Tracing the Text Through Time

From Tablets to Torah Scrolls • 36m

In our final episode with Dr. Brian Rickett and Dr. Drew Longacre, Brian and Drew share important insights we have learned about the Bible from the science of paleography.

Learn how this amazing, detective-like work has helped us understand the way in which the biblical text been transmitted over time. What clues exist within the manuscripts that help paleographers determine their age and place of origin? What do the very earliest manuscripts tell us and are there passages within Scripture that illuminate how and when copying the text became more prominent?

Dr. Longacre also shares about his exciting, upcoming book on Psalm manuscripts from the Dead Sea Scrolls - and what the different arrangements and handwriting styles of those texts convey to us.

Lastly, Dr. Rickett relays, once more, how you can get the brand new MIKRA View app - as well as how you can have the MIKRA team come to your area to put on one of their scroll display events. These events have drawn people to connect with the biblical text in a profound way, viewing it in its ancient, artifact form.

To learn more, please visit the MIKRA website:
https://mikralab.org

Making Biblical Manuscripts Available

Interview; Part 1

From Tablets to Torah Scrolls

We will be closing out the year and our From Tablets to Torah Scrolls Focus with a 2 episode series in which Tim interviews Dr. Brian Rickett and Dr. Drew Longacre of the MIKRA Research Laboratory.

In this first episode, Dr. Rickett and Dr. Longacre share some exciting updates! Soon the team will be launching a new app called MIKRA View which will allow anyone to gain access to ancient biblical manuscripts.

This means laypeople, scholars, and institutions alike will be able to have an encounter with and study biblical scrolls and manuscripts in their original languages. People with the app will also have access to MIKRA’s research on the manuscripts that are featured, as well as be able to upload their own notes to the platform.

This is incredibly exciting for anyone who wants to study these scrolls and gain a deeper understanding of how scribes throughout the centuries copied the biblical text, bringing it to us today!

Dr. Longacre also shares his background and how he became the Paleographic Project Coordinator on the MIKRA team.

https://digitalpatternsofevidence.vhx.tv/videos/making-biblical-manuscripts-available

New Staff Appointment: Mordechai Vaintrob

The MIKRA Research Laboratory is pleased to announce that Mordechai Vaintrob will be joining the MIKRA Lab’s Hebrew paleography team as our new Associate Paleographer and Specialist for Talmud, Halacha and Hebrew Codicology. Mordechai has a very unique background that has prepared him to bring authoritative experience to the academic fields of Talmud, Halacha, and Hebrew codicology.

ABOUT Mordechai

Mordechai is an expert in Rabbinic laws concerning the writing process of Torah scrolls, Tefillin and Mezuzahs (STaM), and in Hebrew palaeography and codicology. In addition to his academic education, Mordechai studied at orthodox Yeshivot in Jerusalem and Benei Berak for over a decade where he received a wide traditional Rabbinic education.

He holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in biblical studies and Talmud from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His Master’s thesis, written under the supervision of Prof. Simcha Emanuel and Prof. Judith Olszowy-Schlanger, dealt with para-textual signs found in Torah scrolls from antiquity up until the modern era. He is currently writing his doctoral dissertation at the department of Talmud and Halacha in the Hebrew University on codicological aspects of Torah scrolls writing.

Some of Mordechai’s projects have included the following:
2022-Present. Researcher at the Hebrew Bible Manuscripts Research Institute

2017-2019. Researcher at the Hebrew University Bible project

2011-2015: Editor in the Jerusalem Talmud edition of the Oz veHadar institution

Mordechai has published extensively in his areas of specialization, most of which are in the Hebrew language. However, it was Mordecai’s 2019 article, “More Fragments of Early Torah Scroll Come to Light” published in The Newsletter of the Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit, at Cambridge University Library, that initially gained the attention of the MIKRA Research Laboratory. This popular level, yet important newsletter, is the news publication for The Genizah Research Unit at Cambridge - the center for the most important Genizah research in the World. We are very excited to have snatched up Mordechai while still early in his doctoral program, and in advance of the launch of our new MIKRA View software platform.

New Staff Appointment: Yehiel Tzeitkin, PhD

Yehiel Tzeitkin, PhD: Senior Associate Researcher for Hebrew Manuscripts and Paleography

The MIKRA Research Laboratory is pleased to announce the appointment of Yehiel Tzeitkin, PhD as our new Senior Associate Researcher for Hebrew Manuscripts and Paleography. He is a specialist in the authentication of Hebrew manuscripts and inscriptions, as well as in Hebrew bibliography, paleography, and the history of Hebrew printing.

ABOUT YEHIEL

During the course of his academic training, Yehiel distinguished himself by winning numerous awards, foundation prizes, and scholarships culminating with the "President's Scholarship" for outstanding doctoral student at Bar-llan University in 2012. Upon completing his PhD, Dr. Tzeitkin has continued to have a prolific academic career lecturing and publishing numerous Hebrew language articles on a variety of subjects but especially on the Hebrew Bible and Masorah of medieval manuscripts.

Outside of academia, Yehiel’s professional life has been equally focused on the Hebrew Scriptures.  He has extensive experience working as a certified scribe (sofer STaM) and is an expert in the attribution of Torah Scrolls by their calligraphy and writing features. He has used this expertise extensively as an expert consultant for private collections, synagogues, and auction houses in the attribution of Hebrew books and manuscripts, including scrolls of the Torah and Prophets. Here are a few highlights:

• 2013-Present. Independent Consultant in attribution of Hebrew manuscripts.

• 2018-Present. Research Associate at the Academy of Hebrew Language, Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

• 2013-Present. Lecturer; Bible Department, Orot Institute, Rehovot, Israel.

• 2011-2017. Editor and Research associate in Ha-Keter Institute at Bar-Ilan University; for this project, Yehiel worked on a new academic edition of the Tanakh, Masora and commentaries based on the Aleppo Codex.

• 2010-2014. Lecturer; Bible Department at Bar-Ilan University.

Yehiel’s varied academic and professional experience gives him both academic precision as well as artistic and experiential awareness in the complicated field of dating and attribution of Hebrew manuscripts. Added to this skill set is native fluency in both Hebrew and Russian. We look forward to the contributions that Dr. Zeitkin will make to the dating and localizing work of our manuscript projects.

New Staff Appointment: Marc Michaels Lead Hebrew Paleographer

New Staff Appointment: Marc Michaels Lead Paleographer and Specialist for Scribal Arts and Hebrew Manuscripts

The MIKRA Research Laboratory is pleased to announce the appointment of Marc Michaels as our new Lead Paleographer and Specialist for Scribal Arts and Hebrew Manuscripts. Marc adds a specialization in Hebrew scribal arts in addition to Hebrew paleography that will provide added depth to our expanding manuscript research projects. Marc joins our team in advance of several new and important digitization projects. Bringing decades of experience as a practicing sofer (scribe), scholar, and lecturer in the Hebrew scribal arts, he is ideally suited for manuscript analysis in the modern digital era. 

More about Marc

Marc is perhaps best known by his Hebrew name and website, Mordechai Pinchas Sofer, an educational platform that since 1995 has featured aspects of the work and life of a scribe committed to biblical manuscripts.  Marc has published numerous works related to textual analysis and the scribal arts, including the pivotal work, Sefer Tagin Fragments from the Cairo Genizah: A Critical Edition, Commentary and Reconstruction (Brill, 2021). As noted by the publisher, in this project, Marc Michaels,

 “transcribes and recreates fragments of arguably the earliest found manuscript of the manual for sofrim (scribes) concerning the decorative tagin (tittles) and 'strange' letter forms that adorn certain words in the Torah. Comparing these found fragments against other core and secondary sources of Sefer Tagin (including several pages of a new secondary source), Michaels establishes the most likely readings to assist the reconstruction of the fragments and shed light on the original intention of the author of Sefer Tagin.”

Highlights from Marc’s other notable activities

• Current PhD student with senior scholar status at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies (FAMES), university of Cambridge (Fitzwilliam College), 2022

• Fellowship recipient from Rothschild Foundation Hanadiv Europe, for research in scribal studies and Hebrew manuscripts in 2021

• Creation of the first new tiqqun (copyists’ guide) in several thousand years for the Megillat ha-Shoah (Holocaust Scroll) converting the text into a manuscript and using techniques from Sefer Tagin and other sources

• His featuring in three BBC television programs

• Accomplishments as an excellent graphic designer/marketing expert, numerous non-academic works in his areas of specialization, and featured national and international lecturer.

To access Marc’s publications, academic contributions, and extended CV see: https://independent.academia.edu/MordechaiPinchas. To learn more about this fascinating and accomplished scholar, be sure to visit his website: https://www.sofer.co.uk .

 Marc has hit the ground running at MIKRA and has already completed stage 1 of a challenging commissioned paleographical analysis of a centuries old Yemenite Torah scroll. We’ll be making more announcements about this project in the future. 

Check back soon to keep up with Marc’s work at MIKRA! 

Job Announcement: Specialist for Modern Hebrew Paleographer; Torah Scrolls Specialists

MIKRA Research Laboratory is hiring a specialist in Torah scroll paleography to be part of a team performing digitization, paleographic analysis, and database building on modern era scrolls and manuscripts from the 16th-20th centuries. See below.

New Staff Appointment: Drew Longacre, PhD

Drew Longacre, PhD: New Project Coordinator and Specialist for Ancient Hebrew Paleography

We are excited to announce that Dr. Drew Longacre will be joining the MIKRA Hebrew paleography team as our new Paleographic Project Coordinator and Specialist for Ancient Hebrew Paleography.

Drew adds an ancient specialization to our Hebrew paleography team already strong in medieval and modern Hebrew paleography. Thanks to this addition, our team will have specialists representing the full spectrum of Hebrew paleographical study.

About Drew

Drew is a specialist in the texts and manuscripts of the Hebrew and Greek Bibles, with over a decade of professional research and publication experience. He completed his doctoral dissertation in 2015 on the Dead Sea Scrolls and is an expert in the study of Hebrew paleography and ancient Torah scrolls. Drew has completed several major research projects:

• In 2022, he was the National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow at the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, working on identifying different Dead Sea Scrolls written by the same scribes.

• From 2016 – 2021, he was the postdoctoral researcher at the University of Groningen on the European Research Council project “The Hands that Wrote the Bible: Digital Palaeography and Scribal Culture of the Dead Sea Scrolls” (principal investigator: Mladen Popović), which used radiocarbon dating and digital paleographic tools to assess the development of ancient Hebrew handwriting.

• In 2015, Drew was the Educational and Cultural Affairs Junior Research Fellow at the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, working on reconstructing fragmentary ancient Torah scrolls.

• From 2014 – 2016, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Helsinki’s Academy of Finland Centre of Excellence in Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions, studying ancient Greek fragments of the Torah.

  Currently, Drew is helping us to finish an analysis of a composite Russian-Polish scroll and is gearing up to begin work on an oriental Torah scroll. With working language skills in: English, Hebrew, Greek, German, French, Dutch, and Aramaic, he’ll add a helpful diversity to the team.

  He has known MIKRA founder Brian Rickett for over 15 years and shares MIKRA’s goals for scholarly study of the Bible and educating the general public about its continuing religious and cultural significance. Drew began working with MIKRA in 2022. For Drew’s fuller CV along with sample articles and papers, please visit his Academia.edu page here.

If you have a manuscript or manuscript project and would like to contract or collaborate with MIKRA, we invite you to connect with Dr. Longacre here. For a paleographical sample, see here.

1000 Year Old Bible Refound in Cairo Synagogue

In 2017, Prof. Yoram Meital rediscovered the Zechariah Ben Anan manuscript in a Cairo, Egypt synagogue. The manuscript is similar to the Aleppo Codex and Codex L (the most important Hebrew Bibles; currently only containing the Writing’s section). It is named after the scribe who produced it, Zechariah Ben Anan (ZBAM for short).  Here is a recently released video describing Meital’s experience (#1 below). Yesterday, on June 29th, MIKRA participated in a presentation out of Cairo sponsored by the Egyptian non profit, A Drop of Milk Association, that interviews key persons in a project to preserve the manuscript. It has been released and is linked below (#5).

(1) Video on the discovery.

(2) Here are two articles by MIKA CEO Brian Rickett on the discovery: Article 1; Article 2.

(3) Here is Yoram Meital’s JQR article on the rediscovery.

(4) Richard Gottheil’s original 1905 article on his discovery of the ZBAM in The Jewish Quarterly Review.

(5) June 29th presentation on the rediscovery of the manuscript by the non profit, Drop of Milk Association.

Dead Sea Jar Lid Found to Hold Decomposed Papyrus

PRESS RELEASE

A study of ancient residue in a clay jar lid, originally coming from the area where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, has shown that it contained decomposed papyrus. Numerous cylindrical jars and lids were found in caves close to the ancient site of Qumran, west of the Dead Sea, but these were largely broken and empty, and their association with scrolls has been doubted. The discovery of decomposed papyrus in one of the lids adds to the evidence that scrolls were once placed in them, even when no scroll fragments have survived.

Jewish Ritual Art Coming Into Its Own At The Met

Just over a year ago, the Metropolitan Museum of Art purchased one of the most important Jewish manuscripts to survive medieval Spain. This 14th-century Spanish Bible from the Castile region is one of only three surviving decorated Hebrew Bibles from the region. Its uniqueness is in the beauty of the manuscript, with its clean margins and uniform penmanship, complex micrographical patterns, illuminated initial panels and intricate designs on its opening carpet pages.

Getty Museum Acquires a Rare, 700-Year-Old Torah

LOS ANGELES — The Getty Museum has long been a destination for fans of illuminated manuscripts, with a trove including Christian prayer books from the Middle Ages. Now it also owns a rare Jewish illuminated manuscript from 1296, known as the Rothschild Pentateuch.

“This is the most spectacular medieval Hebrew manuscript that’s come to market in over a century — it’s unusual at this late stage in the development of collections to find something like this not already owned by a major museum,” said the Getty Museum’s director, Timothy Potts, who finalized the acquisition last month. “It’s the greatest example of its kind.”

Gleanings from the Cave of Wonders? Fragments, Forgeries, and “Biblicism” in the Dead Sea Scrolls

Kipp Davis on the treasures of Qumran

“Remember, boy.
First fetch me the lamp.
And then you shall have your reward . . .

. . . Your eternal reward.”

Any child of the 1980s or ‘90s or self respecting Disney animated film buff will recognize the “Cave of Wonders” as the fabled treasure cave in the 1992 blockbuster hit Aladdin. The film was a loose adaptation of folk tales in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. The Cave was the secret horde of treasure belonging to a bloodthirsty band of thieves that was unwittingly uncovered by a poor woodcutter named Ali Baba. The story of Ali Baba and his wealthy brother Cassim is in part a moral tale about greed, and this theme is also reflected in the film: At one point of the movie the protagonist is provided entry along with his boon companion—a monkey named Abu—into the Cave, but is then restricted from even touching any of the limitless treasure within. Unable to quell his own greed Abu breaks this prohibition and he and Aladdin are consequently swallowed by the magic cave.

Pity the scholars who toiled over the Book of Kells and other medieval manuscripts

The poor scribes of yore who were spiritual calligraphers and illuminators of Ireland's most famous book ... 

by Miles Murphy

The poor scribes of yore who were spiritual calligraphers and illuminators of Ireland's most famous book ... 

If you are not familiar with the Book of Kells, sometimes called the world’s most famous book, this 8th century illuminated gospel is held by Trinity College Dublin, where it has lived permanently since being donated by the Bishop of Meath in 1661.  Every day, two pages are on display to the public for a fee (book your visit online or be prepared for a considerable wait).

If you’re not able to see the manuscript in person, you can visit it online, in its entirety, ….

Where Do Hebrew Acronyms Come From?

Medieval and modern Hebrew are unusually rich in abbreviations, but in a manner that is the reverse of English.

First written record of Semitic alphabet, from 15th century BCE, found in Egypt

"Newly deciphered Egyptian symbols on a 3,400-year-old limestone ostracon from Luxor’s Tomb of Senneferi appears to be the first written evidence of the ABC letter order of the early Semitic alphabet, according to a University of British Columbia Egyptologist.

In his article, “A Double Abecedary? Halaham and ‘Abgad on the TT99 Ostracon,” Prof. Thomas Schneider concludes that a small (approximately 10 x 10 centimeters, or about 4 x 4 inches) double-sided limestone flake was used by Egyptian scribes as a mnemonic device to remember the letter orders of not one, but two forms of early Semitic alphabets."

RARE COIN FROM ANCIENT JEWISH BAR KOKHBA REVOLT DISCOVERED IN CAVE

The coin is believed to have been minted between the third and fourth year of the Bar Kokhba revolt (136-134 CE).

One side of the coin shows a palm tree with seven fronds and two clusters of fruit, as well as the inscription “Shim[on].” The other side portrays vine leaves with three lobes and the inscription, “To the freedom of Jerusalem.”

BY JULIANE HELMHOLD

Artificial Intelligence Is Cracking Open the Vatican's Secret Archives

The Vatican Secret Archives is one of the grandest historical collections in the world. It’s also one of the most useless.

The grandeur is obvious. Located within the Vatican’s walls, next door to the Apostolic Library and just north of the Sistine Chapel, the VSA houses 53 linear miles of shelving dating back more than 12 centuries. It includes gems like thepapal bull that excommunicated Martin Luther and the pleas for help that Mary Queen of Scots sent to Pope Sixtus V before her execution. In size and scope, the collection is almost peerless.

The Top 2 Archaeological Finds of All Time

Experts harness 3D printing to recreate ancient artifacts destroyed by ISIS

“Experts are using crowdsourced images and 3D printing technology in an ambitious project to recreate ancient artifacts destroyed by Islamic State in the Iraqi city of Mosul.... 

Last month ISIS released a video that showed militants using sledgehammers and drills to destroy artifacts in the Mosul Museum, the latest in a string of wanton attacks on sites of historic and religious importance. Project Mosul, part of the European Union-funded Initial Training Network for Digital Cultural Heritage, is calling on volunteers to help restore the museum’s devastated artifacts.”

Note: To see an interactive 3D image of the Mosul lion, see middle of article.

NASA Technology Reveals Existence of Missing Dead Sea Scroll

"High-resolution photography finds writing not visible with the naked eye on fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and paleo-Hebrew writing that hints at a scroll never seen before.... 

Advanced imaging technology originally developed for NASA has revealed previously unnoticed writing on fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Israel Antiquities Authority revealed on Tuesday. Moreover, one of the newly discerned and deciphered passages, written in early Hebrew, hints at the existence of a scroll never found and still unknown to researchers.

A fragment of Deuteronomy found at Qumran, as seen by the naked eye Shai Halevi, The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library

The Dead Sea Scrolls, which date from the 3rd century B.C.E. to the 1st century C.E and were discovered in the Qumran caves near the Dead Sea in the 1940s, include some whole scrolls and tens of thousands of fragments from as many as 1,000 scrolls and manuscripts. For the sake of posterity, digitalization and research, all are being photographed in high-resolution under different types of light, which among other things brings previously unseen writing invisible to the naked eye, as well as some ink stains, to light.”