RT Article
T1 Two Models for Pollution, Part A, From Leviticus to Late Second Temple Literature
JF Jewish studies quarterly
VO 30
IS 2
SP 109
OP 137
A1 Meshel, Naphtali S.
A1 Mali, Hillel
A2 Mali, Hillel
LA English
YR 2023
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1851472355
AB Ancient Israelite and early Jewish texts on ritual purity vacillate between two incompatible conceptual models of pollution. According to the »disease« model, which is non-hierarchic, pollutions from diverse sources differ from one another qualitatively; according to the »temperature« model, pollutions are conceived as differing in degree. While no single text adheres to an unadulterated version of either model, this study demonstrates the explanatory power of a Two Model Theory for understanding biblical and early Jewish literature on pollution. Within Pentateuchal law, pollutions from different sources are nowhere hierarchized. This conception, which follows the disease model, was replaced in several late Second Temple texts by an alternative conception, wherein pollutions are mapped onto a hierarchy. A study of 4Q274 (4QTohorot A) and other late Second Temple texts demonstrates how this theoretical shift was achieved, how »severity« was invented and how the necessary terminology for the temperature model was »unearthed« from within Leviticus.
K1 4Q274
K1 Hierarchy
K1 Kelim
K1 Pollution
K1 Purity
K1 Qumran
K1 Ritual
DO 10.1628/jsq-2023-0008