Table of Contents
Preface Steven Fine Aaron Koller v
Mishnah Baba Metsia 7:7 and the Relationship of Mishnaic Hebrew to Northern Biblical Hebrew Shawn Zelig Aster 1
Mishnah Baba Batra 8:5 - The Transformation of the Firstborn Son from Family Leader to Family Member Jonathan S. Milgram 19
Mishnah Avodah Zarah 4:5 - The Faces of Effacement: Between Textual and Artistic Evidence Noa Yuval-Hacham 29
Tosefta Ma'aser Sheni 1:4 - The Rabbis and Roman Civic Coinage in Late Antique Palestine Joshua Weistuch Ben Zion Rosenfeld 53
Tosefta Shabbat 1:14 - "Come and See the Extent to Which Purity Had Spread' An Archaeological Perspective on the Historical Background to a Late Tannaitic Passage Yonatan Adler 63
An Illustrated Midrash of Mekilta de R. Ishmael, Vayehi Beshalah, 1 - Rabbis and the Jewish Community Revisited Uzi Leibner 83
Jerusalem Talmud Megillah 1 (71b-72a) - "Of the Making of Books": Rabbinic Scribal Arts in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls Lawrence H. Schiffman 97
Jerusalem Talmud Sanhedrin 2,6 (20c) - The Demise of King Solomon and Roman Imperial Propaganda in Late Antiquity Alexei Sivertsev 111
Genesis Rabbah 1:1 - Mosaic To rah as the Blueprint of the Universe -Insights from the Roman World Burton L. Visotzky 127
Genesis Rabbah 98:17 - "And Why Is it Called Gennosar?" Recent Discoveries at Magdala and Jewish Life on the Plain of Gennosar in the Early Roman Period. R. Steven Notley 141
Leviticus Rabbah 16:1 - "Odysseus and the Sirens" in the Beit Leontis Mosaic from Beit She'an Galit Hasan-Rokem 159
Babylonian Talmud, Sukkah 51b - Coloring the Temple: Polychromy and the Jerusalem Temple in Late Antiquity Steven Fine 191
Babylonian Talmud, Avodah Zarah 16a - Jews and Pagan Cults in Third-Century Sepphoris Sacha Stern 205
The Rehov Inscriptions and Rabbinic Literature - Matters of Language Steven D. Fraade 225
"This Is the Beit Midrash of Rabbi Eliezer ha-Qappar" (Dabbura Inscription) - Were Epigraphical Rabbis Real Sages, or Nothing More Than Donors and Honored Deceased? Stuart S. Miller 239
The Piyyutim le-Hatan of Qallir and Amittai - Jewish Marriage Customs in Early Byzantium Laura S. Lieber 275
Afterwords
The Use of Archaeology in Understanding Rabbinic Materials: An Archaeological Perspective Eric Meyers 303
The Use of Archaeology in Understanding Rabbinic Materials: A Talmudic Perspective Daniel Sperber 321
Index 347
