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  • From: "Ian Hutchesson" <mc2499 AT mclink.it>
  • To: "b-hebrew" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] The Priestly Stratum
  • Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2003 19:58:55 +0100

Hi Liz.

> I disagree that the people of pre-Exilic Judah were
> polytheistic. I don't know that the figurines represented
> Ashera or that they were worshipped.

If they weren't cultic figurines like all
the others, what were they?

> I don't know who
> wrote the grafitti on the Kuntillit Adjrud pithoi.

Or the Khirbet el-Qom inscription or at Deir
el'Alla (with its shadayin gods), but then the
archaeological record says that the inhabitants
of the area were polytheistic and they were so
even during the period when most people don't
want them to have been, so with no
archaeological evidence to support the case one
asserts monotheism.

Who worshipped at the bamah just outside
Jerusalem at Malhah (which is now a part
southern suburbs)? (See de Vaux, Ancient
Israel, p285.)

> I can tell
> you tho that there was only one matzevah at Arad, the
> other one you see in all the photos was part of the wall
> and had fallen into the cella area.

This is not how A.Mazar and others see it.
There were in fact two altars in the temple.
See Mazar's Archaeology..., Doubleday, p497.

"Placed inside the niche, against the rear
wall, were two standing stones (massebot);
one, painted red, was larger than the other.
At the entrance to the Holy of Holies, there
were two monolithic stone altars of different
dimensions, each standing opposite the
massebah of comparable size."

Piera Arata Mantovani writes in an Italian
analysis, "The Arad Temple, annexed to the
fortress, reflects a single phase (strata
VII-VI): it was built at the beginning of
stratum VII (1st half of the 7th c.) and
remained in use until the final destruction
of fortress VI, at the beginning of the 6th
c... two stone stelae... two small stone
altars..."

It's also interesting to remember that the
temple in Jerusalem was described as having
two pillars [`mdym] in the porch.

> All the polemics that you read in Ezekiel, etc. are just their
> way of explaining the disasters. The temple was captured,
> the people deported -- ERGO they must have worshipped
> other gods.

What you need to do first before making such
pronouncements is to date the text. It was
written sometime after the fall of Jerusalem
and before the citations from Qumran, perhaps
before Ben Sira who knew of the prophet and
maybe the book. Beyond that, the onus is on
you to contextualize it, otherwise your ideas
about significance can't even be considered,
for the fall of Jerusalem may have been used
in that text as a trope for other
circumstances.


Cheers,


Ian





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