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In a land flowing with milk and honey, what kinds of food made up the ancient Jewish diet? What did people eat and drink in Roman Palestine? Susan Weingarten guides readers through a menu of the first millennium C.E. in her article "Biblical Archaeology 101: The Ancient Diet of Roman Palestine," published in the March/April 2019 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review. Although it is difficult to reconstruct the diet of the average person in Palestine during the Roman and Late Antique periods, Weingarten, as both a food historian and an archaeologist, is well equipped for the task. Using archaeological remains...

How can this thing be divine?!? The Pentateuch, if divine, is full of mistakes from the very first word (we're talking Hebrew here...the basis of the Greek/Latin/English translations everyone in the world uses.) How could that be? Example: In the beginning G-d created, in the Hebrew version, is actually literally "In the beginning OF... G-d created" There are thousands of examples of the Pentateuch making no sense in its grammar or syntax. So how do we know how to interpret it even on a literal level? Well... behold, the Oral Torah... The link is to an hour-long class (in English...

After a controversial six-year-long translation project, a Jordanian think tank based in Amman published an Arabic translation of the Babylonian Talmud. After gaining enthusiastic responses to the project from the Arab League, 96 scholars began work on the translation. The editors are happy with the project, stating that the lack of an Arabic Talmud "has always been an obstacle to understanding Judaism." Despite some polarized and politicized responses, most have adopted a positive impression of the massive scholarly work. Dr. Raquel Ukeles of the Israeli National Library states that the project stemmed from scientific curiosity, and the introduction discusses the...

Posted on Sat, Jun. 07, 2003 Support for authenticity of book of Matthew comes from an unlikely place By NEIL ALTMAN Special to The Star Buried in ancient texts of Jewish historical works are fragments of evidence that appear to show the first book of the New Testament actually was written by one of Jesus' apostles. One of these texts also challenges a long-held assertion that no ancient text except the Bible mentions Jesus' birth. Taken together, the information lends support to the claims of some Christian scholars that Matthew actually wrote the Gospel bearing his name, a Gospel that...