Tag Archives: Scholars

Ritual Indexing at SBL Meeting

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Goran Zivkovic (program chair), James Watts, Naphtali Meshel, Roy Gane, William Gilders, Mark Giszczak (left to right)

A couple weeks ago in Boston I had the pleasure of presiding at a session of the Ritual in the Biblical World program unit of the Society of Biblical Literature Annual Meeting for 2025. The topic under discussion by the presenters was the concept of “ritual indexing” in the thought of Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced “purse”) and how it can be applied to understanding biblical rituals.

Here’s the official description of the event:

“This session will focus on the interpretation of ritual activities as indexes. Building on the theoretical framework of Charles Sanders Peirce and expanding upon it, this session will primarily explore how ritual actions function to index existential relationships between different ritual elements.”

Rappaport on Peirce

The idea of an “index” is not that complicated. It is “a sign which refers to the Object it denotes by being really affected by that Object” (Buchler quoted in Rappaport). It simply indicates or points to the meaning it is trying to convey. While a ritual action (e.g. eating) might look just like a regular action to an outsider, rituals are constructed to convey deeper meanings. Rappaport gives the following examples:

Thus, a rash indicates (is an index of ) measles, the rustling of the peacock’s spread tail fan indicates his sexual arousal, the weathervane indicates the wind’s direction, the Rolls Royce or sable coat indicates the wealth of its owner, May Day parades indicated the strength of Soviet armaments, or aspects of that strength, the March on Washington of November 15, 1970 indicated the size and social composition of opposition to the war in Viet Nam. (Roy Rappaport, Ritual and Religion [Cambridge, 1999] p. 55)

Presenters and Papers

We had presentations by a group of top-notch scholars working on this concept in the text of Leviticus and the ancient Israelite cult that it prescribes/describes. The papers presented began with “Interpreting Leviticus 1 with Nancy Jay, Charles S. Peirce, and Roy Rappaport” by William Gilders of Emory University. He launched much of this discussion with his important 2004 book, Blood Ritual in the Hebrew Bible, that seeks to interpret the meaning of the blood manipulation rituals of Leviticus. James Watts of Syracuse University presented on “How Indexing Cuts the Gordian Knot of Ritual Meaning,” also using Peirce as mediated through Rappaport to describe how Levitical ritual “indexes” relationships in the Israelite community. Roy E. Gane of Andrews University offered a paper on “Methodology for Analyzing Indexing in Ancient Israelite Cult” along with a very detailed PowerPoint presentation that expanded on how indexing helps us understand Israelite ritual. Lastly, Naphtali Meshel of Hebrew University analyzed the text of Leviticus to reveal ritual indices within the text in his paper, “Ritual Texts Pointing to Ritual Texts.”

It was such a joy to be able to participate in a conversation with these scholars and explore the depth of ritual meaning available in the Levitical system as presented in the biblical text. There is always more to learn and more to study! I look forward to next year’s presentations on Ritual in the Biblical World and I hope that the conversation will continue.

Who Were the M‘amadot?

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Yesterday, I came across a pretty obscure reference in a book by Jim Davila, the most profilic of biblical bloggers to whom I have linked for years. He wrote a commentary on some of the Dead Sea Scrolls entitled Liturgical Works (Eerdmans, 2000). On p. 242, I found this tidbit on the so-called “Words of the Luminaries” (4Q504, 4Q506). Davila speculates that the text

“was used in the m‘amadot service (a pre-Mishnaic institution in which delegations of lay representatives would participate in the temple sacrificial services for a week at a time).”

Twenty-Four Divisions of Lay People

Huh? I had never heard of the m‘amadot. Who were they? Unfortunately, there is very little information about them out there. The word is a feminine plural, which means “stands” or “posts.” The Encylopedia Britannica has a tiny entry on them. Even the Jewish Encyclopedia is extremely sparing in its reference.  It distinguishes between on the one hand, the “mishmarot,” which were the 24 divisions of the Levitical priests who would take turns serving at the temple, and on the other hand, the m‘amadot, which were 24 divisions of lay people that mirrored the 24 divisions of the Levitical priests. The JE says that “on the return from the Exile 24 (Israelite) ammudim (m‘amadot) were established, parallel to the priestly and Levitical mishmarot (Tosef., Ta’an. 4:2).”

 

The Talmud on the m‘amadot

There is a reference to the m‘amadot in Ta’anit 27b: “Rabbi Ya’akov bar Aḥa said that Rav Asi said: Were it not for the non-priestly watches and the Temple service, heaven and earth would not continue to exist, as it is stated: “And he said: Lord God, by what shall I know that I shall inherit it?” (Genesis 15:8)” (see sefaria.org). So the laity, not just the priests, kept watches in the temple—and at least to some rabbinic authorities, their role in the temple service was cosmically necessary. This section also goes on to describe the deeds of the m‘amadot: they would remain “in their towns and would assemble in the synagogue and observe four fasts each week to correspond with the days of creation:

  • Monday: a fast for seafarers, “as the sea was created on Monday”
  • Tuesday: a fast for “those who walk in the desert, as the dry land was created on Tuesday”
  • Wednesday: a fast that children would not fall subject to croup – corresponding to the day on which the luminaries (me’orot) were created (a word similar to “curses” me’erot)
  • Thursday: for pregnant women for “living beings” were first created on this day
  • Friday: no fast since it was Sabbath eve
  • Sabbath: no fast

I’m left wondering when these people would eat! I guess they would eat a huge feast on the sabbath to be sustained throughout all these fasts.

 

The Word of the Luminaries and the M‘amadot

Davila points to a source by Daniel K. Falk to illustrate his point. I’ll quote a whole paragraph here so we get some context:

“Another possibility, if we continue our speculation along these lines a bit further, is a connection of the weekly prayers in Words of the Luminaries with the lay ma‘amadot services. About these little is known, and there is not even a hint that communal prayer placed any part in these services, although scholars often assume that it must have. Nevertheless, that each course [i.e. division, of the 24 divisions] met for one week would make a weekly cycle of prayer appropriate, and their reading of particular passages from the creation story in sequence for each day of the week is at least analogous to the weekday prayers in Words of the Luminaries which also follow a historical progression, albeit from creation to post-exilic times.” (Daniel K. Falk, Daily, Sabbath, & Festival Prayers, Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah, vol. XXVII [Brill, 1998] p. 91)

Now Falk doesn’t say a whole lot here, but he does highlight the fact that the nature of these m‘amadot services likely included communal prayer. The groups met for a week at a time and perhaps this one source we have from the Dead Seas Scrolls, “The Words of the Luminaries,” is an example of a text that they would pray when they gathered.

Consolidating Insights on the m‘amadot

While the sources are patchy at best, we can pull together a few key insights on the groups of lay people referred to as the m‘amadot:

  1. There were twenty-four divisions of m‘amadot that paralleled the twenty-four divisions of the Levitical priests.
  2. These groups took turns attending the daily temple liturgies (the Tamid) a week at a stretch.
  3. Their observance included specific daily fasts for specific intentions.
  4. Their observance probably included communal daily prayer.

It would be nice if we had more ancient sources describing the function and practice of the m‘amadot but there is not much there. Perhaps there are some interesting works out there that say more. For now, I think of the m‘amadot as the daily Mass-goers of Second Temple Judaism. They were dedicated lay people who came to the temple to worship every day when their division was on duty. In this way, they were quasi-priestly kind of like the Nazirites who would take a special vow for a time period. They remind me also of the apostles in the book of Acts who were “going up to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour” (Acts 3:1), which would indicate the time of the evening sacrifice. While we cannot be sure, perhaps some of the early believers were members of the m‘amadot. I hope that over time we can learn more about these interesting devout Jewish worshippers from the Second Temple era.

 

For further reading:

The only additional reference that I have not had time to pursue is Esther Eshel and Ḥanan Eshel, “4Q471 Fragment 1 and Maʻamadot in the War Scroll,” in The Madrid Qumran Congress: Proceedings of the International Congress on the Dead Sea Scrolls, Madrid, 18-21 March 1991, 611–20, (Brill, 1992).

Max Weber on 2 Thess 3:10 – If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat.

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A few years ago, I published an article in the Catholic Biblical Quarterly on 2 Thessalonians 3:10 where it is stated “If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat.” My essential argument is that the “let him not eat” statement was a formal indication of excommunication for persons who refused to work.

Little did I know that the inimitable Max Weber–one of the towering intellectuals of the early twentieth century–weighed in on this passage himself:

Almost all prophets have been supported by voluntary gifts. The well-known saying of St. Paul, “If a man does not work, neither shall he eat,” was directed against the swarm of charismatic missionaries. It obviously has nothing to do with a positive valuation of economic activity for its own sake, but only lays it down as a duty of each individual somehow to provide for his own support. This because he realized that the purely charismatic parable of the lilies of the field was not capable of literal application, but at best “taking no thought for the morrow” could be hoped for. (Max Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization [New York: Free Press, 1967] p. 363.)

Is he right? I don’t know, but he offers an intriguing theory. Were there indolent “charismatic missionaries” hoping for a handout and refusing to do any real work? Well, 2 Thessalonians does not provide evidence for this, but the Didache does! This absurdly early Christian document (first century!) was lost for centuries, but rediscovered in the 1873 hiding in a monastery library somewhere in Constantinople. In it, we find the following almost humorous warning:

In regard to ‘apostles’ and ‘prophets,’ act according to the doctrine of the Gospel. Let every apostle who comes to you be received as the Lord. But he shall not remain more than one day. But, if necessary, let him remain a second day. But, if he stays for three, he is a false prophet. And when the apostle departs, let him take only enough bread to last until he reaches shelter; but, if he asks for money, he is a false prophet. (Didache 11:3-6; Francis X. Glimm, “The Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,” in The Apostolic Fathers, trans. Francis X. Glimm, Joseph M.-F. Marique, and Gerald G. Walsh, vol. 1 of The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1947), 180.)

I don’t know if Max Weber was aware of this text from the Didache, but it does support his interpretation of 2 Thess 3:10. Perhaps there were wandering “apostles” and “prophets” some of whom were legit and some of whom were trying to get a free lunch. The Didache puts a firm limit of two days on any prophet’s stay–any more and he’s false! I don’t know if these prophetic freeloaders really came in “swarms” as Weber supposes, but they must have really been walking around the first-century Christian world, such as it was.

 

An Inside Look into the Work of the ESV Translation Oversight Committee

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I found this amazing clip today. It offers an inside-the-room, fly-on-the-wall view of a debate among the translators of the ESV. In this video, they debate how to render Hebrew and Greek words indicating “slave” or “servant.” In particular, it shows them voting to approve the change from “slave” to “bondservant” in certain NT passages. The video features Translation Oversight Committee members Paul House, Wayne Grudem, Gordon Wenham, Peter Williams and Jack Collins. It gives a sense of the serious nature of the translation debates and the types of evidence members would marshal to support their arguments:

Did the Wave Offering Make the Sign of the Cross?

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Wave offerings are prescribed in the Old Testament several times–mainly in Leviticus and Numbers. Normally, the OT sacrificial system leads people to tears of boredom, but something caught my eye in reading about this in Allen P. Ross’s book, Holiness to the Lord. He describes the wave offering ritual thusly:

The wave offering (tenupa) was placed in the offerer’s hands, and then the priest placed his hands beneath those of the offerer, moving them upward and downward, forward and backward, thereby symbolizing the consecration of the gift of God in the sight of all. (p. 192)

Sounds interesting, but what is even more amazing is what he suggests in a footnote:

[R.K.] Harrison ([Leviticus: Introduction and Commentary, IVP 1980] 83) observes the description and interpretation of this ritual and notes that the motion was in the shape of a cross. If this is right, then it is a symbolic foreshadowing of the sacrifice of Christ.

Interestingly, there is no description of the ritual in the biblical text and some commentators, like Jacob Milgrom, have rejected the wave offering as a “fiction.” Harrison’s description is rooted in later Jewish rabbinic sources. So this may remain a mystery, but if the description of the ritual is accurate, it reminds me of a Catholic priest making the sign of the cross over the gifts on the altar before the sacrifice of the Mass is made. Perhaps this act is foreshadowed by the ancient Israelite wave offering.

What Did Ezra Read?

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Today, the mass reading comes from Nehemiah, which reports the event of the priest-scribe Ezra reading the law of God to the Jews who have returned from the exile to the land. Here’s the report:

And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law. (Neh 8:3 ESV)

So the question is what exactly is he reading? Scholars have put in a lot of sweat equity trying to figure out what exactly the “Book of the Law” was–Deuteronomy? The P material? Some early form of the Pentateuch? But of course, being scholars, they resort to bookish ideas to try to solve this problem of the book. I thought I’d lend a hand by introducing modern technology. 🙂 (That would be a rather Catholic Bible Student kind of thing to do anyway.)

So…here’s where mp3 files come in. Back in the 60’s a mellifluous rabbi recorded himself reading the entire Tanak aloud and a very kind webmaster, has turned these recordings into mp3’s for all of us to enjoy for free. If we can grant Ezra about 6 hours from sun-up to noon to read, then how long would it take to read the Pentateuch in its present Hebrew form?

Using the Mechon-Mamre recordings as our baseline:

  • Genesis – 4:31:59 (4 hours, 31 minutes, 59 seconds)
  • Exodus – 3:14:39
  • Leviticus – 2:07:22
  • Numbers – 2:55:12
  • Deuteronomy – 2:43:28

So, if he read the whole Pentateuch, it would take 15 hours, 32 minutes and 40 seconds, with no breaks! So…he didn’t have time to read the whole Torah. But he could have read all of Deuteronomy and all of Numbers. Or he could have read all of Deuteronomy slowly with breaks and stops for moments of explanation. 

How much of the Pentateuch can you read from sunrise to noon?

A Catholic Theology of the Old Testament

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One of my friends mentioned to me a couple weeks ago, “No one has written a Catholic theology of the Old Testament in over 40 years.” I took a look and well, he’s right. In fact, if you type “catholic old testament” into Amazon, almost nothing comes up. There have been lots of Old Testament theology books from Protestant scholars, famous ones too: Childs, Goldingay, Waltke/Yu, and of course, Brueggemann.

The exact goal of an Old Testament theology is a little hard to define, but it comes around to explaining how the Old Testament portrays God and man’s relationship with Him. Of course, Christian writers are interested in how the Old Testament prepares the stage for Jesus and the New Testament as well.

A specifically Catholic theology of the Old Testament should contribute all these things, but should add a lot on how to integrate Old Testament teachings with the official doctrine of the Church and her theology. This is not easy to do. Significant changes in Catholic theology have unfolded over the last 50 years, so the task has become even more complicated.

So, what old Catholic Old Testament theologies are there? Well, I just checked out one called Theology of the Old Testament by Paul Heinisch (originally written in German around 1940; published in English in 1965; Review here). Another one was Theology of the Old Testament by Paul van Imschoot (original in French? 1954; vol. 1 English translation in 1965)–three volumes were planned; two were published in French, only one in English.

Perhaps it is time for a new Catholic theology of the Old Testament.

UPDATE:

I found a couple more Catholic theologies of the Old Testament in Frederick Prussner’s book, Old Testament Theology: Its History and Development. Here they are:
Cordero, Garcia. Teologia de la Biblia: vol. 1, Antiguo Testamento. Madrid: Editorial Catolica, 1970.
McKenzie, John L. A Theology of the Old Testament. Garden City: Doubleday, 1974.

Cardinals who are Biblical Scholars

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Now that the cardinals have entered the conclave, there’s not much to be said about anything besides white and black smoke. So, I thought I’d add to the non-discussion discussion by listing the cardinal electors I can find who are biblical scholars in some respect.

Cardinal Giuseppe Betori, S.T.L. (Gregorian), S.S.D. (Biblicum)

Cardinal Thomas Christopher Collins, S.S.L. (Biblicum), S.T.D. (Gregorian)

Cardinal Dominik Duka, O.P., S.T.L. (Warsaw)

Cardinal Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya, S.S.D. (Biblicum – Jerusalem)

Cardinal Patriarch Antonios Naguib, S.T.L., S.S.L (Biblicum)

Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, S.S.L. (Biblicum)

Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, S.T.L (Milan), S.S.L (Biblicum)

Cardinal Robert Sarah, S.T.L. (Gregorian), S.S.L. (Franciscanum)

Cardinal Peter Turkson, S.S.L., S.S.D. (Biblicum)

Note that this is not a definitive list, so if you notice any cardinal electors who are biblical scholars not on this list, post a comment!

Hippolytus’ Commentary on the Song of Songs Now Published

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A while back, I wrote a post on Hippolytus’ commentary on the Song of Songs, which is the first extant Christian commentary on the Song. Unfortunately, it has never been published in an English translation…until now. Yancy Smith wrote his dissertation on this topic and incorporated a translation of the commentary, including translations from the Georgian texts. Now, he has thoroughly revised and changed the dissertation into a book being published for 2013, but now available from Gorgias Press. So, if you are studying the Song of Songs or its interpretations and are in the market for ancient Christian commentaries, you can purchase the book, which is available now with a big discount from the Gorgias Press website. The book is entitled, The Mystery of Anointing: Hippolytus’ Commentary on the Song of Songs in Social and Critical Contexts.