“People on road to caves of Qumran where Dead Sea scrolls were found.” G. Eric and Edith Matson Photograph Collection, 1958 via wiki commons.
“People on road to caves of Qumran where Dead Sea scrolls were found.” G. Eric and Edith Matson Photograph Collection, 1958 via wiki commons.
“When manuscript loss and discovery is framed this way--when we tell the stories of modern discovery the same way we recite religious texts—our reverence and desire distracts us from the material reality of trade in ancient artifacts. The other kind of mystery, hidden crime, remains obscure.”
Read MoreThose who seek moral guidance from the Bible are faced with a further challenge: how does one interpret, distill, and apply the sheer variety of ethical views contained in these diverse texts in order to apply them to one’s life?
Read MoreHenri Matisse, La Danse I. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Henri Matisse, La Danse I. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
These reviews have shown me not only what I was looking at when writing Body Language, but where I was standing when I looked.
Read MoreThe Orator, 110-90 BCE. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The Orator, 110-90 BCE. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
When reading texts from the Hebrew Bible or ancient Rome, it is tempting to focus on the similarities between ‘them’ and ‘us’, our shared humanity, and the very familiar descriptions of longing, love, fear, and despair that make us identify with the peoples of the past, and ‘understand’ them.
Read MoreHannah’s Prayer, by Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Hannah’s Prayer, by Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
We share with ancient readers the condition of embodied and vulnerable human existence.
Read MoreKuttamuwa’s Grave Stele, Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Kuttamuwa’s Grave Stele, Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
These ideas about representation are nearly everywhere assumed but rarely taken up for examination. But as Vayntrub points out, a glance outside the Hebrew Bible suggests the possibilities of different ontologies of representation at play in ancient West Asia.
Read MoreArchaeological stratification in the Athens Metro, Dafni Station. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Archaeological stratification in the Athens Metro, Dafni Station. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Jacqueline Vayntrub’s Body Language has a dialectical relationship to the pervasive metaphor of archeological excavation, which has indelibly shaped both the way we practice biblical scholarship and the way we encounter the self in modernity. On the surface – so goes the metaphor – we see ruins and dust, but if we dig deeper, with our spades and shovels, we can uncover valuable treasures, columns and temples, sense and vitality.
Read MoreFragment of a Head of a Queen, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Fragment of a Head of a Queen, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Voice makes moral and relational claims. It anchors awareness in the particular. The textualized voice and voiced text lay claim to the attention of their audiences in ways that defy apathy, demand engagement, and render the past both vivid and urgent.
Read MoreBeyond Brutality: Reclaiming Female Presence in Bavli Sotah reflects my scholarly journey over these many years of returning to a stance of assuming female presence. Rather than emphasizing absence, marginality, or invisibility, I choose to assume women's presence within rabbinic culture of late antiquity.
Read MoreOut of my deep desire to leave my students with positive lasting memories for the ancient texts that I love, I have permitted my students to present their research in forms outside of the traditional research paper.
Read MoreRather than portraying the sage as a mere conduit for divine truth, these stories present Torah as emerging from the sage’s individual identity and as deeply bound up with his personality. Consequently, an injury to a sage’s honor is not merely an injury to the person himself, but also to the world of Torah learning and creativity associated with him.
Read MoreThe twelve verses about the Magi in Matthew do not invite final answers; they invite attention, patience, and the persistence to keep digging.
Read More“The Rise of Talmud concludes with the argument that Talmud was distinctive because it centered humans reading other humans, as opposed to humans reading God; let this piece conclude with an argument for humans reading other humans as opposed to machines.”
Read MoreHalper 82 Talmud Yerushalmi, Zera'im, Demai 2:1; 2:2-3
Halper 82 Talmud Yerushalmi, Zera'im, Demai 2:1; 2:2-3
“Moulie uncovers a new world of distinctions between the Yerushalmi and the Tannaitic literature. “
Read MoreI will argue that in the Amoraic period, the Jerusalem Talmud may not have been quite so unique and innovative in a way that differs from all other rabbinic compilations. Rather the Talmud and the Amoraic Midrash may rather have participated in similar debates, often taking different stands on the same issues.
Read More1879 Hall, View from southwest (photo circa 1910).
Princeton University Archives, Mudd Library, Grounds & Buildings, SP 2
1879 Hall, View from southwest (photo circa 1910).
Princeton University Archives, Mudd Library, Grounds & Buildings, SP 2
The Bavli might remain the most celebrated rabbinic work, but the Yerushalmi was the first of its kind. The Bavli, in a sense, becomes less unique through Moulie’s reading, and “the Talmud” is re-situated within its late antique Palestinian intellectual context – among Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, and Epiphanius, and other contemporaneous scholars.
Read MoreIllumination featuring the martyrs Milos, Bishop of Persia, Euoures, the Presbyter, and Seboes, the Deacon from the Menologion of Basil II (circa 985 AC, Constantinople). Image courtesy of Wikimedia. The manuscript may be found on Vatican Website.
Illumination featuring the martyrs Milos, Bishop of Persia, Euoures, the Presbyter, and Seboes, the Deacon from the Menologion of Basil II (circa 985 AC, Constantinople). Image courtesy of Wikimedia. The manuscript may be found on Vatican Website.
In her groundbreaking 2004 book Martyrdom and Memory: Early Christian Culture Making, Elizabeth Castelli memorably shifted our gaze from the martyrs’ torn bodies to their hagiographers, requiring us to consider how these narrators shaped their stories and to what ends, with a firm eye on such studies’ relevance for our own world.
Read MoreAt the 2025 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, the Inventing Christianity Unit sponsored a panel honoring the work of Elizabeth Castelli, highlighting her landmark 2004 book, Martyrdom and Memory.
Read MoreTaddeo Crivelli (d. ca. 1479), illuminator, Saint Catherine of Alexandria, The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Ms. Ludwig IX 13, fol. 187v.
Taddeo Crivelli (d. ca. 1479), illuminator, Saint Catherine of Alexandria, The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Ms. Ludwig IX 13, fol. 187v.
In responding to these papers, I have not followed the order in which they appeared on the program, but I have rearranged them in order to try to highlight and feature their contributions to our broader discussion about martyrdom in early, late ancient, and contemporary Christianity.
Read MorePaul Delaroche, La Jeune Martyre (1855), Musée Du Louvre [Wikimedia Commons].
Paul Delaroche, La Jeune Martyre (1855), Musée Du Louvre [Wikimedia Commons].
Do martyrs matter in martyrdom? This may seem like a question with an obvious answer. How could they not? Surely martyrdom is all about the martyrs, and without martyrs, there would be no martyrdom?
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