Was there a Revival of Hebrew during the Hasmonean Period?

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 217-280
Author(s):  
Daniel A. Machiela ◽  
Robert Jones
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Early Judaism ◽  
Hebrew Language ◽  
Archeological Evidence

Abstract Since the end of the nineteenth century, many scholars have held that there was a revival of the Hebrew language during the Hasmonean period, associated with a growing nationalistic sentiment under Hasmonean leadership at that time. Other scholars have rejected this idea, opting instead for a revival of the language at different times, or for no revival at all. Though the idea of a national revival of Hebrew has often been used to explain various historical or literary phenomena in early Judaism, serious defenses of this position have been lacking. In this article, we examine much of the relevant literary, epigraphic, and archeological evidence in order to reassess the idea of a revival of Hebrew associated with Hasmonean rule. In light of this evidence, we conclude that such a revival finds strong literary and archaeological support, and may justifiably be assumed by historians of Second Temple period Judaism.

scholarly journals The Praise of God and His Name as the Core of the Second Temple Liturgy

2015 ◽  
Vol 127 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mika S. Pajunen
Keyword(s):  
Second Temple ◽  
Second Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
Hellenistic Period ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Early Judaism ◽  
Primary Element ◽  
Liturgical Texts ◽  
Liturgical Practice

Das Lob Gottes wurde schon immer als wichtigstes Element des liturgischen Lebens am 2. Tempel verstanden. Formkritiker haben dieses Moment der liturgischen Praxis vor allem durch die Analyse der Psalmen nachgezeichnet. Demgegenüber erscheint die Rolle der Klage zumindest in der späten Phase des 2. Temepls randständig. Allerdings fehlt ein Bindeglied zwischen der hellenistischen Phase der Liturgie und dem Lob in den Qumran Texten des 1 Jh. v. Chr. Der Blick auf das Motiv der Schöpfung erschließt dieses Bindeglied und erklärt zugleich, warum das Lob als Verpflichtung Gott gegenüber verstanden wurde.Praise of God has always been understood by scholars as a primary element of the liturgical life of the Second Temple period. Form-critics have situated the praises of God in the liturgical practice of the period most of all by analyzing the Psalms now in the MT Psalter. However, at least in the late Second Temple period the role of laments seems to be marginal. Thus far a link has been missing in scholarship between this centrality of praise perceivable in the liturgical practice of the Hellenistic period and the all-encompassing nature of praise in the texts of the Qumran movement from the first century BCE. This is a link that may in part explain why prayer, or during this time more properly praise, came to be seen in early Judaism as an obligation towards God. This question is explored by investigating how the Second Temple liturgy is in many texts from the second century BCE given an explicit basis in the creation, and how such traditions in turn served an important function in the composition of new liturgical texts.La louange de Dieu a toujours été comprise par les exégètes comme un élément essentiel de la vie liturgique de la période du Second Temple. A l’aide de la critique des formes, certains exégètes ont situé les louanges de Dieu dans la pratique liturgique de cette période, en analysant surtout les Psaumes actuellement présents dans le psautier du TM. Le rôle des lamentations, en revanche, semble marginal, au moins dans la période tardive du Second Temple. Jusqu’à présent la recherche n’a pas établi de lien entre la centralité de la louange perceptible dans la pratique liturgique de la période hellénistique et l’importancede la louange dans les textes qumrâniens du premier siècle av. J.-C. Ce lien pourrait expliquer, en partie, pourquoi la prière, ou à plus proprement parler la louange, a été de plus en plus perçue, durant cette période, comme une obligation envers Dieu dans le judaïsme primitif. Cette question est explorée à travers l’analyse de nombreux textes du deuxième siècle av. J.-C. qui montrent comment la liturgie du Second Temple a été basée explicitement sur la Création et comment de telles traditions ont occupé en retour une place importante dans la composition de nouveaux textes liturgiques.

The Attraction of Aristocratic Women to Pharisaism During the Second Temple Period

1995 ◽  
Vol 88 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tal Ilan
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Reform Movement ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
The Real ◽  
Important Study ◽  
Jewish Religion ◽  
Wissenschaft Des Judentums

Unlike Christianity, which regards the word “Pharisee” as synonymous with “hypocrite,” “legalist,” and “petty-bourgeois,” Jews have always understood Pharisaism as the correct and trustworthy side of Judaism. Since the eighteenth century, all disputants who participated in the great controversies and schisms within Judaism have claimed to represent the true heirs of the Pharisees. For example, adherents of the strong anti-Hasidic movement initiated by R. Eliyahu of Vilna in the second half of the eighteenth century, who are usually referred to in literature by the negative appellation “opposers” (םירננחמ), referred to themselves by the positive title “Pharisees” (םישורפ). When the Reform movement was founded in Germany in the first half of the nineteenth century, with the goal of reforming the Jewish religion to make it more “modern” and acceptable to its neighbors, the reformers perceived themselves as the true heirs of the Pharisees. In his important study of the Pharisees and Sadducees, Abraham Geiger, one of the founders, ofWissenschaft des Judentumsand an important spokesman for the radical wing of the Reform movement, formulated the view of the flexible open-minded Pharisees, who reformed Judaism to the point of contradicting the laws set out in the Pentateuch, in order to accommodate them to their changing needs. Geiger's opponents easily produced evidence that negated his findings and proved beyond doubt that they, in their conservative strain, were the real heirs of Pharisaism. To his opponents, Geiger was a representative of the detestable Sadducees or their later counterparts, the Karaites.

Georgian

2019 ◽  
pp. 165-194
Author(s):  
Jost Gippert
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Special Interest ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Apocryphal Texts

Within the 1500 years of Georgian literacy, Jewish literature of the Second Temple period is represented by biblical apocrypha and pseudepigrapha as well as a translation of Josephus’s Antiquitates. Among the former, it is especially the ancient versions of Wisdom, Sirach, and the Apocalypsis of Ezra (IV Ezra), preserved in the Oshki-Bible of 978 CE, that deserve special interest. Beyond, the Georgian tradition is comparatively rich in apocryphal texts that are related to Genesis, including two versions of the Vita Adae and various adaptations of the Caverna Thesaurorum. Whereas some of these texts are of noteworthy age (eleventh to fifteenth centuries) and based on Greek or Armenian models, some others such as the Historia de Melchisedech are late translations from Russian (eighteenth to nineteenth centuries). Josephus’s Antiquitates were mostly translated from Greek by the Hellenizing school of Gelati (eleventh to twelfth centuries); chapters 16 to 20 were added in the nineteenth century on a Russian basis.

The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Very Short Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy H. Lim
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Dead Sea Scrolls ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Dead Sea ◽  
Cultural Significance ◽  
Short Introduction ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Early Judaism ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Dead

The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Very Short introduction discusses the cultural significance of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the religious, political, and legal controversies during the seventy years of study since they were found. It looks at the contribution the scrolls have made to our understanding of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible, and the origins of early Christianity. Exploring the most recent scholarly discussions on the archaeology of Khirbet Qumran, and the study of the biblical texts, the canon, and the history of the Second Temple Period, it considers what the scrolls reveal about the communities closely associated with the scrolls and sectarianism in early Judaism.

A Guide to Early Jewish Texts and Traditions in Christian Transmission

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Great Degree ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Ancient World ◽  
The Other ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Jewish Culture ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Early Judaism ◽  
The Many ◽  
Medieval Christianity

The Jewish culture of the Hellenistic and early Roman periods established a basis for all monotheistic religions but its main sources have been preserved to a great degree through Christian transmission. This Guide is devoted to problems of preservation, reception, and transformation of Jewish texts and traditions of the Second Temple period in the many Christian milieus from the ancient world to the late medieval era. It approaches this corpus not as an artificial collection of reconstructed texts—a body of hypothetical originals—but rather from the perspective of the preserved materials, examined in their religious, social, and political contexts. It also considers the other, non-Christian, channels of the survival of early Jewish materials, including rabbinic, Gnostic, Manichaean, and Islamic. This unique project brings together scholars from many different fields in order to map the trajectories of early Jewish texts and traditions among diverse later cultures. It also provides a comprehensive and comparative introduction to this new field of study while bridging the gap between scholars of early Judaism and of medieval Christianity.

scholarly journals The Jewishness of Jesus and ritual purity

1970 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 11-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cecilia Wassen
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Historical Jesus ◽  
Proper Understanding ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Central Aspect ◽  
Early Judaism

Today it is commonplace for historical Jesus scholars to emphasize Jesus’ Jewishness. At the same time most New Testament scholars deny that he cared about the Jewish purity system, which was a central aspect of early Judaism. This article examines how such a reconstruction of the historical Jesus would influence his Jewishness, arguing that it indeed would make such a Jesus figure ‘less Jewish’. The article also investigates questions concerning what Jewish identity in the late Second Temple period entails and how we may characterize the Judaism of Jesus’ time, especially in relation to purity concerns. Finally, I examine key Gospel texts that are commonly used as evidence to prove Jesus’ alleged disinterest in purity laws. On the basis of a proper understanding of how the purity system functioned in Jesus’ time, I conclude that there is no evidence for the view that Jesus was disinterested in matters of purity; quite the opposite.

Early Judaism

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Dead Sea Scrolls ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Dead Sea ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Modern Times ◽  
Christian Communities ◽  
Early Judaism ◽  
The Dead

The Dead Sea Scrolls, ancient inscriptions, and Jewish books preserved within various Christian communities demonstrate that Jewish identity took a variety of forms in the period following that described in the Hebrew Bible. However, the teachings of only one of these groups – the rabbis – became normative. This was also the period during which prayer and synagogues emerged as a widespread practice. It was also at this time that the foundation for the eventual break with Christianity, which began as a form of Judaism, was laid. Remarkably, several of the features from this Second Temple period are shared with our modern times.

Going Through Hell; ΤΑΡΤΑΡΟΣ in Greco-Roman Culture, Second Temple Judaism, and Philo of Alexandria

2013 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 352-378
Author(s):  
Clint Burnett
Keyword(s):  
Second Temple ◽  
Second Temple Judaism ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Philo Of Alexandria ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Literary Sources ◽  
Roman Culture ◽  
Greek Myths

This article questions the longstanding supposition that the eschatology of the Second Temple period was solely influenced by Persian or Iranian eschatology, arguing instead that the literature of this period reflects awareness of several key Greco-Roman mythological concepts. In particular, the concepts of Tartarus and the Greek myths of Titans and Giants underlie much of the treatment of eschatology in the Jewish literature of the period. A thorough treatment of Tartarus and related concepts in literary and non-literary sources from ancient Greek and Greco-Roman culture provides a backdrop for a discussion of these themes in the Second Temple period and especially in the writings of Philo of Alexandria.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document