Land and Temple: Field Sacralization and the Agrarian Priesthood of Second Temple Judaism PDF
Preview Land and Temple: Field Sacralization and the Agrarian Priesthood of Second Temple Judaism
Benjamin D. Gordon Land and Temple Studia Judaica Forschungen zur Wissenschaft des Judentums Begründet von Ernst Ludwig Ehrlich Herausgegeben von Günter Stemberger, Charlotte Fonrobert, Elisabeth Hollender, Alexander Samely und Irene Zwiep Band 87 Benjamin D. Gordon Land and Temple Field Sacralization and the Agrarian Priesthood of Second Temple Judaism ISBN 978-3-11-042546-8 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-042102-6 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-042116-3 ISSN 0585-5306 Library of Congress Control Number: 2019957136 Bibliografic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliografic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com Acknowledgments This book developed out of a doctoral dissertation I completed in 2013 in the Graduate Program in Religion at Duke University. Initially the project was to be about the settlement patterns of Judean priests—where and how they lived outside of Jerusalem, and how their presence impacted village life. I began by examining the question of the priests’ role in land management and never got muchfurtherthanthat,decidingintheendtowritethedissertationonfieldcon- secrationsinancientJudaism.Myheartfeltthanksgotomydoctoraladvisor,Eric Meyers, for his mentorship, guidance, and friendship through the years. I was also privileged to have Stephen Chapman, Laura Lieber, Evyatar Marienberg, and Joshua Sosin on my doctoral committee. The Perilman endowment of the Jewish Studies Program at Duke provided generous funding when I was a doc- toral student. JoshuaSosinhascontinuedtoworkwithmeindevelopinganewreadingof Lev27,asourcethatisveryimportanttothisproject.Yearsago,hesuggestedthat thechaptercouldbeaboutsecurities ondebt.InitiallyIdisagreed,holdingfast totheidea,whichiswellestablishedalreadyinrabbinicexegesis,thatitisabout donationstoGod.EventuallyIcametoagreewithJosh.Mythanksgotohimfor the idea and for his willingness to continue to work with me in developing it. For the past four years my institutional home has been the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Pittsburgh,where I have benefitted from conversations with colleagues and students about this book. I am particularly gratefultoAdamShearandthelateLindaPenkowerfortheirsupportasdepart- mentchairs,andtotheDean’sofficeintheDietrichSchoolofArts&Sciencesat Pittforgrantingmeasemesterofffromteachingtoworkonthebook.Since2017, theRosenberg-PerlowendowmentatPitthasallowedmetospendmoretimeon research.Thanks also go to my research assistants Natasha Mayer and Sydney O’Brien of the First Experiences in Research program for all their hard work. Ipresented some of the material in this book at conferences over the years and have benefitted from the feedback I received at them. Particularly fruitful were discussions with Andrew Monson, Carolin Arlt, Marie-Pierre Chaufray, Ann Goddeeris, and Lidia Matassa at the Irish Society for the Study of the An- cient Near East’s third annual conference on“Money and Cult:The Role of the TempleintheAncientEconomy.”Alsohelpfulwereresponsesfromparticipants in a conference at the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies of the Hebrew Uni- versity of Jerusalem on “Expressions of Cult in the Southern Levant in the Greco-Roman Period.” Some of the content of Chapters 5 and 6 below appears in mycontribution to the conference volume: “Debt Fraud, Herem Entrapment, https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110421026-001 VI Acknowledgments andOtherCrimesInvolvingCulticPropertyinLateHellenisticandEarlyRoman Judea,”pages255–67inExpressionsofCultintheSouthernLevantintheGreco- RomanPeriod.ManifestationsinTextandMaterialCulture,editedbyZeevWeiss and Oren Tal (Turnhout: Brepols, 2017). I published my interpretation of Romans 11:16,which appears in Chapter 7 below, in the article “On the Sanctity of Mixtures and Branches:Two Halakhic Sayings in Romans 11:16,” Journal of Biblical Literature 135, no. 2 (2016): 355–68. I would like to thank Rebecca Denova, Douglas Campbell, T.J. Lang, Joel Marcus, and the participants in the Duke-UNC New Testament and Judaic StudiesColloquiumfortheirassistanceasIworkedonthatmaterial,theresults of which are in Chapter 7. IamgratefultomyreadersintheStudiaJudaicaseriesatdeGruyter,partic- ularly Alexander Samely and Günter Stemberger, for the careful attention they gavethemanuscript.AliceMerozandSophieWagenhoferintheeditorialdepart- mentwerepatientandhelpfulalongtheway,JanaFritscheproofreadthemanu- scriptandsawitthroughtopublication, andFlorianRuppensteinmanagedthe productionprocess.NellyBeymanoftheIsraelAntiquitiesAuthorityhelpedme secure permissions to use several images. Finally,Iwouldliketogivethankstomyfamilyforalltheirsupportoverthe years, as well as to my partner James Arjmand. He tolerates myoccasional dis- tractedness with good cheer, provides reassurance, and laughs with me after a hard day’s work. Benjamin D.Gordon Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Contents Abbreviations IX Figures XI Chapter 1: Introduction 1 . Sacred Land in the Ancient World 11 . History of Research and Summary of Contents 19 Chapter 2: Field Consecrations in Leviticus 27 29 . Introduction 29 . Consecration of a Patrimonial Field 36 .. The 50-Shekel Valuation Benchmark 38 .. Field Redemption 44 .. The Consecrated Field as Hypothecary Pledge 57 .. Seizure of a Patrimonial Field 69 . Consecration of a Non-Patrimonial Field 71 . Voluntary Herem Dedication of a Patrimonial Field 73 .5 Anathematization of Land by Decree 78 . Summary 81 Chapter 3: The Sacred Reserve of Yahweh in Ezekiel’s Temple Vision 84 . Introduction 84 . The Sacred Reserve and Its Local Prototypes 87 .. Levitical Settlements Reimagined 91 .. A Non-Urban Sacred Reserve 95 . Priests, Farming, and Temple Dependency 98 . The Temple Collective and Sacred Property 105 .5 The “Plot of the House of Yeho” on a Land Survey from Idumea 112 . Summary 115 Chapter 4: Hellenistic Rulers, Jewish Temples, and Sacred Land 117 . Introduction 117 . The Land Endowment for the Oniad Temple at Leontopolis 121 . A Sacred Garden next to a Synagogue at Arsinoe 130 . The Hasmoneans and Sacred Land in Judea 132 .5 The Ptolemais Hinterland and the Jerusalem Temple 136 . Summary 145 VIII Contents Chapter 5: Field Consecrations in the Late Second Temple Period 147 5. Introduction 147 5. Fields in the Freewill-Offering Laws of the Damascus Document 150 5.. Consecration of Forcibly Seized Assets 153 5.. Consecration of Assets Claimable by Household Dependents 157 5.. Forced Redemption of Consecrated Assets 158 5. The Proceeds from Agricultural Consecrations 160 5. Land Donations among the Yahad and the Jesus Movement 169 5.5 Agricultural Consecrations and the Herodian Temple Economy 170 5. Summary 179 Chapter 6: Herem Property and Landholding by Priests in the Late Second Temple Period 181 . Introduction 181 . The Herem Field in a Halakhic Text from Qumran 184 .. Herem and the Priests’ Entitlements 186 .. Sanctity Protections for Herem Property 190 . Landholding by Priests 195 . Summary 203 Chapter 7: An Allusion to a Sacred Tree in Paul’s Letter to the Romans 205 . Introduction 205 . Sacred Admixtures 207 . Protecting Derivatives of Agricultural Consecrations 210 . Sacred Olive Trees and the Allegory of Romans 219 .5 Summary 224 Summary and Conclusions 225 Bibliography 232 Index of Ancient Sources 269 Index of Subjects 282 Abbreviations Ant. Josephus,JewishAntiquities b. “sonof”(ben) b. BabylonianTalmud BHS BibliaHebraicaStuttgartensia C.Ap. Josephus,AgainstApion CD DamascusDocument(CairoGeniza) CPJ CorpusPapyrorumJudaicarum DSD DeadSeaDiscoveries FAT ForschungenzumAltenTestament HTR TheHarvardTheologicalReview HUCA HebrewUnionCollegeAnnual IEJ IsraelExplorationJournal INJ IsraelNumismaticJournal JBL JournalofBiblicalLiterature JESHO JournaloftheEconomicandSocialHistoryoftheOrient JJS JournalofJewishStudies JNES JournalofNearEasternStudies JPS JewishPublicationSociety JSJ JournalfortheStudyofJudaism JSNT JournalfortheStudyoftheNewTestament JSOT JournalfortheStudyoftheOldTestament JSOTSupp. JournalfortheStudyoftheOldTestamentSupplementSeries LAB Pseudo-Philo,LiberAntiquitatemBiblicarum LXX Septuagint m. Mishnah MT MasoretictextoftheHebrewBible NRSV NewRevisedStandardVersion PAM PalestineArchaeologicalMuseum R. Rabbi Rahlfs AlfredRahlfs(ed.),Septuaginta RB RevueBiblique t. Tosefta VT VetusTestamentum War Josephus,JewishWar y. Palestinian/JerusalemTalmud https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110421026-002
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