Apply for a Doctoral Studentship

We are currently seeking applications for three doctoral studentships for study at the University of Göttingen within the larger project of Unity and Diversity in Early Jewish Monotheisms. The project focuses on the different forms that monotheistic belief and practice took in the exilic and Persian periods with an emphasis on the relevant biblical texts. Click here to read the description and application information.

Coining Monotheism

The coin which is the ‘logo’ of our project website well illustrates the variety of factors involved in the emergence of Jewish monotheisms. This unique coin (catalogued as TC 242.5 in the British Museum) from Israel/Palestine bears traces of the Persian Empire in slow decline and of Greek and Phoenician trade. There is no published coin similar to TC 242.5 in diameter, weight, artistic quality and image. In spite of the uniqueness of the coin, its authenticity is beyond doubt. The depiction of a seated deity on the coin indicates something of the religion and iconic practice of the people designing, authorising, and using the coin. An artefact like this perplexes in a context often assumed to refrain from images, especially from anthropomorphic representations of God. It raises various questions including: is the coin inscribed YHW(H)? What deity would be anthropomorphically depicted? What does the various imagery mean? How does the imagery fit into the context of Jewish aniconism?

Click here to read the entire article.

P's Gordian Knot

The priestly material (P) is widely recognized to be monotheistic. But where should one begin when seeking to analyze P’s theology? This is no idle question, but draws us deeply into the problems of determining the extent of P and the definition of monotheism.

In a perceptive analysis of the first volume of Jacob Milgrom’s impressive Leviticus commentary, Rolf Rendtorff articulated a sense of disorientation in reading Milgrom’s work. For historical-critical scholarship P means primarily the narrative thread, which parallels the non-priestly parts of the Pentateuch. For Milgrom P means Leviticus, and one seeks for P’s theology there. There is not even a backward glance to the other parts of P in the Pentateuch.

Milgrom is clear about the monotheism of Leviticus, but this book is not easily equated with monotheism, especially since monotheism has often been characterized as ethical, often as a contrast to ritualistic (still Gnuse). Milgrom deploys Yehezkel Kaufmann’s tendentious contrast between pagan and Israelite religion to bring Leviticus and monotheism into shape. Konrad Schmid’s exposition of P’s monotheism, on the other hand, begins – and virtually ends with – an exposition of P’s creation account in Genesis 1. This would accord with the sense that for P the primeval history presents the paradigm for the world. To understand P we need only make sense of this cosmic blueprint (cf. Lohfink).

So, how can we draw these different senses of priestly theology together? The solution of much recent redaction-critical scholarship has been to see the end of the priestly Grundschrift (Pg) with the completion of the Tabernacle in Exodus 25-40. But is this not just a case of cutting the Gordian knot?

New SBL Unit: Early Jewish Monotheisms

At the forthcoming annual meeting of the SBL in New Orleans there will be a unit formation session for a unit devoted to the examination of Jewish monotheism in the exilic and post-exilic period.

The session, "Unity and Diversity in Early Jewish Monotheisms", will be held from 4.00-6.30 on Monday 23rd November in Poydras, Sheraton Hotel.

The following papers will be given which will provide a basis for discussing the future direction of the unit:

• Nathan MacDonald, Göttingen/St Andrews
  "Monotheism after Deutero-Isaiah?" (20 mins)
• Hermann Spieckermann, Göttingen
  "Monotheism in Context" (20 mins)
• Loren Stuckenbruck, Princeton Theological Seminary
  "Monotheism in the Early Second Temple Period: A View from the Later Second Temple Period" (20 mins)

There will then be a discussion. After the session we will retire to a local restaurant.

A Polytheistic Holiday

One can never understand one's own homeland before being faced with another that is incomprehensible. The most important qualities of "home", previously assumed to be simply the way things must be, can only be articulated after being juxtaposed with the jarringly different assumptions of an alien land. G. K. Chesterton introduced his reflections on visiting America: "A man is perfectly entitled to laugh at a thing because he happens to find it incomprehensible. What he has no right to do is to laugh at it as incomprehensible, and then criticise it as if he comprehended it. The very fact of its unfamiliarity and mystery ought to set him thinking about the deeper causes that make people so different from himself, and that without merely assuming that they must be inferior to himself."

The study of biblical monotheism, a "homeland" for most in the West, might well begin, therefore, with an extended journey into a polytheistic world. Unfortunately, our access to the thought-world of the polytheistic elements of ancient Israel is quite limited. As with the study of many of the "losers" of history, source writings are dominated by the perspective of the "winners". So perhaps we can visit other polytheistic "lands" for help, always aware that there will assuredly be stark differences with the biblical world. There are better documented, monotheism-polytheism struggles than those of the Old Testament. Examples include the struggle between Christianity and Roman paganism, modern missionary struggles with traditional religions, and perhaps even struggles between the three Abrahamic religions and Durkheimian functional religions, such as Nazism, Soviet socialism, and present-day liberal democratic capitalism. Despite drastic differences, perhaps visits to these foreign lands can illuminate the otherwise easily missed peculiarities of various forms of biblical monotheism.