This article describes the current crisis in Pentateuch research, presenting its origin and results, as well as the impact on the modern research. It shows the main players in the debate and its contribution to the current status in the field. It finishes describing the future of the research, as we can grasp from the current research and the…[Read more]

This article describes the current crisis in Pentateuch research, presenting its origin and results, as well as the impact on the modern research. It shows the main players in the debate and its contribution to the current status in the field. It finishes describing the future of the research, as we can grasp from the current research and the…[Read more]

This article describes the current crisis in Pentateuch research, presenting its origin and results, as well as the impact on the modern research. It shows the main players in the debate and its contribution to the current status in the field. It finishes describing the future of the research, as we can grasp from the current research and the…[Read more]

The historical narrative of water purity tends to chart a process of secularisation with an
increasing importance on cleanliness. We suggest otherwise – that rhetorically at least, water
has never been secularised. Moral impurity and water contamination have a long and
interrelated history. Even before the connection had been made between c…[Read more]

The historical narrative of water purity tends to chart a process of secularisation with an
increasing importance on cleanliness. We suggest otherwise – that rhetorically at least, water
has never been secularised. Moral impurity and water contamination have a long and
interrelated history. Even before the connection had been made between c…[Read more]

Analyses the introduction of Yeshuʿah ben Yehudah’s Risāla fī ’l-Jawāb ʿan masāʾil mushkila fī ’l-tarkīb, its key concept (al-muwāḍaʿa al-sharʿiyya), and its relation to Muʿtazilī uṣūl al-fiqh.

The paper revisits the arguably most conspicuous example of a Jewish Muʿtazilī Hexaemeron in Arabic. Its 11th century Byzantine Hebrew translation bears the title “Bereshit Rabbah” and attributes the work to Yeshuʿah ben Yehudah (fl. 1040-1070) whose authorship has been questioned in recent scholarship. Based on a reconstruction of all extant…[Read more]

Analyses the introduction of Yeshuʿah ben Yehudah’s Risāla fī ’l-Jawāb ʿan masāʾil mushkila fī ’l-tarkīb, its key concept (al-muwāḍaʿa al-sharʿiyya), and its relation to Muʿtazilī uṣūl al-fiqh.

The paper revisits the arguably most conspicuous example of a Jewish Muʿtazilī Hexaemeron in Arabic. Its 11th century Byzantine Hebrew translation bears the title “Bereshit Rabbah” and attributes the work to Yeshuʿah ben Yehudah (fl. 1040-1070) whose authorship has been questioned in recent scholarship. Based on a reconstruction of all extant…[Read more]

The papper offers an identification and reconstruction of Abū l-Ḥasan al-Ṣūrī’s “Kitāb fī bāb al-qibla” together with its anonymous Qaraite refutation (al-Naqḍ ʿalā l-Sāmira). Building on previous studies by A. Loewenstamm, A. Halkin, H. Pohl, and others, this paper will also provide new evidence from the Firkovitch collections (mainly ФIPK. СA…[Read more]

Audio & slides of a paper given at the Colloquium on Avicenna and Avicennisms held at SOAS, University of London, 6–7 June 2014. http://meti.maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/home/meti-info/2014-avicenna/ © Gregor Schwarb, 7 June 2014

Forthcoming in Like ʾIlu Are You Wise: Studies in Northwest Semitic Languages and Literature in Honor of Dennis G. Pardee, Oriental Institute Publications.

“Luke’s complex portrayal of ‘the Jews’ in general, and of the Pharisees in particular, reflects a situation in which the lines between Judaism and Christianity were not yet clearly drawn.”

Pre-publication draft (not intended for circulation or citation) of a contribution to a forthcoming edited volume on Narsai of Nisibis. Any comments, suggestions, or corrections are welcome (email to jwalters@rc.edu).

Between January 1969 and the summer of 1975, NASA received over eight million letters and petition signatures supporting the right of American astronauts to free religious expression in space. Prompted by Madalyn Murray O’Hair’s complaints about the reading of Genesis during the flight of Apollo 8, the petition campaign points to the complex…[Read more]

Tibet – end of the legend

The central topic of João Botelho’s “Um adeus português” (1986), is memory in 1980s Portuguese society. The film alternates scenes from 1973, during the colonial war in Africa, with scenes set in 1985, in rural and urban areas of Portugal. In the present essay, I argue that the film enacts the need for a conversation among the Portuguese by opti…[Read more]

A short note on a 2012 find from Göbekli Tepe – a seated figurine with an animal on its shoulder.

In July 2013, the recently elected Pope Francis chose Lampedusa for his fist pastoral visit. A tiny island, part of the Sicilian region yet closer to Tunisia than to Italy, Lampedusa has at times become hyper-visible in the media and national discourses surrounding immigration while at other times it is ignored — part of Italy’s geographic and soc…[Read more]

Recent debates about the ethics of identity in a global age have dealt with how to prioritize conflicting local and global allegiances. Guided by these concerns, the fiction of Alice Walker develops a distinctive view of how local cultures and global movements can fruitfully interact. This vision depends on concepts from Asian religions, a major…[Read more]