Head of All Years

Astronomy and Calendars at Qumran in Their Ancient Context
Erscheinungsjahr 2008
ISBN: 978-90-04-17088-9
Verlag: Brill

Buch, Englisch, Band 78, 332 Seiten, Format (B × H): 160 mm x 244 mm, Gewicht: 635 g

Reihe: Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah

Rather than being an isolated, primitive body of knowledge the Jewish calendar tradition of 364 days constituted an integral part of the astronomical science of the ancient world. This tradition—attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Pseudepigrapha—stands out as a coherent, novel synthesis, representing the Jewish authors’ apocalyptic worldview. The calendar is studied here both “from within”—analyzing its textual manifestations —and “from without”—via a comparison with ancient Mesopotamian astronomy. This analysis reveals that the calendrical realm constituted a significant case of inter-cultural borrowing, pertinent to similar such cases in ancient literature. Special attention is given to the “Book of Astronomy” (1 Enoch 72-82) and a variety of calendrical and liturgical texts from Qumran.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Ben-Dov, Jonathan

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Christentum, Christliche Theologie Bibelwissenschaften
• Naturwissenschaften Astronomie Zeiterfassung, Chronologie

Über Autor(innen)

Jonathan Ben-Dov, Ph.D (2005), Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is a Lecturer in Biblical Studies and Second Temple Literature at the University of Haifa. He has co-authored the edition of calendrical texts in the series Discoveries in the Judaean Desert (Oxford University Press, 2001), and published a series of articles in the field.