At the intersection of texts and material finds
Subtitle: stepped pools, stone vessels, and ritual purity among the Jews of Roman Galilee : with a postscript, From Roman Galilee to nineteenth century Chesterfield, Connecticut
By: Stuart S. Miller
Series: Journal of ancient Judaism. Supplements -- volume 16; V & R academic; V & R academic; Journal of ancient Judaism -- v. 16.
Publisher: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Company KG
Published: 2015
Place of publication: Göttingen
Language: eng
Number of pages: 423
ISBN-13: 9783525550694
Subjects: Mikveh; Judaism; Jews; Customs and practices; Antiquities; Design and construction; Historia; Judendom; Ritual Purity; Renhet-orenhet; History
Description: Stuart Miller examines the hermeneutical challenges posed by the material and literary evidence pertaining to ritual purity practices in Graeco-Roman Palestine and, especially, the Galilee. He contends that "stepped pools," which we now know were in use well beyond the Destruction of the Temple, and, as indicated by the large collection on the western acropolis of Sepphoris and elsewhere, into the Middle and Late Roman/Byzantine eras, must be understood in light of biblical and popular perspectives on ritual purity. The interpretation of the finds is too frequently forced to conform to rabbinic prescriptions, which oftentimes were the result of the sages' unique and creative, nominalist approach to ritual purity. Special attention is given to the role ritual purity continued to play in the lives of ordinary Jews despite (or because of) the loss of the Temple.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 344-377) and indexes.
Table of contents: title: Introduction : ritual baths and ritual purity, the last fifty years --; title: Misleading use of terminology : the "miqveh," "bet tevilah," and other "ritual baths" --; title: Pre-rabbinic, non-rabbinic, and rabbinic ritual immersion practices in the making --; title: Did the author of P. Oxyrhynchus 840 know what a "miqveh" was? --; title: Further observations on stone vessel finds and ritual purity in light of talmudic sources --; title: The stepped pools of the western acropolis at Sepphoris --; title: Understanding the pools : biblical perceptions of purity and the habitus of the Jews of ʼEreṣ Israel --; title: Domestic Judaism and the "well-ordered bayit" --; title: Priests, purities, and the Jews of Roman and late antique Galilee : rethinking the priests of Sepphoris and the Mishmarot --; title: Non-rabbinic ritual immersion practices in post-talmudic sources --; title: From stepped pools to miqvaʼot and the society that produced them --; title: Postscript : from Roman Galilee to nineteenth-century Chesterfield, Connecticut.