Travels

Two Recent Archives Visits

Strangely enough, even though biblical studies as a discipline revolves around primary sources, not a lot of those involved in research actually have a reason to view a physical ancient manuscript. It’s a digital age. Even in my own work with Hellenistic papyri and inscriptions almost everything I need to look at is digitized. Occasionally I will view a published edition, but even a lot of that is online as well (e.g., SEG).

That is why I always relish the opportunity to actually see some physical stuff in a library somewhere. I have posted a few times in the recent past about a few visits I’ve made to the University of Cambridge library, where I took some time to view some of the correspondence of revered Septuagint scholar H. B. Swete (e.g. here and here. NB I hope to post more from the troves of what I found there in due course).

But recently I had the chance to make two archival visits to view some items that were actually old. One pretty old and another really old. It was great fun so I thought I’d explain these visits. (more…)

A Follow-Up to the 2016 LLX.D Conference in Wuppertal

About two weeks ago I returned from Wuppertal, Germany, where I participated in the 6th International Conference for the Septuaginta Deutsch research project.
You can read my preliminary post about this here. I thought I’d write up some follow-up thoughts about the event.

The Kirchliche Hochschule is a beautiful institution, located on a serene hilltop just a short walk from the city center. All told there were about fifty people at the conference, and from all around the world. In fact, it is no exaggeration to say that I was the only American there. I arrived after a very long journey from California (~20hrs) on Wednesday evening, and spent the next 24 hours recuperating from the time change (with some help from the local pilsner and generous portions of bratwurst). The conference began on Thursday afternoon with four keynote lectures (three of which were in German, naturally).

20160721_083456683_iOSDuring the course of the next two days the lectures split into three simultaneous sessions of two papers apiece. What was really nice about this conference was the pace of it all. Between each paper there was a fifteen minute break, and between each session there was either a coffee break or lunch. The benefit was to allow for conversation about the papers, exchanging ideas, and, of course, fueling up on caffeine.

Another great aspect of this conference was its excellent organization. Room and board were all included and all on site, which made it significantly less stressful because you didn’t have to worry about navigating a new place and foraging for food. The meals were another opportunity to mingle with scholars from all over the world and converse in some language or another about your work.

One particular highlight was the after-dinner time spent sitting outside until the wee hours of the morning. This was yet another opportunity to meet new people and benefit from their conversation. wuppertal 1Not only that, but evidently it is a long-held tradition at this conference to sing. A few people bring their guitars and eventually a small crowd accumulates to belt out whatever songs come to mind (I heard everything from Bob Dylan to Russian folk songs to the Beetles).

Below is a photograph of all the attendees at the conference, which as you can tell is a pleasantly modest number:

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Book Highlights

Another interesting part of the conference was the join book announcements. The two main features were the recently published Septuagint handbooks, the T&T Clark Companion to the Septuagint (2015) and the Handbuch der Septuaginta: Einleitung in die Septuaginta (2016). Edited by James K. Aitken and Siegfried Kreuzer, respectively, each scholar took some time to speak about these resources and highlight how they each fill a major gap in the current reference literature in the field.

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My Presentation on Koine Greek

20160723_165242000_iOSOf course, I also presented my work. Overall I would say it went well. The audience seemed to receive it fairly, and offered a good range of questions to help refine my thinking.

I am very glad to have gotten the opportunity to participate in this conference, and I am grateful to the organizers for hosting it. In due course there will also be a volume containing the proceedings, so be on the lookout for that as well.

The 6th International Conference on the Septuagint in Wuppertal

Old Testament scholarship is pretty obscure stuff for most people on the street. But mention the word “Septuagint” and you’ll usually get even more muddled looks and occasionally a “God bless you” in puzzled response. Well, things don’t get any better from there as you get into sub-fields of this sub-discipline. 

Even within the small, fascinating world of Septuagint scholarship, the biannual Tagung held Wuppertal, Germany, is not terribly well known. Certainly not among casual “septuagintal hobbyists.” That is not to say that it isn’t very influential. To the contrary, in fact, this conference is one of the most important “think-tank” events in the discipline. Every two years it takes place at the Kirchliche Hochschule and attracts specialists in Septuagint scholarship from around the globe. The connection to that institution is the highly regarded Dr. Seigfreid Kreuzer, emeritus professor at the Hochschule and also (among other things) current editor-in-chief of the discipline’s own Journal of Septuagint and Cognate Studies.

The 6th LXX.D Conference

Although the page is sadly out of date, you can read (in German) about some of the previous Tagungen that have been part of the outrageously productive Septuaginta Deutsch research project over the years. I have written previously about their Septuaginta­übersetzung (LXX.D, 2 volumes), which is also accompanied by their commentary volume (LXX.E). I’ve also mentioned the ongoing Handbuch project (LXX.H), which is slated to be a massive eight volumes – Volume 1, edited by Dr. Kreuzer, is already available.

In addition to this (quite literally) voluminous output from scholars associated with this research initiative, there has also been a steady flow of edited volumes containing the essays presented at each LXX.D biannual conference in Wuppertal. Thus far, these have been published by Mohr Siebeck, and can be obtained for somewhere between €140-215 if you have extra pocket change.

Die Septuaginta – Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten (2006)
Die Septuaginta – Texte, Theologien, Einflüsse (2008)
Die Septuaginta – Entstehung, Sprache, Geschichte (2010)
Die Septuaginta – Text, Wirkung, Rezeption (2012)
Die Septuaginta – Orte und Intentionen (2014)

This year is the 6th international conference to be held in Wuppertal, from 21-24 July. This year’s theme and, presumably, the subsequent volume’s title is:

Die Septuaginta. Geschichte – Wirkung – Relevanz
(The Septuagint: History – Impact/Effect – Relevance)

My Contribution

I was pleased to get the opportunity to participate in this year’s conference.
When something like this comes along in the life of a young scholar, you scrape every penny of funding together that you can to make it happen. And make sure your wife is okay with it. Oh, and double check that you also have something worthwhile to say.

Thankfully, I have managed to coordinate all three (I love you, Kelli). I think the “have something worthwhile to say” criteria will be put to the test at the actual conference, but at least in theory my paper should fit in quite nicely with this year’s theme.

My abstract is as follows:

Title: “The Septuagint as Catalyst for Language Change in the Koine: A Usage-Based Approach”

Ever since Deissmann, scholars of Greek have increasingly recognized that the Septuagint embodies a corpus of language rightly categorized as the non-literary Koine of its time. Even now, current research efforts that take account of the documentary evidence continue to improve our understanding of Koine Greek per se, and precisely how the Septuagint fits within it. However, it is important also to evaluate how the Septuagint does not only embody the new linguistic features of Koine Greek, but also prompted and proliferated them. This paper adopts a linguistic perspective that recognizes how language as a system changes in response to the new uses to which it is put. The first section of this paper overviews the usage-based linguistic approach, focusing on the theory of language change put forward by William Croft (2000). In a second section, this theory is applied to a conventional Greek grammatical construction that was significantly propagated in the Septuagint, and which therefore became more entrenched in the language in general. The concluding section gives general comments on the social mechanisms of the translation of the Septuagint that made it a catalyst for language change

This paper comes partly out of previous research I had done for my dissertation. The grammatical construction I refer to in the abstract is what I call the “meeting construction” in the paper, which can be represented:

[Verb] + εἰς + [‘Meeting’ Noun] + [Modifier]

I had noticed some interesting trends in the use of this phrase in LXX-Judges, so this paper explores the construction in broader Greek sources, both biblical and nonbiblical. Much of the reading I have been doing in the past eight months or so is more methodology-oriented. My topic is primarily lexical semantics, so I have been digging more deeply into theoretical approaches to this area that could benefit my work (and Septuagint scholarship more generally, I hope).

If you’re interested in the paper in its draft form, let me know.