The cult of an ancient temple was largely cultivation of the cult image. Paul Johnson describes the activities in a typical Egyptian temple: “Except for Re, the sun-god, who was cultivated in the open, images were placed in the innermost sanctuary of the temple and the rite might even take . . . . Continue Reading »
In the Old Testament, “flesh” physically describes the musculature of the body; the skin is the boundary between the world and the flesh, and there is a distinction made between the flesh and the heart or internal organs. Both in animals and men, “flesh” denotes the . . . . Continue Reading »
At the beginning of Galatians 3, Paul reminds the Galatians of his first visit to them and says that Christ was “publicly portrayed” before them. This was before their eyes; now, someone has laid an “evil eye” on them. This verse is sometimes taken as a reference to the . . . . Continue Reading »
Theodore Lewis assesses Tryggve Mettinger’s comparative study of Israel’s aniconic tradition in a 1998 issue of JAOS . Lewis’s enumerated conclusions are (the next few paragraph are directly quoted): 1. Aniconic traditions (i.e., Mettinger’s “de facto . . . . Continue Reading »
Greeks also seem to have practiced some form of ancestor cult and, perhaps related, a cult of heroes. In a detailed discussion of the archeology of the cult of the dead in early Greece in the American Journal of Archeology , Carla Antonaccio summarizes the evidence that she wishes to test by . . . . Continue Reading »
A 1984 article by Baruch Levine and Jean-Michel de Tarragon in the JAOS examines a Ugaritic liturgy that commemorates the accession of Ammurapi and includes honors to his dead father Niqmaddu. The liturgy begins with a summons to the Patrons of Ugarit, including the “Rephaim of the . . . . Continue Reading »
In a 1973 article in the journal Iraq , Miranda Bayliss reviews the evidence for a cult of the dead in ancient Assyrian and Babylon Little evidence survives a general “cult of deceased kin” except among royal families. For others, most of the evidence involves dealing with ghosts that . . . . Continue Reading »
Nearly every student of Israel and the ANE emphasizes the uniqueness of Israel’s aniconic worship. Explaining the significance of it is much more difficult. As Ronald Hendel summarizes ( CBQ 1988), scholars have offered several rationales for the exclusion of images from Israel’s . . . . Continue Reading »
Though the Greeks built temples for a variety of reasons, housing and serving the cult image of a god was one of the motivations for building a temple in the first place. John Pedley ( Sanctuaries and the Sacred in the Ancient Greek World ) writes that some temples “seem to have been . . . . Continue Reading »
Othmar Keel ( The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms ) has shown that much of the symbolism and theology of temple is common throughout the ancient world. Of Egypt, he writes, “Almost all the great Egyptian sanctuaries claimed to house . . . . Continue Reading »
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