Once again on the unique incantation bowl BM 135563.

• Author: Kwasman, Theodore
• Position: Critical essay

Eastern Aramaic dialects in Late Antiquity are an intriguing but complicated area of research. One particular area of interest that provides new insights and information on the character of Eastern Aramaic is that of incantation bowls. New texts have continuously been published in recent years, expanding this resource considerably. Many editions of bowls, however, are old and outdated, and are in need of re-editing or at least collation. Thus there is a parallel need in Aramaic Studies to edit and publish new bowl texts on the one hand and to re-edit and collate older editions on the other. (1)

First editions of texts are not an easy undertaking. An accurate transliteration is a prerequisite for any edition, in addition to notes or comments on unusual features. A translation is required in order that the reader better understands the text and, depending on the type of text, further analytical comments may be added.

In 2000, the present authors published an unusual incantation bowl (BM 135563). (2) Almost simultaneously, J. B. Segal in his catalogue independently edited the same text. (3) Our text edition differed from Segal's not only in the readings but also in emphasizing the unique linguistic character of the bowl text, which was composed in Babylonian Talmudic Aramaic (BTA), and in pointing out a Mandaic forerunner, parallels, and Akkadian motifs.

In 2004, M. Morgenstern published an article entitled "Notes on a Recently Published Magic Bowl," (4) which is actually a revised version of our text edition. In our view, however, these "notes" have not improved upon the text sufficiently to justify a new edition. The few suggestions made by Morgenstern do not change the general understanding or judgment as to the character of the text. And Morgenstern's assertion that he would show that "the bowl presents a text that is more cogent and better structured than either of the existing editions suggest" (5) is not substantiated. Instead, superficial divisions of certain sections of the Aramaic text are introduced. These designated sections are not even indicated in his translation. Moreover, the divisions are neither explained nor the sections analyzed, and thus the reader is left in a quandary as to why sections F, F', and FF" are parallel. If Morgenstern's interpretation of the verbal forms is followed, sections F and F' cannot be parallel, since section F has asyndetic imperatives and F' perfect forms. The parallelism is only maintained when the verb forms are read as imperfect in F and F' as in our edition. F" is not parallel with F and F' at all. (6)

In regard to the present authors' edition it was never our intention to present a literary analysis of the text, since this would have required more comparative material and would have deviated from the focus of the article, which concerns the dialect of the text. Instead of showing that the bowl is more cogent and better structured than either existing edition, in many instances Morgenstern offers confused and unclear comments, in addition to misquoting and misrepresenting the authors.

His treatment has ignored three important aspects of the text: 1) the nature of the language is not addressed at all, but instead the reader is referred to a future article on linguistic variation, (7) 2) the "Sitz im Leben" of the incantation is not taken into consideration; and 3) Mandaic features, including parallels, and Akkadian motifs have been ignored.

TERMINOLOGICAL PROBLEMS

Before discussing the text further, we would like to make some remarks on scholarly terminology. Although many technical terms have changed or have been replaced by new linguistic terminology over the last decades, some basic terms remain universal. Morgenstern has employed in his publications a number of terms that do not correspond to conventional usage.

Morgenstern is apparently unfamiliar with the distinction between "transliteration" and "transcription." (8) A transliteration is a means of rendering letters of a text into another script on a one-to-one basis. This may be either a transliteration into Latin, Hebrew, or any other conventional script (IPA). A transcription interprets the text according to grammatical rules, i.e., adding the speech sounds of the foreign text. (9) The present authors published their text version in a Latin transliteration and Morgenstern in a Hebrew transliteration. Morgenstern states in his article: "Both MKK and Segal present their transcriptions in transliteration. I have rendered their versions into the Hebrew script, which naturally involves the employment of final letters which their transcriptions do not distinguish." (10) Firstly, our text is a transliteration and not a transcription. Secondly, the transliteration system is not our own but the standard employed for all Semitic languages in the academic world. (11) All transliteration systems have minor faults, including that of Hebrew, which cannot represent double consonants. And it should be noted that Morgenstern has not rendered our "versions" into Hebrew script but has made an independent transliteration of the text.

Morgenstern is also unsure about the grammatical terms "declined" and "conjugated." The words are not synonyms, but are clearly distinguished in grammatical usage. A noun, an adjective, and a pronoun can be declined, especially in inflected languages where cases are productive, e.g., Latin, German, Russian, and Arabic. Only verbs can be conjugated. Morgenstern uses "declined" in connection with verbs. (12) In his review of Segal's publication of BM bowls (p. 122) he states "This root is effectively quadriliteral and declines like pa"el, which takes the prefix /ni-/, e.g., b. Yoma 2a."

Morgenstern consistently uses the term "material" in place of "graphic." (13) This usage is naturally incorrect, since the two words are not interchangeable. Standard terms should always be employed in describing orthographic features.

When a phoneme is dropped in final position one speaks of "apocope" and not of "elision." The latter indicates the dropping of a vowel or syllable in medial position, and is not a synonym for apocope. (14)

The terms "pseudo-historical" and "non-historical" are incorrectly used. What Morgenstern means in these cases is "etymological." (15) He also employs the term "epigraphy" for "palaeography" in reference to ink writing on clay bowls. (16)

METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH

Morgenstern presents an apparatus, listing readings of the previous editions and discusses those that he considers preferable. This is often done subjectively without any substantial evidence and contributes little towards improving the text. (17) The observation that the present authors made "many textual emendations" (p. 208) is misleading. Text parallels clearly show that the emendations made in our original publication are justified. The Mandaic forerunner demonstrates that the BTA version is defective and has been miscopied in several instances. Since there does not yet exist a complete Mandaic parallel, it is conceivable that the BTA incantation formulas have been compiled from various stock phrases translated from Mandaic or another standard Aramaic source into BTA. (18) At this point the Mandaic parallel offers a more reliable text version. It may be assumed that the BTA text is dependent on the Mandaic or a similar Aramaic text version such as a non-standard text. Magic formularies are often built upon common expressions that may become incoherent when adapted into other Aramaic dialects, and consequently lead to scribal errors. This is an important issue for the understanding of such texts. The narrative in the present bowl, however, is not as coherent throughout the text as Morgenstern claims. (19) That the text is not derived from one source may be deduced from the fact that the ritual in I. 11 occurs in two unrelated texts (BM 91776 and ZRL 48). Magic texts are often compilations composed of borrowed phrases (e.g., demon lists) and embedded sections. The present authors agree that textual corrections should be only employed cautiously and when there are compelling grounds.

The bowl contains a "specimen" text, which is an incantation type that has its forerunners in Akkadian models. The present BTA text, however, despite its difficulties and corrupted spellings, is thus a model of an Aramaic incantation type text that developed in Babylonia...