Eleven Non-Royal Jeremianic Figures Strongly Identified in Authentic, Contemporaneous Inscriptions

Using established criteria, this article identifies nine persons mentioned in the book of Jeremiah and two high priests in 1 Chronicles, all of whom were contemporaries of Jeremiah. These persons are identified with virtual certainty in inscriptions of known authenticity contemporaneous with that prophet. Some these inscriptions came to light as recently as 2005 and 2008. Authentic bullae from excavations in the City of David refer to several Hebrew people named in the Bible. These are: Gemaryahu the king’s minister and his father Shaphan the scribe, Yehukal the king’s minister and his father Shelemyahu, Gedalyahu the king’s minister and his father Pashḥur, and two high priests: Azaryahu and his father Ḥilqiyahu. A well-known neo-Babylonian cuneiform tablet lists two courtiers of Nebuchadnezzar II who are also mentioned by name and title in the book of Jeremiah: Nergal-sharezer the samgar official and Nebuzaradan the rab-ṭabāḥîm (variously translated as “captain of the guard” and “chief cook”). Nebuzaradan oversaw the exile to Babylonia. Finally, a recently-translated neo-Babylonian clay tablet records a temple offering made by a third official of Nebuchadnezzar II, Nebo-sarsekim the rab-saris, to whom the book of Jeremiah also refers by name and title. “If the authors of the book of Jeremiah had not intended to produce such historically accurate work as they did, these precise identifications would be inexplicable” (p. 61*). Identifications of officials reach a level of detail that has even greater credibility than identifications of the five kings in the book of Jeremiah also named in ancient inscriptions

53 People in the [Hebrew] Bible Confirmed Archaeologically

This is a list, with end-note documentation, of 53 people in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament who are strongly identified in published inscriptions of known authenticity, in most instances from during or quite close to their lifetimes. It includes people from ancient Egypt, Moab, Aram-Damascus, the northern kingdom of Israel, the southern kingdom of Judah, Assyria, Babylonia, and Persia. The intent is to include only well-grounded, strong identifications that can be trusted. Mykytiuk\u27s publications firmly reject the haphazard, flying by the seat of the pants approach of numerous online lists which are created without explicit criteria or by suspect use of ad hoc criteria, all of which easily produce results that are desired but often questionable at best, or in some instances based on forgeries, rather than winnowed by rigorous critique. The list is the result of applying the protocols and identification criteria established in Mykytiuk’s published dissertation, Identifying Biblical Persons in Northwest Semitic Inscriptions of 1200‒539 B.C.E. (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2004), as amended by his article, “Corrections and Updates to [that title],” Maarav 16.1 (2009): 49–132. The identification protocols, criteria, and some early results are summarized and further updated in his book chapter, Sixteen Strong Identifications of Biblical Persons (Plus Nine Other Identifications) in Authentic Northwest Semitic Inscriptions from before 539 B.C.E., in Meir Lubetski and Edith Lubetski, eds., New Inscriptions and Seals Relating to the Biblical World (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 35-58.

Archival Literacy Competencies for Undergraduate History Majors

Undergraduate history majors need to know how to conduct archival research. This paper describes the second phase of a project to identify “archival literacy” competencies. Faculty, archivists, and librarians from baccalaureate, masters, and doctoral/research institutions commented on a draft list. This resulted in competencies in six major categories: accurately conceive of primary sources; locate primary sources; use a research question, evidence, and argumentation to advance a thesis; obtain guidance from archivists; demonstrate acculturation to archives; and follow publication protocols. Collaborations of archivists, faculty, and librarians can integrate the competencies throughout undergraduate history curricula in their institutions

Spanning Boundaries to Identify Archival Literacy Competencies

This paper is a report of a collaborative research project that identified the competencies undergraduate history majors should have related to finding and using archival materials. The boundary-spanning collaboration involved archivists, librarians, and history faculty. Historians have long relied upon archives as essential source material, and recent studies confirmed the continued significance of archives to research in this field. However, there is no detailed listing of the archival research competencies that college history students should attain. Without a clearly defined list upon which history faculty, archivists, and library liaisons to history departments agree, teaching about archives research is difficult and often either inconsistent or non-existent. The purpose of this study was to develop a list of archival research, or “archival literacy,” competencies that could be incorporated into the undergraduate history curriculum by history faculty, librarians, and archivists. The mixed-methods study was conducted in two phases. Phase 1 took place in 2012-13 at one large public research university. It consisted of a review of the literature, compilation of a first draft of archival literacy competencies, review of course syllabi, in-depth interviews with history department faculty, and comments from those faculty and recent graduates on a second draft of archival competencies for history students. The study population in Phase 2 expanded to the history department faculty, archivists, and history liaison librarians (or equivalents) at a stratified random sample of U.S. baccalaureate, masters, and doctoral/research institutions. This involved the viewpoints of different stakeholders at different types of institutions. The report on Phase 1 of this study will be published in American Archivist in November 2014. The data for Phase 2 of this study were collected from February through April 2014. The report on Phase 2 that includes the final list of archival literacy competencies has been submitted to a journal

Strengthening Biblical Historicity vis-a`-vis Minimalism, 1992–2008 and Beyond. Part 2.3: Some Commonalities in Approaches to Writing Ancient Israel’s History

This series of articles covers scholarly works in English which can, at least potentially, be associated with a generally positive view of biblical historicity regarding periods preceding the Israelites’ return from exile. Part 2 covers works that treat the methodological issues at the center of the maximalist–minimalist debate. Parts 2.1 and 2.2 selectively survey the works of 24 non-minimalist scholars during two decades. In the absence of consensus, this article analyzes the works in Parts 2.1 and 2.2, tracing elements of approach that are held in common, at least among pluralities of non-minimalists (possible majorities are not noted). The first commonality of approach is that history is provisional, not final. The second is that history should become fully multidisciplinary. The third commonality is that historians should receive all historical evidence on an equal footing before examination and cross-examination. The fourth and last is that historians should become increasingly sensitive to cultural aspects and coding in ancient Near Eastern materials

Sixteen Strong Identifications of Biblical Persons (Plus Nine Other IDs) in Authentic Northwest Semitic Inscriptions from before 539 B.C.E.

This revised conference paper presents the strongest results of the author\u27s published dissertation as corrected and updated in a journal article published in 2010 and as updated using a 2011 essay. In Northwest Semitic inscriptions which are known to be authentic, using sound protocols, one can identify with certainty at least ten persons from before the Persian era who are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. Another six such persons can be identified with virtual certainty, for a total of sixteen strong identifications (IDs). Five other authentic inscriptions offer an additional seven IDs which, while not quite certain, are at least reasonable IDs and can be used as hypotheses. A provenanced wall inscription offers two other IDs whose historical value is unclear. Inscriptions in other languages and of other time periods increase the number of IDs of persons in the Hebrew Bible

Corrections and Updates to Identifying Biblical Persons in Northwest Semitic Inscriptions of 1200-539 B.C.E.

This article does two things. First, it corrects things in the book, Identifying Biblical Persons in Northwest Semitic Inscriptions of 1200-539 B.C.E. (2004), abbreviated IBP below: • Regarding potential forgeries, the article applies the principles for treatment of unprovenanced inscriptions set forth in Christopher A. Rollston, “Non-Provenanced Epigraphs II: The Status of Non-Provenanced Epigraphs within the Broader Corpus of Northwest Semitic,” Maarav 11 (2004): 71–76. • It disqualifies proposed IDs in eight (8) inscriptions that are forgeries or probable forgeries, notably including the two bullae frequently attributed to the biblical Baruch. Second, it evaluates 32 proposed identifications (IDs) of biblical persons in inscriptions of 1200-539 B.C.E. Doing this updates the book, IBP, from its original coverage through mid-2002, to July 31, 2008. In order to evaluate these proposed IDs, it uses the protocols set forth in the book, IBP, pp. 9-89. Resulting IDs and non-IDs appear in six categories of strength or weakness, from unmistakable to disqualified. • Constructively, it makes eleven strong, reasonable, or possible IDs of biblical persons in provenanced Northwest Semitic inscriptions and two reasonable IDs in inscriptions written in other languages (one in Egyptian hieroglyphics and one in Babylonian Akkadian). • It gives page-by-page corrections to the book, IBP, if they affect IDs. These corrections end with a summary of the results of the book as corrected by this article on pp. 125-126. A summary and an index only of the results in the article appear on pp. 126-132

Strengthening Biblical Historicity vis-à-vis Minimalism, 1992-2008, Part 1: Introducing a Bibliographic Essay in Five Parts

This is the first in a series of five articles which cover one aspect of a debate in biblical and ancient Near Eastern studies. In question is the historical reliability of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). Historical/biblical minimalism, the side in the debate which finds the Hebrew Bible almost completely unreliable as a source for history, has already received substantial bibliographic treatment. Therefore, this series attempts to provide balance by covering the literature in support of historical reliability. These articles focus not on modern histories of ancient Israel, but rather, publications related to the historicity of the non-miraculous assertions and references in the biblical text. Because of the nature of the debate, the series treats works in English from 1992 through 2008 on the historicity of the biblical content regarding the periods preceding the return from exile (itself disputed) soon after 539 B.C.E. Some relevant articles from 2009 and later are treated in notes. The other articles are tentatively titled: Part 2, the literature of critique, methodology, and perspective; Part 3, the literature on the Hebrew Bible as a whole that supports historicity with external evidences; Part 4, the literature that supports historicity within particular periods with external evidences, and Part 5, the literature on internal evidences in the Hebrew Bible

Liberal Arts Books on Demand: A Decade of Patron-Initiated Collection Development, Part 1

The Purdue University Libraries was an early implementer of purchasing rather than borrowing books requested through interlibrary loan. This pioneering user-initiated acquisitions program, started in January 2000 and called Books on Demand, is managed by the interlibrary loan unit. Now that the program has reached its tenth year, the authors revisit their initial 2002 study to analyze books purchased in the six top subject areas across the whole decade. Subject librarians in their review of the liberal arts titles selected found that the books were appropriate additions and that these titles expanded the cross-disciplinary nature of the collection. The Books on Demand service offers a seamless method for all users, especially graduate students, to provide input into the collection building process