Magic and Divination in Ancient Palestine and Syria PDF Download

Author: Ann Jeffers
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9789004105133
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
This publication is a detailed study of magical and divinatory practices in the Ancient Near East, particularly in Palestine and Syria. It combines the insights of the Old Testament with the data available from Phoenician and the older Ugaritic texts. It traces the links both historically and archaeologically.

Author: Ann Jeffers
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004667806
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Book Description
Beginning with Deut. 18:9ff and its condemnation of magicians and diviners, this book explores the window that this text gives us into magic and divination in Ancient Palestine and Syria. Investigating the wealth of language combined with the archaeological and historical evidence, it seeks to place the influence of these factors in the emerging Israelite religion. An integral part of Ancient Near Eastern cosmology and culture, magic and divination are never completely eradicated despite the ideological warfare led by the Old Testament writers. The first part examines the function of various magicians and diviners. This is followed by a chapter on dreams and visions. The third chapter looks at the techniques and devices used by the oracular practitioners. Other subjects covered include magic in warfare, in the treatment of diseases, and blessing and cursing.

Author: Solomon Nigosian
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISBN: 1782847626
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 166

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Book Description
Explores the practices and rituals associated with magic and divination among the ancient Israelites as documented in the Old Testament.

Author: Silke Trzcionka
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134163843
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Magic and the Supernatural in Fourth Century Syria presents an in-depth investigation of a variety of ‘magical’ practices with a focused study in the late antique Syria and Palestine. Offering new research using both archaeological and literary sources, and blending Classical, Jewish, and Christian traditions from both regions, Silke Trzcionka examines a myriad of magical activities such as: curses, spells and amulets accusations related to chariot races, love and livelihood methods involved in protection, healing, possession and exorcism. The information is provided with clarity and theoretical sophistication which enables students to develop an understanding of these beliefs and their place within the social context of the time. Altogether, a useful, enlightening and enjoyable book which students studying religion and/or social history will find invaluable.

Author: Leda Ciraolo
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004497366
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 164

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Book Description
This collection of essays focuses on divination across the Ancient World from early Mesopotamia to late antiquity. The authors deal with the forms, theory and poetics of this important and still poorly understood ancient phenomenon.

Author: Scott Noegel
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 9780271046006
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
In the religious systems of ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Mediterranean, gods and demigods were neither abstract nor distant, but communicated with mankind through signs and active intervention. Men and women were thus eager to interpret, appeal to, and even control the gods and their agents. In Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World, a distinguished array of scholars explores the many ways in which people in the ancient world sought to gain access to--or, in some cases, to bind or escape from--the divine powers of heaven and earth. Grounded in a variety of disciplines, including Assyriology, Classics, and early Islamic history, the fifteen essays in this volume cover a broad geographic area: Greece, Egypt, Syria-Palestine, Mesopotamia, and Persia. Topics include celestial divination in early Mesopotamia, the civic festivals of classical Athens, and Christian magical papyri from Coptic Egypt. Moving forward to Late Antiquity, we see how Judaism, Christianity, and Islam each incorporated many aspects of ancient Near Eastern and Graeco-Roman religion into their own prayers, rituals, and conceptions. Even if they no longer conceived of the sun, moon, and the stars as eternal or divine, Christians, Jews, and Muslims often continued to study the movements of the heavens as a map on which divine power could be read. The reader already familiar with studies of ancient religion will find in Prayer, Magic, and the Stars both old friends and new faces. Contributors include Gideon Bohak, Nicola Denzey, Jacco Dieleman, Radcliffe Edmonds, Marvin Meyer, Michael G. Morony, Ian Moyer, Francesca Rochberg, Jonathan Z. Smith, Mark S. Smith, Peter Struck, Michael Swartz, and Kasia Szpakowska. Published as part of Penn State's Magic in History series, Prayer, Magic, and the Stars appears at a time of renewed interest in divination and occult practices in the ancient world. It will interest a wide audience in the field of comparative religion as well as students of the ancient world and late antiquity.

Author: BILL T ARNOLD
Publisher: Inter-Varsity Press
ISBN: 1789740487
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 1729

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Book Description
The 'Dictionary of the Old Testament: Historical Books' is the second volume in IVP's Old Testament dictionary series. This volume picks up where the 'Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch' left off - with Joshua and Israel poised to enter the land - and carries us through the postexilic period. Following in the tradition of the four award-winning IVP dictionaries focused on the New Testament, this encyclopedic work is characterized by in-depth articles focused on key topics, many of them written by noted experts. The history of Israel forms the skeletal structure of the Old Testament. Understanding this history and the biblical books that trace it is essential to comprehending the Bible. The 'Dictionary of the Old Testament: Historical Books' is the only reference book focused exclusively on these biblical books and the history of Israel.

Author: Michael D. Swartz
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 147985557X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 132

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Book Description
This book explores the belief in ancient Judaism that God embedded hidden signs and visual clues in the natural world that could be read by human beings and interpreted according to complex systems.

Author: Emilie Savage-Smith
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351921010
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
Magic and divination in early Islam encompassed a wide range of practices, including belief in jinn, warding off the evil eye, the production of amulets and other magical equipment, conjuring, wonder-working, dream interpretation, predicting the weather, casting lots, astrology, and physiognomy. The ten studies here are concerned with the pre-Islamic antecedents of such practices, and with the theory of magic in healing, the nature and use of amulets and their decipherment, the arts of astrometeorology and geomancy, the refutation of astrology, and the role of the astrologer in society. Some of the studies are highly illustrated, some long out of print, some revised or composed for this volume, and one translated into English for the first time. These fundamental investigations, together with the introductory bibliographic essay, are intended as a guide to the concepts, terminology, and basic scholarly literature of an important, but often overlooked, aspect of classical Islamic culture.

Author: Nina Nikki
Publisher: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht
ISBN: 364752218X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 332

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Book Description
Magic in the Ancient Eastern Mediterranean: Cognitive, Historical, and Material Perspectives brings together articles with the shared conviction that the category of magic remains useful in religious studies and provides new insights to biblical and related texts and artifacts. Historically, magic has been considered in both scholarly and popular discourse to be questionable, obscure, and potentially subversive. 19th century scholars of religion viewed magical beliefs and practices as primitive and inferior compared to Judeo-Christian forms of worship, which were considered true "religion". More recently, the category has been defended especially by scholars of the cognitive science of religion, who find it useful for delineating a set of beliefs and practices fundamental to all forms of religion. The volume joins current scholarship in refraining from using the concept as an othering device and in arguing that it can still serve as a helpful analytical tool. In addition to analyzing the discourse on magic in both ancient literature and modern scholarship, the articles provide individual examples of how literary and material culture attest to the existence of magical beliefs and practices in sources from the Ancient Near East to the Byzantine Period. The book is divided into three parts. The contributions in the first part approach magic from the theoretical perspective of cognitive studies, ritual studies, and cultural evolution, while the rest of the book focuses on how magic and magicians are understood in ancient sources. The second part discusses a specific set of textual material dealing with blessings and curses. The third part of the volume discusses the world of various destructive celestial beings, from which one and one's loved ones had to be defended, as well as the multitude of protective beings such as angels.