Scholars Debate “Jezebel“ SealKorpel Responds to her Critics Talkback Add Your CommentSeveral people have reacted extremely critically to my proposal to identify the seal Avigad & Sass WSS No. 740 as Jezebel’s royal seal. What surprises me is the highly personal, self-confident and clearly over-heated tone of their arguments. Even though at the end of the article in BAR I refer to a scholarly publication scheduled to appear soon in Ugarit-Forschungen, my opponents could not exercise patience until that has appeared and attacked me vigorously in an often-discourteous or even rude manner. I have no inclination to rebut them in the same style, so I will discuss only their more or less scholarly documented objections, without mentioning them by name.
1. “zbl is a rather rare root.” This is plainly not true. I never implied such a thing. My academic upbringing taught me that one should always beware of accusing people of “implying” something they have not said in so many words. On the contrary, I cited several Phoenician and Hebrew personal names containing the root. The point is that the most natural way to complete the name [ ]yzbl is the reading [’]yzbl, and I provided examples of a similar distribution of consonants on other seals.
Given the fact that in these parallels the personal name is frequently preceded by the lamed indicating ownership, there is insufficient space for the reading [lm]yzbl, let alone for a desperate attempt like [b‘l]yzbl, which some of my opponents have suggested. Unlike [’]yzbl, a personal name [m]yzbl or [b‘l]yzbl is not attested. In my U-F article I indicate that, in view of the available space, the only other possibility is to read [h.]yzbl, which, however, is also unattested and, considering the iconography pointing to a Phoenician queen, is definitely a less likely option than attributing the seal to the attested queen Jezebel.
My critics overlook the fact that the Hebrew vocalization of the name of Jezebel is not the same as that of Zebul and Zebulun. Zebel points to the Ugaritic pronunciation of Baal’s epithet ziblu (“highness, majesty”). This in turn makes a connection with the Ugaritic Baal Myth most probable and explains why ’yzbl was a suitable name for a Phoenician princess.
2. “Even if [’]yzbl is the correct restoration, it might be the name of a different woman or even the name of a man,” some of my critics have remarked. Sure, this might be the case. But is it likely? No other occurrence of the name of this foreign princess has been found in Israel, neither in the Hebrew Bible nor epigraphically. In view of her (undeserved) bad reputation this is what we might expect. The background of the name in Canaanite mythology also makes it unrealistic to expect that Israelite parents would ever give this name to their son. If the seal were a man’s, this would make it very hard to account for the elements pointing to a royal female owner. In a further study that is at the press, I will also demonstrate that according to some hitherto-undetected evidence in the Hebrew Bible itself, Jezebel was seen as a lioness when she became the ruling queen-mother in Samaria.
3. “There have not been found any ninth-century B.C.E. inscribed seals in any reliable archaeological context in Israel,” say my opponents. This is an argument from silence—not the most reliable type of argument. At any moment a fresh find might refute it. Moreover, it reveals an undue faith in the reliability of archaeological dating. If Israel Finkelstein finds it necessary to adjust his chronology for the Iron Age by more than a century and is vigorously opposed by colleagues, I find it difficult to accept archaeological dating as an absolute measure when a difference of a century makes all the difference.
Moreover, we are not talking about Hebrew seals alone. Everything indicates that this is a Phoenician seal or a Hebreo-Phoenician seal. It is commonly accepted that inscribed Phoenician glyptic started in the ninth century B.C.E. (see below).
4. It is said to be problematic that the seal contains no patronymic (i.e., no “’yzbl-daughter-of-Ethba‘al”) and no title (such as “queen”). Apart from the fact that there is no room for either addition, those who brought forward this objection are knowledgeable men who must have known very well that they were manipulating the evidence here. Especially on ancient Phoenician and Hebrew seals this kind of extra information is very often lacking. One of the most convincing examples is the carefully carved Phoenician amethyst scaraboid of Hady, now in the Louvre, and dated by most experts to the ninth century. It has detailed Egyptianizing iconography and the inscription lhady (Bordreuil 1986, No. 1; WSS No. 738).1 To quote Pierre Bordreuil in this connection:
There are other inscribed seals, without iconography, that are supposed to be older than the eighth century.2 Probably my opponents will argue that they are far more competent judges than the authorities I quote and regard them as ignorant scholars who are not worth a polite scholarly answer.
5. Fortunately most of my critics recognize that some of the elements of the script on the seal might be Old Hebrew, others Phoenician. I have deliberately refrained from any attempt to date the seal on the basis of the script. Almost every time in the past when an important new addition to the epigraphic corpus was published it became necessary to revise the chronology of letter forms. In my articles I account for several aspects of the lettering, e.g., the stance of the bet, by taking into account the constraints imposed upon the scribe by the iconography that apparently had already been incised by a specialist colleague before he himself started to work on the seal. Moreover, I cited several examples of differently shaped letters in one and the same inscription, a circumstance underlining the unreliability of dating based on paleography alone. The argument that other artisans appear to have been able to overcome this kind of space constraint does not prove that every scribe was as able to do the same.
Notes1. Further examples: WSS 85 (found at Megiddo, dated by Ussishkin in the tenth century), WSS, No. 160 (found at Megiddo, dated by Ussishkin in the tenth century), WSS No. 377 (ninth-eighth centuries), No. 938 (ninth-eighth centuries), WSS, No. 1041 (ninth century; also Herr 1978: ninth century), WSS No. 1124 (found at Megiddo, dated by Ussishkin in the tenth century), WSS No. 1165 (found near Tel Dan, ninth-eighth centuries, Herr 1978, 47, No. 97, opts for the ninth century); Deutsch & Lemaire 2000 No. 136 (ninth-eighth centuries).
2. WSS, No. 1067 (tenth-ninth centuries; Cross even thinks it may be 12th century, while Renz & Röllig, HAE, vol. 2/2, 117, opt for the ninth century); Herr 1978, 148, No. 161 (ninth century); Herr 1978, 149, No. 163 (ninth-eighth centuries).
ReferencesP. Bordreuil, Catalogue des sceaux ouest-sémitiques inscrits, Paris 1986.
P. Bordreuil, “Sceaux,” in: E. Lipinski et al. (eds), Dictionnaire de la Civilisation phénicienne et punique, Brepols (n.p.) 1992.
R. Deutsch & A. Lemaire, Biblical Period Personal Seals in the Shlomo Mousaiieff Collection, Tel Aviv 2000.
L.G. Herr, The Scripts of Ancient Northwest Semitic Seals, Missoula 1978.
D. Ussishkin, “Gate 1567 at Megiddo and the Seal of Shema, Servant of Jeroboam,” in: M. Coogan et al. (eds.), Scripture and Other Artifacts: Essays on the Bible and Archaeology in Honor of Philip J. King, Louisville 1994, pp. 410-428, especially pp. 419-424.
The Ninth Century Is ThereDr. Ryan Byrne has written another fine and detailed article. I agree with him most emphatically that the iconography was engraved before the epigraphy and thus put constraints on the letters being engraved. In addition to Dr. Avigad, Drs. Hestrin and Dayagi-Mendels noticed that the iconography had been engraved before the epigraphy as well. They say so on page 48 of their Inscribed Seals book. However, like Dr. Avigad, and apparently Dr. Benjamin Sass, Drs. Hestrin and Dayagi-Mendels dated this seal to the Ninth to Eighth Centuries. Dr. Andre Lemaire probably did as well. All five of these scholars called the palaeography or epigraphy Phoenician or possibly Phoenician. It is also interesting that Dr. Christopher Rollston says this about two of the four letters: "The morphology of Yod and Lamed are indeed better Phoenician forms than they are Old Hebrew." in his ASOR article that you mention above. Dr. Rollston's strong stance in his ASOR article that the Bet is recumbent and must be Old Hebrew is negated by Dr. Byrne and other scholar's observation that its engraving was hindered by the iconography already present. There are numerous examples in our West Semitic Seal Corpus that show that Dr. Rollston is incorrect in his ASOR article statement that the engravers always had things figured out, before engraving the letters. At the very least the twenty-one LMLK seals of King Hezekiah, which are definitely Royal seals, have letters upside down, backwards, false starts, etc. What I find even more interesting than this, is a comparison of this seal to the Gezer Calendar script. Although it is not stratified, it has been dated to the tenth century like the Tel Zayit Inscription. The Zayins at the end of the first line and in the sixth line are pretty much identical to this seal; the Yods found on all seven lines are very similar(having the rounded top stroke); the Lamed towards the end of the fifth line is also pretty much identical; the Bet on the bottom left hand side written vertically is not that close because it has the characteristic on the bottom half of what Mr. Wolfe calls the "Lame Bet" or a forged bet that does not have a sharp bottom half. However, I am confident that the Gezer Calendar is authentic. Thus, Dr. Byrne can attempt to date this seal to the Eighth Century like Dr. Rollston and Dr. Amihai Mazar, but there are other scholarly epigraphers, who have dated it to the Ninth Century. I respect You and Dr. Rollston and Dr. Amihai Mazar. Dr. Mazar taught right along side of Dr. Barkay and Dr. Rainey when I studied in Jerusalem in the 1980s. I have to disagree with all three of you and say that the Ninth Century is There on this seal and other seals. Dr. Avigad said that the owner of this seal could be a contemporary of Jezebel. Thus, it is a Ninth Century seal, according to the epigrapher who you call: "the expert nonpareil of West Semtic seals" above in your article. The seal of Shemaryau, WSS 377, is also dated by Dr. Avigad to the Ninth Century. Its cursive script is pretty much identical to the Samaria Ostraca of the late Ninth Century. Dr. David Diringer noticed that even in the late Ninth Century on the Samaria Ostraca there was an Advanced Hebrew Cursive Script. This is retained on this steatite scarab. Contrary to what Dr. Byrne has stated above, cursive script is retained on stone inscriptions. Dr. Frank Moore Cross noticed this on the Monumental Siloam Inscription which he calls "more developed and more cursive" on page 62 of Dr. Andrew G. Vaughn's Palaeographical Dating Of Judean Seals. Dr. Yohanan Aharoni says, about the seal impression of Nera (son of) Shebna, impressed right next to a LMLK two-winged Hebron sun disc: "All letters are clearly written in a cursive hand." on page 16 of his Excavations At Ramat Rahel. And, Drs. Hestrin and Dayagi-Mendels call the script of the seal of Shemaryau cursive. In fact, on page 59 of their Inscribed Seals book, they describe the seal like this: "Scarab seal, perforated, chipped on left side. The seal is ornamented with Egyptian hieroglyphs and pseudo-hieroglyphs in Phoenician style. In the centre, incised in cursive script, is the name of the owner." Thus, on one seal from the Ninth Century we have both hieroglyphs and cursive Hebrew Script. The hieroglyphs are what Drs. Mazar, Rollston, and Byrne say are supposed to be on Tenth to Ninth Century excavated seals, but not the Hebrew Script. This is supposed to be for the Eighth Century Seals. Yet, we have advanced cursive late Ninth Century Hebrew Script on both the Samaria Ostraca and this seal. Eighty-five to ninety percent of the West Semitic Seals in our Corpus are not excavated. So Drs. Mazar, Rollston, and Byrne's argument is statistically a weak one, based on a few hundred seals out of several thousands. I agree with Dr. Byrne that script forms are retained for long periods of time. For this reason, our problem is that we have not noticed Tenth and Ninth Century Seals in Our West Semtic Seal Corpus that often. With Much Gratitude, Sincerely Yours, Michael Welch, Deltona, Florida • • • • • • • JezebelDear Sir: Hershel Shanks was kind enough to compliment the tenor of my analysis. I feel the need to add a crucial observation, however, of BAR’s preemptive, editorial comments about Dr. Rollston, which appeared slightly less gracious than the standard Mr. Shanks has endorsed. Scholars routinely critique each other’s work in the peer-review tradition, which BAR so frequently calls “the marketplace of ideas.” Marjo Korpel published an unpersuasive article in the South African Journal for Semitics, to which Rollston, Amihai Mazar and I published responses. Dr. Rollston’s critique essentially stole the thunder of BAR’s flashy resuscitation of an obscure article for a popular audience with the so-called Jezebel seal splashed across the cover. I understand BAR’s disappointment about preemptive articles refuting Korpel’s claims appearing in advance of a heavily marketed issue, but Mr. Shanks decision to attack Dr. Rollston under the guise of defending Dr. Korpel accrues to BAR a role it need not assume. Peer-reviewed, academic media constitute the proper protocols for critique, rejoinder, and surrejoinder. Since Rollston did not even mention the BAR piece (and may not have even been aware of it given how secretly BAR protected this issue pre-press), I cannot fathom Mr. Shanks’ ire without consideration of the upstaging effect of Rollston’s critique on the ASOR website. Dr. Rollston is one of the world’s half-dozen preeminent epigraphers in the world; and the assertion that Kyle McCarter of Johns Hopkins (Rollston’s mentor and mine) would strongly disagree with Rollston’s arguments is not correct. After hours of conversation with the principals, I think we are mostly on the same page. I do not mean to suggest that BAR has no place to weigh in on scholarly debate. Surely it does, but it is difficult to overlook that the vitriol about BAR and the Korpel piece in BAR began with Mr. Shanks’ ad hominem sidebar on Korpel’s article. There is plenty of consternation to go around. Please let us move past this fracas into more pertinent scholarship for the sake of BAR’s readers if not the pursuit of academic freedom. Bar can be a champion of dialogue if it chooses the opportunity to make use of its powerful presence in the marketplace. Can’t we all just get along? Dr. Ryan Byrne Co-director, Tel Dan Expedition Rhodes College, Memphis byrner@rhodes.edu • • • • • • • |
Scholars Debate “Jezebel” SealIntroductionFit for a Queen: Jezebel’s Royal SealRollston Critique of the Jezebel Seal TheoryShanks: Is It Tenable?Rollston Responds to ShanksShanks Responds to RollstonByrne: Where is Jezebel?Mazar: Too Late for JezebelKorpel Responds to Her CriticsInside DebatesScholars Debate “Jezebel” SealIsrael Antiquities Authority vs. Conspiracy of (Alleged) ForgersSeal Controversy: From Temech to Shlomit“Jesus Tomb” Controversy Erupts—Again |
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