THE MOUNT
EBAL LEADEN CURSE TABLET
AND THE CRISIS IN ALPHABET RESEARCH
Brian Edric Colless MA BD PhD ThD
This remarkable little artefact (a mere 2 x 2 centimetres), resting on the hand of the archaeologist Scott Stripling, is believed (by Stripling and some other scholars) to be an imprecation and execration tablet, a curse document, technically known as a defixio. It was discovered in December 2019, on Mount Ebal (near modern Nablus, ancient Shekem, on the "West Bank" of the Jordan River), in the course of an expedition of the Associates for Biblical Research, led by Scott Stripling. It has now appeared officially in a preliminary publication:
"You are Cursed by the God YHW:" an early Hebrew
inscription from Mt. Ebal
https://heritagesciencejournal.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s40494-023-00920-9?fbclid=IwAR3G9ih5D98ZCB7t1Wk7fIXfVerZzXAdu2Uiw4yqP8KYDCDEvFbnh3Qs7LM
The story of its discovery and its decipherment is told here:
A Tsunami from Mt. Ebal: Cursed by the God Yahu
https://www.academia.edu/104014709/A_Tsunami_from_Mt_Ebal_BAS_Spring_2023
Scott Stripling, Abigail Leavitt,
Pieter Gert van der Veen, Bible and Spade, 36.2 (2023)
My tentative opinion is that the
editors have largely succeeded in deciphering the two inscriptions (interior
and exterior), clearly discerning the presence of the roots for "die" (MWT) and
"curse" ('RR), and the divine name YHW; but some of their interpretations
may be slightly awry.
Certainly, the diminutive letters are a handicap to attaining certainty
with regard to the intended meaning of the texts, but the microscopic
inscription on the tiny lice comb from Lakish has been successfully read,
according to my interpretation. Some of the inscriptions that are coming to
light from early Israel show that a syllabic form of the proto-alphabet was
being employed in the period of the Judges,
and this may also be the case in this defixio.
For my part, I will suggest some other possibilities.
Instead of the indicative mood, I will propose the imperative
mood for some of the verbs: "Die!" (MT). "Be cursed!" (HT`R).
"You are Cursed by the God YHW:"
an early Hebrew inscription from Mt. Ebal
Scott Stripling, Gershon Galil, Pieter Gert van der
Veen,
Ivana Kumpova, Jaroslav Valach, Daniel Vavrik
Top right: the exterior inscription,"Outer A".
Top left: traces ("bulges") of the "Inner B" text on the outside .
The red spot indicates the broken corner of the object; apparently it should be positioned as the top right corner when reading the Outer A text.
The engraver had written an elaborate "cursary" (my word for a collection of curses, in the sense of invocations of doom upon an offender, incantations of death, involving a deity, and therefore not magic spells but imprecations). Yahwe (rather than Yahu), the god named in this conjuration, would be the agent of the curses, analogous to ancient treaties, in which the gods named in the covenant administer the curses and blessings written in the document.
This was the procedure, perhaps: a small strip of lead was prepared, and on one half of its face the cursary was inscribed with a stylus; the unmarked part of the document was then folded over as an envelope, and the elaborate curse was repeated in tiny writing on the outside; thus the imprecation was recorded in duplicate, and even in triplicate, as the imprint of the first impression was bulging on the rear side to some extent. Alternatively, both inscriptions may have been written before the metal was folded over. Yet another possibility is that there is only one inscription, Outer A, which made indentations right through to the back of the folded piece; in this case, the object used was already folded, and possibly intended for some other purpose, but the scribe adapted it as a vehicle for his curses.
I will work with the hypothesis that there are two inscriptions, an outer and an inner text. How was the concealed inscription read? Surprisingly, against our preconceptions about the metal lead (plumbum) being impenetrable to X-rays, the results were achieved by employing "X-ray computed tomography and advanced data processing", producing and analysing the photographs of 46 "slices".
See the moving picture of the detecting process:
https://static-content.springer.com/esm/art%3A10.1186%2Fs40494-023-00920-9/MediaObjects/40494_2023_920_MOESM1_ESM.gif
As is my custom, I will ponder whether the revealed letters belong to a syllabary, and thus represent syllables (consonant plus vowel, syllabograms), not simply consonants (consonantograms).
By the way, there is a word "leaden" (like "golden") which helps in decoding the multi-purpose 'lead" (liid or led?); I have just seen it in action in a Father Brown story of G. K. Chesterton.
Sketch of the interior text ("Inner B"), after Pieter
van der Veen:
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10161143436379948&set=a.10153844636149948
Presentation
This drawing is based on his painstaking examination of the photographs (Tables 2-9),
and it agrees substantially with the published drawing of Gershon Galil
(reproduced further below).
Notice the divine name, with letters highlighted and annotated by
myself: LYHW ("by Yahweh"), and around it various occurrences
of the passive participle 'RR ("cursed"), not `RWR (the reading
proposed by Galil).
Tentatively, we can affirm that there are two large stick
figures of a jubilating person, one above the other, representing the consonant
/h/ or a syllable (h with a vowel). The same pattern is observable on the
exterior text,(Outer A). Gershon interprets each figure as YHW.
Gershon and Pieter also detect two smaller versions of this
letter H, next to the highlighted L of LYHW.
A reproduction of Galil’s drawing
(adapted by Brian Donnelly-Lewis) is viewable below.
For
the interior inscription (Inner B) Gershon Galil has:
[A] You are cursed by the god Yhw,
cursed.
[B] You will die, cursed :
[B] cursed, you will surely die.
[A] Cursed you are by Yhw , cursed.
Gershon suspects that the text is chiasmic (A B B A): thus the first two
statements are repeated in reverse order, in his interpretation, and this is an
elegant proposal.
However, perhaps there is only
one instance of LYHW, situated at the centre, and all the curse
participles in the text are relating to it: "cursed by YHW" ('RR
LYHW).
Where is the starting
point of this jumble of letters?
Galil has numbered the characters that
he has detected, 48 in total, and has divided them into three groups or
"clusters":
[1] (A=1-17) beginning low down with ' TH, "thou", and meandering to
the top.
[2] (BB=18-33) beginning at the top, near the H-sign, with TMT 'RR, "You
will die accursed", then running down the opposite side, with "cursed
you will surely die".
[3] (A=34-48) beginning at the bottom with "cursed" and circling
around the large H of YHW.
This is an elegant reconstruction, but it may contain flaws.
I will now outline my own case for reading the
hidden inscription, on the assumption that Gershon and Pieter have
correctly
identified the characters in the recovered text, though I will offer
alternative
interpretations for a few of them. My basic principle in such endeavours
is to
recognize that the person who inscribed these marks on the leaden tablet
knew
what the intended meaning is, but it will probably be difficult for us
to
decipher the significance of the signs. Here is my tentative
transcription and
translation, employing the numbers assigned to the characters by Gershon
Galil, beginning with his yellow 1 and 2, but not adhering to the
connecting lines.
Gershon Galil’s drawing
of the interior inscription with the characters numbered, and with coloured
lines added by Brian Donnelly-Lewis. This is a mirror-image of the other
drawing reproduced above.
1 2 3 39 38 37 41 40 42 43 16 45 23 24
’ T H
T ’ R L H Y
H W ’ R
R
Be thou (’t) cursed (ht’r) by (l)
YHW himself (h),
accursed one (’rr).
25 26 27 28 29 30 44 31 32 33 45 46 48 34 36
35
’ R R Y M
T W T
M T ’ R R ’
R R
An accursed one (’rr) he puts to death (ymt),
and so (w) thou shalt die (tmt) accursed (’rr),
accursed one (’rr).
20 21 22 10 11 12 17 9 8 13
19 18 14 15 7 4 5 6
T ’ R L Y H W ’
L W M T ’ R R ’ R R
Thou art cursed (t’r) by (l) YHW God (’l),
and so (w) die (mt) accursed (’rr),
accursed one (’rr).
This arrangement into three parts would demolish
the fourfold chiastic structure of Gershon Galil (ABBA, described above), though
he himself divides the text into three “clusters” (7).
Here I will point out the differences between Gershon’s reading of the inscription, and explain my modified arrangement of the meandering letters; but I fear that my presentation will be painfully abstruse. I have already signaled above that I would tentatively change some of the verbs from indicative mood to imperative. Thus, Gershon’s ’th ’rwr (1-7: “Thou art cursed”) becomes ’t ht’r (1 2 3 39 38 37: “Be thou cursed”); his version has the passive participle of the root ’rr, “curse”, and mine has the imperative singular masculine, on the pattern of the reflexive and passive hitqattel; and my reading ht’r is based on the presumption that the double R is not repeated, on the analogy of hw’r, the hoqtal form, attested as yw’r, “he is under a curse” (he is caused to be cursed!).
Notice my understanding of three instances of ’rr, not as emphasising the curse, but as addressing the accused as “accursed one”. This choice raises the question of the identity of the addressee, the “thou” in the curse. The editors report (1b) that ancient mass-produced curse tablets had blank spaces where names could be added; but our leaden defixio apparently has a general reference (To whom it may concern). It was discovered on the mountain of cursing (Deuteronomy 27:13), and it might be directed against covenant-breakers, as defined by the twelve curses stipulated by Moses (27:15-26); or it could apply to a person who desecrated the altar, since this is where the tablet was found.
The reason I have moved away from Gershon’s approach is the final h on his reading of ’th (= ’attâ); this is a convention for indicating the long vowel â, which came later, and was presumably not available in the Bronze Age for this very old inscription. Similarly, Gershon’s ’rwr (’arûr, “cursed”) has a waw representing û, and again it is doubtful that this system was operating in West Semitic writing at this early stage. The consonants W and H and Y, when they are standing for vowels, are known as matres lectionis, “mothers of reading”, aids to pronouncing words in a text.
Gershon sees six examples of ’rwr (’arûr, “cursed”) in the interior inscription; my total is five instances of ’rr, without w; but I also have ht’r, “Be cursed”, perhaps twice, and in one case (bottom left on Gershon’s drawing, and bottom right on Pieter’s sketch) it is accompanied by ’t (“thou”), hence “Be thou cursed”. In the other occurrence of ht’r, at the top, there is no “thou”, but Pieter has an additional Alep there, and perchance a T is lurking undetected. At this point, Gershon finds a sequence L’L YHW, “by (l) YHW God (’l)”, and I have provisionally accepted this, although the first four of the six letters (excepting HW) are “ghosts”, and may have been intentionally erased by the scribe. Even so, to achieve my construction HT’R L YHW ’ L W M T (“Be cursed by YHW God, and die”) I would have to use the stick figure H (12) in a double role; and if I wanted to write the Divine Name in its customary four-letter form, the Tetragrammaton YHWH, I would need to call sign number 12 into service for a third time. However, the editors seem to concur on reading YHW, without the final H, as the form YHWH is presumably a later use of a mater lectionis. Consequently, I now propose, tentatively, to use the H-figure only once, and reduce HT’R to T`R, “Thou art cursed” (Qal passive, or Niqtal, or Hoqtal?).
Confronted by a host of such evil demons and accursed gremlins, we now descend into the depths of the slough of despond, and my premonition of “abstruseness” is upon us. You will be lost in the forest of numbers, and be drowned in the sea of letters, unless you have copies of the two drawings close at hand.
In passing, on a cautionary note, as we proceed through our analysis we need to explore the possibility of scribal errors in the text, and confront the problem of seemingly superfluous signs (H40, W47). I know that some people would say I am wasting my time, and frittering away my life chasing phantoms, but this is an important task.
Identification
First, Gershon Galil has miraculously found enough Waws for his six ’RWRs, and although I have reduced those half-dozen ’RWRs to five ’RRs, I still have one long-stem Waw (47) left dangling in the air, together with R46 and R48; Gershon has constructed his sixth ’RWR from this cluster (45-48), and this seems to be credible, with the Waw as an indicator of the vowel û. However, Footnote 9 states that two instances of ’Alep are faint, and their “existence and form could not be established with certainty”, and therefore they “appear in square brackets” in the transcriptions; and these two weak instances are in the central [45]-48 cluster, a vertical sequence of signs, which we are examining here, and the [34]-37 group, which runs horizontally in boustrophedon fashion at the bottom. Both these examples are part of Gershon’s third curse, beginning and ending the sentence (“Cursed art thou by Yhw, cursed.”). Each ’Alep is an unmistakable bovine head, as drawn by Gershon and by Pieter; each Waw is a small circle on a long stem, in contrast to W16, a larger circle on a short stem; each Resh has the typical angular (“rhomboid” or diamond-shaped) head on a neck, with one possible instance of the more conventional triangular head (<|) at position 22.
Although Gershon has decided that the Resh has an angular head, and the Waw has a circular top, he does not adhere strictly to this rule, and he must sometimes be assuming that an error has been made by the scribe. Thus, in identifying the letters in another of his ’RWR sequences (4-7, centre-left on his drawing, sinistrograde, moving from right to left, but dextrograde on Pieter’s mirror-image), where all three standing figures have a pointed top (on his drawing, but Pieter’s trio is more ambiguous), he accepts the middle one as Waw, followed by a large Resh (7), which seems to belong to another group. In this regard, I propose for consideration two adjoining sets of three-letter “cursed” words (but ’RR, not ’RWR): 4-5-6 , 14-15-7; Gershon’s versions of these, with Waw included, are: 4-5-6-7, 14-15-16-17. The Galil numbers seem to fit together nicely, but he is the one who numbered the signs! On closer inspection each of them falls under suspicion: 4-7 is slightly tricky, as already noted; but 14-17 is problematic; it begins with an ox-head, moves to a tiny inverted R located next to it, then to a Waw with a short stem below the Alep and next to the head of the central figure with upraised forearms, and finally to a small inverted R between the legs of the upper exulting figure.
My misgiving about this 14-17 group is the Waw (16), which seems unnecessary in ’RR (“cursed”) but necessary in the divine name YHW. Having snapped up W16 for this curse-group, Gershon has to find an alternative, and so he contrarily crosses over to the cluster R46 W47 W44, and chooses W44, the furthest letter away from Y42 H43; he rejects W47, because it is needed for his 45-48 group, which I have mentioned previously; and I want W44 to be a copula, “and thou shalt die”. Note carefully that W47 (which I could not fit into my reconstruction of the text), with a small circular top and a long stem, is quite unlike any of the other instances of Waw; and W48 is a smaller version of W13 (with an oblique stem), both of which I interpret as wa, “and”, preceding a verb: 44-31-32-33, WTMT, “and thou shalt die”; and 13-19-18, WMT, “and die!”.
Now, with one eye on the right side of Gershon’s drawing (with the helpful coloured lines added by Brian Donnelly-Lewis), and the other on the left side of Pieter’s (my copies are pasted side by side on a piece of cardboard, Pieter right, Gershon left, and these two sections of the inscription are adjacent to each other), we perceive some startling differences. So, when I say that there may be scribal errors, this could apply to the original scribe, and also to the two recent copyists.
At the top, Pieter has four ’Aleps:
(1) no counterpart in Gershon’s scheme, but might be part of ’T, “thou”, if a Taw could be found as a companion for it;
(2) corresponding to Gershon’s A9 (in his yellow line), a ghost letter, intertwined with my WMT, “and die!”, and taken with a ghostly L8 to say ’L, “God”, to be linked with YHW, 11-12-17;
(3) A21 (in the blue-green line), which Gershon includes in another ’RWR (21-24), running vertically downwards;
(4) A25 (also blue-green), near Pieter’s unique Alep (Number 1, above); in a highly dubious ’RWR (25-28); this demands a detailed examination; the Alep (25) is a large ox-head, in an oblique stance, with a long cross-bar, like the ’alep in the standardized consonantary of Iron Age II; in Gershon’s drawing it has two R-letters (26 27) next to it, each with a pointed, not rounded, head; then comes a vertical letter (28), with a long stem that has two oblique prongs at the end of it, and for my eyes (looking at the photograph of the letter, 3A on Table 8) it is a Yod, but the accompanying drawing (3B on Table 8) has it as a triangle on a stem, thus making it possibly equivalent to R22, situated between the horns of the Alep (25), but inverted and with a longer stem; surprisingly, Pieter’s account of this sequence is different, in that his R27 or W27 is separated from its partner, and its head is resting on the head of R28, and in this stance it could indeed be Waw, like W13 and W44; but my preference is to read this sequence as ’RR YMT WTMT ’RR: “An accursed one he puts to death, and thou shalt die, accursed one”.
It seems that I am prompt to propose problems but slow to supply solutions. In view of all the uncertainties involved here, occasioned by the ancient scribe with his minuscule marks, and also by the recent copyists in their attempts to decipher them as writing, it might be better to stay silent, and join the defeatists, who have withdrawn from the struggle before victory is won, even though the end is in sight. Unfortunately, there is no complete photograph of the Inner B inscription, but we have miniature images of all the recoverable signs, and the drawings are proving to be fairly reliable. However, when there are discrepancies between the presentations of Gershon and Pieter, as we have just seen with the hypothetical ’RWR (25-28), our confidence is slightly shaken, but the ARR form is preferable to ARWR, on the whole.
As I write this ramble I am trying to follow the trail of the meandering letters, and in the process I have experimented with various combinations, and have now managed to add a sixth case of ’RR to my second sentence of three, producing: “thou shalt die accursed (45 46 47), accursed one (34 36 35)”; but to achieve this I have also employed Alep 45 in the ’RR at the end of the first sentence (45 23 24). My rationalisation for this is Gershon’s square brackets around two instances of Alep, and Pieter’s extra Alep at the top of the text! Apparently, neither drawing gives an entirely accurate picture of the inscription. Perhaps the outer version of the curse will clarify the matter, or it may increase the confusion.
1 2 3 39
38 37 41 40 42 43 16
4 5 6
’ T
H T ’
R L H Y H
W ’ R R
Be thou (’t)
cursed (ht’r) by (l) YHW himself (h),
accursed one (’rr).
25 26 27 28 29 30
44 31 32 33 34 36 35
’ R
R Y M
T W
T M T
’ R R
The
accursed (’rr) he puts to death (ymt),
and (w) thou shalt die (tmt),
accursed one (’rr).
T ’ R L Y H W ’ L W M T ’ R R ’ R R
Thou art cursed (t’r) by (l) YHW God (’l), and so (w) die (mt) accursed (’rr) ,
accursed one (’rr).
Thus, I have tentatively accepted that the inscription does indeed include the statement “You are cursed by the God YHW”, but this is not my final decision.
Time now to confront the problem of YHW(H), starting with a seemingly superfluous H (40), which could have been attached to YHW to produce YHWH. At present I have proposed lahu (41 40), “by him, YHW”, or “by YHW himself”; but this is not tidy, and may not be idiomatic; H40 could fit at the end of the circle of signs producing LYHW(H) (41 42 43 16 40). Notice that H3, H43, and H12 are all standing persons, while H40 is apparently seated. If this is true, is it significant? Could it be that the two forms represent different syllables of H? Furthermore, is hawaha the original form of the root of Yahweh (He causes to be, or He is)? Allowing H40 to create the full tetragrammaton YHWH, are we then obliged to admit Gershon Galil’s ’TH (1 2 3) instead of ’T (“thou”), and ’RWR (“cursed”)? What shall we then say about the LYHW’L (“Yahwe ’El”) in the third sentence? One thing is that it has only one H; and also it makes the line too long, as indicated by comparison with the other two (the translations should be ignored in this exercise). One detail to note is that Gershon has declared (7b) that the exterior inscription (“Outer A") is “very similar to” the interior text (‘Inner B”), or “the inner and outer texts are almost identical” (22b), except that ’L (“God”) is absent. Actually, the letters ’A9 and L8 for El, are among the ghost characters in the top sector, the other two being L10 and Y11, which produce “by Yhw “El” with H12 and W13. However, on the assumption that these four faint signs are meant to be omitted, I can employ H12 in the verb HT’R, “Be cursed”, as in line 1:
12 20 21 22
13 19 18 14 15 7 45 23 24
H
T
’ R W M
T ’ R R ’ R R
Be cursed (ht’r) and (w) die (mt)
accursed (’rr) ,
accursed one (’rr).
With thirteen consonants it now has the
same length as line 2, while line 1 has fourteen. The order I have chosen for
the three curses seems logical: (1) the offender is addressed (not by name but
by pronoun, atta, “Thou”), and the curse is placed on them in the name
of Yahweh; (2) those under his curse are sentenced to death, and so you must
die; (3) the curse is reaffirmed, and the offender is ordered to die.
However, I have two signs (47 48) left over, and also the extra
Alep provided by Pieter (*49). I will propose that W47 is not a letter but a
dividing line, separating the WTMT line (44 31 32 33) from the 45 46 48 ’RR; this
prevents Gershon from incorporating the remote W44 into his reading of YHW (42
43 44), instead of W16, which is right next to the head of H42. I could quietly
move on from here, hoping that you would not notice that “45 46 48 ’RR” does
not appear in my solution; “45 23 24” is my combination at that point, but this needs to be reconsidered. Gershon has six
cases of “cursed” (’RWR) in his rendition of the text; my version, which
is patently imperfect, has five instances of “cursed” (’RR without W) and two
imperative verbs, “Be cursed” (HT’R), but I need to incorporate “45 46 48 ’RR”
into my scheme.
This presentation of the data is tedious to the
reader and taxing to my brain, but perhaps the solution will eventually emerge.
Remember, only the person who wrote this inscription (that is, composed it, and
possibly also engraved it) knew what its intended meaning is, and also the
points where each sequence begins and ends.
As we have seen, Gershon tentatively
identified 48 letters, and divided them into three clusters, forming a chiasmus
literary structure:
(1) yellow (1-17), winding up the
lefthand side on his drawing to El YHW at the top; my first line starts at the
same point, but finds YHW and the cursing in the central part, where
Gershon’s white cluster sits.
“You are cursed by the god YHW,
cursed.”
(2) green (18-33), moving from top
left (TMT, “you will die”), across to the righthand side and then down to
another TMT, passing MT along the way,
taken to be an infinitive verb, strengthening the finite verb, hence MT TMT
(“you will surely die”).
“You will die, cursed : cursed you
will surely die.”
(3) white (34-48), beginning at the
bottom and moving around the central part, incorporating the prominent YHW (Y42
H43 and a great leap sideways to grasp W44).
“Cursed you are by YHW, cursed.”
This certainly gives the gist of the text, but it is
not exact, since it manages to construct six instances of ’RWR, two in each of
the lines, when there are not enough instances of W to allow this, in my view.
(1) 4 5 6 7 & 14 15 16 17
(2) 21 22 23 24 & 25 26 27 28
(3) 34 35 36 37 & 45 46 47 48
The consonant-sign W is presumed to be representing the vowel sound U in a word
’ârûr (“accursed”); but Gershon has produced the six cases of ’RWR by
sleight of hand; he finds a first R to go with the initial ’Alep, then he reads
an obvious R in the same sequence as W, and another R is commandeered from
elsewhere to complete the quartet. An instructive example is observable in the top
right area of Gershon’s drawing, with green numbering (*’RWR 25-28, in line 2):
the ’Alep is a large ox-head with a long diagonal crossbar; next to it are two
identical R-letters, but for consistency the second one is given the honorary
role of W (=U); the next letter in line (28) is necessarily R, but it in no way
resembles the previous R, which has a short stem with a “rhomboid” (or diamond-shaped)
head on top, but it has a long downward stroke with a hand (side view of thumb
and fingers) at the bottom, obviously a Yod, as the photograph shows (Table 8:
3A), contrary to the drawings of Gershon and Pieter. In this regard, it is
surprising that Gershon has not noticed this, since he has recognized a similar
form on the Qeiyafa Ostracon (line 2), and recreated two of them on the sherds
of the Jerusalem Ophel Pithos to fill the gap before N, and to produce a word
YYN (wine), though I would prefer the upright version found on the Ostracon
(line 4) to offer YN. Here on the defixio this Yod could be linked to the M and
T below it to make a finite verb, whereas Gershon has the MT as an infinitive
emphasizing the following TMT, hence “you will surely die, cursed”. On the other hand, my suggested reading is:
25 26 27 28 29 30
44 31 32 33 34 36 35
’ R
R Y M
T W
T M T
’ R R
"The accursed one
(’rr) he puts to death (ymt), and (w) thou shalt die (tmt),
accursed one (’rr)".
Incidentally, Gershon’s interpretation begins with ’TH ’RWR, “Thou art cursed”; this phrase is attested in the Bible as ’RWR ’TH (Genesis 3:14. 4:11. Deuteronomy 28:16); and he begins his third sequence with ’RWR ’TH.
Here now is my renewed attempt to unravel the tangle, while wondering whether the apparent chaos was intentional, making it difficult for anyone (except God) to decipher it, and pronounce an antidote or countermeasure to neutralize the curse:
1 2 3 39
38 37 41 40 42 43 16
4 5 6
’ T
H T ’
R L H Y H
W ’ R R
Be thou (’t)
cursed (ht’r) by (l) YHW himself (h),
accursed one (’rr).
25 26 27 28 29 30
44 31 32 33 34 36 35
’ R
R Y M
T W
T M T
’ R R
The
accursed (’rr) he puts to death (ymt),
and (w) thou shalt die (tmt),
accursed one (’rr).
12 20 21 22
13 19 18 14 15 7 45 23 24
H
T
’ R W M
T ’ R R ’ R R
Be cursed (ht’r) and (w) die (mt)
accursed (’rr) ,
accursed one (’rr).
Syllabification
“All letters represent a
variety of forms and stances” (7b-8a), we are told, and this raises the
suspicion that we are in the presence of a syllabary, perhaps an early example
of the Neo-syllabary.
However, it is also said, regarding
this variation: “The scribe who wrote the inscription used a stylus to form
tiny letters on a small malleable surface. As a result the font is sometimes
sloppy, with overlapping letters, and lacking in uniformity” (2a).
The Taw has three variant forms of a
cross, suggesting TU, TA, TI; thus YAMIT(I) (28 29 30) with diagonal M, as
causative of mwt, “he puts to death”, is suitably different from TAMUT(U) (31 32 33) with horizontal M, “you
shall die”, and this accounts for the three forms of Taw; but when we look at
YHW (42 43 16), fully expecting to confirm its original vowels (perhaps YAHIWI
for Yahwe) the Yod for the anticipated YA is not the same as the one in YAMITI;
the fingers of Y28 point leftwards, Y42 rightwards (with a shorter arm); possibly
we should read YIMITI, instead of the normal yâ of Hip`il imperfect (3
p. m.); but if not, we are confronted by YIH(I)WI, and this is
surprising; the unanswered question is whether *Yahweh is an archaic word
meaning “He is”, or “He causes to be”, that is “He creates”. A disturbing
detail is that the Yod of YHW on the outside has its fingers at the top of the
sign!
The ox-head (’Alep, still pictorial) and
the human head (Rosh) are fairly consistent in all the cases of ’ARUR(U); but
there is one oblique ’Alep (25), perhaps ’I, and a divergent R (<| 22),
possibly RI.
Classification
According
to my theory of the Quadrinity, there are four standard West Semitic scripts in
the Bronze Age (with the Cuneoconsonantary, the cuneiform alphabetic and
partly syllabic system, as an outlier).
The writing on this leaden document is certainly not (1) the Protosyllabary,
the progenetrix of all the subsequent scripts; it exhibits none of the unique syllabograms
of that system.
It is probably not (2) the Protoconsonantary
(the long Protoalphabet), even though its characters have surprisingly archaic
forms; it is not classifiable as protoconsonantal, because it does not display
any of the letters that were discarded in the short Protoalphabet, the Neoconsonantary.
Consequently, it might be either (3) the
Neoconsonantary or (4) the Neosyllabary, but, as we have seen, its syllabic nature
seems probable but problematic.
Let
me add that some of the characters in the books of the Bible were
present when changes were made in the development of the Quadrinity (the
fourfold "early alphabet", E=2M+2C squared), and they were
well-educated scholars: Joseph and his two sons were in positions of
authority in Egypt (a great seat of learning) when the West Semitic
Protosyllabary was modified into the Proto-consonantary and started to
be used in Egypt; Moses was (undeniably!) on the scene when Israel's
proto-history and constitutional law were written down, presumably
employing the Protoalphabet (the Protoconsonantary or the
Neoconsonantary); but Moses may have decided to turn the consonantal
proto-alphabet back into a syllabary, the Neosyllabary (so that he could
show the vowels in the name YHW?!) and this is what Joshua used when
the covenant was renewed at Shekem, and Joshua wrote the words in a "spr
twrt 'lhym" (Joshua 24:25-26). This is speculation, but the four
scripts of the Quadrinity were real, and their existence must now be
acknowledged, as also those personages named in the Bible and attested
outside the Scriptures (Moshe is still in hiding, though, but his
foster-mother may have been Princess Hatshepsut, or her daughter!).
Mystification
Against whom was this multiple curse
directed? It was discovered near the altar on Mount Ebal, and thus it might be
concerned with any attempt to damage or destroy that sacred object; in this
case the offence was sacrilege. A later example of desecration of an altar of
Yahweh was by Antiokhos IV with his “abomination of desolation” on the
burnt-offering altar in the temple of YHWH in Jerusalem, in the 2nd
century BCE (1 Maccabees 1:54, 4:36-48).
Reaction
There are three types of reaction to an archaeological discovery that purports to be epigraphical:
(1) MAXIMALISM (2) MINIMALISM (3) NIHILISM
Maximalism has two subtypes: (a) seeing more characters than are actually present in the assumed inscription; (b) observing accurately what is written.
The three editors of the first published edition of the tablet have (ostensibly) taken a maximalist stance; drawings of each of the assumed characters have been made, accompanied by individual photographs, and a composite line-drawing of the tomographically retrieved "Inner B" text. These results seem quite plausible to my mind, and over many months of detailed analysis I have endeavoured to extract coherent meaning from them, as recorded above
Immediately after its publication, and even before, Christopher
Rollston was cautiously pessimistic, but Brian Donnelly-Lewis
expressed hostility towards the piece of
lead and its markings, as not being an inscription at all (a sad case of defeatism).
https://www.academia.edu/101971691/Final_Thoughts_on_the_Piece_of_Lead_from_Mt_Ebal_Supposed_to_be_an_Inscription
“As someone who works heavily in the field of Iron age inscriptions, and
especially with early inscriptions, I find the work to be exciting, full of
boundless possibility, giving forth new data and new insights with each
excavation year. Considering only the material from Lachish and its
surroundings in recent years, our knowledge is growing, and our focus deserves
to be elsewhere, solving the existing problems of epigraphy, improving
readings, and designing new interpretations based on newer data. I’m sure every
other epigrapher (and scholar) would agree with me here.”
Speaking for myself, I have to say that this is an
unsteady judgement, after the mess he has made (BASOR 388, 2022, 181-210)
of the Qeiyafa
ostracon and its "David and Goliath" inscription; he has not proved that he is capable of discerning letters in inscriptions, whether they are distinct or indistinct, and fails to recognize the different types of writing systems in "Early Alphabetic" documents; his "knowledge" has much "growing" to do.
More recently, in the midst of violent
warfare in the Levant, denialists published peer-reviewed articles in the Israel
Exploration Journal, and their opinions were reported in the local
newspapers.
JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH NOVEMBER 29, 2023. The
Jerusalem Post
Experts question claims that there is
writing on the lead object from Mount Ebal, and their doubts about it
cover some 21 pages in the Israel Exploration Journal.
Ariel David, New Studies Debunk Controversial
Biblical ‘Curse Tablet’ From Mt. Ebal
Haaretz
Nov 30, 2023
The lead surface displays “random scratches, striations, pitting, and
indentions,” which are consistent with the nature of lead and the processes or
erosion and weathering the artifact may have undergone over the centuries, they
add.
Thus spake Ariel, the harshest and
fiercest doom-prophet of them all. My restrained retort brands these “new
studies” as merely “opinions”; and his word “debunk” implies sarcastic ridicule,
but my reaction will be sincere satire, what I call “lampooning”, which means
shining a bright light on their criticisms and highlighting their foibles and
failings.
Speaking for myself (though my opinions are generally
judged to be ingenuously ingenious, or vice versa) I think it would be the undeniable
writing on the outside that was being damaged from that corrosion and erosion,
and the interior text was comparatively free of that weathering, and therefore
it should be examined first, if you don’t mind. Eventually, as with the Qumran Copper
Scroll, a way may be found to release the interior text to our direct gaze, or
we shall see that there is no writing at all, and it is just a blank page.
Moreover, according to the theory of
the three scholars who published the piece of lead, the recto (Outer A) has
indentations (that is, impressions, in a technical sense) made with some form
of metal stylus; the presumed and proven interior text (Inner B) lies
directly under the outer text, and was likewise created by indentation; the verso
does not have an inscription, but has bulges, which swell outwards, and they
are indications of the indented letters inside the folded manuscript (unless
they are simply the corresponding marks of the indentations on the other side, the
recto). These are the details that the in-denial critics should have
investigated in their “new studies”, with a view to falsification of the proposed
hypothesis. Maybe they did, or else someone will apply for a research grant to painstakingly
map and compare all the marks on both sides of the artefact, and then prise it
open, since the ultimate outcome of archaeology is destruction.
The academic critics
who express sceptical misgivings about the existence of any writing on the
object are (and I respect all three of them, and have had personal contact with
them through electronic media):
Amihai Mazar, who has difficulty reading his own Rehob
nscriptions, and who identifies the object as a lead fishing weight, and
perhaps he is right, but his denial of writing on it may be wrong;
Aren Maeir, who disagrees with my interpretation of the Qeiyafa
Ostracon, and whose initial attempt to read it himself was wide of the mark;
Christopher Rollston, who is unable to put the three pieces of the L-YRBB`L
inscription together, and does not recognize its neo-syllabic script, and
for whom every new inscription is a forgery or merely “putative” till he has
authenticated it; in this regard he has published a useful article on NW
Semitic forgeries; but he is
incapable of classifying
West Semitic inscriptions into their correct categories.
Here is a more positive suggestion from the
critics:
“Since any putative writing on the outside would
not need to be tomographically reconstructed, but instead, could be read with
the naked eye or the naked eye assisted by a stereo-microscope, we suggest it
would have been methodologically useful for the authors to have first ascertained
the morphology and ductus of the putative letters on the outside of this
inscription, and then to have used that knowledge of the script’s morphology
and ductus to assist in the more complex process of attempting to read any putative
letters on the inside of the lead.”
Fair enough! However, my mother used
to say to me, “Choose the most difficult task first”.
2nd December 2023. In response to this renewed onslaught, Pieter van der Veen pondered solemnly (on Facebook):
“The 40 letters are Galil's claim. At the moment I would suggest that we
have no more than 10 letters for the inside and even here most of them
are not completely certain. I find much fault with Galil's extreme
interpretation, and I always have. I unfortunately could not change much about
it, although I was one of his fiercest critics from the start leading to a
complete separation between us. I see a diagonal proto-alphabetic mem on
the inside (upper right, upper left on Galil's questionable drawing of the
inside inscription). This is perhaps the clearest letter, which I do not doubt
for a minute. But there is also a taw with terminal hooks just like at
Serabit el-Khadim. Unfortunately, it is not so clearly visible, except for on
some scans. There is also an inverted yod and if you compared it with
another upright yod on the inside and outside (!), then indeed we would be
dealing with the same form. Then we have a stick-figure on the inside as
well as on the outside, suggesting a possible proto-alphabetic he. This
already suggests one or two words containing a mem and a taw (depending on
which direction we are reading, this could perhaps read either tm or mt). In
addition, we may have a yod and a he near each, either reading yh
(from left to right) or hy (from right to left). We also have a diagonally
oriented tail-like figure with a nearly square or oval head (this icon
reappears on the in- and outside). Whether or not this icon is the letter waw,
remains uncertain, but it does resemble waw as written in proto-alphabetic
inscriptions. So, if read from left to right, we would have yhw. Which
remains a possibility, but it will need further study. As for the inside
inscription, everything else is much too speculative to go into here and even
(except for mem!) none of the characters are certain, except that mem,
"yod” and part of "he” (or whatever they might be) appear to be
visible on the verso as dents. But as there are many more dents on the outside,
this again is not certain.
“As
for the recto, we have the letter aleph in the lower left corner
(this seems clear from the best available photographs), a mem (again a
diagonal watery sign, just like the one we have on the inside) and a taw
(although we have an extra dent, which makes the reading uncertain. We also
have a stick-figure, but here it seems to be tumbling backwards, so that
it may be something else than a he (this was also our initial
interpretation before the Czech people sent us the better images). But all this
needs more study. The upright yod is again relatively obvious. If we
abstain from a speculative interpretation, it is noteworthy that we do seem to
have similar characters as on the inside (mem, taw, he and possibly a waw),
which is striking, at least this is my personal opinion. Inside these
characters on the recto we appear to have incisions, which seem to be tooling
marks. Some of the characters have raised edges, just like on other lead
inscriptions, where the lead has been pushed to the side by a sharp implement
or styles. To ignore all this, would simply not be right and therefore all this
deserves further study".
In reply to all their dubiety and negativity,
I propose the power of positive putation. Their word “putative” is not in my
private vocabulary, but as an erstwhile Latin scholar I can associate it in my
mind with puto, which means “I think”, I think (not puteo, “I
stink”), and I ponder why we do not say puto ergo sum, or the more
pungent puteo ergo sum, instead of always cogitating; so then, putative writing is “thought-to-be
writing”. Similarly, I presumed that Latin putatio would signify
“thinking”, but I thought wrong. The primary meaning of puto is “prune”,
and my neoverbum (or neologism) putation would denote only “pruning”.
So, I put on my severest “prune” face, and apply the secateurs for some drastic
amputation, in order to promote the growth of the defoliated leaden
tabletette as a genuine defixio, and its curse be on anyone who seeks to
deflower it. Being a very cautious person, I am not inclined to engage in
such a parlous parlay, which bespeaks doom.
First of all, we suddenly find ourselves facing
up to a tiny leaden “sinker” (I have known that word since my boyhood fishing
failures and their sinking feelings); it is not a document at all. I might have
applied the term “sinker” to that suggestion, but it could well be a correct
answer, though my lead sinker was rounded, not flattened. The mocker will
retort that this was no place for piscatorial practices, on top of a barren
mountain, far from the Great Green Sea, and quite distant from that inland sea
in Galilee, where Shimon Kepha (alias Petros) and his merry band of “fishers of
men” would labour with their nets all night; and even if the sky sometimes
rained schools of fish (as in the epic of Gilgamesh, and in whirlwinds),
buckets and baskets were of rigour as rigging, not nets, hooks, lines, and
sinkers. Swinging the lead refers to making up excuses, and in the present
circumstances there is no excuse for denying the possibility that the priestly
scribe saw in a fishing implement the ideal vehicle for conveying an
imprecation. The crease mark on it might be where a cord was tightened around
it, and this permitted it to be strung on one of the stones of the altar, I
ween. My mistake! Now they can hypothesize that all the indentation marks on
the soft metal of the sinker were made in collisions with the altar’s sharp
(“unhewn”) rocks, as it swayed in the breeze; but that makes it into a mechanical
distractor to shoo flies away from the animal sacrifices (after the Deluge the
Mesopotamian gods swarmed like flies over the sacrifices, we are told).
Next, after all the nihilistic haggling
over presumptions and putative thinking, Pieter has apparently started to lower
his bargaining price, so to speak; but even if the outside text (the Recto, Outer
A) only has a dozen signs (a defeatist position), this does not mean that the
concealed Inner B curse can not have three dozen miniature characters, though
in cases of sealed clay envelopes, the message on the outside was the same as
the one on the inside. For that reason, I would argue that in this case, the
Outer A inscription has the same message as the Inner B, comprising three
imprecatory sentences with a logical sequence.
On the outer recto I see in the
centre (viewing the tablet with Pieter’s large Alep in the bottom left corner)
the same LYHW as in the interior text. The other signs in the interior are
attested by the revealing rays, and the seven tables of recognizable images of
letters, which were approved by Scott, Pieter, and Gershon at the point of
publication, have been examined by myself over a long period, and I have
identified them with the numbering provided on Gershon’s Table 1 and on his
annotated drawing, and written the numbers at the appropriate positions on the
tables of ’a H W Y L R M T, by which words from the roots ‘RR (curse) and MWT
(die), and the name YHW, are represented in writing.
The skeptical reaction to this published
work is an unmerited insult to the professional integrity of the technical team
who made these extraordinary discoveries, and an insolent snub to the marvelous
skill of the ancient scribe who engraved the leaden tablet.
Is the object too small (2 cm x 2 cm)
to be a tablet? The little lice comb
is 2.5 x 3.5 cm, and its scribe found room for two dozen neosyllabic letters, with space remaining
for more.
The marks made on the leaden tablet by the putative inscriber, were intentional, but necessarily miniscule and
imperfect; he was probably myopic and could read fine print. Although its curse
was directed against a sinner, it was not written for that “accursed one” to
read; its main purpose was to establish that YHW God would bring the imprecation
into operation against the offender.
Prospect
Where do we
go from here? I have just counted (roughly) the number of marks on the exterior
of the tablet, and there are dozens of them, including two large instances of
the Halleluyah figure, one above the other (top half, centre), as detected tomographically in
the interior; and according to the sketches of Gershon and Pieter, there should
be two smaller examples (lower half); and my old brain (which started analysing the world in 1936) can construct a concomitant pair of
them on its mental slate. Gershon Galil claims to have perceived all the signs
on the outside as well as on the inside, and they are almost entirely the same. Yet Pieter
wants to backtrack their train, which has already delivered a full load of
valuable goods, pushing the bulk of them back into the wagon to be carted away to
the nearest dump. He is accepting the distinct letters, and jettisoning the indistinct ones.
Therefore, the advice given by
Christopher Rollston should be heeded: a committee should be given
access to the artefact, to examine its exterior microscopically. Today (12/12/2023)
I bought yet another book that describes the amazing intelligence of octopuses,
who solve puzzles by feeling things with their tentacles; this team should
include a blind human (as in “sightless in Gaza”, to make a topical allusion),
someone who is not afraid of lead poisoning, and who will touch and feel the
marks, and actually read them. Volunteers?
Be
warned, ye who are messing about with your archaeological digging
around the Ebal altar, though there are indications that it was desacralized in
antiquity, covered over. Remember
not to put your hand on the Ark of the Covenant or on the Altar of
Consecration, but handling the curse tablet is surely permissible and
necessary for our serious research.
I should have warned prospective readers of this lengthy
essay that it is not an easy ride or read; and it is not written with a broken
reed, but with an adamant pen and caustic ink; the metaphors could be tedious,
too.
Criticisms against the work of persons named herein come with regret
and respect. They are my "learnèd friends" in this court of
judgement, and my esteemed colleagues in this school of
"palaiogrammatology", as I have dubbed it; we are fellow-labourers in
this garden of delights, as we dig up treasured messages from people of the
past. However, I feel like Cassandra weeping over the folly of the citizens of
Ilias, as they erringly venerate their treacherous Trojan horse; in our setting
there is a parlous paradigm that could cause our downfall. Instead of weeping
and wailing like Cassandra, and sinking into deep depression, I have chosen to
play the part of Hamlet's "poor Yorick ... a fellow of infinite
jest", before my skull (created in 1936) becomes bereft of brains. as his
was after exhumation. Kindly picture my rollicking caricatures as satirical
cartoons without drawings.
In truth, there is many a true word spoken in earnest. The bruised
and broken inscriptions that have come to light are portents from the prophets
and preachers of antiquity, to warn this perverse generation of ours that the
retribution for our pollution of planet Earth is now upon us, in the form of
fire and flood. Recently I saw a rainbow in the sky of Aotearoa New Zealand,
said to be a reminder of a divine covenant (Genesis 9:11-17) promising no more
deluges to destroy life on the land; but the earthlings who have followed
Prometheus and worshiped the unclean spirit, the Lord of Fossil Fuels, whose
names are legion (King Coal, Prince Petroleum, Ignition, Incendiary, Combustion,
Conflagration) have nullified that
compact. There is a passage in Christian Scripture, where the Flood is
recalled, and destruction by fervent heat and fire is foreshadowed; I have
never heard it read aloud in church, but it is written (2 Peter 3:1-13).
The origin of the alphabet
must not be our chief concern, when the world is being consumed by wildfires, and
engulfed in floods, largely caused by human pollution of air, land and sea, and constantly fueled by widespread warfare. Civil civilization on a peaceful planet must prevail.
