An Aramaic Amulet for Winning a Case in a Court of Law

An unusually long text of a Jewish-Aramaic amulet of the sixth or seventh century, inscribed on a sheet of gold, is the topic of this paper. Its language is close to Jewish Palestinian Aramaic and to the late Targums. Its vocabulary consists of a number of rare words and some peculiar spellings. It...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Jewish studies quarterly
Authors: Shaked, Shaul 1933-2021 (Author) ; Elitzur-Leiman, Rivka (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Mohr Siebeck [2019]
In: Jewish studies quarterly
Further subjects:B Palestinian Aramaic
B Litigation
B solar deity
B magic recipe
B Jewish-Aramaic amulet
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Description
Summary:An unusually long text of a Jewish-Aramaic amulet of the sixth or seventh century, inscribed on a sheet of gold, is the topic of this paper. Its language is close to Jewish Palestinian Aramaic and to the late Targums. Its vocabulary consists of a number of rare words and some peculiar spellings. It is copied with some errors (e. g., mistaking the letters dalet and resh) from a book of magic recipes, and includes the title that accompanied the text, »For all authorities,« and some instruction for its use. The goal of the spell is to reach a successful issue in litigation. The text reflects some typical Jewish notions and expressions, but it also refers to Shamash (or Shamish), a solar deity, and employs divine attributes that are rarely if ever employed in Jewish texts. Such oddities may be explained by its provenance in the Balkan area.
ISSN:1868-6788
Contains:Enthalten in: Jewish studies quarterly
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1628/jsq-2019-0002