Family and Household Religion: Toward a Synthesis of Old Testament Studies, Archaeology, Epigraphy, and Cultural Studies

334 Pages·2014·15 MB·English

by  Rainer Albertz

F
Edited by
A
Rainer Albertz,
M
Beth Alpert Nakhai,
I
L Saul M. Olyan,
Y
and Rüdiger Schmitt

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FA M I LY A N D N
FA M I LY A N D
D

H O U S E H O L D H
H O U S E H O L D
O
R E L I G I O N U
R E L I G I O N
S
E
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This volume is the most recent collective contribution of a group of biblical
scholars and archaeologists who are engaged in an ongoing debate about the O
nature of family and household religion in ancient Israel and its environment. It is
intended to complement the volume Household and Family Religion in Antiquity, L
Toward a Synthesis of
edited by John Bodel and Saul M. Olyan, which grew out of a conference held at D
Brown University in 2005 on household and family religion in the ancient Mediter-
Old Testament Studies,
ranean world, with an emphasis on cross-cultural comparison. Several meetings R
after the Brown conference carried the theme forward, and a fourth meeting at Archaeology, Epigraphy,
E
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster in April 2009 emphasized theoretical
L
and Cultural Studies
and methodological challenges facing scholars of household and family religion
I
(e.g., the conceptualization of family/household religion, the problem of identify-
G
ing pertinent artifacts, and the difficulties inherent in using texts together with
material evidence). This volume is a direct outgrowth of the Münster meeting. I
O
For both the meeting and the volume, the goal was to bring together a group
of specialists in biblical studies, epigraphy, and archaeology who would utilize a
N
variety of humanistic and social-scientific approaches to the data and would also be
willing to engage in dialogue and debate; during the conference in Münster, there
was much vigorous intellectual engagement. The essays published here reflect the
energy of that conference and will contribute, both individually and collectively, to Edited by
the advancement of our knowledge of Israelite family and household religion. Albertz,
Nakhai,
Olyan,
and
Schmitt
Eisenbrauns
POB 275
Winona Lake, IN 46590
www.eisenbrauns.com
EISENBRAUNS
Family and Household Religion

Family and Household Religion
Toward a Synthesis of Old Testament Studies,
Archaeology, Epigraphy, and Cultural Studies
Edited by
RaineR albeRtz, beth alpeRt nakhai,
Saul M. Olyan, and RüdigeR SchMitt
Winona Lake, Indiana
eiSenbRaunS
2014
© Copyright 2014 Eisenbrauns
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
www.eisenbrauns.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Family and household religion : toward a synthesis of Old Testament studies,
archaeology, epigraphy, and cultural studies / edited by Rainer Albertz, Beth Alpert
Nakhai, Saul M. Olyan, and Ruediger Schmitt.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 978-1-57506-288-4 (hardback : alk. paper)
1. Families—Religious aspects—Judaism—To 70 a.d.—Congresses. 2. Jewish
families—Conduct of life—History—To 70 a.d.—Congresses. 3. Families—
Palestine—History—Congresses. 4. Families—Religious life—Congresses. 5.
Palestine—Social life and customs—To 70 a.d.—Congresses. 6. Families—Biblical
teaching—Congresses. 7. Sociology, Biblical—Congresses. 8. Bible. Old
Testament—Criticism, interpretation, etc.—Congresses. I. Albertz, Rainer, 1943–
editor. II. Nakhai, Beth Alpert, 1951– editor. III. Olyan, Saul M., editor.
IV. Schmitt, Ruediger, editor.
BS1199.F32F35 2014
296.7′409014—dc23
2014011290
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.™♾
Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Women’s Rites of Passage in Ancient Israel: Three Case Studies
(Birth, Coming of Age, and Death) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
SuSan ackeRMan
The Relevance of Hebrew Name Seals for Reconstructing Judahite
and Israelite Family Religion .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
RaineR albeRtz
The Household as Sacred Space .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
beth alpeRt nakhai
Philistine Cult and Household Religion
according to the Archaeological Record . . . . . . . . . . . 73
david ben-ShlOMO
Anomalies in the Archaeological Record: Evidence for Domestic
and Industrial Cults in Central Jordan .. . . . . . . . . . . 103
p. M. Michèle daviau
The Judean “Pillar-Base Figurines”: Mothers or
“Mother-Goddesses”? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
WilliaM g. deveR
The House and the World: The Israelite House as a Microcosm . . . 143
avRahaM FauSt and ShlOMO buniMOvitz
Healing Rituals at the Intersection of Family and Society . . . . . . 165
eRhaRd S. geRStenbeRgeR
Family Religion from a Northern Levantine Perspective .. . . . . . 183
tiMOthy p. haRRiSOn
Horses and Riders and Riders and Horses .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
R. kletteR and k. SaaRelainen
Feast Days and Food Ways: Religious Dimensions of
Household Life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
caROl MeyeRS
v
vi Contents
The Roles of Kin and Fictive Kin in Biblical Representations of
Death Ritual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Saul M. Olyan
A Typology of Iron Age Cult Places .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
RüdigeR SchMitt
The Textual and Sociological Embeddedness of
Israelite Family Religion: Who Were the Players?
Where Were the Stages? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
ziOny zevit
Indexes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
Preface
Family and Household Religion: Toward a Synthesis of Old Testament Studies, Archae-
ology, Epigraphy, and Cultural Studies is the most recent collective contribution of a
group of biblical scholars and archaeologists who are engaged in an ongoing debate
about the nature of family and household religion in ancient Israel and its environ-
ment. It is intended to complement the volume Household and Family Religion in
Antiquity, edited by John Bodel and Saul M. Olyan (Bodel and Olyan 2008), which
grew out of a conference held at Brown University in 2005 on household and fam-
ily religion in the ancient Mediterranean world, with an emphasis on cross-cultural
comparison. After the conference at Brown, there was a session held at the meeting
of the European Association of Biblical Studies in Budapest in 2006, in which the
focus was narrowed to the gender dimensions of Israelite family/household religion.
Two more sessions focusing on the Israelite house as a locus of family religion took
place at the European Association of Biblical Studies meeting in Vienna in 2007.
A fourth meeting at Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster in April 2009 em-
phasized theoretical and methodological challenges facing scholars of household
and family religion (e.g., the conceptualization of family/household religion, the
problem of identifying pertinent artifacts, and the difficulties inherent in using texts
together with material evidence). This volume is a direct outgrowth of the Münster
meeting. For both the meeting and the volume, we were particularly interested in
bringing together a group of specialists in biblical studies, epigraphy, and archaeol-
ogy who would utilize a variety of humanistic and social scientific approaches to the
data and would also be willing to engage in dialogue and debate, as we believe that it
is through such synthetic and dialogical approaches that our understanding is most
likely to be enriched. During the conference in Münster, there was much vigorous
intellectual engagement. We trust that the essays published here reflect that energy
and will contribute, both individually and collectively, to the advancement of our
knowledge of Israelite family and household religion. On a final note, we would
like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the generous financial support of the
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) which made possible both the conference and
the publication of this volume.
RaineR albeRtz, beth alpeRt nakhai,
Saul M. Olyan, and RüdigeR SchMitt
vii
Publisher’s Note
The conference on which this volume is based was held in April, 2009; the publisher
received the manuscripts from the editors in spring, 2011, and the delay between
that time and the publication of this volume is entirely the fault of the publisher.
Readers should note that the essays were completed some years ago and only minor
updates in proof have been made by the authors; the opinions expressed are based
on research completed at the time of the conference and shortly thereafter.
Women’s Rites of Passage in Ancient Israel
Three Case Studies (Birth, Coming of Age, and Death)
Susan Ackerman
Dartmouth College
I take a fundamental conviction to be implicit in this volume’s main title, Family
and Household Religion, and especially in its focus on “household”: that in the study
of ancient Israelite religion, the category of space matters profoundly in analyzing re-
ligious experience and practice, so that, to take a very obvious example, religion as it
was practiced by families and their domestic affiliates in ancient Israelite households
was of a very different sort than Israelite religion as it was manifest in priestly-based
communities at major state temples such as Dan, Bethel, and Jerusalem. Much of
my own work on Israelite religion has in addition based itself on the conviction that
the category of gender matters, and matters quite profoundly, in analyzing ancient
Israelite religious experience and practice (Ackerman 1989, 1992, 1993, 1997, 1998,
2002, 2003a, 2003b, 2006, 2008); I have elsewhere argued, for instance, that Israelite
tradition, at least as manifest in the Hebrew Bible, responds quite differently to the
possibility of women, as opposed to men, functioning as prophets, with the result
that the Bible only envisions women engaging in prophetic activity in conjunc-
tion with some very specific historical and literary constraints (Ackerman 2002). My
contention in this essay is that a third category that matters in analyzing Israelite
religious experience and practice is time, and while this category of “time” might be
construed in many different ways (for example, changes in the practice of Israelite
religion over time during the Iron Age, as the centuries pass, or the various time-
bound celebrations—weekly, monthly, and annual—mandated within the Israelite
ritual calendar), here I consider “time” in terms of the passage of time over the course
of a religious practitioner’s life. My hope in what follows is to bring this category
of “time” into conversation with the categories of space and gender by examining
women’s experiences during a particular type of temporal event—life-cycle rituals—
that I take to be household based. My thesis is that, while ancient Israelite household
spaces were typically quite productive forums for women’s exercise of ritual agency
and for their exercise of religious power (Ackerman 2008; Meyers 2002, 2005), the
distinctive structure of life-cycle events in general and of women’s life-cycle events
in particular compromised this exercise of agency and placed the women subjects
of life-cycle rituals in the sort of relatively powerless position that I take to be more
1