Bible Software Review

It may seem somewhat remote from Philonic studies, but not necessarily so.... Hence I would like to direct your attention to the new Weblog by Ruben Gomez on Bible Software Review. (thanks to Mark Goodacre for the link info). He also runs a webpage on Bible Software Review. It promises to "be devoted to bringing you all kinds of information about the ever-growing Bible software scene." I am not quite sure how he defines Bible Software. My first impression is that it is rather traditional, comprising the software that is explicitly announced as Bible programs. I have challenged him (in a comment on his weblog) to also include programs that may seem more remote, but that also are very useful for writers of Biblical studies. Of course, those who know me, will understand that I am here thinking about my favorite program NotaBene, which has the biblical texts as supplementary modules, and even has a nice concordance function, not to speak about its textbase and bibliographic module. I can't understand why anybody are using any other word processing programs when writing scholarly biblical studies.......

New book on the Therapeutae

As my comments feature (below the postings) is quite new, I would like to emphasize the comment posted by Ellen Birnbaum on my former posting on the Therapeutae. She directs my attention to the fact that Joan E. Taylor has just published a book on the Therapeutae:Jewish Women Philosophers of First-Century Alexandria - Philo's 'Therapeutae' Reconsidered (Oxford University Press; Price: £70.00 (Hardback) 434 pages). According to the announcement of the publisher, "this study focuses particularly on issues of history, rhetoric, women, and gender in a wide exploration of the group, and comes to new conclusions about the 'Therapeutae' and their relationship with the Jewish allegorical school of exegesis in Alexandria. The volume includes a new translation of De Vita Contemplativa."

Thanks for the comment, Ellen. I hope the comment feature will prove useful for more readers, whether that be additional information like this, or just comments of opinion.

Comments feature

I just added a 'Comment feature' to the postings: it makes it possible for you as a reader to comment on the various postings on this Philo WeBlog.

The enigmatic Therapeutae

I just discovered that Harvard theological Review has made all their articles from 1999- available on the Internet. Not much to find there about Philo, but here is one interesting piece:

Joan E. Taylor, Philip R. Davies, 'The so-called Therapeutae of 'De vita contemplativa': identity and character.' Harvard Theological Review, Jan, 1998.

Though this article is not new, I was not aware of the fact that it is available on-line. The summary of the articles runs thus: It has become quite common in scholarship to consider the community described by Philo in De vita contemplativa as a specific Jewish group comprising contemplative Essenes or people somehow related to the Essenes.(1) In this study, we shall explore the meaning of Philo's masculine and feminine designations, and consider the possibility that these words referred not to the male and female members of one group that was part of a Therapeutae sect, but to individuals whom Philo understood as exemplary devotees of God. We shall also consider a few matters concerning the character of the group. Overall, this study seeks to call into question the assumption that, in his De vita contemplativa, Philo is describing an Essene community in Egypt. The Therapeutae is in fact an enigmatic group. We really need a commentary on Philo's De vita contemplativa where he describes them. I for my part, do look forward to David M. Hay's commentary in the Philo of Alexandria Commentary Series (PACS). I expect that volume to be a definitive discussion for years to come on both this book of Philo and of the Thereapeutae.

(More on) Associations, Synagogues and Congregations, - with a view from aside on megasites

This year it is - in fact - 20 years since I published my first article on the Greaco-Roman Clubs and Associations... It was a review article, written in Norwegian and printed in a small Norwegian journal. The reviw focused mainly on works on the associations, and how these had been or could be applied in investigating the social life of the early churches.

Since then, the interest and publications on both the associations per se, and their value for understanding the social lfe of both Jews and Christians have increased amazingly. The publication of S.G. Wilson and John Klobbenborg (eds.), Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World (1995) was one example of this interest, and several more, not at least from some of Kloppenborgs students, like Richard Ascough and Philip A. Harland have been published.

I my self became interested in this field as part of my efforts to understand the social world of Philo and the early Christians, and have tried to keep updated since. Hence, though I have referred to it before on this blog, I would again like to refer you to the site of Philip A. Harland on Associations, Synagogues and Congregations. It is regularly (?) updated, and his latest article provided in full text on that site; Imperial Cults within Local Cultural Life: Associations in Roman Asia (Originally published in Ancient History Bulletin / Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte 17 (2003):47-69. Reprinted in accordance with the journal's policies. Copyright Philip A. Harland 2003), provide also a lot of bibliographic information in its footnotes.

Harland's site, in addition to being very nicely designed, is also an example of sites that focus in depth on a particular issue of the Graeco-Roman world and/ or its literature, and represent a type of sites very helpful for us trying to upheld "megasites" (vf. the debate on megasites initiated on this Weblog (ses also later postings on my site). In fact, this may be the way to go in the future: to build a site focusing on a specific, almost narrow topic, providing material that covers and promotes research in that particular field. When such sites are administered by persons who are real experts in the field, like Philip A Harland on associations, the sites become immensely interesting and profitable for other scholars. For the momens we have some such topic or more narrowly focused sites (examples; Felix Just on Johannine literature, Goodacre on the Joseph and Asenath, or the case against Q; or Vernon K Robbins on Socio-Rhetorical criticism; and- of course, my page :-) on Philo of Alexandria, and several others... ; I hope and believe that we will get more and more of these kinds of sites in the coming months and years.

SBL Releases New Hebrew Font

The Society of Biblical Literature announces a new Hebrew font, and even better,- new Greek fonts to be released in the near future.Academic writers and those who publish books on the ancient world and the Bible can now use a Hebrew font that is visually pleasing on computer screen and printed page, and facilitates the exchange of texts between computers, thanks to the joint efforts of the Society of Biblical Literature, SBL Font Foundation, and Tiro Typeworks. Until now, texts composed with a Hebrew alphabet were not easily transferred from one computer to another, or would read well on screen but not on paper — annoyances familiar to those in the publishing world. The solution was to design a more readable font in Unicode, a text encoding standard that assigns a unique universal code for each character and works across diverse computer platforms. The new typeface, designed in a Sephardic style suited for screen and print readability, offers clear distinction between similar Hebrew letters.

The font is provided without cost to individuals for non-profit use; commercial use is reserved for members of the SBL Font Foundation. The font and more information about the foundation are available online at http://www.sbl-site.org. The SBL plans to release new Unicode fonts for Greek and Latin later this year, with other ancient languages to follow. The complete series will include all symbols needed to produce critical editions of biblical and related texts. You can read more on the fonts available at SBL here.

Philo Christianus

In his book on Philo in Early Christian Literature(CRINT III,3; Leiden,1993), David T. Runia has an introductory chapter on 'Philo Christianus'; that is, on how Philo became 'a church father honoris causa'. Early Christian writers first made a connection between Philo and the Christians, later he even was considered a Christian. The first Christian writer to make a connection between Philo and Christians was Eusebius in his Ecclesiastical History. However, there is little historical values in this information. Runia himself surmises that the beginning of the legend of the Christian Philo may go back to a now lost work of Clement.

The reason I mention this here today is the article I found on the Internett last week, proposing that Philo wrote the Gospel of Mark.
The main arguments of the author of that article are fanciful, but not much convincing, and run like this:
He starts out with a doubtful premise already at the beginning: "In reality the only definite information pertaining to "Mark" was that it was the first Gospel composed and that it was written in the colloquial Greek of the Alexandrian Jews." Not only that, but " the hidden message within the cryptic Gospel is directed by a Jew of Alexandria specifically towards the Jews of Alexandria, Hellenized Jews. The latter is confirmed by the fact that the version of the Jewish Scriptures quoted in "Mark" is the Greek Septuagint. "
The only possible candidate he can find as the plausible author is Philo of Alexandria. This, furthermore, he argues along these lines: "Philo created Jesus as his vehicle. Firstly, Jesus would follow in the literary traditions of Socrates. Secondly, Jesus would be the literary personification of the Logos. The first point is argued by a list of issues in the life of Socrate and of Jesus he finds comparable; the second is argued by considering the Philonic logos 'doctrine' an invention of Philo, and a hidden way of depicting Jesus.
The author also considers "Mark" as esoteric literature, a vehicle for a hidden message, finally written during the "the religious oppression of the Alexandrian Jews by Caligula. It was this oppression which drove the Jews of Alexandria underground. This is the secret society steeped in Judaism … a secret society full of ritual, signs and symbolism." Here he also finds that "Philo of Alexandria incorporated events of the Maccabaean Rebellion into his cryptic, or secret, gospel for two main reasons. Firstly as a tribute to the Maccabees and their victory in the face of all odds, and secondly to give the Alexandrian Jews hope in the face of the current religious oppression under Caligula. Most importantly, only the Alexandrian Jews would be able to interpret "Mark" correctly. This again is tried substantiated by another list of alledged parallels between the story of the maccabees and the Gospel.

I'm not sure how to consider the article; is it a joke or not? probably not. The author have other articles on his site focusing on Egypt, and he seems to have a certain preference for finding aspects of early masonry in Egypt.
His arguments in the article mentioned above is strained. Its greek language and use of the Septuagint is no argument for an Alexandrian provenance. Did not also the other New Testament authors write in Greek and cited from Septuagintian versions? His list of parallels between Jesus and Socrate, or his alledged references in "Mark" to the Oppression of the Jews, under Caligula, or References in "Mark" to the Maccabaean Rebellion are all strained, to say the least. And he never copes with the question that would have to be answered; why is there no other references to Jesus or Christians in any of the other works of Philo.

For those who would like to learn more about Philo in later Christian literature, the abovementioned book of David T. Runia is most illuminating. Tolle lege!

Inscriptiones Judaicae Orientis

The Mohr Siebeck announces the publication of the following work (German description here):
Ameling, Walter,
Inscriptiones Judaicae Orientis Vol. 2: Kleinasien
2004. ca. 668 pages (Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 99)
ISBN 3-16-148196-8 cloth € 119.00
Description:
This book collects all known Jewish inscriptions from the Graeco-Roman period (up to c.700 CE), in Asia Minor. It provides the mainly Greek texts of the inscriptions with German translations together with full bibliographies, discussions and indexes. The previous collection, Corpus Inscriptionum Judaicarum, published 1936-50, has been superseded by the discovery of more inscriptions, and over half the inscriptions included in this new collection were not in CIJ.

To all of us who are used to the Corpus Inscriptionum Judaicarum, this is great news. The bad news is the price of the volume: 119 euro means 147 USD...