1. Sources, Resources, and Periods
Class 1 Introduction
Sources, Resources, and Periods

2. Do Now
Write down:
an event that happened during the Second Temple or Rabbinic Periods
Your favorite site in Israel
something interesting about yourself

3. Secular Nationalism, now
You are a religious Jew and pray for the renewed state of Israel 20 times a day. Finally after 2000 years Israel wins its war of independence. However, the leadership are secular Jews who don’t want to see any Judaism in the Jewish state. Do you support the new government?

4. Secular Nationalism, then
The Maccabees were great heros in 164BCE but the year is now 90BCE and the ruler is the Hasmonean Alexander Yannai who hates the Pharisees and has even murdered great sages who opposed him.
Will you go to the Bet Hamikdash on Sukkot to see him perform the services?

5. Messianism
You are a religious Jew and pray for Mashiah 30 times a day. There is a group of Jews who believe that Mashiah has already come but you don’t think they are right.
Should you oppose them, tolerate them, support them…?

6. Conversion
One million Russians have emigrated to Israel. 400,000 of them are not halakhically Jewish. You are the Chief rabbi. Do you allow them to convert?

7. Conversion
You are on the Sahhedrin. John Hyracanus has forcibly converted thousands of Edomites in 110BCE. Can they be considrered part of the Jewish nation?

8. Primary Sources Tanakh New Testament Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha
Ezra-Nehamiah, Daniel, Zechariah, Malakhi
New Testament
Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha
Archaeology, Cuneiform Tablets
Dead Sea Scrolls
Josephus
Greek and Roman Historians
Talmud and Midrashim

9. Yosef ben Matityahu
Lived CE
Aka Titus Flavius Josephus

10. Works by Josephus 75 – Jewish Wars (Aramaic)
94 – Jewish Antiquities (Greek)
97 – Against Apion
98 – Life of Flavius Josephus

11. The Josephus Puzzle

12. Josephus the Apologist
Apologetic to the Romans
War says revolt was only by a few thugs. Tacitus says national rebellion, non-Roman Jews helped the Palestinian Jews
War says Titus urges that the Temple be spared. But compare Sulpicius Severus and Bavli Gittin 56b who say Titus demanded destruction of the Temple
See L. Feldman in Miller reader p. 904.

13. Themes Dealing with Political Domination Nationalism
Confronting External Cultures
Tradition and Change
Finding the roots of Judaism as we know it
Unity and Diversity
Interpretation and Text-centeredness
Universalism and Particularism
Messianism

14. History of Israel: The Big Picture
Kings of Israel ( BCE)
Babylonian Period ( BCE)
Tish’a be’Av
Persian Period ( BCE)
Purim
Move back
Hellenistic Period ( BCE)
Septuagint
Hasmonean Period (164-63BCE)
Hanukah, Sectarianism
Roman Period (63BCE – 395CE)

15. Homework
Read 2 Kings and Jer 52 carefully. Make note of the dates provided.
List the last three kings of Judah.
What happened to each of them and when?

16. Last Kings of Judah Jehoiakim 609-598BCE Jehoiachin 597BCE
Vassal to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon
Jehoiachin 597BCE
Captured by Nebuchandezzar in a siege
Imprisoned in Babylonia
Freed in 562BCE by Amel-Marduk
Zedekiah BCE
Placed on throne by Nebuchadnezzar
Rebelled and entered alliance with Egypt
Watched children murdered before being blinded

17. Babylonian Kings Nebuchadnezzar II (r. 605-562)
Nabopolassar (r. 626 – 605)
Nebuchadnezzar II (r )
Amel-Marduk (r.  )
a.k.a אויל מרדך
Nergal-sharezer (r. 560 – 556)
Labashi-Marduk (r. 556)
Nabonidus (r. 556 – 539)

18. Sources of Chronology Ptolemy’s Canon Uruk King List
Ptolemy of Alexandria (85-165)
Famous geographer and astronomer
Passed on a canon of kings covering 900 years
Uruk King List
In Baghdad Museum (unless looted in 2003)
Lists kings and years reigned from

19. Cuneiform VAT 4956 An Astronomical Diary

20. Absolute Dating From VAT 4956:
“Year 37 of Nebuchadnezar, king of Babylon. Month I (the first of which was identical with) the 30th (of the preceding month), the moon became visible behind the Bull of heaven…Saturn was in front of the Swallow…Night of the 3rd, the moon was two cubits if front of…”
This accurately describes 568 BCE and no other year.

21. “Chronology Papers” by W. Dolen
“But not only did these tablets report on lunar eclipses, and one planet position with specific dates (month and day), these tablets report on many planet positions. By ascertaining through retro-calculation the position of these planets on certain dates, we narrow the dates down to the exact year in the Christian Era system.
“For example the BC tablet contains several positions of the planets Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, and Mars during this time period. Jupiter repeats its synodic period every 71 (70.987) or 83 solar years. Venus repeats itself every eight years. Saturn repeats itself every 59 years. And Mars repeats itself every 47 (46.979) years. These four planets will all be in the same position in relation to themselves and the stars on the same solar date approximately every 1,575,064 years.”
(vol. 5 p. 112)

22. Summary of Methodology
We find relative dates in Tanakh and Cuneiform documents.
We can correlate those relative dates with an absolute calendar through king lists or astronomical data.