Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Christian M. M. Brady" <cbrady AT tulane.edu>]

Dear Steve,

I think you misread the original post:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Peter Kirk [mailto:Peter_Kirk AT sil.org]
> Sent: Monday, September 04, 2000 8:11 AM
> Remember that we have evidence from the Elephantine
> letters for a Samaritan temple from about this period.
> 
> Peter Kirk

I believe Peter was saying that there was a Samaritan temple in this period,
not that the temple at Elephantine was Samaritan. Thus the quote from ABD
was introduced, the implication being that if the Elephantine Jews are
writing to Samaritan priest's for help to build a temple because they too
(the Samaritan priests) had built a temple and would be willing/able to help
them.

But maybe I misunderstood Peter.

Yours,

Cb

BTW, Steve, your computers clock is off by about 18 years.

On 7/25/18 12:00 AM, "Steve Oren" <soren AT enteract.com> wrote:

> Let's try again.  The ORIGINAL assertion was that there was a Samaritan 
> Temple
> at Elephantine.  Liz Fried quite properly questioned this.  BTW-THere was 
> (see
> Porten's book on Elephantine) a Temple in Elephantine but why would one term
> it "Samaritan"?
> Now we are given a citation from Freedman but all it shows is that when the
> ELephantine Temple was destroyed, the Elephantine Israelites requested aid
> from both Jerusalem and Shechem.  Yes, this proves, as Freedman says, that
> there were two Temples at this point in time.  If one assumes that either or
> both of these Temples had adopted Deuteronomy (and the existence of
> ELephantine would suggest they had not) then they each would have thought of
> themselves as the ONLY legitimate Temple and would be rival Temples.  Again,
> the fact that the Elephantine temple asked for their help suggests that they
> did not think of themselves as a "rival" to either one and presumtively did
> not think of the remaining two as rivals to each other.  But even granting
> that point, all that it would show is that there was a rivalry in
> Palestine/Israel.  It does not demonstrate that which was to be proven, that
> there was a distinctively Samaritan Temple at Elephantine unless our 
> original
> author thinks that any Temple outside Jerusalem is "Samaritan".
> 
>                  
> Steve Oren
>                  
> Chicago, IL      
> ----------
>> In a message dated 9/4/2000 10:04:17 AM Central Standard Time,
>> lizfried AT umich.edu writes:
>> 
>> 
>> << Just curious, what is the evidence for a Samaritan temple
>> in the Elephantine papyri??
>> thanks,
>>>> 
>> 
>> The 5th century b.c.e. Elephantine papyri include letters requesting help 
>> to
>> build a temple from both the Samaritan and Jewish priests (CAP, 30), 
>> implying
>> an already existing schism. Indeed the Samaritan Chronicle of Abu’l Fath
>> claims that Zerubbabel and Sanballat, subsequent leaders of the Jewish and
>> Samaritan communities, were already feuding about the appropriate location 
>> of
>> the restored temple while still in Babylon (Stenhouse 1985:89–95). The
>> Persian king, “Surdi,” likely Darius spelled backward, ruled in favor 
>> of
>> Sanballat and sent him home to Mt. Gerizim with funds to construct the 
>> altar
>> and by implication the temple.
>> 
>> Freedman, David Noel, ed., The Anchor Bible Dictionary, s.v. "Samaritans",
>> (New York: Doubleday) 1997, 1992.
>> 
>> gfsomsel


Cb
cbrady @ tulane.edu
-- 
"You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers.  You can tell
whether a man is wise by his questions."
          - Naguib Mahfouz (b. 1911), Egyptian writer, winner of 1988
            Nobel Prize for literature