Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-04T19:33:54.598Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The First Jewish Astronomers: Lunar Theory and Reconstruction of a Dead Sea Scroll

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 July 2017

Eshbal Ratzon
Eshbal Ratzon*
Affiliation:
University of Haifa E-mail address: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Argument

The Astronomical Book of Enoch describes the passage of the moon through the gates of heaven, which stand at the edges of the earth. In doing so, the book describes the position of the rising and setting of the moon on the horizon. Otto Neugebauer, the historian of ancient science, suggested using the detailed tables found in later Ethiopic texts in order to reconstruct the path of the moon through the gates. This paper offers a new examination of earlier versions of the Astronomical Book, using a mathematical analysis of the figures and astronomical theories presented throughout the Aramaic Astronomical Book; the results fit both the data preserved in the scrolls and the mathematical approach and religious ideology of the scroll's authors better than the details found in the late Ethiopic texts. Among other new insights, this alternate theory also teaches about the process of the composition of the Astronomical Book in the first centuries of its composition.

Type
Research Article
Information
Science in Context , Volume 30 , Issue 2 , June 2017 , pp. 113 - 139
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Albani, Matthias. 1993. “Der Zodiakos in 4Q318 und die Henoch-Astronomie.” Forschungsstelle Judentum. Mitteilungen und Beiträge (7):3–42.Google Scholar
Al-Rawi, Frouk N.H. [Pleass add first name(s)], and George, Andrew R.. 1991-1992. “Enūma Anu Enlil XIV and Other Early Astronomical Tablets.” Archiv für Orientforschung (38–39): 52–73.Google Scholar
Ben Dov, Jonathan. 2008. Head of All Years. Leiden-Boston: Brill.Google Scholar
Brack-Bernsen, Lis, and Hunger, Herman. 1999. “The Babylonian Zodiac: Speculations on its Invention and Significance.” Centaurus (41):280–292.Google Scholar
Brown, David. 2000. Mesopotamian Planetary Astonomy-Astrology. Gronigen: STYX Publications.Google Scholar
Drawnel, Henryk. 2007. “Moon Computation in the Aramaic Astronomical Book.” Revue de Qumran (23):3–41.Google Scholar
Drawnel, Henryk. 2011. The Aramaic Astronomical Book (4Q208-4Q211) from Qumran. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Duke, Dennis, and Goff, Matthew. 2014. “The Astronomy of the Qumran Fragments 4Q208 and 4Q209.” Dead Sea Discoveries (21):176–210.Google Scholar
Duke, Dennis, and Goff, Matthew. 2016. “A Response to Eshbal Ratzon, ‘Methodological Issues Concerning the Astronomy of Qumran’.” Dead Sea Discoveries 23 (1):79–87.Google Scholar
Grebaut, Sylvain. 1918-1919a. “Table de levers de la lune pour chaque mois de l'année.” Revue de l'Orient Chretien (xxi):422–428.Google Scholar
Grebaut, Sylvain. 1918-1919b. “Variation de la durée des jours et des nuits pour chaque mois de l'année.” Revue de l'Orient Chretien 21:429–433.Google Scholar
Hunger, Hermann, and Pingree, David. 1999. Astral Science in Mesopotamia. Leiden, Boston, and Köln: Brill Google Scholar
Jacobus, Helen. 2014a. “Greco-Roman Sundials and their Links to a Qumran Calendar (4Q208-4Q209).” Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry 67–81.Google Scholar
Jacobus, Helen R. 2014b. Zodiac Calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Their Reception: Ancient Astronomy and Astrology in Early Judaism. Leiden-Boston: Brill.Google Scholar
Milik, Joseph T. 1976. The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Neugebauer, Otto. 1964. “Notes on Ethiopic Astronomy.” Orientalia (33):49–71.Google Scholar
Neugebauer, Otto. 1975. A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy. Vol. I. Berlin-Heidelberg-New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neugebauer, Otto. 1979. Ethiopic Astronomy and Computus. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.Google Scholar
Neugebauer, Otto. 1985. “The ‘Astronomical’ Chapters of the Ethiopic Book of Enoch (72 to 82).” In The Book of Enoch or1 Enoch (Studia in Veteris Testamenti Pseudepigrapha, 7), edited by Black, Mathew, 326–386. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Nickelsburg, George W.E. 2001. 1 Enoch: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 1–36, 81-108. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress.Google Scholar
Nickelsburg, George W.E., and VanderKam, James. 2012. 1 Enoch 2: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch: Chapters 37-82. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress.Google Scholar
Ossendrijver, Mathiew. 2012. Babylonian Mathematical Astronomy: Procedure Texts. Tübingen.Google Scholar
Ossendijver, Mathieu. 2016. “Ancient Babylonian Astronomers Calculated Jupiter's Position from the Area under a Time-Velocity Graph.” Science 351 (6272):482–484.Google Scholar
Ratzon, Eshbal. 2012. “The Conception of the Universe in 1 Enoch.” PhD diss. Tel Aviv University.Google Scholar
Ratzon, Eshbal. 2014. “The Gates for the Sun and Moon in the Astronomical Book of Enoch [In Hebrew].” Tarbiz 82 (4):497–512.Google Scholar
Ratzon, Eshbal. 2015a. “The Gates Cosmology of the Astronomical Book of Enoch.” Dead Sea Discoveries 22 (1):93–111.Google Scholar
Ratzon, Eshbal. 2015b. “Methodological Issues Concerning the Astronomy of Qumran.” Dead Sea Discoveries 22 (2):202–209 Google Scholar
Ratzon, Eshbal. 2016a. “Astronomy of Qumran: Further Considerations.” Dead Sea Discoveries 23 (1):88–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ratzon, Eshbal. 2016b. “Early Mesopotamian Intercalation Schemes and the Sidereal Month.” Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry 16 (3):143–151 Google Scholar
Rochberg-Halton, Franchesca. 1988. Aspects of Babylonian Celestial Divination: The Lunar Tablets of Emma Anu Enlil. Horn: Verlag Ferdinand Berger and Sohne Gesellschaft.Google Scholar
Steele, John M. 2008. A Brief Introduction to Astronomy in the Middle East. London: Saqi Books.Google Scholar
Stern, Sacha. 2012. Calendars in Antiquity Empires, States, and Societies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Tigchelaar, Eibert J.C., and Martínez, Florentino García. 2000a. “4QAstronomical Enocha ar (Pls.III-IV).” In Qumran Cave 4 XXVI (DJD XXXVI), edited by Pfann, Stephan, 104–131. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Tigchelaar, Eibert J.C., and Martínez, Florentino García. 2000b. “4Q Astronomical Enocha-b ar: Introduction (Pls.III-IV).” In Qumran Cave 4 XXVI, edited by Pfann, Stephan J.. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Tigchelaar, Eibert J.C., and Martínez, Florentino García. 2000c. “4Q Astronomical Enochb ar (Pls. V-VII).” In Qumran Cave 4 XXVI (DJD XXXVI), edited by Pfann, Stephan, 132–171. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
VanderKam, James C. 2008. Sources for the Astronomy in 1 Enoch 72-82. Vol. 2, Birkat Shalom: Studies in the Bibe Ancient Near Eastern Literature, and Postbiblical Judaism Presented to Shalom M. Paul on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday, edited by Cohen, Chaim and et al., 965–978. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns.Google Scholar
VanderKam, James C. 2009. “The Aramaic Astronomical Book and the Ethiopic Book of the Luminarie.” In With Wisdom as a Robe: Qumran and other Jewish Studies in Honour of Ida Fröhlich, edited by Dobos, Károly D. and Kőszeghy, Miklós, 207–221. Sheffield, England: Sheffield Phoenix Press.Google Scholar
Zotenberg, Herman. 1877. Manuscrits Orientaux. Catalogue des Manuscrits Éthiopiens (Gheez et Amharique) de la Bibliothèque Nationale. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale.Google Scholar