The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

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Russell Gmirkin
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

Post by Russell Gmirkin »

Leucius Charinus wrote: Thu Feb 09, 2023 8:39 pm The research of Gmirkin and Adler goes against the contemporary paradigms which have been inculcated into its students. Thinking outside the paradigm is tantamount to thinking outside the box. An act often frowned upon.
Still, Adler's reception has on a whole been very positive. The criticism has been very mild, and predictably from those who haven't yet read his book.
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

Post by mlinssen »

Russell Gmirkin wrote: Thu Feb 09, 2023 8:54 pm
Leucius Charinus wrote: Thu Feb 09, 2023 8:39 pm The research of Gmirkin and Adler goes against the contemporary paradigms which have been inculcated into its students. Thinking outside the paradigm is tantamount to thinking outside the box. An act often frowned upon.
Still, Adler's reception has on a whole been very positive. The criticism has been very mild, and predictably from those who haven't yet read his book.
A criticism that has as yet been unanswered is the fact that I asked Adler about the quantification of the chalk vessels. He responded with data that demonstrate that about 1% of the dump finds consist of chalk artifacts

Which is no small matter to leave unaddressed, I would think - and in my opinion that would indicate that they were used for an by unclean Judaics at best. If they were to be utilised by a wider circle of "subscribers" so to say, that in turn would attest to a minute presence of Judaics in general within society at large

I have come at a quarter of the book front to back and still have to finish it - so YMMV and so may mine

Almost without exception, chalk vessels are found only at sites known to have been settled by Judeans, and production sites were found only in Judean regions.

Adler pointed me to and article that I'm trying to locate, but if chalk vessels were found in Judean sites alone AND comprised less than 1% - the combination of which I have to verify - then its use world be limited to a fraction of the people, and priestly use alone would perhaps be more likely.
All in all, Adler conducts solid research, even though he heavily relies on Josephus - but then again who doesn't
Russell Gmirkin
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

Post by Russell Gmirkin »

mlinssen wrote: Sun Feb 12, 2023 7:37 am
Russell Gmirkin wrote: Thu Feb 09, 2023 8:54 pm Still, Adler's reception has on a whole been very positive. The criticism has been very mild, and predictably from those who haven't yet read his book.
A criticism that has as yet been unanswered is the fact that I asked Adler about the quantification of the chalk vessels. He responded with data that demonstrate that about 1% of the dump finds consist of chalk artifacts

Which is no small matter to leave unaddressed, I would think - and in my opinion that would indicate that they were used for an by unclean Judaics at best. If they were to be utilised by a wider circle of "subscribers" so to say, that in turn would attest to a minute presence of Judaics in general within society at large

I have come at a quarter of the book front to back and still have to finish it - so YMMV and so may mine

Almost without exception, chalk vessels are found only at sites known to have been settled by Judeans, and production sites were found only in Judean regions.

Adler pointed me to and article that I'm trying to locate, but if chalk vessels were found in Judean sites alone AND comprised less than 1% - the combination of which I have to verify - then its use world be limited to a fraction of the people, and priestly use alone would perhaps be more likely.
All in all, Adler conducts solid research, even though he heavily relies on Josephus - but then again who doesn't
First, I think it is inaccurate to say that Yonatan Adler has left any question with regard to the quantification of chalk vessels “unanswered” or “unaddressed”. Yonatan Adler and Yuval Gadot have conducted the only statistical analysis on chalk vessels in archaeological sites. They published pretty much everything currently known about the proportion of chalk vessels to ceramic pottery finds in an article easily available on JSTOR, which I assume is the article Adler referred you to:

Yuval Gadot and Yonatan Adler, “A Quantitative Analysis of Jewish Chalk Vessel Frequencies in Early Roman Jerusalem: A View from the City's Garbage Dump,” Israel Exploration Journal, 66/2 (2016), 202-219.

In his article he points out (as have other archaeologists) that part of the reason for the low numbers of chalk vessels is that these stone vessels were more durable than pottery vessels, and hence less liable to be broken and discarded in Jerusalem (or Gamala’s) garbage dumps (Gadot published on Gamala). The percentage of vessels in actual use in the periods in question was thus likely to be higher than the percentages of broken vessels found in the dumps.

The idea that priests were more likely to use chalk stone rather than ceramic vessels due to purity issues has been proposed by other archaeologists and is mentioned in the article. So you don’t bring up anything particularly new in mentioning priestly use. In any case, I don’t see how this is a criticism of Adler’s thesis. Adler argued that the Torah was likely initially observed by a few elites at best during the early Hellenistic Era, and that Torah observances by a wider Jewish population was only seen in the archaeological record starting in the second century BCE. That purity laws were mainly observed by priests even as late as the first century CE in Early Roman Jerusalem would tend to confirm that thesis, not undermine or contradict it.

Finally, I can’t figure out what you mean “used for an by unclean Judaics at best” in your post. Is there perhaps a language/translation issue here from Dutch?
Last edited by Russell Gmirkin on Mon Feb 13, 2023 9:20 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

Post by mlinssen »

Russell Gmirkin wrote: Sun Feb 12, 2023 6:09 pm
mlinssen wrote: Sun Feb 12, 2023 7:37 am
Russell Gmirkin wrote: Thu Feb 09, 2023 8:54 pm Still, Adler's reception has on a whole been very positive. The criticism has been very mild, and predictably from those who haven't yet read his book.
A criticism that has as yet been unanswered is the fact that I asked Adler about the quantification of the chalk vessels. He responded with data that demonstrate that about 1% of the dump finds consist of chalk artifacts

Which is no small matter to leave unaddressed, I would think - and in my opinion that would indicate that they were used for an by unclean Judaics at best. If they were to be utilised by a wider circle of "subscribers" so to say, that in turn would attest to a minute presence of Judaics in general within society at large

I have come at a quarter of the book front to back and still have to finish it - so YMMV and so may mine

Almost without exception, chalk vessels are found only at sites known to have been settled by Judeans, and production sites were found only in Judean regions.

Adler pointed me to and article that I'm trying to locate, but if chalk vessels were found in Judean sites alone AND comprised less than 1% - the combination of which I have to verify - then its use world be limited to a fraction of the people, and priestly use alone would perhaps be more likely.
All in all, Adler conducts solid research, even though he heavily relies on Josephus - but then again who doesn't
First, I think it is inaccurate to say that Yonatan Adler has left any question with regard to the quantification of chalk vessels “unanswered” or “unaddressed”. Yonatan Adler and Yuval Gadot have conducted the only statistical analysis on chalk vessels in archaeological sites. They published pretty much everything currently known about the proportion of chalk vessels to ceramic pottery finds in an article easily available on JSTOR, which I assume is the article Adler referred you to:

Yuval Gadot and Yonatan Adler, “A Quantitative Analysis of Jewish Chalk Vessel Frequencies in Early Roman Jerusalem: A View from the City's Garbage Dump,” Israel Exploration Journal, 66/2 (2016), 202-219.

In his article he points out (as have other archaeologists) that part of the reason for the low numbers of chalk vessels is that these stone vessels were more durable than pottery vessels, and hence less liable to be broken and discarded in Jerusalem (or Gamala’s) garbage dumps (Gadot published on Gamala). The percentage of vessels in actual use in the periods in question was thus likely to be higher than the percentages of broken vessels found in the dumps.

The idea that priests were more likely to use chalk stone ceramic vessels due to purity issues has been proposed by other archaeologists and is mentioned in the article. So you don’t bring up anything particularly new in mentioning priestly use. In any case, I don’t see how this is a criticism of Adler’s thesis. Adler argued that the Torah was likely initially observed by a few elites at best during the early Hellenistic Era, and that Torah observances by a wider Jewish population was only seen in the archaeological record starting in the second century BCE. That purity laws were mainly observed by priests even as late as the first century CE in Early Roman Jerusalem would tend to confirm that thesis, not undermine or contradict it.

Finally, I can’t figure out what you mean “used for an by unclean Judaics at best” in your post. Is there perhaps a language/translation issue here from Dutch?
Thank you Russell, and yes that likely is the article. Yonathan and I have a lovely exchange on Twitter which I since have abandoned, and I'm having trouble locating the conv. I had removed my account but later reinstated it because people were inquiring after missing tweets, which naturally was an intended effect but one that I never worried about anyone actually carrying for that. That's the story there.
He didn't leave the question unanswered when I asked him about it, surely not.
And yes, he brought up the durability to me as well, but I don't believe that chalk is more durable than stone - I believe that to be the exact opposite, given the relatively incredible ease with which chalk could be worked when compared to stone

The idea of the priests is from his book, hence why I brought it up - certainly without claiming that to be a new find!
I don't understand why you think I criticise Adler's thesis in general, I find his book rather compelling really, and even state that in my post. "Solid research" is not a phrase that I toss around in the wild, certainly not among biblical academic. Your book attested to it, and now does Adler's - and please do realise that these are at the fringes of where I do mine, I'm not an authority of any kind on those. If any

The 'an' is missing a 'd' - I very frequently make typos, as you can see in "and article"
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

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mlinssen wrote: Mon Feb 13, 2023 8:32 am
Russell Gmirkin wrote: Sun Feb 12, 2023 6:09 pm
mlinssen wrote: Sun Feb 12, 2023 7:37 am
Russell Gmirkin wrote: Thu Feb 09, 2023 8:54 pm Still, Adler's reception has on a whole been very positive. The criticism has been very mild, and predictably from those who haven't yet read his book.
A criticism that has as yet been unanswered is the fact that I asked Adler about the quantification of the chalk vessels.

<snip>
<snip>
The idea that priests were more likely to use chalk stone [rather than] ceramic vessels due to purity issues has been proposed by other archaeologists and is mentioned in the article.
<snip>
Thank you Russell, and yes that likely is the article. Yonathan and I have a lovely exchange on Twitter which I since have abandoned, and I'm having trouble locating the conv. I had removed my account but later reinstated it because people were inquiring after missing tweets, which naturally was an intended effect but one that I never worried about anyone actually carrying for that. That's the story there.
He didn't leave the question unanswered when I asked him about it, surely not.
And yes, he brought up the durability to me as well, but I don't believe that chalk is more durable than stone - I believe that to be the exact opposite, given the relatively incredible ease with which chalk could be worked when compared to stone

The idea of the priests is from his book, hence why I brought it up - certainly without claiming that to be a new find!
I don't understand why you think I criticise Adler's thesis in general, I find his book rather compelling really, and even state that in my post. "Solid research" is not a phrase that I toss around in the wild, certainly not among biblical academic. Your book attested to it, and now does Adler's - and please do realise that these are at the fringes of where I do mine, I'm not an authority of any kind on those. If any

The 'an' is missing a 'd' - I very frequently make typos, as you can see in "and article"
I (incorrectly) inferred you were critical of his thesis because you led with the statement, "A criticism that has as yet been unanswered..." Thanks for the clarification.

Also, I apologize for a mistake in my posting I failed to catch. I intended to write "chalk stone [rather than] ceramic vessels" but "rather than" dropped out of the text. Chalk is an easily worked form of stone and chalk vessels more durable than pottery (ceramic) vessels.

Again, thanks for your comments.
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

Post by austendw »

andrewcriddle wrote: Wed Jan 04, 2023 5:21 am
IF the Jews believed, before the composition of the Pentateuch, that the institution of a single sanctuary for worship meant NOT a single sanctuary location to be decided later BUT a single sanctuary at Jerusalem, THEN I would expect some indication in the text.
It may well be that an earlier text requiring a single sanctuary, location unspecified, was finally redacted by Jews who, despite believing that this sanctuary must be at Jerusalem, did not update the text to reflect this. However, I have more problems about our present Pentateuch being a basically original work by Jews who held that the single sanctuary must be at Jerusalem.

(I hope I've explained what I am arguing, YMMV as to how plausible my argument is.)

Andrew Criddle
You may be interested in this essay by Stefan Schorch - The Samaritan Version of Deuteronomy and the Origin of Deuteronomy

http://www.schorch.at/SchorchSt2011_The ... ronomy.pdf

I am sceptical of the dating of Deuteronomy's initial compostion and "move south", and I quibble with some other details (which I think may arise from that too early date), but I think that his central argument has a lot to recommend it: Deuteronomy's centralisation motif originally referred to Mt. Gerizim and was only later taken to mean Jerusalem.

Also, in view of thegeneral discussion here, the following comment is also rather interesting:
Thus, the [Masoretic] textual change from “he has chosen” (בחר) to “he will chose”(יבחר) seems to have taken place in the period between 4QMMT and the Temple Scroll, i.e. around the middle of the 2nd century BCE.
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

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neilgodfrey wrote: Mon Nov 07, 2022 12:45 pm
andrewcriddle wrote: Mon Nov 07, 2022 10:16 am One can of course use the sparse population of Judea during the Persian period as an argument that the major components of the Pentateuch predate the Persian period but were combined together during the Persian era.
And yet, one has to reconstruct a scenario where Pentateuchal literature was being composed or redacted in a culture where such literature appears to have been unlike any other and in a world where Judeans left evidence that they had no knowledge of a holy sabbath day of rest, of an exodus-passover myth, of a Mosaic law, of a central place of worship.... (Elephantine).
This is true only if one adopts the model that the Pentateuch was first "published" as a complete authoritative 5-volume work with "a holy sabbath day of rest, of an exodus-passover myth, of a Mosaic law, of a central place of worship" all appearing together at the same time. But models of the formation of the Pentateuch, as proposed by many biblical scholars, (eg Kratz, Dozeman, Albertz, Gertz, Romer, Shmid, Otto etc etc), give it a complicated gestation and they suggest various literary strata, that involve the inclusion of earlier documents or fragments into a narrative, and these receive supplementation, are revised and redacted (involving, inter alia, a Hexateuchal redaction, then a Pentateuchal one). Many scholars' analysis of the text suggests that the narrative of the exodus developed at one point, that the slavery motif was a later addition, that the assocation of law-giving at Horeb/Sinai was also added to that scenario at a later time, and the actual law corpora were added at different times, and supplemented with other laws, and different laws were added to them at another times, etc etc. The centralization motif appears strongly in Deuteronomy but is clearly absent in other sections (and textual tensions on that score are evident). Even the chronologically conservative Israel Knohl argues that the promulgation of the Sabbath is one of the latest strata of the Pentateuch *, and his theory only needs a chronological adjustment to sit well with other theories.

Crucially, the above scholars argue that these changes were not taking place during an oral or pre-literary process, but are embedded in the text. Of course many unsupportable chronological schemes have now been abandoned but nevertheless the diachronic nature of the process is surely quite clear, and it doesn't strike me as an impossible task to fit this account into a possibly later and shorter time frame. You yourself link to an Albertz article about the Pentateuchal redaction, so you must be open to the notion that this process has some validity, no?

* One of his more interesting proposals is that the earliest "P" version of Genesis 1 narrated the creation taking place over eight days without any final Sabbath rest, which was later adjusted to reflect six days of creation with a final Sabbath rest by Knohl's "HS" redactor.


(Edited for grammar & punctuation)
Last edited by austendw on Tue Apr 11, 2023 10:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

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neilgodfrey wrote: Sat Jan 28, 2023 3:07 pm Then there is the evidence that the book of Joshua is also Samaritan-friendly. Couple this with the argument that the final chapters of the book of Numbers were redacted to accommodate a removal of the book of Joshua from a hitherto Hextateuch and a whole host of questions arise. What we don't know far outweighs what we do, to parrot the old truism. So it is not without reason to think that Samaritans and Judeans did see eye-to-eye even beyond the Pentateuch for a time.

The case for the Samaritan-Judean split has been presented that it was gradual, piecemeal, faction by faction, as has been mentioned already.

Other little factors that mess with clear and obvious arguments are the notion of canon, and then, especially, the evidence for redactions of the Hebrew text in the early "rabbinic" era post 70 CE.
Joshua 24, with its "covenant renewal" at Shechem, looks acceptable to Samaritan sensibilities, and Joshua 8:30-36 in perhaps an earlier form (the altar on Mt. Gerizim rather than Mt. Ebal) would have worked too. However Joshua 18:1, which sets up the tabernacle at Shiloh may well have been objectionable as it appears that they emphatically rejected Shiloh as a legitimate sanctuary.

However, it's very hard to know how such matters played out because the both the relative chronology of the biblical text and the absolute chronology of the deterioration in relations between the Samaritans & Judeans seem all but impossible to pin down.

Can you direct me to the "evidence for redactions of the Hebrew text in the early "rabbinic" era post 70 CE"? I'm not familiar with the redactions at that late date.

(Edited for spelling)
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

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austendw wrote: Mon Apr 10, 2023 11:45 pmBut models of the formation of the Pentateuch, as proposed by many biblical scholars, (eg Kratz, Dozeman, Albertz, Gertz, Romer, Shmid, Otto etc etc), give it a complicated gestation and they suggest various literary strata, that involve the inclusion of earlier documents or fragments into a narrative, and these receive supplementation, are revised and redacted (involving, inter alia, a Hexateuchal redaction, then a Pentateuchal one). Many scholars' analysis of the text suggests that the narrative of the exodus developed at one point, that the slavery motif was a later addition, that the assocation of law-giving at Horeb/Sinai was also added to that scenario at a later time, and the actual law corpora were added at different times, and supplemented with other laws, and different laws were added to them at another times, etc etc. The centralization motif appears strongly in Deuteronomy but is clearly absent in other sections (and textual tensions on that score are evident). Even the chronologically conservative Israel Knohl argues that the promulgation of the Sabbath is one of the latest strata of the Pentateuch *, and his theory only needs a chronological adjustment to sit well with other theories.

Crucially, the above scholars argue that these changes were not taking place during an oral or pre-literary process, but are embedded in the text. Of course many unsupportable chronological schemes have now been abandoned but nevertheless the diachronic nature of the process is surely quite clear, and it doesn't strike me as an impossible task to fit this account into a possibly later and shorter time frame. You yourself link to an Albertz article about the Pentateuchal redaction, so you must be open to the notion that this process has some validity, no?
The models you describe are born from the assumption that the biblical literature began in the times of the biblical kingdoms of Israel and Judah, let's say from the eighth and seventh centuries -- and then, of course, in the "creative window" of the Babylonian captivity. But is not the debate is over whether this assumption is justified?
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Re: The Origins of Judaism, Yonatan Adler

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austendw wrote: Tue Apr 11, 2023 7:30 am
Can you direct me to the "evidence for redactions of the Hebrew text in the early "rabbinic" era post 70 CE"? I'm not familiar with the redactions at that late date.
Hoo boy -- ancient history. I have not touched this topic for weeks. Give me time and I will try to track down what I was reading around the time I wrote the above.
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