances, commensality with non-Jews is equated with idolatry, the binary opposite of Jewishness in rabbinic literature. While…[Read more]

Justifications for foodways are too often ignored in the academic study of commensality. In seeking to understand how a particular group constructs the rules around the table – what, how, and with whom one will or will not eat – the rationales for these rules must be factored into any scholarly analysis. In this essay, I use the example of anc…[Read more]

This essay explores how changing the subject can function as a valid legal process in classical rabbinic literature. In order to do so, it first establishes standard rabbinic legal procedure, in which the legal reasoning for arguments is debated and either supported or refuted. Next, it discusses cases that do not fit this pattern: namely, those…[Read more]

Review of Kipp Davis, Kyung S. Baek, Peter W. Flint, and Dorothy M. Peters (eds.) The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday.

An analysis of pentateuchal laws pertaining to women either born or married into priestly and levitical families in ancient Israel.

Generically, theologically, and with respect to content Joseph and Aseneth and the Gospel of Mark are miles apart. But the two narratives also exhibit remarkable stylistic affinities. Each is paratactically structured, frequently employs verbs that are active in voice and imperfective in aspect, evokes Jewish Scriptures echoically rather than by…[Read more]

Historians tend to turn data into stories. For those of us who study the ancient data typically categorized as early Judaism and early Christianity, few stories captivate as much as Jewish particularism and the tale of the “turncoat” general Josephus. The story of Jewish particularism during the first century often assumes an inevitable cul…[Read more]

Forty thousand infantry prepared for battle slowly march south toward Judea from the Seleucid capital in Antioch. They are joined by seven thousand cavalry with a single command: destroy Judea. Upon reaching the land they make camp at Emmaus and wait for a rather small band of Judean rebels to respond. Such is the opening scene of the battle of…[Read more]

Many scholars have used two verses from an epistle appended to the main body of 2 Maccabees to suggest a canon, proto-canon, or body of scripture is present already during the Hasmonean era and even before. We question such conclusions by investigating the background and contents of the epistle, using both historical-critical and rhetorical…[Read more]

This brief study investigates the desire for a fixed textual form as it pertains to scripture in the Judean tradition. It particularly delves into this phenomenon in three early versions of the Septuagint origin myth. is paper argues that this myth is invaluable for the study of transmission and reception of scripture, as it is one of the…[Read more]

One goal of this essay is to offer an exploratory, historiographical analysis of the conquest account in the book of Joshua, an analysis that focuses upon the sociocultural milieu of ancient Judah. I propose to show how this narrative of conquest might have contributed to discourse(s) among the literate Judean community that perpetuated the text,…[Read more]

This essay works toward three goals. First, it lays some groundwork for researching prophetic literature as a source for ancient Judean historical thought. Prophetic literature reveals a great deal about how ancient Judeans thought about and with their past, as it was represented in their literary repertoire. Second, it examines Isaiah 40-48, to…[Read more]

An interview with Francis Landy on the occasion of his retirement from the University of Alberta

Review of Transforming Literature into Scripture: Texts as Cult Objects at Nineveh and Qumran by Russell Hobson

Review of The Ways of a King: Legal and Political Ideas in the Bible by Geoffrey P. Miller

Review of The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity by Eva Mroczek

An examination of Judean Pillar Figurines in relation to cultural discourse and identity construction in the late Iron-Age Levant

This essay offers a close reading of the dirge in Ezek 27, the metaphorical description of the famed and sinking Tyrian ship. The analysis pays close attention to the symbolic world of the text, situating it within the literary and historical milieux of fourth-century BCE Judah, when Jerusalemite literati began codifying their authoritative texts…[Read more]

An examination of the Song of the Sea (Exodus 15) and allusions to it in the book of Isaiah